Author's Note: Welcome! This is a re-write of a story I did a few years ago. The majority of the plot will stay the same, but I'm working on improving my technique, so the whole story will see improvement. I have added new content, so if you read before, please re-read! I believe you will enjoy it. :)
To those of you who reviewed the first go round, thank you so much. This particular story was my first venture into creative writing in a very long time, and even though it was rough, you all gave me wonderful encouragement. I have continued to write during the last year – despite my busy school of grad school and working full-time – because of your kind words and time. So thank you! I hope if you're re-reading this, you enjoy it even more than the first time.
Summary: Thanks to a fluke of Pietro Maximoff's hyperspeed powers – and the determination of a certain Shadowcat – a small group of Bayville teens find themselves stranded in one of history's darkest chapters.
Rating: M for Mature. Story contains violence, war, genocide, character death and an overall abandonment of morals. Not for the faint of heart.
Last note – These characters are largely based off their X-Men: Evolution characterizations. However, the story contains elements from the movies, comics and other cartoons. Nothing present in the story should be confusing if you're not familiar with all the adaptations of X-Men, as it will be explained if relevant to the overall story.
No! Not this time, Maximoff!
It was Kitty Pryde's last coherent thought before she leaped for him, straight from the cafeteria floor where she'd been hiding, half-phased into the grimy laminate.
Because he wasn't getting away this time. That coward was always running, but not this time. He would have to face the consequences.
"Hey, Kitty! Catch!"
The warning was too little too late, particularly for Kitty's delayed morning reflexes, and when the Nerf ball landed with a splat in her bowl of cereal, she got a face full of milk and soggy Cornflakes.
"Evan!" she wiped at her face with the back of her sweater sleeve, sending her most heated glare down the long dinner table, where a dozen other teenagers ate with varying levels of enthusiasm. The morning was bright, airy and welcoming, and even better than that, it was the last day of school before summer break. This time last year, the table had been positively deafening with excited chatter. This year, however, was a different story.
"Sorry," Evan joined Kitty at her spot and pulled the sopping wet Nerf ball from her ruined breakfast. "You have terrible reflexes."
"Yeah, well, you have terrible aim," said Kitty, helping herself to a piece of toast just as Kurt Wagner appeared with a puff of wispy, foul smelling smoke. "How do you think you guys will do on your finals?"
Evan toyed with his ball, dark eyes turning listlessly to the window. "Who cares. I'm just glad this year is finally over."
"Da," agreed Kurt, as he clicked his hologram inducer to on, his blue fur and pointed ears instantly masked by a more human-like appearance. "School is terrible. Ever since… well, you know."
Kitty swallowed a bit of dry toast before giving up on breakfast entirely to shoot a happy smile their way. "Come on, guys. Things will get better. People just need time to adjust, that's all. They'll get used to the idea soon, and then everything will be totally smoothed over by next year, ya know?"
"Yeah well, tell that to those of us who are graduating," said Scott Summers, car keys dangling in his fingertips. "If you guys want a ride to school, you better move it. I gotta stop and get gas."
"Oh!" Kurt called out. "I get front seat!" Bamf. Evan cursed before shoving a whole piece of toast in his mouth and leaping over the bench.
"You always get front seat!" he called before dashing out.
Kitty Pryde was a model student, thank you very much, and she'd always genuinely enjoyed school. Ever since transferring to Bayville to live at Xavier's Institute for Gifted Youngsters, she'd strived to give her best at both her studies and her training. And it wasn't even because she was a nerd like – ahem – some had suggested, but because she really wanted to do well. Now, she could only hope the tiny, nagging voice inside her head that said all that effort might be for nothing would just shut up and go away, because she was going to be a senior next year, and she needed to keep her head clear.
"If mutants want to jobs and education, I say, let them build their own schools!"
"I don't want my kid going to school there. Not with those mutant freaks."
"They kill people! I saw it, and I read about it."
"No mutants in public schools! I heard they can spread their mutation through touch. I'm keeping my kids away."
Kitty wondered when every classroom had started tuning in to the news during school hours. If it had been going on before, she might have noticed. But maybe not, she thought as she passed down the hallways of Bayville High, books clutched tightly to her chest and eager smile threatening to crack. Maybe the students and teachers at Bayville had always watched the news, read the fear-mongering websites, spread the lie-filled articles, and she had been there, just as oblivious as anyone her age had the right to be - before all of this had happened.
