First things first-obviously, Marvel Comics holds the rights to the X-Men, and all the other people and concepts in this story. This is just a piece of fan-fiction, written for fun, and I'm not making a penny out of it. So is that clear to everybody?
Having said that, we come to this story. In one form or another, it's been on my mind for a good fifty years now-since the Lee/Kirby days, in fact. I finally decided to just get it all out of my system, using the subsequent history of the Marvel Universe as I have seen fit. Some details-like Hank McCoy's hometown-have been changed at my whim. Other points can be disputed, recognizing that the MU is a constantly-evolving thing, and most aspects of it are subject to change. I have chosen whatever interpretations of the MU that suit the convenience of my story.
I have tried to utilize both my memory-and some actual, you know, research-to get the mid-1960s era of the story as accurate in tone as possible. It should be remembered that what has come to be called "The Sixties" had barely started by 1964, and the mythology of the later 60s plays relatively little part in this story. (One instance, out of many-the musicians at the Coffee-a-Go-Go play jazz, not rock.) I've tried to be honest to the era of 1964-5 as it was, both in the real America, the MU, and my own memory.
The recent events of AV/X, and subsequent stories, have generally been ignored in this story. Still, there is nothing inherently contradictory between them and the events in this romance, as will be apparent to anyone who slogs through the whole thing. But I simply have to try to think about the events of AV/X as little as possible...sigh.
Special thanks for friendship above-and-beyond the call of duty to Iasmin Iribarrem, who read this story a day at a time as it was being composed, and whose suggestions have improved it out of recognition. I haven't agreed with her about everything-but inasmuch as I haven't, it's made the story weaker. Thanks, Iasmin-it's been *greatly* appreciated...:-)...
I hope you X-fans like it.
BOOK ONE: TORCHES AND PITCHFORKS
Chapter One
Was she still asleep?
Jean Grey floated in a cocoon of thought that was no longer unconsciousness, but not self-aware consciousness either. She was unaware of her identity, of who and where she was...but realized at some level that this knowledge would come, that all she had to do was wait, hear her heart beat and her breath slowly unwind from her body, and everything would become clear. Also: she knew that it was now, in these moments between sleep and waking, that the moments of clarity were the strongest, that illumination was closest. And that the moment would pass, soon, very soon...so that if insight were to come it had to be now. She couldn't force things, just had to let it happen of its own accord, to bless her with its presence or not. Something about her in this state was far more real than either her "waking" or "sleeping" state, something even more real than her identity as a mutant...
"Mutant"? That was too real, too concrete. Too much of something connected to her waking identity. Sensing this, she realized that she was emerging from this state, and she felt a slight sense of disappointment that it was ending without any particular insights, when everything changed and her very soul felt itself transformed. And then...
I'm dying.
That was all she could understand in that first instant of the experience, a sense of death, of everything ending. It was like when she was with Annie Richardson when she died, but this was different too, this was more all-inclusive... Jean sensed Death itself, the concept, the reality, the final goal of all life, all joys and sorrows and striving, all tears and laughter and love and birth and babies and education and work and play, all wisdom and folly, all of it, collapsing into the dark hole that was Death, the great equalizer into which everything else faded and withered. She felt a sense of overpowering sorrow, one which nothing could assuage. All the light, all the joy, all of it so precious because it was so fleeting-all nothing, just the tiniest flicker of utter meaninglessness between two eternities of blackness. It was so absolute, and so inescapable, that she felt despair cover her like a shroud.
And then-in that final millisecond before she woke completely-the black vision faded. A new thought replaced it, an image that seemed small, infinitely small, but even as she saw it in her mind it grew and filled her field of mental vision, filled the entire universe. A bird...was that what it was? Yes-now unmistakeable. A giant bird that spread its "wings" across all existence. A terrible, cruel image, an image that contained evil and hatred of all that lived. And yet, that was not all it contained either. There was also compassion and love and a sense, spreading from it, that death was the ultimate absurdity, that it was nothing, almost an irrelevancy in the greater scheme of things. The despairing vision she had just a moment earlier was wiped away as if it had never been, and she knew that death could not triumph in the end. The two aspects of the bird-the great evil, and the overwhelming goodness-didn't seem to contradict each other, somehow. It all seemed natural... And, in the very last instant before she awoke completely, she had a last realization-she, Jean Grey, was the reason they didn't contradict. Somehow, she herself was the balancing principle, she brought everything into focus, into perspective.
