Two Horse Race
Author's Note
After delving into the world of X-Men Evolution AU's I grew a bold, brave streak and decided to have a go at a crossover between my two favourite things, X-Men and Enterprise. I did my research, I pondered and brainstormed, and I think, I think I was able to come up with something that passes as a good crossover that will work in the end. Call me crazy, but judge for yourself after you've read and let me know what you all think. So, good luck.
~Telaka~
Days it had been… no… it had to be longer than that, weeks perhaps? Weeks that could very easily have been months and months, years. In space a sense of time could undoubtedly be lost far faster than it could be kept, certainly it had become so on his small team of mutants.
He felt a great swell of pity for them as he stood before them, back turned, and an even greater bundle of guilt that lay upon him. He had been the one who had led them here; he had personally hand picked and assembled them for a mission that was no more that a false alarm and in the middle of space of all places. It was definitely not the best of territories to be making mistakes in, but he had and now his team was to suffer for it along with him.
Slowly, reluctantly, he turned away from the window of the space adapted Blackbird that displayed their endless black surroundings and faced his group of six.
If he had been asked to pick out the worst off amongst his numbers he would have pointed straight towards Ororo, no question or doubt about it. With no atmosphere she cared to try and control and no connection with Earth's nature to be made in this merciless void she was slowly and painfully losing any of the spiritual essence that made up a generous amount of her mutation and being as a whole. It was horrible to watch, heartbreaking. She rested beside Logan, for now sleeping but she would only awake in a few hours as pain stricken as before, if not more so.
Logan. Well you never could tell with him, certainly he couldn't anyway. Restless but silent most of the time in these cramped conditions, he was at least coping. Grudgingly so, but he was.
Across from him sat Rogue and beside her Remy, both still determined to torment the life out of each other, as their bold accents flew in whispers towards each others ears. This made him smile, slightly. Their antics offered some relief from the mind numbing silence and tranquillity of space at least.
He was brought to consider his wife next as she rose from her seat beside Ororo and stood next to him, smiling sadly with her radiant green eyes. Her past experiences in space hardly brought forth the fondest of memories but still she somehow managed to push that to the back of her mind and bury it. He took most all of his courage from that.
Then there was Hank, the small ray of hope that kept them all sane. For most of their time up here he had poured over the ship's computers and readings trying to find something, anything that would explain what had happened. So far he had come up with nothing but he did claim that he was onto something. So the team could only wait patiently and dare to hope.
And then of course there was he himself, Scott Summers, fearless leader of the X-Men. Fearless enough to be blinded from to the upcoming disaster that would spell out their currently doomed situation.
Everything had happened so fast, so maybe for that he could be forgiven. But still, it had turned out to be too fatal a mistake for him to make and let it pass without some heavy level of remorse.
People as proud as the Shi'ar did not just hail for help, certainly not from the likes of Earth bound mutants. Yet even they could not be blamed for the disaster that had literally hit them.
Scott in his head liked to describe it as some sort of tornado or storm (at least calling it a storm made it more acceptable to his messed up and confused mind) that had come from nowhere, hammering them with relentless and brutal force. From that the team had suffered minor bruises and swelling, Jean had even succeeded in gained a concussion. Now though they battled with fatigue, hunger, agitation, sweltering heat (the cooler had given up with the main line of power during the blast apparently): a list too long to mention all their complaints.
That could have been a week ago, it could have been four, but it took what felt like an eternity and a day before that something Scott was looking for from Hank happened, and the small ray of hope that he had clung to with his desperate optimism widened. Beast coughed roughly and straightened his back, focusing his strained cat-like eyes on Scott who looked up eagerly as he did.
"It would appear, oh dear fearless leader, that there is other life out here in this playground of space. The computer's scanners are picking up another vessel and quite a big one at that."
For all the painful wishes he had made to make this moment happen, when it did Scott began to look more than a little sceptic. Maybe it was the numbness of space, but it almost seemed too good to be true though. "How can we be sure it's safe?"
This was where Hank's eyes seemed to glimmer in a smile too wide for his furry jaw to make. "The computer also says there are human occupants aboard, about eighty or so."
Scott's worried doubt faded somewhat and he began to allow the faith to seep back in again. "Can you send out a distress call to them?"
No questions about why a ship would be this far out in space and if the occupants were even to be trusted, human or otherwise, sprang to Scott's taut mind now; the desperate part of his confusion was beginning to kick in, hard, almost completely throwing the short lived doubts and worries.
Hank nodded and turned back to the screens, his long black claws moving swiftly across the keys with far more life in them now that hope spread.
Beside him Jean said nothing but her look was that of trust as if to say she had known all along that her husband would get them through this eventually.
The others too were silent, even Remy and Rogue had stopped their seemingly endless bickering for now.
Ororo's particular lack of words, or any general noise or movement, even in her sleep, was beginning to worry him again though, a lot more than it had before. Logan too wore the slight emotional expression of grave concern for the woman he had known and considered a valuable friend for countless years now. He would never say it though, as if confirming the worries with words would reinforce the situation.