Before everyone in Bayville knew they were mutants.
If the news was harsh now a days, it was nothing compared to the 48 hours following their big reveal. Kitty would never forget seeing her face on the television screen, phasing through a police car, scratched and bruised and stricken with terror in stark contrast to the heated, overly excited tones of the News 5 reporter.
"… now positively identified as high school junior Kitty Pryde…"
"Are they mutants or aliens? More at eleven."
"… now believe the entire student body of Xavier's Institute for Gifted Youngsters may be mutants."
"Fear wins the day as national paranoia grips the country, neighbor versus neighbor, friend against friend, entire families afraid to even step outside…"
The city hadn't succeeded in its mutant ban, but it was a mixed blessing. Every day seemed to come with a new restriction, a stricter rule, a fresh warning. Even a hint of their powers at school meant immediately expulsion, no questions asked.
Kitty took her seat in AP Biology just before the warning bell trilled, all the while doing her best to ignore the uncomfortable shifting of her lab partner in the seat next to her. "Hey Jen," Kitty pressed when she was met with silence. "Ready for the summer?"
She'd always been so nice before, even though they never hung out outside of school, but nowadays, Kitty's sweet friend seemed to go to any lengths to avoid looking in her direction. Sure, they'd never been close, but Jen had always been so kind and helpful before. Now, a courtesy nod of greeting was much as Kitty could get out of her, strained as it was. When the class finally came to its long and uncomfortable end, Jen bolted from her seat like Kitty held the world's most dangerous and incurable virus.
It gets better, Kitty thought to herself with much less enthusiasm than before. It gets better.
Pietro Maximoff abhorred school.
Not because he didn't like learning – he did – and not because he struggled to read at a third-grade level – like Lance – but because it was, a whole, boring as hell and it made his teeth hurt to think about the fact that Magneto forced him to attend with Lance and the other cretins.
When Pietro had questioned him, Magneto had given him some sort of vague answer about keeping the right kind of mutants in public view, because if all they had to see was the submissive, kicked dog behavior of the Xavier brats, who knew what kind of weaklings they might take mutants for? Those were, at least, the reasons Magneto had given him, but he'd been very dismissive about the whole thing and Pietro suspected he might have simply been trying to get him to go away.
Whatever the reason, it was stupid dull, and the only thing that kept him from sprinting straight out of Dodge was knowing that Magneto would find out, and hell if he cared to get on his bad side at the moment. So here he was, sitting at a cafeteria table, listening to Toad work his disgusting tongue over a sandwich while Lance picked his nails with the keys to his Jeep and Wanda sat aimlessly, glaring hard at anyone who dared glance her way.
Suddenly, Lance stumbled over himself on the cafeteria bench and fell into an unconvincingly casual pose, so Pietro looked in the direction of his cross-eyed stare. Kitty Pryde walked by, not sparing the table so much as a glance. As soon as she was gone, Lance reverted back to a slumped, primate-like pose that looked much more natural on him.
"I thought you two morons were through," said Pietro idly.
Lance shrugged. "She's just playing hard to get, that's all." The silver-haired speedster raised a thin brow, two slim fingers poised over a salt-shaker.
"Oh yes," said Pietro. "Because Kitty Pryde is a renowned seductress."
"Hey, she's gotten me blue before," Lance said gruffly.
Pietro made an unimpressed grimace and replaced the salt-shaker before shifting a stare in Lance's direction. "Lance, I've lived with you long enough to know that it doesn't take much more than a girl trying to empty a ketchup bottle to get you all hot and bothered." Lance colored red and turned his grunt to the table once more, leaving Pietro to scan the cafeteria boredly.
There they were, the X-Dorks all huddled at their table, shying away from every heated glare sent their way. The Brotherhood's table wasn't spared the dirty looks, but they'd been getting them for ages, and really, it was nothing new. Even if it was, Pietro doubted they'd take it as personally as those sad little lambs seemed to.
He'd heard Jean Grey's pleading address to the city council. Their cries for understanding. Their efforts at equality. Those idiots had talked to everyone from the principal down to the damn janitor in an effort to plead their case. All they wanted was to be accepted, what was so hard about that, why couldn't everyone just love one another and hold hands and – and – do whatever else stupid little kids did at summer camp, because that's the only image he could conjure that was disgusting enough to satisfy him in terms of how he felt about the X-Men.
