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Nathan goes looking for Angelo, hoping to track down Amanda's pendant. Nathan proceeds to very carefully and skillfully be an utter bastard towards Angelo. Angelo loses it. The desired effect is achieved.

Angelo was, once again, spending his "study" period watching television. He knew he probably ought to do some work, but he'd been doing okay in classes, and he didn't really feel like it. So there he was, feet drawn up underneath him, watching daytime TV.

It didn't take Nathan long to track the boy down. All of the work he'd been doing with Charles was having a definite sharpening effect on his telepathy, and Angelo, given his mental state since arriving back from Los Angeles, was hard to miss. Lingering at the door of the rec room, taking the opportunity to observe Angelo for a moment before announcing his presence, Nathan didn't particularly like what he saw.

"There are better ways to rot your brain," he finally said, dryly, as he moved forward into the room. "Ways that are a lot more fun, in any case."

Angelo glanced round at the sound of his voice, waving lazily. "Yeah, but I'm not allowed to use them", he pointed out. "Underage an' all."

Nathan raised an eyebrow. "Let's not start that again," he said, ambling over to the couch and sitting down at the far end, leaving enough space between him and Angelo that the boy hopefully wouldn't feel crowded. "The subject seems to do unfortunate things to my blood pressure."

Angelo shrugged, not bothering to mention that Nate had brought it up. "Fair enough. How're you doin', with the visions?"

Nathan snorted, catching the thought. "There are ways to rot your brain that don't involve chemicals," he pointed out, shifting a bit restlessly. "I should lend you a Clancy novel. Get you hooked while you're still at an impressionable age." It struck him that he'd ignored Angelo's question - this was part of the problem with developing his telepathy; he kept responding to the non-vocalized things - and he shrugged. "Fine. New developments. Weird, but much less falling over."

Angelo nodded. "Well, that's gotta be good, right? The fallin' over sounded like it was startin' to get really bad."

"Yes, the whole cardiac arrest thing was no fun." Nathan fell silent, his eyes narrowing a little as he watched Angelo. Someone clearly needed to talk to the kid about what had happened with Rack, but he wasn't sure he was the best person for the job. Especially given that he was still a little pissed at both Angelo and Amanda for going off on their own like that, good intentions be damned. It was probably best to stick to the issue at hand. "Anyhow, Angelo," Nathan said calmly, "I didn't come looking for you to chat." Angelo stiffened, but Nathan ignored the reaction and went on. "You don't know what happened to Amanda's pendant, do you?"

Angelo blinked. "Oh. Yeah, she gave it to me for keepin'. It's right here." He dipped a hand into his pocket and produced it. "Why d'you ask?" he said, a little puzzled.

"She needs it," Nathan said, taking it from him and coiling the chain carefully. "At least, I think she probably does. The way she explained it to me back when she first got it, it moderates her withdrawal symptoms."

Angelo paled, just slightly, and said hastily, "I didn't know that. I thought it just limited how much power she could take in... she gave it to me 'cause she thought she'd need more than it'd let her have."

"It does that too," Nathan said, noting Angelo's reaction, again. "But I think its other function is the important one at the moment."

Angelo nodded. "Yeah, of course. Is she... is she not doin' so good, then? I remember when she was withdrawin', before... but I thought it wouldn't be so bad with her bein' unconscious..."

"Let's not take the chance," Nathan said a bit brusquely. He had no intention of telling Angelo anything about his trip into Amanda's head. "It's here, it could help... but I'll give it to the doctors and let them make the final decision."

Angelo nodded sadly. "I'd've got it to her sooner, if I'd known..." he muttered, almost to himself.

"Oh, knock it off," Nathan said irritably, knowing he was being a little on the uncharitable side. "You didn't know, and even if you did, you weren't thinking clearly. Funny, but traumatic experiences will do that to you."

Angelo blinked up at him, confused by the mix of irritation and sympathy. "Yeah, I guess", he said a little hesitantly, trying to work out what to make of it.

