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Sam’s wasn’t sure he remembered what it used to feel like, back when his head wasn’t so fuzzy all the time. There had been a time, once, when the dark patches hadn’t kept flitting so gloatingly out of the corners of his eyes, obviously taunting him to chase them. When the quiet, bone-wracking screams didn’t increase in pitch when he focused on them (proving he’d find nothing, because that wasn’t what it sounded like when Dani and Bobby and Shan screamed). He could swear, a long time ago, that his thoughts used to actually sound like him — not voices of their own that he could talk with when the hopelessness was suffocating. Didn’t it used to be possible to feel something good?
But that past didn’t matter now. Sam was the leader of the New Mutants, and there was another teammate who needed to hear his words much more badly than the nattering noise in his head. It was the only part of leadering he’d ever been good at, after all. Damn, he sure wished Dani hadn’t been depowered.
His teammate stood here now — in the open air, beneath one of the terraces of Utopia. They’d been talking, he and Sam. Did I zone out? Sam remembered trying to… he didn’t know what he was trying to really do. Relate, maybe? Comfort him?
“Doug,” he said softly, in a voice that didn’t sound like his own, and Doug’s head swiveled again to look at him. Did he zone out too? Or was he waiting on me? Perfectly clear sky blue eyes examined Sam, darting across his body; but whatever knowledge they absorbed didn’t change the calm serenity in Doug’s expression and posture. Nothing ever did. Doug never let anything slip.
Sam could feel his own heart beating against his ribs, but he quickly took a step closer. A deep sense of unease, only mingled with worry for his friend, was starting to unbalance him, but he looked inward, honed in on his concern, and was focused again. “Is it alright if I hug you?”
Doug — poor, sweet Doug — lifted his chin slightly, as if discerning some unsaid meaning that he chose not to comment on. What did I let slip now? Sam determinedly kept looking at his eyes, though they wouldn’t stop moving enough to meet his own. At last Doug nodded, and moved forwards into an embrace.
He was taller than he had been, but still shorter than Sam. Whenever he moved these days, Doug often looked so stiff; but he sunk into the hug now like Sam was a waterbed. Maybe that meant he needed this.
“I missed you,” Sam said quietly, and lord, he felt like he was speaking what had been inside him for a very long time. Grief and ache and love. That spike of resentment towards most of his team rose again, for ignoring Doug, for treating him like a stranger; and Sam hugged him tighter, hoping if he hid his face, maybe it wouldn’t give every thought away. “It’s so good to have you back where you belong, with us. We all missed you. Even Bobby, who deserves to be ignored. He gets too wrapped up in his own emotions to notice anybody else’s. It was scary seeing what Selene had done to you. But of course it was scarier for you. My point is… that sort of thing… your mind was violated, I know it don’t just go away when the bad guy gets got.”
He wasn’t sure he knew how it felt — his own brief death at the hands of Sauron and subsequent resurrection was some au naturel, destiny-laden affair — but he did know what trauma did to the mind, he knew what it was for your mind not to be yours; and he had no idea how he would’ve survived it if his friends had treated him the way they now treated Doug. It wasn’t Doug’s fault he was different. It was something that had been done to him.
He wished Doug knew how much they’d all missed him. He wished he could tell him how broken they all had been in the wake of his death; the dark, empty, weeks and months had raged after. But no one deserved to hear that, either.
Doug’s cheek was soft against his shoulder. The movement of his jawbone as he replied was gentle. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, Sam. However, my syntax hasn’t changed due to psychological trauma.”
“No?” Sam didn’t believe that for a moment. Doug didn’t want to talk about it, because it was difficult to open up. Sam felt terrible he hadn’t saved Doug from any of this suffering — or even softened it for him. “Then why’s your syntax changed?”
“It hasn’t changed. Language evolves over time, new slang becomes standardized, foreign words adopted, colonized words subsumed through dialects — it’s what it does. Look at you. You used to have a skip in your step. Now that skip is only jumpiness, and you hate every second you’re responsible for this team. I doubt your syntax changed so much as evolved, though it may look abrupt to one who lacks the etymology.”
Sam blinked. “I — I love this team, Doug, I just ain’t right no more — did Dani tell you I’ve been trying to quit?” Doug felt abandoned. He must. That was the only reason he would say that. And why not? When Sam — it felt like — was the only one making any effort to reach out to him?
Insomuch as Doug could be expressive these days, he did look guilty.
