Here it is, every Scott-bashing reader/author wetdream! Read on to find out!

A/N: I am NOT a Scott-basher, though the thought sometimes could be a turn-on... me bashing him while he licks at my leather boots... yum.

Scott stepped inside the sterile medical room. Everything in the room reflected one person: Hank. There was a blue mug sitting dangerously at the edge of a table; there was a strange-looking material that looked suspiciously like badly shaped clay that lay upon a table, also in blue; the cork board was also blue; a blue computer mouse and the juicy-looking aquamarine Apple.

He would have laughed at these and joked with him; what, Hank, are you colour fetishist or what? Or something like that. It would have been a great way to make himself at least feel better about himself, and probably Hank would think better of him, like, at least this man has a sense of humour, or something like that.

Scott sighed as he stood at the doorframe, looking in, not willing to enter. Or was he waiting for someone to invite him in? Was it something like, hey, Scott, come in, it's okay, you did nothing wrong, you're the leader, you did what you have to do, we all understand.

Hank looked up from a spread of raw flesh, one dainty and very sharp needle poised in one hand, the other hand at the edge of the wound. He eyed Scott with a less-than-grateful stare and went on stitching the wound.

"Slow down, man," Scott heard Logan's voice, pain barely restrained in it. Inwardly he winced; even Logan felt pain. Hank mumbled an apology and started on his task again, this time more carefully. "Jubilee," Scott heard Hank called out. There was a scraping sound from behind Hank and not long after that Jubilee stood behind him.

Scott took a deep, shocked breath. Jubilee's head was covered with bandages, one eye was also covered. Her forehead seemed to have been soaked in blood that had long dried, and the disconcerting smell of dried blood and crude iodine assaulted his nose. She lowered her head with some difficulty; she had a crutch under her right arm and when she went off to do whatever Hank told her to she was limping like a cat with a broken leg.

He wanted to walk out of here, but that would make him look even more the guilty party. Steeling himself against whatever that would come he took two steps forward… and collided with Remy on the shoulder.

The tall Cajun - indeed, a few inches taller than he was - stared down at him with an irritated glance. They were so close to each other that Scott had the chance to scrutinize a very bad and very large scratch that ran down from the left side of his cheek to the underside of his jaw. His nose had stopped bleeding, but the scratch had been left untended, and Scott noted, with both repulsion and consideration, that some of its area had begun to show signs of infection.

"Remy - " Scott began, pointing at his cheek.

"Git outta way, sir," Remy said with barely restrained anger as he slapped Scott's hand, the last word said with a scornful sneer. "Gambit's busy."

"You should do something -"

Remy held up one hand quickly, threateningly. Scott started to say something again but suddenly a card appeared between them and Scott saw Remy's eyes became tiny red slits.

"I maybe hurt, monsieur, mais oui I still can kill," Remy said as the card glowed red. "So git outta way."

With that Scott let down his hands to his sides and Remy nodded sternly and moved on, putting away the card in his pocket as the red glow faded. Scott wiped his palm over his mouth in an effort to steady himself. He made his way slowly through the maze of the tables and medical trolleys.

Someone groaned. He looked about, his searching eyes met a crouching figure with white hair. Ororo, Scott thought. She seemed to be holding her head, and there was blood in between those hands…

Scott quickly dove toward her and brought her to standing position. "Ororo, what's the matter?"

"My wound… reopens…" was all she could manage.

"I'll get a bandage," Scott said, looking at her. Truth be told, he could not think of leaving Ororo's side, with her head literally pouring blood forth like some damned river. He tried to cover the wound and only then he realised that the wound was not only open, it was deep, more like a gash on her head.

"Oh my God," Scott said, pulling away his hand, but never letting go of Ororo's waist. Suddenly the white-haired woman collapsed.

Scott panicked. "Ororo!"

