(no subject)
Title: New Mutants, Vol VII: A Day In The Life, 1/2
Author: kanedax
Rating: R for language, sex, and violent discussion
Pairings: Moira/Sean, Theresa/Remy, Bobby/Kitty
Summary: A day in the life of the Academy, where powers are revealed, relationships are forged, and a new threat arises.
Notes: Because the server's being a putz, this chapter has been divided up into two separate posts. One scene in particular is lovingly taken from Astonishing. As usual, I don't own the X-Men, 20th Century Fox, or Joss Whedon. But if I did, I'd have the phone numbers for Alison Hannigan and Jewel Staite. And that would be awesome.
Previous Chapter (An Unexpected Mission) / Next Chapter (A D ay In The Life, 2/2)
Emma Frost runs down the street. Despite the terror in her mind, she notices that she’s the only one running. The sidewalk is filled with people, the streets filled with cars, yet no one seems to feel that anything is amiss.
She screams out, both with her mouth and her mind, trying to gain their attention.
It’s coming! Haven’t you heard? Don’t you know the danger you’re in?
It’s coming! Run! Hide!
Too late.
The sky darkens. She looks up, feeling the dread pervade her. She knows what’s next, because she’s been here before.
A shadowy figure flies overhead, encased in flame. She can see it in silhouette: the armor, the sword, and the skeletal, metallic wings. Red eyes glowing from behind the helmet.
What is it?
She thinks, this time, she can see the flames around the creature form into a shape. But before she can get a good look, it has already passed.
The world has quieted. She looks around, and sees bodies everywhere. All the humans on the sidewalk and in their vehicles, dropped dead where there stood. There were no marks, they just…
Ended.
A roar is heard from the distance, where the creature had originated. Her head jerks towards the noise.
A wall of fire, consuming all in its path.
Coming towards her.
Her mind erupts in red pain.
Emma bolted upright in her bed, her hands flying to her head.
The pain passed.
Just a dream.
Again.
She looked around the bedroom, seeing the morning sun shine in through the window. It didn’t look right. She leaned over to her alarm clock.
Ten thirty.
Shit, she thought, jumping from the bed and pulling her nightgown off, Why didn’t anyone wake me?
She stopped, closing her eyes, thinking. If anyone had walked in at that point, they would have gotten quite a scene, with her gown pulled up, covering her head but leaving everything else in the breeze.
“Saturday,” she mumbled. “Today’s Saturday. They let me sleep in.”
She sighed, pulling her nightgown back down around her body, instead pulling her bathrobe, white along with all of her other clothing, from its hanger. Walking into her private bathroom, she stripped off her gown again, and stepped into the shower.
As the hot water cascaded down on her, her mind once again returned to the dream.
This was the third night in a row that she had dreamt it. Each time it was the same. The street, the creature, the flames.
Was it an omen? A prophecy?
Emma shook her head. She was far too much of a pragmatist to believe that it was anything spiritual, sent from some higher power.
Psionic, maybe? Possibly some psychic event? Or a telepath playing with her mind?
Or possibly something as simple as her subconscious mind reacting to events?
Her mind immediately leapt to the only major change that had happened in her life three days ago.
Three days ago.
That was when he showed up.
Emma turned off the shower, and stepped out.
Alex Blanding had done a terrible thing when he killed his family, and there was no guarantee that something else wouldn’t happen. Just as bad, if not worse.
Was this her mind picking up on something that she was missing? Something going on in Alex’s thought patterns?
She would have to be on her guard.
Lucas Bishop walked slowly down the hallway. He carried a tray, with a turkey sandwich and a glass of milk.
He approached the door, and knocked.
“Yeah?”
“It’s Lucas,” he said. “Can I come in?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Lucas reached out to unlock the door, the only one in the building with a lock on the outside, and opened it to see a completely black room. Forgetting that it was going to be there, he quickly pressed the button on the wall. The darkness disappeared, and he passed through, closing the door behind him.
Alex was sitting on the bed, but when the field had gone down he quickly jumped up and ran to the window. Lucas tensed, ready to run out and warn everyone if Blanding decided to make an escape attempt.
