"She lost blood! Put her the **** back to bed, she will be fine."

That was all DocProf had to offer, yelling from his office as Mirror walked into the Infirmary carrying Evelyn. Apparently, she had already been there earlier. With a sigh, Gawain stepped back into the mirror and walked Eve back to her room, where he deposited her on the bed. She looked pale and exhausted. Which was, let's face it, just not fair. Gawain went from pissed to worried so fast it made his head spin, and it was not a pleasant trip.

Sliding down he sat on the floor, leaning back against the bed. There was still a lot to think through.

Evelyn woke a short while later, feeling twice as exhausted as she had when she passed out. The playbacks flickering in her mind were a jumbled mess, with images of sewer monsters overlapping with sunsets and paintings. She didn't dream, but the way the memories tangled made it feel like one big nightmare.

Opening her eyes, she squinted at the ceiling, trying to orient herself. Time, date, anything... The last memory she had to hold onto was talking to Gawain out on the grounds. This was definitely not the grounds.

Pulling the blankets closer, she rolled over and looked at Gawain. She bit her lip and sighed, shutting her eyes again. "I'm sorry..." It was really all she could say at this point. Maybe eventually it would stick, or mean enough. Until then she just felt like a broken record. This must have been how Gawain felt after the Gala disaster.

She was up and instantly apologetic. Gawain turned his head to look up at her. She was awake, but that was barely an improvement.

"Yeah" he sighed, acknowledging her apology. He knew what it felt like to do that over and over again. "You scared me, you know that right?"

It was about the fainting, but also about the sewers and everything before that. Gawain reached up to smooth the hair out of her face.

"I'm sorry for yelling at you. What happened? Was it playbacks?"

The anger seemed to have at least faded, but the air still seemed to have some of the hurt feelings wafting around in it. It was like soot, clinging to their skin, the room, their surroundings.

>>"You scared me, you know that right?"

"I know..." She stared at her hands, and one of the scratches that hadn't gotten healed by DocProf. "I think I scared me too..." As his hand brushed her skin and the hair moved out of her vision, his skin seemed warm. But maybe hers was just cold. She was lying still, but he mind was running all over New York, trying to decide which direction to go, or what to do.

>>"What happened? Was it playbacks?"

"More like a tidal wave of them... Lost too much blood, made me dizzy, and the echoes think anytime I'm dizzy it's apparently time for a nap..." She shut her eyes again and rubbed her forehead. "You had every right to yell at me. I'm yelling at myself, you just can't hear it over the echoes." She opened her eyes again and looked over at him, giving a tired, sad, smile. "I'm an impossible disaster. You know that, right?"

>>"More like a tidal wave of them... Lost too much blood, made me dizzy, and the echoes think anytime I'm dizzy it's apparently time for a nap... You had every right to yell at me. I'm yelling at myself, you just can't hear it over the echoes. I'm an impossible disaster. You know that, right?"

"Oh heck no, you don't get to do that" Gawain frowned, climbing up to sit on the endge of the bed "You don't get to beat yourself up while I am still angry at you. Ain't fair, you know?"

It really wasn't. His anger was seeping away, leaving some bitterness and worry. Evelyn was apparently struggling with a lot more than just her conscience.

"Look, we gotta talk about all this. Probably not all at once, and maybe not right now. But... yeah. That's a lot to talk about."

>>"You don't get to beat yourself up while I am still angry at you."

"Sorry... You can be mad, I'll put a rain check on beating myself up." She said. Part of her was joking, but she was pretty sure the other part of her was at least somewhat serious. She wasn't done beating herself up for this mess. Not by a long shot. Having playbacks aided in that. Relieve a mistake and you get to feel bad all over again.

>>"Look, we gotta talk about all this."

"I know..." She wiggled into a sitting position, leaning heaving on the wall for support. Still dizzy, but at least she wasn't craning her neck to see Gawain now. "Maybe...start somewhere easy?" Was there anything easy to talk about?

>>"I know... Maybe...start somewhere easy?"

Gawain pulled himself up to sit next to her with his back against the wall. This way if she decided to fall over again, at least she could lean against his shoulder.

"Okay..." he sighed, trying to find an easy place to start. There really wasn't one. But there was less annoying.

