xp_logs | Marie-Ange and Nathan, Tuesday afternoon

As he promised, Nathan finds Marie-Ange, so that they can discuss what happened with Manuel. He extracts a promise that Angie will talk to the Professor or Emma. The beginnings of meditaitive techniques are taught.

Marie-Ange sat in her usual window seat, methodically sorting through her cards, separating out the Major Arcana from the Minor Arcana, and the Court cards. It helped her nerves to let the slick pieces of paper slide through her fingers into tidy piles in front of her, ordering themselves into categories without her having to pay direct attention.

Nathan lingered at the doorway for a moment, watching her. She was clearly anxious, and his mouth twisted a little as he reflected that he should have been a little more careful with his responses to her last night. Especially if what he thought had happened had actually happened.

"Hey, Angie," he said quietly, moving into the sunroom, hands in his pockets as he concentrated on maintaining his best unthreatening posture. "This a good time to talk?"

"No?" Marie-Ange shook her head, but sat up and faced the door, at least giving Nathan some of her attention, if she couldn't quite meet his eyes. She had expected him eventually, but it did not mean she was looking forward to the talk.

"I do.. not think any time would be good to talk, but I should talk anyway." She shrugged, and looked up, starting to nervously fidget with the card still in her hand.

He smiled faintly, sitting down in one of the armchairs. It was close enough that they wouldn't be shouting at each other across the room, but far enough to give her a little bit of space. "Recognizing that you need to do something you don't want to do is a definite sign of maturity," he said, a bit wryly. "Angie, I'm not here to badger you into it. I'm just worried."

"No, I know I should talk, I just do not know where to start. Doug had an idea, about what happened, and I am not sure if he is right, but I cannot see another reason for it." Angie's words came out almost all at once, as if she was trying to get as much said as possible before she changed her mind. She leaned back against the window and closed her eyes, trying to let out some of the tension already starting to creep into her limbs.

"Why don't you tell me what Doug's idea was?" Nathan suggested. He was already fairly sure he knew what had happened, if not the specific circumstances. Angie's reaction on the journals had been telling, and if Manuel was inexperienced enough to do dangerous things with a link to one girl, why not another?

Marie-Ange let out a ragged breath. "Doug .. thinks that Manuel and I had our powers react badly to each other. Before break, that Wednesday, because .. I got very upset at the things that Kwannon said, and I am not sure what happened, only Manuel was there, and he tried to .. I am .. I do not know -what- he tried to do. "

Nathan leaned forward, hands on his knees. "Describe it to me?" he asked seriously. "What it felt like, I mean."

"It felt like Manuel was trying to make me use my powers. There.. there was a ... " Angie scrunched up her face, trying to figure out how best to describe it. Her powers just were, she wasn't sure there was any way to explain how she used them any more than she could explain how she could walk or write or speak.

"It hurt, more than usual, and then it stopped, and Manuel was running away." She shook her head, and frowned. "I am not sure how to explain the rest. It sounds like I am insane."

Running off to pound Manuel into the ground was not going to be productive, Nathan reminded himself, leaning back in his chair. "The whole situation is insane, really," he said calmly. "So how about you try to put the rest of it into words without worrying about my reaction?"

Angie mentally smacked herself for being a clod. Nathan was the -last- person who would be judgmental about her seeing things. She hoped.

"When Manuel did whatever it was that he did, I saw a girl with him. It might been just before he tried anything, though. I am not certain. It upset him a lot, I think that is why he .. did... whatever it was. After, I saw colors. I do not know how to explain it better than that. It was like .. fabric, or ribbons of cellophane." She said, with several pauses while she struggled for the right words, or at least, the words that felt the least wrong.

"His powers," Nathan said slowly. "You were seeing through his eyes. What he sees, when he uses his empathy."Marie-Ange nodded slowly. That news wasn't exactly a surprise. "He mentioned the colors once or twice. I.. .. it is what happened Thursday morning that.. bothers me most, I think. Wednesday night, I think Doug stayed to make sure I slept, because he was there when I woke up Thursday.. "

She waited barely a moment, just enough to take a breath, and to make sure Nathan wasn't going to give the look of Doom about Doug staying the night before continuing. "That morning, Rahne and Clarice had left already, and .. when I woke, at first I thought I had gotten tangled in my blanket.. " She leaned back, looking at the ceiling and sighed. "Except that it was not a blanket, and it faded when I woke up completely, and it felt like the same .. things . that my images are made of, and even when it faded, I could still almost see it, and I do not understand how that could happen, or what it meant or ... "

Nathan closed his eyes for a moment, needing to block out the sight of her for a moment, so that he didn't give into the urge to murder Manuel messily for what he saw in her eyes. "How long did it last?"

Angie thought back, trying to remember exactly when she'd started feeling 'normal' - as normal as she ever felt - that day. It had definitely been after lunch, because Doug had made her eat, even though the food looked wrong, and she hadn't gone to any class except Biology, and by Biology, it had mostly faded.

"Most of that Thursday. I know that I was not seeing colors while I was in Biology, because I am not sure I could have kept that from Dr. MacTaggart," she said, thoughtfully. "It was definitely over when I packed for break. "

Nathan opened his eyes again, studying her closely. "It does sound like he linked with you," he said, unable to quite keep the edge out of his voice. He only hoped Angie would realize it wasn't directed at her.

Marie-Ange let out a long sigh. "It.. isn't going to come back and .. make me suddenly ... .. " She hesitated, reluctant to speak her thoughts, to put reality into what she feared.

