Part 3
"Whatcha doing?" The soft words slid, as if from another world, into the void Jesse currently inhabited, luring him back to reality. Blinking furiously, he looked round to find Shalimar's worried brown eyes fixed intently on him. For a long moment he wasn't certain where he was - or even who he was for that matter, so far removed from the now had he been. But with an effort he focused on the concerned warmth he could feel emanating from the passionate feral and used it to thaw the frozen wastes of his mind. That worrying his friends – particularly this friend – was to be avoided was too deeply embedded in his psyche for even the changing perspectives of the past months to erase, so almost without conscious intent he conjured up a reassuring smile.
"Oh, nothing much. Just..." He glanced around, searching for a plausible excuse, and realized with a start that he was actually sitting on the edge of the Double Helix's boarding ramp with no clear recollection of how he'd gotten there. "Uh...thinking about some modifications to the onboard systems I'm working on," he finished, crossing mental fingers that she wouldn't ask for details.
Shalimar brushed fingers back through her tangle of hair, with just a hint of the exasperation she was feeling but knew intuitively she shouldn't show. This wasn't the first time since they'd returned safely from that potentially disastrous mission to retrieve the Phased Vibrational Generator and missing pilot that she'd come across Jesse like this, sitting or standing somewhere with a blank expression. But, as now, he'd always managed to come up with an acceptable reason for being wherever it was. She couldn't help being troubled, though, by the warning scream of her instincts when she'd first spotted him slumped beside the plane's open hatch, despite his pretence at normality. When she added in his recent oddly forgetful behaviour - missed appointments and strange lapses in concentration - she just knew there was something wrong. But she also knew getting him to say what wouldn't be easy.
Leaning her head to one side, she folded her arms and stared at him, taking in the shadows under the alarmingly distant blue eyes, the too long dark blonde hair straggling over forehead and neck, the recently perpetual-seeming stubble that ghosted over and around his set jaw line and the lips curved into a not quite convincing smile. And this from the clean cut, sweet tempered, achingly honest young man she'd come to think of as the brother she'd never had, the one she felt as protective of as a she-wolf of her cub despite the relatively small age gap between them.
Jesse shifted uncomfortably under her scrutiny, the once unaccustomed but now increasingly regular feelings of anger and frustration welling up inside him. Along with, although he didn't want to admit it, just a little fear.
In the past few days he'd begun to feel progressively more uncomfortable in the presence of those he knew he should trust most. Almost worse, these surroundings, the only home he'd really known since his world was turned upside down as a child by the full emergence of his 'abilities', the one place he'd come to feel truly safe and in control, were becoming more and more unfamiliar. So much so that he'd started to find himself turning a corner without knowing for sure what he'd find round it, or heading for the dojo and ending up in the kitchen instead. And then there were these blackouts when, like now, he'd find himself somewhere totally unexpected, usually with one or more of the others talking at him... 'But why won't they all just leave me alone!!' echoed through his head tetchily, and he blinked again, wondering where that had come from.
He thought he should probably tell someone – tell Adam, of course. After all, he understood the intricacies of all of their conditions – God, that made it sound like an illness, didn't it? – better than anyone. But somewhere inside him a little voice was telling him that he was grown-up enough to handle his own problems, that he didn't need anyone to do it for him. Especially not Adam. And, at least for the moment, the voice was winning.
He fought back the urge to push Shalimar away, swallowing down the tumbling words of rejection and denial that he knew would just provoke her in ways he wasn't sure he could deal with right now. But the building pressure of the thumping headache that always seemed to follow one of these zone-outs was gnawing away at his self-control and he was only partially successful, snapping out, "What?" in response to her unspoken query. "Don't you believe me? You want to come see them?"
The brown eyes narrowed slightly at his tone, a half-imagined glint of gold illuminating their depths, and he felt a twinge of apprehension that he thought he knew was wrong. Shalimar would never hurt him... would she?
The flash of fear briefly overcoming the guarded expression that had been masking his emotions was like a slap in the face to the feral. Jesse had never been good at hiding his feelings, especially from her, but she'd never seen him look at her like that before. The slightly naïve outlook on life that was largely a result of his sheltered upbringing here with her and Adam usually made him see the best in everyone, which tended to leave him vulnerable to disappointment when they revealed their inevitable feet of clay. But his acceptance of her – both the good and the bad - had always been complete, as it had become with Emma and Brennan despite a slightly bumpy start, and she couldn't stand the thought that she might in some unexplained way be losing that.
