Title: A Monster Amongst Monsters
Pairing: Magneto and Legacy/The Reaper
Rating: PG. For now . . .?
Summary: In those early days of their desperate fight to remain free, some wonder if it is even worth it, when even amongst the wretched and despised, they're set apart.
Spoilers: None I suppose. Go read Age of X! I'm sure that'd help! I did take some liberties with a few people's background stories so please don't string me up too aggressively for it.
Disclaimer: None of these characters belong to me, they belong to Marvel or Disney or both. I dunno, I forget at this point. I just know they're not mine, and I'm writing this for freesies and to recommend that people check out the Age of X run!
Also, I am so glad to be posting! It has been so long since I have written a fanfic, but this one popped into my head and refused to let go!
Day 79:
Monsters don't deserve love, and they don't ask for it. They take what they're given.
Legacy – and she would call herself that, until the day she died – walked the silent halls of their citadel, the hour somewhere between obscenely late and obscenely early. She couldn't sleep. That was a problem for her more and more often. Too many memories collided merged, and melted together, or attempted to subsume another. All too often Legacy felt like a referee in a particularly violent soccer match, except every player was an irate hooligan. With super powers.
And so, on the nights where she could not find any solace or respite Legacy would wander the halls, avoiding the others of their fortress with a deftness that was afforded her by Kurt and all the training he had experienced in his brief life. Of all the people that were now within in her head instead of the flesh, she missed Kurt the most. Raven had birthed the child, given him up for a short while before returning to him for fear of his safety, and raised him with her lover, Destiny, until the older woman's unfortunate, but foreseen death at the hands of Arcade in his sick prison.
Eventually, in the chaos of the early days of anti-mutant hysteria, Mystique found and raised an abandoned Anna Marie before being separated and sent to jail for a brief stint. Alone, the siblings had survived by staying together, and eventually reunited with their mother in this last bastion for mutants before she too was taken by the first and only Avengers. Anna Marie hadn't been able to imprint either of her foster mothers' before they died, and the shame of it cut deeper than all but the grief of losing her brother. They could have remained a family, all within her, but fate had taken even that solace from her!
The shame and pain of her lost family was almost stronger than the hate that seethed within her.
This hate wasn't just her own. Her powers were as wild and uncontrollable as a forest fire, and twice as dangerous. It was the hate and fear that nearly each person felt as their lives, their memories, their souls leeched out of them and into her. Even those who wanted it, they all eventually came to the same conclusion within her. That this procedure was abhorrent, an abomination, no matter the grandiose spin their General Magnus gave it. That her name Reaper was too kind. There were stronger, uglier names that could be used against her, that were more appropriate, and –
"Anna. It is late." The gentle banality of the words gave way to an easy interpretation of what he really meant. Magnus was one of the few who would approach Legacy, much less keep her quarters close to him.
To think of him is to summon him. A thought came from a corner of Legacy's mind, flitting away before she could tag exactly who it came from. Taking full control of herself, of shoving the personae of so many deeper within, was always a difficult endeavor. For this man however, she always wanted to be herself. "General," she said quietly – monsters did not speak firmly to their betters – and she turned to face him, though reluctance showed in every line as she kept her gaze to the ground and her shoulders rounded. Clad as always in white armor and cape, he looked the part he had assumed long before now: The Savior of Mutantkind. She in her dark cloak and hood also was the exact opposite. Where he was the symbol of beginnings and hope for their species, she was very much their end.
"Anna," Magnus said, his expression and voice changing, gentling. "It is unbecoming of one so important to our cause to debase herself with such a downcast expression." Anna's shoulders shifted in a knee-jerk reaction. Any contact – physical, or just conversational – did that to her, especially those she did not initiate and were unexpected. She was tainted, the reminder of the grim reality of their lives.
"Couldn't sleep," the laconic reply was barely above a whisper. Still she would not meet his gaze! Each response, her ashamed demeanor, and even the fact that she was ghosting these halls like an unwelcome revenant infuriated Magneto to a level that he had not felt since he removed the skyscrapers from the city of Manhattan to make this citadel. That fury was boiling within him, threatening to overwhelm him.
No. This was not the time of place for righteous wrath. Magnus placed his hands, his touch gentle, but her shoulders flinched as if receiving a blow. For a long, nearly endless minute did he refrain from pursuing any other action. He wanted to though. He so very badly wanted to. The lights flickered, playing her into browning sepia to the chiaroscuro of the natural light outside heightened by the protective barrier the Force Warriors wove every day.
Not. Now. He stayed in this position, and continued to remain as he was until she eventually lifted her head and looked at him. What he saw in her eyes, what he always saw there, was a mix of her own fear and loathing. That was always the first emotions anyone could see, if they looked hard enough, though few did. But, with every time he found his gaze stroking her body, he could see something else. When looking at Anna Marie, he could nearly see the ones she had absorbed within, looking out at him. Judging him, and wondering why he hadn't done better at protecting them. It was all too familiar of times that he thought were long buried, long past.
The moment passed, and Anna was Anna once more, without a stranger looking out of her eyes. A strange light passed over them from the windows set within the hall. There was a wave of pure white, following a fracture and a colorful array of lights that threw all colors before flashing back into the pearlescent white. The Force Warriors had reached this quadrant of the walls, rebuilding what the humans, the flatscans had undone. What could not be undone though was what Magnus could see. As the lights gathered their strength and returned to their full glow, the shadows of pain Legacy went through, and did to herself was still apparent, though Magnus decided that he indeed was the only other person in this citadel that could even see it. His rage was stoked anew. It was unnecessary, fully unworthy of one so important to their cause. To him.
The light had returned to normal. Anna had returned to normal. But within those moments he had revealed to himself something...surprising. Not normal. It left him feeling confused and vulnerable, emotions he had not felt in a long while.
One hand traveled up cupping her chin, even as she began to tremble. His flinty blue eyes captured and held her green. "Anna...do not fool yourself into thinking you are unimportant. That you mean little to anyone, to our cause." This was not the smartest way to inspire her. He could see her confusion, read the jumbled emotions that played across her face. Did she really think that she was that inconspicuous? That no one would ever notice?
Well, perhaps they didn't. She, however, did not deserve to be. "Without you, they would have so much more to fear. They would have so much more to lose." He paused, he believed his words, but knew that she was wavering in her own decision and decided to forge forward. Tomorrow, death surely waited for them all. Tonight, it was silent. It was peaceful. With a startling moment of clarity, he knew that his dream, his need to protect mutantkind would be hollow and unimportant, unless he savored the victories earned for more than just the value of defeating an enemy.
"I would lose as well. More than they, worse than they." Very carefully, he ghosted his gauntleted thumb over her lower lip, and then abruptly released her. Shaken as badly as she and wondering why he had said so much and done more, Magnus rounded on one heel and stalked off down the corridor. Anna Marie stood there, watching him go until his form was swallowed by the shadows. If her mind had been a whirlwind of activity before, it was now a raging tempest, a swirling tornado. When it would settle and what she would be able to think about were concepts she could not even begin to contemplate.