However, Alex just stood at the window, staring out into the courtyard below.
“I brought you lunch,” Lucas said.
Alex turned around. “Sorry,” he said, a small smile on his lips. “That field doesn’t give me a chance to look outside very often.”
Lucas nodded, setting the tray down on Alex’s television. “Yeah, I guess it must be kinda frustrating. But Mr. Forge is out picking up some stuff, and he says you should have a suit that will let you move around in the next day or two.”
Blanding snorted, turning back to the window. “And what happens when the suit gets finished? Do you guys hand me off to S.H.I.E.L.D., or one of those other government groups? I seriously doubt you’re letting me out of this room any time soon. You or any of the other X-Men.”
Lucas sighed, sitting on the bed. “I’m not an X-Man,” he said. “I’m just a student.”
“Yet you’re the only one they’ll let in here. Everyone else talks to me through the television,” Alex said, pointing to the set. Forge and Sean had convinced Emma to allow Blanding to have a DVD player and PlayStation. But in addition to that, a small camera and microphone sat atop the set.
Lucas shrugged. “If something happens, I’m the only who can take it.
“Plus, I’m the only one who can kick your ass in Madden.”
Alex turned, his mouth opening to say something. Instead, he turned back to the window. There was silence for a minute or so before he spoke again.
“Scott,” he muttered.
Lucas stood up and looked out the window. As he looked out for the first time, he realized that Alex’s window looked down on the garden memorials for Charles Xavier, Jean Grey, and Scott Summers.
“Did you know him?” Alex asked.
Lucas shook his head. “I only have heard a few things from Pete and Bobby, but he died before I came.”
“I barely knew him, either,” Blanding said. “Our parents died when we were kids. I was two, he was seven or eight, I don’t really remember. We both lived in an orphanage for a few years before we were both adopted by different families. I was adopted by the Blandings, and I don’t know who adopted him.
“But he ended up here. He was a mutant, just like me.”
“He was the leader of the X-Men for a long time, I guess,” Lucas said. “Before Professor Munroe. I could talk to her, see if she has any pictures. If you want to see him, that is.”
Alex sighed, and walked away from the window. “I dunno,” he said. “Like I said, I barely knew him. I remember my parents even less. I was born Alex Summers, but I was raised as Alex Blanding. Even if…”
Alex’s throat cut him off. He sniffed.
“I didn’t mean to kill them…”
“I know.”
“It was that fucker, Vince,” he said. “Haley’s boyfriend. He was an asshole, treated her like a punching bag. She had broken up with him, put on a restraining order. But he came back.”
“Alex, you don’t have to-“
“I do,” Alex responded. “It was dinnertime. We were sitting down to pizza. We were gonna watch the Cardinals game. Vince kicked the front door in. He was insane.
“Before we had a chance to react, he pulled a gun. Shot Haley. Shot my sister in the face.”
Lucas could see Alex swallow hard. “I jumped on him before he could run. My mom was screaming. My dad… I don’t know what my dad was doing, I was too focused on hurting Vince. I wanted to kill him.
“I punched him. Punched him again. Beat his head against the floor.
“I felt my body get hot. I could see smoke coming from my shirt. But I couldn’t stop. I just wanted to kill him. Everything lit up. The house was gone. And I ran.
“Fucking Vince.”
Alex stopped talking, his head leaning against the window. Lucas could see tears streaming down his face.
All of a sudden Lucas just wanted to leave. He was here to drop off lunch, not to hear this.
“Alex, I…”
Alex nodded his head, his forehead rubbing against the windowpane. “Thanks, Luke. You’re good people.”
“You’re not going to…”
Alex looked up, looked at Lucas. “Do something stupid?” He shook his head. “Don’t worry about me. I know what I did. I have to pay for it. I wouldn’t take the chickenshit way out.”
“We’re just trying to help you,” Lucas said, standing up.
“I know,” Alex said, taking the plate and glass from the tray. “Here, you can take this back.”
Lucas took the tray and walked back to the door. “See ya later.”