"Jesse, what's wrong? Talk to me." She took a step forward, hand outstretched, intending to sit beside him, hug him, tell him everything would be all right if he'd just let her help, but her movement only sent him surging to his feet. He turned to face her, keeping his back to the Helix's smooth side and a few feet between them, eyes sliding almost longingly towards the hanger bay door as he wiped a hand down over his lower face in the tell-tale gesture she'd recently come to understand meant he was under extreme stress.
"Nothing," he said firmly. "There's nothing wrong. Nothing to talk about. I'm OK. I'm just tired... just..." He tried to meet her gaze, overwhelmed for a second by the need to tell her, to reach for her and let her hold him as she'd done when he was a confused and scared kid. But she wasn't the comforting presence he remembered, not now, and the fear he'd been struggling to contain swept through him and sent him hurrying from the room with a mumbled apology, leaving a shocked Shalimar staring open-mouthed after him.
**
Time was, Adam thought ruefully as he watched the door slam shut behind yet another of his team, when he could spend an afternoon working peacefully in his office without being disturbed. Nowadays, though, if it wasn't Brennan complaining about the lack of opportunities to stretch his metaphoric legs, it was Emma checking to see if there was anything she could do to help. Or, as had happened a little earlier, Shalimar, come to bend his ear about whatever was worrying her most at that moment - which right now was Jesse.
"You have to *do* something... talk to him, find out what's wrong..." she'd demanded, resting her hands on his desk and leaning towards him to ensure she had his full attention.
But her evidence for anything life-threateningly amiss had been flimsy, and even she had sounded apologetic when she finished listing unexplained absences, forgotten facts, and distant demeanour by blurting out plaintively, "And he won't let me touch him! He... he was *frightened* of me!"
Though Adam had acknowledged how unsettling that would have been for her, he'd also pointed out that Jesse's developing powers seemed to be taking him longer to get fully to grips with than the others, which would have to be frustrating him, and that his pre-occupation with resolving the unanswered questions he had in his mind about just how far he could really push himself could account for a lot of his strange recent behaviour. But he'd found himself wondering who he was trying to convince most, himself or her.
He'd shaken his head at Shalimar's automatic protests that they all had faith in Jesse, in his abilities, that he should confide in them if he had doubts and let them help, responding with, "You've felt what it's like to be phased now, Shalimar. Just think how much control it must take to keep yourself in that state without dissipating completely, then think how frightening it must feel to have to release that control enough to extend the molecular shift to something external. Every time Jesse tries phasing some new element, or something bigger than he's tried before, he has no idea how much he's going to have to let go - or how hard it's going to be to get back. And that's denting his confidence, holding him back from seeing how far he can really go. It's a big hurdle for him to get over, and not one I think anyone can really help him with."
But tenacious as ever, Shalimar had refused to let the matter lie until Adam had finally agreed to talk to Jesse, try and persuade him to let him check him out, the 'but' that was to follow dying on his lips when he'd seen the look of hope and belief she turned on him.
"Promise?"
A sigh. "I promise." But even as she'd reached up to plant a kiss of thanks on his cheek, he'd known it would easier said than done... as it had proved.
Predictably, when Adam had tried to raise the matter with Jesse just now, he'd gotten the expected smiling reassurances that everything was fine that quickly morphed through stubborn resistance to barely disguised hostility as he'd persisted with his questioning.
"You know, I bet if I were Shalimar or Brennan, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You'd trust them to know what they were doing," had been his parting shot as he'd stormed from the room, leaving Adam to ponder on what lay behind that particular outburst. So far though, as he'd tried to convince Shalimar, there was nothing to indicate that there was anything physiologically wrong with Jesse, whatever turmoil his emotions might be in. Short of knocking him out and forcibly subjecting him to tests, Adam didn't know how else to find out for certain – and that would be a betrayal of trust that might drive the young molecular so far away from them that they'd lose him for good, particularly in his current mood.
But at least that would be Jesse's choice, one that they might have a chance of talking him down from. Adam just wasn't sure if it was worth risking right now on the basis of a few out-of-character moments, though he was painfully aware that if he was wrong the alternative might be far worse.
