Power Swap: The Sound of Silence (Open)

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean’s morning had not been as pleasant as Ann’s had on the other side of Pilot Ridge. He had woken with pain in his back from sleeping in an awkward position, and as gradual awareness slipped in his eyes fluttered open.

It was quiet.

Although odd, he didn’t give the silence much thought as he padded downstairs to brew his morning coffee. He wasn’t awake until he’d had two cups in him anyway. But as he sat and sipped, the silence became nearly overwhelming.

Why was it so quiet?

One of his neighbors jogged by and waved at him through the large glass window in his kitchen. Sean waved back but then he frowned.

He couldn’t hear anything. His hands began to shake in panic as he concentrated and still heard nothing. He focused and tried to extend himself to the farthest limits of his range – straining to listen for his other neighbors and still hit that emptiness, like he was trapped. He didn’t even feel the telltale psychic signature of another telepath who might be interfering. There was nothing.

The coffee mug crashed to the floor. The sound of liquid splashing the tiles and the ceramic shattering was loud in his ears against the otherwise silent backdrop.

He was mind-blind.

For the first time in 41 years, Sean Neville was alone in his head. And it frightened him more than when he was twelve and the voices first took up residence in his mind.

He was mind-blind.

Details slipped by because the panic and the depression left no room for observation. Details like his hands shaking or the fact that he was shivering, on his way to a breakdown he hadn’t had since young adulthood. Details like the fact that he was barefoot and there were broken shards all over the floor, so he would have to be careful as he walked. Details like the present time and the fact that he would have to get ready for work soon. Details like the half-familiar odor which lingered in the air.

He wished that Robert was still alive, because he didn’t know what else to and old habits died hard. Robert would know what to do, Robert would know how to help him, Robert would hold him while he broke down until he got it out of his system...

If only he was deaf.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

***************************

The only reason that Sean hadn’t called in sick to work was that he couldn’t think of an excuse that didn’t sound like he thought all non-psychics were some class of untermensch. For the record he didn’t, but he lacked the calm required to reason his way through an available excuse. And besides, everyone else coped with being mind-blind without wanting to vomit, so why couldn’t he?

Because the rest of the world weren’t psychics, and now he wasn’t either. That thought caused him to ache down to his toes.

He drove the entire route to school at a consistent 15 miles-per-hour, ignoring all stoplights, posted speed limits, road signs, and the surrounding traffic. Someone flipped him off but he didn’t notice.

After arriving, he immediately took up residence in his office, glad that he didn’t have any sessions scheduled. But he couldn’t focus on paperwork; his own thoughts were at once oppressive and repetitive, and he couldn’t ignore the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. A reflection of the emptiness he felt around him. He just needed to get to the end of the day when he could drink himself to the point that he no longer cared that he’d lost his most important sense.

But time crept forward at a snail’s pace and the day was no closer to ending. Finally he gave up and retreated to the staff lounge. His hands shook as he poured himself a cup of coffee. And he huddled on the sofa like a lump.

[Dr. James Campbell]

Sean wasn't the only one who was blind that day. James felt that he was looking around, but he wasn't seeing anything.

After all, he hadn't seen the world this way for more than a few minutes--in training with a power negator, over a decade ago--since he was eleven. His power was intrinsically linked to how he viewed the world, and without it, everything looked so bland, so boring. But it wasn't just his vision. Sound wasn't as sharp, his taste was just off, and his skin wasn't the hypersensitive organ it was usually. And like he had told Chase that morning, he had a hard time believing that other people really managed to get through the day like this, without all the "proper" information getting through.

On the other hand, though his world was filtered, he had no compulsion to touch the doorknob three times before he opened it, nor did he have to double-check the lock before they could leave. His senses were muted, but James hadn't been bothered by his OCD once that morning.

Also, he could manifest shadows into shadow-people. That was new.

