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xp_logsBack at Mistra, Nathan's reconditioning takes place. Sometimes the nightmare is real.
Nathan smiled out the kitchen window at the sight of Miles and Artie chasing each other around on the lawn. Good to see them in such high spirits, he thought cheerfully, and turned his attention back to the dishwasher. Telekinesis made emptying the thing a whole lot easier, and he didn't mind doing it; it was good practice when it came to splitting his focus.
Plates and bowls, then silverware, then glasses. They all floated from the dishwasher, stowing themselves in the appropriate cupboards. All in order. Everything in order. Then he looked up through the kitchen window again, and the boys were gone.
Not just the boys. The whole fucking lawn was gone.
Nathan backed away, eyes widening. Nothing. There was nothing outside the window but blank space. "What the fuck..." he breathed, backing away. Nothingness. That was the only way to describe it, and...
The wall in front of him was torn away suddenly, the debris vanishing in an instant as it was sucked out into the blankness. "Shit!" Nathan cursed and turned, running from the kitchen. #Charles!# he called out desperately, heading for the Professor's office. There was no answer. #CHARLES!#
---
#We're in.#
#Finally. That took a lot longer than it should have. Someone's been giving him training.#
"Enough, both of you. Keep going; I want all those defenses down."
#Yes, sir.#
#Aye, sir.#
"Empath team, stand by."
---
He could feel the walls of the mansion shaking. Like an earthquake, only an earthquake didn't account for the hungry emptiness gnawing at the house, and where the fuck was the door to Charles' office? This wasn't the right hallway. Where was he?
There was the sound of a piano from up ahead and Nathan ran in that direction, not knowing what he'd find. He didn't expect it to be Shinobi, placidly playing Beethoven, his head bent over the keyboard. "Shinobi!" he said sharply. "We're under attack!"
Shinobi made a thoughtful sound and kept playing. Bewildered and more than a little angry at having been ignored, Nathan started forward, determined to grab the young man by the scruff of the neck and drag him along if need be.
Then the ceiling was torn away and the piano and Shinobi were sucked upwards into the emptiness. Nathan cried out and tried to snatch him back telekinetically, but there was nothing there, nothing to grab onto. A few last bars of the Moonlight Sonata lingered in the air, then faded.
---
#Complication...#
#I see it. Projection?#
#Must be. Some empathic intervention would be good, people...#
"All right, you heard the man. Let's start hitting him where it hurts."
---
This was insane. Since when was the Fencing Hall on the same hallway as the music room? Nathan stopped at the door, blinking at the sight of Manuel fencing apparently with his own shadow, as far as he could tell. "Manuel!" he said desperately. "We have to get out of here - something's tearing the house apart!"
The young empath glanced back over his shoulder at him, smiling cryptically and shaking his head. He went back to fencing with his shadow, and over in the corner, Amanda clapped enthusiastically, cheering him on. Nathan gritted his teeth and started forward, again...
And again, he was too late. The polished wooden floor of the Fencing Hall dropped away and Manuel was gone in a flash. Amanda floated there for a moment, looking vaguely perplexed, and then fell like a stone, vanishing into the blankness.
Nathan staggered backwards, away from the door. "No," he muttered, his mind refusing to process what he'd just see. "No, this isn't real, this isn't..."
---
"Hitting him with depression."
"Indecision from my direction. Is he still resisting?"
#Resisting, hell. He's still running.#
"Huh. Didn't expect him to be this stubborn."
"This is Cable, people. We made him that way."
---
Angie and Doug went spinning off into the void, hand in hand, grinning at each other, and a cry of denial escaped Nathan as he tried to pull them back, again, and failed. He stumbled again, holding onto the half a bannister still left, and stared, stunned, into the emptiness.
Stay here, a voice advised him coolly. Let it take you. What is running going to get you?
But there were other people in the mansion, Nathan told the voice stubbornly, pushing away from the remnants of the bannister. He needed to find them. Get them out of here. He wasn't going to lose them all, he wasn't...
---
"Oh, for the love of..."
"Told you."
#We're going to kill him if we keep this much pressure up for too much longer. We've been at it for what, six hours already? Backing off might be a good idea...#
"Failure is not an option."
