>> “You’d better sit down.”

Yeah. He’d better. Rupert slumped down into the chair, without a frown or a snarky comment in sight. So help him, though, he moved the scotch to his side of the table. And even though there wasn’t any competition on, that didn’t stop him for matching Tarin swallow for swallow. An ex-cop wasn’t going to be out drunk by a spirit medium.

>> “You took her to church every week. And you were mad when we took her out of town and she couldn’t go. You said she would have started asking questions when she got older…but she’d already asked me if the Holy Ghost was the same as the spirits I could see.”

A small smile quirked at the corner of Rupert’s mouth; it was easily obscured by the edge of a teacup. “Mad? You kidnapped the girl to... where? Texas? She came back with a cowboy hat, and hadn’t memorized her bible verses for the week.”

Lee was pacing, Rupert realized tearing his gaze away from the warm scotch. Lee was pacing, and there were only two chairs at this table. He gave a start, and put a hand on the back of his chair to rise. But, to repeat: Lee was pacing, with all due emphasis. “Do you want to sit?” He offered, not at all sure she did. A moment later, though, Lee had found the counter.

>> "But if it's not just a dream of yours I walked into. How come I can't actually remember any of it? And why, if I can't remember, do I keep having these moments of almost panic because I don't know where she is?"

Rupert poured for himself again, and off-handedly offered to pour for Tarin with a gesture of the bottle towards the man’s own teacup.

“Damned if I know,” he answered, his own voice low as he stared down into his cup. “I thought it was just my dream.” He hadn’t counted on the two muties sharing in it. He hadn’t counted on that extra weight their confirmations gave it. As if it needed any extra weight. He’d already cooked the damn pie, and apologized. What more did Alice want from him?

“Kidnapped her? We took her to see her grandmother.” Tarin said with slight incredulity at Rupert’s tone. Was that a smile Tarin saw creeping around the edge of that teacup? “And of course she came back with a cowboy hat, would a brutal sunburn have been preferable?” Tarin laughed and almost cast a look around the shop for his little girl. She wasn’t there. That hurt.

It wasn’t until Rupert offered Lee his seat that Tarin realized that there were still only two chairs around the table. Lee was pacing though, and if Tarin had to put money down, he’d say that she was going to stay that way. With as little as she remembered about Alice and the dream, she had to be troubled by just how detailed this conversation was getting.

Rupert poured more Scotch…man it was disappearing fast, but he offered Tarin some too and somehow that made it okay. The dark liquid splashed into the glass and Tarin drank, slightly slower than before, but fast enough to make reasonable progress. His lips were getting a little numb, could the liquor be having an effect that fast? Tarin didn’t know, but he had drank 3 cups full in however long it had taken them to get to this point in the conversation. It made all of this easier to swallow though.

Lee made a good point when she sat on the counter, and Tarin stared at her legs over the rim of his cup as Rupert replied, nodding sagely. “We just thought that Lee was dream walking…it’s happened a couple times before…and it explained why she didn’t remember as much as I did.”

Tarin was quiet then for a few moments, leaning back in his chair and staring into his glass, “I don’t think it was a dream at all though…I think it was some kind of real, somehow.” He took another drink and frowned, “I wish she was real…but we were living at the mansion.” Tarin shook his head, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Rupert was commenting about how they had kidnapped Alice to Texas and brought her back wearing a cowboy hat. To which Tarin replied incredulously, because all they had done was taken her to see her grandmother.

Lee was frowning as she paced. These two men seemed to remember so much, as if it were all real. How could they both not only remember Alice, but remember so many details? It had just been a dream. Right.

Lee was just stepping to the counter, her hands on either side of her hips to help her hop up, when she heard Rupert's voice.

Yeah...that first little jump up onto the counter didn't work so well...Lee just stared at Rupert in shock for a moment. She had heard him properly, right? Had he just asked her if she wanted a seat? His hand was on the back of the chair still as if he were about to get up.

Ok, this was a little too weird, Rupert actually offering something to make her more comfortable. Without even thinking about it, Lee hopped again, this time more successfully, and was sitting on the counter as she looked across at Rupert.

"No, I'm ok," Lee replied, though she felt a little awkward doing it. "Thanks, though."

As she sat, Lee placed her hands on either side of the counter beside her legs, leaning on them slightly. And as the men talked, her eyes slowly dropped down to the floor until she was studiously examining the wood grains after Tarin said he wished Alice were real.

