Disclaimer: This fan fiction is not written for profit and no infringement of copyright is intended. Not beta read so all mistakes are mine. Please note there is a little swearing but everything else should be fine. Enjoy!
- LULLABY IN BLUE -
Manhattan, 2039
Blue. Raven can see blue.
Sleeping, waking, it doesn't matter.
All she can see these days is blue.
Blues drifts in front of her eyes, the warmth of Charles' hand in hers-
She's 98 years old and he can still make her heart skip a beat, how wonderful is that?
But even as she thinks it her yellow eyes drift shut with finality, and though she knows the action is merely an echo, Raven thinks that she smiles.
Westchester, 1982
"Raven, you're dreaming again, darling. Rather loudly."
And Charles shuffles in his bed. Stretches. His hand has strayed down to slide, ever so gently, over her bare back but he's still too much of a gentleman to move lower and try to cop a feel. More's the pity.
The man's been on the FBI's Most Wanted List twice in the last ten years, Raven muses, and he still treats her like she's a nun.
She opens her eyes at the thought- She's fallen asleep on his chest again and she can't help but think that she shouldn't be squashing a man recovering from a gunshot wound in quite that way. She might end up finishing what that moron Stryker started at Alkali Lake, and Lord knows she doesn't want that. But when she looks up at him he's smiling, his eyes still blue. He still wears blue pyjamas, perpetual schoolboy that he is.
He is still the one person she feels truly safe with, even after all this time.
"How far back was I?" she asks, brushing her hair out of her eyes. She can't remember. She seldom wants to remember her dreams, but she has only herself to blame for that.
The memory of what went down in Alkali Lake shivers behind her eyes.
"I think you were dreaming about the night we met," Charles is saying and she can't help it, she sees the sliver of guilt that still accompanies that memory. The thought that even then he should have known better, that even then he was trying to buy her affection with food and a home and love.
He's still so hard on himself, she thinks. St. Charles on a cross, to the last.
She wants to remind him that she was eleven and he was twelve and that even if age hadn't been an excuse, then the kindness he showed her was. That that was about more than his insecurities, and more than her need to belong. But though neither of them are children anymore, she doesn't say it.
She can't bring herself to.
Instead she smiles and nuzzles into his throat and -Judging by the slightly uncomfortable, slightly happy way his breath hitches as she does it he has no problem with her method of diversion at all. After all, she's not a gentleman; Copping a feel is no problem for her.
So she moves so that she's straddling his lap and even though they're in a hospital bed, and even though it sways alarmingly as she starts to kiss him, to jostle him, as they both laugh and smile and move, she knows what she wants just as surely as he does. It's a new thing between them, a wonder nonetheless.
Honest and aware is not a natural state for either of them, but somehow they make do.
Bavarian Alps, 1966
It can't be much further, Raven thinks.
She looks down at the child she's carrying in her arms, its skin as blue as her own, and prays that she's right.
Because the little one won't take much more of this mountainside's cold; If Azazel's directions towards the monastery were wrong then she has essentially marooned herself in the path of an oncoming snow-storm for nothing. The chill probably won't damage her, but the baby can't say the same; Raven knows that, and she suspects the baby might too, judging by his wails. Her smart little boy, he knows they're in trouble. But though it's late October and even starting this journey was probably a mistake, she couldn't leave him back with Margali-
If the mob in Munich had seen him, they would have torn both him and the entire circus apart in their anger, Raven doesn't doubt it.
She hadn't been able to save Margali or her children, but she had been able to save her little Kurt. She had been able to spare him the fate she herself had nearly met when she was a child. And some day- Some day she'll bring him to Charles and he'll be safe. Wanted. They might even… They might even be family. Someday- No, she thinks, her will hardening. One day.
One day, we'll all be safe together.
My Kurt will grow up with so much more love than I ever did.
And so she trudges onwards. Keeps to the path. If she weeps as she forces herself further into the storm, she doesn't let herself feel it-
And even if she did, what good would it do?
It's will that keeps her moving, and it's will that will save them both.
San Francisco, 2012
"Raven, people are staring."
And Charles looks over his shoulder, shoots her his most censorious frown. The one Scooter and Jeannie are terrified of.
(Ororo is indifferent to it, as is Kurt. Raven has taught them well).
Behind him Raven pushes his wheelchair on regardless, grinning wickedly as she struts through Golden Gate Park's Japanese Tea Garden. She's proudly wearing the uniform of a candy-striper nurse, her hair long and strawberry blond, her face a masterpiece of makeup, even if she does say so herself. And if the uniform happens to be a little shorter than requirement, or a little more low-cut, and if she happens to be wearing the form of a twenty-two year old supermodel she saw in some magazine earlier today, and if every head in the park happens to be turning and staring, well that's of no consequence-
Changing shapes is just for fun, anyway, she thinks. At least, it is these days.