Their world was about to explode, and the only consolation to Pietro was that he would be there to watch it burn.
"Pass a straw, Kitty." A pause. "Kitty – Hey, Kitty! Wake up!"
Jarred out of her stupor by a straw to the eyeball, Kitty snatched it from Evan and passed it down the line to Tabitha, who jabbed it in her soft drink. Man, lunch time was quickly becoming her least favorite time of the day. She felt so exposed in the cafeteria, even when surrounded by her fellow mutants. And they were all pretty crammed, now that they all sat the same time. None of the other kids in school would even entertain the idea of sitting with them, and since they'd started isolating themselves to this one, some brilliant jackass had graffitied it after hours with a bunch of profane words the school board didn't deem worth the cost of a fresh coat of paint.
"Hey girl," Angel Salvadore slid into the seat next to Kitty, making Evan grimace as they fought to make room. As usual, Angel barely noticed, only flashing a brilliant smile and a wave of her dark hair before tearing into a side of fries.
Angel had the type of personality Kitty had wanted all her life – confident, smooth and always full of laughter, just as pretty in her soul as she was on the outside. Even now, with all the craziness in school, Angel never seemed to take a single moment's notice of the hateful looks. She was much the same as always, ready with a quip and a wink, and she made Kitty's heart lighter. To the naked eye, Angel looked just as human as anyone, but the pair of inked wings on her back were much more functional than they appeared.
"How'd your final go?" asked Kitty, helping herself to a fry.
Angel grinned and bit the tip off a fry. "Oh, I forgot most of that crap in like five seconds, so I cheated." At Kitty's choking gasp, she laughed and shrugged. "I'm sorry! You're a great tutor, Kitty. I'm just a terrible student."
With a roll of her eyes, Kitty stood away from the table. "You need to buckle down, Miss Salvadore," she said in her best teacher tones, and Angel grasped her chest in mock earnestness.
"I'll straighten right up, Miss Pryde! I swear it!"
Giggling, Kitty waved a hand. "I'm going to go grab a water for gym class, I'll see you." Angel waved and turned back to her fries, leaving Kitty to journey across the cafeteria in the direction of the vending machines. She sucked in a deep breath and forced herself to keep her eyes straight, because if she looked out at the many rows of scornful faces following her path, she might just not make it through the day without tears.
Unfortunately, she never made it to the vending machines, because a certain slim speedster blocked her path.
Pietro Maximoff drawled, "Hey there, Pryde."
Kitty stopped, blue eyes narrowed, and she tried to edge around him. He stepped in her way, his smirk growing, and Kitty steamed on the inside. Ooh, he thinks I'm so stupid, she growled inwardly.
Pietro Maximoff was, in Kitty's opinion, one of the vilest creatures on the planet, and not just because was the flesh and blood of Magneto. Everything about him screamed danger, from his uncaring stance to his glinting silver eyes. His complete disregard for life was also more than a little alarming.
"What do you want, Maximoff?" she asked, fighting to keep her voice low.
Pietro reached in his pocket and drew out a small silver device, which he wiggled in his fingers in front of Kitty's annoyed face. "I was just wondering if you could tell me what this gaudy piece of shit was," he said casually, and Kitty's eyes widened.
Oh, no.
Pietro's smirk only deepened at Kitty's obvious alarm, and he tucked the hologram inducer into his palm with a low chuckle. "Don't you think someone should tell Wagner that people already know he's a mutant? I mean, you could really get some mileage out of him, if you know what I mean. He could be like your mascot."
A dangerous shade of red rage colored Kitty's vision. Pietro had Kurt's image inducer, and that meant he was stranded somewhere, bluefurred and pointy-earred.
"He can just teleport home," gritted Kitty between clenched teeth, but Pietro simply shrugged, looking no less pleased than before.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that," he said, tossing a look over his shoulder. Kitty followed his gaze and, to her great horror, saw Wanda sitting at the Brotherhood's table, darkly outlined eyes staring intently at them. Kitty's heart seized with fear. If Wanda was controlling Kurt's powers from here – Oh, god.
"Give it back!" she snapped.
Pietro jerked his hand away, true amusement lighting up his severe features. "Oh, Pryde, Pryde, Pryde… Don't you know by now that you will never, ever catch me?" He backed away with a small hop, the hologram inducer in his fingertips once more as he waved it around, high over his head, and it was now that Kitty realized how utterly silent the cafeteria had gone.
