xp_logs | [Paul, Shiro] Backdated to Tuesday: A simple 'I'm sorry' can't possibly express my regret.

Shiro comes to see Paul to apologize and is a little surprised at the response. The two end up discussing Shiro's future, and Paul is too ill to spank some sense into him, thank heavens, because that could just get complicated.

It's been insufficient for me often enough.

Shiro had read Paul's e-mail at least half a dozen times before finally peeling himself away from his computer to make his way to Paul's room. He was still dressed in track pants and a hoodie to cover hs skin. He hesitated only momentarily before knocking, and waited silently for a response.

Paul was dozing and irritable. He wasn't comfortable, no matter what he did. The knock was something of a relief. He pushed himself up in bed. "Come on in." He wasn't sure who it was, and didn't really care. He wasn't too unnerving to look at now, his visible skin was staying put, much to his relief.

Shiro slowly opened the door and peeked in, his face barely visible in the dark room. "Mr. Beaubier? It's Shiro. May I come in?"

"Come on in, Shiro." Paul tapped a button on the bed to bring the lights up a little and another to lift the head of the bed so he could sit up decently.

Shiro entered and closed the door behind him, but didn't take any steps farther in, still a bit wary about how Paul would react upon seeing him. For his part, Shiro made no reaction to Paul's physical condition, only swearing viciously at himself mentally for putting him there. "I got your e-mail." Duh.

"I thought as much." Paul gestured to the chair by the bed. "Would you like to sit down?"

Shiro looked around the room quickly, as if developing an escape plan, before nodding and taking the seat. "Mr. Beaubier, I-I do not know what to say, how to even begin . . . A simple 'I'm sorry' can't possibly express my regret."

"I'm sure it can't," Paul said dryly. "It's been insufficient for me often enough. Why don't you just begin at the beginning, if you want to say something to me? I'm not going anywhere." He sighed. "I'd be lying if I said I weren't irritated as hell with you, Shiro, but... being angry at you isn't going to do anyone any good. So whatever you want to say, say it and I'll listen."

Shiro gulped and stared down at his hands, something he found himself doing whenever he was worried, embarrassed, or feeling weak. "I just felt so . . . helpless" he spat, "That no matter what I would do, Harada would always be looking for me, waiting for the right moment to move in and take me back. Or worse, take Leyu-chan and use her as collateral."

"And so the natural conclusion to this was that you should burn out your powers?" Paul kept his temper. "Even after things with Nathan, you couldn't see? Shiro..." Disappointed. That's what he was.

Shiro could hear the disappointment in Paul's voice, and couldn't bring himself to look up. With most people, he would stubbornly defend himself and what he did, but he couldn't do that with Paul. This was one of the few men whom he admired, whom he'd felt earned his respect. Shiro owed Paul more than that. "No mutation, no being hunted. I wanted it gone. I didn't want to have to wake up everyday and ask myself, 'Will today be the day Harada strikes and makes me his weapon?' It was beyond stupid, I know . . ."

"As a last resort, Shiro, it wasn't unwise. It was even understandable." Paul leaned back in the pillows and closed his eyes, thinking. "But to do it first, when you hadn't even sought help? To do it without warning, so that we had no choice, by ethics or sentiment but to do everything we could to stop you? That was foolish."

Shiro was not expecting that first comment. Shocked, he finally stopped staring at his hands and looked at Paul. But upon seeing his disfigurement, however temporary, Shiro turned away again. He didn't need to be told that he was foolish, because looking at what he'd done to Paul was enough of a reminder. "I know. I reacted like a scared, self-centered, self-righteous teenager." The word burned his tongue.

"Yes, you did. Emphasis on the scared, though," Paul said, his voice gentler. He sighed heavily. "Whose fault is it that you didn't know how to trust anyone and turn to them?" It was mostly rhetorical. "It is what it is, Shiro. You know yourself better now. And you can make what you will of your consequences. You're not the only person to make damning mistakes out of fear and pride; mistakes that nearly cost others their lives."

"I'm really going to try, Mr. Beaubier," Shiro said, sounding a lot like a lost child. "I don't want to be like this anymore. And I certainly do not want to damn others because of what I do."

"Shiro..." The boy was killing him. He was. Paul sat up all the way. "These things take time. You can't force yourself to change the way you think and feel all of a sudden. You're setting yourself up for a different explosion. Trust me. Or don't. Or do just a little."

"You're one of the few people I do trust," Shiro admitted. "That's why I feel so bad about this, why I want to change. Not that I wouldn't have sympathy and feel regret if it had been someone else whom I'd nearly killed, but you are different. If I can't be trusted to keep those whom I admire away from harm, how can I ever be trusted? Especially now that I have someone else to take care of."

