X3: Halfway There (R), Pyro/Iceman.
It took him awhile but Bobby's finally got life figured out.
This is a sequel to Ten Steps Closer to Hell, and was written as a response to exisandohs's prompts.
0
It took him awhile but Bobby's finally got life figured out.
Politeness and good deeds aren't worth a damn and won't change the world, so there's really no point in bothering.
John just nods and says, well, yeah, it's about time you got that.
1
John comes back at quarter to four, a wad of tens and twenties in the palm of his hand and his hair sticking up in all directions. His right eye is darkening; Bobby can already see the bruise that will be there tomorrow, spreading out and up almost to the hairline.
"Where'd you get that, John?" Bobby asks. He congratulates himself on his calm, and he doesn't bother to clarify whether he's talking about the money or the bruise, because they both know they came from the same place anyway.
John just laughs, and tosses the money onto the only table in the room. "Where the hell do you think?" he asks.
"I told you to knock that off," Bobby yells. "If we're going to work--"
"You're the one that got me kicked out of the Brotherhood," John says. "I don't see you bringing any money back."
Bobby grabs him by the shoulders and pulls him closer. "That's the last time you do that. You got that? We'll figure something--"
"Fuck you, Drake," John says, but he's smiling, and Bobby knows that for John this still qualifies as civil conversation. "You don't own me."
"You're right," he snaps. "No one does. I'm just wondering when you're going to wise up and realize it."
John just pulls away and glares at him. Tomorrow it'll be the same exact thing.
2
"How old are you?"
"Sixteen," John tells him shyly, tilting his head up. This guy likes them young, John can always tell the type, and he can still pull off young, no matter how old his eyes get.
He doesn't waste time, either; probably got a wife at home, 2.5 kids, a dog in his perfect backyard. John really couldn't care any less, but they like to try and talk away their guilt. "I've never done this before," he tells John, as he helps him out of his shirt.
John falls back on the bed with a half-smirk. "No one ever has," he says.
The man's eyes change, and that's when John realizes he's misjudged him. His cheek is stinging before he can block the strike, and there's another after that, with a running commentary about how he's a whore, insignificant, a fucking nothing, and that he doesn't know a damn thing.
John's reaching for his lighter just when the room gets colder, and by the time his fingers close around the metal, the guy is already dead.
Bobby's eyes are as frozen as the dead man's. "You never learn," he says.
John smirks, a little shakily. "Can't say the same about you," he says. "You're learning just fine."
3
"This is wrong," Bobby says.
John flashes him an incredulous look. "You kill the guy, but this is wrong? Those are some flexible morals you've got there, Bobby-boy."
John's laughing at him, and Bobby wonders how he can. He's got a bruise on his cheekbone as well as his eye now, and he keeps flexing his shoulder. Bobby's never understood why John doesn't seem to mind pain.
"He was hurting you," Bobby snaps harshly. "I wasn't going to--"
"What were you even doing following me?" John asks. "I told you, I don't belong to you."
Bobby presses his lips together and doesn't answer. John just rolls his eyes at him and uses the keys he pulled off the dead man to open the door to the apartment. "I had this guy all wrong," John says. "It doesn't usually happen. I'm good at reading them, usually."
The apartment is a standard bachelor pad. No wife, no kids. John glances around. "Check the bedroom and look for a safe," John tells him. "I'll get the TV."
There's a row of pictures on the mantle. Bobby glances at them, at the smiling happy figure that is nothing like the monster he'd found posed to strike John again, for the third, fourth, maybe fifth time.
And Bobby hates that he's not sorry for what he's done.
4
They find the safe on the other side of a bad Monet reproduction. Haystacks. End of Summer. John scoffs at it. "Had this guy ever even seen the real thing?"
"When did you turn into an art snob?" Bobby snaps.
"God, you're a bitch," John says, and glances at him. "What's wrong with you?"
"We're committing a felony," Bobby hisses.
"What, are you new? Do you know us?"
"That was self defense," Bobby says. "I was protecting you."
