Jason looked around him at the impromptu meeting he'd called in his quarters. Nobody had asked why it was here and not in the ready room. He suspected, though, that they knew why he'd done it, rather than not thought it odd.
"We have to do this right. Mark needs help. But he needs space too, and right now he can't make any for himself. We have to be careful not to crowd him."
Princess nodded. She had the air of someone who'd had no sleep and less rest, and the haunted look he'd come to associate with her worrying about Mark. She'd deny it, though. So he ignored it.
"We go see him every day. But not for long. Not unless he wants us to stay."
"Maybe we should go all together? Just once? Briefly? I agree we shouldn't crowd him, but just so we've done it?"
"No." Jason was quite sure on this one. Having the whole rest of his team turn up in a mass show of support might well feel good for Mark, while they were there. Having them walk out together, without him...that would have to be the worst feeling ever.
"And Rick?" Tiny asked. "Is he part of this? I noticed we're not discussing this in the ready room."
"Rick?" Jason shrugged. "You think having him turn up and say 'hi, Mark, I'm having a great time doing your job' would be a good idea?"
"I guess not," Tiny subsided.
Keyop, though, was wearing a decidedly shifty expression, one Jason didn't dare leave unchallenged. "I mean it, Swallow. You try to push in there when he wants to be alone and he'll go ballistic."
He hadn't anticipated the eyes filling with tears, or the wordless sniff. Keyop wasn't a kid any more, and maybes didn't upset him. Keyop's eyes weren't right, either, definitely pinker than normal, and now that he looked more closely, the lids were slightly swollen. No, something had gone down already. Damn.
"What happened?" Tiny asked, putting a hand on the young man's shoulder.
"I...snuck in there this morning. I really wanted to see him, Jason! Just to talk. Just to say we're here for him. He was...mean."
"Like I said. He needs space." Jason looked around the faces, reading acquiescence, if not complete agreement. "I've been there. Trust me on this. Now, Keyop. If you've already pissed him off, you need to stay away for a couple of days. Then you can go back with one of us."
Keyop looked at the floor, and Jason caught his chin, forcing the much shorter man to look steeply up at him. "I mean it! No sneaking back there. You could lose his friendship forever."
This time the eyes widened in horror, and Jason knew he'd been believed. He let go, and Keyop instantly dived for the comfort of Princess's arms. She caught Jason's eye over the top of Keyop's head.
"Maybe I should go - you've already talked to him. But what do I say, Jason?"
Jason shrugged. "Not 'where the hell have you been'. Apart from that...whatever. Just don't push it. If he doesn't want to talk, leave him alone."
She nodded, face set in determination.
"You go see him now," Tiny said. "I'll go this afternoon. Jason's right - we need to go easy on him. Not march in there all accusations and demands for explanation. And definitely not rub his face in the fact that we're still a team and he isn't part of it any more."
From the flush on what he could see of Keyop's face, still buried against Princess's side, Jason was pretty darn sure something like that had happened already. Too bad. Mark wasn't a child, and had obviously stood up for himself. They did need to be careful it didn't happen again, though. Not just for Mark's sake. They'd all been thrown by their former commander's return, and he was very grateful the alarm hadn't gone since. They needed to calm down and get used to the idea that Mark was back but still sick, and that for them nothing had changed. They were still G-Force, they still had a job to do, and they still didn't have the Eagle.
"Mark? Are you asleep?"
Well, that was a stupid question, she chided herself instantly. What's he going to say? Yes?
The eyes opened to look at her. "No."
Her heart sank. She wished desperately that she'd figured out what to say in advance, because now she was lost. "How are you feeling?" And that was about as bad a question as I could have asked. Come on, Princess. He's your friend. Talk to him!
"Fine."
She hesitated desperately, looking anywhere but at him, and then realising what she was doing and catching his eye awkwardly. "Um...can I get you anything? Water?"
"No, thanks."
"I...we've missed you, Mark. Very much. We're so glad you've come back."
