A Grocery List of Forgiveness [Sean]

"Not a pleasant one, I'm sure." Jake looked off to the side, holding his own forearm. This was stupid, he should have just left Sean to his own devices. But it was too late to just turn around and walk away. The best he could hope for was to say his piece and then be on his way. It's not like he was expecting anything from Sean.

On the plus side, Sean hadn't hit him yet. That was more than he could say for the majority of the people he had approached or run into since the MSAD debacle.

"I apologize for interrupting you and I realize this is hardly the time or the place, but..." He trailed off for a moment, trying to gather his words before he made a bigger fool of himself. "I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for everything, for what MSAD did, and for what I did as a part of them. I know just saying sorry doesn't fix it and I don't expect to be forgiven, but I've been trying to start over and I don't think I can until I address what happened."

"I'm rambling." He stopped to shake his head. "I guess what I really wanted to say is that I deeply regret the unrest that MSAD caused and that people were hurt." He didn't dare mention anything about Gabriel, even if thoughts of his former boss were always lurking somewhere in his mind. As much as he might have blamed Gabe, Jake knew that his actions were his alone.

Wringing his hands nervously, Jake started to wonder which was worse: the sudden and somewhat violent reactions he'd earned from Morgan and Cobalt, or this awkward semi-silence and almost emotionless response coming from Sean. It was unnerving, but he had already made the promise to himself to face what he had done.

And despite how much Jake wanted to look away from Sean, because he'd always felt slightly intimidated by him, he was going to respectful and maintain eye contact. If anything, he wanted Sean to know he was being sincere.

When the telepath spoke, Jake reflexively braced himself, only to be surprised and somewhat confused by the question. He thought back on his family life, on his parents and his siblings, but there had been no emotional attachment there. They had been all too eager to see him off; he was too different for their tastes. And throughout the rest of his life, the people that he'd grown close to had all been Meta. "Uh... no, I guess not. Not specifically anyways."

Jake was sure he held no animosity towards regular humans and that which he'd shown while under the command of MSAD had come from Gabriel himself. That didn't make it right, of course, nothing did, but these were things that Jake was learning about himself, without the presence, the pressure, and the consuming power that Gabe had held over him.

Despite the uneasy rolling in his stomach and the panicking thoughts in the back of his head telling him that this was one of the worst ideas he'd ever had, Jake listened intently to what Sean had to say. His experience with Sean might have been limited, outside of the times he'd gotten himself in trouble as a teenager or what he had heard from Gabriel, but Jake knew that Sean was a smart man and he had no reason to distrust him.

He was right, after all. It didn't make sense to hate someone for the circumstances of their birth. Maybe if Jake had realized this when he was younger, or if his family hadn't reacted they way they had to his manifestation, this situation would have never presented itself. But there was no solace to be found in "What Ifs."

Jake looked down when Sean questioned him again, then shrugged. "I... I don't know." He raked his fingers back through his hair. "To be honest I just... it didn't matter what we did, I just thought everything would be okay as long as I was with him." His hands fell to his sides. "I was being so foolish and I didn't realize it until..." Until he'd met Morgan, until he'd fallen in love with Morgan. That was when everything he'd ever thought began to fall apart.

But for whatever reason, he found that difficult to say to Sean, so he let the sentence die off. "But I didn't know how to get out or if I even could."

Whatever it was that Sean wanted to hear eluded Jake. Of course, he had no intention of saying just what he thought Sean would want to hear, there was no point in that, but he was genuinely curious about why the telepath would want to know these things.

Part of him was also embarrassed about how much control Gabriel had held over him. Even more so that he wasn't fully aware of it until after his death.

Jake nodded his head slightly in agreement. Gabriel was nothing if not confident, arrogant even, and he regularly talked as if his success was inevitable. Using words like "when" instead of "if" for example. And Jake had leeched off that confidence, never questioned it, and learned to speak like he had.

"That's what I always did." His voice was soft, a bit hesitant. "Anything he wanted, I didn't even think about it." There was a faint shrugging of his shoulders and a brief look of confusion when Sean asked him to walk with him. "Okay." The word dragged out a bit, Jake's unease coming through a bit in that moment as he turned to grab the handle of his cart and turn it around.

He was grateful to have something to hold onto as he walked alongside Sean, his forearms resting against the handle of the cart. "But when I was with them, I felt like I belonged. I hadn't felt that since... since I was a student at Hammel."

Purposely walking at a much slower pace than Sean, Jake took the moment away from the intensity of Sean's gaze and his intimidating presence to try and calm his nerves. He let his head hang between his shoulders, pursed his lips, and blew out a long breath. This was much more exhausting than he'd anticipated and he was saying things he'd never said aloud before.

The only person he'd ever talked to about any of this was Ella and even when he'd practically bared his soul, she simply shrugged. It didn't matter to her. But Sean was involved. People that he knew and cared about had been hurt because of something that he was involved in. It was something that neither he nor Jake could simply walk away from.

Reflex had Jake tensing when Sean's voice caught his ears. He lifted his head and watched Sean's hands. It was easier than looking at his face. A lot of times, when Jake thought about Gabriel, he ended up more confused and upset than before. There had been no closure to find in his death, in visiting his grave, not even in the dog with whom he'd given the same name. In some ways he didn't want to think that Gabriel had only used him as a means to an end, but in others it made so much more sense that he had been so manipulated by the man he thought he'd loved.

His jaw clenched when Sean mentioned the destruction of Hammel and suddenly he felt sick to his stomach. Looking back, he couldn't believe that had been what he was working towards. Hammel was one of the few places where he had happy memories. "I've realized that now." He said solemnly. "But not by myself. I had some help." Jake swallowed thickly, his thoughts flicking back to Morgan. Everything had started to fall apart then, but of all the things he regretted, loving Morgan was the one thing he didn't.

"I hurt people that I loved. As far as I'm concerned, that's a worse punishment than prison." For a moment he looked genuinely upset, but with a quick shake of his head, he turned back to Sean.

Jake sighed and scrubbed his hand over his face, trying to compose his thoughts. "I'm sure it worked, but it seems worse now. In there, I couldn't do anything. Now I can but-" He trailed off, gesturing absently with his hand at nothing in particular. "How do you know what to do? How do you even start?" He wasn't looking for an answer, but it was the only way he could think to express his dilemma.

He watched Sean as he went about his shopping, his own list forgotten for now. It was hard to focus on that when there were so many other things going through his head. And he was worried that neglecting whatever sort of conversation this was might seem rude. When the telepath moved onto the next section, Jake gripped the handle of the cart and nudged it forward, wincing slightly when one of the wheels squeaked.

Pressing his lips into a thin line as Sean spoke again, Jake's shoulders started to sag in an almost defeated manner. Of course it made sense that he couldn't be separated from his actions. Of course Sean was right. So far he might have faced the law, but that was the easy part. There was precedence, the punishments were clearly written, and he'd been able to lessen that load by complying and agreeing to testify should his information lead to apprehension of the other, likely scattered, MSAD members. But with people, with individuals, it was so much different.

How could he ever repair the damage he'd done to Morgan? How could he make it up to Levi for abandoning him? How would he face the Campbells after what MSAD had done to their family?

"I'm trying." Jake spoke softly. "I don't want that to be what I'm remembered for." He knew that it was a big scar on his record, however, and he would likely never be able to put it completely behind him. "But I'm trying to do whatever I can to make it alright." Jake wasn't sure if that was the right word because he doubted things would ever be "alright" after what they had done.