xp_logs | Doug and Nathan, with Logan and Marie later

Doug lay back on his bed, propped up on a throw pillow as he leafed idly through a paperback. All in all, it had been a pretty good day. He had finally bit the bullet, and was talking to Marie again. A silly grin flashed over his face over how silly and stubborn he'd been. Jamie said Mr. Dayspring...Nathan, had not been by yet, so Doug was staying in the room in case he did.

He had checked the room number on the computer before coming down, but now that he was here, Nathan felt a little hesitant about this. The kid had seemed nice enough on the journals, but he was feeling somewhat loathe to hand over the recording of whatever the hell he had been saying to someone who was more or less a complete stranger. Still. Moira and Marie had both been fairly insistent about it being a good idea... Swallowing a sigh, he raised a hand and knocked on the door.

"Door's open!" Doug called. Then he realized who it probably was, and hopped off the bed to open the door more fully. "Mr. Daysp...er, Nathan. Hi. I'm Doug, I don't think we've had a chance to meet in person." Doug offered a hand cheerfully.

Nathan regarded the hand for a moment, then mustered a slight smile. "Good to meet you, Doug," he said evenly and forced himself to take the kid's hand, shake it, then release it again. "I brought the tape," he said, lifting the recorder. "I appreciate this, by the way."

Doug nodded and moved to the side, motioning Nathan into the room if he wanted to stay. "It's good to do something useful with my power. Apparently my self-esteem issues over it have been shouted down, but still. I like doing things for people. I like helping."

Nathan looked around until he spotted a chair that looked relatively sturdy. "It's a hell of a power," he said, lowering himself into the chair gratefully. Pitiful, when walking down a couple of flights of stairs winded him. "All the people telling you that in my journal were quite right."

Doug blushed slightly. "I've been working on that whole self-esteem thing lately. It's..." He waved a hand. "Something you're probably not interested in hearing about." He held the hand out. "Mind if I see the recorder?"

Nathan handed the recorder over. "It's about two minutes long," he said as Doug took it. "I sort of trail off towards the end. Not sure what that was about."

Doug nodded and wheeled his chair over to his desk, fishing out a pad and pencil. "Mind if I take some notes for both our benefit?"

"Go ahead." Nathan shook his head slowly. "It still makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck," he confessed, staring at the recorder. "I don't think I like what it implies, that I'm making enough of a connection with these people to start speaking their language spontaneously." He smiled mirthlessly. "Bad enough that I've got their damned war playing in my head."

Doug nodded. "I can imagine." He depressed the play button on the recorder and listened intently to the fluid, musical-sounding language that came out of it.

Nathan listened to it, trying to hear some sort of pattern, something familiar. This was only the second time he was hearing it; he hadn't been able to bring himself to play it back again after the first. There wasn't as much shock this time, thankfully. He could listen to it almost objectively, analyze the way it tickled at the back of his mind as if there was something there he couldn't reach, some reservoir of knowledge beyond his conscious grasp--

Doug blinked and cocked his head over his shoulder as Nathan began talking in the same musical tones. After a brief decision, he left the recorder running, figuring it might keep Nathan in whatever state he was in. He turned and listened to what Nathan was mumuring carefully.

"Nel'amriahr ve'la," Nathan heard his own voice say, softly but firmly. "Nel'ahariahr sun haladelisya." The room was blurring in his sight, and there was a voice speaking to him from somewhere in the distance, a questioning voice that sounded more curious than impatient. "Suana velheesiyah," he said, answering it. "Suana velnouri--"

Doug looked at the notes he'd been writing. "I'm not an enemy, I'm a friend. You need to help me understand. You need to show me--" Doug took a deep breath and plunged in. "~Understand what, Nathan? Show you what?~" he responded in the musical language.

"~I don't know who he is. I don't understand why you think I--~" Nathan sucked in a sharp breath at the stab of pain that went through his skull. "~Stop,~" he gritted out, angry suddenly as the voice snarled at him. "~I don't know, stab your eyes--STOP IT!~"

-Oh dear,- thought Doug. He pondered paging Doctor Mactaggart briefly, but decided to save that in case things started going really badly. "~Stop what, Nathan? What's happening to you?~"

There was a face in the front of his mind now, high cheekbones and blazing red hair. Angry. So very angry. Its teeth bared, it snapped at him, demanding. Answers. Obedience. He tried to resist, but then there was something pushing at his shields, trying to break through, and he pushed himself away desperately, not feeling the chair fall over as he lurched out of it.

"~Shit.~" Doug cursed feelingly, not realizing he was still talking in the mystery language. A very large telekinetic mercenary freaking out on him was not a good thing. He switched back to English. "Nathan. NATHAN. C'mon, snap out of it. You're not there."

Another voice, and Nathan swayed as the face in his mind's eye shattered into a thousand pieces with a noise like the scream of a raptor. His vision started to clear, but his balance was gone utterly and all he could manage to do was not fall completely on his face as his knees gave out and he sagged to the floor.

"Nathan? Nathan, you back with me?" Doug looked down at where Nathan huddled over on hands and knees.

