Rachel had decided that she was just going to do it. She was going to officially ask Aidan to move in with her. After all, they'd been together for a long time, well, by her standards at least, Aidan might have had longer relationships but it wasn't fair as he was a couple of centuries old and the scales were different. And they practically lived together anyways, she couldn't really remember the last time she'd spent a night alone.

Well, except last night. But a stopover in the clinic didn't count.

Smoothing the skirt of her sundress down, she took a deep breath before entering the clinic with the bunch of flowers she'd picked up and a few books and magazines. You know, normal visiting the boyfriend in the hospital things. She tried to put everything else out of her head. She'd get to it, she knew, but she wanted to focus on her injured boyfriend for a little while before she emotionally went off the rails.

Did normal people have this much trouble trying to figure out their relationships? People who hadn't dated aliens, seen the loves of their lives killed by mutant-hunting robots. People who hadn't done and seen the things she'd done. Or was it just her particular quirk of inherited emotional issues and her own paranoia. Did she even have the right to ask him, because she knew she didn't want to get married and have kids, not here on the island, and was that even fair to him to go so far and just draw a line in the sand? Or was she just leaving herself and him an escape hatch if it gets to be too much?

Those were the thoughts she was trying not to dwell on as she walked over to the bed. "Hey, punching bag, how are you feeling today?"

Hey, what are friends for if they can't kick your ass and tell you you're an idiot once in awhile.

Consider this the concrit post for Rachel Summers Grey.

Hit me with your best shot - comments are screened, and will only be unscreened with the author's permission.

[Dated March 31st, 2012]

She wanted this to go smoothly. She wanted this to go smoothly so badly, it was almost making her nauseous as she finished setting the table and setting out the last of the food. Some of it she'd made, some of it she'd bribed members of the kitchen crew to make for her, but all of it was hopefully something someone would like. And hopefully none of it would end up on someone's face.

Because she really didn't know.

She'd never really done anything like this before. Sure, there were family-style dinners at the mansion and with her grandparents while she was with them, but nothing like that existed here. She had no idea how this group of people that meant so much to her would get along with each other. She knew they'd all try, for her sake, and bless them for it, but she had a habit of making friends and family out of very opinionated and stubborn people and once the wine and beers were opened, who knew what would happen.

So she just said a prayer and hoped for the best as she got up to fiddle with her hair again.

[Post is gathering-style, put up a top-level if you want one or pop into someone else's thread. you can specify the time of the thread, or just leave it open.]

Rachel just didn't want to think about Halloween. Ever. Again. Just the image of all those bodies, all her friends, her family, in a pile in the jungle gave her chills. She'd seen massacres before and had never wanted to again and yet there she was, smelling the blood soaking into the ground, hearing the buzz of flies drawn by the blood. The rest of it, too, was something she never wanted to see, but the island had different ideas and now that was an image that was actually keeping her up at night.

She should be sleeping, but her body ached from the fight with Logan and she was still far too wired after having to babysit him and watch Charles get carted off to the clinic. She was actually a little surprised Logan hadn't broken free at some point and gutted her, he'd certainly tried, and while the adrenalin had long ago left her, she was stuck staring at the ceiling after she got home. For hours. Punctuated only by brief sleeping interludes that ended with her jerking awake, trying not to scream. Somewhere around dawn she managed to drift off for good, tossing and turning, but finally getting some shut-eye.

Which had been her mistake. She should have just stayed up.

They'd both been worried about Halloween, but Rachel and Aidan both knew they'd be more useful split up for the day. Rachel could check on her friends, fight if needed, Aidan could pitch in at the Clinic. They'd agreed on a place and a time to meet the next day so that they'd know the other was okay. At least that had been the plan. A plan that was completely screwed now that Rachel had pretty much slept through the meeting. Running out of her door, she knew that even if she ran the whole way flat-out, she was going to be hopelessly late.

She had to hope Aidan would stick around and not panic. Seriously, she was going to hunt Stark down and make him build a damn phone system for the island if it was the last thing she did.

Rachel's school schedule was light enough this semester that she was able to spend a lot of downtime just... relaxing. She'd laid in a good supply of books that she actually read on occasion, she took relaxing walks - a neat contrast to the way she used to run herself to exhaustion just so she wouldn't dream. In fact, she's just gotten back from one such walk and was feeding her quetzals, humming a wordless tune as she went about the chore. All in all, she felt more at peace with herself than she had in a long time.

And she really wasn't in a hurry to examine why that was, either. She knew part of it was from that shared dream she'd had with Nathan and the others. That world that she'd actually hoped was a world in which she'd managed to rid herself, and it, of a demon worth killing. She was disappointed it hadn't been real, but in the end she hadn't been surprised. At least she'd gotten to meet her brother's wife and son, even if they were the ones in his memories, it was more than she could ever hope for back home.