It always came back to that, didn't it, Tarin wanting to have kids. Even though Lee had mentioned that this dream, or whatever it was, about Alice might have been to show her that she could have kids, it didn't mean she was ready to try any time soon. It would still take time to get her prepared for something like that.

"If it wasn't a dream, what was it, though?" Lee asked quietly, her eyes still on the floor and a small line between her brows. "It felt like a dream. And how come we all seem to remember Alice, well, you two remember her and I have these feelings?"

There was something darkly amusing in that missed jump of Lee’s. What? Of course he was going to offer his seat to her. She might be a mutant, but she was still a woman. If her husband over there couldn’t be bothered to move his rear, then it was Rupert’s duty to at least ask.

>> “We just thought that Lee was dream walking…it’s happened a couple times before…and it explained why she didn’t remember as much as I did.”

“Dream walk—?” Rupert shook his head, going back for the bottle. “Forget it. I’d be happier not knowing.” A hell of a lot happier. Too bad he’d learned that lesson a little late. How would life be different if he didn’t know Tarin and Lee were mutants?

How would things be if Raina had damn well told him up front that she was?

>> “I don’t think it was a dream at all though…I think it was some kind of real, somehow. I wish she was real…but we were living at the mansion.”

“If it wasn’t a dream, then what was it?” Rupert asked. The scotch was getting alarmingly light. There was one drink left in there, tops. “Some freak getting in all our heads? What the hell would it want with me?”

He glanced across the table at Tarin’s teacup. Then, with a slightly vindictive air, he poured the last of the scotch into his own cup. And shook the bottle for those last few drops. He was starting to feel a bit blurry around the edges, but that did not revoke his right to out drink the Medium in the man’s own shop.

Tarin was learning. Tarin was learning as he and Rupert were sitting across from each other in the back of the shop. The fact that Rupert had come to the shop to apologize didn’t mean that his overall opinion of mutants had changed. That much was obvious when he requested an end to the explanation of Lee’s dream walking before Tarin could get it halfway out of his mouth. The medium stopped talking, regarded the other man, and simply took another drink of scotch. What else was there to do?

If it wasn’t a dream, what was it? Frankly, Tarin didn’t know. It was something. Some kind of freak inside of their heads? Tarin shrugged his shoulders, “I can’t think of any reason that one would be in my head, or Lee’s for that matter. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Rupert emptied the bottle into his glass and…empty?! That was alarming, they’d just started talking. Tarin grunted in slight frustration at the empty state of the bottle and rose from the table, even more surprised that his legs felt just a little bit wobbly. Then it was over to the cabinet. There was one more bottle of scotch left. Thank god. For a moment, Tarin had thought it was all gone.

Back to the table Tarin moved, unscrewing the top of the scotch bottle as he walked and plopping back down into his chair with little to no preamble and filling his cup again. “Maybe it was a sun spot or something. One of those interdimensional things? All I know is that when three people have the same exact dream…” Tarin paused at that, there had been other people in his dream.

“What about your wife…” Tarin said, screwing up his face in thought at what seemed like a half-memory. “Didn’t she have red hair? Does she remember?”

What was with all the Scotch, Lee wondered as she watched Rupert empty the last of the bottle into his tea cup. Sure, it hadn't been a full bottle, but they'd finished the whole thing in short order.

And, Tarin was getting up, slightly shakily, and going to the cupboard to get another bottle. Wait, he had a whole other bottle here? "Don't you guys think you've had enough?" Lee asked softly as she watched her husband make his way back to the table and pour himself yet another glass.

Apparently they hadn't, though, since Tarin took a sip of said Scotch. And then started talking about sun spots and stuff. Yeah, Lee wasn't any good with this bit of conversation either. She knew science fiction, and old science fiction at that, not real science. Her last bit of science she had taken had been grade 12 Physics by correspondence, and that had been years earlier.

Then Tarin asked Rupert a question that made Lee blink in surprise. Well, more surprise than she already felt over what was going on here. And the fact that Rupert had been Alice's Godfather.

"You were actually married?" She asked, then realized how rude that probably had sounded. "Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. I don't actually remember any of this."

Rupert grunted noncommittally at the Medium’s hypothesizing, taking a long, wonderful swallow. Scotch. Scotch, with another bottle already on the table. This was the kindness of the world, right here.