#I know it's not, sir. But I don't think leaving the job half-done is an option either, is it?#
"Work more quickly, then."
#You know, subtlety isn't necessarily a bad thing...#
#What did you have in mind?#
#Let's stop letting him pick the setting, shall we?#
---
Changing. It was changing. He ran down the halls in the grip of pure terror as the house shifted around him. Old woods and warm colors shifting to dull gray and blank, cold and institutional. "Stop it," he gasped out as he ran. "This isn't right, it isn't real..."
"Isn't it?" Aliya said from behind him. Nathan staggered to a stop, turning back towards her, and his wife smiled almost pityingly at him. "Idiot," she chided softly, reaching out a hand to him. "Come on, Nate. Tyler has something he wants to show you. A picture."
Nathan shook his head slowly. "No," he said hoarsely. "No, you're..."
"Are you going to disappoint your son?" Aliya said with a sudden grin. "He'll pout at you, you know."
Nathan took a hesitant step towards her, past an open door... and froze. Inside, there were white-coated figures surrounding a gurney. One shifted to the left, and he saw Rahne lying there, looking small and lost and terrified. She turned her head towards him, mouthing something at him, and one of the white-coated figures made a thoughtful noise.
"Lots of possible applications," he droned. "Tracking, assassination..."
"NO!" Nathan shouted, ignoring Aliya and heading for the door. It slammed in his face. "No!" he screamed, hammering on it. "Leave her alone!"
---
#Oh-ho. I see an opening.#
#Predictable. Given his psychological profile.#
"Whatever you did, crank it up. I can feel him crumbling from here."
--
He was in the observation area above one of the main training gyms, staring down through the class at the latest group of candidates being put through their paces. "This isn't right," he muttered wildly. "They shouldn't be there..."
"They're ideal," Aliya said with a smile, coming up behind him and laying a hand on her shoulder. "Besides, if you're having doubts, get down there and work your magic." She looked up at him, her eyes gleaming. "That's what you're here for, aren't you?"
Below them, each of the young candidates was a face he knew. Amanda, Angelo, Illyana, Manuel, Shinobi, Angie, Doug, Rahne, Jamie, Paige, Jubilee... Jane? What was Jane doing down there? "No..." Nathan muttered, his eyes widening in horror as Jane stumbled back from the instructor working on hand-to-hand with her. She crumpled to the ground, crying, hiding her face. The instructor frowned down at her and then looked up at them questioningly.
Aliya shook her head. "Not stern stuff in that one, I'm afraid," she said, giving the instructor below a signal.
He nodded, drawing out his sidearm and shooting Jane in the head.
---
"Shit, his heartrate and blood pressure just went off the charts! Ease off, you're going to kill him!"
#Yeah, but we just created a huge opening.#
"Let's go for it. Hammer the point home."
---
Nathan stared as the burial detail started to shovel dirt over Jane's body. Reddish dirt that seemed to drift away from her face, leaving it untouched. Except for the bullet hole in her forehead, of course. He shook his head slowly. "No. S-She.... she was..."
"Not worth the effort," Morgan said from behind him, giving him a curious look. "Come on, Nate, you've seen them do this dozens of times. What's the big deal?"
"But she was..." Young and scared, and... Nathan gasped and grabbed at the sides of his head. "No," he said again, unevenly. "No, this isn't real. This didn't happen..."
Morgan snorted. "I think you need your conditioning tweaked, old man. Losing touch with reality isn't a good sign."
Need your conditioning tweaked..
The conditioning...
The conditioning.
Nathan looked up, out into the desert, and saw a flash of golden light in the distance. Golden light, and several dark figures advancing on it. "NO!" he screamed, and pushed away Morgan's restraining hands. "NO! Moira!"
---
#He-llo. What's this?#
#Holy shit, it's a psi-link.#
"It's a what?"
"I thought you couldn't form one of the damned things twice. What about his wife?"
"Hey, you learn something new every day."
"Enough. Break it."
#But the possible damage...#
#... wait. The damage is fixable. This might be the way to break down the last of his resistance.#
"Oh, feel the panic... yeah, you take that out and he'll break."
