xp_logs | Forge and Jean, Tuesday morning (Reply)

Once his friends are out of the infirmary and into their own rooms, Forge heads down to the medlab with some pointed questions for Jean.

After the recent events, it was somewhat surreal to see the infirmary mostly empty, Forge thought. Amelia was off... doing whatever she did during her off-hours time, and the sounds from the office area meant someone was still working on something. Which was definitely good, he thought, then realized that hesitation was rather pointless when you were paying a visit to a telepath.

Walking over and rapping his knuckles against the door frame, Forge stuck his head into the office cautiously. "Hi Jean," he said with a grin, "got a few?"

Jean looked up from her files and offered Forge a smile, nodding. "Sure, come on in. Grab a seat, I won't be a second." A few more quick notations were made before Jean closed the file and set it aside. "What can I do for you?"

"I, uh, wanted to thank you. For the help with the... you know, Kyle and Jennie and Marius and stuff." Forge stammered awkwardly. "Um, I mean, I know it's your job and all but... I knew that going to Dr. Essex was going to be questionable, but you didn't give me any shit for it and I really appreciate that. I just want you to know that if I didn't think there wasn't any other option..."

"On analysis, I don't think there was, either - nor does Moira. And we would have come to that conclusion eventually. You're way saved time. So..." Jean paused, leaning back in her chair. "Well, while I can't say I'm a hundred percent happy you took the decision all on yourself, I can't really disapprove of it, either."

Forge nodded, looking pensive. After a moment, he cocked his head and studied Jean intently. "How do you do it?" he asked suddenly. "I mean - I know you were the Professor's first student and all, so you were kind of the test project for everything. But, I mean, you've been to medical school and have the doctor thing, and then your work in Washington, and on top of it all, at some point you decided you were going to put on the uniform and be an X-Man. How?"

Jean blinked, caught off guard by the sudden question out of left field, and it took her a few moments to frame a response. "Well," she said slowly, "it kind of came down to Scott and 'Ro, actually. And Charles, of course. And Eric." Jean stopped and shook her head. "People," she said, starting again. "As a telepath, it always comes down to people, really. The good times, the bad times, it all centers around the people around me - even on my best days, when I'm most in control, I can't not be effected, at least a little, by other people. And I'd been lucky. I didn't think it at the time, mind, but I was so incredibly lucky that my parents brought me to Charles. I lived, more or less, the ideal for coping with mutation - surrounded by people who accepted and taught me. Hank, too, more or less. Fairly idyllic childhoods, that led naturally into being able to cope with our powers. Scott and 'Ro... didn't. And that was really the first time I got to see what it could be like for mutants who didn't have that sort of protection. Children who didn't have that sort of protection. I'd already been leaning towards going into medicine, but the thought that I could help people cemented it and, when Charles told me he was expanding the school into a proper institution I knew I would be coming back to help. The team, then, sort of... grew around us, another step, for me, towards helping everyone I came across. Especially when it came to Magneto."

Forge pondered that, then nodded in understanding. "But you do so much for mutants with your work on Capitol Hill - as much as sometimes I might not see eye to eye with some stances, I can't disparage the steps you've helped make. With all that, you still go out there in the thick of it with people like Magneto, Sabretooth - you stopped tsunami with your mind and saved an entire city. Haven't you ever thought... I don't know, that the work you do is too important to take those risks?"

"Honestly... no. I mean, I got a more direct view of this than I would ever wish on anyone but... the world was, actually, fully capable of going on without me. After Alkali, the X-Men still went out and did all they could do to help people, and the students still got taught and their scrapes got mended. Even in Washington, progress was still made in getting mutants the basic human rights every other American gets. Things got done. And who's to say if they were done better or worse than if I'd still been here, but the thing about people is, there's a lot of them. And you never know when one of them is going to stand up and do something spectacular. How many people live in San Diego? How many parents and children, brother and sisters? People with loves and hates and hopes and fears and potential. What amazing things will they create in the next five or ten or fifty years? What are they already doing right now, that they wouldn't have done if Nate and Jim and I hadn't been there? And there's not a one of them who's life is worth less than mine, simply because they can't do what I do. 'Cause, you know, I can't do what they do, either."

"You've got a husband, a career - two, if you want to look at it that way," Forge countered, "And every time you go out there... every time any of you go out there... I've heard about what happened at Alkali. Even after that, how do you do it? You more than anyone know how dangerous it is. Anyone can be hurt, any one of you could be killed. How do you do it?" he asked earnestly.

