Prologue
Eight months after Alcatraz Island
October 27th
Erik solemnly stared at the barely filled out application, not thinking anything in particular. Except that he hated that mutant cure with a passion.
His normally clear blue eyes darkened at the thought. He had to stop himself from tearing the piece of paper in shreds.
The wind blew through his silver hair and the sun highlighted his blue eyes. He cringed and looked up at the sun in the clear sky before looking back down at the piece of paper.
Why, he asked himself, was he filling out an application for a job as a cook at a small reclusive family owned diner?
He couldn't spend the rest of his days dreaming his life the way he wished it to be, that's why. He had to swallow his pride and fill out this application. His funds were no longer any good to him; the governments of the world united and seized his bank accounts.
He snorted at the thought. Greedy people always did band together, he thought before he continued with the application. And he already lost his previous two jobs because they recognized him.
He looked up suddenly as a voice caressed the back of his mind. He couldn't distinguish it from a child's voice or a woman's voice, but it was soft, very soft. Like lovers' caress. He couldn't make out what it was saying, but he knew that it didn't belong there in his head.
Erik turned around, placing his left arm over the benches' backrest to look better over his shoulder. All he saw were children playing in the distance, their mothers' talking to one another or reading their frivolous paperback romances, anything else than watching their children.
That train of thought caused his eyes to darken once again. The mothers' were careless; did they not understand how precious a child was? How precious their family was? That it was a crime against their own flesh and blood not to enjoy their presence as much as they could?
The bells from a nearby church rang out the time. It was noon.
The earth started to shake and the mothers and their children looked all around in fright. Even Erik looked around as if in search for the source. But as he did so, it had gone as quickly as it arrived. The spooked families whispered and some ushered their children and packed their things to head back home.
He didn't though; he didn't have his own family to worry about anymore. His eyes saddened at the thought, but he quickly banished it to the back of his mind as he turned back around and continued filling out his application, making sure to avoid the previous employer lines.
x
Mystique, other wise known as Raven, mostly known as Raven, stretched her pale limbs towards the top shelf of a bookshelf in her second job at a used bookstore. She pulled down the book that a girl around the height of five foot had asked for, T.H. White's "The Once and Future King".
She brushed her black hair that was now some ways past her shoulders. With a beautiful smile, she handed the girl the book and received a kind smile in return. "Thanks." The small girl said.
"Anything else today?" Raven asked as she led the small girl up to the register.
"Nah, this is it," the girl said as she stopped by her Asian friend clad in yellow. Said friend popped a huge pink bubble and merrily continued chomping on her bubble gum. Raven couldn't help but think the yellow kid looked familiar. She also didn't like her. She dressed loud and was even louder, something that Raven didn't like at all.
"Five ninety-six." Raven said quietly as she rung up the worn book with the red cover. She fingered it with a thoughtful look on her face as she waited for the girl before her to fish out the money.
She remembered seeing Erik reading this before, a long time ago. Her eyes darkened at the thought of the man she had loved. That she still loved.
But she was going to get her revenge soon. She hid a sadistic smirk as she glanced at the inch and a half silver bangle on her right wrist.
She had forged new bonds now. New bonds that promised her everything that she wanted… and more.
With a diabolical gleam in her eyes, she lifted her head and held out her hand as the girl finally got out the exact amount of money that she asked for.
"Why're you even getting that book for Kitty?" The Loud one asked as she nonchalantly picked up a book and flipped through it, her spiky black and yellow streaked hair and overly large hoop earrings and constantly popping bubblegum driving Raven mad. Not to mention all the yellow. Yellow leather jacket, yellow halter top… yellow crocodile boots. It all made Raven want to just… BLAH!
"The said it was the Professors' favorite book." the girl named Kitty said in a quiet voice as she took her proffered book from Ravens' grasp.
Ravens' eyes flashed at the girls' response, her grip on the book tightening only a little before she let the small girl take it.
"Oh… sorry Kitty." the Loud one said in a truly sympathetic voice as she placed the book she was looking at on the wrong shelf.
Ravens' eye twitched.
The next thing she knew the girls were walking out of the used bookstore, Raven watching them the entire time.
"X-Geeks." she said quietly. Her gaze still lingered on the glass door that they passed through. Stayed there even when a tremor echoed through the store, though she didn't seem to notice. Her gaze was only taken away when a little old lady around the age of ninety came up and asked for the time.
Raven glanced at her plain black strapped wristwatch.
"Noon."
x
Rogue knew the awful truth. Had only the slightest inkling about what it would bring. But an inkling nonetheless. Rivers of salt filled tears cascaded down her ivory face. She gazed at her bare hands, palms up, despair on her face as she laced her fingers slowly together.
"Ah can't believe you were right." she whispered, her tone echoing with such dejected finality that it nearly made Magneto wince.
Nearly.
Her eyes lifted to that he was sitting across from her in a plush chair, a smug smirk on his face. He gestured with his hands 'what can I say' before feigning mock pity, his lower lip slightly protruding. A sound snapped her attention away from him and to the door, where someone had just knocked.
Magneto's eyebrows rose as she passed him without a single glance. She opened the door just a crack, peering through to a blinding light. She squinted.
"Hey." said a strong voice.
Rogue blinked against the light a few times before her eyes focused on the figure standing at her door and blocking most of the harsh sunlight streaming from the corridor's large window. The figure was tall.
"Hey Pete." Rogue rasped, her throat raw and dry, her face red.
"Are you okay." he asked, concern lacing his tone.
Rogue nodded slowly, trying to keep some of her hair in her face without looking as if she was purposefully trying to hide her face in the first place.
"Yeah."
Pete drew in a deep breath and slowly released it out. He looked as if he didn't believe her. But he nodded his head in acceptance for her want of privacy.
"It's eleven fifty." he spoke softly, knowing she had been suffering severe migraines for quite a while now. He was one of the few who did know, one of the few who knew anything about her personal life anymore.
Rogue nodded. "I'll meet ya down there." she rasped and quietly closed her door, submerging herself back into the almost pitch black of her room.
She paused, her forehead to the cool door, her hand still on the brass knob and sighed. She heard chuckling from her left and barely turned her head towards the sound to find Magneto still sitting there, smirking at her.
"It's pointless, you know." he said.
Rogue gulped.
He heaved a sigh and looked around her room, "So sad, really." he looked back at her with a mocking frown marring his face, "You, not the situation to which you find yourself in."
"I find you completely and utterly uninspiring. A bit plain. And certainly very traditional in the face of danger." He looked straight ahead and murmured, "I can see why you took the cure."
Rogues' jaw clenched.
"Only way to keep a fellow." He smiled at her and winked.
"GET OUT!" she yelled, tears streaming down her face, her body shaking.
He placed a hand on his chest, "The truth cannot offend, my dear."
Rogue started to shake with barely controlled rage.
"Get. Out. Now. Or I'll..."
He looked at her through curious narrowed eyes at her pause.
"Or what."
She looked away, her lips firmly pressed together as she briefly ponder on the thought, and looked back up at him, the answer evident in her eyes but not evident to her. "I don't know." she whispered.
Magneto nodded his head and looked to the ground. He placed his fedora back on his head and tipped it in her direction before disappearing.
Rogue rubbed her forehead and closed her eyes, ignoring the scalding hot flesh her hands touched. She was starting to get a migraine. She couldn't help but think bitter thoughts on how that would affect her training and how Storm will grill her about her lack of decent performance.
Rogue looked at the digital and blissfully silent digital clock in the far corner of the room, far away from her bed.
It read twelve in the afternoon, and she was late for training. Again.