Jean.
It was the Professor's mental voice, and she suddenly was fully awake.
Yes, sir? she answered mentally.
You were set for a test of your telekinesis skills at eight this morning, he answered. It's five past eight now.
"Oh!" she cried, jumping out of bed. "I'll be right there, Professor. My deepest apologies!"
That's all right, he answered, and she glimpsed a slight hint of bemused humor in his thoughts. This is very rare for you, oversleeping. Unlike one or two others in this school whom I could name. Be here in five minutes, and I think we can avoid a demerit.
"Yes sir!" she cried, throwing off her pajamas and getting into her uniform. Already, the vision she had had right before waking was starting to fade. All that remained was a sense of overwhelming joy, a realization that she had had a very good dream indeed-and that somehow, there was something real about it, something that affected her in a way she couldn't define. She wished she could remember...
Oh well, she mused as she rushed to the Danger Room, if she didn't think about it, maybe it would come back to her.
Maria Gianelli cocked her ears. Was she safe from them? Had she escaped? Then she heard it-a din in the background, slowly getting louder and assuming definite shape... No. She sighed. The Torches and Pitchforks were still closing in on her. She looked around. What were her options? Was there any way of avoiding a confrontation?
She could hear voices now, distinct voices of individual members of the mob. "Where is it? Has it gotten this far?"
"-Don't get too close to it...God knows what it can do..."
"We'd better call the National Guard. Maybe the army. They can deal with it..."
"How about the FF? Or the Avengers? Isn't dealing with it more their job?"
-This, and similar words. It. That was all she was to these people, an "it" without any identity of her own, without even a gender in their eyes... "It". Why did that sound familiar? She searched her memory, then it came-"It", the short story by Theodore Sturgeon. She shuddered slightly. She had read it when she was eleven, and it had given her nightmares for weeks. The story had dealt with a skeleton that had somehow acquired a "body" of swamp muck and forest detrius, and animated itself. Walking the forest, it had a sharp intelligence and an intense curiosity-curious enough to wonder what happened when you tore apart dogs-and human beings...
That gave Maria an inspiration. Well-where was she, anyway? In a clearing. In a forest. If these people wanted an "It", who was she to disoblige them? It wouldn't be very difficult, after all. She peered from behind the hollow stump she was hiding behind. The crowd-actually carrying rifles and shotguns, though there was a torch or two among them-numbered about thirty men. It was dusk, and warm-they were dressed in short-sleeved shirts for the most part. And they were frightened. More so, in fact, than she was. She knew they couldn't really injure her. Or so she hoped. But her real emotion was weariness, and frustration. She was tired-tired of running, of the reactions that she always got whenever she showed herself. Tired of knowing that it would never change, that it would always be this way. And tired of trying to hang onto her humanity despite all this-and she laughed inside, as she always did when she used the word "humanity". To describe herself, certainly-but also to describe the mob chasing her. If they were what was passing for "human" these days...
Enough. She shut her eyes, and concentrated. Thought of the "It" of the story. Thought of her body as a walking mass of swamp muck, thought of herself as acquiring a skin of bark and moss and leaves, with a circulation system of mud and brackish water...thought of herself as a walking mound of forest flotsam and jetsam...
She opened her eyes, and looked down. The feeling was unfamiliar, as all new states were to her the first time she experienced them. She tried to move, and it was even more difficult than it usually was on the first try. She imagined what she looked like, and laughed to herself. She knew her "real" form made Boris Karloff look like Tony Curtis. But this one! Even by her standards, this was gross. Well, it'd only be a few minutes, after all...long enough for a little fun.
She stepped out behind the stump as the men approached. "Boo!" she cried, hands up by her ears, wiggling away. There was a group scream from the men, and a number of the rifles fired their bullets at her. She moved back behind the stump, some of the bullets passing through her It-like substance harmlessly. All she felt was a sort of pressure, like when a muscle used to clench when she had a "human" body. But it certainly didn't hurt. She couldn't remember what physical pain felt like-she hadn't experienced it in many years. But she had no particular desire to remain as a target for the guns. If enough of them fired enough bullets, she couldn't be certain that it would have no lasting effects on her physiognomy, when she returned to "normal". And sooner or later, one of these Einsteins might get the bright idea of starting a fire. That was one thing she did share with Frankenstein's Monster-an intense distaste for the flaming stuff.