That she can even think such a thing is a testimony to how far she and all mutants have come
She shoots Charles a look she knows he understands and projects her thoughts to him: You always say appearance is unimportant, she points out sagely. If appearance is unimportant, than what's wrong with this appearance?
She bats her eyelashes innocently and St. Charles harrumphs. Crosses his arms. Though he's lost his hair, and though he's lost his youth- survival will do that to you- he's still surprisingly like that little boy she met in Westchester all those years ago, and just as easy to rile.
Perhaps that's why she takes so much delight in doing so.
Rather than speak though he answers her telepathically- unwilling to have a conversation about her mutation out loud. These are peaceful days, but one can never be too careful.
Her heart twists, remembering what happened to poor Alex, but she says nothing. Just tries to enjoy St. Charles' proselytizing. It seems to make him happy, and God knows, she likes things that do that.
There is nothing wrong with the form you're wearing, Raven, he's telling her staunchly. As if she needs his confirmation, she thinks with a derisory grin. I'd just rather you didn't take on an appearance that makes me look like some randy old fart with a penchant for teenagers and a fetish for uniforms-
She snickers and his frown turns into a scowl. He actually pouts, and at this she openly snorts with laughter. He should know better than to give her ammunition like that after their knowing one another for sixty years, but St. Charles never thinks of that at a time like this-
It's one of his more charming limitations.
So, determined to rile him thoroughly she parks the chair. Comes around to the front and leans down, giving him a beautiful view down her top. Gentleman that he is, he tries to avert his eyes. She doesn't know why, it's not like he hasn't seen this view before, and more besides-
I don't see why you won't wear your own appearance, he tells her petulantly.
The tips of his ears are turning red, and it's really rather adorable.
Your own appearance is a hundred times lovelier than some random child you've decided to impersonate, he says, and it has the added advantage of making neither of us look like a paedophile-
Rather than let him get up a good head of steam though she reaches down. Kisses him. She is flattered that his thought processes sputter to a halt for a moment, his mind flailing against hers as she distracts his focus.
Not bad after sixty years, she thinks. Not bad at all.
Without his really meaning to his hand comes up and cups the back of her head, pulls her down to him harder. He still kisses like a scoundrel, even if he is St. Charles on the Cross, and even if she is someone he spent years telling himself he loved as a sister.
They've never been sister and brother though, not really, and Raven is finally old enough to be happy that they're merely kith, not kin.
When they pull apart they're both a little breathless, and Raven's fairly certain she's lost enough of her own concentration that her eyes have changed colour. She probably has a little blue skin showing too. This is confirmed when she hears a gasp and straightens up, sees a group of elderly women whispering together and pointing at she and Charles. The word "mutant," floats on the air Raven shoots them a wicked grin. Takes Charles' hand, holds it as she manoeuvres him farther into the park.
"You did that on purpose," Charles says eventually, but his tone isn't angry. It's thoughtful. "Have I been that much of a pain in the arse lately?"
"Oh God, yes." They pass through the shade of a small pagoda-shaped hut and in that moment she changes, allows her own appearance- minus the blue skin- to come through.
Charles beams as if she's done a magic trick, but then he usually does.
"There now, there's a true beauty," he tells her, and the amazing thing is, she knows he's telling the truth. Red hair threaded with grey and yellow eyes not nearly so bright as they once were, she still knows he means it. For a moment they're both back in a kitchen in Westchester, for a moment she's wishing they're both blue underneath their skin.
For a moment, maybe they are.
They meander through the park, waiting for Erik to make his presence known and provide some context for all this cloak and dagger. The day is warm and the quiet's now peaceful, and when they finally meet Erik, Raven's able to listen to him with surprisingly little anger.
His eldest his looking for a place to train and Charles agrees to provide it.
She's a little girl with green hair and when she sees Raven's yellow eyes she smiles.
Alkali Lake, 1978
Logan's bleeding, that's all Raven can think.
Logan's bleeding and he's screaming and his hands are cut to ribbons and his guts are all over me and it seems like he's losing his mind and it's all- all - my fault.
She can't help thinking it: I never should have listened to Charles. But though she wants to blame her "brother," for this debacle, she knows the responsibility for her plan heading south rests squarely on her shoulders.
She was the one who planned this operation, she was the one who persuaded Logan to go undercover and find out what Stryker was up to.
If there's anyone who should be hauling the Wolverine's ass out of the trap she persuaded him to step into then it's most certainly her.
