A/N: My most sincere "thank you" to Quicksilver1881, my beta!
The Infinity Gems
I. Space and Soul
Sookie Stackhouse wasn't thinking clearly.
One could argue that she just acted her age, for once, or that she simply had the right instinct as to run away when that monster started to approach, knowing her parents would ignore her warnings, go on to their planned date, and leave her alone with him.
Maybe she just remembered what had happened to her cousin, Hadley, and didn't want to go through the same fate.
With or without excuses, the little six year old was running for her life, into the woods that surrounded her grandmother's house. Said grandmother was currently in one of her "Descendants of the Glorious Dead" meetings, and wouldn't be back soon enough for Sookie to risk herself, alone with Uncle Bartlett.
Her purple dress seemed to be getting caught in every single plant she left behind, and not for the first time did she wish to have had friends with which she could have stayed, like her elder brother, Jason, who had been happily left in Hoyt Fortenberry's house. But then, she was the town's weirdo, the freak everyone liked to humiliate from time to time. It was a given she wouldn't have friends.
Nothing better than an isolated freak, right?
Her own family would have preferred to just shut her out completely, regardless of the smiles and the kind words they would utter at her face.
See, it didn't matter how good they were at acting like they actually cared for her, because she could hear them. Their inner voices, their very thoughts. The books she had read about it had called what she could do "telepathy". She just referred to it as her curse. It didn't matter how sweet someone acted, she could always see under the mask.
And gods, what a terrible curse it was!
Running, running, she was leaving everything behind, not a single ounce of food on her. Sookie had just left without preamble. She had felt him reach her hearing range, his disgusting thoughts polluting her young mind, and she had started to run, deaf to her parent's shouts, like a leaf in the wind, getting lost in the wilderness, the setting sun barely allowing her enough light to see her way.
Sookie was crying, of course, pieces of her life circling her mind, as always, taunting her, hurting her soul in every possible way. She was six years old, but her soul was older. Oh, so much older. After all, could you ever imagine? Knowing everything anyone in a ten kilometres radius just happened to have thought about? Without any way whatsoever to stop their thoughts from entering your mind, as if you were locked up in a soundproof room with a thousand radios, all in different, changing frequencies, some louder than others, all hurting your poor, poor ears? And that wasn't counting those who preferred to think in images. Telepathy hadn't any kind of parental control, either.
Most of the time, Sookie Stackhouse was too lost in the sea of frequencies, of thoughts, of images, of fragmented dreams, to properly interact with her surroundings. Thus, she used to look like a drugged sea lion suffering migraines on a daily basis, and her classmates liked to make fun of her, either by voiced taunts, or more physical proofs of their obvious dislike.
On the bright side, she had become very adept at dodging objects thrown at her person, and the fastest runner in town. On the not so bright side, her mind was such a chaotic disaster that merely becoming aware of her own self was a complicated task only achievable in the deepest part of the woods, where only the incomprehensible feels from the plants and the animals bothered her, to a much lesser extent that human thoughts ever could.
She felt something akin to peace in the woods, alone with all that greenery surrounding her, like the motherly embrace she had never been able to get, or what she supposed being safe in the womb would feel like. There was something ancient, in the woods, that somehow, she knew, looked for her. She had never seen anything, but she had always been able to feel it. Just there, like a warm blanket.
Not today. Not tonight.
The warm feeling wasn't there, as if her mysterious magical protector had left, and as she crossed the greenery, it didn't feel inviting at all. Somehow her safe place had stopped being her safe place, and she had no clue as to why. However, her legs were getting tired -her shoes weren't exactly proper to run with-, and her dress and hair were an absolute mess. Leaves and twigs were intertwined in her previously neat long-tailed hairdo. Her purple dress was in strips.
The mad race had left her with bloody lines decorating her face, from the harsh hits of the plants on her way through the woods.
But in the end, she had made it. She had reached the heart of the woods. Her forest clearing, the safest place her mind could conjure. Even if her warm feeling had vanished from the major part of the woods, she could still feel it there, like a warm breeze around her.
Sookie knew Uncle Bartlett wouldn't be able to reach her there, in mind nor physically. The forest clearing was sacred. No other had been able to reach her there, even the cute animals. The plants, too, were different there. More exotic. It was like something out of a fairytale, somewhere only she could go, for reasons she didn't want to know or rationalize.
Finally feeling safe, the little girl allowed herself to fall on her knees, breathing the magical air like someone who had been about to drown, her hands caressing the exotic greenery around her.
For the very first time on that day, she felt safe.
{_O-O_}
The air was hot, and breathing was hard, but Anna Marie D'Ancanto couldn't be bothered to care.
She had to escape.
The D'Ancantos had moved from Italy in 1912, running from the impeding war, maybe thinking they would be safe in the New World. Hard times went by, but Anna Marie's Great Grandfather hit the jackpot. He had been clever, and cunning enough as to reach important positions of power in the USA, starting to amass a fortune that his descendants would only increase, thanks to many business enterprises. Thus, Anna Marie was raised in a rich family, with everything that it implied.