That was what he was considering when he entered the staff lounge. He needed to refresh his coffee, and he managed not to notice that someone else was in the room until he was at the coffeepot. James stiffened, because what gave it away was that tell-tale odor. The one that he could usually sense before he opened the door, and made him break his routine. Stress from doing things differently didn't come close to the stress from being in close quarters with Adam. But he hadn't noticed, and now he was going to have to talk to him, or seem rude. (The other man had been actively avoiding him too. Had they even spoken since the attack?)

"Good morning, Ada--" James said as he turned, then nearly dropped his mug of coffee when he saw Sean of all people on the couch. "Oh, God, Sean. I didn't realize it was you." Not quickly enough, he realized that it was the older man who was giving off that smell, and put two and two together.

He sat down, wide-eyed, and simply said, "It happened to me too."

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Although he didn’t suffer from any OCD or anxiety disorders, Sean was a creature of habit. The drive to maintain his lifestyle wasn’t all-consuming, but he took subconscious comfort in knowing that even if he hopped in his car and drove down to Manhattan for the weekend, when he returned to Pilot Ridge, everything would be as he left it or within acceptable parameters for change. This was not within those acceptable parameters.

The telepath had never taken stock of how much he came to rely on his abilities over the years: to keep in tune with others for work or recreation, as a means of staying aware of his surroundings, as a means of conveying information quickly without clumsy mediums, to identify everyone around him because every mental voice was as different as a vocal voice. It disturbed him that he didn’t know who had entered the room because nobody was speaking, and that he would have to actually turn around and try to catch a glimpse of the man or woman who was sharing his space. Unlike most people who had lost a sense, his others weren’t compensating for the loss and he had no interest in trying to adapt.

Rather than do so, he moved further against the arm of the sofa. Just like when he was thirteen and had first sat in this room, feeling like he didn’t belong. His behavior was barely recognizable to everyone who knew him only as Doctor Neville, the calm, confident, patient psychiatrist. But to those who knew him before, this was familiar, his behavior a throwback; Claude would remember him this way but there was no danger now of uncontrolled memory loss or of him digging up all of someone’s secrets.

He frowned when he heard James begin a greeting for someone else and then give up, make an exclamation which he couldn’t fully identify as being in the realm of pity, shock, or sympathy. Then the younger man was in his line of vision, sitting across from him in one of the overstuffed chairs, professing that the same thing had happened to him. But whereas James was aware of a new power and benefiting from being spared his OCD, Sean was unaware and a hair trigger away from backsliding. His hands continued to shake as he looked over at James, still feeling like he might vomit and mortified about doing so in public. “I shouldn’t have come into work today. I’m useless right now.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

Usually, the recruiter relied heavily on his power to interpret other people's body language. When he was in the right state of mind, he could easily read body language and situations so well he was able to manipulate conversations to his advantage. (There was a reason he was very, very good at his job.) But that natural instinct was gone now, so he observed Sean and slowly sipped his coffee, grimacing a moment before adding in more sugar.

He hadn't smelled that he hadn't sweetened it enough. Okay, drawback.

But even without his power, the psychiatrist was easily read. James assumed he was a lot less conflicted about his new ability and more upset that he had lost the skill he had spent decades learning. (If his math was right--and it was--it was approximately the same amount of time that James had been alive.) The younger man's control had jumped forward by 1000%, and he couldn't be happier about it.

James shook his head, smiling ruefully. "Adam would probably be offended by that, and if there are more people this happened to, we're going to need you. Has this ever happened?"

All that morning, he'd been exhausting every record he could get his hands on, but there was nothing about this happening before.... Okay, that wasn't entirely true. A lot of his time had also been devoted to him manifesting his shadow into a physical being. They had, briefly, played chess against each other. And though James was feeling more than a little drained, he wanted to keep playing with this new power. It was interesting. It was fun. And for the first time ever, he felt completely in control of his power.