And she knew the other part of it was the guy she'd woken up to. The one with the dark eyes and dark past who still managed to smile and make her smile, too. The one she was sharing her bed with, gladly, who might want to share more. That was what she really didn't want to look at. Not closely. It wasn't that she didn't want... well, she didn't know what she wanted. It was just, after everything, it was just good to be with someone. No expectations. No worries.

[February 29, 2012]

Leap Year. With everything else, she'd somehow missed that it was a leap year and now she felt... slighted. This really wasn't her month and she was just to the point of waiting it out. Deciding that she wanted to date was one thing, actually doing it was another. She knew she was going about it the wrong way, that looking at every guy she came across while checking off a mental checklist of eligibility was not the way to pick out a guy. But then, she has never done this before. Ever.

Falling in love with Franklin had been as easy as breathing, they had known each other for so long that being in love was just.. natural. It fit. With Korvus, she'd gotten a massive push from the Phoenix Force, an instant connection that made her feel closer to him than she had anyone else in ages, once she stopped fighting it, that was. But she'd made peace with the idea that none of them were coming here and she wasn't going home anytime soon, so... she had to stop pretending it was all transient, try and make a go of it on the island, and - she didn't want to do it alone.

She was tired of being alone. Of seeing everyone else pairing off. Okay, so she'd seen quite a few of them end up with broken hearts, but for a little while, those people looked really happy. Rachel desperately wanted to be happy. Even if it was just for a little while.

But she was 0 and I-don't-want-to-think-about-it in the dating department so she just wanted the month to end. New month, new chances. In the meantime, she'd just park herself at the bar in the Hub, have a few drinks, and start wondering if the bookcase would give her dating advice books in the morning.

[August 30th, 2011]

She'd been spending a lot of time at the waterfall lately. The rave was over, but Rachel could still feel the tremble of the bass under her skin. The hangover was past, but she could still feel the pain of guilt and confusion. She had just wanted to have some fun, let loose for a night and now she was starting to think that she'd ruined one of her closest friendships here on the island.

Not to mention opened herself up to an entirely new avenue of sexuality she'd never considered before.

But at the heart, she thought the sexuality thing wasn't even the important part. Well it was important, but she knew eventually it would take care of itself. She'd just never thought of it before, was all and was trying not to think about it now. The really important part was that she was pretty sure her best friend would never speak to her again and that hurt Rachel more than she wanted to admit. So Gabrielle maybe had a little crush on her? So had Alistaire Stuart, and they'd managed to stay friends, but lately Gabby wasn't even talking to her and that made things worse. She couldn't repair, or work on, or even talk about their friendship if Gabby wouldn't even see her.

Standing on the edge of the cliff and looking down, Rachel wondered if things really had been simpler back home. Kill Gabriel. Kill the bastards that had killed her family. Sleep with Korvus, who loved her and she... she loved him. At least she was pretty sure she did. The longer she was here, the more she started to doubt that. And did that mean she'd taken advantage of him? Had she taken advantage of Gabby? She didn't want to think that she had. she didn't want to admit that her loneliness combined with the alcohol and drugs and... she'd just gone too far.

But if she couldn't talk to Gabby... she couldn't work it out. God, was there anything Rachel could do right? She looked down at the rolling water and debated with herself before deciding that ultimately, she couldn't make a decision today. If Gabby wouldn't talk to her, she couldn't make amends. And she wasn't home so she couldn't sort things out with Korvus. All she had was today and a deep pool of water just begging to be dove into. Which is what she did, diving with almost perfect accuracy to the center of the pool, trusting that it was deep enough for the dive.

It was, but as Rachel surfaced she realized that diving from such heights had it's disadvantages. Like stripping the tops of bikinis off one's body. Looking around, Rachel tried to see where her top had gone, or if she was going to end up rushing home with her hands as her only modesty.

[July 28, 2011]

She's lost count of the days since the subs, those bathysphere-things, shut down and trapped everyone down here. Aside from the increasingly fragile feeling of the walls around, above and below her, she thought she was doing pretty good. She's kept moving, managed to find food, and been... around the other groups trapped below. She's also aware that there's something massive going on, but unless or until people start screaming for help, she has other things on her mind.

Namely, the splicer she's been following.

( She starts moving almost as soon as little hands appear at the vent's opening, but she's not quite fast enough and the splicer dives, reaching for the girl's wrist. The girl's scream echoes off the metal and glass walls and Rachel's in action before she can think, pulling the shotgun over her shoulder, knowing that if she doesn't get the splicer away... something else will. )