I don't own anything to do with anything in the X-Men franchise. That sucks majorly, but that's all right. I'll live. I do own Jaklyn Porter, Silence Allerdyce, Andell Brown, and most of this plot, besides the bits that came from the movie. Mina belongs to my friend. This fic follows along with X-Men III: The Last Stand and is rated for language, violence, drinking, blood, gore, and a little bit of sexual content, but nothing too graphic. Enjoy.
Intoxication
Chapter One / A Few Months Gone By
The mansion had come back to life. After a lengthy period of reconstruction, the battered hallways had been retuned to their former glory and everything that had been broken when William Stryker's men had attacked had been replaced. Xavier's mansion was standing tall again and its halls were filled with laughter once more. As spring approached and the expansive amounts of property brightened into green once more, the children spilled outside and the air around the mansion was filled with joy. After the death of Jean Grey and John Allerdyce's choice to abandon his home for Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants, many of the students had needed time to recover, but now, all was back to normal. Or, as normal as it can be in a house full of mutants who just lost one of the most important members of their household; Jean had been a mother, a friend and so much more to the majority of the students. The wounds were healed and the scars had begun to fade for all but one.
Jean's lover, her soul mate, Scott Summers seemed to be only one who hadn't recovered in some way or another. Even Logan, who had loved Jean as much as Scott, had returned to his usual surly manner and was going about his life pretty much as he had before. It seemed that Scott had just sunk farther into his depression as time went on. He had become very anti-social, very short-tempered and very bitter: a completely different man than before Jean had died. He had stopped teaching his classes regularly and running his Danger Room sessions. It was almost as if half of him – the happy, good-natured, kind half – had died with his fiery-haired love and left him devoid of everything good. The students and the other adults just ignored him mostly, speaking to him only when they had to.
But everyone else had brightened.
Jaklyn Porter, who had arrived at the mansion almost a year before, had undergone a reconstruction of her own at the same time the mansion was being rebuilt. First off, Jaklyn had shaken her dependence on vodka by shear will power and determination. The biggest part of her new beginning was her birthday present. When she was fourteen, Jaklyn had been attacked by mutant hunters and had lost her left eye to a gunshot, leaving that side of her face twisted and covered in rope-like scars. Her birthday had been in the dead of winter, and for that birthday – her eighteenth – her friends, Mina Felisin, Silence Allerdyce, Kitty Pryde and Bobby Drake, and Logan and Ororo Munroe, two of her teachers, as well as her boyfriend, Piotr Rasputin, had talked the Professor into contacting Forge, a mutant with the ability to design and make anything he wanted, and asking him to design a mechanical eye that would replicate the way Jaklyn's natural eye looked and everything her mutant ability allowed it to do. Forge had agreed and, a month afterward, he and Moira McTaggert, an old friend of the Professor's, had flown to New York from Scotland and preformed the surgery to implant the mechanical eye into Jaklyn's head. When she had come around after the surgery, Jaklyn had burst into tears out of happiness. And when she cried out of both eyes – the tear duct in her left eye had been reopened – for the first time in four years, she cried even harder.
The only mutant her age who hadn't been involved in the gift was Rogue, a southern girl who had the ability to drain other people of their memories, their personality and psyche and disable them for a while. She and Jaklyn hadn't gotten along since they had first met, but Rogue had given Jaklyn her congratulations when she was up and walking again, and Jaklyn had given Rogue a hug.
Christmas that year had been something quite spectacular for Jaklyn, as she had only ever experienced Christmas with three people before - herself and her two adoptive parents Samantha and Jonathon Peters back in England. At the mansion, there were so many more people, and the Christmas tree they set up in the living room was huge, going all the way from the floor to the top of the twelve or so foot ceiling. They had needed ladders to decorate it, and the youngest telekinetic mutant had, if a little shakily, lifted the glittering star to the top of the tree. By Christmas morning, there was a flood of present covering the hardwood floor of the living room, some bought and some homemade and all excepted with smiles and hugs and cries of joy. Many of the mutant's parents had sent gifts, and the Professor had bought something for everyone. Mina had had a bit of a hard time because John, who had been her boyfriend, wasn't there for the first time since she'd come to the mansion, but she hadn't let it ruin her holiday.