"So... you are not sure you want to be on the team. Do you want to talk about that?"

He really didn't care if she left the team. In fact, she would probably be safer, which was an idea he could get behind. But he was curious about the reasons.

Evelyn fiddled with the blankets in her hand, echoes slowly bouncing around the room. They looked at the papers on the desk, watched the time on the clock. Then she tried to focus on the question.

"I guess there is a few reasons for that, really. I feel like to really be an x-men there needs to be a level of trust, and there needs to be at least goals and ideas we'd agree on. I thought I agreed with some of those things, but when I start to question it, I start to question whether I'd be good for the team, or a hindrance. If we're in a battle and my team leader says do something I don't agree with, I'm not sure I can just... do it. I mean, with you and even CS, I trust you guys. But some of the other x-men I don't think I'd put my life in their hands." Mostly, just one x-men. And she didn't even remember why she felt that hesitant towards him.

>>"I guess there is a few reasons for that, really. I feel like to really be an x-men there needs to be a level of trust, and there needs to be at least goals and ideas we'd agree on. I thought I agreed with some of those things, but when I start to question it, I start to question whether I'd be good for the team, or a hindrance. If we're in a battle and my team leader says do something I don't agree with, I'm not sure I can just... do it. I mean, with you and even CS, I trust you guys. But some of the other x-men I don't think I'd put my life in their hands."

"Yeah... you've got a point there" Gawain nodded, considering what she told him. Her concerns were not as crazy as she thought they were.

"The trust thing, that might change with training. That's what training with teammates is for, after all." he noted, looking at her "At the same time, it might not."

Mirror had to face the fact that he did not always get along with all the team members either.

"I mean... I understand what you mean. The team has been all over the place lately. Sam being... in trouble did not help either. To tell the truth, most of the time I don't even know what we are doing either. I have been kind of winging it."

He glanced at Eve.

"So... what do you remember from what Saph told you? Or what his problem was with you being on the team?"

As Gawain talked, some of Evelyn's guilt started dissipating. Suddenly, her doubts didn't feel so childish.

>>"The trust thing, that might change with training."

That was true with Locke, but Saph? She was pretty sure the opposite had happened.

>>"At the same time, it might not."

She wondered if that was her doubts showing through this time or his.

>>"So... what do you remember from what Saph told you? Or what his problem was with you being on the team?"

Once upon a time, she might have laughed at such a question. But that was before she met the memory eraser and scrubbed a few brain cells. Now that part of her memory was cut and pasted back together like clips from a movie. The more she tried to question what was missing, the more the record just skip, skip, skipped over the missing tape.

"He said I could have just toughened up with a few self defense classes. As a member of the x-men I would be asked to put myself in harms way for the sake of others, and that didn't line up well with self centered goals. And I said what I thought: that even doing good has a level of selfishness to it. You help people because it makes you feel good. There are emotional rewards. He didn't like that answer. Said it meant people who gave their lives for others were 'selfish'. Then..." She paused, the memories scooting forward. Something was missing... she picked up what she remembered. "We talked about fighting opponents who would be trying to kill you, and knowing to only seek disabling them as possible. And... Then I left."

A skip in a tape. A wrinkle, a piece of fabric stitched carefully over the memory. What had been there? What else had he said?

>>"He said I could have just toughened up with a few self defense classes. As a member of the x-men I would be asked to put myself in harms way for the sake of others, and that didn't line up well with self centered goals. And I said what I thought: that even doing good has a level of selfishness to it. You help people because it makes you feel good. There are emotional rewards. He didn't like that answer. Said it meant people who gave their lives for others were 'selfish'. Then... We talked about fighting opponents who would be trying to kill you, and knowing to only seek disabling them as possible. And... Then I left."

"And... that's just what you remember." Gawain sighed "I'm sorry about Saph he can be a bit... he can be a hardass sometimes. He is a good teammate, but... well. Yeah."

Someone who channels kinetic energy to wreck things was not going to be the most subtle of persons.

"I think you both were right in some way. You are right about everyone having their own reasons for being on the team. Look at me. Mine was mostly a girl, and not wanting Sam to kick me out of the Mansion. At first. It was not exactly a good start, but it was a start." he smirked and shook his head "At the same time, he is also right, you don't have to be on the X-team to train with us, or learn self-defense. Going on missions is optional."