With a sigh, she prepared to make a run for it, through the bullets, into the deeper part of the forest. But before she could make a move, all hell broke loose. She blinked in astonishment-an earthquake had suddenly hit the forest! The ground shuddered, opened up between her and the pursuing men. Great torrents of lava shot out of the earth, slowly moving its way toward her pursuers. They screamed, and fled back in the direction they had come-away from the lava, and her. Maria found herself panicking-fire, lava, was the one thing that could harm her, destroy her. While the lava didn't move in her direction at all-almost considerately, she thought with a lucid part of her mind-and although it didn't seem to actually give off any heat, she fled in the other direction from the men-deeper into the heart of the forest.
The "lava" dissipated as quickly as it had appeared, and when it had two men walked up to the clearing where Maria had been moments before. They were oddly matched. One was a tall, thin man wearing an old-fashioned Inverness jacket. He had dark, lanky hair and a drooping moustache, with a saturnine expression on his face. The other man was short and squat, and so agitated that he literally began hopping around the clearing. An onlooker would have raised their eyebrows at this latter man, inasmuch as-hopping aside-he was dressed as a court jester.
"Wyngarde!" this second man cried out in an English Midlands accent as he hopped. "You idiot! You've not only scared off the humans, you've scared her off, too! What will the Master say?"
The man known as Wyngarde shrugged. "Oh, I suppose he'll have a fit. As usual. I daresay you'll get the brunt of it, Mortimer. Don't you always?" His voice had the drawl of an upper-class Englishman, and sounded amused.
"Not this time!" Mortimer cried. "Not this time, Wyngarde! The Master will know whose fault this is! I guarantee you that!"
Wyngarde shrugged again. "Oh, I daresay he will. But will he care, my dear Mortimer? I mean-you act as such a perfect outlet for his aggressions, after all. When in doubt, abuse you a little more." Mortimer flinched, as if what the taller man had said was no more than the simple truth. He hopped around the clearing some more.
"Perhaps we can still find her," he mused, looking for signs of the way she had gone. Wyngarde looked around him languidly.
"I doubt it, Mortimer. She looked very determined, and I expect she could move quickly if the need arose. And let's face it-neither of us are right for a trek through the forest. Your hopping is no doubt useful, but still-! As for me, well, it is a bit uncivilized out here. A long way from Saville Row." He sighed.
Mortimer frowned at him. "Then you truly don't fear returning to Magneto after failing our mission?"
"I can't exactly say I'm looking forward to imparting this news to our esteemed leader," Wyngarde drawled. "But perhaps next time, it will inspire him to man these expeditions a bit more felicitously. For instance-Pietro would be very useful right about now, were he with us."
Mortimer stopped hopping, and smiled. "Oh, yes! You have a point there, Wyngarde. That one! Let him earn his keep for once. Do something the Master demands without whining. Just to see if he could do it."
"I believe he could," Wyngarde said. "He thinks he's a cut above the rest of us, you know-our Pietro. And his sister." Wyngarde scowled slightly. "They don't believe they're 'evil'. Just poor little lambs led astray. I don't believe they're as different from us as they think. They'll find that out some day." He smiled again. "Especially her."
Mortimer looked daggers at him. "I don't like what you're thinking, Wyngarde! Wanda will be mine."
Wyngarde actually laughed out loud at the smaller man. "Yours! Mortimer-she barely knows you exist. Except as a foul breath that seems to exhude from Magneto's nostrils." He sneered at Mortimer. "Getting a bit above your station, aren't you, my dear boy?"
Mortimer was so agitated that he started hopping again. "You stop that, Wyngarde! You stop that! You know what I mean-playing the lord-of-the-manor bit with me. You know what Magneto thinks of any of us mutants emphasizing human class or national differences. He won't stand for it! Maybe he'd be interested in the fact that you continue doing it-yes, maybe he'd be very interested in that indeed."
"And you're just the one to tell him, aren't you, Mortimer?" Wyngarde said, but a bit less diffidently than before. Mortimer's shot, it seemed, had hit home. He shrugged again.