John leans his ear into the safe, and moves the dial until it clicks. He's glad that his years at Xavier's haven't robbed him of all of his talents. "Whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep at night," he says.
The safe clicks open, and John grins. "Jackpot," he says. There are stacks of hundreds placed one on top of another and filling most of the safe. A thin manila folder rests on top, and John pulls it out.
There are pictures inside of Kelly's replacement and a woman half his age. John laughs. "If it makes you feel better," he says. "He was a blackmailer as well as a pervert."
5
"I don't know where you're getting the impression that I'm asking," Rogue says.
Only it isn't Rogue. John twists his lighter in his hand. "Do you have to be her?"
Mystique smiles, and thirty seconds later she's Bobby, and far too close. "I can be whoever, but in the end it doesn't really matter. You're going to give me what I want."
"Magneto told me to get lost," John snaps.
"He was angry. You fucked up," she says. "Things have changed. He needs a favor."
"Well he can find someone else," John says.
"Because you're doing so well without his protection?" she asks. She uses Bobby's hand to trace his bruises. "Baby, you need us."
"Go fu--"
Mystique reaches out and grabs him around his throat. The expression in her eyes, on Bobby, would have been foreign a year ago. It's not so shocking, really, these days. "You're going to do this," she says. "Or Bobby's going to meet with an accident."
John coughs and rips her hand away, then he laughs. "You and Magneto have a real flair for drama, you know that?"
She glares at him, morphs back into herself. "This isn't a game," she says.
John just shakes his head, because that's exactly what it is.
6
Bobby is fascinated with his scars. John's never understood it, but he guesses it has something to do with the fact that Bobby doesn't really have any of his own. "What about this one?" he asks, kissing the faint brown slice down his right collarbone.
John remembers a knife at his throat, and someone behind him; a drug haze and pain. He pulls out of Bobby's grip. "Got it in an explosion," he says easily. "Window broke apart and cut me."
Bobby believes him, because he always does.
"Look, I have to go for a walk, okay?" John pulls on his jeans, his boots. He makes sure his lighter is in his front pocket before bothering with his shirt.
Bobby watches him with wary eyes. "John--"
"I'll be back before too late," John says.
"You're not going to..." Bobby trails off. "Because we have some money now, and I really think--"
"Jesus, loosen up," John snaps. "I just want some goddamn air."
And Bobby should believe that too, because he always does. Except John's forgotten that trust is usually lost along with everything else, when you end up where they've been.
7
John flicks open his lighter, and launches the fire at the warehouse; one mental command from him, and the entire thing is in flames. He didn't bother to ask Mystique if there would be anyone inside.
Magneto wanted the building gone, and reluctant as he is to admit it, John figures he probably owes him that much.
He doesn't think they'd go through with their threat, though. Magneto never killed mutants unless absolutely necessary. He's still planning, after all, for the day they would be the only ones left.
John sticks his hands in his pockets and starts down the street. He doesn't work to stand out like he used to. His hair is darker and he's just wearing a regular blue shirt, looking like any other kid coming back from a party, and not a mutant terrorist.
He can still feel the flames licking at the back of his mind, and he's sure that's what distracts him; any other time he would have heard the footsteps coming up behind him before the arm twisted around his waist and pulled him back.
A cloth was pressed into his face, and he's dizzy before he can fight. "Well, what have we here?" someone asks.
John doesn't recognize the voice, but he thinks, you're so dead before he feels the world go black, and his fire flicker out.
8
"Who sent you?"
John rolls his eyes. His wrists are bleeding, because no matter how many times he finds himself tied up, he never can stop himself from trying to get free. "You can't be this stupid," John says.
The guy glares at him. He has about as much intelligence in his gaze as the Juggernaut, so John decides that yes, he really can be that stupid. "Jesus. You are. That's just great. I got caught by a freakin' moron."