"Can he use the link? Now? Or.. ever, if he gets the other part of his power back?"

He leaned forward in the chair again, meeting her eyes as levelly as he could. "I don't know," he said frankly. "I'm not much of a telepath, Angie. What you need to do is talk to Professor Xavier or Ms. Frost, tell them what happened. They're much better equipped to figure out precisely what happened and to stop it from happening again." He smiled faintly. "I promise you, though, he can't do anything to you with that dampener on."

"I know I need to tell them. I .. do know. I just ... " Angie sighed. It was impossible to explain why she didn't want to tell them. She shifted in her seat, and began fidgeting. "I do not want him to be able to do that again, but they will ask questions that I do not know I want to answer."

"It was a shitty thing to have happen to you," Nathan said quietly. "I can understand not wanting to relive it any more than necessary, but you do need to make sure you're all right."

Doomed. That was definitely a feeling of being doomed. It didn't take precognition to recognize it for what it was. "I don't have much of a choice now, I suppose." she said, quietly.

"Remember what I said about recognizing that you need to do something you don't want to do?" he reminded her gently.

Marie-Ange smirked - an expression at odds with the rest of her demeanor . "Maturity is overrated." She offered, then leaned back against the window. "I will. Just not today."

"Just promise me you won't wait too long," Nathan said, and then tilted his head at her. "If you want, I could try and teach you some of those meditative techniques. It might take your mind off other things." Hell, it might even help her state of mind.

"I promise.. and.. yes, that.. um. Yes. please.. " Marie-Ange nodded, then fell silent. It couldn't hurt to learn them, it might help, and it would definitely give her something to think about that was not Manuel de la Rocha and how much of a plague he was.

Nathan slid out of the chair and to the floor, crossing his legs. He beckoned Angie to join him. "They're not all that complicated," he said, falling naturally into the sort of teaching manner he had used with so many trainees over the years. "One of the program instructors adapted some techniques for me, when I was having some trouble coping with my precog always being 'on'." It had been during training, so almost twenty years ago...

Marie-Ange raised her eyebrows in surprise, then shrugged, and sat on the floor, crossing her legs carefully under her long skirt. She tilted her head, watching Nathan and listening intently.

"Precognition is basically a psionic ability," he went on. "Our perceptions are expanded, but they're also unstuck in time, so to speak. We're attuned to a--frequency, for lack of a better word, that we really shouldn't be able to access." He laid his hands on his knees, squaring his shoulder, and smiled across at her. "Close your eyes," he said lightly.

She did, though it took a bit of willpower to keep from reopening them. Angie felt just a bit silly - though not half as much as she did at other times, so this couldn't be that bad, she thought.

"Just concentrate on breathing deeply, and listen to my voice," Nathan said, deliberately slowing down the pace of his words, altering the rhythm. It wasn't quite hypnosis, but it was close enough for government work. "Whatever happens, you're still in the sunroom, Angie. If you want to open your eyes at any moment, you can." She didn't, though, so he continued. "Imagine you're sitting in front of a mirror," he said. "There's another you there, your twin in every way."

Marie-Ange tilted her head slightly, silently listening. She inhaled, filling her lungs slowly, and then let it out, over a few breaths, matching her breathing to the cadence of Nathan's voice. She let her imagination drift, picturing the floor-length mirror in her room, and her reflection in it.

"Push the perspective out," Nathan said, watching her face closely, monitoring her mental state just as closely. "Expand the distance between you and the mirror, until you can just barely tell that it's still you."

The image in Angie's mind fell back, as though she were moving, rather than pushing the mirror image away. The mirror, its frame, the seated posture of her imaginary duplicate remained unchanged, but her thoughts kept draping her twin in folds of blue cloth, like robes. She felt her lungs tighten, and concentrated on keeping her breathing and thoughts even, regardless of her wavering concentration.

Nathan tilted his head, intrigued by the images she was projecting. "You want her to be separate from you," he said, trying to analyze the impressions he was getting. "Part of you doesn't feel like she can be your twin?"

"I do not know." Angie said quietly. She thought she knew the image, the folds of blue cloth, the posture, but not quite. The feeling of recognition was fleeting - just the barest sense of 'You know this." before it faded.

"Open your eyes, Angie," Nathan said, and waited until she did before he went on, in a more normal voice. "Not bad for a first time," he said with an encouraging smile. "The other you... what I was trying to get you to do was a form of dissociation, to separate the part of you that's perceiving the future form the rest of your consciousness. You were definitely on to something there, but I don't think we ought to push it too far until you've gotten checked out."

Marie-Ange nodded thoughtfully, still half-musing over the picture her mind had provided for her. That was going to nag at her until she figured out why she recognized it.

"Thank you." She finally said, remembering her manners.

Nathan shrugged, still smiling. "Mull it over a little," he suggested. "We can try it again, whenever you'd like."

Angie smiled, and unfolded herself from the floor. "I .. should go do homework.. and maybe see if I can talk myself into writing Ms. Frost or Professor Xavier an email." She stood, and gathered up the cards on the window seat, and made her way to the door.

Nathan watched her go, the smile lingering until she was safely gone, at which point it fell right off his face. He would wait, give her the chance to address the problem herself. If not, he'd have to talk to Frost or Xavier himself.

And there, of course, there was Manuel. A problem for another time, he thought with a sigh, pushing himself up off the floor.