Nathan eyed him for a moment, wrestling with conflicting instincts. It wasn't a good idea to kick anyone when they were down, let alone a kid who wasn't all that stable in the first place, but damn it, sometimes a kick in the ass was necessary. "Must've been hard," he said, carefully measuring his words. "Being there, but being useless..."

Angelo nodded, eyes shuttering. "Yeah. It was", he answered flatly. "Been there once before, an' it doesn't get easier."

Nathan rubbed at the smooth crystal of the pendant, his eyes narrowing a little. "Tough shit," he said finally, very calmly.

Angelo glanced up, a little startled, but back on more familiar ground - to him - so more confused at the apparent about-turn than surprised. "What?"

"Tough shit," Nathan said again, simply. "What you went through. This time, and all the others. But you need to stop feeling sorry for yourself." He went on before Angelo could react to his words. "So you weren't able to do anything. You were unequipped, and both you and she were stupid. Well-meaning idiots, but idiots. But you, at least, came out of it intact in body and mind. You have no business inflicting all this damage on yourself after the fact."

Angelo looked up at him, and there was something very vulnerable in his eyes - a glimpse of old pain and grief - just for a moment before he glanced back down. He said nothing, suspecting "I'm sorry" wasn't going to be enough, but not knowing what else to say.

"You deal with it and you move on," Nathan said in that same even voice. "Even if you don't deal with it well, you still have to move on. Because even if you're in a place like this, where the people give you every chance in the world, every helping hand they can, it all comes down to you in the end, Angelo. Your decision, whether to wallow in your pain and throw away everything that's being given to you, or to shake it off and carpe the fucking diem."

"I don't know how to deal with it at all", Angelo said dully, still looking down. "It used to be so much easier than this, so simple - you let it distract you, you'd be dead next fight you got into. An' there would be a next fight, there always was. Doesn't work like that anymore."

"I weep for you," Nathan said, a bit of the irritation creeping back into his voice. "What a burden, to have the opportunity to live your life without death waiting for you around the corner. Freedom is such a crushing burden."

"You're missin' the point", Angelo retorted, finally showing a spark of life. "It's not about the freedom, it's about the... adjustment. My whole life, I've been dealin' with things one way. An' it doesn't work anymore... an' I don't know any other way to try."

"Again, boo-fucking-hoo, kid," Nathan said with a smile that was more a baring of teeth than anything else. Good, so there was a little spirit in there after all. He'd almost begun to give up on that. "I doubt you've tried very hard. After all, the sulking and self-flagellation is just so much easier."

Angelo's eyes flashed, before he visibly pushed the anger back down and responded levelly, "I've been goin' to my sessions with Samson. Been talkin' to Marie. Been doin' what I can t'find other ways, it just seems t'be takin' a while."

"And how determined are you to find those other ways?" Nathan countered, his voice steely. "How tightly are you holding onto those helping hands, Angelo, when at the first opportunity you start talking about how you're so perfectly willing to get the hell out of Dodge if anyone wants you to go?" Nathan snorted. "Not to mention trying to take people to task for their reactions to that. We talked about this the last time, didn't we? You don't live in a vacuum, Angelo." Ease back a little, Nathan told himself, analyzing the impressions he was getting from the kid. He wanted to provoke him to let some of that anger out, rather than turning it in on himself. It was a delicate line to be walking.

He had, indeed, gone just a little too far to the wrong side of the line, as evidenced by Angelo's face going blank again while he tried to force back the guilt that was only too quick to rush to the surface. "I didn't mean it like that", he offered lamely. "An' it wasn't "people's" reactions, it was Marko's."

"Nice move there," Nathan complimented him sarcastically. "You avoided the real question very smoothly. Then again, you've had a lot of practice, haven't you?"

"You could say that", Angelo answered quietly, still struggling with the guilt but helped by Nathan's presence, which provided a distraction. "An' I am tryin'. That week or so, though, before I went away... it was harder'n usual. Goin' back..."

"Stop stewing," Nathan growled. "For pity's sake, boy, how do you ever expect to get over things if you do nothing but obsess about them? There's a difference between sorting things out in your own mind and self-pitying navel-gazing."