---
She was there. Standing in a golden nimbus of light, hands outstretched, smiling at him. Nathan, her voice whispered in his mind. Love...
He tried to reach out, to take her hands, but there was a barrier there. A feeling of distance. "Moira!" he cried desperately. "MOIRA!"
Laughter, from behind him, as the shadows advanced. For a moment he staggered, a flash of something, somewhere else overlaying the desert. Looking up from a table, restraints holding him flat, with faceless figures leaning over him...
He whirled. "Get away!" he snarled, envisioning armor. Walls of titanium encasing Moira, keeping her away from them. Keeping her safe. "Fuck you, you can't have her, you can't touch her!"
More laughter. One of the shadows folded his arms across his chest. "Pitiful," it said in an amused voice and Nathan stumbled, going to his knees with a moan as pain sliced into his mind. "You won't be able to touch her yourself in a moment. Shall we give you time for a kiss goodbye!"
#NO!# Nathan screamed at them, trying to drive them back. But nothing he did had any effect and they were still laughing as they closed on him. Laughing, as the walls surrounding Moira fell away, crumbling into dust. He hauled himself to his feet and whirled, trying to grab her, to shield her with his body. But she was so far away, right here yet so far away, and the golden light surrounding her burned. #Moira... MOIRA!# he cried out.
"Wave goodbye, Nathan," one of the other shadows sniggered, and Moira shattered in his arms with one last scream of his name.
---
#Yeah, I think that did it.#
#Christ, what a mess. We're going to be at the repair work all night.#
"Ohhhh... oh my. Feel it? Never thought I'd get to experience a psi-link breaking that close before. Isn't that exquisite?"
"You're a twisted freak, you know that."
"Skip the commentary. Focus on restoring the obedience compulsions first. Then tackle everything else in order of descending priority. We want him operational again as soon as possible."
"Shouldn't be too hard. He's not fighting anymore. Can't you feel it?"
#Yeah, that mindscape's gone, too. This is going to be easy as pie.#
"Good. Good job, people."
"Thank you, sir."
#Our pleasure.#
Nathan smiled out the kitchen window at the sight of Miles and Artie chasing each other around on the lawn. Good to see them in such high spirits, he thought cheerfully, and turned his attention back to the dishwasher. Telekinesis made emptying the thing a whole lot easier, and he didn't mind doing it; it was good practice when it came to splitting his focus.
Plates and bowls, then silverware, then glasses. They all floated from the dishwasher, stowing themselves in the appropriate cupboards. All in order. Everything in order. Then he looked up through the kitchen window again, and the boys were gone.
Not just the boys. The whole fucking lawn was gone.
Nathan backed away, eyes widening. Nothing. There was nothing outside the window but blank space. "What the fuck..." he breathed, backing away. Nothingness. That was the only way to describe it, and...
The wall in front of him was torn away suddenly, the debris vanishing in an instant as it was sucked out into the blankness. "Shit!" Nathan cursed and turned, running from the kitchen. #Charles!# he called out desperately, heading for the Professor's office. There was no answer. #CHARLES!#
---
#We're in.#
#Finally. That took a lot longer than it should have. Someone's been giving him training.#
"Enough, both of you. Keep going; I want all those defenses down."
#Yes, sir.#
#Aye, sir.#
"Empath team, stand by."
---
He could feel the walls of the mansion shaking. Like an earthquake, only an earthquake didn't account for the hungry emptiness gnawing at the house, and where the fuck was the door to Charles' office? This wasn't the right hallway. Where was he?
There was the sound of a piano from up ahead and Nathan ran in that direction, not knowing what he'd find. He didn't expect it to be Shinobi, placidly playing Beethoven, his head bent over the keyboard. "Shinobi!" he said sharply. "We're under attack!"
Shinobi made a thoughtful sound and kept playing. Bewildered and more than a little angry at having been ignored, Nathan started forward, determined to grab the young man by the scruff of the neck and drag him along if need be.