Silence had left the day after Christmas to go to New York City where she spent three days with Warren, her "secret mutant-lover", who she wouldn't say anything about. She kept in contact with him through the phone and e-mail, but since he lived the majority of his time in San Francisco, she could only see him once in a Blue Moon when he came to New York City.
Classes had resumed after New Year's Day as normal. It was kind of bittersweet for the older students as this was their last year of classes and they were expected to go out into the real world after this to go to University or get a job or do whatever they pleased. It was a well-known fact that Jaklyn, Mina, Silence, Kitty, Bobby and Piotr were going to come right back to the mansion after University and that they would probably visit or even live there throughout their upper level schooling. They all loved the school so much and their only goal was to become one of the Professor's X-Men and fight on the good side.
"Can you believe we only have like, a couple months left until the summer?" Jaklyn asked, stumbling slightly as they descended the stairs towards the conservatory where they had biology with Ororo, also known as Storm; she was stumbling, because she still wasn't used to perceiving depth with two eyes, and the more she walked, the less balanced she got, and walking from upstairs where they had math with a depressed Scott down to the conservatory was a long walk.
"Shut your face," Silence snapped. "I don't want to think about it. I don't want to leave this place."
"Me either," echoed Mina. "Do you think the Professor would just let us stay here and not go out into the 'real' world? Wait, don't answer that, I know what the answer is: 'Fat chance', right?" The girls laughed as they entered the bright room and sat down in their usual wooden desks. "I still don't know why the Professor doesn't replace these things with chairs. They would be so much more comfortable."
Jaklyn shrugged as she turned towards her boyfriend, who sat on the other side of her. "'Morning Piotr," she said, smiling widely, exposing her teeth and along with them, her short fangs.
He smiled back, leaned over and kissed her cheek. "Hey."
They would have said more, but Storm walked in then, her brilliant white hair shining in the sunlight and her tanned skin standing out in stark contrast. "All right class. Today, we will be talking about…"
As she always did in biology, Jaklyn let her mind and thoughts wander as she absently jotted down notes. She would check them against Piotr's later and copy anything else she had to down; he was meticulous in his note taking. She had to stay after class to talk to Storm about scheduling some solo Danger Room sessions to do some analyzing of the progression of her mutation, and then, Logan had asked her to meet him in the garage after dinner that night to talk about something having to do with the incident at Alkali Lake a few months ago. She had no idea what that could be about, but it didn't matter. Logan was her friend, and she liked talking to him. They had a connection on a base level, a animalistic level and they understood each other as such.
"Hey," Silence whispered from behind her. "Jak, do you have any idea when you'll be doing your solo Danger Rooms? I want to come and watch." There was excitement in Silence's voice, as there always was when anything having to do with the Danger Room or fighting was involved.
Jaklyn shrugged and without turning around said, "I might have one before dinner."
"Right. We'll be there if you do."
By "we", she meant Mina, Piotr, and herself for sure and maybe Bobby and Kitty and some of the other mutant kids. They liked watching her perform her sessions because they liked watching shift back and forth between her human and wolf forms, because, besides Mina, she was the only shape shifter at the mansion, and her shifts were more violent than Mina's. Jaklyn's mutant for resembled something about of a horror movie. Her audiences had grown since she had developed the ability to change into a half-human and half-wolf form, something like a werewolf.
When Storm dismissed the class, everyone except Jaklyn got to their feet and exited the room. When they were the only two people left, Jaklyn gathered up her books, shoved them in her bag and walked up to her teacher.
"Hey Jaklyn."
"Hi Storm," she said, smiling her wolfish grin again and sitting on the top of a nearby desk.
"We can't have a lesson tonight. Bobby wants to run some more sessions."
"That's OK."
"Is next week still OK for you?"
Jaklyn thought for a moment. Her and Piotr had plans for Monday and Wednesday, and Friday was the night Jaklyn, Kitty, Mina and Silence went shopping or to the movies. It was girl's night. "Yeah, as long as the lessons are on Tuesday and Thursday night or in the afternoon on any day."
Storm nodded. "That sounds good. I'll let you know what days after I check the schedule, all right?"
Jaklyn nodded. Her and Storm walked out of the conservatory, chatting idly about mundane things like Jaklyn's plans for after the summer. It wasn't a topic the younger mutant was keen on discussing, but she complied placidly to Storm's questions, even though she didn't know all the answers herself. At a hallway intersection near the kitchen, Jaklyn headed to the lounge outside the Professor's office where she had her English class and Storm turned right, heading for the backyard. Now that it was nice outside, Storm didn't like to be away from her garden for very long. The door to the richly decorated room was open and Jaklyn stepped inside to take her usual seat in the front by the window.