Of course, this came with a lot of questions. "There aren't any other pheromone manipulators around here other than Adam, right? And, well, you, of course. Have you talked to him? Did he lose his power? Or did he keep it?" Then James' eyes went wider as he realized that there was another option. "Or did he get yours? I'm guessing that however this worked, some level of control was involved, because I couldn't do anything before and now I can do this." With a big smile, James willed Sean's shadow into another being. Looking like dark, opaque air in the older man's silhouette, the shadow man only lasted for a minute or so, looking around and then sitting on the other end of the couch from Sean.

James frowned. "Sorry about that. Maybe I'm getting tired? I've been playing with this all morning." And it had been nice. Though everything still felt heavily filtered, he wasn't paranoid, and that was great.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean gave the younger man a curious look when he mentioned that Adam would be offended by his remark. Why would he have any right or reason to be more offended than anyone else about the fact that the psychiatrist was mind-blind now? He liked the trainer fine but this wasn’t about him or anyone else. Sean considered himself useless because he could barely keep his hands steady and all he wanted to do was vomit. He couldn’t think clearly, he couldn’t focus, and he had difficulty holding back every impulse he’d had as a child that he’d thought had been overcome but apparently had only been waiting for this opportunity to manifest. “What are you talking-”

But then James made another reference to this affecting multiple people, and everything came together in the psychiatrist’s thoughts, the question died on his tongue. That combined with his comment about Adam and how James had begun to greet the other man before noticing him. He’d thought he was ill, he’d thought he was broken, and so he hadn’t noticed. No details had permeated about himself because he’d been so distraught. But people were losing their powers, or trading them perhaps across the board, and so he had...Adams? Now wasn’t the time to try and figure out if that was true.

Since nothing had come of them, that either wasn’t true or he had retained the same control of those as he had of his own. Or he had Adam’s control which was also excellent. If it was the first, and Adam had his powers, then there was little problem, but if it was the first and someone else had them, there was potential danger. He remembered with perfect clarity what it was like to be a telepath with little control and the memory manipulation...that snapped him out of his funk, feeling a mixture of concern born from sympathy and for the first time being vulnerable to his powers the way all of the other adults at Hammel had been when he was a boy.

But when he saw that his shadow was momentarily alive, the psychiatrist scratched the “same control as his own theory” off the list, because James’s control of his powers was notoriously awful; much of his time at Hammel was learning to cope with his poor control rather than gaining better control or turning it on and off. Sean calmed at that; no bouts of amnesia, little chance of danger. Thankfully.

“I hadn’t noticed,” he murmured, confessing to the fact that all of this was new. He set down his coffee, rubbed his temples, and tried to focus and answer all of the questions though not necessarily in order. “There’s one in Boston, at least two in New York that I know of, but no others here. And no, this hasn’t ever happened before; there’s no record of it, and I’ve never come across it through talking with anyone else. I haven’t spoken to Adam.” He didn’t realize that he’d needed to speak to Adam. “Every part of me feels like I’ve inherited a disability so bear with me.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

It said a lot about James' current state of mind that he didn't pick up quickly on Sean's confusion. Even without his heightened perception, pheromone manipulators had a distinct smell, and it just didn't occur to him that the older man could have been unaware of it.

Granted, James' shock at discovering his own new power had been bad, though not as bad as Chase's.

The last thing Sean said made him pause, reflecting. He'd freaked out at first when he realized that his glasses were no longer an affectation, but a necessity. But his new ability and level of control had made up for his lost senses. "I'm getting that some too. My perception is really weird now and I actually need these." He gestured to his thick glasses and shrugged. "Everything just feels filtered, but..." What else was there to say? As blinded as he felt at the moment, he felt like his disability had been lifted. Without his compulsions, he felt free. "But the shadow thing is cool, and I don't know what else I can do, but I can control it."

James gulped down the coffee--barely tasting it, in comparison to his normal coffee experience--wanting a caffeine buzz to give him enough energy to keep the shadow beings up and running for a while. He wanted to experiment and play with his new skill, the same way teenagers often did when their powers manifested, and as he didn't know the side-effects, he was putting himself in danger of burning out.