The D'Ancantos were traditional, strict and disciplined. They tried to engrave this principles into their only daughter, without much success, at least in everything related to their traditions.
Anna Marie was a young girl, clever like only herself and more cunning than most, but lonely.
Oh, so terribly lonely.
In her hectic life, the only contact she had was with her tutors, and with the more often than not snobbish other pupils of said tutors, on the tedious social meetings some of them liked to organize.
Her parents, being more prone to the old, Victorian way of raising children, only met her during her tests, to evaluate her progress, or when she was needed as an extra decoration on her father's arm for publicity or some boring social party they were invited to. Her father at least had the excuse of being an important businessman who rarely spent more than a month in the country. Her mother, instead, just avoided her like the plague, lost in her luxurious life, trying to keep up a youthful façade in which her daughter, living testimony of her own years, and her decaying beauty, couldn't possibly fit.
Her birthdays were more for her parents good publicity than a celebration of her new year of life.
Most days, when the sun finally set and her tutors left her finally alone, she would stare at her bedroom's ceiling for hours, her body too exhausted to move, wondering what would her parents ever do if they ever found her dead somewhere. The most self-deprecating part of her thought they would use it as a way to improve their social standing, oh the poor grieving parents. Now they understand so many injustices in this world of ours, you should really give them your love and adoration!
Ah, as if they weren't already sought after by most parts of the USA's sycophants!
The only bright sides of her life were her violin, and Cody Mason, after poor Susan's death.
Susan had been her nanny. Or, as she preferred to believe, her soul mother.
If god existed and had given her such a distorted family, Marie liked to think in Susan as god's way to say sorry.
She knew many people out there were in worse situations than her, but in her opinion, her life was a different kind of bad. Not in the physical way, not in a torturous way.
It all just left her... empty.
She was but a doll in her tutor's hands, a playable character, a cute decoration for her father, a hated mirror for her mother. She hated it. When Susan had been alive, her good old southern nanny, she could feel motherly love, even if she wasn't really her mother.
In fact, she had started to play the violin to make her nanny happy. Susan had lost her son to an accident with a car -or so had little three year old Marie heard-, and so Anna Marie had done her best to try and help her dear nanny get over her grief.
Susan's son, Michael, had been a promising violinist, and so the girl had begged and begged for a violin tutor, getting it after having announced said wish aloud in her fourth birthday party, because refusing such an easy gift in public would have been detrimental to their public appearance.
It had been hard at first, but eventually her violin lessons had been her favourite time in the day, followed by little shows for her dearest nanny, who could only look at her with tearful eyes, until she placed the violin back into its case, moment when Susan hugged her as if the world was about to end.
She had wondered if her playing was really that bad as to make Susan cry every time, and so Marie had worked hard to improve.
It took years for her to feel comfortable and sure of her abilities with the violin, but Marie managed to learn how to play a popular nursery rhyme Susan used to sing for her without help or support. It would be a melody engraved in her soul, something she would always be able to play, no matter how much time without practising past.
And she played, and Susan cried again. But this time, when the grief stricken child asked in a trembling voice if she was that bad as to make her cry, Susan smiled, hugged her, and told her she cried because her music was beautiful. That she could see, what a brilliant future she had as a violinist, like her little Michael had.
And when Susan cried again, Marie knew that it was for Michael, her lost son, the brilliant violinist, and wondered silently if by trying to help Susan she had been torturing her, reminding her of her lost son every day... Marie wondered, too, how could that feel, a grief so strong it transcended so many years -four years were a very long time, for a child...
When Marie was twelve years old, she met Cody Mason.
Cody Mason was the major's only son, and so far, the only person who had tried to approach Marie for herself, rather than merely being the heir to the D'Ancantos. He was rather cute, blonde, blue eyed and tanned. But the most important part of him was his personality, that strange adorkable aura he gave off, had somehow kept her grounded, and filled her with butterfly-like feelings in her chest.
Maybe he was god's way of saying "sorry", because the very day she met him, Susan died.
Her parents never truly told her what had happened, or how. No. Her father had called her into his study, and she had went, all bubbly inside, wanting to run to Susan and tell her all about Cody's eyes, and how cute he was, and his adorkableness... Yet, when she entered Milo D'Ancanto's study, and saw the stern look on his steel-grey eyes, Marie knew something bad had happened.
"Susan is dead. She won't come back. And no one will replace her. You're 12 years old, Anna Marie. Almost a proper lady. Thus, you'll have to do things by yourself from now on. If you really need advice, Albert will be a proper guide. Be careful, though. He's the main butler, so you mustn't disturb him for pointless things. Now, go. You have your fencing lesson in less than an hour."
So cold...
Marie had walked to her room in a daze, almost unable to comprehend what had been told to her.
It couldn't be...
Susan... Susan couldn't be...
Her mind refused the very idea. And so she refused that idea. Susan couldn't be dead, and so she wasn't. But even if she was determined to surround herself in her delusions, she could already feel a huge gap in her heart, Susan-sized.
Suddenly, the world was so cold...
