xp_logs | Marie-Ange and Nathan, late Tuesday afternoon

Nathan goes to find Marie-Ange to talk to her about what he suspects she had to do on Sunday. She manages to vocalize what's going on in her head. He pushes her a little, thinking she needs to get angry, then comforts her. They finish, rather than start, with small-talk.

Doug's room was, she thought, the best place for her to relax and recover. Except that Doug was asleep, hopefully napping, and wacky sleep schedule or not, sleeping at three in the afternoon on a bright nearly-summar day was not a good idea. So, Marie-Ange did the next best thing. She wandered down to the sunroom, curled up with a book randomly grabbed from one of Doug's piles, and lounged in the sun. The book wasn't really helping. The sun -was-, or at least, for the first time in a few days, Marie-Ange no longer felt like she was freezing to death.

Nathan managed to catch himself on the doorway, biting back a curse. This one-crutch thing really wasn't working all that way, even with his telekinesis. Angie, curled up in a chair, looked up at him, and Nathan gave her a rather strained smile. "Hey," he said, and gave up on the whole walking idea, levitating himself over to the chair across from hers instead. "You'd think I could manage that a little better by now."

Marie-Ange watched Nathan cross the floor, blinking at the display of his power. "The .. walking, or the floating in a very spooky fashion across the floor?" she asked, quietly, putting a slip of paper in her book to mark the place.

"The floating's easy." Well, not really. His head was throbbing from the effort, even as he lowered himself into the chair. "Walking is the challenge. I don't have two good arms to operate crutches properly."

"Dr. MacTaggart is letting you walk around?" Angie asked, a ghost of a smile on her face. She was almost certain that if the situation was her, and Doug was on crutches, he would not be wandering around. Even if he could float around in a spooky manner.

"Been lying flat on my back for entirely long enough," Nathan said with a sigh, slouching in the chair. "Have to start getting mobile again at some point. Might as well be now."

"Mobile is good.." Marie-Ange said, fidgeting with her hair, the book in her lap, and a pencil that had been previously tucked into her braid. "There.. are not any lingering, um, side-effects, and you are going to be okay?"

"From Jamie's evil twin's poison glove? Apparently not. They just kept me in overnight for observation. My pain meds and the curare interacted not-so-well, but it takes more than that to do me in." Nathan watched, a calm, assessing gaze. "How about you, Angie? Any lingering effects?"

Marie-Ange shrugged. "Not sleeping, but that is normal for me, I suppose." she answered, a bit dully. "Tired, and ... " She slid down in the chair a little more, and sighed. "Just tired."

Nathan tilted his head, studying her. Time for something a little more blunt, he decided. "So how are you feeling?" he asked just as calmly. "About your first kill, I mean."

"How? How did you know?" Marie-Ange barely got the question out coherantly, and even then, it was just barely audible. "I.. do not want to think about it, because if I think about it, I keep -seeing- it."

"I saw it in your eyes in the medlab on Sunday night," Nathan said very softly. "And I imagine you're probably still thinking about it, still seeing it. Even when you try not to."

"Nightmares. About him not being Jamie's evil dupe, right before he dies." Marie-Ange started to fidget with her book again, then gripped it tightly. "About pushing the swords with my own hands, about ... " She shook her head. "I didn't even know, when I did it..."

"Heat of the moment," Nathan said gently. "You acted instinctively."

"I.. didn't know what happened when a.. when one of those dupes died.." Marie-Ange shook her head firmly. "I did not know that they fell apart when you knocked them out, and I didn't even try to do that."

"And if you had?" he inquired. "What difference would that have made? What choice did you have?"

Marie-Ange let out several breaths before answering. "i .. do not know. I could have at least tried to stop him. I .. " She looked down at the floor, and sighed. "All I could think about was that he had killed you, and Alison, and that he was going to hurt Doug, and I did not even stop to think about it."

"You have good instincts, Angie. You did well," Nathan said very carefully, knowing it was precisely the wrong thing to say, the thing she didn't want to hear, but saying it anyway.

"Well?" Marie-Ange stared in horror at Nathan. "Nathan, I -killed- him. If he hadn't dissolved into a puddle of icky mess, he would be a dead body in the medlab. How is that doing -well-? I made someone dead. Even if it wasn't really a someone, I -wanted- him dead."

"An enemy, Marie-Ange," Nathan said coolly. "Someone who was threatening you and people you care about."

For many seconds, all Marie-Ange could do was make small half-sounds and gape. Finally, after opening her mouth several times to speak, and failing, she blinked, shook herself, and made a fist with her free hand. "And Doug still managed to knock him out, even if he was taunting him. I could have done something, I could have made another wall or hit him with the flat part of a sword, or .. anything but sticking him full of swords like some kind of pincushion!" As she spoke, her voice raised in anger.

