Hey, everyone, Songue here.
This is just a quick story I just wrote down about the game X-MEN: DESTINY, which, funnily enough, does NOT have a category to be placed here on, so I'm improvising.
Huh.
Anyway, bit of inspiration, totally out of my usual stuff, you'll notice even the language is a bit grittier than my usual stuff.
(Thought that writing it down might help me with the sudden block I just hit, I confess.)
I'm sorry for the delay on the updates, sometimes I just need to talk with some of you or read your opinions to get me inspired to write more, you know.
Hope you like this fic, I know the game was not well received, but it does have a share of qualities. I did like some of its ideas, other were kinda wasted there ("No multiplayer, WTF?!"), but the characters, oh, they had SO MUCH potential, so, here's what I imagined could have made the ending (and the entirety of the story, actually) better...
As usual, reviews will be appreciated!
Oh, one more thing, spoilers for those who had not played this game yet, just warning!
"Okay guys, let's take a break", Adrian Luca spoke, dropping his backpack on the floor. "I think we're far enough from San Francisco already."
"Talk about 'hit and run', man", Grant Alexander spoke, also letting go of the enormous bag he had been carrying for almost a day. "Aimi, want some water?", the tall man offered the petite teenager that completed the trio.
"Thanks", the sixteen year old said, quietly from beneath the scarlet scarf she wore around her neck. "You guys think they're still after us?", she asked, worried.
"Hell if I know", Adrian spoke in an angry tone. "Fucking X-Men, fucking Brotherhood…"
"Man, chill out", Grant started, but Adrian was still raving. "They think just because we took Reyes down, everything would be fine, didn't they!"
"Maybe if we joined them, either one side, we would not be having that much trouble", Grant said, reasonably.
His two travelling companions went quiet for a moment, but they both shook their heads.
"The Brotherhood is just as bad as they appear to be", replied Adrian, checking his surroundings. They still had some way to go down their road. "Magneto and his gang are a disaster waiting to happen."
"Same with the X-Men", added Aimi Yoshida, stretching her legs after their long walk. "No offense, Iceman and the rest were really nice people, but they don't understand, they see the world hating and fearing mutants and they do nothing to prevent it."
The athlete quieted down.
"Man, the Brotherhood is too violent, the X-Men are too lazy, so what that makes us, then?", he asked, the thoughts confusing him. "We saved people, then we destroyed the U-Men labs. We mowed down through Purifiers after what they did with Pixie and we even caught the asshole who murdered Professor Xavier. So, are we good guys? Bad guys?"
Adrian scratched his rough beard, "I think we're just it. We're just guys. And a girl", he quickly added, Aimi nodding in return.
But, in a blink, her face showed worry.
"What is that?", she asked, pointing towards the direction they had come from.
A large heavy car, just like the reinforced military vehicles the Purifiers were using, was speeding through the road, a man wearing orange jacket and holding a rifle sitting on top of it.
"We found a bunch of them, boys!", yelled the man, who was already setting his gun towards the trio.
"Shit!", yelled Adrian, who was far from the other two, his trained instincts kicking in. "They found us, take cover!"
No sooner did he say that, a shot came pretty close of him.
'Good shot, buddy, but I ain't letting you have another one', Adrian thought to himself, as he, quicker than a blur, passed through his friends.
The man in orange had just finished adjusting the lens of his gun, the yellow girl right on his aim, when something suddenly appeared from above him. He barely had a moment to register when the fist of Adrian connected to his head, sending him flying towards the asphalt.
The occupants of the armored vehicle were not aware of what had just happened, the driver intently set to get the huge car to ran over the muties they had been tracking, shifting gears and speeding up…
… only for the car to crash to a sudden stop by the suddenly oversized fist of Grant's, his skin now covered in what appeared to be petrified scales.
"What-the-fuck…?" spluttered the injured driver, while his friend on the back seat suddenly yelled in panic, pointing at the side of the vehicle, where a girl was pointing yellow-glowing fist, her eyes showing no mercy towards them.
A bright flash and the vehicle was torn into pieces, the humans inside barely escaping with only a few burns and grazes.
The football player's right arm was not shrinking and returning to normal, the athlete impressed by the display of control his Japanese friend just showed him. When they first met, the previous day, Aimi, just like him and Adrian, had just realized she had abilities beyond other people, and now, they were able to do stuff he had only seeing in Hollywood movies!
"What did you just do?", he asked her.
"You like it?", she asked Grant softly. "I burst the brightest as possible for just an instant. Like a flash!"
"It looked more like a shotgun too me, so awesome."
"Thanks, you punching a tank to a stop was pretty cool too."
"If we're all done with the pleasantries", said Adrian, suddenly landing from the skies, the man who tried to take a shot of them previously unceremoniously dropped to the ground, "I think it's time for us to check who the fuck are these guys."
"Oh man", Grant said, picking up something from one of the fallen men's jackets. "I recognize this guy's badge, this is one of those 'Friends of Humanity' clowns!"
"'Friends of Humanity'?", asked Aimi, confused.
"Some morons from the south of the country", explained the football player. "They showed up sometimes in our games, back in Georgia. They protest over how mutants should all be banned from 'normal' people's schools, how mutants are thrash and stuff. Never got violent, just your run on the mill wackos, trying to get some publicity."
The Japanese girl nodded, tossing away a gun she found in one of the men's pockets. "So, they are not like the Purifiers, is that what you mean?"
"Nah, the F.O.H. is just talk, Purifiers were the ones who walked the walk", Adrian said, checking the pockets of the man he just beat down, hopping to pick up some money.
"That is what your father told you?", asked the girl.
Adrian quickly spun his head in the teenager's direction. Aimi, however, didn't turn her eyes away, at all.
"Yeah, something like that", Adrian admitted. The girl could give him quite the goosebumps, with all that anger she kept bottled up.
Grant watched the bypass quietly. He learned from the girl that her own father put her on a boat, intending for her to meet the X-Men in San Francisco.
And, in Adrian's case… well, that was a whole other other level of Daddy issues.
He was just glad that, unlike these two, he had no problem with his folks at home, whatsoever.
'Well, not yet, still don't know how to break to Pops about my newly-found… condition', Grant reckoned.
"Look", she surprisingly spoke first. "I am sorry for what I said. That was impolite. We should get out of here, though, as more bad guys may be approaching."
"I agree", said the muscle bound player. "The quicker we leave this State, the better."
Adrian said nothing, but nodded with a smile. He still had issues of his own to solve, issues with his mutant-hating father and his pure-breeding indoctrination.
Yesterday, he was a man ready to attack mutants, only to discover how ironic life could get.
Today, standing up and observing these strangers who were now, for a lack of better word, his new family, running away from their own kind, he did not feel conflicted anymore. At all.
"Alright, you two, let's go then. As far as I can see, the F.O.H. must have picked up Purifier tech and weaponry after yesterday's mess. Must have been how they were keeping track on us all this time."
"They are probably trying to show everyone how serious they are committed about getting rid of us", reasoned Grant, "seeing as we were the ones who kicked major butts back in Frisco. We must definitely get out of California before things get even uglier."
"For them, that is", Aimi concluded, with a hidden smirk.
Already packed up, the three new friends set their path back on the road, their future unknown.
They walked not driven by the dreams of Xavier, or the hate of Magneto.
They had ideas of their own, and their own Destiny to fulfill.
The End.