The basement wasn't a bad place to sleep, it'd be formed into the
'boys zone'. The underground floor contained a large open space that had
been covered with a black rug and a black couch with the television and
video games in front of it, with a bathroom and various open closets that
passed as rooms when a sheet was hung as a door. It wasn't so bad, at least
nothing was falling apart. Lance just sat on the mattress of his bed
staring at the dark blue sheet that was his door. He could not get to sleep
and it was an hour or two before he would usually even think about getting
up. He couldn't come to the realization that he and his 'family' were
really safe here. Sure there was no threat of the house caving in on them,
but could this Irene really be trusted and when would Keith get over his
anger management problem? He'd let them down and now he couldn't sleep
because he was afraid if he was asleep he wouldn't be able to protect them,
but from what?
To ease his mind some the earth manipulator got up and crept lightly across the black rug looking into first Todd's area, the Pietro's, and the Fred's. All were calmly asleep and for a moment he was jealous of them. Seeing them safe helped him relax a little, but he had to go see how his sister was. As silently as possible, Lance made his way up the stairs, tensing when one creaked under his weight but eventually continuing on when it was apparent no one had been disturbed.
Unlike the other four girls who shared the attic, Cami had taken over the couch at night. Her bed was too soft after her years of a hard mattress and the couch was just perfect. She was there, curled up in the green comforter clutching onto it with one hand and her other pillowing her head. Light brown hair draped over her face and she looked peaceful.
"Come up for a glass of warm milk or something?" Lance spun around to see Jewels in the doorway holding a glass of water.
"No, couldn't sleep."
"I couldn't either, I wish someone would have warned me that by dropping Summers with Rogue's power I'd have his thoughts in my head. What's scarier though is that sometimes his voice will respond to my thoughts, it's all very disturbing. And to think that was almost a week ago." She turned and went back into the kitchen and Lance followed since there was nothing better to do.
"You actually held onto him for a pretty long time considering Rogue does about a maximum of five seconds."
"Well, he was being really annoying."
"You calling me Alvers for the past few days was annoying too." Lance grabbed a glass from one of the upper oak cabinets and filled it with water. He downed the liquid in one gulp and washed the dish before putting it the dishwasher.
"You do know the washing machine does that for you, plus it was just water."
"Habit I suppose." Avalanche leaned on the doorframe looking at his sister sleeping ignoring the girl sitting at the table behind him.
"You got pretty damaging powers you know that? After the game I was allowed to go to this field with nothing but weeds in it and play around with the powers I'd copied." Now Mimic was just talking probably for the sake of conversation and Avalanche listened half-heartedly. "Hurt my head a bit, but yeah, it was impressive what earth manipulation let's you do."
"I suppose it is."
There was a pause for a while then Jewels started back up with a more worried and softer tone. "Irene said she saw something about you in one of her visions. I think that might be why she's always wondering where you're going and Keith and Jordan are always watching you."
Lance sighed heavily, "So I wasn't being paranoid."
"She told us about it, what she saw. I'm not supposed to tell you but I think it would be best."
"Whatever," he wasn't even really paying attention at this point.
"Just don't use your powers to kill anyone, got it? Not even if they killed someone close to you first." She'd already said enough but it had gotten his attention.
"Who?"
"I can't say, Irene didn't tell us who. She just said that she saw that and then you using your power to take out about thirty people. Probably could be prevented, but yeah, you never know."
"Thirty people? I wouldn't do that, I think Irene was just being paranoid." Lance turned to go back to his 'room' with hunched shoulders. How could Jewels think he'd be such a cold-blooded killer? He was almost to the stairs leading down when a hand placed on his shoulder, firmly but gently. It reminded him of the time at the institute when Scott had put his hand on his shoulder to apologize to him for being a jerk.
"Don't take it lightly, Alvers," he heard Mimic say in a tone that sounded a lot likes Scott's. "You aren't like that, but things change and Destiny knows what she's talking about." Lance looked back at Jewels but she had already left mumbling about when the annoying one eye was going to leave her head. Then he started down the stairs, hitting the creaky board and this time waking someone up.