"Ah well-there's nothing more for us here. She's gone, Mortimer. Best get back home and tell Magneto. He can decide what to do then." The two men left the clearing, in a direction that took them away from the pursuing men and Maria.
Charles Xavier sighed as he removed the helmet after a consultation with Cerebro. He felt slightly confused, because the machine-usually reliable and very clear in its indications-was giving him mixed signals. He frowned at the computer screen's simulated map, which-thanks to his connections to the FBI-he was able to access using satellite technology. Without that help, Cerebro would be a very limited tool indeed. ...Hmm. About twelve miles south-southwest of Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Very heavily forested. A good place to go into hiding, if that's what one wanted to do. A good place to hide-if you were a mutant...
He shut his eyes and focused his mutant brain west-a hundred miles, two hundred miles... No. No, it was no good-there was too much distance, and too little knowledge on his part. Had it been Scott or Jean-someone whom he knew, someone whose brain patterns he couldn't help but recognize-then contact would be easy. But someone whose mind was a blank to him-well, it was too much like a needle in a haystack.
He was about to close off his attempted mental contact, and return to Cerebro, when he froze. He was suddenly in contact with two minds he knew all too well-Mastermind, and the Toad. He had to be sure. He punched a few buttons on Cerebro, and their signal came in sharp and clear. Northern Pennslyvania. So they were there... He looked at the electronic map, at the signals they showed him. He gave a mental sigh of relief. The unknown mutant, his quarry, was moving north. Mastermind and the Toad were headed east. He could see the distant between the two widen with every minute. At least their mission had proved abortive-for now. But they had been ahead of him! He didn't like this, that Eric had gotten the drop on him. This seemed to be becoming a habit-Magneto always being a jump ahead. The recent encounter with the Sub-Mariner had been another example-it was Eric who had taken the initiative there. And it had been only good luck-and Eric's own endless megalomania-that had kept that from becoming a disastrous shift in the mutant balance of power.
He removed his own mind completely from the area. Mastermind, after all, was a psychic himself in his way. And Eric-though not truly psychic-could somehow send his mind out from his body, in ways that Charles had to admit he didn't fully understand. There was so much about mutants and their powers that Charles felt ignorant of. They were all of them-he, Eric, Essex, Apocalypse, Moira, all of them-still babes in the woods. Even En Sabat Nur's experience, vast though it was in time, was untrained and imprecise, without the modern technology to focus on the right questions.
Charles sighed. Only Essex, he suspected, even had the right questions at this point-and that included himself, Charles Xavier. But the man who called himself "Sinister" was not about to share with anyone-certainly not with him. That man frightened him, ultimately, much more than Magneto did. Perhaps it was because he wasn't actually a mutant himself. That put him out of the game, in certain ways. Which just made him all the more cold-blooded...and dangerous.
In any event, he didn't want either Mastermind or Magneto to sense that he had been in the area psychically himself. That might rile the Brotherhood up, increase the priority of this particular mutant in their minds. Meanwhile... Yes. With the Mastermind/Toad operation seemingly a failure, here was a golden opportunity.
X-Men. His mental commands swept through the Mansion as if the walls and plaster didn't exist, and all five of his students looked up from their business. Charles very briefly looked at their activities-their privacy was important to him, despite-because!-of his mental abilities. The quickest of scans... Hank was balancing on a medicine ball while reading The Great Gatsby. Hmm. He hadn't assigned that text...this was a good sign. Bobby was walking out near the lake wiping his brow with ice, his "instant air conditioning". Scott-oh dear. Charles winced slightly. Scott was sitting on the toilet. He broke off even the slight contact he had been in with the boy...this did happen occasionally. Warren...Warren was high above the Hudson Valley, just soaring for the sheer joy of it. No costume, which was fine with Charles Xavier-who'd recognize him up there? From the ground, he was just a hawk seen from afar. And Charles couldn't keep Warren from being Warren, and had no desire to try. And Jean was in the chemistry lab, trying to puzzle out the mystery of reagents. All five of them stopped what they were doing.
X-Men. You will assemble in my study in ten minutes, in costume. That is all. He sighed to himself. Give Scott time to finish his business...