Thud. That was a lot of responsibility, and Paul felt it land squarely on him all at once. Well, hell. "You just need to learn to think, that's all. You're not the only one with that problem. I'm glad you want to change, for your sake and Leyu's. Little sisters need their brothers more than we realize, sometimes."

Shiro smiled a bit and looked up again. "Right, thinking. Check. I will remember to do that from now on. At the very least, so I don't have Leyu-chan hitting me all the time."

"I bet her fists are really pointy. And her elbows," Paul said wryly. "Wait 'til she learns to throw things." Then he sobered up. "How are you, anyway?"

"I'm waiting to see if she's continue her kendo lessons, actually. A bokken in her hands would hurt. As for me . . ." He shrugged. "I am doing as well as I can be, given the circumstances. Everything feels so different without my powers, though. Darker, colder, slower . . . I don't remember feeling this way before my powers came to me."

"Contrast." Paul remembered what he'd felt like when he was too ill to use his powers, and when... when his powers were cancelled out. More recently. "Have they checked to see whether or not this is temporary? Can they?" He was curious; if Shiro had succeeded it would have repercussions.

"They seem to think that I will recover a few months down the line," Shiro said, holding up one blackened hand. "But they do not know if this will go away. More tests might reveal the truth, but I would like to keep out of the medlab for as long as I can."

Paul chuckled at that. "I don't blame you." He looked Shiro over appraisingly. The black was shocking in its intensity but not terrible, really, in the grand scheme of things. "I realize that it's a shock to you, but it's got its own rather broody charm," he pointed out lightly. "Nice and uniform and at least it's not too far off the human scale."

Shiro rolled his eyes. "But it doesn't match anything in my wardrobe," he joked wryly.

Paul did laugh at that. "We'll have to go shopping," he said, amused and heartened by Shiro's ability to be a little silly. "Any excuse to shop is a good excuse. But aside from your skin tone and your powers... how are /you/?" He had to press a little. It was only responsible.

Shiro didn't answer immediately, taking a few moments to mull over his answer. "A little lost, honestly. I'm trying to figure out where do I go from here. I will certainly complete my education here, but that is only for another year. Going to college was always a given back in Japan, but I am not so sure about here."

"Finances shouldn't be an issue. Why wouldn't you go to college?" Paul asked.

"What would I do there?" Shiro replied, shrugging. "What are my interests? The only courses I particularly enjoy here are art related, but I really only like cartooning and manga. Where would a degree in that get me?"

"Into creating things? You're a smart young man and you're just starting to live. I hear college can be very good for widening the mind. I didn't attend, mind, I got my degrees while working with Alphaflight. What would you do instead? Paul watched Shiro's expression. It was harder to read with the new skin colour, but his sharp eyesight was returning.

"Instead of college? I don't know. I don't have any marketable skills, so I couldn't get a job straight out of high school." He shrugged again. "For a little while I thought about becoming an X-Man, but that is even less of a possibility now than going to college is."

"Shiro, there's no reason that college is out of the question for you," Paul chided. "And as for the X-Men, there's nothing that says that's beyond you in some capacity, whether your powers come back or not, there are many ways to be an asset. Finding them is your challenge."

"Everything's a damned journey, isn't it?" Shiro asked rhetorically. "Life was a lot more simple when I was being told what to do."

Paul shook his head. "You're going to grumble either way, I think. You have choices now, a lot of them. The world is open to you, it's a good thing."

"And it's a matter of finding where I fit in, ne? In a world of over six billion people, where is my niche?" Shiro sighed. "Thank you, Mr. Beaubier."

"I'm not telling you anything you don't know, Shiro. I'm just saying it where you can hear it again." The boy was wearing him out and Paul wanted to give him a shake. "Shiro, your place is wherever you make it. That's the good and the bad of it. I don't have some nice answer for you, though I think you'd probably brush it off anyway, and there's nothing to argue about because you can't really argue with the way things are."

Shiro could see that Paul was getting tired, so he decided it'd be best to leave him be. "I know. I . . . I just have some thinking to do." He got up from his seat and looked down at Paul, eyes full of sadness but also a little flicker of ambition. "I should let you rest."

"Shiro." Paul said, feeling concern warring with irritation, as seemed to be typical where Shiro was concerned. "If you want help, or even if you don't want it but you need it, ask. Please?" Yes, no repeats of that falling star imitation.

Shiro nodded. "Of course." And he surprised himself that he actually meant it, too, which brought the tiniest of smiles to his lips. "Thank you for everything, Mr. Beaubier. Just . . . yeah. Thanks."

"You're welcome, Shiro." Paul saw the smile and couldn't help one of his own. "Get some rest."

"Same goes for you, sir." His heart feeling lighter, he quietly left Paul's room and made his way back to his own. Introspection was in order.