Good, Nathan thought, hearing the building anger, seeing it in her eyes. "But you didn't," he said bluntly. "You went for the kill. He was taunting you, threatening Doug, making you think he had already killed, and so you put him down." He shook his head, rubbing briefly at his temple. Her unsettled mental state was getting to him a little more than he had expected. "When I was still working for the government, I had senior trainees who couldn't react as swiftly and decisively as that. So yes, Angie, you did well."

"Nathan! What is -wrong- with you? I just told you I killed someone, because he told me you were dead, and you tell me I did a good thing?" Marie-Ange stared openly at him, and shook her head. "I -killed- him. I made ten swords from a card, and they went right into his back, and he -died-. And I did not know he would turn into goo when I did it, and I am not sure I would have cared either way at the time!"

Nathan leaned forward in his chair. "What if you had tried to knock him out," he asked levelly, "and hadn't succeeded? If he'd gotten you with that glove, that would have left Doug to fight alone. What would have happened then, Angie?"

"What if? What if I had not gotten any cards, or he had made more than one dupe, or Doug had not gotten the other one in a headlock?" Marie-Ange dug her fingernails into her leg to keep from making a fist. "I do not know what would have happened. I don't know. Doug might have gotten hurt, or he might have knocked out the other dupe or ... I don't know. Killing him didn't even do any good, he just made another not-Jamie."

"Are you getting some idea of how futile it is to second-guess yourself?" Nathan asked patiently, the words more gentle this time.

"I still killed." Marie-Ange said, in a quiet voice. "I do not know what else I could have done, but there had to be something other than that." She slumped down completly in the chair, and fidgeted with her hands. "There is a reason it is a mortal sin."

Oh, well, there was a conversational brick wall if he ever saw one. Still, he wasn't about to walk away. "I was fifteen years old," Nathan said slowly, "the first time I killed someone. It was a training misson. I was under orders to walk up to a man on the street in Los Angeles and shoot him."

Marie-Ange stopped - breathing, speaking, fidgeting, even blinking for a few seconds, while she processed this. She considered several responses, before reverting to simply blinking and swearing under her breath quietly.

"He got out of his car," Nathan said quietly, his eyes going briefly distant. "A businessman, something like that. I walked down the street towards him, pulled the gun out of my shoulder holster. I pretended to bump into him, pressed the gun against his chest, and fired. Then I ran." He focused on Angie again, smiling very faintly. "I got back to base and threw up on my instructor's shoes. He told me, very calmly, that I had to forget guilt. That I had to be able to kill without feeling, or I would be a liability. Then he beat me so badly that I was in the hospital wing for a week."

"And... you are telling me this.. so I will not feel as bad?" Marie-Ange asked, trying to hide the fear and disgust in her voice and almost -but not quite- managing it. "I do not understand."

"No," Nathan said softly. "I never did forget guilt, Angie. That's what I'm telling you." He relaxed back into the chair, sighing a little. "But I didn't let it cripple me, either. It's done, mi'souvra. One way or the other, it's done. You had better reason than most do to kill, but you have to decide how much your guilt is worth."

"I do not want it to cripple me. I .. " Marie-Ange sighed. "I just can't stop seeing it, over and over, and the way he looked at me - both of them, one dying, and the dupe it made, and that one looked like I had gotten his -respect-." She let out a small noise of disgust. "I did not do it to impress him!"

Nathan thought about it for a moment. "When you start seeing it," he said finally, "think of Jamie. Our Jamie. Think of how he's here and alive and relatively intact, because he had his friends backing him up. It's a loop, Angie," he said, drawing a circle in the air with his good hand. "For some reason that's the way our minds work when it comes to traumatic memories. You need to find something to break it." He felt his expression turning wistful, despite his best efforts to keep it as calm as possible. "You have numerous things that can, if you try hard and keep trying. I wish I'd had that..."

"I can try, I just do not see how it will really help. Every time I think about Jamie, I see the dupe instead. "I hate this. I didn't even stop to think about doing something -other- than making him hurt." Marie-Ange sighed, and let her head fall back, to stare up at the ceiling. "I cannot see what else I could have done to make it better, but.." Her voice caught, and she shut her eyes, trying to hold back tears. "I don't know what to think anymore. What if I am not any better than he was? He said he killed people before."

Nathan bit his lip, then floated himself up out of the chair, over to Angie. He reached out, offering her a hand as she blinked up at him.

Marie-Ange stood carefully, and then, all in one motion, buried her face in Nathan's shoulder and wrapped her arms around him. Her already cracked and worn control over her emotions completly broke, and for some time, she clung to him tightly, crying.