The guy leans forward, wrapping his fingers around John's bloody wrists, where they're tied to the arms of the chair. "Who sent you?" he repeats, and his breath is heavy with cigarettes and a life without brushing. "Why did you blow up our headquarters? You one of them mutants, kid?"
John can feel his lighter in his pocket, but he just smirks. He'll never deny it. Not for anything, and his silence and his smile are answers enough. The guy pushes away from him in disgust. "Kill him," he says, motioning to another man in the corner of the room.
John glances at him, mostly unconcerned. He lost the sense to fear years ago, when he walked away from Xavier, and his offered redemption. He didn't want to die, but he was a realist, and he'd given up on reaching thirty before he was twenty-one.
Bobby still had a bit of an optimist in him, however, and John knew he was the only thing keeping him alive. Bobby's fingers are cold as they struggle to pull the ropes free, and he says nothing, not a word.
John doesn't say anything either. Just lets Bobby pull him up again, and tries not to look too closely at the two figures in the center of the room, frozen to the ground, mouths still hanging open in shock.
John doesn't really get cold anymore, so he doesn't even shiver as they pass them by.
9
"This is getting to be habit," Bobby snaps.
"Killing people?" John asks.
"Saving your ass," Bobby tells him coolly. "We should get the hell out of here. I can't do this any longer. I can't."
"You're doing fine," John tells him. "Besides, where do we have to go? There's nowhere. It's not getting any better, Bobby, so let's focus on keeping it from getting worse."
"Sound advice."
John's head shoots up at the voice, recognizing it instantly, and he grips his lighter tightly, and narrows his eyes. It's the man that grabbed him last night, the one that should be standing frozen in an old warehouse.
Bobby looks rightly like he's seen a ghost, but John's quicker at figuring it out. He's dealt with her enough. "Mystique," he says, warily, and he can feel Bobby's surprise give way to tension.
She smirks. "Magneto and I'd like to thank you. This goes above and beyond. We had no idea that the high and mighty Iceman was getting his hands dirty, these days."
Bobby's hands clench to fists, then relax. "We're done. You got it? Don't come back."
"You're giving me orders now?" Mystique asks coyly. The tone is odd coming from the vision of a dead man, and Bobby isn't the only one to flinch.
"You really don't want to start something with us," Bobby says. He sounds sure and dangerous, and John glances at him, slightly disbelieving. Last time he saw Bobby and Mystique interact, Bobby was so scared he wouldn't even get close enough to touch.
Mystique's grin goes cold, but she sounds almost impressed when she says, "You're getting better at this, Iceman."
"Why don't I think that's a compliment?" Bobby asks
"Only you wouldn't," she says, and then backs away, giving him a small wave before changing into someone else, and disappearing right into the crowd.
10
Bobby is packing when he wakes up, says something indistinct like, 'with or without you' that neither believes for a second. Anyway, John figures Bobby won't get far without him. They don't have a class on hotwiring cars back at Xavier's.
"John, I mean it," Bobby says.
It used to be kind of cute, the way Bobby would insist on things, but John glares at him now. It's not so cute when Bobby expects him to do as he's told. "I like it here," he says.
"Oh, yeah," Bobby says. "It's great. You get to fuck around and get beat up and--"
John reaches for his lighter instinctively. Open. Close. Open. "But you're a saint, right?"
"We have to get out of here," Bobby says, and for a minute, he just sounds like he used to. He sounds scared; and there was so very little reason to be scared, these days, that John is fascinated he can still feel the emotion. "Please."
John will never admit it, but it's the please that does it. It doesn't take long to finish packing, because they don't have much. Bobby seems happy for the first time that he can remember, so John tries not to bitch too much as he leans underneath the dashboard of some old Jetta.
"Let's go West," Bobby says.
"Considering East will land us in the fucking Atlantic, that's probably a good idea," John says.
Bobby rolls his eyes. "Just drive," he says, and sounds a little desperate, but a little hopeful all the same.
John watches him for a moment before pulling the car out onto the road. It's on the tip of his tongue to remind him they can't outrun anything, but he doesn't.
