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xp_logs2006-08-29 12:12 pm
x-cable.livejournal.com) wrote in xp_logs2006-08-29 12:12 pm
Nathan and Ororo, Tuesday morning
The day after the incident with Shiro, Nathan and Ororo review his Danger Room tapes from the summer, looking for some sign of when he may have started relying on a little pharmaceutical assistance. When they focus on a specific (and suspicious) DR session, something about the tape twigs something entirely unrelated for Nathan - a lost memory that's been gone for only a couple of months, rather than years.
"This is the one I was talking about," Nathan said to Ororo as the screen in front of them lit up to show Shiro trying to navigate his way through the Thwomps. "Back near... the beginning of the month," he said as his eyes flickered to the date stamp in the corner of the screen. "You see that he's not doing well at this point. That changed. After," Nathan said with a bitter twist of his mouth, "he ran to the locker room."
They had been at it for nearly an hour, reviewing the tapes of Shiro's Danger Room sessions over the course of the summer, looking for signs of anything unusual. When Ororo had called him in, Nathan had immediately thought of this session in particular. But they'd agreed to start a couple of months ahead of that, to see if they couldn't pick up on any sort of progressive weirdness. Or wrongness.
Drugs. Damn it, kid. And according to the report from yesterday, it was pure luck no one had actually been injured. Shiro was going to have a lot to deal with, not just his own recovery. "I should have trusted my instincts," Nathan muttered, watching the Shiro on the screen struggle. "I knew there was something odd about this run."
Ororo shook her head, watching the young man flounder on the tape. It was clear he wasn't doing well, and she couldn't help but wonder what exactly was in the drug Shiro had been taking that could rescue a performance like that so drastically. "It is not your fault - you had no reason to think something like that was wrong. I do not think any of us would have thought to question him." Of course, we will never know now...
"There," Nathan said as the scenario came to a stop and the screen flickered briefly. "I stopped the recording while he ran to the locker room, and started it up again when he came back." He reached out to the keyboard, fast-forwarding to the next chunk of recording. "I'm sure you'll see the difference." And he'd seen the difference. Telepathy or no telepathy, he had, and he should have... Gah. Stop kicking yourself, Dayspring.
"Indeed," 'Ro murmured, leaning forward slightly to watch as the now slightly-manic Shiro continued the scenario.
"He was definitely not right, here," Nathan murmured again, watching. The pick-ups hadn't quite caught the laughter, but you could see it on Shiro's face, through the flames...
The flames. Nathan blinked at the screen, feeling rather odd all of a sudden as he stared at the streaks of fire as Shiro darted back and forth. Queasy. Why did he feel queasy? And there was a strange sensation of pressure behind his eyes. Not pain at least, just...
"He does seem rather strange. Still, it is not as if this could not have been an off day... Nathan?" Ororo refocused her attention from the screen onto the man next to her, who seemed to be staring through the monitor now. "Are you feeling all right?"
"I..." Nathan reached out, instead of answering, and rewound the feed, back to where Shiro had started moving very fast, streaks of fire blurring one into each other until the air looked like it was on fire. Air on fire. All lit in gold... "The air was... gold," he muttered, feeling increasingly light-headed.
"Gold?" Shifting, Ororo reached out to put a hand on Nathan's upper arm. "Nathan, can you hear me?"
"... I'm okay, 'Ro." It came out sounding faint, though, and Nathan closed his eyes, his jaw trembling slightly. There were images forming in his mind, hazy but recognizable, and they had nothing to do with the DR session they were watching. Fragments, slowly coming together like puzzle pieces as he concentrated on them. "The air was gold, because I was inside the exoskeleton." Talk it out. The images would be steadier, if he sorted them out.
Ororo frowned, still not removing her hand from Nathan's arm, afraid that he just might keel over at any moment. "When was this?" she asked, peering up into his face.
His lips twitched in a brief, almost desperate smile. "San Diego," he finally said hoarsely, opening his eyes. There was a strange look in them as he glanced sideways at her, a mixture of relief and wariness. "So much for the permanent effects of my seventeenth concussion. The glow, on that tape... I remember. I remember being inside the exoskeleton on the beach, watching the wave come closer."
"You remember? Oh, Nathan..." Ororo smiled back, recalling a similiar memory, though from a slightly different vantage point. "Do you remember anything else?"