His cell phone buzzed in his pocket, and he checked it, nodding at the message. "I should probably talk to Morgan. I think his power comes closest to what's going on with me. And.... Chase just texted me. Half the people in his class don't know what's going on. Nothing happened to him or Niko though." He finished off his coffee and put down the mug. James didn't know what was going on either, but he was going to enjoy it, even if it lasted a long time. He could learn how to see like this again, if it meant he could be more normal.

Sean, on the other hand, had a better relationship with his original power. And while he wanted to be mindful of that, without a super-powerful psychic on staff, Hammel might be in trouble. "Can you still shield? I don't know if the shadow control affected it, but I still can't." He'd made Chase try his mind control on him that morning. The thought of someone being in his head still terrified him, but he wanted to be sure the blond man was still capable of protecting Niko from Gabriel, and they weren't about to test mind control on a nine-year-old. Luckily, Chase had retained his own power, and with the lack of perception, James didn't feel him in his head at all.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Ever the psychiatrist, Sean almost suggested a support group for everyone affected and particularly those who had lost a sense or five, but he kept that to himself. Particularly since James admitted to liking his new power – although in a better mood the psychiatrist would admit he couldn’t blame him. But they weren’t on the same page when it came to this event; James felt free and benefited from the control and loss of his anxiety and OCD, and Sean...if this had happened forty years ago he would be thrilled, but he couldn’t stand the sudden feeling of helplessness.

“I should ask Claude to cancel classes.” Usually Sean advocated consistency for the sake of the students and loathed to disrupt everyone’s routine because of something occurring behind the scenes. However if multiple people were affected – which they were – and students were also affected – which it sounded like was true – then it was best to ease the pressure of classes and schoolwork. Not permanently, but he also couldn’t let himself think about a reality in which he was permanently mind-blind. “And I’ll go talk to Adam; if nothing else, we might be able to sort out just who is affected at Hammel and then find out how far it stretches.”

The question was a valid one, but also one for which the psychiatrist didn’t have a satisfactory answer. Telepathy did not have a classical off switch, in that with the exception of the weakest permutations of the power, one did not have to concentrate to hear, although one had to concentrate to focus without training. Mental shields were necessary for power training, and with his range, mental shields were what allowed him to function – when he had his powers. He’d spent years perfecting them, and the thought of losing that work bothered him almost as much as the mere fact of his mind-blindness. He also had a different relationship with mental shields than non-telepaths; people learned to shield for defense, but his bearing of them came initially from silence. His shields were perfect when he was alone in his head, but now he was alone through no work of his own, and his bearings were off. “I don’t know; I’d have to test with another psychic. I can’t feel them but that’s meaningless.” Even if his shields did work, he doubted his ability to throw someone out of his mind should he – Gabriel – manage somehow to break through, and that was an uncomfortable vulnerability. He was used to being the strongest boy on the block in that regard; no wonder he was backsliding to when he was younger, he felt so weak and disoriented.

Then another thought occurred to him and he frowned. “Do you know if Sam and Vincent were affected?” Someone else with Sam’s uncontrolled pyrokinesis could easily burn the school to the ground, and Vincent without his powers could die from one of his stunts. Easily. On their watch. The psychiatrist decided to try to give warning lest a disaster happen. He officially snapped out of his depression, although it loomed on the horizon, and he reached out with steadier hands for his cup of coffee, which he drained quickly, possessing a sense of purpose now.

[Dr. James Campbell]

"Not the power training, at least. What if this is permanent? What if everyone doesn't end up with the same level of control? We're going to need to keep training them. And if it's permanent, how long do we keep classes closed?" And he would need to head back to his office for more recruitment planning. Thankfully, none of his recruiters had been affected by this powers mess, and had been able to do their jobs just fine. But if there were young metas who had suddenly been given complete control over something, the same way that he had.