And it's this knowledge which keeps her going; It keeps Raven huffing and snarling, trying to force her concentration steady as she pulls her fellow mutant's (now metallic) ass through another dirt tunnel. The Alkali Lake base is still a Goddamn maze.
She's managed to gag him and bind him in the adamantium chains they were using to keep him tied in the tank but how long that's going to last is anybody's guess: This is The Wolverine she's dealing with, after all. The one man mutant army of legend. The one person besides Charles that even Erik truly fears. And if he pops-
Well, if he pops his newly acquired mass is going to be the least of her problems, she muses darkly.
As if to underline her point Logan gives a low, guttural snarl and now when she looks at him there's not a trace of the man she knows looking back at her.
"Let me go, bitch," he snarls. "You let me go right. The fuck. Now."
And he shows his teeth, snarls. Begins struggling against the chains, his claws coming opening with a slick, sickening snikt sound that Raven's fairly certain will haunt her nightmares for the rest of her life. But though she's afraid, she won't give up. Behind her, she can hear Stryker's men hissing orders, swearing. Most are without weapons- Thank you Erik- but a few still retain their firearms and all are well-trained in hand-to-hand. A couple are even carrying tranquilizer guns, having been briefed on what to expect, should Weapon X get loose.
She can't leave Logan to that, she thinks. No matter how much he's scaring her.
She stares down at her friend, watches him ram his- Jesus, even his claws are metal now?- claws through his abdomen in an attempt to stab at her and then she grits her teeth. Pulls him into an alcove and does the unthinkable- She reaches out telepathically and asks Charles for help. She says please and everything.
A second later there's a burst of light, a grunt and then a roar. She looks up to see Hank barrelling towards her in full Beast mode, one of Charles' newest students, Meghan Wynne, at his elbow. The girl is staring at she and Logan in horror, her fear obvious. She doesn't approach, merely stands behind Hank.
"Stop gawping and help me," Raven snaps, and suddenly Meghan remembers where she is. What she's supposed to be doing. She nods shakily, reaches out and touches both Raven and Logan-
It's as she's flickering out of existence that Raven hears Hank's howl of pain.
She's a little afraid that it will be the last sound she ever hears him make.
Westchester, 1951
She can hear him in her head.
Raven wants to believe that either hunger or cold might be making her crazy. She wants to believe that her mind is tricking her, but deep down she knows it's not.
Because the boy before her, the perfectly normal looking boy in the blue pyjamas, he's making himself heard inside her mind. She knows he is. She can… She can feel him inside her head, angrily demanding to know what she has done with his mother- Angrily demanding to know who she really is-
If she were any less frightened, Raven thinks she'd be absolutely amazed that this normal-looking boy is a freak, like her.
It should be wonderful to realise that she's not alone.
But she is frightened, she is cold and lonely and hungry, and the thought doesn't make her feel any better. No, it makes her feel about a million times worse. And she's also very aware that she doesn't have many options: She only has one trick. It has kept her safe so far, but if this boy can do things she doesn't know about, if he has a gift too, then maybe he can use that gift to call for the police or force her to do something horrible or make her head explode or peel her skin off or, or something…
Nobody will believe her if she complains, she already knows that.
Nobody will believe someone who looks like her over someone who looks like him.
Panic erupts inside Raven with the thought and, as it always does, it wrecks her concentration. Blue bleeds through the façade of the boy's mother's clothes and she feels herself shrinking- literally- as her own form reasserts itself. Suddenly she feels small. Scared. Helpless. Suddenly she feels like a little girl, which of course is what she is, no matter how she might sometimes look.
But then the boy does something amazing. (She doesn't know it yet, but it will be one of the most amazing things she ever sees, no matter the length of her long, long life.) Because as he sees her body change, the anger goes out of him. His eyes widen, like he's looking at something… good. Something amazing. Something beautiful.
Raven has never had anyone look at her like that before.
It feels almost… Almost like she's not a freak.
A smile splits his face and suddenly he doesn't look nearly so scary. She can't feel his mind inside her own and his voice is so soft.
He's only a little bigger than her, she realises.
"I knew it," he's saying, "I knew I couldn't be the only one…"
And Raven doesn't know why but suddenly she feels mixed up. Wonderful and scared and, and brave and seen. She's never really wanted to be seen before.
It's always been so dangerous, for someone like her.
But she thinks being seen by someone like him might be the most wonderful thing in the world.
"Charles Xavier," the boy says then and before she even decides to, she's telling him her name. Shaking his hand. He says her she can have as much food as she wants, that she doesn't have to steal and then, impulsively, that she will never have to steal again. Raven doesn't think that's a promise a little boy can really make but she keeps it to herself: She can't believe that there's someone else like her and he's so nice.