Nathan took a shuddering breath. His head was throbbing already, and the echo of the scream--why did he think it was a scream? - was still reverberating in his ears. But his vision was starting to clear, at least a little, and he started to remember where he was. "Doug," he rasped, looking up at the kid. "I--I'm sorry, I don't know what--"

"I think hearing the language on the recording set you off on another episode, Nathan," Doug explained. He had turned the recorder off as soon as the episode had gone south. "Think you can sit down?" Doug turned the overturned chair back up.

Nathan took a deep, shuddering breath, and managed to get to his feet, holding onto the back of the chair. "I don't know what the hell that was," he said weakly. "It wasn't anything--I've never felt anything like that before."

Doug grabbed his pencil and pad. "Describe it while it's fresh? Or...if you'd rather not, that's okay too."

Nathan shivered. "I think--I don't think I can, Doug," he said, his voice wavering. "It's not--she'll see me again--" He gripped the back of the chair more tightly, trying to ignore the way the room seemed to tilt around him.

"Okay. Okay, no talking about it," Doug reassured Nathan. "Just stay here, and I will be _right_ back." He dashed from the room. "EM!"

Somewhere in the back of her head, Marie was certain that she heard one of the kids shouting for her. "...wait." She sat up, pulling her knees together and sliding to her feet.

The sudden change of mood startled Logan, -- he hadn't been paying attention to anything but the harsh sound of Marie's breathing -- but he pushed himself to his feet. "What's wrong?" he asked, and then he smelled panic rolling in waves off...someone.

Doug skidded to a halt and knocked insistently on the door. "Em?" he called, slightly out of breath.

"Doug." Marie pulled her robe around her and stepped around Logan. She was at the door in a few strides and flung it open. She was dishevelled and flushed, brow furrowed with concern. "What's wrong, honey?"

Logan took a slow, deep breath. The smell of panic was easier to focus on than the smell of Marie and he quickly adjusted himself and turned around, trying not to look too conspicuous as he wiped at his mouth.

Except that conspicuous had a lower threshold for someone who could read body language. Hastily drawn bathrobe, Logan's adjustment, the bite marks on Marie's neck... "Oh god." Doug blushed furiously. "Sorry, I didn't mean to..." He swallowed and got back on track. "Nathan. My room. Another episode."

"Oh, God." Marie slipped past Doug and flew towards his room. "Page Moira, /now/," she called over her shoulder. "Nathan?" she said gently as she entered Doug's room. The man stood clutching the back of a chair, eyes fixed on the floor between his feet. "Nathan, it's Marie. I'm going to help you upstairs."

Logan watched Marie leave and looked around for her phone. When he found it, he quickly dialed the number for Moira's pager and left a numeric message with the emergency code and Nathan's room number, then hung up.

Doug folded his arms across his chest in a subconscious gesture of protection, and watched Logan very carefully. If his posture even hinted at violence, Doug was gone. "Sorry," he murmured.

Marie interposed herself between Nathan and the chair, shifting his hands to grip her shoulders instead. "It's okay," she said soothingly. "Don't move at all." Once she was set, she put her hands on his waist and lifted them both just enough that her feet barely brushed the ground. Nathan was still conscious but barely, his body rigid with the effort of remaining in this world.

Logan turned toward Doug, raising one eyebrow, and shrugged. "We'll finish later."

Doug blushed even further. "Right. I guess I'll just be going then. Again, sorry about interrupting." He walked back to his room, cleaning up his papers and setting the recorder aside for tomorrow.

Marie had Nathan out of the room easily enough and was taking him up the stairs, listening to him murmur with great interest. "Mother, eh?" she said softly as she rose straight to the third floor. "I'll make sure to tell Moira."

Logan watched Doug leave and shrugged again, then walked out of Marie's room, closing the door behind himself and heading upstairs.

The door to Nathan's room was open and Marie could tell he was struggling to talk to her. "Don't say anything, Nathan," she said firmly. "You're fine, and I"m fine, and Moira's coming." Hearing the doctor's name brought a flicker of relief to Nathan's eyes. His hand dug into Marie's shoulders so hard that the skin there was starting to bruise already. "Here, baby." She made to lie him down in his bed, ever so gently.

Prying Nathan's hands off of her shoulders was impossible without her gloves on. She could hear Logan's footsteps in the hall and waited for him to appear in the doorway. "Can you..." she tilted her head to indicate Nathan's white-knuckled grip on her shoulders. At least now that he was lying down he could focus on her face and Marie gave him a gentle smile. "You're fine, honey," she assured him.

Logan nodded and walked into the room. He carefully removed Nathan's hands from Marie's shoulders, trying not to hurt either one of them in the process. "That better?" he murmured quietly.

"Thanks. I think I hear Moira coming." Marie pulled blankets around Nathan and tucked him in tightly. "It's okay, baby," she said gently "Moira's here and you're going to be fine." She stepped out of the way to let Moira through. "I'll send Doug up to tell you what happened, Moira. I just got him upstairs. He hung on really well."

"Aye," Moira nodded and waved Marie away, all her attention on Nathan. "Sen' 'im up when 'e can come. Thanks, Marie."

"No problem, Moira." Marie took Logan by the hand and they slipped out of the room.