The Professor was already seated by the ebony desk he never used, waiting for the students to arrive. "Good morning, Jaklyn. How is your eye doing?" It was a weird question, but one she was used to getting by now.
She sat down and pulled her notebook and her tattered paperback copy of Shakespeare's Hamlet out of her bag and put them on her lap; she had always loved reading Shakespeare. "'Morning, Professor. The eye's fine, but I'm still getting used to have two. Walking is the hardest part. It's like I have to learn all over again." Jaklyn smiled her closed-lip smile to him, like she always did. It wasn't that she was afraid to show him her fangs, but she thought it was rather disrespectful.
"Well, Moira said that would be normal. Have you thought any more about your school applications?" he asked. The Professor was a sort of academic counselor for the students as well as his other roles. "The deadlines for most schools are approaching."
"I sent in a few before Christmas, and I'm working on a couple more… I don't have much hope, really. I mean, I don't have any extra curriculars because this is the first real school I've gone to since I was really young, and I don't have much work experience. Plus, going away from this place isn't something I'm terribly excited about."
The Professor smiled his fatherly smile and opened his mouth to say something else, but the rest of the students filed in from wherever they had gone in the ten minutes allotted between classes and took up their normal seats. Piotr sat behind Jaklyn, Kitty to her left and Silence and Mina, Bobby and Rogue filled out the back row near the bookshelves. There were a few other students around the same age, but Jaklyn only really knew a few of them. There was Siryn, Jubilee, Artie and Jones. There were a few others, including a set of twins, but Jaklyn only knew them by face and some, by power, like the girl who could transfer what she heard as she heard it onto paper.
English flew by like it always did, and then it was time for lunch. In the afternoon, the older students had physics or chemistry with Storm depending on the day, group Danger Room sessions every other day usually run by Logan but sometimes by Logan and Storm, and Spanish with the Professor. Then, it was time for dinner. Not that they had to eat then, of course, but if they ate earlier or later students would have to make food for themselves. Jaklyn was restless all through the meal, eager to learn what Logan wanted to talk to her about. Since it had something to do with Alkali Lake, she assumed it had to do with his past, but what would he want to talk to her about his past for? It's not like she could help him figure out anything. As soon as she had deposited her dishes in the kitchen for Mina and Silence to clean up – it was their turn – she headed out to the garage. Logan never ate with the other inhabitants of the mansion, so he was out there when Jaklyn stepped into the large area filled with all of Scott's cars, the cars for anyone's use and the bike that Scott had given Logan after the rugged man had beat it up beyond Scott's liking. It was that bike that Logan was crouched beside, tinkering with.
Jaklyn sat down on an empty stool with wheels on its legs and prodded Logan's thigh with the toe of her slipper covered foot; she wore her slippers everywhere in the mansion, even the subbasement and the garage. "What do you want, Logan?" she asked. She wasn't being rude, that was just how she and Logan talked to each other. "I haven't got all day, you know. I'm a student. I have to be studious."
He turned and looked up at her, a smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth. "Your eye still creeps me out Half-pint."
"Yeah, that's nice. What did you want to talk to me about?" She bounced impatiently on the stool.
Logan pushed himself onto a stool identical to the one Jaklyn was sitting on, shoved the tools out of the way with his foot and then wheeled a little closer to her. "You can't tell anyone I've asked you to do this, OK? This is my business, and even though I know I could take care of her myself, you're going to smell her anyways, so I might as well tell you." He smiled a bit at the confused look on Jaklyn's face. "When we were up at Alkali Lake, I found the room where I was given the metal on my bones. There were three sets of X-Rays in there, one was mine and one of the other sets was this chick that I fought with five claws on each hand that came out of her fingers."
"And why are you telling me this?"
"I'm gettin' to that, Half-pint." Logan gave her the look and pulled out a cigar and lit it, savouring the taste for a moment. A puff of smoke surrounded his head; he cleared his throat and said: "The last set of X-Rays was identical to mine, except, the bones belonged to another chick. Her name's Andell Brown."
"I'm still not seeing the point."
"Just shut up and listen. Before I left, Stryker said that she was looking for me."