“Yeah,” Alex said. He took a bite from the sandwich. “When I get the suit, we should get a game of Mario Party going downstairs, or something.”
Lucas laughed quietly. “Yeah,” he said. “Me and you, it’s on. We’ll get Jimmy and Arthur to be cannon fodder.”
“I haven’t met them yet,” Alex said. “But it’s on.”
“Wow, he’s on today.”
Sean Cassidy sat in the Danger Room’s control room, watching in awe as Arthur Centino flipped through the obstacle course with amazing ease.
“I mean,” he said to Moira, who was studying the displays behind him, “There were a few times where I thought it was really close, that he was going to miss some of those bars, overshoot the target, something. Anything. But he keeps going.”
Sean could see the exertion on Arthur’s face. He had been given the task of chasing a glowing sphere through what was basically a glorified jungle gym. He flipped, spun, swung through like a monkey in the jungle. Occasionally Arthur’s left eye would flash.
“There, it flashed again,” Sean yelled as Centino hooked an overhead bar by one finger, swinging himself up and on.
“I’m seeing a pattern again,” Moira said, hunkered over the monitors. “Try to pull yourself away from him for a minute and tell me what you think.”
Reluctantly, Cassidy pushed his wheeled chair across the room. “I swear, that kid could the next Jackie Chan if he wants to be.”
“Watch his brain scan,” Moira said, “And tell me what happens when I say, okay?”
Sean nodded, focusing on the digital model of Arthur’s mind.
“Okay, now!” she yelled.
“Nothing,” Sean said, “but right before you yelled…”
“What?”
“Let’s reverse it a bit,” he said. “When I call, you start narrating his actions, okay?”
Moira nodded.
“Now!”
“Arthur just made a hard u-turn,” Moira said. “The ball reversed direction, and he moved right along with it.”
“Is that all?”
“And his eye flashed. Yes!”
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
Moira smiled, planting a kiss on Sean’s cheek, then standing up and patting his shoulder. “I’m the one who thought of it first, dear.”
“Yeah, but…” he blurted. “But I… I, um, confirmed it?”
Moira ignored him, sitting down at a separate monitor. She pulled the keyboard to her, and began typing. Sean stood up and walked behind her, putting his hands on her shoulders and leaning his chin on her head.
“’Subconscious telepathy and telekinesis,’” Sean read. “’Precognition and mind-control.’ Jaysus. This kid’s quite a piece of work, isn’t he?”
“Bobby and Kitty said that the bottle he threw changed direction in the air,” Moira said. “Almost like it had a mind of its own. But it was Arthur who made it change direction. He pushed it the right way, for just a split second.”
“But we’ve seen him miss,” Sean said. “We’ve seen his aim go awry. We’ve seen him answer questions wrong.”
“But when he misses,” Moira replied, “he really misses. And when he hits really good shots, you can see in his body readings that he reacts like anyone else would. Like he had hit a really lucky shot, one he didn’t expect to hit.”
“So what does that mean?”
“I don’t think he has any control over these powers. I think they’re in some back part of his brain, calculating what the best outcome would be. But this other part of him doesn’t have enough strength to do much.
“His telekinesis can nudge an object into the right place, or lift his body a degree or two. His telepathy can find an answer in someone else’s brain, but only if it’s sitting right there on the surface. His mind control can only drop a hint to another person to do something, but can’t full-out force the person to do anything.”
“Huh…”
“That’s why they got down to the basement that night,” Moira said. “He pushed Lucas into going along with them, but he was already close to making that decision.
“He pushed Emma into letting them pass, but she considered it a good idea that she might very well have decided anyway.
“He made Kitty sneeze, letting them get past her.
“He got out of the way of the gun, but he only knew it was coming a split-second before it did.
“He hit the gun with his bottle, but if he had thrown it any further off, not even a telekinetic push would have helped it.
“But I honestly don’t believe he knew any of this was happening.”
“So what do we have?”
Moira shrugged. “For lack of a better term,” she said, “Arthur Centino has a psychic lucky charm.”
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