“No, but that doesn’t surprise me. I wish I could make your language easier, but there are no words that can fix your head. Just like there are no words that can make Bobby stop hating me.”
No words that can fix your head. Sam knew he should be saying something kind, assuring Doug that Roberto did not in fact hate him, but he hadn’t been prepared for all these ultra-personal takes. Doug could read everything now, and he just kept digging them both a deeper hole, and Sam wished… he wished… but the nattering kept trying to distract him, a misery-filled soliloquy that sounded like his dead brother, and he couldn’t. I’m sorry Jay, I’m so sorry— He couldn’t. He had to focus on Doug.
“I believe my connotation has been misinterpreted.” Doug’s body twisted in Sam’s grasp, freeing himself from the hug. Sam let him; he felt him trembling, and knew that Doug was upset, even through the lack of emotion in his voice. “I only meant that words alone can’t heal you, not that you can’t be fixed… I hope you can get better.”
“You can tell… that something’s wrong with me?” Sam faced him with troubled eyes. Dani couldn’t tell. When he told her he needed to step down from leadership, she told him he needed to quit the negative self-talk.
“You aren’t broken. But if you think I can’t see it when you dissociate, you have a very poor grasp of the shared language.” Doug’s gaze wandered.
“When I what?” Sam’s heart was beating, his vision swimming. That wasn’t a linguistics word. Dani ought to know if his leadership was compromised in so serious a way. Of course, he’d already known he was compromised, he’d said as much after Xi’an’s blood and screams had filled the jet and she only barely survived, but nobody much cared or believed that he was serious. Maybe they just couldn’t afford to. Fighting for survival wore on everyone.
And now Sam was stressing about himself. Selfish. Doug had such a way with words — with diverting from the point. Was that intentional?
Sam’s eyes squeezed shut, inclining his head. “Hold on. Are you dissociating then?” He wasn’t sure he liked the word. It must mean something different in this context than with Legion. He supposed there was that odd mental distance, that used to only take him in the wake of violence and horror but now stretched and stretched until he needed to wear himself out punching walls — because nothing around him felt real when the pitching screams were insistent, when his thoughts took on the voices of the dead that seemed so real; when he had no choice if his consciousness fled to another plane of reality. “Is that why you’re…” he gestured to Doug’s bland face, and immediately felt ashamed of himself when that face turned into a frown.
“No,” Doug said evenly, physically taking a step back. “I’m distracted by reading the world’s stimuli. That’s all. Which is how I know you don’t believe me, which has no bearing on the truth.”
“S’alright, you don't gotta confide in a soul till you’re ready,” Sam said quietly. “What matters is that you know that I’m here when you are ready. You coming back is the best thing that’s ever happened to us, and don’t you forget it.”
“I read guilt in your eyes when you look at me,” said Doug softly. He looked up at him again, for a second his eyes focusing. “Which isn’t fair. Just because my power is a stupid one doesn’t absolve me of responsibility for my own sacrifice.”
“Your power ain’t stupid and my guilt ain’t got to do with nought but the fact that I was the oldest and y’all were all my responsibility.” Sam bit his tongue.
“And I’m not a baby,” Doug’s lip curled, and Sam stared at him past his own hastening heartbeat. Oh. Sam hadn’t heard any of them call each other babies since they were teenagers… actually, around the age they’d been when Doug had died.
Doug, who was fifteen in a grown-up body. Doug, whose violent death and brutal resurrection had scarred him so badly he could only describe anything as language.
Doug, whose friends were slow to trust him after everything that had happened, even though none of it was his fault.
“I know you’re not,” Sam said gently, and took a step closer to him again. Doug’s entire body was trembling, and this time he didn’t fight the hug that was pressed upon him, tucking his face under Sam’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to grow up so fast.”
“I’m sorry I commented on your psychological sentence fragments,” Doug muttered. “Let it be known that I trust your leadership with my whole heart.”
“Thanks,” said Sam, because he was grateful, even if he didn’t agree. It made him feel vulnerable, but in a cared for way, like he was seen — someone had noticed that he wasn’t okay. Maybe that was enough to give him the strength to try again and make this leadership thing work.
Doug spoke, his voice muffled against Sam’s shirt. “I know I unnerve people, but if you would like to talk, I’m available to help.”
“Thank you, Doug. But I really want you to know you can still talk to me, if you want to. Or need to. I know it’s hard, but think about it?”
”Thank you, Sam.”