The face twisted. "Not that I'm much use to anyone."
"Not yet." Don't tell him he's going to be fine. That much she did remember. Tiny had insisted on it. Mark knew full well that they didn't know what had gone wrong, and telling him the opposite would only make it sound like she thought he was an idiot.
"Maybe not ever." The blue eyes closed again, the face going hard. "I'm glad it's working out with Rick."
She froze for just a moment, but he didn't seem to notice. Now that was an area they really could use Mark's advice on - their fifth member wasn't gelling as part of the team, wasn't catching up the way they needed, wasn't much use at all. But she couldn't possibly talk about that, not now. It could only make him feel more guilty that he wasn't part of the team any more. She settled on a neutral "Yes" and cast around frantically for something else to say. She found nothing, and the eyes stayed closed. This had to be what Jason had been talking about. He wanted space.
"Anyway, I've got to go. Training. I'll be back soon, Mark. Let me know if there's anything I can bring you. We really are glad you're back."
"Yeah. Bye."
#
She didn't so much as stop in the main area of Medical, instead hurrying to the nearest elevator, swiping her bracelet across the panel such that she had priority use, and heading up to the top floor where she had her quarters. Ten yards, and she was inside, the door was shut, and only then did she collapse face down on the bed and cry as if her heart would break. How could he do it? How could he sit there, propped up on pillows, and say he was glad they'd found a replacement for him? And how could she possibly stay strong enough never to break down in front of him and share how much she cared about him? That she knew he hurt inside, and that seeing him like this tore her apart? She had to stay strong for him. She just had to.
"And how are you doing this morning?"
Mark considered pretending to still be asleep, but he was quite sure that the psychiatrist would see right through him. Instead he opened his eyes and pushed himself back into a slightly more sitting position.
"Nothing's changed. Don't you think you'd have heard if it had?"
"I expect the entirety of black section would have heard." Samuels pulled a chair up to the bed. "I hear you've had visitors."
Mark grimaced. "Everyone's come to tell me how much they missed me, yes."
"You sound like you're not convinced."
"Not that." He sighed, trying to keep his attention on the man when all it wanted to do was wander away into happier memories. "They missed me, and now I'm back. But I missed them too, and the things we did together, and I still can't do them! I just want to be fixed."
"That may be part of the problem." Samuels was good at hiding his own emotions, but Mark was better at reading them. The man was apprehensive about what he was about to say. "It's been four days now. There's no need for you to lie in bed all the time. You could go do some things together if you wanted to."
"In that?" He flicked a single disgusted glance at the wheelchair in the corner of the room.
"It's just a tool. A medical aid."
"No."
"Your call. Are you ready to talk about where you went when you left?"
"No." Mark locked his eyes on the ceiling, forcing himself to count the patterns of reflected light from the equipment. Anything other than what he actually wanted to do, which was lean forward, grab the irritating little man by the collar, and tell him exactly where he could stick his oh-so-careful probing questions.
"You ought to. Fill in the gap for them. It would be much easier for all of you to talk freely then."
How had he ever thought Samuels was helpful? Damned interfering busybody who had not the faintest idea what Mark was going through, how he felt, what he needed. What wasn't to talk, or to go for a ride in a stupid wheelchair. It was to get fixed. A medical problem. Let the doctors do their job.
"Mark? Can we talk about this now?"
He simply ignored the man. Talking did nothing. Never had, never would.
"How's he doing?" Chris Johnson asked as Samuels closed the door of the sideroom behind him.
The psychiatrist held one hand up, walking towards the other end of the main medical area before speaking in as low a voice as he thought would be audible. "Not well. He's not talking to the others, from what he said?"
Chris raised his eyebrows. "They've certainly talked to him. They've done pretty much what I would have suggested - spread visits out, gone in singly, in couples, just popped in for a couple of minutes. Not putting pressure on him."
"Problem is, he recognises the tricks. He knows that something non-spontaneous is going on, and of course he fears the worst."