"Jordan! That was my pillow you just exploded!" Zac yelled jumping out of his room. The time manipulator's black hair was sticking out everywhere and he was only in a pair of old jean shorts. White fuzz clung to his hair in some places and Lance just shook his head waking past the shorter mutant to his own room. One think TNT had to work on was controlling his more destructive power in his sleep.
"What? Oh, sorry, Zac." And by this time everybody but Calvin and Todd were up. "Keith, I didn't mean it, stop fucking looking at me like that."
"I was having a very nice dream," the yellow banged senior practically growled. "And I have a test first thing tomorrow, I do NOT need this!" Electro lunged at TNT.
"What's going on?" Fred asked sleepily.
"Jordan-blew-something-up-again," Pietro answered within a millisecond. "Stand-here-please-Fred." Too tired to argue Fred did so and blocked Keith.
"Ok," Lance mumbled rubbing his face, "let's just all go back to sleep. No need to wake anyone else up."
Electro looked up at Fred and decided it wasn't worth it, maybe he could still get back to his dream. Jordan gave Zac his pillow as a peace offering before both retired, Fred decided the couch looked like a good place to go back to sleep.
"Interesting place we've got ourselves into here," Pietro remarked to Lance who simply nodded. Pietro had never been the one to be able to get up and then go back to sleep after he was up, but he had a plan. Lance went back into his room and noticed Pietro run up the stairs but didn't think anything of it. Maybe he should have.
"Pietro, what are you doing?"
"Come on, we're going to go to Canada."
Cami didn't get much of a choice and put her arms around Pietro's neck as he picked her up. Now that he knew what her lie had been he was actually getting to like her. This was their third trip to Canada. When running she could make the wind go with instead of against her and that helped him go faster and in two hours that they had they could go to Canada and back if they liked. "Why are we going to Canada?"
"Because everything is cheaper there." He picked her up and dashed out the door.
"Pietro, we can't go to Canada," Whirlwind sleepily babbled paying just enough attention to cut the wind resistance. "We've got school tomorrow, err, today and we're going to be dead when we're found gone and…. These colors are going by really fast."
"You sound drunk."
"No I sound tired," Cami corrected trying to figure out where they were. "I'm going to have my big brother beat you up for kidnapping me." There was no wind to rustle her white shirt or velvety, cloud print, pajama pants and it was actually pretty warm. Looking around Cami noticed that they were traveling through a tunnel of colors blurred together with a clear picture in front of them. Then she wondered if Pietro's mutation had made him able to decipher these colors as hers had made her eyes not dry out when flying or anything with wind coming at her.
"Told you going to Canada would be fun."
"You never told me anything," Cami said realizing her head had dropped back so she could watch the colors. "We should start back, I'm actually awake now."
Pietro slid to a stop and noticed he'd seriously lost his way and instead of Canada they were standing in front of a beach with the Cape Elizabeth Lighthouse sitting proudly on it's cliff. With the ocean splashing against the rocks in huge waves. The sun was just poking up over the horizon painting the sky warm tones of gold and pink and red.
"All right, home would be a good place to go now." Cami frowned when Pietro put her down because it was cold and she had no shoes on then she noticed her 'kidnappers' feet were also bare and laced with small cuts from running. "You idiot, couldn't you have at least got slippers?"
"It didn't come to mind." Pietro looked at Cami as she pushed him into a sitting position and looked at his feet. "I'm fine, ouch," he winced as she picked a rock out of a cut, "really."
"Come on, I'm gonna fly us back. It doesn't matter if we're late you aren't running back like that!"
"Why, Cami, I never knew you cared." Pietro smirked as Cami picked him up. "Oh my hero."
"Oh, shut up or I'll drop ya." She sent a particularly large gust at them and was airborne. Getting up was always the problem, staying up was nothing. First flight had been terrifying, but it eventually came natural like breathing.
Pietro found flying fun, but too slow. He wanted to get some more speed! It wasn't until Cami had landed on the wing of an airplane that he noticed how fast they had been going. He also realized how far they were up. Wasn't this about the height the air pressure or whatever wasn't enough to breathe? "Cami?" He shouted and she rolled her eyes grabbing him again and falling off the wing.
"You baby, don't think I know what I'm doing?"