>> “What about your wife…Didn’t she have red hair? Does she remember?

Choke. Cough. Repeat. Rupert set his cup down.

>> "You were actually married? Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. I don't actually remember any of this."

“Don’t worry. It surprised the hell out of me, too.” He glared down at his teacup, wondering how it was empty again. Hadn’t he just filled it? And filled it? And—how many drinks was he on? He’d been trying to match Tarin, and maybe one-up him. Strict counting was for men who weren’t walking home. He didn’t even have a pie to carry, on the way back—he could stumble all he wanted. New York’s finest: ex-cop, and ex-sober.

...What was the question, again? Something about his wi—

“I haven’t asked her yet,” he said, and reached for the bottle. Those two actions were part of the same answer.

“Enough?” Tarin said in response to Lee’s query as to whether or not he and Rupert had drank enough of the scotch. An eyebrow raised, and he looked at his own, still half-full glass. Half-full because Tarin Brooks was an optimist. Tarin looked at his wife and shook his head, “Definitely not.” The words weren’t quite incredulous, but they were talking about a dream that they’d all had where Rupert was the Godfather of their daughter. They all remembered the same details…they all remembered the same feelings…”We definitely haven’t had enough yet.” The words may or may not have been just slightly slurred at the end, but it didn’t matter.

Tarin had to laugh at Lee’s response to the fact that Rupert had been married in the future, and it seemed like Rupert was every bit as surprised as Lee. Tarin couldn’t say he blamed the man. Rupert wasn’t married now, and it must have come as quite a shock to find himself in that situation in the dream. He hadn’t asked her about it…that meant he actually knew the woman. Wow, that was going to be an awkward conversation to say the least.

“Maybe you should do that…” Tarin said, taking another drink of scotch, “Maybe that’s part of the reason for the dream…maybe you’re supposed to go and talk about it…then she’ll realize you’re soul-mates or something.” The medium nodded sagely, “It’s one of those cosmic things.”

Tarin leaned forward in his chair, propping his forearms on the table, face sobering a little. “So why the apology? What’s changed?” Tarin hadn’t asked, but felt like he needed to ask, “Surely you’ve had plenty of dreams…they didn’t make you bring pie.”

Lee had gotten her answer about whether they had had enough Scotch the moment Tarin repeated her. Yeah, really, how could they think they'd had enough Scotch? Even sober, Lee wasn't completely sure how many glasses they'd had, since they'd been drinking so quickly.

But Tarin turned to look at her then, shaking his head, confirming what she thought would have been his answer. As well as confirming that he was well on his way to definitely being drunk. "Well, just remember when you're hurting tomorrow, I asked if you'd had enough," Lee told Tarin. If he was wanting to drink this much, this fast, he could suffer the consequences the next day.

Rupert started coughing on his Scotch as they started asking about his wife in the dream, but he recovered quickly, explaining that it had surprised him, too. But he was simply staring at the teacup in front of him, almost as if it would answer a question for him. Or refill itself.

A moment later when Rupert replied to Tarin's question about whether he'd talked to the woman who'd been his wife in the dream, Lee realized it had been the second; Rupert had been waiting for the cup to refill itself, then had done it when that hadn't happened.

Then Tarin asked a question that really peeked Lee's interest. And despite his lack of sobriety, it really was a rather good question. Rupert had already kind of told her about the reason being Alice, but Lee was interested whether there was more to it than that. So she sat back and waited for the answer.

>> "Well, just remember when you're hurting tomorrow, I asked if you'd had enough,"

Rupert gave a snort. A ‘damn woman, get off of our drinking habits and back in the kitchen’ snort. Tarin was right: they hadn’t had nearly enough.

>> “Maybe you should do that… Maybe that’s part of the reason for the dream…maybe you’re supposed to go and talk about it…then she’ll realize you’re soul-mates or something. It’s one of those cosmic things.”

Another snort, of the same variety. “Soul-mates might be a stretch,” he said, lifting his cup in a sort of self-toast to mistakes past and very present. “Maybe if I’d only shot her once...” Yeah, it might be less of a stretch, then. Rupert downed another teacup, and went back for more. His hand had to grope to find the bottle neck. To his credit, it was... moving.

>> “So why the apology? What’s changed? Surely you’ve had plenty of dreams…they didn’t make you bring pie.”