If Bobby still thinks their lives will change with their location, John will let him, even if he knows better.
This is a sequel to Ten Steps Closer to Hell, and was written as a response to exisandohs's prompts.
0
It took him awhile but Bobby's finally got life figured out.
Politeness and good deeds aren't worth a damn and won't change the world, so there's really no point in bothering.
John just nods and says, well, yeah, it's about time you got that.
1
John comes back at quarter to four, a wad of tens and twenties in the palm of his hand and his hair sticking up in all directions. His right eye is darkening; Bobby can already see the bruise that will be there tomorrow, spreading out and up almost to the hairline.
"Where'd you get that, John?" Bobby asks. He congratulates himself on his calm, and he doesn't bother to clarify whether he's talking about the money or the bruise, because they both know they came from the same place anyway.
John just laughs, and tosses the money onto the only table in the room. "Where the hell do you think?" he asks.
"I told you to knock that off," Bobby yells. "If we're going to work--"
"You're the one that got me kicked out of the Brotherhood," John says. "I don't see you bringing any money back."
Bobby grabs him by the shoulders and pulls him closer. "That's the last time you do that. You got that? We'll figure something--"
"Fuck you, Drake," John says, but he's smiling, and Bobby knows that for John this still qualifies as civil conversation. "You don't own me."
"You're right," he snaps. "No one does. I'm just wondering when you're going to wise up and realize it."
John just pulls away and glares at him. Tomorrow it'll be the same exact thing.
2
"How old are you?"
"Sixteen," John tells him shyly, tilting his head up. This guy likes them young, John can always tell the type, and he can still pull off young, no matter how old his eyes get.
He doesn't waste time, either; probably got a wife at home, 2.5 kids, a dog in his perfect backyard. John really couldn't care any less, but they like to try and talk away their guilt. "I've never done this before," he tells John, as he helps him out of his shirt.
John falls back on the bed with a half-smirk. "No one ever has," he says.
The man's eyes change, and that's when John realizes he's misjudged him. His cheek is stinging before he can block the strike, and there's another after that, with a running commentary about how he's a whore, insignificant, a fucking nothing, and that he doesn't know a damn thing.
John's reaching for his lighter just when the room gets colder, and by the time his fingers close around the metal, the guy is already dead.
Bobby's eyes are as frozen as the dead man's. "You never learn," he says.
John smirks, a little shakily. "Can't say the same about you," he says. "You're learning just fine."
3
"This is wrong," Bobby says.
John flashes him an incredulous look. "You kill the guy, but this is wrong? Those are some flexible morals you've got there, Bobby-boy."
John's laughing at him, and Bobby wonders how he can. He's got a bruise on his cheekbone as well as his eye now, and he keeps flexing his shoulder. Bobby's never understood why John doesn't seem to mind pain.
"He was hurting you," Bobby snaps harshly. "I wasn't going to--"
"What were you even doing following me?" John asks. "I told you, I don't belong to you."
Bobby presses his lips together and doesn't answer. John just rolls his eyes at him and uses the keys he pulled off the dead man to open the door to the apartment. "I had this guy all wrong," John says. "It doesn't usually happen. I'm good at reading them, usually."
The apartment is a standard bachelor pad. No wife, no kids. John glances around. "Check the bedroom and look for a safe," John tells him. "I'll get the TV."
There's a row of pictures on the mantle. Bobby glances at them, at the smiling happy figure that is nothing like the monster he'd found posed to strike John again, for the third, fourth, maybe fifth time.
And Bobby hates that he's not sorry for what he's done.
4
They find the safe on the other side of a bad Monet reproduction. Haystacks. End of Summer. John scoffs at it. "Had this guy ever even seen the real thing?"
"When did you turn into an art snob?" Bobby snaps.
"God, you're a bitch," John says, and glances at him. "What's wrong with you?"
"We're committing a felony," Bobby hisses.
"What, are you new? Do you know us?"
"That was self defense," Bobby says. "I was protecting you."