"Yes," he immediately answered. Then she smirked and dived downward gradually killing the wind keeping them up and landing lightly in the front yard. It was about time for everyone to get up. "We better go in." Pietro said as he rushed up to the porch. The speed demon quickly kissed the wind rider's cheek and dragged her in side where, amazingly, no one was up yet. "It was fun."
Cami just got onto the couch to hide her blush and with a whoosh of air he was gone. The teen barried her face into her pillow and smiled, slight insomnia was a good thing.
To ease his mind some the earth manipulator got up and crept lightly across the black rug looking into first Todd's area, the Pietro's, and the Fred's. All were calmly asleep and for a moment he was jealous of them. Seeing them safe helped him relax a little, but he had to go see how his sister was. As silently as possible, Lance made his way up the stairs, tensing when one creaked under his weight but eventually continuing on when it was apparent no one had been disturbed.
Unlike the other four girls who shared the attic, Cami had taken over the couch at night. Her bed was too soft after her years of a hard mattress and the couch was just perfect. She was there, curled up in the green comforter clutching onto it with one hand and her other pillowing her head. Light brown hair draped over her face and she looked peaceful.
"Come up for a glass of warm milk or something?" Lance spun around to see Jewels in the doorway holding a glass of water.
"No, couldn't sleep."
"I couldn't either, I wish someone would have warned me that by dropping Summers with Rogue's power I'd have his thoughts in my head. What's scarier though is that sometimes his voice will respond to my thoughts, it's all very disturbing. And to think that was almost a week ago." She turned and went back into the kitchen and Lance followed since there was nothing better to do.
"You actually held onto him for a pretty long time considering Rogue does about a maximum of five seconds."
"Well, he was being really annoying."
"You calling me Alvers for the past few days was annoying too." Lance grabbed a glass from one of the upper oak cabinets and filled it with water. He downed the liquid in one gulp and washed the dish before putting it the dishwasher.
"You do know the washing machine does that for you, plus it was just water."
"Habit I suppose." Avalanche leaned on the doorframe looking at his sister sleeping ignoring the girl sitting at the table behind him.
"You got pretty damaging powers you know that? After the game I was allowed to go to this field with nothing but weeds in it and play around with the powers I'd copied." Now Mimic was just talking probably for the sake of conversation and Avalanche listened half-heartedly. "Hurt my head a bit, but yeah, it was impressive what earth manipulation let's you do."
"I suppose it is."
There was a pause for a while then Jewels started back up with a more worried and softer tone. "Irene said she saw something about you in one of her visions. I think that might be why she's always wondering where you're going and Keith and Jordan are always watching you."
Lance sighed heavily, "So I wasn't being paranoid."
"She told us about it, what she saw. I'm not supposed to tell you but I think it would be best."
"Whatever," he wasn't even really paying attention at this point.
"Just don't use your powers to kill anyone, got it? Not even if they killed someone close to you first." She'd already said enough but it had gotten his attention.
"Who?"
"I can't say, Irene didn't tell us who. She just said that she saw that and then you using your power to take out about thirty people. Probably could be prevented, but yeah, you never know."
"Thirty people? I wouldn't do that, I think Irene was just being paranoid." Lance turned to go back to his 'room' with hunched shoulders. How could Jewels think he'd be such a cold-blooded killer? He was almost to the stairs leading down when a hand placed on his shoulder, firmly but gently. It reminded him of the time at the institute when Scott had put his hand on his shoulder to apologize to him for being a jerk.
"Don't take it lightly, Alvers," he heard Mimic say in a tone that sounded a lot likes Scott's. "You aren't like that, but things change and Destiny knows what she's talking about." Lance looked back at Jewels but she had already left mumbling about when the annoying one eye was going to leave her head. Then he started down the stairs, hitting the creaky board and this time waking someone up.
"Jordan! That was my pillow you just exploded!" Zac yelled jumping out of his room. The time manipulator's black hair was sticking out everywhere and he was only in a pair of old jean shorts. White fuzz clung to his hair in some places and Lance just shook his head waking past the shorter mutant to his own room. One think TNT had to work on was controlling his more destructive power in his sleep.
"What? Oh, sorry, Zac." And by this time everybody but Calvin and Todd were up. "Keith, I didn't mean it, stop fucking looking at me like that."
