xp_logs | Doug and Nate

Nathan comes by some time after Alison, and joins in the "what you did was very stupid, Douglas" parade. Doug has no answers for anyone, and pretty much has to sit there and continue to take it. Still no sign of Angie, and Doug's starting to worry. A lot.

Doug was bored. And tired. And sore. And feeling like the world's biggest idiot. It was worse, because the boredom left him plenty of time to go over the events of the day, and the amount of lecturing he'd already been issued by various people who had come in to check on him in the Medlab. And he doubted it was over by a long shot. There were still a few more people he expected visits from that he hadn't seen. The longer Angie stayed away, the worse Doug felt.

The door was partially open. Perhaps the last person to come in and lecture Doug had stomped out and forgotten to close it, Nathan reflected. He pushed it the rest of the way open and stood there, one eyebrow raised as he regarded the young man in the bed.

"There was a line-up," he said, in what might have been a dry tone if it had been even a fraction warmer than glacial.

Doug sighed slightly. Unfortunately, Nathan's sort-of joke had more than a kernel of truth to it. People had been in and out ever since Scott's lecture. And the visits hadn't gotten any better. Everyone seemed to feel an urge to drive into Doug's skull just how stupid he had been. "Hello, Nathan," he replied softly.

"Douglas." Nathan came over and sat down in the chair beside the bed, eyeing him coolly. He had gotten his shouting and breaking things over with after having read a certain email. "So. Has everyone else made it clear what a fucking dumb stunt that was, or do I need to add my two cents' worth?"

"Very clear. Crystal clear," Doug responded, shaking his head. "Fucking dumb, arrogant, stupid thing to do," he continued in a very quiet, defeated tone. "And I've already gotten what seems like a couple dollars' worth of peoples' two cents on my stupidity," he murmured.

"Pardon me while I don't feel particularly sorry for you." It was surprisingly easy to fall back into all-business-but-still-disgruntled father figure/boss mode. But he had used it with enough members of the Pack, particularly Dom, over the years - it should be second nature by now. "So tell me - I can maybe, possibly understand why you didn't go to Angie to get a precog's view on all of this. But why the fuck wouldn't you come to me?" he asked crisply. "Or don't I qualify anymore?"

Many of the members of the X-Men 'felt' different to Doug's body language sense when they were in their X-Men persona. Scott had been very much Cyclops when he had come in to lecture Doug on how stupid he had been, and Alison had been every inch Dazzler when she had looked in on him. And this was definitely Cable lecturing him in that crisp, almost emotionless tone. "If I had told anyone, they would have prevented me from going to the blood drive," he answered. "And I felt that if that happened, something worse might have happened." It sounded even lamer to his ears after the number of lectures he'd already received, and he closed his eyes, shaking his head.

"You felt," Nathan said. "What a fabulous piece of strategy, going on a hunch like that. How precisely did you survive until your seventeenth birthday, again?"

"I don't know, sir," Doug replied meekly. He was definitely _not_ calling him Nathan, or Nate, or anything informal like that. The crisp, cold tone of voice was difficult to deal with, but better than incoherent yelling. Doug had already had enough of that to last him several years, and he had a hunch that more was to come.

Nathan's eyes narrowed. "Would've been a very heroic way to go," he said very softly. "Wouldn't it? Taking the responsibility all on your shoulders, making the hard choice, sacrificing yourself for your friends..."

Doug shivered, trying not to cry uncontrollably. He was _tired_ of crying, even though he knew more was to come. "It sounds so selfish when you put it like that," he said quietly. "It was stupid, and arrogant, and I know that. I didn't _want_ to die, Nathan, I swear," he sobbed brokenly, the dam gates bursting and tears flooding down his face again.

Nathan let him cry for a few minutes, not moving in the chair, his cool expression remaining unchanged. "If you'd really had a deathwish," he said finally, once Doug had quieted a bit, "you wouldn't have used that Kevlar to protect yourself. I'll tell you, though, Doug... I almost wish it had been a deathwish. That, at least, I could have understood. But there's a fair bit of difference between a martyr-complex and a hero-complex."

"Hero complex?" Doug stammered out. "It wasn't...I didn't...It wasn't supposed to be about me. I just...didn't see any other solution." He shook his head. "And I _know_ I should have talked to someone else, but I was afraid of something worse happening..." He almost seemed to fold in on himself, looking tired and drawn out. "I'm sorry," he said simply.

No pity. Still. "You didn't see another solution because you didn't look," Nathan said bluntly. "You bought into the vision, Doug. As if it were literal. As if the future was a book and that line was already written. I don't know how you've managed to know Angie this long and not understand anything about precognition, but it doesn't speak very well for your ability to absorb information."

Doug shook his head, his mouth moving wordlessly. Then slowly, he closed his eyes, unable to say anything. He had no answer for Nathan's accusations and assertions. His hands clenched and unclenched in the sheet covering his legs. "I don't...I can't..." he stammered, trying to say something, at least, but nothing coherent seemed to want to come out.

"Uh-huh." That would just about do it, Nathan assessed calmly. He got up slowly, standing there for a moment and watching the boy. Young man. He was really torn as to which term to use. Like he'd said to Angelo that day, they were at an awkward age, which yes, led them to do awkward, stupid, occasionally potentially fatal things. But this was a bit excessive, even by those standards. "You and I are going to talk more about this," he said, his voice neutral, "but not until you're back on your feet. Get some rest."

"I'm trying," Doug said slowly. "Nightmares," he admitted with a wry twist of his mouth. Not that they were anything less than what Doug felt he deserved. The lectures, the pain, the nightmares, as far as Doug was concerned it was no more than his due for being such an idiot and scaring everyone.

"Doug..." Nathan paused, not sure whether or not he'd weaken the impact of his words by going here, but unable to help himself. He was probably getting soft in his old age. "You're alive," he said finally, quietly. "Everything else is negotiable." He smiled suddenly, a wry smile with only a touch of real humor to it. "Although after this, you may have to do some very fast talking."

"I know," Doug replied. "She hasn't come down here yet, and every time the door opens and it's not her, it gets even worse. Because I can't imagine that she'll be any _less_ mad at me when she finally does come down." He stared up at the ceiling and sighed again.

Nathan shook his head. "She'll be here soon enough," he said softly, turning for the door. "You should maybe have something a little more coherent to say about what you were thinking when she gets here."

Doug nodded. "I know. I keep trying to come up with something to say, but the bottom line is, I was stupid, and I got lucky, and there's no good explanation for what I did." He shrugged listlessly and watched Nathan walk to the door.