(no subject)
See Previous Chapters Here
Title: The New Mutants, volume XIV: Aftermath
Author: kanedax
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Spoilers: X3; New Mutants volumes I-XIII (see above)
Pairings: Theresa/Remy, Bobby/Kitty
Rating: PG for mild language
Summary: Following the events of the previous chapter, the students and faculty of Xavier Academy come to grips with what was lost.
Notes: I was initially planning to press on in the story, move into the final phase of The New Mutants, with this chapter. But after beginning to write, I realized that this chapter needed to be written first. I hope it doesn't come across as too sappy to those reading it, but I think it turned out very well. As usual, I don't own any of these characters.
Previous Chapter (Release The Hounds 2/2) / Next Chapter (Making Amends)
Ororo Munroe pressed the small button on the wall, and the med lab door silently slid open.
Walking inside, she couldn’t help but feel her heart tighten at the sight of the three X-Men lying in the beds. Marie D’Ancanto lay motionless, with a few sensors taped to her head, but otherwise appeared fine. Bobby Drake and Logan, however, looked much worse off. Both were heavily bandaged, with IV drips and blood transfusions attached to their arms. Sensors beeped softly from medical equipment positioned near both beds. To the right, on a lab table, lay the pieces of adamantium torn from Logan’s body. Through the blood that covered them, dried now to a dark maroon, the metal armor gleamed in the harsh fluorescent light.
Ororo turned to face Dr. Hank McCoy, who was leaning over one of the monitors, scribbling notes onto a yellow note pad.
“How are they?” she asked. In response, he looked up and put his blue-furred finger over his lips, then pointed to the corner. Ororo felt her heart skip again as she saw Kitty Pryde, sleeping upright in one of the computer chairs. A medical lab coat was draped carefully over her.
Outside, Hank mouthed, and walked with Ororo out into the hallway.
“I tried to convince her to go join the others and get some sleep,” Hank said as the door closed behind them, “but she wouldn’t hear of it. She wants to stay by Bobby until he wakes up.”
Ororo put her hand to her mouth, fighting back tears. Eventually, she won herself over, and asked again, “How are they?”
“Medically speaking,” Hank replied, “they’ll pull through. Marie just fainted from the shock and trauma of what had transpired, and all she needs is rest. The same with Logan. His body was badly damaged when Magneto removed the adamantium, but thankfully it didn’t shut down his healing factor. He is going to have to learn to fight without his claws, though. They had been surgically implanted into his body along with the coverings on his skeleton.
“Bobby,” he sighed, removing his glasses and cleaning them absently with a hankerchief, “is going to take a little longer. His body was punctured with dozens of small ice fragments, from the initial blow as well as when he hit the bookshelf. Fortunately it was ice, so there won’t be any surgery necessary to remove any of the pieces, but he has multiple legions across his chest and back, some going in as far as his internal organs. But he should pull through.
“All things considered,” he said gravely, “things aren’t as bad for them as they are for others.”
Ororo nodded, her mind once again calculating the cost of the attack. In total, four members of the Academy died tonight. Jubilation Lee was killed by John Allerdyce. Emma Frost, Arthur Centino, and Artie Maddicks had all died from the psychic pulse released by that… that…
“Do we have any more information about what took place tonight?” Hank asked, as though reading her thoughts. “Right now the government and S.H.I.E.L.D. are both giving us an extraordinary amount of leeway when it comes to taking care of our own, as well as in dealing with the Ferguson girl. But the fact remains that not only did hundreds, if not thousands, of mutants die today from whatever it was that this Brian fellow turned into, but the offspring of one of the most powerful mutants in the world were taken out of a super-max prison under our noses. I’m going to have to give them some information fairly soon.”
Ororo thought for a moment, trying to come up with some way to clarify the cause behind the death of every telepath on the planet. She had just gotten off the phone with Moira, who had landed to find one of the few mutant-centric hospitals in Europe in total chaos, where dozens of doctors and patients had fallen dead in their tracks.
“One year ago,” Ororo said carefully, “Brian was a bed-ridden mutant. Since birth, his brain had never allowed any processes beyond the basics: heartbeat, lung capacity, that sort of thing. I’m sure Moira could give you any research that you would like.