"Ah. Now I understand. You want me to keep my nose open and let you know if she's coming so you're not caught off guard and you can fight her. You think this Andell is dangerous?"
"If she's anything like me…"
"Ah, point taken." Jaklyn leaned forward a bit, her hands between her legs and her legs sticking out to the side in a childish and playful manner. "Are you excited to meet her when she finally hunts you down?" Jaklyn couldn't keep the smirk from her lips and the dangerous light from her eyes. Logan gave her his "yeah right" look, but didn't say anything. Jaklyn laughed. "Oh, come on Logan! You've got to be excited to meet someone who's like you, who knows the same things you do, who's gone and is going through the same things you have and are! Someone who's not trying to kill you," she added, remembering the chick Logan had fought.
"What if this chick is trying to kill me?"
"And why would she do that? She doesn't even know you."
Again, Logan raised his eyebrow in a high arch and chewed on his cigar. "You know as well as I do that she'd kill me anyways. Hell, she probably blames me for what Stryker did to her. I mean, if he hadn't made me what I am, than he wouldn't have kept testing it out. She probably had a life. She probably remembers what she left behind."
"Whatever. I'll keep my nose open for any female scent laced with Adamantium if it'll make you happy." Jaklyn smirked. "I'll watch your back."
"Don't get any ideas Half-pint."
She tried to look innocent, which was extremely difficult because of her fangs and the animal look to her eyes. "What? Me? When have I ever tried to pull anything over on you? It would be stupid because you can smell me coming a mile away." Jaklyn rose to her feet and stretched her arms up to the high garage ceiling. "I'm running a solo Danger Room sessions next week," she informed him. Her hands fell to her hips. "They should be pretty interesting. Storm wants me to run it in my new form and test my potential. According to her and the Professor, I've got quite a lot of that," she added as an afterthought.
"I might come watch." He blew smoke out his nose and also rose to his feet. "See ya later."
"Bye." Jaklyn headed back into the mansion. Almost subconsciously, she started paying more attention to what she smelled, and she allowed her wolf senses to flood to the forefront. The only Adamantium she smelled was Logan's, and the only females she smelled were the ones who lived in the mansion, the ones she smelled everyday. "Ah, no female Logan around yet." She made her way up to Silence and Mina's room where she found them and Kitty sitting around a board game spread out on the floor. "Oo, what are we playing?" She folded her legs underneath her and sat between Kitty and Mina. There was already a place set for her.
"Scene It. You know, the movie trivia game." Mina tossed her the dice. "We're rolling to see who goes first, and you're the only one who has to roll."
Jaklyn tossed the dice and grimaced at the bright white number one stared back at her.
"So, Jak," Silence started as she rolled and moved her game piece, "What did Logan want?"
"Can't tell you. It's a secret."
Silence stuck her tongue out before the conversation fell into talk about the game and the room filled with shouts and laughter as they answered the DVD questions in turn. Their attentions were riveted on the medium-sized television perched on Silence's desk and wedged into the corner where the walls connected. The game lasted about an hour – Silence won, like always – and then the girls decided to watch a romantic comedy and pig out on popcorn, pop, ice cream, chocolates and whatever else they could find. When the girls had nights like these – no homework, no essays, no dates, no other plans – they usually would pull the classic sleepover moves and the four of them would crash in one room. Around ten thirty, Storm had to come and tell them to be quiet as the other students were trying to sleep and warned them not to stay up too long because they had group Danger Room tomorrow. Being tired in the Danger Room wasn't safe and it wasn't an option. Grudgingly, the girls consented and fell asleep shortly after Storm's visit.
Now there was a strange pressure… It was beside the hot pressure, the mutant who could manipulate flames. It wasn't the feral one she was looking for, but it was… strange. Older, foreign. She closed her eyes, accessing her powers more deeply, manipulating the energy around her to ascertain more about this odd mutant. He could control metal and magnetic fields… Hm. I wonder if he could control my metal. She opened her eyes and looked down at her hand, clenched into a fist. Three claws shot out and she bit her lip against the pain. Unlike the one she was tracking, Logan or Wolverine or whatever his name was, her claws were strictly metal and they had been implanted completely; there had been no bone protrusions to base them off of. As her claws started to retract, something pulled at them and brought them back out. There was a massive tug over her whole body – it felt like her bones were being pulled out of her body – and she flew forward, crashing through some trees and halted, hanging in mid-air, in front of an older man with a smirk on his face.