With careful navigation, he tapped bottle neck to teacup, and poured a modest rimfull. “Damned if I know. Just...” He ran a shaky hand through his hair. “****. You used to say I was a good man, Tarin. We both know that’s a load of bull. But in the dream... I was. I actually was.” The scotch really helped the sour taste of his real life go down.

Rupert’s snort matched Tarin’s comments perfectly. And so the two men had beaten back Lee’s attack of temperance, and the Scotch was once again allowed to flow freely. And boy did they need it, Tarin realized at the same time he realized that his lips were completely numb. Oh…that was always a good sign.

Rupert pointed out that he wasn’t sure that he and his future-wife were soulmates and that the situation might have been helped if he’d only shot the woman once. Tarin couldn’t help but continue to be an optimist, “Thas probably true…” he said, a healthy slur starting to work its way into his voice. “But at least you already know her…and don’t have to track her down.” He added with a knowing look over the rim of his glass as he drank again…how did his glass keep getting empty?

Out Tarin reached, and he missed the bottle on his first grab, managing to play the motion off as a suave flick of the hand in Rupert’s direction. For what? Tarin didn’t know, but it was better than looking stupid. Concentration and coordination combined on the second try, and Tarin got the bottle, managing to pour a suitable amount of the liquid into his glass. Was it still daytime? Tarin realized he didn’t care and took another drink, just as Rupert answered the next question.

Tarin nodded his head as Rupert explained, shaking his head at what the other man said. “That’s because you are a good man.” Tarin said, his slur approaching magnanimous by this point as he declared the words in the name of manly brotherhood. “You could have shot me…twice…” he turned to Lee, “He could have shot me twice…an’ I probably deserved it.” He said, then looked back to Rupert, “But you didn’t…and in a weird way…you’re why me and Lee are even married. Plus…you are…were…going to be a great godfather to Alice…so stop beating yourself up.”

Tarin almost felt the need to take a deep breath after all of that. Wasn’t this the same man he’d wanted to kill when he’d walked into the shop this afternoon? Eh…who cared, Tarin decided as he took another drink, there really was something to be said for scotch.

The only response that Lee got when she said not to complain when they were hurting the next day was a snort from Rupert. Fine. Tarin wasn't going to get an ounce of sympathy from her the next morning when he was nursing his hangover.

Rupert was talking about the woman who'd been his wife in this dream, and Lee's eyes widened as he said that he'd shot the woman. Though, after a moment's thought and hearing Tarin's reaction, Lee realized that that shouldn't be all that surprising. This was Rupert they were talking about. How many times had this man almost killed her and Tarin?

And they were still drinking, Lee saw. As she watched both Tarin and Rupert have problems grabbing the bottle and pouring another glass. Lee shook her head. Yes, this was a strange situation, yes, she wasn't exactly sure what to make of it, but that didn't mean that she was drinking herself stupid like the two men in front of her.

But apparently Rupert couldn't really explain why he was apologizing. He mentioned that in the dream, he was actually a good guy, not how he had been acting over the last year that she'd known him, but beyond that, there was no explanation.

Tarin's words were slurring even more as he answered Rupert. Apparently he still thought, despite everything that had happened, everything the man had done to them, that Rupert was a good man.

That wasn't all, though, and Tarin said that Rupert was a great god father to Alice. Not were, as in he had been in the dream, but it sounded like Tarin was talking more about the present, as if he currently is a great god father.

Lee's eyes dropped until she was staring at the floor. And then Lee's mind registered the last change in tense that Tarin had made, and her eyes shot back up to him. "Going to be?" She asked. Her voice wasn't harsh, it was just...surprised. "What do you mean he's 'going to be' a great God Father?"

>> “Thas probably true… But at least you already know her…and don’t have to track her down.”

The magnanimous slurring brought a hearty hiccupping laugh. “Yeah... track her down. ‘Sa good idea.” He squinted into his cup, to get a second opinion. “Maybe,” the cup was telling him. Tracking down: it didn’t sound like stalking at all. He could even leave his gun behind, like he did today.

>> “You could have shot me…twice…” He could have shot me twice…”

“I could’ve shot him,” Rupert pointed his teacup towards Tarin’s skull, quite helpfully. “Twice.”

>> “But you didn’t…and in a weird way…you’re why me and Lee are even married. Plus…you are…were…going to be a great godfather to Alice…so stop beating yourself up.”