~~~
Wild, that Doug was the only one who knew something was wrong with Sam. Even Sam wasn’t sure what exactly was wrong with him, even though he was fighting a war inside his mind. It was normal, right, for a soldier to never sleep deeply? It medically followed, right, for a soldier to have an unreliable psyche?
Except he hadn’t been this bad, before M-Day, and the horrors in its wake. His strategizing used to feel clearer, even when his chest throbbed with obsession and his thoughts raced so bad he wanted to die. Were these even his own thoughts, that spoke to him in voices that made his heart scream? What else could come from inside his head? Maybe he was haunted. Everyone on this island had suffered; Sam was a drop in the bucket. But was so tired of not talking back in front of other people. He was so tired of hissing at the screaming to shut up. Life formed a vicious cycle that never let him rest, and even in his downtime, he didn’t know how to escape the endless rush.
It really was a rarity, through the guilt which flooded his senses: the whisper-battle he got into that afternoon, with a thought that sounded horribly like a ghost. He picked at his nails, feeling tense. Grief throbbed at his prickling skin. As he shot back gently against another bad take, Sam tried again to focus: as team leader, there was someone else he knew he needed to talk to. Right? When Jesse finally agreed, Sam stomped exhaustedly across Utopia and turned the knob of the room he shared with Roberto.
Sam wasn’t looking forward to this. He did hate the responsibility. But he was Roberto’s best friend — he was the only one who could. Sam had long wanted to solve everything, for some perfect team cohesion ever since Doug’s resurrection (he’d wanted to solve so much, earlier, in the heavy ache of Dani’s ferocity to prove herself, in the judgement without her powers) — but something about the way Doug had immediately recognized Sam’s brokenness was actually making him do something. Doug thought Roberto hated him. Doug was a smart cookie, but that couldn’t be true.
He was here to make at least one tiny thing better — to make the most of his place as leader.
Roberto was sprawled out on the bed and wholly absorbed with his computer — most likely playing some game he had bought during his last trip to the mainland. Sam cleared his throat, but Roberto didn’t acknowledge his presence. After a few moments, Sam decided to announce himself. “You could be nicer to Doug.”
Roberto looked up at him immediately, tugging off his expensive-looking headset, and let out a harsh, incredulous laugh. “What? Where’s this coming from?”
Sam sat down next to him, gazing at the edge of the computer. It seemed to be some sort of first-person shooter game; it hadn’t been paused. “Where’s it coming from? First off: he’s a fellow mutant who went through an extremely traumatic experience, only to find that all his friends have grown up without him. Second: we’re all each other’s got right now, and it’s harder for him to reach out than for us. It hurts him when you make fun of him, even if his face don’t show it.”
“I don’t make fun of him. I simply disparage him whenever he feels the need to remind me he exists.” Roberto flattened the smirk that tugged at the corners of his mouth, like he was trying not to smile.
“Bobby!” Sam felt a surge of frustration. As much as he loved Roberto, it was impossible to deny the guy had almost no compassion when his emotions were high. For that matter, Roberto hardly had compassion when he wasn’t emotional; times like these reminded Sam why Roberto had been able to play levelly with his compatriots in the Hellfire Club. But there was no love amidst the Inner Circle. The New Mutants were a family. Their family.
And Roberto really was emotional. He was staring at the Game Over screen, eyes burning with annoyance, and something wilder.
“We are talking about the same zombie, right?” Roberto’s voice rose sharply. “He doesn’t act traumatized! He doesn’t understand why we would be upset that Amara was almost murdered by his hands! He called it a miscommunication!” A fierce, protective anger had alit his dark eyes; the fire that always surrounded him these days when it came to Amara.
“Looking at serious events as language is clearly a coping mechanism because he can’t face his reality as it is.” Sam made a concerted effort to be patient, because no one responded well to escalation. “Ain’t you ever done something similar?”
“Absolutely not,” Roberto snorted. “Are you claiming you have?”
Sam squeezed his hands together, because the opinions of maybe-ghosts were drawing away his focus, like when an earworm you hated with a passion came on the playlist. Focus on Roberto. Focus on Roberto. “You and me… we both deal with survivor’s guilt.” Yes, yes, over Jesse. And yes, over Jay, and Jay’s classmates. And obviously Doug and Illyana… Can’t even hear myself. “Maybe more than we should. You know how, when it gets to be too much with the overthinking, you convince yourself for a while that the rotten ways it really went down maybe only happened in a movie? You know, to stay kinda sane or functional when you can’t turn down the volume?”
“What?” Roberto stared at him, and shook his head. “Irmão. I… I pretend I’m Magnum, but not… that’s not the same, is it?”
