Praeperationis
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This is based on a film I've seen called Dogsville. The film was pretty dreadful, but the concept was awesome. This will spoil the ending of Dogsville for you, so if you intend to watch the film, don't read this. The film is probably better. But it doesn't have the X-Men.
If you don't get it, you have two options. Ask me, or sit and think about it for a while. Mostly people don't like the thinking, but sometimes it's worth it for that moment of …. 'ooooohhh' that comes when you work it out.
I've also always had the urge to - at least once in my life - kill 'Him'. This was always the most obvious option. I just never had a chance to write it before :D Fun fun.
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The world was full of silence.
No. Not silence. The world was full of noise - rapid-fire heartbeat, panting breaths, the odd ringing of displaced air.
Displaced. Not there anymore.
Like Him.
He realised his eyes were shut and forced himself to open them. There was a little pain - the light was bright and his eyes were still full of flash-shadows - but he looked on.
His right hand. He looked down at the weight he could feel there, but was distracted by the sight of his hand, burned and blackened.
It should hurt - he thought - and then it did. With a cry he dropped to his knees grasping his wrist as though he could cut off that pain with his own grip.
The thing that he held… Just a thing. His brain could not process the image. A thing. An object. Nothing more. Like the others scattered around on the floor, shining in the light.
The thing that he held was stuck in his grasp, his hand a burned claw wrapped around it, immovable, unable to let go. He stared at it with the beginnings of horror in his gut.
'What have I done?'
It was not an unfamiliar thought. Not to this long-tortured soul.
'Why?'
There was the sound of soft footfall behind him, but he didn't turn to look. He knew who it was.
'Was it for you?'
"Yes." He looked up, beyond the pile of things on the floor to the man watching. His doubt resolved. His guilt settled. Oh yes. That was why. "You remember now, don't you." He looked around him, looked at the smouldering ruins of the Xavier mansion. Looked at the bodies, the remains here and there. The men and women he had fought with, fought for. The people who had taught him hate, and fear. Vulnerability and betrayal. Love. And death.
He looked over the wreckage of his life here and then looked back to the man offering him his outstretched hand. His past. His future.
No. Not a man.
The devil. The anti-christ. Red eyes.
He took the hand in his uninjured one and allowed the red-eyed man pull him to his feet.
Standing again he grasped the metal blade still clasped in his damaged hand and pulled it away from his skin. The devil's hand at his back stopped him from falling again. He dropped that blade on top of the pile with its five twins and the rest of a man-shaped skeleton wrought in metal, in pieces on the ground; its joints and flesh all made of softer things so much more vulnerable to charge and blast.
He wondered absently if any piece of Him - now distributed so finely - was large enough to start again. To heal.
He turned his back.
"Are you ready now?" A smirk, indulgence.
"Yes father. I'm ready to take my place." Red eyes met red eyes. Found the familiar there. Like father like son.
"Come then." They stepped through the portal together, leaving the ruins of the X-Men behind them.