Author Notes: Another mini-arc, because they are sort of addictive.

Archiving: List, otherwise ask

*****

Bobby was avoiding him. Fuck. Remy, you better move a hell of a lot faster than that if you wanna get by me.

"Elbow in, Marie!"

Jubilee was avoiding him, but he avoided her too, so that worked out pretty well. So what if she thought he was a self-righteous bastard. If she even knew what had happened, which he doubted.

"Marie, what the fuck are you tryin' to do?"

Rogue was avoiding him and he hoped to God that kept up for awhile. Like the rest of their lives.

There were five things he noticed, and this was only the first. He didn't want to say he cared, but he did. He didn't want to forgive her, not ever, but seeing things would lead to that. He knew that much.

But that was the first, and he noticed it and started noticing, as he hadn't for the long five days since he'd sent her from his room.

And five days alone was a damned long time--a lot longer than St. John had expected.

It was instant and frightening, and maybe if it hadn't been, St. John wouldn't have paid any attention to any of them. Partnered up with a hostile Remy, he was totally focused today. No way in hell anyone was gonna break his concentration. But that did, for some reason--maybe it was Logan's tone when he said it, edged--though shit, Logan had been so on edge the last few days that St. John couldn't actually remember him doing anything but snapping orders and prowling the Mansion with restless energy that didn't seem to require anything by the way of sleep. Maybe it was the sudden quiet from Jubes, or maybe it was just some weird sort of prescience when he would have sworn he had none. But he and Remy stopped as one to check what the hell was up on the other side of the gym, and it was just in time to watch Rogue do some serious living up to her name.

Her head came up sharply, and he couldn't read a damn thing on her face--not precisely unusual in training. Spinning backward, bringing her leg up and kicking the practice bag with enough pressure to knock it backward--that was new. Rogue didn't have too much strength--all her ability lay in the sheer speed she worked at. So that was something of a shock, then the sudden fast jerk of her body and she came around, too fast, faster than he'd ever suspected she was capable of, and her foot was an inch from Logan's jaw, where he caught it mid-air.

That wasn't in the training run.

"Fuck me," whispered Jubilee. And how a whisper could echo in a room where *everyone* had gone completely still.

His reflexes kicked ass, no question--St. John was almost certain he never would have caught that himself. Watched Logan flip her and she twisted, landing in a picture perfect defensive crouch, staring up from behind unreadable eyes, a low sound that could have been a growl--but Rogue really didn't sound like that. And for the briefest second, St. John thought she would attack--

--and apparently, Logan did too.

"Stand down, Marie." A pause, and every muscle in her body tensed, almost deliberately, before she let out a breath, raising her head. "You wanna explain that?"

"Just keepin' ya on your toes, Wolvie." A pause, and she straightened, slowly, and even St. John could see the muscles in her back were tense and hard. "We done yet? Got a class with Scooter to sleep through, if ya don't mind. I want a shower." She reached for a towel, wiping her face before tossing it behind her with a lack of interest in where it fell (almost hit Jubilee in the face), taking off for the showers without a word. Logan watched her briefly, eyes narrowed, then nodded to the rest of them.

"Take off." Turning away while they quickly put their toys away--St. John wished he could snigger at that thought--and the rest did their level best to get out of sight. St. John grabbed his bag, turning toward the door.

His social skills right now were somewhere in the region of nonexistent, and he liked it that way.

In his room, he checked the clock, noticing Logan had let them out thirty minutes early--half an hour before lunch. Which gave him thirty minutes to find a way to avoid Bobby, avoid Jubes (though she was avoiding him nicely, so no problems there), and since Rogue was completely avoiding everyone--

--fuck, he had some major time on his hands. Seriously. And showers just didn't take that long.

A knock on his door was almost welcome, and St. John turned, pulling his shirt over his head and tossing it in the hamper.

"Come in."

Not many people would actually wait for permission.

"Mr. Summers."

St. John supposed five days of tension would be noticed by the older man, and the visored eyes skimmed the room briefly before coming to rest on him.

"You okay, Johnny?" A pause--Mr. Summers was all about sensitivity and New Age male talky stuff, and it occurred to St. John that if there had been anyone he *could* have asked about talking to Bobby, it'd be him. Of course, there was that slight but disturbing possibility that Mr. Summers wouldn't be too supportive of the whole idea of the younger X-Men getting into serious relationships, or an even slighter chance that Mr. Summers had sexuality issues.

Hmmm. Maybe not such a good idea.

"Fine, sir." Just fine. We're all good. Your least favorite group of troublemaking mutants aren't speaking to each other, and Rogue is keeping all that physical contact you and Dr. Grey are so afraid of down to a minimum. You just be happy, sir.

Mr. Summers frowned briefly (what, could he read his thoughts now?), then glanced at the desk chair.

"You mind if I sit down?"