"Being more or less positive that I was going to die." He gave a weak laugh, leaning back in the chair, his hands going to his temples. He wouldn't examine that part too closely. "Jean boiling away the wave," he said more softly. "And her and Jim on the link... why is it just there like this?" He rubbed at his temples - then paused, lowering his hands and staring at them. "My hands... I was holding the psimitar when it blew up, wasn't I?" Of course he had been. The memory rushed back, the physical sensation of the psimitar shattering and the feedback surging through his mind.
"Yes, I believe so. Forge was not very happy with you..."
"Well, I knew something had happened to it. I just wasn't sure how..." Too many minds, too much power of different types being pushed together through it. He could remember frantically adapting the patterns, trying to accomodate... Jim.
Nathan slumped a little in the chair, the DR tapes and Shiro's problem forgotten, and if that was selfish, he didn't really care. His eyes stung with tears and he rubbed at them with a shaky sigh. "One less hole in my memory," he said a bit raggedly, that first conversation with Jim after San Diego and the one yesterday all making sense now. Oh, Jim, you idiot. Why hadn't he just said... well, you know why. Yesterday's conversation was clear on a number of levels, now.
"I can imagine this may be quite a lot to suddenly handle," Ororo said gently, watching Nathan's face carefully. "It was a monumental task to achieve, and to relive it again now... Are you sure you are all right?"
He didn't answer her for a moment, just concentrated on breathing, letting his emotions even back out. It hadn't been a flashback, and in a way that had been more disconcerting than anything else. It was like he'd taken a closer look at what he'd thought was a gap and it was all there - or almost. He didn't still remember anything past when the breakwater had changed, pushing the wave back out to sea. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. Do you really want to recall Jim knocking you out?
"I'll be all right," he finally said to Ororo, then mustered up a weak smile. "Think my concentration's gone, though. Can we take a break?"
"Yes, yes of course." Sitting back, Ororo flipped off the recording and shut down the monitor. "Would you like me to make you some tea? It seems to be what I do in situations like this... offer tea." She smiled wanly, putting one hand on the back of his chair.
"Why don't I come with you? I really ought to learn how to make tea properly." He needed to get up and do something, or he was going to be sitting there staring blankly into space for the next hour. Or three. "GW always despaired of me picking up the proper technique." And maybe he could bend Ororo's ear in confidence and figure out precisely what the hell he should and shouldn't say to Jim about this.
"Well, I cannot promise to live up to those standards, but I did study with a master. Charles would hate to think of anyone in the mansion not getting their recommended weekly allowance of hot Earl Grey. Come, we will even break out the big mugs."
"This is the one I was talking about," Nathan said to Ororo as the screen in front of them lit up to show Shiro trying to navigate his way through the Thwomps. "Back near... the beginning of the month," he said as his eyes flickered to the date stamp in the corner of the screen. "You see that he's not doing well at this point. That changed. After," Nathan said with a bitter twist of his mouth, "he ran to the locker room."
They had been at it for nearly an hour, reviewing the tapes of Shiro's Danger Room sessions over the course of the summer, looking for signs of anything unusual. When Ororo had called him in, Nathan had immediately thought of this session in particular. But they'd agreed to start a couple of months ahead of that, to see if they couldn't pick up on any sort of progressive weirdness. Or wrongness.
Drugs. Damn it, kid. And according to the report from yesterday, it was pure luck no one had actually been injured. Shiro was going to have a lot to deal with, not just his own recovery. "I should have trusted my instincts," Nathan muttered, watching the Shiro on the screen struggle. "I knew there was something odd about this run."
Ororo shook her head, watching the young man flounder on the tape. It was clear he wasn't doing well, and she couldn't help but wonder what exactly was in the drug Shiro had been taking that could rescue a performance like that so drastically. "It is not your fault - you had no reason to think something like that was wrong. I do not think any of us would have thought to question him." Of course, we will never know now...
"There," Nathan said as the scenario came to a stop and the screen flickered briefly. "I stopped the recording while he ran to the locker room, and started it up again when he came back." He reached out to the keyboard, fast-forwarding to the next chunk of recording. "I'm sure you'll see the difference." And he'd seen the difference. Telepathy or no telepathy, he had, and he should have... Gah. Stop kicking yourself, Dayspring.
"Indeed," 'Ro murmured, leaning forward slightly to watch as the now slightly-manic Shiro continued the scenario.
"He was definitely not right, here," Nathan murmured again, watching. The pick-ups hadn't quite caught the laughter, but you could see it on Shiro's face, through the flames...