****
"Whatcha doing?" The soft words slid, as if from another world, into the void Jesse currently inhabited, luring him back to reality. Blinking furiously, he looked round to find Shalimar's worried brown eyes fixed intently on him. For a long moment he wasn't certain where he was - or even who he was for that matter, so far removed from the now had he been. But with an effort he focused on the concerned warmth he could feel emanating from the passionate feral and used it to thaw the frozen wastes of his mind. That worrying his friends – particularly this friend – was to be avoided was too deeply embedded in his psyche for even the changing perspectives of the past months to erase, so almost without conscious intent he conjured up a reassuring smile.
"Oh, nothing much. Just..." He glanced around, searching for a plausible excuse, and realized with a start that he was actually sitting on the edge of the Double Helix's boarding ramp with no clear recollection of how he'd gotten there. "Uh...thinking about some modifications to the onboard systems I'm working on," he finished, crossing mental fingers that she wouldn't ask for details.
Shalimar brushed fingers back through her tangle of hair, with just a hint of the exasperation she was feeling but knew intuitively she shouldn't show. This wasn't the first time since they'd returned safely from that potentially disastrous mission to retrieve the Phased Vibrational Generator and missing pilot that she'd come across Jesse like this, sitting or standing somewhere with a blank expression. But, as now, he'd always managed to come up with an acceptable reason for being wherever it was. She couldn't help being troubled, though, by the warning scream of her instincts when she'd first spotted him slumped beside the plane's open hatch, despite his pretence at normality. When she added in his recent oddly forgetful behaviour - missed appointments and strange lapses in concentration - she just knew there was something wrong. But she also knew getting him to say what wouldn't be easy.
Leaning her head to one side, she folded her arms and stared at him, taking in the shadows under the alarmingly distant blue eyes, the too long dark blonde hair straggling over forehead and neck, the recently perpetual-seeming stubble that ghosted over and around his set jaw line and the lips curved into a not quite convincing smile. And this from the clean cut, sweet tempered, achingly honest young man she'd come to think of as the brother she'd never had, the one she felt as protective of as a she-wolf of her cub despite the relatively small age gap between them.
Jesse shifted uncomfortably under her scrutiny, the once unaccustomed but now increasingly regular feelings of anger and frustration welling up inside him. Along with, although he didn't want to admit it, just a little fear.
In the past few days he'd begun to feel progressively more uncomfortable in the presence of those he knew he should trust most. Almost worse, these surroundings, the only home he'd really known since his world was turned upside down as a child by the full emergence of his 'abilities', the one place he'd come to feel truly safe and in control, were becoming more and more unfamiliar. So much so that he'd started to find himself turning a corner without knowing for sure what he'd find round it, or heading for the dojo and ending up in the kitchen instead. And then there were these blackouts when, like now, he'd find himself somewhere totally unexpected, usually with one or more of the others talking at him... 'But why won't they all just leave me alone!!' echoed through his head tetchily, and he blinked again, wondering where that had come from.
He thought he should probably tell someone – tell Adam, of course. After all, he understood the intricacies of all of their conditions – God, that made it sound like an illness, didn't it? – better than anyone. But somewhere inside him a little voice was telling him that he was grown-up enough to handle his own problems, that he didn't need anyone to do it for him. Especially not Adam. And, at least for the moment, the voice was winning.
He fought back the urge to push Shalimar away, swallowing down the tumbling words of rejection and denial that he knew would just provoke her in ways he wasn't sure he could deal with right now. But the building pressure of the thumping headache that always seemed to follow one of these zone-outs was gnawing away at his self-control and he was only partially successful, snapping out, "What?" in response to her unspoken query. "Don't you believe me? You want to come see them?"
The brown eyes narrowed slightly at his tone, a half-imagined glint of gold illuminating their depths, and he felt a twinge of apprehension that he thought he knew was wrong. Shalimar would never hurt him... would she?
The flash of fear briefly overcoming the guarded expression that had been masking his emotions was like a slap in the face to the feral. Jesse had never been good at hiding his feelings, especially from her, but she'd never seen him look at her like that before. The slightly naïve outlook on life that was largely a result of his sheltered upbringing here with her and Adam usually made him see the best in everyone, which tended to leave him vulnerable to disappointment when they revealed their inevitable feet of clay. But his acceptance of her – both the good and the bad - had always been complete, as it had become with Emma and Brennan despite a slightly bumpy start, and she couldn't stand the thought that she might in some unexplained way be losing that.