"You see this, folks? This is what you call a crutch," he said loudly, just before crushing the hologram inducer in his hand, the busted bit of popping wires falling to the floor with a comically loud crunch. "It's something our race can't afford anymore," he faced Kitty, but his words addressed the entire cafeteria, and she felt her body tremble.
"No more hiding behind fake little pictures, fancy mansions or years and years of lies," he stared down Kitty from a few feet away, and she could feel him soaking up every ounce of anxiety and fear that left her. "That's right, folks. There are mutants among you. You can either live in our world," his grey eyes grew more serious, "or you can die in the old one."
Kitty clenched her teeth so firmly that her tooth nearly cracked, but Pietro held her gaze.
"Mutant and proud," he taunted lowly, just to her. "Right, Pryde?"
He disappeared just like that, dashing off into a run that sent the entire cafeteria into chaos. Tables flipped, windows shattered, benches flew into the air. Screams erupted as students panicked and ran, fighting to avoid flying chairs and heavy benches that might slam them into walls or trap them against the ground.
Kitty shrieked and phased straight into the ground, hands flying over her head in a fit of instinct, and when she peeked up over the floor, all she saw was a microcosm of anarchy that grew with every passing second. "Maximoff!" she called out, so mad she could spit, but the cafeteria was impassable and people were running, screaming, dashing for the doors.
Then, without warning, sirens blared. Lights flashed from the ceiling. And when Kitty emerged from the ground and made a run for her table, she heard the shouts of frightened students. The doors were locked.
"What's happening?" Angel shouted over the deafening noise, but Kitty could only shake her head. In a flash, Bobby Drake appeared next to them and grabbed their arms.
He shouted, "We've got to get out of here! They're locking the cafeteria down!"
Kitty whirled on her heel, only to see that Bobby was absolutely right, because as she watched, metal walls emerged from the ceilings and came to the floor, wall by wall, slamming into the foundation and effectively trapping them inside. Yet another measure of mutant control, she thought with bland, tasteless fear. Evan appeared as well, his brown eyes wide.
"Dudes, come on! We've gotta go, we gotta –"
That was when Kitty saw him. Standing at the back of the cafeteria, smirk in place, enjoying the chaos he'd created with a simple split-second display of his formidable powers. Pietro Maximoff was undoubtedly and one hundred percent satisfied with what he had done, and he was about to get away with like, like always. Like freaking always, and suddenly, Kitty Pryde was as mad as she'd ever been.
She dropped into the cafeteria floor and phased underneath the stampede of terrified students, coming up just behind the unknowing speedster. With a fierce growl, she leaped from the floor and straight onto Pietro Maximoff's back.
"No you don't, Maximoff!" she cried, arms wrapped around his neck.
Pietro lurched forward under her sudden weight, but quickly righted himself. "What in the hell," he exclaimed, turning to throw her off his back. Unfortunately for him, he had only just noticed the closing metal walls, and Kitty felt him stiffen significantly, all signs of amusement gone from his sharp features. "Shit." He reached over his shoulder to pull her off, but Angel grabbed Kitty from behind.
"We are about to get turned into mutant tuna in here!" she shouted, pulling on Maximoff. "And it's all your stupid fault!" Bobby and Evan came to her side and tried to pull the two girls away, and the struggle ended up in a strangle grappling contest that came to an abrupt halt when Pietro yanked with all of his strength. The walls were nearly closed, and Kitty's last memories of that moment were eclipsed by Pietro's angry snarl.
"You want to hold on so bad, Pryde? Give it your best shot," he hissed, and then there was a great pulling in Kitty's stomach, a jerk like she'd never felt before, and she vaguely remembered Angel's hands on her arms and Bobby and Evan behind them before everything became a flash of white, silver and black.
After that, the world went completely black.
"I'm sorry, Pietro –"
"It's okay, we've just got to keep moving."
"I tried, I really did this time! I'm so – I'm so sorry!"
The young boy barely held in a sob. His limbs felt like they were on fire and he was so tired, so hungry. But they had to keep running, because he could tell the mob was getting closer and they weren't nearly far enough away. He couldn't carry her anymore. His little limbs weren't up to it, not after all this way.
