Disclaimer: As always, Marvel characters used and abused in this Fic don't belong to me. This is probably a good thing.
Authors note: There is a story that comes before this (not a good one though) which can be found on my webpage. It's titled Taking Chances.
Elseworlds: Dead for Years
She stares at me with great liquid brown, empty eyes. That void locks on to me, threatens to pull me into her despair. I want to scream aloud and punch my fist through the wall. Maybe that would wake her up. But I doubt it. She just hasn't been the same since....
The X-Men were her family. Much more so than her own Mum and Da ever were. When much of Excalibur went to Salem Center to help fight Magneto, and many of them died, it was like losing a large part of her family.
We were on our Honeymoon when it happened. So in love we couldn't see straight. We headed right back, but the damage was done.
She held together through most o' the funeral and for awhile after. She and I stayed on at Muir along with the Elf. He'd been crippled in the battle, but stayed on t' help Moira with her work. She's still working hard on her Legacy Research. Hope she finds the cure 'fore it kills her.
I don't really know when Kit snapped. Maybe it was after she went to see Storm. The sight of her that way might o' been the last straw. I should have seen it coming. I should have been there for her. Truth is, I didn't. And there was nothing I could have done. I sit down next to her, run a hand through her hair. She's still beautiful. But she's not the woman I married.
"Kit? Luv?" Nothing. She doesn't even blink. A shell, that's all. "Say something. You're killing me." It's like talking to a bleedin' brick wall. Some days I can't even look at her. Breaks my heart, gets me wishing we'd died with the rest of them. No such luck. I'm stuck here with the living- and the half-living- the walking wounded. Lucky me. Never thought me life'd come to this- living on a rock in the ocean. More like a damned rat clinging to a plank after his ship's gone down, just managing to keep afloat.
I leave, have to get out for awhile. The wind blowing through the window tempts me outside. Light a cigarette, stare out over the water. The salt wind feels good on my face, prolly because it's something tangible in this world of ghosts. Drop one cigarette, scuff it out, go on to the next. I tell my problems to the wind, let it carry them all away because I can't tell her. Not that's she's really listening anyway. Might as well be alone.
Sometimes I wish I could muster the strength to be angry about it all. But who's left? Not Magneto. He's dead as the rest of 'em. And I've gotten used to life's nasty tricks. Just take them in stride. I wonder, briefly, what I'd do if I ever found myself alone again, really alone-like it was before I met Pryde. I don't know, and I don't dwell on it. Just let the wind blow around me, let it dull the pain.
The gunshot rings out over the island. I don't jump, like I was half expecting it all along. And I don't know if I should be mad at her for not moving until I was gone, or relieved that it's over. I know I should have taken the gun out of the drawer. But I didn't. I scuff out the last cigarette and walk back to what I know is waiting for me. Maybe I'm a little relieved because she's set me free. But I think, for the most part, I don't feel much of anything at all.
Because she's been dead for years, really.