“About the time that we had fought the battle at Alcatraz, Brian woke up. There were slight indications that his brain contained the consciousness of Charles Xavier. At the time Moira discussed this with me, soon after he brought him with her to the Academy, we had trouble believing it. We didn’t think that Charles was the type to willfully choose to possess another body.”
“Of course,” Hank agreed.
“And after talking to Moira tonight, I think we were right. In a way.”
“How so?”
“Before she could contact us,” Ororo continued, “Moira received a call from her research facility on Muir Island. They have some machinery there that records psychic output, brainwave patterns, that sort of thing. At the time the pulse hit, these sensors went off, and picked up the readings of this pulse. The patterns resembled those that had been emitted by Charles when he was alive.
“But they also picked up a second pattern combined with it. It was Charles’ consciousness in Brian, but we don’t think he was the one who put it there.”
Beast exhaled sharply. “Jean,” he muttered, and Ororo nodded.
“I can only guess,” she said, “but right now we have to take anything we can get. When Charles fought Phoenix at Jean’s house, we think that Jean was able to fight her way to the surface long enough to transfer Charles’ mind to Brian’s body before he was killed. It was an example he had been using for years in his ethics class, and I’m sure that, as our doctor in residence, she, Charles, and Moira had discussed the case many times.
“But she may not have done it perfectly. When Charles transferred to Brian, we think that a fragment of the Phoenix consciousness went with him. Stayed in stasis, back in the unconscious mind, needing Charles to weaken his mind just long enough to bring it forward.”
“It makes as much sense as anything I could come up with,” Hank replied.
“And it would explain the shape that the flames took on when it manifested,” Ororo continued. “Alex and Alison were both very sure that they saw it take on a bird-like shape.”
“So, the Phoenix is loose again,” Hank sighed. “The government will want to know that as soon as possible.”
“The Phoenix is loose again, yes,” Ororo replied, “but we don’t know if it’s as powerful as it was before. When it was in Jean, it had her high-level telekinetic powers at its control. With Brian, a mutant who has a power we don’t know, and with the mind of Charles Xavier wrestling it for control, who knows?”
Hank’s brow furrowed in thought. “Do you have the files that you had been studying earlier?” he asked. “The ones concerning that string of murders that you three had been investigating?”
“There are copies in Emma’s office,” Ororo replied. “But my personal copies were destroyed with the jet.”
“I would like to look at them, when you get the opportunity,” he said.
“I can get them now, if you would like,” she said, pointing her thumb towards the elevator.
“What I would like right now,” he said softly, putting his blue hands gently on her arms, “is for you to get some rest. It’s past midnight, and you’ve been running yourself ragged.”
“I can’t yet, Hank,” she replied, but her body told her otherwise. Having to deal with the students, contacting the families of Jubilee, Arthur, and Artie (Emma had no family remaining to contact). Dealing with S.H.I.E.L.D. agents when they arrived to bring Cain Marko into captivity, and to deal with the bodies of Allerdyce, Rushman, Maddox, and Wyngarde. Arguing with them over control of Clarice Ferguson, who wished for nothing more than to repent for her actions with the Brotherhood, and to join the Academy.
“You can,” Hank replied, “and you should. Don’t worry about the four in that room. They’re in good hands. And the students who are sleeping in the Danger Room are also in good hands as long as they’re here.”
Ororo put her hand gently on his. “Thank you for coming,” she said quietly.
“It is my honor,” he replied. “I took a few calls when you were talking to Moira. Kurt Wagner called, and said he will arrive soon to help. Warren Worthington offers his condolences, and will supply any financial aid necessary to get things rebuilt. However, he says right now things are still ugly enough at Worthington Labs that he can’t afford to leave it.
“And I will stay as long as you need me,” he said, smiling. “Even UN Ambassadors are allowed leaves of absence in family matters.”
“Moira and Forge should be coming back soon, after Starsmore is taken care of,” Ororo said. “Sean took the first flight back. For Theresa.”
“Yes,” Hank nodded. “She lost her best friend tonight, she could use her father.”
