Alessia left me some chocolates and a beautiful pot of roses outside my door today.  There was a note, no signature, but I'm not labeled a telepath for nothing.  I know it was her, and I think it's incredibly sweet.  I had the distinct feeling she'd been avoiding me.  In fact, I knew she was.  I'm still not sure why, but this spontaneous act of kindness piques my interest.

Although I do have a feeling the young empath left Valentine's Day gifts for all of her friends, which is wonderful.  I really think so highly of her, and I wish she knew that.  She and I seem to be so much more alike than we realize.

At any rate.  I'm attempting to bake a cake for the kids tonight.  I hope everyone isn't terribly surprised if the experiment fails miserably and I have to resort to a generic specimen from the supermarket.

I've been feeling restless lately.  I've taken to strolling the Institute grounds each night because I can't sit still enough to stargaze from the roof.  I feel as if something is on the verge of happening, of being, but I'm not at all sure what.

I can't tell if it's my telepathy or what, but I'm starting to become paranoid and fearful of this mental foreshadowing thing.  Every time I've had it in the past something has gone terribly wrong.  But this time it's stronger, it's more ... ominous.  The timeframes are always uncertain, too, and I can never get a firm grasp on any of the details or particulars.  It's closest to intuition, but it's more than that.  Whatever it is, it could happen a day, a week, a month, a year from now.  Maybe it already happened, even.  Maybe it's some sort of biological, psychological - call it what you'd like - aftermath of a past insecurity or situation.  Maybe it's not even my own conscience .  Maybe it's the perception of everyone around me, or the perception of some stranger half-way across the continent. 

All I know is that it's wearing down on me to the point where I can't sleep at night.  Xavier has been trying to council me, and he's of the opinion that it is my own awareness.  He believes that it is a mental manifestation of the worries and concerns in my life, something that is simple science working at it's basic, human level, only adjusting and adapting to my particular molecular makeup.   Much akin to the way one might develop a physical manifestations of stress, i.e. hives, rashes, etc. 

I'm still not entirely convinced.

What I am convinced of, however, is that my situation might improve darastically with a night out and a few drinks. 

I feel as if time, that universal enigma that I've been trying to disregaurd and squeeze my way out of for the past two decades of my life, is finally catching up to me. 

I've barely left the underlevels of the Institute since the second advance, when Bobby took a hard shot into the neck and another directly into his abdomen.  He recovered fine, but god ... three straight days and I was worried sick.  My greatest fear has always been that we'll loose one of the team, one of this family, living on the brinks of constant danger like we do.  I wish it didn't have to be this way, but as much as I loathe to admit it, it is necessary.

I've been catching as many (or perhaps I should say as few) sessions of brief and restless sleep as I can, wherever I can.  A bench in the locker room, my desk in the lab, the overhang of the danger room.  At least it's quiet down here, and still.  No signatures interfering with my telepathy or electricity to throw off my telekinetic balance.  Just...calmness.  It's a sactuary for people like me.

I've heard that Scott's returned. I'm not sure, but I think I can feel him.  That is to say, I knew before anyone told me that he had come home.  I haven't seen him yet, but it's only a matter of time.  I can tell he's glad to be home, that he's changed in a few minor ways...but the one thing I can't tell is if he wants to see me or not.

Logan, Remy and Alessia have brought Rogue back.  She's a little shaken, bruised up, but she'll be fine.  I was worried sick about her, too. 

I think the happiest day that humanity will ever see is when these crimes stop and we can all sleep soundly at night.  It's unbearable to keep waking to other people's dreams, realizing that just before you fell asleep you were thinking the same awful, destructive things.  It's an endless cycle without a visible end.

Quite a night, to say the least. 

One minute I was running downtown to pick up some last minute files from the police station, next I was meeting Remy and a string of terrified students in the driveway.  The situation was explained to me right away, and though we've prepared the Institute for these kinds of things (tunnels, safehouses, emergency exit strategies, etc etc) it was completely unexpected and harrowing.

It never fails to disappoint and perplex me, the reasons why humans behave this way.  It's frankly mind-boggling, and I wish there were a rational explanation.  Perhaps that's why I've always drifted back to science and numbers after all these years; at least they never surprise you, at least with them you can predict what's coming.

At any rate, the person I'm really disappointed in is myself.  I can't believe I left, especially knowing that Charles had flown over to Sacramento for the week.  I figured everything would be fine, of course, especially with the better part of the team there.  And it was, despite - god, I don't know what would have happened if Rogue, Bobby, Logan and Remy hadn't acted like they did.

But I know I shouldn't have left, I could feel it.  I knew something was off. 

But there's not much I can do about it now.  While Bobby and Remy fought off some of the assailants I led a couple dozen of the kids into the woods.  Four miles, into the woods.  Eight miles, back and forth.  I was exhausted by the time I got back to check on everything, though I'm sure it didn't compare to the hypothermic hell that Remy had to endure.  He's still recovering down in the medical bay.  I have him on non-stop IV fluids and about ten different kinds of pain killers.  I'm trying my best to thermally stabilize him, too, but that first half-hour out of the cold was the most crucial.  He should be up and going anytime now.  Someone remind me to tell him what a brave thing he did, and how many brownie points he's earned with me.  I'm upping his allowance.

Bobby should be fine, of course, that indifference to temperature ability of his surely aiding him a great deal.   I'm continually in awe of that boy, watching him grow up into a handsome young man and competent team member, watching these things he's able to do.  He carried Remy back into the Institute from far off on the grounds, got him safely into the lab. 

Rogue is fine, save a cut on her leg that I fixed up with a few stitches.  Logan's healing factor took care of everything for him, though I'm still hoping to get him aside soon to talk about it.