So she nods. Smiles. Lets him lead her into the house.
For the first time in a long time, she feels safe around someone.
His eyes are blue and his pyjamas are blue and just for a moment, Raven lets herself pretend that underneath them, Charles Xavier's skin is blue like hers. She knows it's not. She knows it's silly.
But the thought of it brings a smile to her face as she follows him inside.
The Bronx, New York, 1980
The first time she sees Kurt, she knows who he is.
She hasn't seen him since he was a baby, has feared more than once that he's been lost. A bright blue boy is no safer amongst the normal humans than a bright blue girl once was, she knows that, and there are so many ways in which he could have been harmed- In which he may have been harmed- in the sixteen years that she's been away from him-
And yet, as soon as he steps off the Blackbird, before Charles even tells her who he is, she knows him.
She would know her son anywhere.
Even beneath his thick coat and hat, even beneath the image inhibitor that he uses to hide his skin's natural tone… She knows her boy. She needs no smiling Charles, no shuffling, shy introduction and halting English to tell her that this child is hers. Charles has brought her Kurt back to her. She wants to speak, to blurt out everything she's feeling but she knows that wouldn't be a good idea. The child's been through enough in Stryker's care without her making him feel self-conscious and confused.
She'll wait until he's settled in. She'll wait until he's ready.
She'll wait until she can speak past the massive lump in her throat and not cry because she's afraid it's going to upset the kid entirely.
So she nods. Gives him a stern, appraising look and a small smile. Squeezes his shoulder and lets Hank lead him upstairs. The two seem to have developed a rapport and she has no desire to interrupt it-
Thank you, she mouths to Charles as she hurries after them, and though she can't see it she knows that Charles is smiling at the thought.
He is smiling when he comes to her in the dark that night, and he is smiling when she wakes with him the next day.
Raven always knew there was a sweetness to Charles, but she never knew its depths before now.
Los Angels LAX, 2019
"It's over, Erik," she says. She gestures to the small group of mutants Magneto has gathered around him, to the carnage of what used to be the Los Angeles' famed terminus building, and shakes her head.
"We have the area surrounded," she says. "Cerebro's been neutralised, the Avengers are on their way in now. Stark's practically twitching at the idea of a rematch. There's been enough bloodshed already, you don't need to cause more-"
Erik's laughter is a bark, hard and cold. It has no laughter in it.
He surveys her as he surveys everyone, from down his nose.
"I thought Charles had promised to stop randomly taking over your mind, darling?" he asks mockingly. "Or do you simply spout his nonsense automatically, now that he's made you his pet?"
Beside her Raven feels Rogue tense up, and- not surprisingly- she feels Rogue's husband tense up likewise. Because The Wolverine being tense is always such a wonderful occurrence, she thinks sarcastically, and never leads to mayhem of any sort. As the older man reacts a ripple goes through the younger X-Men, tension mounting rapidly: They've already had a taste of what Erik will do to them if he gets a chance and they're too young to want to try diplomacy, something Raven remembers all too well.
But still, they have to try. That's what Charles would do, were he here and not fighting for his life in a hospital somewhere, put there by the same man who now stands before her.
So Raven squares her shoulders, takes a deep breath. Throws a questioning look at Logan and from there at Storm. The Canadian cocks an eyebrow at her, chomping on his cigar, and says nothing. Storm tightens her lips slightly and shakes her head, indicating that no, she doesn't think Erik can be reasoned with. Raven happens to agree.
A beat of silence lies between the two old friends, silent and thick with worry, and then-
"Screw this," Raven mutters and takes a swing up at Magneto.
He gets such a shock when she actually hits him that he doesn't even notice the flash of Logan's claws until it's too late.
Manhattan, 2039
Blue. Raven can see blue.
Sleeping, waking, it doesn't matter.
All she can see these days is blue.
Blues drifts in front of her eyes, the warmth of Charles' hand in hers- She's 98 years old and he can still make her heart skip a beat, how wonderful is that? Blue drifts behind her eyes, the memory of Erik, of Logan, of her Kurt and her Destiny and even her Ororo making her smile. All the children she's known, all the children she's helped…
Hers has been a life of service and she has loved it.
Her life has been defined by blue and she would not change it, not for all the world.
Blue eyes stare questioningly into hers at the thought- Was she speaking aloud again? Can she do that here?
Does she even know what she's saying, this far from home?
But even as she thinks it her yellow eyes drift shut with finality, and though she knows the action is merely an echo, Raven thinks that she smiles.