Then the ceiling was torn away and the piano and Shinobi were sucked upwards into the emptiness. Nathan cried out and tried to snatch him back telekinetically, but there was nothing there, nothing to grab onto. A few last bars of the Moonlight Sonata lingered in the air, then faded.
---
#Complication...#
#I see it. Projection?#
#Must be. Some empathic intervention would be good, people...#
"All right, you heard the man. Let's start hitting him where it hurts."
---
This was insane. Since when was the Fencing Hall on the same hallway as the music room? Nathan stopped at the door, blinking at the sight of Manuel fencing apparently with his own shadow, as far as he could tell. "Manuel!" he said desperately. "We have to get out of here - something's tearing the house apart!"
The young empath glanced back over his shoulder at him, smiling cryptically and shaking his head. He went back to fencing with his shadow, and over in the corner, Amanda clapped enthusiastically, cheering him on. Nathan gritted his teeth and started forward, again...
And again, he was too late. The polished wooden floor of the Fencing Hall dropped away and Manuel was gone in a flash. Amanda floated there for a moment, looking vaguely perplexed, and then fell like a stone, vanishing into the blankness.
Nathan staggered backwards, away from the door. "No," he muttered, his mind refusing to process what he'd just see. "No, this isn't real, this isn't..."
---
"Hitting him with depression."
"Indecision from my direction. Is he still resisting?"
#Resisting, hell. He's still running.#
"Huh. Didn't expect him to be this stubborn."
"This is Cable, people. We made him that way."
---
Angie and Doug went spinning off into the void, hand in hand, grinning at each other, and a cry of denial escaped Nathan as he tried to pull them back, again, and failed. He stumbled again, holding onto the half a bannister still left, and stared, stunned, into the emptiness.
Stay here, a voice advised him coolly. Let it take you. What is running going to get you?
But there were other people in the mansion, Nathan told the voice stubbornly, pushing away from the remnants of the bannister. He needed to find them. Get them out of here. He wasn't going to lose them all, he wasn't...
---
"Oh, for the love of..."
"Told you."
#We're going to kill him if we keep this much pressure up for too much longer. We've been at it for what, six hours already? Backing off might be a good idea...#
"Failure is not an option."
#I know it's not, sir. But I don't think leaving the job half-done is an option either, is it?#
"Work more quickly, then."
#You know, subtlety isn't necessarily a bad thing...#
#What did you have in mind?#
#Let's stop letting him pick the setting, shall we?#
---
Changing. It was changing. He ran down the halls in the grip of pure terror as the house shifted around him. Old woods and warm colors shifting to dull gray and blank, cold and institutional. "Stop it," he gasped out as he ran. "This isn't right, it isn't real..."
"Isn't it?" Aliya said from behind him. Nathan staggered to a stop, turning back towards her, and his wife smiled almost pityingly at him. "Idiot," she chided softly, reaching out a hand to him. "Come on, Nate. Tyler has something he wants to show you. A picture."
Nathan shook his head slowly. "No," he said hoarsely. "No, you're..."
"Are you going to disappoint your son?" Aliya said with a sudden grin. "He'll pout at you, you know."
Nathan took a hesitant step towards her, past an open door... and froze. Inside, there were white-coated figures surrounding a gurney. One shifted to the left, and he saw Rahne lying there, looking small and lost and terrified. She turned her head towards him, mouthing something at him, and one of the white-coated figures made a thoughtful noise.
"Lots of possible applications," he droned. "Tracking, assassination..."
"NO!" Nathan shouted, ignoring Aliya and heading for the door. It slammed in his face. "No!" he screamed, hammering on it. "Leave her alone!"
---
#Oh-ho. I see an opening.#
#Predictable. Given his psychological profile.#
"Whatever you did, crank it up. I can feel him crumbling from here."
--
He was in the observation area above one of the main training gyms, staring down through the class at the latest group of candidates being put through their paces. "This isn't right," he muttered wildly. "They shouldn't be there..."
"They're ideal," Aliya said with a smile, coming up behind him and laying a hand on her shoulder. "Besides, if you're having doubts, get down there and work your magic." She looked up at him, her eyes gleaming. "That's what you're here for, aren't you?"