John leans his ear into the safe, and moves the dial until it clicks. He's glad that his years at Xavier's haven't robbed him of all of his talents. "Whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep at night," he says.
The safe clicks open, and John grins. "Jackpot," he says. There are stacks of hundreds placed one on top of another and filling most of the safe. A thin manila folder rests on top, and John pulls it out.
There are pictures inside of Kelly's replacement and a woman half his age. John laughs. "If it makes you feel better," he says. "He was a blackmailer as well as a pervert."
5
"I don't know where you're getting the impression that I'm asking," Rogue says.
Only it isn't Rogue. John twists his lighter in his hand. "Do you have to be her?"
Mystique smiles, and thirty seconds later she's Bobby, and far too close. "I can be whoever, but in the end it doesn't really matter. You're going to give me what I want."
"Magneto told me to get lost," John snaps.
"He was angry. You fucked up," she says. "Things have changed. He needs a favor."
"Well he can find someone else," John says.
"Because you're doing so well without his protection?" she asks. She uses Bobby's hand to trace his bruises. "Baby, you need us."
"Go fu--"
Mystique reaches out and grabs him around his throat. The expression in her eyes, on Bobby, would have been foreign a year ago. It's not so shocking, really, these days. "You're going to do this," she says. "Or Bobby's going to meet with an accident."
John coughs and rips her hand away, then he laughs. "You and Magneto have a real flair for drama, you know that?"
She glares at him, morphs back into herself. "This isn't a game," she says.
John just shakes his head, because that's exactly what it is.
6
Bobby is fascinated with his scars. John's never understood it, but he guesses it has something to do with the fact that Bobby doesn't really have any of his own. "What about this one?" he asks, kissing the faint brown slice down his right collarbone.
John remembers a knife at his throat, and someone behind him; a drug haze and pain. He pulls out of Bobby's grip. "Got it in an explosion," he says easily. "Window broke apart and cut me."
Bobby believes him, because he always does.
"Look, I have to go for a walk, okay?" John pulls on his jeans, his boots. He makes sure his lighter is in his front pocket before bothering with his shirt.
Bobby watches him with wary eyes. "John--"
"I'll be back before too late," John says.
"You're not going to..." Bobby trails off. "Because we have some money now, and I really think--"
"Jesus, loosen up," John snaps. "I just want some goddamn air."
And Bobby should believe that too, because he always does. Except John's forgotten that trust is usually lost along with everything else, when you end up where they've been.
7
John flicks open his lighter, and launches the fire at the warehouse; one mental command from him, and the entire thing is in flames. He didn't bother to ask Mystique if there would be anyone inside.
Magneto wanted the building gone, and reluctant as he is to admit it, John figures he probably owes him that much.
He doesn't think they'd go through with their threat, though. Magneto never killed mutants unless absolutely necessary. He's still planning, after all, for the day they would be the only ones left.
John sticks his hands in his pockets and starts down the street. He doesn't work to stand out like he used to. His hair is darker and he's just wearing a regular blue shirt, looking like any other kid coming back from a party, and not a mutant terrorist.
He can still feel the flames licking at the back of his mind, and he's sure that's what distracts him; any other time he would have heard the footsteps coming up behind him before the arm twisted around his waist and pulled him back.
A cloth was pressed into his face, and he's dizzy before he can fight. "Well, what have we here?" someone asks.
John doesn't recognize the voice, but he thinks, you're so dead before he feels the world go black, and his fire flicker out.
8
"Who sent you?"
John rolls his eyes. His wrists are bleeding, because no matter how many times he finds himself tied up, he never can stop himself from trying to get free. "You can't be this stupid," John says.
The guy glares at him. He has about as much intelligence in his gaze as the Juggernaut, so John decides that yes, he really can be that stupid. "Jesus. You are. That's just great. I got caught by a freakin' moron."
The guy leans forward, wrapping his fingers around John's bloody wrists, where they're tied to the arms of the chair. "Who sent you?" he repeats, and his breath is heavy with cigarettes and a life without brushing. "Why did you blow up our headquarters? You one of them mutants, kid?"