“Thankfully she and Remy have gotten close since he arrived,” she continued, “but, yes, having a father close by for the funeral will probably help her.”
Hank sighed, and then turned back to the door. “I should go back and check on them,” he said. “And you should go sleep.”
“I’ll send you those files first,” she said, yawning.
“The files can wait,” he replied. “I’ll contact S.H.I.E.L.D. right away about Phoenix, but I believe anything that I can garner from those cases will be of little use to us beyond ‘I told you so.’”
Alison Blaire sat up in her bunk, looking around the dimly lit room. A small fireplace burned gently in one wall, casting amber light along the wooden cabin walls so convincingly that Alison had to remind herself of where she really was: a holographic cabin created within the Danger Room.
She looked at the others that shared the room with her. Connor Jones snored softly from underneath his blanket. Theresa Cassidy and Remy LeBeau had apparently fallen asleep in the same bed, his arms around her. Usually looking at that sort of public display of affection would make Alison scoff, but after tonight she felt a small wave of jealousy at the comfort the two were able to give each other, even in that small display.
Alison pulled the blankets away from her body and set her feet on the floor. She had been sleeping and waking in fits and starts all night, and she discovered that, since her last attempt, Professor Munroe had joined them, appearing to have been so tired that she had fallen asleep on her cot before she could even take her shoes off or get covers pulled up over her.
Alison pulled her shoes on and pulled her robe over her pajamas. Shaking her head, she took the blanket from her bed and carried it to the Professor’s. Carefully, she covered Ororo before walking to the door and pressing a button (the one piece of technology that gave away this otherwise serene scene) to open the door.
Minutes later, the elevator door opened into the main hallway of Xavier Academy. She pulled her robe tightly around herself at the chill that struck her. She turned towards the stairs, and then stopped before she took two steps. Even from this distance, she could see yellow tape criss-crossing the hallway near where the stairs began.
“You can’t go up there yet,” she jumped as a voice spoke behind her. She whirled around to see Peter Rasputin standing nearby, his hands in the pockets of his winter coat.
“Jesus, you scared me,” Alison said.
“Sorry,” he replied. “Alex is up there, in his room. Ororo says he’s a special case, because his suit was damaged in the fight, and right now his room’s the only safe place for him. But otherwise she doesn’t want anyone to go up there until everything’s cleaned up.”
Cleaned up. He meant the blown-in door of the girls dorm. The charred floor where John and Marie had fought, the charred wall where Jubilee had died. And the blood-stained floor. Alison suddenly decided that she didn’t want to go over there, after all.
“What are you doing up?” she asked.
“I’m on patrol duty,” he said quietly. “Just in case… you know…” He shrugged wearily. “You?”
“Couldn’t sleep,” she said, shivering. “Decided I needed to get a little air.”
Peter nodded in understanding. “You look cold.”
Alison chuckled through chattering teeth. “I can manage.”
Peter shook his head, and took off his coat. “It’s snowing,” he replied, “and you’re in a bath robe and pajama bottoms. You can borrow this.”
Alison wanted to protest, but her rattling knees told her not to bother. She accepted it gratefully, and pulled it over her t-shirt (Aye Heart Pirates, it said in glittering pink letters) after removing her robe.
“Thanks.” She said softly
“Enjoy the weather,” he replied, eliciting a smile.
“Good luck,” she said, reaching up to touch his shoulder before turning off towards the front door.
When she turned the corner, she realized where the chill had come from. A large blue tarp was covering the hole in the wall created by Juggernaut, and snow was floating in around the edges.
She passed it, carefully stepping over the debris, and walked out the front door into the dark. The sky was cloudy, but she could still see where she was going from the porch lights turned on along the front wall. Her breath was momentarily taken from her at the beauty of the scene: the fluffy snowflakes falling gently onto the ground, which had already been covered enough to allow tips of grass to poke through the white.
She turned her head, basking in it all, and saw a small body sitting on one of the nearby stone benches.
“Couldn’t sleep, either?” she asked quietly, walking over.
Lucas Bishop turned his head to look at her. “Nope,” he said.