He looked at the electronic map again. Yes-it was unmistakeable now. The unknown mutant was heading almost due north, on a path that would take him just west of Williamsport and on eventually into New York state. The X-Men had to reach him first. He paused for a moment. If they should succeed... The others were on the verge of graduating from the school. Once they had their diplomas-and the experience they had gathered as X-Men-Charles had promised himself a sabbatical. He had an old score to settle with the man who called himself "Lucifer", and he could taste the desire for vengeance in his mouth. This damned wheelchair... Well, thinking of that was counterproductive. More importantly, he was certain that Lucifer was up to something. Exactly what he wasn't sure of yet, but he could feel a menace emanating from his general direction. He felt an urgent need to travel to Europe, and deal with this-without involving the X-Men.
But now there was the prospect of a new student in the Mansion, of a new young mutant to train and develop. He couldn't leave at such a moment. Revenge would have to wait. And as for the menace... He sighed to himself. Something would turn up.
At the end of the designated ten minutes he was in the office, and they of course were as well. They gazed at him, curious but confident that he'd speak when he was ready. What trust they had in him! He felt the burden of that trust as a ten-ton weight sometimes, grinding him down. Still-he could only do his best. And they were a finely-honed tool by now. He was proud of their abilities, proud of how they worked together. No other team in the world had their sense of who they were, and what they could do-as a team. Whatever the sins of his life, he had done well here.
"Greetings, my X-Men," he said in his speaking voice. "I have a mission for you. There is a new mutant I have discovered. You are to find him-or her-and convince them to come to the Mansion for refuge."
They nodded, understanding at once. "Is there anything you can tell us about this mutant, Professor?" Cyclops asked.
Charles winced slightly in his head. Those anomalous readings-! What did they mean...? "Not yet, Scott. I've only had a mental sighting so far." Not strictly true, but he wasn't ready to share the secret of Cerebro with the rest of them at this time. "The mutant is currently west of Williamsport, Pennslyvania, and heading north-towards New York state."
Jean nodded. "Very well, Professor. Perhaps we should do a little scouting in Williamsport itself-see if anyone has seen or heard of anything unusual?"
"An excellent suggestion, Jean. By all means. But I think that one of you, anyway, should proceed immediately to the New York/Pennslyvania border to be ready for anything that might happen. You can all be in mental contact with me, and thus with each other."
Some more details of the mission were ironed out, and they got the Blackbird ready for departure. "Just remember," Charles told them before they left. "Be gentle with this mutant. He might have been through all sorts of nightmares. We know something about what normal humans can be like when they encounter those of our kind, do we not?" he asked, a slight smile on his face. They nodded. They all had had experiences of their own with frightened humans.
Charles relaxed after their departure. At least he had taken the initiative this day, thanks to luck, he admitted-the Brotherhood's own failure. But he had acted. Perhaps a trick of my own, Eric. We shall see.
"Hello, Dolly...well hello, Dolly...it's so nice to see you back where you belong..."
Frank Gianelli smiled to himself. How good to hear some real music on the radio! He saluted the hash house on West 32st Street as he passed. "Nice to hear you again, Pops!" he cried out to Louis Armstrong, and the world in general. Real music, to Frank, was Pops-and Sinatra, and Miles, and Brubeck, and Sarah Vaughan. It most definitely was not four effeminate-looking boys from Liverpool with girly haircuts and Edwardian suits. But the Beatles were everywhere these days on the radio-at least, until Pops knocked them off. And not a moment too soon.
He turned up Sixth Avenue-like all New Yorkers, he refused to call it "The Avenue of the Americas"-and, with a couple of head turns to look at girls in skirts shorter than any he had ever seen, he approached his goal: The Daily Bugle Building. He entered through the doors, walked to the elevators. Ah-here was one now. The doors opened, and he started to enter...
Frank blinked from his position of being flat on his back. Someone was looking down at him with an apologetic expression.
"Gosh, Mr. Gianelli! I'm so sorry!" A boy of perhaps seventeen was standing above him, not particularly tall or muscular. Frank blinked. This kid knew him-did he know the kid? He stared, then the memory came to him. Oh yeah...
"Parker, isn't it?" he said, as the young man helped him to his feet.
"That's right, Mr. Gianelli. Gosh-guess I wasn't being careful. Sorry. Didn't mean to knock you over."
"That's OK, son. You're Jameson's hot-shot kid news photographer, aren't you?" Cripes-the way the kid picked him up! Frank felt like he didn't weigh anything. This kid might be on the small side, but he had muscles like Charles Atlas.