“How is that different?” Sam latched on through the confusion. “That’s Doug with miscommunications. Of course he feels awful about what happened to Amara, but he can’t bring himself to face the fact that it happened at all.”
Roberto was eyeing him dubiously. “Not how it seemed to me. I know I’m not Thomas Magnum.”
Sam searched his eyes. “What’s wrong with him ain’t his fault. He’s hurting.”
“He hasn’t shown an ounce of emotion since coming back.”
“Which is unsustainable. And unless you quit beating down on him how you have been, forcing him in a state where he can’t be vulnerable, thinking he has to keep his guard up constantly around his own friends, it ain’t gonna end well. Do you wanna see an undead, traumatized genius snap? No? Then be a decent friend to him and maybe you won’t have so much to regret when he does!”
Roberto studied him silently. “So you think he’s crazy,” he said at last.
Sam felt guilt grind up in his chest. That was how it had sounded. “No more than the rest of us.”
“Perhaps. Life’s not a movie, Sam—”
“This isn’t about me.” Damn. There was a silence. Sam looked away, but he could feel Roberto’s eyes on him, studying him, filing away what he observed. Dammit: he and Doug had a lot in common, apparently!
Sam had never discussed with Roberto how often his heart hammered so fast sometimes he couldn’t breathe. He’d never mentioned the gross truths that ghosts revealed in leering whispers when he was alone. But right now, the way Roberto was looking at him was like seeing the cracks.
Maybe it was for the best. Maybe Roberto would agree Sam wasn’t fit to lead. But Sam couldn’t derail this conversation, not when he was advocating for Doug.
He took a long, deep breath. “Doug is still Doug. He’s just… sick, is all. It’s a big adjustment, getting used to not being dead, after so many years in the grave. And that’s not mentioning how his powers and his build changed. He’ll get better if we give him time.”
“You always want to save people,” there was something akin to wondering incredulity in Roberto’s tone.
“Only my friends,” Sam said evenly.
“Yeah, well. That’s friendship for you,” Roberto nodded slowly. He chuckled wryly, running the side of his finger along the computer. “Survivor’s guilt, huh? Makes me wish Rahne would come to see him. He always liked her so much better. I mean, talk about the way he died for her! Talk about the way he died.” Roberto drew a shaky breath, his eyes darting downward. “And it’s not just that I dragged Warlock away on my pity party, leaving him vulnerable, either… me and Doug rubbed each other the wrong way pretty often, and I don’t even know if he knew that I cared for him. The last thing he ever said to me, and I remember it word-for-word, as that day will forever be ingrained in my mind: ‘I hope that doesn’t disappoint you too much.’ He was talking about that I hadn’t successfully killed you.” Roberto snorted wryly, but his eyes were shining.
This was the first time Sam had ever heard that information. Why hadn’t Roberto ever told him? “Damn. I’m sorry,” he said.
Roberto smiled, unconvincingly. “Why? I’m just saying.”
And he thought Doug was refusing to show emotions? This deserved unpacking — and Sam wasn’t sure he could do it on his own. He was so overwhelmed. “From what I understand, they all said rotten things to you that day, and they all were sorry. He would’ve been sorry, too. He wasn’t perfect, nobody’s saying that, but he was always good. And then he was gone, but by a miracle, now you have the chance to show him you care.”
“But you’re right, he was good, and it’s not him anymore,” Roberto said miserably. “It’s just… that zombie walking among us… and all he does…”
“Is make you feel guilty all over again. I know. Worst of all, he knows it, and our guilt don’t justify our lashing out and making it worse for him.”
Roberto said nothing. He was drumming on his computer, and anguish was written across the crinkles of his brow. Sam hated that he’d made him feel like that. But this was so important. For healing. No matter what anyone thought. God, he couldn’t focus on one train of thought!
“Listen,” he said, anyway. “Like I said, blunted emotions ain’t sustainable, and if he breaks, and you see that, he’ll need all our help. I just need to know you’ll stop.”
“If he breaks… if I see proof he still has a soul… of course I’ll be there for him.”
“Good,” Sam closed his eyes, even though it was an impossibly low bar. And when I break? The thought passed briefly through his mind, but he brushed it away. He would hold together as long as was needed to make sure that Doug was okay.
Not so far away, past beds and walls and ghosts, a pitching shriek repeated variations his name in distorted sentences, and he was so tired, he couldn’t have comprehended if he tried. He smoothed the blanket on Roberto’s bed and stood abruptly. “I’m gonna get some air, okay?”