"Why are you following me?" he asked, his voice smooth and touched by a British accent.
She just glared at him.
"What is your name?"
Her claws, extended not of her own control, started to spread apart, sending waves of excruciating pain up her arms and through her entire body. "Andell… Andell Brown," she croaked. Suddenly, he let his hold on her go and she crumbled to the ground, coughing slightly.
"What are you doing?" the younger man with the hot pressure snapped. "We don't need anyone else. What if she gets us caught?"
"She won't."
Andell pushed herself back to her feet, planted her hands on her voluminous hips and snarled. "Who the hell are you two and what the hell are you doing in the middle of the woods?" She gave them both a once over, taking stock of their clothing. Unlike herself, the men weren't exactly wearing clothing suitable to hiking though a dense forest. "You're not dressed for it, and you don't look like you belong here, so what the hell are you doing here?"
The young man stepped forward and opened his hand, a flame blossoming in front of his palm. He held it there for a moment, the ball spinning in place and growing slightly. "What makes you think you can talk to us like that?" he snapped. He was a very angry young man.
"Pyro, let it go." The older man turned to face Andell once more, a small smile on his lips; that smile frightened her more than Pyro's fire. "My name is Eric Lehnsherr. You can call me Magneto. And this," he gestured to the boy. "Is John Allerdyce. Pyro. As you've no doubt guessed, I can manipulate metal and he can manipulate fire. As for what we're doing out here… Worthington Labs thinks they have discovered a cure. I have a colleague looking into that claim and we are out here because we are hiding." Magneto smiled. It was a knowing smile. "What, my dear, are you doing out in the woods?"
"I'm hunting."
"And what can you do?"
Andell debated with herself if she should tell him. She wasn't sure if she trusted this Magneto, but if he had wanted to harm her, he could have done so by ripping the metal out of her bones or exacting some sort of magnetic torture on her. Besides, if what he said about a cure was true… Great. Another problem to add to my growing list. "I can manipulate energy and I have regenerative powers because of the burns the energy leaves behind, and I can things about people before I ever meet them, just by the pressure they give off, but it only works over short distances."
Magneto's eyes lit up. "I could use someone of your talents. Would you care to join us?"
Again, she paused for a moment, thinking. "Sure. But I'm not your lackey or anything like that. I'm staying with you out of my own will and I reserve the right to leave whenever I feel like it. I don't work for anyone. Not anymore."
"Fair enough."
Magneto started walking again, Pyro staying a few steps behind him on his right side and Andell fell into pace on the left side. Pyro seemed angry about her presence, and she guessed that he liked being Magneto's right hand man, that he didn't want any competition for the bosses' attention. Don't worry kid, I won't steal your thunder or anything. A thought struck her then. This guy knows a lot about metal… "Hey Neto-Magneto, I've gotta question." She almost laughed at the look he gave her.
"Yes?" he asked as he kept walking.
"Have you ever met any other mutants with Adamantium bones?" Maybe it's a shot in the dark, but it's a shot nonetheless.
"Why yes, I have. His name is Wolverine. Is that who you are hunting, my dear?"
"Yeah, that's him. I've got a score to settle with him. Do you know where I could find him?"
"I do, but, like I said, I could use someone of your talents with me, so I'm not going to tell you where that is. I imagine we'll run into him sooner or later in our quest against the cure."
Andell snarled but didn't protest. She wasn't going to get anything else out of this guy, so there was no point in trying. Of course, she could try to electrocute him, but he could control her metal, and not to mention his little lapdog would probably burn her and she hated being burned, even if never left a mark. Not unless she got upset that was. Her regenerative powers relied on her emotions. If she ever got too upset, her wounds would start reopening and if she wasn't brought under control soon enough, it was possible for her to die. She had been close once, and she never planned on letting that happen again. So far as she knew, there was only one topic that could anger her and upset her that much: her children. The son and daughter that she couldn't remember; the son and daughter she didn't know anything about. She clenched her jaw, bringing her emotions back into the safe zone and focused on the woods around her.
Author's Note… Hurruh! My first sequel has begun! Now, I'm going to be writing this one at the same time I'm writing my new Batman fic, but it shouldn't be a problem, because I'm, like, addicted to both fandoms right now, so we should be OK. Enjoy! By the way, I suck at summaries.