"Yes, sir. And I know you all right. Everyone's heard about your stories concerning-well, you know."
Frank smiled, a bit cockily. Indeed, everyone knew those stories. Especially a certain J. Jonah Jameson. And they stuck in the old man's craw but good. This had given a certain young reporter named Frank Gianelli a great deal of satisfaction, indeed. It had also raised that same Frank Gianelli's stock in Jameson's eyes. Jonah respected professionalism, above all else.
"OK, kid. No harm done. We'll have to compare notes about life someday. After all-with my stories-and what you get with that camera of yours-"
"I'd like that, Mr. Gianelli."
"Frank, OK?"
"Sure. And I'm Pete." With mutual waves, Peter Parker left the Bugle building, and Frank went up to the 26th floor, where he had his desk. He smiled to himself. A Pulitzer was probably too much too hope for. He was still young, after all, and there was a lot of other action in the world these days. But his stories had caused a stir-especially here at the Bugle. Well, that was no surprise...
He got to the desk. He had no special stories he was working on right now, which suited him fine. He could do what he needed to do-hopefully, without anyone being the wiser. It might take a little shading of the truth-but it was in a good cause. At least, he hoped so...
Maria, I'm going to find you. I'm going to try to make this all right. I'll try. God knows what anyone can really do for you now. But that's what I'm hoping to find out, if I can. And I swear to you, kid-whatever happens, I'm not running out on you. I'm never going to do that again.
A door opened across the large city room. There were a number of reporters present, some writing on their brand-new electric typewriters-Frank loved his old Remington, but he guessed he'd adjust to the new era-some talking on phones, some just sitting at their desks seemingly doing nothing. Just like him. A man appeared in the doorway, saw Frank, and frowned. He was in his late forties, small, with graying hair and glasses.
"Not too busy, are you Gianelli?" the man called across the room to him. Ben Urich was that most favored of all mortals-a columnist. As such, he had his own office, even his own lavatory-a scarcely-to-be-believed luxury-and the overwhelming spite and jealousy of this room of struggling shoe-leather reporters. He also represented everything that Frank Gianelli wanted to be. There were legends in New York City reporting, and Ben Urich was very definitely one of them. Frank knew that he at least had sense enough to recognize that fact. And maybe knowing it was one of the things that didn't make him hopeless.
Urich walked over to Frank's desk. "Resting on our laurels, Mr. Gianelli?" he asked, a bit less fiercely than Frank had been expecting. "It's over three months until they announce the Pulitzers. Are you going to do any-I dunno, what's the word?-'work' in the meantime?"
"Ask the City Editor," Frank said, not about to take any shit from Ben Urich-and the latter didn't expect him to, to his credit.
"As if he knows his ass from a hole in the ground," Ben said. "Jameson's gonna have to make a change one of these days. I think you might have saved the poor schmoe's job with your stories."
Frank grunted. Still barely a cub reporter, he had been able to get a source that led him to another source, slowly but inexorably leading him to the heart of the biggest crime syndicate New York had ever known-the one led by the individual everyone called "The Big Man". The only man able to unite the Five Maggia Families, the emerging Colombians, the Mexicans, and even the very reclusive-and hard to intimidate-Israelis. By dint of sheer guts, hard work, and very nasty enforcers-nasty even by New York standards-The Big Man had ruled the city for months. Finally, bad luck-and Spider-Man-had brought it all toppling down, and the usual anarchy had been unleashed again in the New York crime universe. Frank had written scoop after scoop detailing the Syndicate, receiving-amongst other honors-a visit from a very large gentleman calling himself "The Ox", who told Frank in very graphic detail what would happen to him should he continue his unfortunate efforts. This hadn't deterred him, of course-though it had gotten him a bodyguard courtesy of Jameson.
Finally, the Big Man's identity had come out. And it had hit the Bugle like an atom bomb. It had been none other than Frederick Foswell-one of their own! The Syndicate had been run right out of the Bugle building. It had been an embarrassment to the paper, of course-but the revelation had also put their circulation figures through the roof. Just about everyone had gotten some secret enjoyment out of the affair-everyone, that is, except Jameson. J Jonah Jameson, everyone at the Bugle knew, believed in loyalty above all. He gave it unconditionally, and he expected it as well. Foswell's betrayal had cut him to the heart.