The flames. Nathan blinked at the screen, feeling rather odd all of a sudden as he stared at the streaks of fire as Shiro darted back and forth. Queasy. Why did he feel queasy? And there was a strange sensation of pressure behind his eyes. Not pain at least, just...
"He does seem rather strange. Still, it is not as if this could not have been an off day... Nathan?" Ororo refocused her attention from the screen onto the man next to her, who seemed to be staring through the monitor now. "Are you feeling all right?"
"I..." Nathan reached out, instead of answering, and rewound the feed, back to where Shiro had started moving very fast, streaks of fire blurring one into each other until the air looked like it was on fire. Air on fire. All lit in gold... "The air was... gold," he muttered, feeling increasingly light-headed.
"Gold?" Shifting, Ororo reached out to put a hand on Nathan's upper arm. "Nathan, can you hear me?"
"... I'm okay, 'Ro." It came out sounding faint, though, and Nathan closed his eyes, his jaw trembling slightly. There were images forming in his mind, hazy but recognizable, and they had nothing to do with the DR session they were watching. Fragments, slowly coming together like puzzle pieces as he concentrated on them. "The air was gold, because I was inside the exoskeleton." Talk it out. The images would be steadier, if he sorted them out.
Ororo frowned, still not removing her hand from Nathan's arm, afraid that he just might keel over at any moment. "When was this?" she asked, peering up into his face.
His lips twitched in a brief, almost desperate smile. "San Diego," he finally said hoarsely, opening his eyes. There was a strange look in them as he glanced sideways at her, a mixture of relief and wariness. "So much for the permanent effects of my seventeenth concussion. The glow, on that tape... I remember. I remember being inside the exoskeleton on the beach, watching the wave come closer."
"You remember? Oh, Nathan..." Ororo smiled back, recalling a similiar memory, though from a slightly different vantage point. "Do you remember anything else?"
"Being more or less positive that I was going to die." He gave a weak laugh, leaning back in the chair, his hands going to his temples. He wouldn't examine that part too closely. "Jean boiling away the wave," he said more softly. "And her and Jim on the link... why is it just there like this?" He rubbed at his temples - then paused, lowering his hands and staring at them. "My hands... I was holding the psimitar when it blew up, wasn't I?" Of course he had been. The memory rushed back, the physical sensation of the psimitar shattering and the feedback surging through his mind.
"Yes, I believe so. Forge was not very happy with you..."
"Well, I knew something had happened to it. I just wasn't sure how..." Too many minds, too much power of different types being pushed together through it. He could remember frantically adapting the patterns, trying to accomodate... Jim.
Nathan slumped a little in the chair, the DR tapes and Shiro's problem forgotten, and if that was selfish, he didn't really care. His eyes stung with tears and he rubbed at them with a shaky sigh. "One less hole in my memory," he said a bit raggedly, that first conversation with Jim after San Diego and the one yesterday all making sense now. Oh, Jim, you idiot. Why hadn't he just said... well, you know why. Yesterday's conversation was clear on a number of levels, now.
"I can imagine this may be quite a lot to suddenly handle," Ororo said gently, watching Nathan's face carefully. "It was a monumental task to achieve, and to relive it again now... Are you sure you are all right?"
He didn't answer her for a moment, just concentrated on breathing, letting his emotions even back out. It hadn't been a flashback, and in a way that had been more disconcerting than anything else. It was like he'd taken a closer look at what he'd thought was a gap and it was all there - or almost. He didn't still remember anything past when the breakwater had changed, pushing the wave back out to sea. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. Do you really want to recall Jim knocking you out?
"I'll be all right," he finally said to Ororo, then mustered up a weak smile. "Think my concentration's gone, though. Can we take a break?"
"Yes, yes of course." Sitting back, Ororo flipped off the recording and shut down the monitor. "Would you like me to make you some tea? It seems to be what I do in situations like this... offer tea." She smiled wanly, putting one hand on the back of his chair.
"Why don't I come with you? I really ought to learn how to make tea properly." He needed to get up and do something, or he was going to be sitting there staring blankly into space for the next hour. Or three. "GW always despaired of me picking up the proper technique." And maybe he could bend Ororo's ear in confidence and figure out precisely what the hell he should and shouldn't say to Jim about this.
"Well, I cannot promise to live up to those standards, but I did study with a master. Charles would hate to think of anyone in the mansion not getting their recommended weekly allowance of hot Earl Grey. Come, we will even break out the big mugs."
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Uh, I'll take some of the blame here, but I'm also not the one who caused the concussion by deflecting a TK blast into my own head.
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