Evelyn shrugged at Gawain's apology. A 'hardass' wasn't quite how she would describe Saphirus, from experience, but he did his best to intimidate. Apparently, he'd been successful enough to warrant memory removal. She wanted to believe in a team setting it would be better, but the way their personalities clashed made her question that a bit. The man liked being in control, and being feared, and being intimidating. She didn't get along with people like that. She didn't like being pushed around.

She ran a hand through her hair and glanced at Gawain, then leaned her head back against the wall, shutting her eyes. "I just... I don't know. Sure, I don't need to be on the team for the training. But I wasn't lying when I said I wanted to do something more with myself. I don't just like standing by watching things happen. I don't like wasting my powers... The more I train, and the more I see what the echoes can do, the more I think that I should be doing something with all that!" Leaning forward suddenly, she reached onto the dresser where a throwing star was. It was a set she had practiced with, not the pair she'd given to Gawain. She pointed over her shoulder without looking.

"There's a target pinned to the wall over there. I painted it the other day when I was bored. Had a few nights didn't have much to do since I wasn't sleeping, and I started doing this." With a flick of her hand behind her back, the star went across the room, and slammed into the paper. She didn't have to glance to know she hit it. "I had a program I was running in the Danger Room, just....teaching the echoes. I mean, it's not perfect. I'm definitely not going to be throwing knives at the circus. But shouldn't I ... do something with that?" She rubbed her forehead. There was too much going on inside her head, and no way to sift through it. A mine of information and all she had was a little pick-ax to chip away at it.

Gawain nodded as he listened to Evelyn. She was mostly having a conversation with herself at this point, but he was happy to assist her with reaching a decision, even if just by being present.

>>"There's a target pinned to the wall over there. I painted it the other day when I was bored. Had a few nights didn't have much to do since I wasn't sleeping, and I started doing this."

Gawain ducked out of the way as the throwing star flicked past and hit the target. That was... impressive, to say the least. Evelyn was not kidding about her powers being useful.

>>"I had a program I was running in the Danger Room, just....teaching the echoes. I mean, it's not perfect. I'm definitely not going to be throwing knives at the circus. But shouldn't I ... do something with that?"

"You definitely should" Gawain nodded, turning back to her "Eve, I put you on the team for a reason, and I still stand by that decision. If Saph doesn't like it, he can take it up with me. But you also gotta know that there are many other options between not doin' anything, and going on fight missions. Your powers are useful for tons of other possible things. I mean geez, if I was the MRC I'd want you on a crime scene first. And that's just one thing off the top of my head. Part of training for mutants is not just controlling your powers, it is figuring out all the different things you can do with them."

Evelyn considered Gawain's answer, and as silence took over, one question loomed: what was she going to do? Half of her didn't want to be a quitter. She didn't want to get bullied off the team, and she didn't want people to think she quit because she couldn't handle herself. But she also didn't want to become a problem.

The team wasn't perfect, that was clear. Sam... Sam did his own thing, and the x-men didn't always agree with him. But he went down that path for far different reasons. The only thing in her way was... herself. And her own doubts whether she was 'good' enough to be with the x-men. Who knows though? Maybe Gawain was right. Maybe training would work everything out. They could keep talking that out and working through it though. It didn't have to all get settled now. She slowly exhaled and rubbed her forehead.

"Maybe we should just wait and see then. Maybe training will smooth things out and make things clearer, maybe it'll make things worse. But it it comes down to it and I realize I'm not really x material, hopefully there will be no hard feelings. And heck, I keep meeting people who work with the police. That skeleton detective, and I ran into a profiler the other day. Maybe I'll nose around and see if I can get into less trouble helping there or something." Leaning over she kissed Gawain on the cheek and cautiously put her head on his shoulder. She knew she was still in trouble for the fiasco she made, but she didn't want to spend the rest of the day in sulky sadface land.

So it wasn't a cut and dry answer, but this was something she didn't want to decide too quickly. She put a lot of thought into joining the x-men. If she left, it needed to be with just as much though.