"There they are!" cried out a voice that wasn't one of their own, and he felt his sister shift into his side with a fearful whimper. Angry voices and angrier faces appeared, glowing orange against the backdrop of a raging fire. It was always like this, thought Pietro tiredly.
Night to night. Home to home. Village to village. The fires burned on in the distance, a beacon to the destruction caused by the Maximoff twins, and Pietro's mind weighed so heavily with despair that his fleeting thoughts as the mob approached them reflected on how he missed being called gypsy thief, because at least that was better than Satan's spawn or demon.
"Children of the devil!" someone shouted, pointing. "That girl is possessed!"
"My livestock are dead! My house destroyed!" shouted the elderly man who'd taken them in for a night, and Wanda sobbed at his side. Pietro couldn't carry her any more, and he couldn't run, so he fell to his knees in front of her, hoping they'd be satisfied to take him instead. Wanda couldn't help it. It wasn't her fault.
The night air felt so dry.
He wanted to protect her, but all he could do was stand in front of her, ready to accept death on both of their behalves. He closed his eyes for a moment of respite. When he reopened them and saw a great, looming shadow standing in front of him, he knew it was the angel of death.
The shadow spread its arms wide, and Pietro bowed his head to accept death. However, it was the mob that dispersed, and then the great looming figure turned to Pietro and Wanda Maximoff with only a whisper of movement.
The angel of death, thought young Pietro. It has come.
"SHIT!"
Angel's startled curse was the last thing Kitty heard before she slammed into the unforgiving earth with breathtaking force, where she continued to skip like a stone on a pond for several feet before coming to a slow, painful stop.
Ow.
It took several dazed moments before Kitty lifted her head, the taste of dirt and blood mixing unpleasantly in her mouth before she wiped her cheek with a shaky hand and spit. "Eugh," she groaned, squinting at her surroundings as she pushed herself to stand. One of her ankles hurt like hell, and she had a long streak of dirt and blood sitting on top of a very nasty scratch on her side.
She was outside. And she was in the woods. Fantastic.
"Angel?" she called out weakly, limping a few feet away from the gnarly trail she'd left in the dirt with her hapless body. "Angel!"
"I'm here," the Latina girl emerged from behind a tree, looking just as worse for wear as Kitty. Her brown eyes went wide as she took in their surroundings, and the two girls linked arms for a moment of solace before Kitty straightened.
"Stupid Maximoff," she muttered. "He ran us somewhere!"
Angel pushed her hair back from her face with a dirt-streaked hand. "Oh, great. Now, what? We're all getting expelled. What a load of crap! I worked really hard on cheating on that final!"
Kitty turned away from her just in time to see Bobby Drake jog towards them, his shirt torn severely and his face bruised. "Kitty! Angel!" he caught both of their arms, eyes scanning them for injuries. "What ha –"
"Whoa," Evan stumbled into view, holding his head until Bobby came to his side and held him up. "What in the hell happened? Where are we?"
Bobby sighed heavily, "No idea. One minute we were in the cafeteria and then – Oh, hell. Maximoff. He ran us here!"
Kitty turned in a circle. "I don't see him! He must have run off, that sorry coward. I swear, when I find him, I'm going to ring his scrawny neck." Evan scowled and leaned against a tree with a wince. He'd messed up his leg pretty badly in the fall.
"Ring his neck? Kitty, if I could get a hold of Pietro Maximoff right now, I'd pound his face into the asphalt." He shifted his shoulder gingerly. "Probably break my own arm doing it, though. Anyone else get slammed into the dirt like they were coming out of a cannon? I'm not even sure I remember my middle name."
Bobby was the first to act, pulling his cellphone out of his pocket. "I'll call Scott, let everyone know we're okay," he said, but as he looked at his phone, his frown grew, Kitty's unease growing with it. "That's weird," Bobby looked up at the other teens. "My phone doesn't have any signal."
"Mine either," confirmed Angel with a glance, and the others found the same. "We must really be in the middle of nowhere."
Evan groused, "Just great. Now what?"
"Chill," Angel put her phone back in her pocket. "I'll just fly above the trees and see where we need to walk to. We're probably just outside of town or something." She removed her light jacket, revealing a slim tank beneath that gave full view of the intricate wing-shaped lines on her shoulder blades. With a fluttering hum, Angel's wings pulled away from her skin and came to life, and she leaped straight up into the air to fly through the tree limbs and above.