Even in her grief, life went on. She wasn't allowed a proper mourning time, and so the agony of Susan's death stretched for years, only shown in her private moments.
Cody, who had been relegated to the depths of her mind after her loss, became an emotional crutch for her, over the following months.
But as if god hadn't deemed her punished enough for her luxurious life, that Christmas would be the setting for a moment that changed her life completely.
Her first kiss...
It all happened in her fencing tutor's garden.
Merely five months had passed since Susan's death, and yet there she was, forced to go to a stupid social meeting, when all she wanted to do was to curl herself in a tight ball and cry for her lost nanny. Her soul mother.
At the very first chance, she ducked out of the party, into the close woods, without knowing her dear friend, Cody, had followed her.
Marie walked until the house couldn't be seen, and sat on a mouldy log, her fingers playing with her hair, like every time she was thinking about something unpleasant, when Cody finally chose to make his presence known.
"You know, you usually do that thing with your hair, and suddenly turn gloomy when no one is looking at you..."
She couldn't contain a little shout, her heart beating like hummingbird wings, before being able to control herself.
"Damn it, Cody, don't do that!"
He smiled, sitting right next to her, not caring about the mould tainting his designer white jeans, biting his lip as he stared at her.
"What?" did she want to ask "Do I have something on my face?"
But she knew, she just knew what he wanted. And so she smiled, closed her eyes and waited.
His lips caressed hers, and for twenty seconds, everything was perfect. She felt elated, her skin electrified, and a shiver went down her back, until...
She was so stealthy, ducking out of the party, and with a smile on his lips he followed her, because he knew that even if she pretended to be alright, she wasn't.
He loved her personality as a whole, the way she somehow always knew what to say and when, and yet how she would stutter every single time he touched her, as if she wasn't used to have contact. And her body wasn't at all bad, either. His mother had told him many times Anna Marie D'Ancanto had good hips, that she would grow and be a very beautiful girl, even if he could only be amazed at her athletic built, how she could always win at every competition that didn't outright need brute force. It was a stark contrast to her social awkwardness, the way she seemed unable to stand being around many people for more than a few minutes.
Oh, but her eyes were so beautiful... He felt he could get lost in those green depths...
Oh gods, Cody...
When she finally managed to get away from him, to cut off their connection, he was sickly pale, and her mind felt like a deeply used drum. Memories, feelings, experiences that weren't her drifted through her mind, confusing her, taking her breath away, and she run. She run, far, far away, back home, back home, back home...
But, where was her home?
She ran, and kept running, even if her legs were about to give up, even if her messy mind couldn't even start to figure out where was "home".
She lost herself in the greenery. Something told her she would be safe there.
{_O-O_}
Sookie was calmly stroking the strange plant that had been growing around her knees, in what could have been minutes or hours.
The sun had completely set, and the moon now shone through the trees, turning everything a shade of silver.
But her peace was shattered by loud shouts, and the following sound spoke of a battle, even if nothing could be seen by her fearful eyes. The sounds were getting closer, and right at her back a bright light shone, drawing if only for a second a big translucent door. Before she was even able to turn around, a purple bullet was shot, going through her and stopping in her heart.
Sookie Stackhouse was barely able to mutter a muffled scream, and then everything she could see was green, the green of the grass at her feet, as her body had collapsed face down on the ground.
{_O-O_}
Marie was barely able to breathe, finally allowing herself to fall down on her knees, face turned to the sky she could see between the trees. She was crying, trying to find her way back to herself, lost in memories she shouldn't have.
She could remember, even then, her father's cold voice during a dinner long time ago, when news about mutants were just being known.
"Such scum! To let them live is a blasphemy! Every proper christian should team up and do everything in their power to annihilate these threats to humanity. Be as it may! If I ever meet one of those monsters, I'll kill them with my bare hands!"
Eh. So, she really had no home to go back to, did she? The very moment she had been discovered as a mutant, she had stopped being a D'Ancanto.
Now, she was nothing but a wandering rogue, something that shouldn't be allowed to exist.
A little rogue, lost in the crowd, like so many others...
She would wander then, like Cain after his punishment. She would wander, lost, but for that night, only for that night, she would allow herself to sleep in the woods.
Marie woke up, alarmed, without being sure why.
The reason, was answered soon enough, by incomprehensible shouts, and beams of light coming out of nowhere, water rising without any possible logical explanation, and even if she wanted to run away, the mud made it impossible.
The earth was swallowing her, and she was way too terrified to shout for help.
It wasn't needed, but she couldn't possibly know that.
Marie was down to her hips when a disturbingly beautiful man collided with her, his hand going through her chest without meaning to, as his strength was far superior to her body's, and all she could see was a pair of baffled green eyes, unnatural green eyes, and then everything turned green, a sickly green colour, while a burning heat where the man had traversed her chest started to burn her whole body, travelling through her arteries and veins.
Yet, she couldn't scream. Marie couldn't see the man -her whole sight had been taken over by that green light-, but she felt his hand on her mouth, before they both disappeared from the forest altogether.
A/N: So, what do you think?