Behind him Remy's voice boomed. "What's de matter wit' you?!" Pushing Scott roughly off Ororo and onto the floor he quickly gathered the swooned woman in his arms while one hand covered the wound on her head. "I let her sit down dere so dat no blood rush's down! Now look what you've done!" Remy was never this furious, Scott thought, his hands behind him the only means of support right now. "Can you fix dis? Huh!? HUH!?"

Behind him he heard Hank's voice. "What's the commotion here about?"

"Dat fool of a leader made Ororo stand up while you ordered her to sit down t'avoid de blood loss," Remy said, almost screaming with madness. "Now she's défailli!"

Hank stared at Scott with the same look he gave him earlier, then motioned at Remy. "Take her to the Special Care bed; Emma will help you there." To Scott he said, "Get out."

"Hank…"

"Get out."

"But I have no idea - "

"Get out, get out, get OUT!"

Scott decided that he was not about to be reprimanded by some blue-furred doctor. He stood up and looked a Hank straight in the eye. "Hank. For the last time I know my mistakes. I accept them. I own them! Hell, even the greatest of leaders make mistakes! Why are you all so mad at me!?"

Hank regarded him coldly. Then he cracked his knuckles noisily. "Let's see. First, you acted on you source information. Second, you made us go as you, not us, had agreed. Third, it turned out that your source had been bribed by the F.O.H. to lead us into an anti-mutant field, resulting in loss of abilities and therefore giving those damnable F.O.H. the best opportunity to bash our arses! Not to mention our pride and then some. Finally, Scott, even though things did not look good for us, you had the gall to tell us not to fall back, to defend ourselves, to show to those 'stupid, incorrigible humans' who's better than who. Now, tell me, Scott; is there any reason, at all, for us NOT to be angry at you?"

Scott fell silent. He never guessed that his informant, who supplied good facts and reliable strategies was one of the F.O.H. himself. Everything that informant told him was correct. Until last night.

He could still recall the way his own heart sank as he saw the blue domed light spread over them. In that chaos he commanded them to keep on fighting no matter what happened. He had wanted to prove to those damned humans that even though they lost their powers they could still fight, and without the presence of their powers he even thought that the F.O.H. would even fight fairly. Maybe they would see that when the mutants are stripped off their powers, the mutants are still human, after all.

But it was not so. A hunter who had his prey trapped where it suits him the most and hurts the prey the most would never, ever, lose this chance to exploit this opportunity. And the X-Men were treated like exactly what they should have been in the F.O.H.'s eyes.

Freaks.

Scott sank boneless onto the floor. His knees hit the floor with a loud cracking sound but he did not feel the pain that shot upward to his head. He did not notice Hank hobbling away from him, leaving him amidst the cold medical trolley and to his own feelings.

I did not ask to become a leader, he thought, staring at emptiness. I never wanted to a mutant. I hated myself being a leader, doing things I should do and the rest hates me for it, doing things we shouldn't, and the rest question my leadership; making sound choices but against their liking, trying to be what they wanted but in the end left unappreciated. Is there a use, at all? Is there a use?

There is a use.

Scott jerked up his head around. That was not his voice of thought! He looked around again and saw someone stood behind him, albeit with difficulties. He noted that person had a crutch and a bandaged right arm. "Jubilee?" he asked.

"No," she said as her face came to view. Scott looked in wonder as Jean stood to his right. "It's me."

Scott recalled how she valiantly pulled the unconscious members away from the frantic F.O.H. mob as she herself was beaten repeatedly. Her badly bruised face now hid most of her beauty, but her eyes were enough to let him know that she still was.

"Don't you get enough of snooping around people's head?" he asked, irritated, recalling her powers. He struggled to stand and was about to walk away from her. "I don't need another anger-vent from any of you anymore."

"What do you mean by that?" she asked, moving closer to him even as he walked away.

"I quit. You can find somebody else to lead this team. I'm not up to it." He stopped and stared at his feet. "In fact I'm not up to anything. Don't depend on me. I hate people doing that and then when I do let them depend on me I end up disappointing them."