"I was having a very nice dream," the yellow banged senior practically growled. "And I have a test first thing tomorrow, I do NOT need this!" Electro lunged at TNT.
"What's going on?" Fred asked sleepily.
"Jordan-blew-something-up-again," Pietro answered within a millisecond. "Stand-here-please-Fred." Too tired to argue Fred did so and blocked Keith.
"Ok," Lance mumbled rubbing his face, "let's just all go back to sleep. No need to wake anyone else up."
Electro looked up at Fred and decided it wasn't worth it, maybe he could still get back to his dream. Jordan gave Zac his pillow as a peace offering before both retired, Fred decided the couch looked like a good place to go back to sleep.
"Interesting place we've got ourselves into here," Pietro remarked to Lance who simply nodded. Pietro had never been the one to be able to get up and then go back to sleep after he was up, but he had a plan. Lance went back into his room and noticed Pietro run up the stairs but didn't think anything of it. Maybe he should have.
"Pietro, what are you doing?"
"Come on, we're going to go to Canada."
Cami didn't get much of a choice and put her arms around Pietro's neck as he picked her up. Now that he knew what her lie had been he was actually getting to like her. This was their third trip to Canada. When running she could make the wind go with instead of against her and that helped him go faster and in two hours that they had they could go to Canada and back if they liked. "Why are we going to Canada?"
"Because everything is cheaper there." He picked her up and dashed out the door.
"Pietro, we can't go to Canada," Whirlwind sleepily babbled paying just enough attention to cut the wind resistance. "We've got school tomorrow, err, today and we're going to be dead when we're found gone and…. These colors are going by really fast."
"You sound drunk."
"No I sound tired," Cami corrected trying to figure out where they were. "I'm going to have my big brother beat you up for kidnapping me." There was no wind to rustle her white shirt or velvety, cloud print, pajama pants and it was actually pretty warm. Looking around Cami noticed that they were traveling through a tunnel of colors blurred together with a clear picture in front of them. Then she wondered if Pietro's mutation had made him able to decipher these colors as hers had made her eyes not dry out when flying or anything with wind coming at her.
"Told you going to Canada would be fun."
"You never told me anything," Cami said realizing her head had dropped back so she could watch the colors. "We should start back, I'm actually awake now."
Pietro slid to a stop and noticed he'd seriously lost his way and instead of Canada they were standing in front of a beach with the Cape Elizabeth Lighthouse sitting proudly on it's cliff. With the ocean splashing against the rocks in huge waves. The sun was just poking up over the horizon painting the sky warm tones of gold and pink and red.
"All right, home would be a good place to go now." Cami frowned when Pietro put her down because it was cold and she had no shoes on then she noticed her 'kidnappers' feet were also bare and laced with small cuts from running. "You idiot, couldn't you have at least got slippers?"
"It didn't come to mind." Pietro looked at Cami as she pushed him into a sitting position and looked at his feet. "I'm fine, ouch," he winced as she picked a rock out of a cut, "really."
"Come on, I'm gonna fly us back. It doesn't matter if we're late you aren't running back like that!"
"Why, Cami, I never knew you cared." Pietro smirked as Cami picked him up. "Oh my hero."
"Oh, shut up or I'll drop ya." She sent a particularly large gust at them and was airborne. Getting up was always the problem, staying up was nothing. First flight had been terrifying, but it eventually came natural like breathing.
Pietro found flying fun, but too slow. He wanted to get some more speed! It wasn't until Cami had landed on the wing of an airplane that he noticed how fast they had been going. He also realized how far they were up. Wasn't this about the height the air pressure or whatever wasn't enough to breathe? "Cami?" He shouted and she rolled her eyes grabbing him again and falling off the wing.
"You baby, don't think I know what I'm doing?"
"Yes," he immediately answered. Then she smirked and dived downward gradually killing the wind keeping them up and landing lightly in the front yard. It was about time for everyone to get up. "We better go in." Pietro said as he rushed up to the porch. The speed demon quickly kissed the wind rider's cheek and dragged her in side where, amazingly, no one was up yet. "It was fun."
Cami just got onto the couch to hide her blush and with a whoosh of air he was gone. The teen barried her face into her pillow and smiled, slight insomnia was a good thing.