"I'm really sorry, Angie," he said softly, stroking her hair. "I am. I wish to hell you hadn't had to do that." Her death-grip on him tightened a little further, and he reflected that air was going to start being an issue before too much longer. #But it's all right to be angry,# he said, hoping she would understand why he had taken the conversation in the way he had. #And it's all right to find someone to hold onto and cry your eyes out, if that's what you need. You don't have to shut this away inside - you shouldn't.#

Angie's desperate clinging lessened slightly, though she continued to keep her face buried in Nathan's arm. #Talking about it -hurts-. Thinking about it hurts. I want it to go away, and I don't know how to stop remembering it.# She tilted her head up slightly, and pulled away, just enough to rub at her eyes. "I .. do not know what I need. Everyone else is just as.. they all hurt as much as I do, or are injured.." She paused, and took a step back, suddenly quite aware of Nathan's injuries.

Nathan shook his head, leaving his good arm around her shoulders. "You need to be aware that you need to answer that question," he said gently. "And that you need help just as much as the rest of us who came out of Sunday in less than sterling shape."

"I have an appointment to talk to Dr. Samson, I .. just do not even know where to start." She shrugged and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "How do I explain what I did? It sounds so .. insane to say 'I am having nightmares about killing one of my best friends, because I really did kill one of his evil twins.' " Her voice threatened to catch again, and she stopped to try to take a few deep breaths.

"You start anyway you want," Nathan said softly. "Ramble, sound insane - whatever lets you get it out." He smiled at her encouragingly. "I can guarantee you that Leonard won't look at you sideways, no matter what you say."

"I did not quite think he would, but .. " Marie-Ange shrugged again, and shook her head. "I just have no idea what to say, or how to explain, or ... I hate this. All of it. Not knowing, and feeling like this, and not sleeping and not wanting to eat, and .. "

"I know," Nathan murmured, and very tentatively hugged her again. "It will get better, Angie, I promise," he whispered. "You're not going to forget it, but it will fade into the distance. The edges will go away." He smiled. "I was going to start that Askani language group this week," he told. "It might be something to do to distract yourself, if you're still interested. Distraction isn't a solution, but it can be a help at times like this."

"Distraction would be good." Marie-Ange nodded. "And I like languages. Not as much as Doug, but .. well, no one likes languages as much as Doug does." A hint of a smile accompanied this last statement.

Nathan laughed softly. "I ought to hire him on as a TA, you think?"

"He would probably like that, actually. He taught sign language to Artie and Miles, and anyone else who sat in on the classes." She made an odd little face, scrunching her nose up, thinking for a moment. "And I think you would be less high-pressure than Ms. Frost .. at least, I hope."

"We'll have to see, won't we?" Nathan gave her his best endearing grin. "It's not as if I've done this before, after all."

"You have never taught? Or just never taught a language?" Marie-Ange asked, tilting her head a bit in curiousity. "You explained the meditation well.. I thought you had taught before."

Nathan grimaced a little. "I... did some training, back when I still worked for the government," he said slowly. "Not really teaching."

Marie-Ange grimaced, and dug a toe into the carpet for a second. "Erk. I am sorry. I .. didn't mean to remind you.."

"It's okay," he said with a chuckle, pushing the grim thoughts away. "I'm really looking forward to this, Angie. The teaching, I mean... all of it. Hope I don't suck too badly."

"You cannot -possibly- be worse than the pillock.. um.. I mean, Piotr, and we -like- you." Marie-Ange said, catching herself on the insult just a bit too late.

"Well, good," Nathan said, wisely letting the pillock business slip. "Because I like you guys too." He straightened a little, but left one hand resting on Angie's shoulder, since the physical contact seemed to be comforting to her. "It will get better," he said again, very softly. "And anytime you want to talk about it, I'm here."

For a few moments, Marie-Ange just stood quietly, the tension in her neck and back -finally- starting to ease just a little. "Thank you. For letting me ramble, and yell," she said, quietly, then added, a bit sheepishly. "And cry on you.."

"Anytime," he said again, firmly but still quietly. "I mean that." He smiled at her, floating back a little. "Do you want some time alone?" he asked, hoping the answer would be no. "We could try meditating a bit. It's not just for managing your precog, you know - it can help your mood, too."

Frowning, Marie-Ange shook her head. "I should probably check on Doug in a bit. He was going to try to get some sleep," she answered reluctantly. "He's as much of a mess as I am, and I do not think he is eating or sleeping much."

"It's a standing offer, Angie," Nathan assured her. "Take me up on it if and when you want." He cast an amused, disparaging look at the cast on his leg. "Not going anywhere too far anytime soon."

"I will. I definitely will" Marie-Ange nodded. "I think I may need to, to get through the rest of my exams." She frowned and rolled her eyes. The end of semester, it seemed, waited for nothing, not even evil twins.