Angelo opened his mouth to argue, then stopped to actually think about what Nathan had said. He nodded, a little reluctantly. "I do know that much. But it's not always that easy to tell when I'm crossin' the line, 'specially since..." He shrugged. "There's more bad memories than one back there. The whole idea of goin' back was to start sortin' things out, an' I was scared as all hell", he admitted frankly.

"And?" Nathan asked, a bit more testily. "You think you're the only one scared of your past, Angelo? This is not something unique to you. Perspective is a good thing."

"I never said I was", Angelo responded, a little snappishly. "Was just tryin' to explain myself a bit."

Ah-hah, Nathan thought, and took the opening. "No," he said more levelly, "you were trying to justify the wallowing."

Angelo stared at him, willing the rising anger back down with minimal success. "An' where is it written that that's so wrong? I'm not allowed to dwell when I have a reason? What, exactly, do you know about my life that lets you judge my reaction to goin' back there, Nathan?"

"You have your head up your ass, and you like it there," Nathan said with deliberate bluntness, hoping that Angelo, at some point in the future, would appreciate this. It really wasn't a whole lot of fun. "That much, I know."

Angelo scowled. "Then you don't know as much as you think you do. Want to know the gory details? 'Cause I'll tell you the whole thing if you'll listen, start to finish."

Nathan leaned back, spreading his hands wide in invitation. "Sure," he drawled. "I'd hate to think I was according you any less pity than you deserve."

Angelo glared. "You can keep your pity", he snapped. "I just want to think that maybe, you understand." He sat back and swallowed a little, preparing to begin.

"Five years old, my father bled to death in front of me", he started flatly. "Stabbed by a fuckin' addict for his weddin' ring. Managed to get home, but he didn't last 'til the ambulance got there. Mom was too busy tryin' to stop the bleedin' to get me where I couldn't see. When I turned six, not long after, the gang started lettin' me run errands for them 'cause they knew we'd lost half the money we'd had comin' in. Got my first knife then, an' got in my first fight."

He paused for a moment to draw breath before continuing his litany. "Eight years old, got hurt for the first time bad enough to scar. Nine, got given my first gun an' taught to shoot it, 'cause I was doin' bigger errands for the gang then an' they needed me to be able t'defend myself. A month later, shot at someone for the first time. Ten years old, shot at someone for the first time an' actually hit them - didn't kill them, though."

He closed his eyes, working up to one of the most painful episodes. "Fourteen, got inducted into the gang. Lay still an' didn't flinch while they cut the mark into my shoulder without painkillers. This mark." He pulled the collar of his T-shirt aside to show Nate as much of it as he could. "Not long after... I killed one of my friends, in a situation where it was my life or his - or, well, his life or both of ours, really. First time I ever killed anyone. He wasn't the threat, another gang was, but they gave me a choice, an' I was terrified. I killed him so they'd let me go." He took a couple of deep calming breaths before going on.

He got up and paced a little, and when he was ready to continue, his voice was flat and emotionless - he'd always found that made it easier to talk about. "Sixteen, I manifested, an' the closest I ever had to brothers tried to kill me. They beat me to my knees an' gave me a "trial" first, made me beg. An' when they'd heard enough, one of 'em slammed me over the back of the head with my own gun, then they stole a handy car, put me in it an' set it on fire. Woke up with my hands still tied an' had to hold them in the flames to burn them free an' get myself out. Spent my seventeenth birthday on the street, suckin' off a guy in a doorway for five dollars an' a bit later, gettin' fucked up against a wall for the price of a good hot meal. Two weeks later, Scott found me an' brought me here. An' the rest is history."

Placing the pendant carefully in his pocket - he didn't want anything to happen to it - Nathan got up and went over to Angelo, ignoring the way the kid flinched at his approach. He stopped a step away, giving him a good, long look. Angelo had been projecting all kinds of things during his outburst, thoughts and images so vivid that it had been a struggle not to react.

"And?" he asked, very calmly.

Angelo turned to look at him, eyes distant. "What d'you mean?" he asked.

"Well," Nathan said in his best faux-reasonable voice, not wanting to say what he was about to say, but fully aware of the fact that Angelo was still a good step away from the line he so badly needed to cross. "I'm waiting for the part that justifies you feeling so sorry for yourself."