"Because it needs to be done." It was a simple answer, but one Jean had thought about so often over the years it had more or less been ingrained in her soul. "Because I can't stand the thought of what would happen if it didn't get done, and I refuse to sit back and hope someone else will do it, particularly not when I have the skills and training to do it myself. I don't have the patience for that."

"Hah," Forge barked a quick laugh, then caught himself. "Sorry, I just find that kind of funny, what with the whole lack-of-patience thing being what I keep getting smacked over the head with."

"Everything in moderation," Jean said with a grin. "Trust me, it took Charles many years to convince me to simply fight the fights worth fighting, instead of throwing myself willy-nilly at everything that looked at me sideways. Including him. I was... a bit of a terror, really, when I was his student."

Forge sighed, shaking his head. "Easy enough for you to do. I mean, hello, you can chuck a Buick into orbit with a thought. If I could do something like that, I mean..."

He stopped and thought for a moment. What would you have done? he asked himself. Smashed Campbell into thin red paste for what he did to your friends? Fought back when Lense came for Kyle? And where do you draw the line?

"...I suppose I don't know what I'd do," he concluded. "Sometimes I feel kind of useless when stuff like this happens, you know? Like I'm the one who has to sit back and help put things back together again."

"Well, a, don't knock it, the recovery work is damned important and you know you're good at it. But, b, how so useless? It may not be fieldwork, but you've taken an active role in a number of situations -your abilities, true, are frequently reactive, but they can also be proactive." She paused. "I guess I mean be more specific. What's at the heart of what's bothering you?"

Sighing, Forge flexed his hands, the sound of flesh and metal knuckles popping in rhythm echoing in the office. "It's not that I felt useless... it's that I was useless, all of us were until Pete got that lead on the mercenaries. It's feeling helpless, I haven't felt like that since it was me there, with Lorna and Magneto." He hung his head, a mixture of frustration and shame on his face. "I know I would have been even more of a liability if I'd been there with them when they got attacked, and that's what's eating at me, Jean. I can't fight. I can't run. I know this, and yet all week, all I could think about was that I should have been there to do SOMETHING!"

"Ahhh," Jean breathed softly, "that. Yeah, that gets all of us, and I really don't think it gets any easier." She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her desk and considering the young man. "Hmmm... Forge, you know the limitations on your tech better than I. Is it that you can't fight or run, or that you don't know how?"

"I'm afraid, all right?" Forge snapped, averting his eyes. "Look at me, Jean. I'm not someone like Garrison or Logan, or even Kurt that can hold their own in a fight. The only thing I can do is cheat, and one of these days that won't be enough to get me out of a scrape. I don't know... I mean... Kyle's been teaching me a few things how to not hurt myself if I have to defend myself, but..."

He sighed, running a hand through his mop of hair. "You said it. We have these gifts, and we can't just sit back and hope someone else will do it when we're needed. But then I see something like what happened to my friends... and I'd have been useless. More than useless, a liability. I don't have the training for that, and what's worse... I don't know if I have the guts for it."

The wave of emotions that washed over her was intense, but fairly straight forward. "Forge, why are you ashamed of being afraid?" There wasn't anything judging in her tone - Jean honesty meant the question. "Being afraid is normal, natural. I don't think I've ever been more terrified than when that tsunami was rushing to shore - I already don't deal well with water and that was... overwhelming. And so you acknowledge the fear and you learn to deal with it. You're right - you don't have the training, but that doesn't mean you couldn't get it."

"I'm... I'm not X-Men material," Forge said hesitantly. "But... the training? You think I could?"

"I think it's certainly possible. You'd want to actually talk to Scott or Ororo at figuring out what aspects of our normal training you'd want to focus on, since you're not looking at actually getting out in the field. It's not as though you don't already work with us more than enough."

Forge almost vibrated out of his seat for a second, but restrained himself. "It's... it bears some thinking about. You know... when the panic button signals came in, the first thing I remembered was when Lorna... when Malice grabbed me. I kept thinking that if I'd been faster, I could have gotten a warning to you all. If I'd been more decisive. I wasn't ready, not then. Kyle, Jennie, Marius, Crystal? They were. I ought to talk to them about this."

Jean's smile widened. Well, that was an emphatic response. "Talking to them might be a good idea, yes. And, you know, you could have just asked for training straight off, actually. Not that I didn't appreciate the opportunity to answer the lead up questions, but I'm pretty sure you already knew what you wanted when you came in here."

"Maybe I did," Forge said, standing up straighter than he'd entered, "Sometimes it just takes a little talking to know your own mind, I suppose."

"Yes, there is that. And I'm glad I could help."