Roberto nodded. He returned his attention to his computer, but his eyes were unfocused. He wasn’t really thinking about his game. Sam missed the days when his own best friend felt more readable.
A moment later, Sam nearly jumped out of his skin. In fairness, ‘Pretty useless with both guys, even when you put the work in! Think you’ll do any better whenever you get the brainpower to talk to the girls?’ was hardly an original sentiment, but it was so loud inside his head that all of Sam’s muscles seized for a fight. Dammit. What the hell was wrong with him? He really was haunted. And the implications of that were too big, too sad, too hopeful, and too horrific to think of right now… so instead he turned and dashed shakily out the door.
~~~
Doug’s eyes were closed. He was the man who never stopped looking at everything; Sam wasn’t sure he’d seen his eyes actually resting like this since he lay in his coffin all those years ago.
He lay curled on the couch in their common area, entwined in Warlock’s arms and tendrils. Warlock looked happy — happy in a way he hadn’t been in god knew how long. Doug looked peaceful. Maybe he was asleep.
Sam’s eyes met Warlock’s, and he nodded, an understanding passing between them, an understanding of how good it was that Doug was resting. It was hard to take care of oneself when one was used to not being alive.
A slim bead of relief released itself in Sam’s chest. Of course he wasn't the only one who’d been worrying about Doug, even when he felt alone. How could he have overlooked Warlock? Such forgetfulness just went to show how much was wrong in Sam’s head. Warlock understood Doug in a way that Sam could only dream of.
Doug was going to be okay. He was going to be himself again, eventually. Because he had the New Mutants — the rest of them would eventually come around, because they were more than friends, they were a family.
“Doug! Up and at ‘em, sleepyhead.” A soccer ball went flying across the room with a familiar saunter in through the door. Roberto spun around like he was showing off. Techno-organic tendrils curled automatically to deflect the ball, but Doug’s eyes jerked open with a start.
Sam turned to stare at Roberto, a protective indignance rising in his chest. Fine, Roberto hadn’t agreed to lay off completely, but couldn’t he let Doug sleep? But there was something different about the way his best friend walked across the room that made Sam pause — something gentler in the way his eyes traced the recently-sleeping New Mutant. Something that felt a little like hope.
“Does selfriendbobby want to play favorite sportgame futebol?” Warlock speculated, eyes boinging towards the ball, which was bouncing in a corner.
Doug rubbed his eyes, sitting up as his body gracefully detangled from Warlock’s. “He doesn’t,” he said simply, with all the certainty of someone to whom micro-expressions were intuitive.
“Of course I do,” Roberto scowled, then pulled a wide smile. “Unless you’re scared how bad I’ll beat you?”
“You don’t really want me to play with you,” Doug insisted, his brow wrinkling in stressed translation. It was like his interpretation didn’t match the words he was hearing.
Roberto sighed, and took a step closer, lowering his voice to speak directly to Doug. Had he realized Sam was even there? “Maybe you creep me out, and that shows in my subtle-language-whatever, but I don’t want that to be the case. You’re not the person I remember, but I want to get used to you, because at the same time, you are him, and that makes us family. You know we’re family, right?”
“All of you are my language,” said Doug, and even though there was still almost no intonation in his voice, his eyes were slightly wider than usual.
“Self thinks selfriendbobby is ‘making an effort’,” Warlock suggested, forming into a vaguely humanoid shape beside Doug.
“What do you say, boys? Wanna play?” Roberto asked grandly, overlooking any reference Warlock may have been making.
“Futebol is a language I would love to brush up on,” Doug replied sincerely, moving to follow him.
Roberto beamed, picked up his ball, and pranced to the door. “You wanna come, Sam?” he called over his shoulder.
Sam followed the three of them through the door and down the hall, but at a slight distance. They needed all the room to heal, because it was going to take some time.
“Your death,” Roberto said, so offhandedly it was almost comedic. “That was some lousy turn of fate.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” said Doug in a quiet voice. “I’m happy Warlock went after you when we pushed you away.”
The moment of silence that followed pulled at Sam’s heart. He watched them carefully. Warlock slid between Doug and Roberto and wrapped himself around them both, and the word “selfriends” slipped out in a sigh so fondly emotional, that the silence between them felt full, not empty.
Sam fell into step a little behind them, and realized that even though he was unwell, he didn’t actually feel so bad right now. Was this what it used to feel like — those moments of peace? He was so glad to call these mutants his family.