"Jesse, what's wrong? Talk to me." She took a step forward, hand outstretched, intending to sit beside him, hug him, tell him everything would be all right if he'd just let her help, but her movement only sent him surging to his feet. He turned to face her, keeping his back to the Helix's smooth side and a few feet between them, eyes sliding almost longingly towards the hanger bay door as he wiped a hand down over his lower face in the tell-tale gesture she'd recently come to understand meant he was under extreme stress.
"Nothing," he said firmly. "There's nothing wrong. Nothing to talk about. I'm OK. I'm just tired... just..." He tried to meet her gaze, overwhelmed for a second by the need to tell her, to reach for her and let her hold him as she'd done when he was a confused and scared kid. But she wasn't the comforting presence he remembered, not now, and the fear he'd been struggling to contain swept through him and sent him hurrying from the room with a mumbled apology, leaving a shocked Shalimar staring open-mouthed after him.
**
Time was, Adam thought ruefully as he watched the door slam shut behind yet another of his team, when he could spend an afternoon working peacefully in his office without being disturbed. Nowadays, though, if it wasn't Brennan complaining about the lack of opportunities to stretch his metaphoric legs, it was Emma checking to see if there was anything she could do to help. Or, as had happened a little earlier, Shalimar, come to bend his ear about whatever was worrying her most at that moment - which right now was Jesse.
"You have to *do* something... talk to him, find out what's wrong..." she'd demanded, resting her hands on his desk and leaning towards him to ensure she had his full attention.
But her evidence for anything life-threateningly amiss had been flimsy, and even she had sounded apologetic when she finished listing unexplained absences, forgotten facts, and distant demeanour by blurting out plaintively, "And he won't let me touch him! He... he was *frightened* of me!"
Though Adam had acknowledged how unsettling that would have been for her, he'd also pointed out that Jesse's developing powers seemed to be taking him longer to get fully to grips with than the others, which would have to be frustrating him, and that his pre-occupation with resolving the unanswered questions he had in his mind about just how far he could really push himself could account for a lot of his strange recent behaviour. But he'd found himself wondering who he was trying to convince most, himself or her.
He'd shaken his head at Shalimar's automatic protests that they all had faith in Jesse, in his abilities, that he should confide in them if he had doubts and let them help, responding with, "You've felt what it's like to be phased now, Shalimar. Just think how much control it must take to keep yourself in that state without dissipating completely, then think how frightening it must feel to have to release that control enough to extend the molecular shift to something external. Every time Jesse tries phasing some new element, or something bigger than he's tried before, he has no idea how much he's going to have to let go - or how hard it's going to be to get back. And that's denting his confidence, holding him back from seeing how far he can really go. It's a big hurdle for him to get over, and not one I think anyone can really help him with."
But tenacious as ever, Shalimar had refused to let the matter lie until Adam had finally agreed to talk to Jesse, try and persuade him to let him check him out, the 'but' that was to follow dying on his lips when he'd seen the look of hope and belief she turned on him.
"Promise?"
A sigh. "I promise." But even as she'd reached up to plant a kiss of thanks on his cheek, he'd known it would easier said than done... as it had proved.
Predictably, when Adam had tried to raise the matter with Jesse just now, he'd gotten the expected smiling reassurances that everything was fine that quickly morphed through stubborn resistance to barely disguised hostility as he'd persisted with his questioning.
"You know, I bet if I were Shalimar or Brennan, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You'd trust them to know what they were doing," had been his parting shot as he'd stormed from the room, leaving Adam to ponder on what lay behind that particular outburst. So far though, as he'd tried to convince Shalimar, there was nothing to indicate that there was anything physiologically wrong with Jesse, whatever turmoil his emotions might be in. Short of knocking him out and forcibly subjecting him to tests, Adam didn't know how else to find out for certain – and that would be a betrayal of trust that might drive the young molecular so far away from them that they'd lose him for good, particularly in his current mood.
But at least that would be Jesse's choice, one that they might have a chance of talking him down from. Adam just wasn't sure if it was worth risking right now on the basis of a few out-of-character moments, though he was painfully aware that if he was wrong the alternative might be far worse.
****