Did he have a choice? With a shrug he hoped was casual, St. John motioned to the chair, wondering if he should maybe put some more clothes on--well, no. If Mr. Summers wanted to see him fully dressed, he shouldn't catch St. John right before a shower.

"I've noticed some--tension--between you and some of the others." A pause, waiting for St. John to possibly break out in confessions of something or other that the older man could start evaluating. Maybe fix. Who knew?

"Just normal teen stuff, sir." Teens fought all the time. It happened. Be cool with it, sir, go do something about that girlfriend of yours who hits on Logan, would ya?

"If it was normal teen stuff, Johnny, I wouldn't be worried."

It really hadn't occurred to St. John that Mr. Summers would actually notice, so worried was a whole new plane of shock. Unwillingly, he sat down on the bed, quite aware that Mr. Summers might annoy him, but had a deep and remarkably strong tenacious streak that probably would keep him here until he was satisfied.

Shit.

"Sir, it's not important."

"It's important enough for the Professor to have given special permission to Rogue to be in the gym after lights out." A pause--oooh, Mr. Summers didn't like that at all, that break in rules. No surprise. Leaning back on one arm, St. John waited. "I'm worried about her and I'm worried about the rest of you. Since the night Rogue and Bobby went off on their little excursion, the six of you have been acting more and more distant." Another pause, this time deliberate. "I've rarely approved of your actions together, Johnny, but I don't deny that it is healthy. What's happening right now is not."

"Why do you care?"

It was out of his mouth before he could even think to edit it--but images of Rogue in the gym after lights-out bothered him. She still got up at six with the rest of them for kitchen duty and she still went to classes. High energy or no, she slept badly anyway--she couldn't afford to lose any more than she already did.

Who gives a fuck. Let Rogue self-destruct at her own pace.

Mr. Summers, surprisingly, didn't react as St. John expected--a slight smile turned his mouth as he leaned back, the visored eyes making it impossible to read his expression.

"I suppose I could say that as future team members, antipathy isn't a good idea, but the example of Logan and I is probably one that breaks that theory." The slightest increase of the smile and St. John wondered what that meant. "I could say I don't like to see any of you unhappy, but that's normal and I don't like to interfere when nature can take its course and usually resolves things better than adult interference." Another pause, longer, as Mr. Summers considered what he would say. "The truth is, I should leave this up to time to fix up, but I suspect that time wouldn't do it--whatever happened between the six of you isn't healing, and if it was going to on its own, it would have started already. Instead, you and Rogue are avoiding everyone outside classes and Bobby is ducking into my office to have long and remarkably odd conversations about the concept of love and what it means. Without once managing to put it in a personal context, and for Bobby, that's just a cry for help. He personalizes everything."

St. John felt his jaw tighten.

"Maybe you should talk to Rogue about that."

Mr. Summers shook his head slowly.

"Rogue wouldn't talk to me if I was the last person left in the Mansion--and I don't blame her." St. John jerked a little at the honesty--he hadn't expected Mr. Summer to realize that. "I guess its about time I stopped treating this like kids being kids. You're not kids anymore, Johnny--you're two months from being permitted accompanied non-combat missions. You're going off to college to decide what you want to do with your lives should you decide to rejoin mainstream society."

Oh, that would be funny. One good loss of temper and his suburban life would go up in a neighborhood flame. St. John shook his head.

"I'll never have a normal life, sir. You know that. This is all I got, you know?"

"And with that in mind, you're willing to throw it away?" Mr. Summers leaned forward. "Whatever happened between the six of you, it's affecting more than you. It trickles straight up to the rest of the team. Professor Xavier can't get anything out of Rogue and the other three that *aren't* you or Bobby or Rogue don't have a clue what's going on, except none of you want to talk about it. Frankly, when Jubilee came by my office today, I got worried."

Jubilee had gone to Mr. Summers. That was enough to make St. John sit up, knowing Jubes' feelings on Mr. Summers and some of his interference policies.

"What--what did she say?"

"That's in confidence, Johnny. You know that. But I think--I think you need to have a talk with her. Just think about it--maybe all six of you should sit down and decide how you're going to handle this."

St. John stood up, knowing he wasn't hiding his discomfort as well as he should.

"Thanks sir. I'll think about it." As dismissively as he could, turning his back deliberately on Mr. Summers and going toward his dresser. "I have to take a shower. If you don't mind, sir--"

"I understand, Johnny." The tone was different, slightly amused, as if he knew (and how *could* he know?) that St. John had been affected. "I'll see you later. If you feel like talking--"

"I know where your office is, sir."

"By now, I suppose you have the way memorized." Irony? But St. John kept his back turned, and Mr. Summers' footsteps disappeared out the door--and did no one in this damn place believe in slamming doors? Shit.

With a sigh, St. John went to the bathroom.

This wasn't his problem. Rogue et al wasn't his problem. Period.