Below them, each of the young candidates was a face he knew. Amanda, Angelo, Illyana, Manuel, Shinobi, Angie, Doug, Rahne, Jamie, Paige, Jubilee... Jane? What was Jane doing down there? "No..." Nathan muttered, his eyes widening in horror as Jane stumbled back from the instructor working on hand-to-hand with her. She crumpled to the ground, crying, hiding her face. The instructor frowned down at her and then looked up at them questioningly.
Aliya shook her head. "Not stern stuff in that one, I'm afraid," she said, giving the instructor below a signal.
He nodded, drawing out his sidearm and shooting Jane in the head.
---
"Shit, his heartrate and blood pressure just went off the charts! Ease off, you're going to kill him!"
#Yeah, but we just created a huge opening.#
"Let's go for it. Hammer the point home."
---
Nathan stared as the burial detail started to shovel dirt over Jane's body. Reddish dirt that seemed to drift away from her face, leaving it untouched. Except for the bullet hole in her forehead, of course. He shook his head slowly. "No. S-She.... she was..."
"Not worth the effort," Morgan said from behind him, giving him a curious look. "Come on, Nate, you've seen them do this dozens of times. What's the big deal?"
"But she was..." Young and scared, and... Nathan gasped and grabbed at the sides of his head. "No," he said again, unevenly. "No, this isn't real. This didn't happen..."
Morgan snorted. "I think you need your conditioning tweaked, old man. Losing touch with reality isn't a good sign."
Need your conditioning tweaked..
The conditioning...
The conditioning.
Nathan looked up, out into the desert, and saw a flash of golden light in the distance. Golden light, and several dark figures advancing on it. "NO!" he screamed, and pushed away Morgan's restraining hands. "NO! Moira!"
---
#He-llo. What's this?#
#Holy shit, it's a psi-link.#
"It's a what?"
"I thought you couldn't form one of the damned things twice. What about his wife?"
"Hey, you learn something new every day."
"Enough. Break it."
#But the possible damage...#
#... wait. The damage is fixable. This might be the way to break down the last of his resistance.#
"Oh, feel the panic... yeah, you take that out and he'll break."
---
She was there. Standing in a golden nimbus of light, hands outstretched, smiling at him. Nathan, her voice whispered in his mind. Love...
He tried to reach out, to take her hands, but there was a barrier there. A feeling of distance. "Moira!" he cried desperately. "MOIRA!"
Laughter, from behind him, as the shadows advanced. For a moment he staggered, a flash of something, somewhere else overlaying the desert. Looking up from a table, restraints holding him flat, with faceless figures leaning over him...
He whirled. "Get away!" he snarled, envisioning armor. Walls of titanium encasing Moira, keeping her away from them. Keeping her safe. "Fuck you, you can't have her, you can't touch her!"
More laughter. One of the shadows folded his arms across his chest. "Pitiful," it said in an amused voice and Nathan stumbled, going to his knees with a moan as pain sliced into his mind. "You won't be able to touch her yourself in a moment. Shall we give you time for a kiss goodbye!"
#NO!# Nathan screamed at them, trying to drive them back. But nothing he did had any effect and they were still laughing as they closed on him. Laughing, as the walls surrounding Moira fell away, crumbling into dust. He hauled himself to his feet and whirled, trying to grab her, to shield her with his body. But she was so far away, right here yet so far away, and the golden light surrounding her burned. #Moira... MOIRA!# he cried out.
"Wave goodbye, Nathan," one of the other shadows sniggered, and Moira shattered in his arms with one last scream of his name.
---
#Yeah, I think that did it.#
#Christ, what a mess. We're going to be at the repair work all night.#
"Ohhhh... oh my. Feel it? Never thought I'd get to experience a psi-link breaking that close before. Isn't that exquisite?"
"You're a twisted freak, you know that."
"Skip the commentary. Focus on restoring the obedience compulsions first. Then tackle everything else in order of descending priority. We want him operational again as soon as possible."
"Shouldn't be too hard. He's not fighting anymore. Can't you feel it?"
#Yeah, that mindscape's gone, too. This is going to be easy as pie.#
"Good. Good job, people."
"Thank you, sir."
#Our pleasure.#
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