Scott was forced to forget her for now though as Hank turned back to him again.
"I've sent the message, now all I think we can do is wait some more."
Scott nodded and told Hank to take a break, which he obliged to eagerly.
Scott, at least at this moment in time, much hated waiting games.
Nothing could ever really fully express the feeling Archer received whenever he stepped onto his bridge with his crew ready for a new day and whatever discoveries (and more likely dangers) that lay ahead. It was a rush that never faded with time, one that was fresh every morning and forever brought him to smile, if circumstances were not life threatening.
The shift itself would not start for another half hour but half an hour was how early he was every day almost without fail. The only other person who was ever there before him was T'Pol, hardly a surprise to him really.
He nodded and smiled when he saw her, wondering if these pleasantries were lost on a Vulcan but feeling a need to greet her so anyway. Her own greeting back was a little more forward.
"Sir, I've just received a distress call, about twenty kilometres from here. It's faint and broken but I believe the caller was," she hesitated for a second, almost as if unsure of herself, "human."
The last word caught Archer by surprise and his attention sharpened.
"Humans? Out here?"
T'Pol's face remained ever passive and now more certain as she nodded slightly. "Yes. I believe the accent was American, much like your own sir."
He leant over her shoulder and scanned the computer's readings with her. Most of it he didn't understand, at least not the details, he was a Captain, not a Science Officer.
"We'll wait until Hoshi gets here and see what she has to say."
T'Pol nodded and Archer stepped back allowing her to on with her work.
Slowly but surly his strong, competent bridge crew filled into their stations, each greeted with the same smile and nod T'Pol was given, only they returned theirs.
If asked, he would never have picked any other life; space was his refuge, his present and his future and would be until his retiring years. He was confident, and right in saying, that most of his crew felt the same way.
Conveniently, Ensign Hoshi was the last to enter the bridge and was immediately set her first task of the day the second she did and took a seat.
"Ah, Hoshi, I have a distress call for you to interpret for me."
Looking a little taken aback by the sudden order but composing herself quickly she took her post with a nod and little question as she punched in commands at her station until she brought the call in question to play. She was forced to rewind the broken and faded voice twice before her sensitive ears could pick up anything. All the while Archer watched in silence eagerness to see what T'Pol had picked up and what his translator could make of it.
Finally she turned to her Captain looking a lot more doubtful than T'Pol had pretended not to be.
"Sir, I think it's human."
Archer exchanged a quick glance with T'Pol then turned back to his Ensign.
"What did he say?"
She shrugged. "The signal was really bad sir but I think he's lost and there's a group of them… I'm not sure. He did sound pretty desperate though, that much I'm sure of."
Again Archer turned to T'Pol. "Do you have the co-ordinates?"
"Yes."
"Okay. Mayweather take us to them."
The young Helm Officer nodded obediently in his seat at the front and instantly got to work.
Archer sat back in his chair shaking his head and almost smiling. Other humans, in the middle of space, lost. It was almost too obscure to believe but who was he to ignore a distress call if there was a chance that it could be genuine? And a big part of him hoped it was.
Every one of the small team of X-Men almost jumped over themselves as the computer released a harsh, ear cringing ring, the most beautiful sound any of them had heard for a long time.
"What is it Hank?"
The furry beast spent not more than a few seconds at the computer typing furiously before he could report. He looked unsure of whether to be relived of worried, his eyes locking onto the window Scott had been gazing out of.
"Well if you look out and up Scott you'll see what 'what' it is."
Scott frowned behind his visor then crawled over to the small, round, rock hard see-through hole that counted as a window on this craft.
If anyone could have seen those hazel eyes behind the ruby visor then they would have wonder if eyes were actually able to spread that wide. His jaw almost literally hit the floor and his heart nearly stopped; certainly it skipped a couple of beats.
Jean gazed out and up with him and showed near the same reaction on her instantly paled face.
There were no grand enough words to describe it really. It was huge was all Scott could really say about it, for now anyway, (although that was an understatement in itself), huge and almost unreal, unbelievable – fantasy, like something out of a sci-fi series.
The bleeping stopped and a crackly, broken voice replaced it instead. Hank strained to hear then nodded to himself.
"They want us to board."
Scott finally turned back round leaving Jean to stare along with Remy and Rogue now. Their faces all lined up together were quite comical to watch, amidst the circumstances.
His reluctance was painfully obvious, although in these situations his choices were strictly limited, if not none existence. He had hardly the right to refuse what could be their only salvage from space's never ending grip.
His final nod was curt and Hank was quick in his response back to the colossal ship.
As Scott turned back to the window and heaved a heavy sigh he wondered whether this was going to be the end or only the beginning of something that none of his years as an X-Man could ever compare to.
~Well there it is, my brave, brave attempts at a crossover, hopefully it's better than what you expected. So, if it took your fancy then feel free to reviews, same with if it didn't, but no flames, I'll always have an answer back for mindless reviews.~
~Telaka~