Honestly, James wasn't sure if Sean was aware of his past with Adam. He hadn't told anyone at Hammel when they were dating--at Adam's request--or after the breakup. But the older man had been around then, and he'd could have picked it up from either of their thoughts. So now that they were actually discussing him, it was a bit of a relief that Sean wasn't telepathic. "You should. He'd be able to help you get used to it, too." Adam was a powers trainer, after all.

As for the shields, James shrugged again, then went up to refresh his coffee. Ugh, he really needed more caffeine today. Luckily for him, his mind wasn't rejecting the break in his routine. "Go to Chase? He's not telepathic, but..." With the exception of Gabriel Underwood's puppetry, Chase's mind control was probably the most offensive of mental powers. If Sean could at least hold his own against him, they would probably be okay.

"And I know this isn't a regular session--and I think we can cancel this week if we need to, depending on how long this lasts--but I let him in my head this morning. It was because I was so afraid of him not having his power and us not being able to protect Nikki, but it's progress, right?" Maybe it was his lack of obsessions. Maybe it was his sudden youthful exuberance, but James felt that he had made great strides in the past six hours or so. Hopefully it would last.

He poured the coffee, sweetening it liberally as he listened to Sean's next train of thought. Shit. If Verax didn't realize he couldn't regenerate, and tried to jump off the roof or something, they would have a dead teenager on their hands. And if there really was a power swap happening, then someone might get caught in a heated situation. (James inwardly groaned at the lame puns he couldn't help but think.) "I don't know. But I really, really hope not. At least on Verax's part. But maybe someone less frequently impaired might be able to handle Rixon's fire." He didn't know if there was a correlation between substance abuse and inability to control powers, but with pyrokinetics, he doubted that weed helped.

He sipped his coffee, then gestured to the pot. "You want some more?" James offered. It was going to be a long day for the older man too. And with a hopeful shrug, he added, "And we'll figure out what's happening. Somehow."

[Dr. Sean Neville]

“I don’t think there’s any harm in giving them a day or two off to relax and cope. Anything longer than that and they have to resume classes, power training first.” But what sense was there in maintaining power training when half the student – or more potentially – didn’t have their usual powers? It would distress them, and he felt that distress needed to be minimized. It would be hypocritical of him to demand the usual routine from the students when he couldn’t even pull himself together, and the psychiatrist did what he could to avoid hypocrisy.

Sean had known that James and Adam were together for a time the same way that he knew that Morgan was seeing a man now and which members of the Idiot Brigade had slept with each other and how frequently. He didn’t mention it because it was none of his business, and he had no desire to think about what anyone else did in their bedroom. If interested, he would ask someone on a date; although it had been so long since that had happened that he doubted he’d remember how to ask. But since he was now mind-blind, he did not know what James was thinking about, and he had little investment in trying to decipher thoughts from body language or tone; it was for the best since he wouldn’t want to know. “I’m sure he would.” That was a lie. He wasn’t interested in learning to cope with pheromone manipulation; his only concern was coping with being mind-blind and Adam couldn’t imagine the loss. No non-psychic could. “I’ll look for him later.”

The possibility of lacking mental shields greatly concerned the psychiatrist, and part of him didn’t want to confront the possibility of lacking his entire mental prowess. The other part of him, more responsible and better able to cope, realized that it was necessary to get that answer and plan accordingly, and Chase’s ability was similar enough that if he could shield from him, his shields were likely up to par. “I’ll look for him too, after I talk to Claude.”

That was positive news, and Sean was legitimately impressed with that progress. Even if it was due to these bizarre circumstances and fear for his son, it was progress nonetheless, and he nodded to convey the fact that he was pleased. “That is progress. How do you feel about it now?” He would be fine with canceling their official session for the week if this lasted more than the next few hours; the psychiatrist was not in a position to offer James advice right now.

