Shadow King: We're All Mad Here

[x-cable.livejournal.com]

Nathan's day gets worse.


It was very mild, as telekinetically-induced earthquakes went. Just a very mild tremor, enough to rattle loose objects in several of the infirmary rooms, and sent a shiver through the furniture and the walls. It came in waves, pulsing erratically before it stopped entirely - for the grand total of about two minutes. Then it began again, going through the same irregular cycle, over and over.

Betsy said, as she strode into the room, a teacup in her hand. "I was having a perfectly nice cuppa before it tried to kill me." She stopped dead in her tracks at the sight before her then continued, unphased. "Do you know how hard it is to get good English tea down here without you going into convulsions."

Nathan was sitting on the bed, head resting in his hands, but he looked up at the sound of her voice, blinking blearily at her. The shape in the doorway would simply not come into focus. It did look like Betsy, but... "Need a lock on the inside of the door, too," he said, his voice low and gravelly. "Keep you all out. Hardly seems fair it only works the one way."

"The cuckoo bird wants to keep the other nuts out?" A bright smile overtook her face as Betsy sauntered towards Nate's bed. "I am waiting for something that should make things a bit interesting. Want to know?" Betsy looked eagerly into Nate's face. "Well, I'll give you a hint anyway. Shoes. Shoes can make any situation worthwhile. Or any escape plan simply thrilling. I think you would do well with some boots, perhaps Doc Martens. Those feet look ripe for some throttling."

The telekinetic tremor pulsed through the room again at Betsy's move towards the bed. Nathan shifted backwards away from her, trying to get his back against the wall. "Stop talking about shoes," he said, even more faintly. "It's very strange."

"Alright," Betsy said softly, taking a seat next to Nate. She was manic in her movements and her speech. Twitchy was a better word for it. "It's harder focus each day but I still remember things. Most of it, I think. Well, mostly." She shook her head at the thought. "I think I heard one of the ginger-looking nuns talk about locking me up in one of those a strait jackets. Did they offer you one? A blue one would really compliment your eyes."

"I think you should go." His skin was crawling, with her this close. "I'm not even sure whose face you're wearing." Blonde hair, British accent... Amanda?

"Stop being silly, Nathan." She took in his countenance and patted his knee absentmindedly. "It's me, Betsy. Well, I really do prefer Lady Braddock but none of these blighters seem to have catched on." Taking a closer look at his face, she laughed. "You really don't recognize me? Well, that is a sad state of affairs and a mistake on my part. Before I decided to join the service for Queen and Country, this is how I used to look."

She found herself staring at her reflection from the mirror on the opposite wall. Her smile waning under the scrutiny. "Reminds me of my mum."

Nathan looked at the mirror, then at her. Then back at the mirror. "They don't like you," he said, sounding distracted. "Making faces at you, in the mirror..." In fact, the thin white faces looked more like they were pleading. White on white, screaming for help... the mirror shattered all at once under a lash of TK.

Startled out of her thoughts, Betsy snapped. "Oi, I was looking at that." She looked at Nate and pointed towards the mirror. "Fix it! Fix it before I smother you with a pillow."

"I'd like to see you try," he growled at her, slipping off the bed and retreating to his corner, where he slid down the wall into a crouch. "You needed to stop admiring yourself, anyway. You're not admirable."

"Silly telekinetic," Betsy protested. "I may be a bit off-kilter but I'm no idiot." She smiled wickedly at him "And I am admirable. People magazine said so and we can't argue with the people and you shouldn't judge You, you have wrinkles and are old and and therefore have no say."

"Go away. You're hurting my head," Nathan said a bit feebly. He didn't want to do anything to get himself sedated again, but he wanted her out of here. "You threw sharp things at a student. I heard them talking."

"I throw plenty of things around, do you think they meant my crackerjack wit?" She crossed her legs and placed her hands on her knees. "Most round these parts barely manage to catch on before I'm running on another tangent. And yes, I mean, no. Wait. I am not leaving you alone until you say something nice."

Nathan looked up at her, reddened gray eyes narrowing. "You," he said, "are annoying. And I have telekinesis. I think it might be worth getting drugged again to throw you out of here. I would laugh as they stuck the needle in my arm."

"I am in psionic shock," Betsy said nobly, nodding her head and pointing at him. "And obviously, nuttier than a bag of peanuts but you are rude and completely spun around. And here I was trying to be polite and civil for your sake but cracked in your world must mean constipated because you are more than grouchy and stopped up."

"Talk, talk, talk. It doesn't mean anything. Your words aren't sharp, so don't throw them at me." Nathan closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the cool, solid wall. "It just makes you look pathetic."

A slight commotion could be heard outside her door and Betsy sat up, excitedly. "They're here!" She stood, using Nathan to catapult her up and hotfooted it out of the room. All the while chanting, "shoes, shoes, shoes!"

The door was locked again behind her. Of course. Nathan turned his face to the wall, wondering what it meant that there was a crazy Betsy, and a Jack without a Jim. Moira kept trying to explain, but it didn't ever make sense. Nothing made sense.

--

Someone had coaxed him back into bed. He wasn't sure who, and had his suspicions about what had been in the glass of water. The haze was back, clinging to his thoughts and making it hard to think. Nathan shifted on the bed, a sigh that was half a whimper escaping him.

There was someone sitting next to his bed, head bent. Angelo looked up sharply at the sound, then leaned forward. "Nate?"