"Who's saying about us depending on you?"

"Isn't being a leader all that?"

Jean chuckled; Scott heard true mirth in her chuckle, no tension, no anger. He wondered. "Scott," she said, standing beside him with her good arm on his shoulder. "Nobody is depending on you. Don't you remember what the professor always tells us? We all are a team. A team cooperates. Every member of a team becomes the parts that move the whole machinery. A leader makes sure that everything runs smoothly. That way, you are part of the team itself."

"In the end the team still have to depend on the leader," Scott reasoned.

Jean scoffed, but still smiling. She shook her head. "Scott, you're not getting the gist of it. A leader is needed to ensure the whole team moves smoothly. In the end, everybody becomes both the leader and the team player. No one person can manage all the works; everybody has their own parts and pieces. Everybody has their strength and weakness, advantages and disadvantages."

Scott shook his head angrily. He faced her. "What does this have to do with me wanting to quit? Nothing, I think!"

Jean shook her head. "I've been watching your progress, if you want to trust me. And I noticed that you did it quite good. In fact rather excellent. One thing was lacking, though. You pushed everyone to their limits until there was no room for their disadvantages. You expect everyone to be perfectly capable of whatever they are good in, each time, every time. Well, it's time you realise that they cannot."

"Jean, weakness cannot help us survive!"

"And so does intolerance! What's worse, intolerance between us! Between the team players, it's the worst."

"What do you expect could be done if everyone cannot perform to their expected levels each time?"

At that Jean suddenly smiled. To Scott's further astonishment she turned and left him. Scott bit his lips and closed his eyes in exasperation. He heaved a massive sigh and turned to leave the medical room.

Instead he turned around and walked toward where Ororo's bed was. Everyone gathered there; Emma, Hank, Jubilee, Bobby, Remy, Jean and Logan, holding his stitched-up arm tightly.

Awkwardly he walked toward them and stood before them, feeling like a second-grader in front of the principal. After a long silence he said:

"I have something to say."

Disinterested looks were aplenty.

"I've been thinking…"

"Should have done it before," Logan remarked acidly. Jean elbowed him as Scott looked down.

"I've been thinking," he repeated, "about what had happened to all of you. To us. Out of my inconsideration I've put all of you in grave danger. I know I should have at least told you where I stumbled upon that piece of information but I thought I was way too certain that this information was correct." He paused, trying to look for a correct word. "I was conceited… yes. That's right. I was a conceited leader who led only a few missions and thought that was it! I'm fit to be the leader!"

Scott shook his head, his gaze downcast. "I recalled Bobby pointing out the obvious location in that info, but I did not listen to you. Logan, too, tried to tell me that it all was way too easy and something was wrong, but I dismissed it. And Hank, too, for the discrepancy of those information with the real data…"

Scott paused again. He looked up at them, not asking for anything, but simply looking at them. "I could go on and on pointing about your warnings and how I dismissed it all, but now everything is too late. The damage is done. I can do nothing to ease your pain or pains, or about your damaged pride." He closed his eyes. "If my words should not suffice, I'm ready to step down."

That caused a stir amongst them, but briefly. Scott expected something nasty from Remy, or Logan's usual one-line remarks that never failed to get under his skin for hours, or Bobby's comic retorts…

There was nothing forthcoming. He nodded briefly at them. A smile spread across his face, but to them it looked like a pasted expression. "Well, that's it, right?" He ran a nervous hand through his hair and turned around and stepped out of the room.

Jubilee, after Scott had disappeared through the door, limped with her crutches out of the room after him. She returned later with Scott's visor and shirt uniform in one hand, staring at the rest of them in a disbelieving sort of way.

"He's gone," she said, her voice as hollow as everyone's mind right now.


********

Translation...

mais oui: but yes

défailli: fainted