The younger man’s inability to confirm or to deny Vincent and Sam’s powers at the moment caused him to yet again rearrange his priorities. He would have to get to security first and to the medical clinic to warn them, particularly about Vincent. “I hope not too; somebody should find Vincent and test him by shoving a tack into his palm. And if I can make a short list of people who would be worse off with Sam’s powers than he is.” Someone should take his drugs away; the psychiatrist occasionally busted him but he didn’t have the time to devote to keeping Sam sober, otherwise he’d have no ability to do the rest of his job if he tried.

The offer of more coffee was met with an enthusiastic nod from Sean. “Please. Sugar and cream.” He then let out a sigh and reached up to pinch his eyes. “I’ll give our sister school a call, or ask Claude to do it. That should hopefully get us some answers.” Or not, because this could be localized to Pilot Ridge which was concerning on a personal level albeit less so than a global epidemic would be overall. He sighed again and admitted, “I feel utterly trapped.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

James shrugged, because while what Sean was saying made sense, he really wanted to throw himself into training with this new power. Thought he felt like he was already pretty proficient with his shadow skills, he wanted to practice anyway. (Even though he was starting to feel pretty worn out.) Depending on how tired Chase was at the end of the day--and he had a feeling it might be a migraine night--he might try to convince him to and impromptu training session. He wanted to know the extent of his ability, and he guessed that a lot of the students would as well. They hadn't grown accustomed to having their powers in the way the older metas had. Though he was seriously in love with his new ability, it had been very disorienting that morning, between the discovery that he had lost his perception and the discovery of his shadow manipulation.

After he had encouraged Sean to see Adam about training with the new ability, James was more than happy to let that thread of conversation drop. Yes, the trainer was qualified to help in this case, but that didn't make him any more willing to talk about him. But it was good that Sean was going to see Chase about this. If the psychiatrist couldn't shield his own mind, then they had a huge security risk on their hands. Sean knew so much about everyone at Hammel, if a strong telepath needed to find something out...

It was strange that James was only realizing it now, but Chase was probably the second most powerful psychic at Hammel. And if Sean couldn't shield, then he was the first, hands-down.

And he'd been okay with having him inside his head. For a while at least. "I don't know. At the time, it just seemed necessary, because we had to know if his power was working. And it felt different. Usually I can feel him in my head--which I thought was the same for everyone but I guess is a perception thing--but this time, I couldn't. It didn't freak me out, but that was at least in part because I was relieved that he still had his powers. And I guess because he was getting me to calm down." James smiled and looked down at the mug in his hands. The feeling of relief--that Chase still had his powers, that he could use his power on him, and the actual influence from the other man's mind--had hung around him all day, putting him in higher spirits than he'd seen for a long time. "It was all in a rush but... I feel good about it. Like something's right again."

Of course, the topic couldn't stay in such pleasant fare, and James had to roll his eyes. When Sean said someone would have to find Vincent, he had the impluse to touch his finger to his nose in a "not it" guesture, but he had younger nieces and nephews than Sean, and he wasn't sure if the older man would get the reference.

Instead, he took Sean's mug and refilled it, stirring in the cream and sugar as he listened. "I haven't heard any reports of unusual stuff this morning, and none of the recruiters who are in the field have called in with problems."

But the admission was harder to respond to. With the power change, James had gained so much; he didn't want to go back to OCD and anxiety. But Sean had lost just as much, and that wasn't fair, by any standards. "We'll figure this out," he finally said, handing over the fresh cup of coffee. "Somehow, we're going to figure this out."

[Dr. Sean Neville]

If the psychiatrist was going to make it through the day, he could not focus on everything inherent in being mind-blind. The fact that he continued to focus on it was why his only “accomplishment” thus far had been retreating to the staff lounge and brewing a pot of coffee.