Frank had been very close to the secret of "The Big Man" when everything went down. He sometimes regretted that Spider-Man had butted in, before he could expose Foswell himself. But on the other hand-maybe he had been getting too close. If he had waited-if Foswell had sensed his danger-well, Frank Gianelli would in all likelihood have been placed in a pair of hundred-pound cement galoshes, and given a one-way tour of the bottom of the East River. He had had a lot of publicity and credit over this-maybe he should just cash in his chips, and think himself lucky. He tried to think that way. But his ambition made him keep regretting, nonetheless...
"Well, there's always something new in New York," Frank said. He pushed a front page from a few days ago at Ben. "This guy, now...yet another one. A 'super-hero'." He was referring to a gray photograph of a man cruising across the rooftops of Manhattan swinging a billy-club, who had become very famous in recent weeks. "Calls himself 'Daredevil'."
Ben scowled. "Yeah...Christ. When I was a kid, all we had was the Human Torch and the Sub-Mareener duking it out over the West Side docks once in awhile. And of course, them-and Captain America-over in Europe during the War. Christ on a crutch, I almost dipped myself in shit when they said a few weeks ago that he was still alive."
"Yeah," Frank said, trying hard not to smile when he heard Ben's little turn of phrase just now. Ben Urich's famous-infamous-piece of advice, vouchsafed to every cub reporter on the Bugle who complained about anything, was: "Life's a shit sandwich, kid. And every day you take another bite."
"Umm," Ben grunted. "And now-ever since Reed Psycho Richards steals a space ship and comes down with him and his friends a bunch of freaks-now, somehow, it's everywhere. I wonder why." He was silent for a moment. "I wonder, kid. If there isn't something behind all this..."
Frank saw his opportunity, but Ben spoke first. "This guy," he said, pointing at the picture of Daredevil. "Christ-have you seen his costume? A combination of black and lemon yellow. Looks like something somebody might have vomited up."
Frank shrugged. "Hey, maybe he's the world's first color-blind super-hero."
Urich glared at him. "Terrific. There's your reporter's instincts at work, kid. Go to it."
Frank waved his hand in mock modesty. He had to get the topic back to where he wanted it. "I'm interested in what you said, Ben. About something 'behind' this. Like the mutants? These X-Men, and Magneto and his crew...they're popping up all over the place. You think that's a coincidence?"
Ben Urich looked thoughtful. "You know, Gianelli, sometimes you actually sound like a real reporter. Honest-to-Christ, you do. That's actually a good question."
Frank mentally blew a sigh of relief. If Ben Urich thought there was something here- "I'm actually doing a little investigating along these lines already, Ben." And that was the God's honest truth. "Mutants-I think there's something important there." And that too was the absolute truth.
Ben looked intrigued-almost against his better judgment, Frank thought. "There's something here, Paisan. What angle have you got?"
Frank was ready for this question. "I'm interested in how mutants react when they become mutants-at puberty, it's supposed. How people respond. How society regards them. What happens then, at the intersection of human and mutant. How they get shunted between the X-Men alternative, I guess you'd call it, and the Magneto one. Or whether they'd prefer to stay neutral, or just go into hiding. We've all seen what's been happening-Magneto's attack on Cape Citadel, he and the other so-called 'evil' mutants and their invasion of Central America awhile back. People are getting nervous. Seems to me that what happens to mutants when they're young-what factors prompt them to one path or another-is an important question."
Here it was. Ben Urich was the shrewdest man he knew. If he recognized that Frank had an ulterior motive for all this... But Ben merely frowned, and looked intrigued.
"You have something there, kid," he said. "I hate to admit it-but you do. I don't remember anyone doing this angle before. Does our government have some sort of protocol? Is any effort being made to educate the public about this? Are any private groups trying to exploit these new mutants-either human or mutant groups? Other than the ones we know about, that is, X-Men and Magneto..." Ben mused. "Kid, you're onto something."
Frank smiled. Despite everything, he was pleased to hear Ben think that just as a journalist, his instincts were sound-ulterior motive or not. "I wonder if there are any reports of isolated mutants being seen lately. Whether they started a riot, or anything. Or even just were noticed anywhere."
"Good question," Ben said. "Come on kid. I'm interested. Let's find out."
An hour later, Frank Gianelli had read the reports of something very odd happening in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Every instinct he had told him he was on the right track at last.