“Have any room on that bench for another?”
Lucas nodded, brushing the snow off of the rest of the bench. Alison sat down, and the two of them stared silently into the night.
After a few minutes, Alison turned to look at him. “Where’s your jacket?”
Lucas, who sat in his t-shirt and jeans, looked down to the ground next to the bench, where his jacket lay covered in snow.
“Aren’t you cold?”
“A little,” Lucas shrugged, “But this is nicer.”
Alison smirked. “Did you grow up in Alaska, or something?”
Lucas shook his head, holding his dark hands out to catch a few flakes. “I grew up in Atlanta,” he said. “This is actually the first real snow I’ve ever seen.”
Alison nodded. “I’m from Albuquerque,” she said. “I know exactly how you feel.”
Lucas looked at her, his eyebrow raised. “I thought you said you were from California.”
“Nah,” she chuckled, shaking her head. “Alison Blaire is from California. My agents said that would sell more albums. So my hometown went out the window, just like my real name was replaced by my stage name.”
“Your name’s not Alison Blaire?”
“Alison Stern,” she replied.
“What’s wrong with that name?”
“Nothing, to me,” she said, shrugging. “But some of the execs didn’t like that I had the same last name as that disc jockey. Others thought it sounded too Jewish.”
“You’re Jewish?”
“My dad’s dad’s side is,” Alison said. “It was the kind of thing that I was surprised the producers would say at the time. But after spending time in the industry, I came to recognize that they’ll say or do anything to make a buck.”
“Huh,” Lucas said.
“So, after two albums and a world tour, I just sorta became Alison Blaire of Los Angeles, California.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, nudging her with his shoulder. “Your secret’s safe with me.”
“Shit,” she said in wonder, pulling the jacket around her, “how can you sit out here dressed like that?”
Lucas sat for a minute, staring out into the snow, before he replied. “Mr. Logan’s been teaching us a lot things,” he said. “Me, and Jimmy, and Alex. He picked up a lot of Eastern religion in his years. He’s been teaching us how to meditate, how to focus our energies, our thoughts, how to be one with our bodies. He’s been doing a good job, too.
“I’m sure when he wakes up, he’ll be happy to know how Alex was able to knock that door over to get you and Theresa out without blowing the whole school up. Or how Jimmy was able to not affect me and Remy’s mutation, even though he was sitting no more than three feet away. In the past, his field had extended well over six or seven feet, so he’s already able to control it. Hopefully one day he’ll be able to grow it or shrink it as far as he wants.”
“Yeah, you all did a really good job tonight,” Alison said. “Everyone did.”
“Logan’s also been teaching us some other lessons. About life, about nature, and about how everything’s tied together. I really didn’t understand what he meant, but sitting out here tonight, I think I do.”
He held his hand out again, and watched it as snowflakes fell onto his palm and his arm, puddling into drops of water as they landed.
“My power,” he said, “helps me with that, I think. I can feel the energy being released by each snowflake as it melts on my skin. I can feel the power of the breeze as it hits my face, helping me grow stronger. Becoming a part of me. Every footstep I take, I can feel the energy of its impact to the ground. It’s like nature, the earth, is lending me its strength.”
He sniffed, and Alison saw a tear rolling down his cheek. “Logan believes that, when someone dies, their soul leaves their body and returns to the earth.
“Sitting out here tonight, I was thinking of Arthur. And Jubilee. And Miss Frost, and Artie. I like to believe that their souls are a part of the earth now that their bodies have died. And that their souls are traveling on the wind, or have become part of the earth, or a tree, or whatever. And that, when I feel the energy of a breeze, or of a leaf brushing my cheek, that it’s one of them, lending me their strength to help me deal with losing my friends.”
He turned his wet face to Alison. “Does that make any sense?”
Alison, who realized that she was crying herself, closed her hand around his. She nodded, finding that any other words would just detract from what Lucas Bishop had said. Instead, she turned her face to the lawn, and the two mutants sat, holding hands, watching the snow fall on the trees surrounding Xavier Academy.
Previous Chapter (Release The Hounds, 2/2) / Next Chapter (Making Amends)