It was bad enough that he felt he could no longer help the school in either a psychic or a professional capacity, until he calmed himself but that wouldn’t happen in the near future. That was why he considered himself useless presently. But to be a liability, to be at risk for every secret, every bit of sensitive information to be exposed because someone decided to rifle through his thoughts...the vulnerability chilled him. If he couldn’t shield, then he was as big a threat to the school as anyone was. This was why he couldn’t let himself think about being unable to shield.

Losing his well-deserved title as Hammel’s resident psychic powerhouse, possibly his hard-earned shields, his sanity...he couldn’t let that last one slip away without a fight. And thinking of others – so long as there was no tangential relationship to his loss – did the trick so far.

This was why he could focus on what James said, on the descriptions of what had happened earlier this morning and what a monumental breakthrough it was. Although James described the incident as necessity, he had still overcome a huge hurdle, one which he had avoided for months; that he had done so was great progress. That he noticed a difference was to be expected given the trauma, but he was able to calm down from the experience, and he was able to think back on the experience without panicking. All of those were steps in the right direction, amplified tenfold by the fact that the younger man felt good about it. The psychiatrist nodded, genuinely pleased although his expression didn’t convey that. “That’s very good.” Perhaps not one of his most articulate bits of encouragement, but at least he was genuine. “Now you can remember this and know that connection can be just fine.”

Sean had seen the gesture with students, which is the only way he would have recognized the action. But James didn’t need to play the “not it” game with Sean, since the psychiatrist intended to either check on them himself or to send security and alert the medical team. He couldn’t scan for them the way he would if he had his powers, and so perhaps this was an issue best left for trained professionals. There was some hope in the fact that the younger man hadn’t heard of any problems thus far, but Sean was unwilling to not engage in some form of investigation himself. Cellular regeneration was a passive power; one wouldn’t notice its absence until there was a large problem and if they waited that long, Vincent could be seriously injured or dead. And Sam...well, it was a good day when Sam neglected to set something on fire accidentally, and so an absence of reports might only be considered a good day, not indicative of a swap. Better safe than sorry. “That’s a start at least. Do you know anyone else who’s been affected? Or have you been distracted?” The psychiatrist didn’t mean that as an accusation regarding James’s enjoyment of his new powers. He, himself, had been too distracted to accomplish anything useful up to this point.

The psychiatrist took the refilled cup of coffee from James gratefully. He didn’t sip yet, instead letting the liquid warm his hands on either side of the mug. He was silent for a long moment, and then said, “The first time I was ever allowed in this room, I was thirteen. My trainer had pulled me out of classes for the rest of the day because I’d had a breakdown and couldn’t handle it; everything was so loud. I didn’t think I would ever learn to live with the noise.” His gaze grew momentarily distant, as he remembered Robert's gentle voice guiding him, helping him recover. He brought the cup to his lips. But he nearly choked on the liquid, as a sob tried to work its way out.

Not here. Not now. Not in front of his coworker, someone younger than him, someone he’d known as a student.

The universe was doing Sean Neville no favors today. And so he squeezed his eyes tight to prevent his eyes from tearing. “Forty years later and it’s the silence that’s breaking me.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

One of the reasons James was in such a good mood--despite being fatigued and having his sensory ability cut down to a fraction of what it had been--was that he'd had a major breakthrough in his healing that morning. Yes, the world looked darker, sounded muted, and seemed so much harder to navigate, but he'd let Chase into his head, and that more than made up for everything else for him.

"I know. I keep thinking about it, and knowing it would have terrified me two weeks ago, but I'm not getting the same reaction now." Somehow, it was easier for him to talk about now as well. Maybe it was because he was talking to Sean, who had seen him right after the attack, literally shouting "Stay out of my head." But he'd improved so much since then--or since yesterday, even--he was proud of this.

"No, I don't. I'm sorry." James was going to meet a few more of the affected today, but he'd spent the morning in his office, doing research that had proved fruitless and messing with the sudden gift he'd been giving. "Distracted is probably the best term for it." He shrugged, slightly embarrassed that he hadn't been trying to see who else on the campus had been hit with this. In the beginning of the day, he'd thought he was the only one, after all.