OK, Maria. I swear to God that I'll find you, at least. And try to tell you everything. You think you know it all, but you don't. When you do know, I don't think you'll forgive. I know I wouldn't. But maybe you'll understand. And maybe that'll be enough, for now.
The flames were coming closer now. Maria was trapped. But even though the flames were devouring the house, she was somehow cold. She went to the window, and even as she did so, she realized that the house she had been in had somehow vanished. But the fire was still there, getting closer...
No matter. She looked out the window, a scared little girl of thirteen, crying out for someone to save her. The people walking the city streets acted as if they were deaf, ignoring her pleas. Why didn't somebody call the fire department? The flames were reaching her...the smoke began to envelope her...Mommy! Daddy! Save me! Her voice sounded strange to her, even taking her panic into account. What was happening to her?
The flames leaped again, and in their light she could see her reflection in the window. She gasped. What was happening to her? Was it the fire? Why was she feeling so strange? That sense she had-of suddenly knowing that she was dreaming, was falling into a nightmare-came over her, and she knew that she was on the verge of waking up, that the nightmare would soon be over. She knew that nothing bad was really happening...
She awoke with a start. It was raining slightly, a warm early summer rain that felt good after the dream fire... She stood up by the old oak tree which she had chosen to sleep next to. She put her hands to her face, felt the texture, felt her entire body as movement and animation came to it after sleep.
Sorry, kiddo, she said to her thirteen-year old dream self. Sometimes nightmares really do come true. And there's no waking. She squatted behind the tree to empty her bladder, and looked around. She had been heading vaguely northwest, towards New York state. Ahead of her was a thicket of evergreens, with an occasional oak and sugar maple blended in. There was no path, but travelling against the grain that way presented no problems for her, and it might conceivably throw anyone following her off the scent. That someone was looking for her seemed certain. The more she thought of that "volcano" the day before, the more bizarre it seemed. Volcanoes didn't pop up that quickly, and their lava sure as hell didn't oh-so-conveniently travel in one direction...away from her. Therefore, that "lava" wasn't real. Therefore, it was an illusion. And that meant Mastermind. And that meant that Magneto was looking for her.
Maria sighed. Mutant politics. Was it naive to think that she could avoid them? Maybe so. Still-she had managed for four years now on her own. Very definitely on her own, she thought bitterly. She caught herself. No, this wasn't the time for that... (It was always time, part of her said. Always. Shut up, she told that part of her.) She had informed herself of mutant news as best she could, if only to know what to avoid. She smiled. It hadn't been easy. She couldn't exactly waltz into a library and ask to see the latest copy of The New York Times. But she did the best she could. For most of those four years, there had been little enough information. Mutants were a rumor, a whisper that people refused to believe, like UFOs. It was only in the past year that it had all become public-Magneto's attack on Cape Citadel, the emergence of the X-Men, then the Brotherhood of Mutants as a counterweight to the X-Men. And the media immediately labelling them "The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants". That alone was almost enough for Maria to sympathize with them.
Almost, but not quite. In the past few months, her traditional toughness hadn't been enough anymore. She realized, slowly but surely, that she might be a pawn between Magneto and the X-Men-a prize, to be captured. A possession. This thought panicked her. Whatever else she would be, she would be free. If she had to spend the rest of her life on the run, travelling across country and staying under the radar of the world-living the life she'd been living these past four years-then so be it. Better loneliness, destituton, bitterness, than being a possession. And she knew with absolute certainty that the only reason anyone could want her-the only value she had for any individual or group, human or mutant-was as just that: a possession, a thing.
The X-Men... Hold on now. Mastermind. Magneto. The Brotherhood...they were on her trail. That meant that the X-Men were, too. That followed as the night followed the day. So she now had both groups to watch out for.
She found herself bent down, her head in her hands. It was just too much. There was so much power, so much ambition, arrayed against her. And she was totally alone. There wasn't even the possibility of aid, not from anyone on Earth. The nightmare...it had no ending. Could have no ending. She wasn't even sure she could commit suicide. She wasn't even sure she could die. She was damned sure that she couldn't live. That option had been taken from her years before .
Enough of this. She rose, and started on again. To hell with self-pity. She was what she was. Let Magneto come for her! Let the X-Men show up! She'd show them all a thing or two.