Nathan's eyes snapped open. "No," he said disjointedly, sitting up. The wave of dizziness almost sent him right back down again, but pure stubborn desperation had him sliding across the bed and off the other side. Away from the voice. He tottered, as he took the two steps towards the wall, then slid down it. "Get his face off. Don't do this."

"It's me, Nathan", Angelo said, would-be soothing, as he rose from his chair in reaction. "Not anyone pretendin' to be me. Just me."

"Don't." Nathan's face turned towards him, gray eyes unfocused, then jerked away again. "Put the file away. I know what's in it. They all told me, over and over.... I know it's my fault."

And the grey face was suddenly hard, unrelenting. "Yeah. It was. All of it, Nathan... your fault."

The bed jolted, shaken by an uncontrolled lash of TK before it went still again. Nathan groaned and grabbed at his skull, his vision vanishing into dark stars. "Stop."

"No stoppin', Cable. 'Cause you're the one who never stops."

There was something beside him. A chair, maybe. Nothing made sense, nothing looked right, chairs weren't supposed to be made of snakes or hiss at you, but at least it stayed put. He could use it to get back to his feet, and he did, tears trickling down his face as he stood, swaying.

"I told you - I told you," he said disjointedly at the flickering dark shape in front of him. "I told you what I was. So many times. And you wouldn't go away - you wouldn't follow anything better." The buzzing rose in the back of his mind, a wave of shifting, buzzing, laughing shadows. "You're going to stay until I kill you, aren't you?"

Angelo froze at those words, caught between denial, bolting, reaching out to the man... and settled for the last, in the end. "I made my choice, Nate. And if I die, when I die... it won't be you doin' it."

Nathan slumped to the floor beside the bed, resting his head against it. The buzzing softened, just a little. Enough to give him the tiniest space to think. "Let me out. Please." He was going to go mad if he had to stay locked in here for much longer. More mad.

"You know we can't do that." The words were soft, but uncompromising. "Not 'til we get this sorted out."

A cracked laugh slipped out before he could stop it. Why try? "Locking me in white rooms. The more things change."

"The more they stay the same, isn't that right, Cable?" came the dry ironic voice that shouldn't be coming from Angelo's mouth. "You'll always come back to the white room in the end."

Nathan dragged himself back to his feet and lunged at Angelo, too confused and shaken to manage a telekinetic attack. Too slow and uncertain on his feet, thankfully, for the physical attack to be much of a threat.

Angelo saw it coming in plenty of time, because of that. His eyes widened and then he dropped, rolling under Nathan's arm to the other side of the little room.

It seemed to lose him Nathan's attention. The rush had taken him close enough to see the door and recognize it for what it was, even though the walls kept flickering back and forth, his eyes playing tricks on him. "Let me out!" Nathan shouted, his voice breaking, and slammed into the door shoulder-first. The tremor that ran through the room was testament enough to the fact that there was more than a little telekinesis behind it.

"Nate - " Angelo started, scrambling to his feet and approaching cautiously from behind. "Nate, they're not gonna let you out. Not yet. They've got to figure this out first, an' fix it."

Nathan clearly wasn't hearing him. His shaking hands moved over the smooth metal of the door, trying to find the lock. He could undo a lock. Smash through it. They didn't have to let him out, he could let himself out.

Very carefully, Angelo reached to lay his hand over one of Nathan's. "Stop it, Nate. You can't get out, an' if you keep doin' that, they'll sedate you again. Or restrain you."

Nathan slammed once more into the door, the whole room shaking. There was a puff of green smoke a few feet away, followed by a lot more. "Nathan," Amelia said steadily, "do not make me teleport you into the Box. I really don't want to have to keep you in there, sedated."

"Listen to her, Nathan", Angelo said, soft and miserable. "They're only lettin' me sit in with you now 'cause you were quiet. Don't think they'd let me be in the Box."

They kept touching him. Didn't they know? What the hell had happened to carrying tasers? Nathan whirled with something approaching his usual reaction speed, although the wave of dizziness meant that his fist caught Angelo on the jaw inside of squarely in the middle of the face.

Given the difference in their sizes, that was still enough to send him tumbling head over heels. He fetched up against the opposite wall, conscious but dazed, to put a tentative hand to his jaw. "...ow."

Amelia disappeared in a puff of smoke - as did Nathan, as the green smoke curled towards him. They were gone for almost ten seconds, then back, Nathan slumping to the ground, the syringe Amelia had been carrying stuck in his arm. "I don't actually want to put him in the Box," she said crisply, removing it and crouching down beside Naathan, supporting him. "Mr. Forge is using it, after all, although that's hardly the only reason. Are you all right, Angelo?

"Yeah, it's... just a couple of bruises. I think. Is he gonna be okay?" Are you gonna let me stay with him now?

Amelia gave him an almost angry look. "None of them are going to be okay if something isn't done," she said sharply, dissolving again, along with Nathan. She reformed beside the bed, Nathan sprawled on the bed. "You can stay, at least for now, if you want. He'll be out for at least six hours."

Angelo nodded, wincing. "Then I'm stayin'. But can you tell me... is there any progress?" It really wasn't that Nathan was the only one of the psis he cared about. It was just... well.

Amelia looked up from her patient and gave him a single, sharp shake of her head. The Russian doctor had never actually managed a warm expression during her time at the mansion, but the look on her face was even more dour than usual.

He looked down, at that news, and didn't say a word.