Rupert’s mouth was opening to answer that, when Lee caught on to the tense. It made sense to Rupert, and it made sense to Tarin—Lee, though, still didn’t seem to fully buy that the dream was more than... more than...

>> "Going to be? What do you mean he's 'going to be' a great God Father?"

More than what? Rupert’s head crept closer to the table, as husband and wife had whatever chat was coming. The table... the table had his answers.

Rupert went down. He didn’t come back up.

Things were deteriorating fast, and despite the fact that he clearly recognized that, Tarin took another drink of scotch. It had been a strange month, and this just put the proverbial cherry on top. Maybe the dream had really been reality, and this was the weird dream. That seemed so much easier to swallow when it went down with a mouthful of scotch. Tarin knew it wasn’t true though, this was the only reality he’d ever known.

Tarin nodded his head at Rupert when he agreed that he should track her down. “Exactly…” Tarin said, wondering exactly who they were supposed to be tracking down. Maybe Lee knew, Tarin looked at her questioningly and smiled. Lee wasn’t smiling though. Why wasn’t Lee smiling…a lot had happened in the last little while that was smile worthy. First off, they weren’t crazy…they hadn’t been the only ones to have the dream about Alice.

Besides, not only had all that happened…but Rupert had actually apologized for all the awful things he’d done. Lee should be smiling. Then she spoke. Tarin was super confused for a moment as he tried to puzzle out exactly what it was his wife was talking about. He took another drink, hoping that the Scotch would simply answer the question for him. It didn’t. That sucked.

“Well…Rupert was her godfather…and he was great at it…Right?” Tarin said in an attempt at an answer the question, then looked to Rupert for help…Rupert was out. “Aw hell…” Tarin said, draining the rest of his glass, surprised at how hard it was to get the drink down. Rupert was moving too as he laid still on the table. Uh oh.

“Hah…I guess next time I’ll drink with a real ma…” Tarin stopped…the room was just spinning way too damn much to finish that sentence. Maybe Rupert had taken the correct route after all…the table wasn’t moving nearly as much as the rest of the room. He groaned, and his head joined Rupert’s on the table. This was much better.

When Rupert started repeating what Tarin was saying about the fact that the former cop could have shot him twice, Lee leaned to the side to take a look at the bottle sitting on the table between them. Then her eyes widened. Somehow, they had managed to drink even more than she had thought they had. Between the two of them, in a very short time, they had drank more than she and Tarin ever drank, even when they started breaking into the jager.

Yeah, she was not going to be nice the next day, Tarin deserved everything he was going to be feeling. Maybe she'd go pay Rupert a little visit, too, just to make sure he was suffering as well. Though, that visit would probably be much more dangerous; he didn't seem to have brought his gun with him today, but it was probably still quite easily accessible to him at home.

And apparently Tarin thought, with increasingly slurred words, that since in this dream that she couldn't remember Rupert was a great God Father to a daughter she couldn't even picture, that meant he was going to be a great God Father. Uh huh...

But by the time that Tarin turned to get Rupert's opinion on the subject, the other man's head was on the table. Unconscious.

Oh, that was just great, Lee thought as she looked at the man sleeping on the table. And just moments later, after a slurred comment that Lee couldn't really understand, her husband's head sank to the table as well.

"Great, just great," Lee grumbled as she hopped down off the counter. "Why does it always have to end up with unconsciousness when they get together? Now what am I supposed to do?"

Heaving a sigh, Lee walked to the table and grabbed the bottle and two tea cups. As she made her way back to the kitchenette, Lee seriously considered just dumping the remaining Scotch down the drain, but when she reached the counter she put the bottle back into the cupboard, the tea cups clattering in the sink.

Then it was back to the table, slowly, her hand running through her hair. Though it would make things so much easier for her, Lee knew she couldn't exactly leave Tarin and Rupert passed out like this in the shop all night. Even if that might teach them the lesson their coming hangovers probably wouldn't.

"Come on, hon, wake up," Lee said, shaking Tarin's shoulder then running her hand through his hair, coming to rest on the back of his neck where she squeezed slightly. "It's time to go home. You too, Rupert," Lee continued, reaching out her other hand to shake his shoulder as well.

A second after she had started shaking Rupert's shoulder, her other hand still on the back of Tarin's neck, Lee's vision started to turn white.

And when things cleared up and came back into focus, Lee was most definitely not in the shop anymore.