James remembered Robert Hopkins. Or, more accurately, he remembered of him. They'd met a few times during his first few years at Hammel, which overlapped with the last few years before the man had retired. But he hadn't trained with him. He didn't know him the same way the older staff did. He did know, however, that he was widely respected, and had earned the same high regard from students that Chase had now. It was strange, seeing the man who was almost as old as his parents looking as vulnerable as the kids he met every day.

He was no trainer, but he had plenty of experience talking to people about new powers. Granted, most of them were under the age of 16, but it still kind of applied here. "Oh God, Sean. I'm sorry." Instead of sitting down in the chair he had claimed earlier, he took the seat on the couch, next to his friend. In eighteen years of knowing the other man, he'd never seen him like this. Gently, he put his hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry."

He wasn't going to promise that it was going to be okay. He couldn't do that, because he didn't know if it was so. Sean had lost an ability he'd had for as long as the younger man had been alive. James just sat and carefully rubbed his friend's shoulder. "I don't know what's going to happen, but you can do this."

And now that he was listening, James noticed that he wasn't hearing as much. But without his perception, without his mindset, it wasn't as severe a shock as it had been that morning.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

“It’s progress,” Sean repeated, and unlike in the technological world where these debates raged constantly, when progress occurred in the psychological and emotional spectrums, it was automatically a good sign. One could only progress where there was room for either recovery or improvement and for James to show any – but particularly this comfort with that intimate act – was truly remarkable. Then again, James’s enhanced perception had been a hindrance in more ways than one; with that sort of perception, Sean had always believed he would never feel clean enough to go outside. Unable to notice in the same way, it was possible that he had been freed and could now recover the same way anyone else would. Those were only theories, as the psychiatrist had neither the ability to confirm those beliefs telepathically nor, as a result, the ability to analyze the matter in depth. He could only offer cursory insight and bland platitudes. “Now you need to remember it for the future, and you’ll be on the right path.”

They had no lists of who had been affected. Sean could hardly blame James for not compiling one or doing research, not when the psychiatrist had been equally ineffective this morning. Perhaps Claude would have that information; he would find out when he spoke to the head master...at some point later. He knew that he had to start working and get to the bottom of this disaster; it was his job and potentially his own salvation. “You have every reason to be.” That was all that the psychiatrist could say on the matter, because his sense of reason had slipped away.

The last thing that Sean wanted was sympathy. He didn’t want to be babied or treated with kid gloves or handled delicately like fine china. He was in his early fifties for Heaven’s sake, older than the man sitting next to him; he was too old for this, and he had his reputation to think about. He was a psychiatrist, the man that those at Hammel came to with their problems; he wasn’t supposed to have problems of his own. He He’d seen or heard it all and he’d gotten past this weakness over the decades.

Except apparently he hadn’t, because the urge to curl up in Robert’s lap was nearly overwhelming. A desire rendered all the more pathetic because of its impossibility; Robert hadn’t had a lap to curl up in since his death years ago, and it hadn’t been appropriate to curl up with him for twenty years before that, if it had ever been truly appropriate at all. He hadn’t because had had begun to cry in front of another human being. He hadn’t because despite being disgusted with himself, he couldn’t contain his sobs. Bringing his fist to his mouth to hold back the sound, he took several gulps of air, as though that might calm him. “So am I.” He was deeply sorry for putting James in this awkward position.

He appreciates James’s reassurances, although he did not believe them. He had done a miserable job of coping this morning, and he was doing a miserable job of coping at the moment. How to make the other man understand? “I’m backsliding.” He shook his head in a futile attempt to calm himself. “I was this bad before you were born and when you were in diapers.” That depressing thought only made him feel worse. “You didn’t know me, but I barely made it through the first time. I don’t have it-” He sobbed and his words rushed together. “I don’t have it in me to do it a second time.”