Angelo stared at him, not wanting to believe Nathan had really just said that. "You... what?"

Do it, Nathan told himself angrily. Backing away now was not an option. "I think you heard what I said," he repeated calmly. "Explain it a little further? I'm still not clear on why you have no spine."

Angelo gaped at him, eyes wide, then his face hardened and, without a word, he clenched one fist and slugged Nathan as hard as he could.

It was a decent punch, actually. Something easy on the jaw would be called for at lunch. Nathan let that one connect, and let the kid get another couple in - this was all about accomplishing something, after all - before he blocked the next. He grabbed Angelo's wrist, twisting his arm up behind his back and pushing him in the direction of the pool table. Angelo stumbled, just as he had expected, and Nathan pinned him rather carefully against the table, face-down. "Now," he said with some difficulty, rubbing at his jaw with his free hand. His side ached from Angelo's second punch; somehow, the kid had gone right for those still-healing ribs. "Please tell me that made you feel better, because I really don't like eating my meals through straws."

Angelo, still raging mad, struggled against his grip with everything he had for a little while, before realizing the futility of that, being considerably smaller than Nathan, and going limp, letting out something like a sob of anger and frustration.

Nathan waited for that before he eased his grip. Not entirely, but enough so that Angelo wouldn't feel quite as trapped. "You need to get angry," he said quietly. "At the world, at the people who did those things to you - hell, at me if you want. But you can't keep turning it all on yourself, Angelo," he said with calm conviction, "or you will never get past it."

Angelo didn't move, except to bring up his free arm to rub angrily at his eyes. "I know you're right", he acknowledged quietly. "I just don't know how t'stop."

Nathan contemplated the impressions he was getting telepathically, and then, after another moment, let go of the kid, taking a careful step back. "I can't give you the answers, but I can give you an option," he said as Angelo straightened up, rubbing at his shoulder. "Come find me. When you feel yourself about to fall off the edge into that pit, before you do that - " he looked pointedly at Angelo's arm, where he knew, just from what he'd sensed, there were cigarette burns, " - come and find me. We'll go find someplace private, and you can do your almighty best to use me as your personal punching bag." He smiled tightly, but couldn't keep the determination or the compassion out of his voice as he went on. "I can't guarantee you'll have much luck at it, but by God, you will learn something trying, and at least you'll be getting some of that anger out of your system before it really does poison you."

Angelo nodded with a weak smile, eyes still bright with the tears he was trying to resist. He hadn't cried for a very long time... "Gotta be worth a try. Thanks."

Nathan felt his jaw clench as Angelo's pained thoughts washed up against his shields. "I didn't mean it, you know," he said roughly. "About you not having a spine. You wouldn't have made it this far if you weren't tougher than any kindly God would have expected you to be."

Another nod, smile still holding, even if it was starting to wobble slightly. "Okay."

"Angelo," Nathan said, more gently. "I just don't want to see you wind up like me twenty years down the road." He bit his lip and then opened up his shields, projecting very carefully, offering it to Angelo without forcing it on him. Why he'd said what he'd said, why he was doing this... and even, more hesitantly, a smattering of his own memories, the cult and Mistra and how he was still struggling with the choices Angelo had an opportunity to make in the here and now...

Angelo's eyes widened as he received what Nathan wanted to send him, and he turned his face away, trying and failing to bite back another sob.

Nathan bit his lip and then reached out to the boy, enfolding him in an awkward hug. So not good at this, he thought, pained. "I'm an expert at living in the past," he muttered. "Just about wrecked my life, doing it. Don't be me, okay?"

Angelo nodded, not trusting himself to speak, then suddenly discovered that the tears had got the better of him anyway - he was just too tired and overstretched to fight them anymore. "Okay", he whispered.

"~It'll be all right, little brother,~" Nathan murmured in Askani, but didn't bother translating. He knew the words weren't important at the moment.

Angelo nodded again, understanding the intent of the words if not their literal meaning. He sighed and let himself cry for the first time in years, drawing an odd comfort from it that he'd never expected.