John can feel his lighter in his pocket, but he just smirks. He'll never deny it. Not for anything, and his silence and his smile are answers enough. The guy pushes away from him in disgust. "Kill him," he says, motioning to another man in the corner of the room.
John glances at him, mostly unconcerned. He lost the sense to fear years ago, when he walked away from Xavier, and his offered redemption. He didn't want to die, but he was a realist, and he'd given up on reaching thirty before he was twenty-one.
Bobby still had a bit of an optimist in him, however, and John knew he was the only thing keeping him alive. Bobby's fingers are cold as they struggle to pull the ropes free, and he says nothing, not a word.
John doesn't say anything either. Just lets Bobby pull him up again, and tries not to look too closely at the two figures in the center of the room, frozen to the ground, mouths still hanging open in shock.
John doesn't really get cold anymore, so he doesn't even shiver as they pass them by.
9
"This is getting to be habit," Bobby snaps.
"Killing people?" John asks.
"Saving your ass," Bobby tells him coolly. "We should get the hell out of here. I can't do this any longer. I can't."
"You're doing fine," John tells him. "Besides, where do we have to go? There's nowhere. It's not getting any better, Bobby, so let's focus on keeping it from getting worse."
"Sound advice."
John's head shoots up at the voice, recognizing it instantly, and he grips his lighter tightly, and narrows his eyes. It's the man that grabbed him last night, the one that should be standing frozen in an old warehouse.
Bobby looks rightly like he's seen a ghost, but John's quicker at figuring it out. He's dealt with her enough. "Mystique," he says, warily, and he can feel Bobby's surprise give way to tension.
She smirks. "Magneto and I'd like to thank you. This goes above and beyond. We had no idea that the high and mighty Iceman was getting his hands dirty, these days."
Bobby's hands clench to fists, then relax. "We're done. You got it? Don't come back."
"You're giving me orders now?" Mystique asks coyly. The tone is odd coming from the vision of a dead man, and Bobby isn't the only one to flinch.
"You really don't want to start something with us," Bobby says. He sounds sure and dangerous, and John glances at him, slightly disbelieving. Last time he saw Bobby and Mystique interact, Bobby was so scared he wouldn't even get close enough to touch.
Mystique's grin goes cold, but she sounds almost impressed when she says, "You're getting better at this, Iceman."
"Why don't I think that's a compliment?" Bobby asks
"Only you wouldn't," she says, and then backs away, giving him a small wave before changing into someone else, and disappearing right into the crowd.
10
Bobby is packing when he wakes up, says something indistinct like, 'with or without you' that neither believes for a second. Anyway, John figures Bobby won't get far without him. They don't have a class on hotwiring cars back at Xavier's.
"John, I mean it," Bobby says.
It used to be kind of cute, the way Bobby would insist on things, but John glares at him now. It's not so cute when Bobby expects him to do as he's told. "I like it here," he says.
"Oh, yeah," Bobby says. "It's great. You get to fuck around and get beat up and--"
John reaches for his lighter instinctively. Open. Close. Open. "But you're a saint, right?"
"We have to get out of here," Bobby says, and for a minute, he just sounds like he used to. He sounds scared; and there was so very little reason to be scared, these days, that John is fascinated he can still feel the emotion. "Please."
John will never admit it, but it's the please that does it. It doesn't take long to finish packing, because they don't have much. Bobby seems happy for the first time that he can remember, so John tries not to bitch too much as he leans underneath the dashboard of some old Jetta.
"Let's go West," Bobby says.
"Considering East will land us in the fucking Atlantic, that's probably a good idea," John says.
Bobby rolls his eyes. "Just drive," he says, and sounds a little desperate, but a little hopeful all the same.
John watches him for a moment before pulling the car out onto the road. It's on the tip of his tongue to remind him they can't outrun anything, but he doesn't.
If Bobby still thinks their lives will change with their location, John will let him, even if he knows better.