"What do you suggest?"
He shook his head. "I need to stop making suggestions. The best thing that can happen now is that it plays itself out naturally for a while. Actually, the best thing that could happen would be for someone to come up with a treatment. I think that if there was progress being made he'd cope a whole lot better. Any chance of that?"
Chris sighed. "I hope so. It's an unusual set of symptoms, which means that I've had a lot of interest from the top experts without having to push for it and draw attention to who he is. But nobody's come up with anything yet, and I have one miserable patient, and four people who are desperate to help and don't know how. What do I tell them?"
"To be themselves." Samuels gathered his coat from where it had been lying over the back of a chair. "Has a single one of them told him to pull himself together? I doubt it. Right now he could use someone losing their temper and telling him exactly what they think, far more than sympathy. That's not something we can manufacture, though. It either happens or it doesn't. Keep going, Chris. He's still Mark. He doesn't need to be treated differently just because his legs don't work."
#
Chris hesitated for a long time after Samuels had gone. Spontaneity was all very well, but so far he knew of only one of them that had tried it - and Keyop had fled from Mark's room in tears. Nothing had been said since in his hearing, but he was almost certain that Jason was running this one with military precision. He wouldn't take kindly to being told he was doing the wrong thing. Princess was frantically unhappy with the whole situation. Which left him with only one possible option. Tiny.
"Hey, Mark! You can't still be sleeping this time of the morning!"
Mark dragged himself out of the depths of what had been a most enjoyable daydream and glared at his disturber. "Why the hell not?"
"Because..." Tiny looked blank. "Because it's a beautiful day out there, and you should come see some of it?"
"No, thanks."
"Because Keyop's developed the world's most revolting mixed soda, and you really ought to try it!"
Mark counted to five, but only got to three.
"Because -"
"Forget it, okay! I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to walk out of here on my own two feet, and that's it."
"Mark, you need to -"
"Don't you tell me what I need to do!"
He'd thought he was being set up all along, ever since Keyop had woken him from a sound sleep with a cheery demand to know exactly what he'd been doing for the past four months, oh, and when did he think he'd be back on the team? This just confirmed it. He'd had his week of sympathy, and now they'd like him back to normal, thank you very much.
Tiny stood his ground. So much for his authority, then. "You have to snap out of it, man! You're never going to heal, acting like this!"
"I'm never going to heal? Or you're not?" Mark knew he should stay silent. Knew, and couldn't, not any longer. "You want me happy and laughing, sitting in that chair and waiting at the door for you to come back from missions, right? Not going to happen, Tiny. You need to face it. I'm not going to pretend everything's okay to make you feel better. I won't. You can like it or not, and right now I don't care."
Tiny had stiffened at the start of his tirade, and now he stood up even taller, if that was possible. "If that's the way you want it, Mark. I've tried. We're here, when you want us."
"I don't want you!" He heard it, knew what it sounded like, and simply didn't care any more. "Get out! And when you come back, don't even think of telling me what I have to do! And the same goes for the rest of you. I'm done playing 'whose turn is it to visit poor crippled Mark this afternoon'."
#
When the door closed behind Tiny - not slammed, pulled carefully shut in a controlled manner which made him feel even worse - Mark made a real effort to convince himself that what he had done was for the best. They needed to forget about him and get on with saving the galaxy. If they never came back to see him, that would be all he could ask for.
They wouldn't do it - would they? Wouldn't leave him here, all alone, facing a life of useless paralysis? Surely not. For a minute he seriously considered calling for Chris, to get him to ring through to the ready room, get Tiny back here so he could apologise for losing it. Anything not to be alone.
He didn't do it. Not quite. He might not be able to walk, or do anything which mattered, but he had just enough self-respect left not to beg. He could cope without them. He would cope without them, for now. They'd come back, because no matter what he'd said, they knew full well that he needed them. He had enough faith in Jason to be quite sure of that.