When she returned a moment later, Kitty instantly picked up on her confusion and uncertainty.
"I don't see Bayville," she admitted, pulling on her jacket once more. "I don't see anything I recognize, actually. It looks like there's a river here in the forest, but it's not any place I've ever seen. I have no idea where the hell we are."
Kitty sighed. She did not need this kind of stress today. And yet here it was, staring her in the face. And why? Because she'd let that arrogant prick get the best of her and draw her into a public argument. This was all her fault.
Well, she'd right it now. "Come on, we'll just get somewhere we can use a phone and call the institute. We'll be home in no time," she said with as much enthusiasm as she could manage, and the others fell into step behind her as they began to walk a winding path through the woods.
However, they'd walked no more than twenty or thirty feet before a strange sound met their ears. Angel paused first, her head turning upwards to the sky, where sunlight filtered through the dense foliage in sparse beams of gold.
"You hear that?" she asked.
The others paused, but Evan shrugged and moved forward, trudging ahead of Kitty.
"Who cares, let's just go," he said, moving several feet ahead as the others listened. The noise grew louder, and after a few moments, began a low, steady hum. Her brows furrowed. It almost sounded like.
"Is that… airplanes?" she asked, but she'd barely gotten the words out of her mouth when –
BOOM.
Angel screamed at the top of her lungs, arms flying over her head as a fiery plume erupted just to their left, bursting into a high tower of intense heat. A split-second later, another explosion sounded just behind them, unfurling into the trees with sadistic strength and purpose. Trees splintered and exploded, catching fire and raining down on their heads as the four teens burst into desperate runs.
The faster they ran, the more bombs dropped around them, one after another, creating craters in the ground so near their feet they had to leap to get over them. Whistling preceded every drop, mounting fear their only warning before BOOM! Another bomb burst into the ground, just in front of Kitty, behind Evan, next to Bobby and Angel, separating them and forcing their wild runs to become more erratic, more terrified. Fire and heat danced so close to Kitty she felt it lick at her elbow, and her chest felt so dry and hot, she could scarcely breathe.
Her limbs hurt, the cut at her side screaming at her, but the explosions rocked the earth more and more every time and once she barely leaped out of the way, and the tree that took her place toppled over with a groan and nearly crushed Bobby beneath its monstrous weight.
Then, in front of them, Kitty's jumping, teary-eyed vision spotted something on the ground, silver in contrast to the dark earth. "Bobby!" she called out, her voice catching, lack of oxygen making her delirious as her feet pounded into the earth, more bombs sounding all around her. "Maximoff!"
A collapsed heap on the ground, nothing more, eyes closed and all too oblivious to the literal hell coming down on them.
"Leave him!" shouted Evan, tripping once and barely missing a falling tree.
Kitty cried out as she skidded to a stop, trying to be heard over the vicious explosions. "Please, guys! Don't leave him! He's complete defenseless!" More planes zipped by overhead, adding to the thunderous din going on all around them, but Kitty's desperate cry finally reached Bobby and he came to her side, pushing her away as they both kneeled next to Maximoff.
"I'll carry him! Go!" he shouted, and with a fierce look of determination, he shifted completely into his ice form. Kitty jumped up and began running again, only looking back in time to see Bobby shifted Pietro's limp, unconscious form over his shoulder before he jumped onto his ice slide and pushed ahead of the rest of the group.
"A CAVE!" he pointed, further up and ahead of the rest of them. "Go, go!"
They sprinted, dodging the forest on fire as it crumbled to ash under the intensity of the bombs, which fell with increasing fervor from the planes above. A pained cry drew Kitty's attention and she stopped, looking back just in time to see Evan fall over in his spot, clutching his leg.
"EVAN!" she screamed, digging in her heels in preparation for a sprint that would never be fast enough. She wasn't Pietro Maximoff, after all. And the one time they needed him, he wasn't there.
Evan looked up, pained eyes finding Kitty's just before the hissing whistle sounded and the bomb – perhaps the last of all of them – dropped through the air and lit the area in a fiery circle of unyielding, unforgiving heat.
Evan disappeared in the blaze, and everything suddenly became quiet to Kitty, only the ringing in her ears letting her know she had not gone completely deaf. She felt Bobby pulling her away, felt Angel tugging on her arm until she was in the mouth of the narrow cave.
But all she saw, all she felt, was Evan's gaze. Gone, forever.