A really odd and wonderful thing amidst this confusion: I discovered that my old friend Erin has been staying at the Institute for the past couple days.  We met in Canada a few years ago, realized our parents knew each other.  So ensued a few very pleasant days wherein many enjoyable talks and discussions were brought about.  I.E.  Puppies, and why they're so drawn to romps in the mud.  I'll be glad to catch up with her again; she's a very interesting character.

Anyway, she, Rogue and I got Alessia (who had blacked out) and a few of the other injured children down to the lab around midnight, maybe one, got Rogue's stitches taken care of and I divied out some non-lethal prescription meds and sleep aids to all of us.  God knows we needed the chemical assistance.

Went back upstairs to help Logan cleanup whatever he already hadn't, and practically passed out the moment I hit the mattress. 

Woke up this morning, had a lovely chat with Rogue.  Fetched some doughnuts from a nearby baker to feed the kids, my attempt to get their minds off everything with lethal amounts of sugar.

Apparently Erin trapped one of the assualters alive, and now Logan has him locked into the Danger Room.  We checked on him this morning; out cold. 

Logan and I are going to go peek in again in a few hours, see if he's come to.  He's going to have a lot of explaining to do.

All in all, the only thing that appears to matter right now is the fact that there were no casualties, and very few injuries, on our part.  I managed to conjure up a brief mental connection to the professor last night - he's assured me we've all acted logically and as best we could given the circumstances.  I'm passing the word along, with my own thanks to all of you.  The school is so fortunate to have such courageous and selfless people surrounding it.

-- Jean

So, Logan's back.

Do I care to ellaborate on the subject?  Not really.  He's exactly the same as he was when he left.  Hasn't changed a bit, and I can't tell if I'm disappointed or surprised by it.  I can't tell if I want to be.  I suppose I thought, maybe hoped, that he had changed, that he was a different guy after two years away.  But then again, who was I kidding?  I know more than anyone that time doesn't change anything - circumstances change things.  And it seems his circumstance hasn't changed, either. 

I'm not really sure what to think.  Or what to do.  How to act.  I'm not sure where we stand.  Do we go back to how it was?  Has that changed, too?  It feels so incredibly strange, just seeing him walk into a room.  I think back over the last two years, and though I did, I didn't have to worry about him.  I didn't see him.  I could have forgotten about him.  Though that last thought conjures up endless hilarity and irony.  Could have, being the key word.  Could have, if I had wanted to.

But now that's all shot to hell.  Lovely.  At least before this I knew I had time to think about it.  Now it's just sort of...pushed in front of me.  I mean, out of the blue.  Just...showed up.  Like nothing had happened.

It shouldn't be this complicated, but it is.  And yet again, I can't tell if I want it to be this complicated, this confusing.  I'm not at all sure of anything anymore.  I need to give myself a good mental slap and start acting like an adult.  I don't know why it's so hard for me when it comes to that man.

Jesus.  My windows are starting to ripple.  I need to stop thinking so hard.

So, I get a call the other evening.  It's from the police station down on 9th, and they say they'd like to speak to Dr. Jean Grey.  I say this is she, and they give me one of those cliche opening cop-movie lines, "Well Miss Grey, I'd like to speak to you for a moment if I could.  There's a bit of a situation..."  And goes on to tell me - without revealing the nature of his call - that they need me to come on down to the station straight away if I'd be so kind.

Okay, first of all: don't you dare scare me like that - I don't care if you are chief-sherrif-officer-God of Manhattan.  I was sure the next words out of his mouth were going to reveal that one of the kids had gotten arrested, drunk, killed or into a fight - a thought I've been particularly worried over since the whole anti-Mutant rally in Chicago last week.  Six college kids in the hospital and three mutants in custody.  God, I can't imagine if anything like that happened with some kids from Xavier's.  We'd be expended in no time.

At any rate, being the law-abiding citizen I was, I told him I'd be there in twenty minutes.  Turns out they had this mutant in their custody - one Mr. Remy LeBeau - a multiple offender from Louisianna with a track record to put even the most polished of criminals to shame.  He was part of a thievery gang in New Orleans, and his recent screw-up landed him a larceny charge from a wealthy widow down south.  The kindly officers proposed I take Mr. LeBeau on as a ward, meaning I would become something like his parole officer - and we'd have a psudo-legal gaurdianship - in exhange for jail time.  They told me they'd heard my name on the news, one of them brought up the fact that I'd been speaking at senate hearings regaurding the mutant registration act since last June.  Of course I agreed, it was a pretty fair deal, and I'd dealt with some things like this before.  Big Brother tends to work with you when something unexpected falls into their hands that could possibly make them look bad - one of the great beneficial ironies that works in favor for our side of things.  Even if the real word for the situation would be lazy - they simply didn't want to have to deal with this mutant fella - it fell in both of our favors.  I could watch over him fairly easily, perhaps he'd change his ways and it would help this whole idea of a "mutant problem" to extinguish itself, and Remy wouldn't have to spend his days locked up like a circus animal.  Plus, there's always room for one more at the Institute.  It's our job to usher in the unwanted and unaccepted, and help them overcome any faults in their histories.  That should be our motto, "Xavier's Institute: We Cover Everything Up so You Don't Have to."

SO.  Racing back into the present.  Everything worked out just fine - save a minor misunderstanding and my running head-first into a mental brick wall - and the Institute is calm and content this week.  We have a few new residents popping up here and there, though I've only met one of them - another young southerner, Alessia Fiore. The other few are rumored myths - I have yet to see them wandering about.

Well if I begin now, I might possibly have the rest of my grading done before the nine o'clock news.  -Insert sarcasm here: it's 10 AM-. 

And off I am to boil another pot of coffee.