To my reviewers: I'm glad you guys liked the first chapter and I hope you like this one. Sorry it took longer than I anticipated for it to be updated but if you've ever had a final or a regent in your life you know what the weeks before them are like. So tx for being patient with me and enjoy.
Chapter Two: Reliving the Past
John's POV(An hour before Alexandra woke up)
It was two o'clock in the morning and I was bugging out. I'd just downed about half a bottle of straight vodka and I had not eaten dinner so I was tipsier than I'd have been normally. While staggering up the stoop to the Magneto's hideout, I heard a swift movement of something pass my ear. My delayed reactions made it so that I responded to it about a minute later asking, "Who's there?"
No answer.
I shrugged and just continued to stagger up the stairs and when I got to the door I put the key into the keyhole and hesitated for a second, remembering how it went last time I came home drunk. Mags had flipped out like a maniac. He had me on lock down for a month and gave all my missions to Mystique, who only rubbed it in my face that I was on lock down. That was a few years back though and Mystique was gone now…sure as hell pissed the fuck off at Mags for doing what he did after she risked herself for him. Hey, I'd be pissed too if I did that…. But that's the difference between Mystique and I: she's been with Mags so long that she'd give life and limb for him when I've only been on his side for about a year…I'm not even sure I wanna do my laundry in the same load as his let alone have to swear my life to him. No way. But I could never say that to his face though. Maybe it's because he takes care of me or because he's becoming more than just a mentor to me, but I feel things between Mags and I are changing.
Swoosh.
I jumped and used the flamethrower to summon a fireball to my hand while I looked around me like a squirrel looks for his nuts: jumpy. When I heard nothing else after a while, I just extinguished the fireball and went to turn the key in the keyhole. As soon as I turned I was met with a swift punch to the face by what appeared to be a blue fist. Only one thought lingered before I blacked out: Mystique.
Alexandra's POVI jumped at the sound of this man's voice and turned quickly to face him, taking a fighter's stance. "Who are you?" I asked, squinting a little to see whom it was but couldn't due to the fact that he was shrouded in shadow produced by the moon shinning from behind him.
"Your new best friend," the man said, stepping in through the window and walking up to me.
Normally I'd have already started attacking him, but something about his demeanor kept me from doing so. Something he radiated from the moment I heard his voice made me a little scared of him. This made me even more scared because it's been four years since I've been scared of something and for someone to make me scared with one sentence was unsettling. But the last four years have taught me something through the forms of my cousins and brother: never show that you're scared because it could kill you.
"Yeah? What makes you say that?" I asked, letting my stance down to show that I no longer considered him a threat…that may have been a mistake but I was willing to make it to keep my dignity.
"Still angry about what happened four years ago?" he asked and made my heart skip a beat when he did.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said, trying to hide my shock and knowing I couldn't for long.
He tilted his head to the side and said, "Oh, yes you do. Remember when the humans almost killed your cousin? Remember when they almost killed your whole family? Remember when you almost killed them?"
I was breathing deeply and unevenly now, anger rising in me like a beast that's been awoken after a millennia of sleep and is hungry. "Shut up. You don't know what you're doing. Just shut up."
He chuckled and stepped closer to me, leaving only about an inch of space between us and asking, "Want to get them back for it? Want to make them pay?"
I stared ahead of me for a minute, letting the anger build up inside me some more and finally just letting go. It was like a raging fire was burning inside me and it had finally burned through the metal of a kerosene tank.
I didn't even know that I could ever be that angry, but I proved that I could when the man flew back into the wall and cracked it so that it almost molded him. I gasped and lost concentration on the hold I had on him and he fell with a loud clang to the floor due to his weird looking helmet falling off.
"My, my. You are a strong one. No wonder Charles was so hesitant to look for you," he said, getting up and picking up his helmet. "It's a miracle he doesn't want to recruit you for himself and make you one of his junior X-Men or that he hasn't even come to you offering help control your powers."
"What're you babbling about? Who's Charles? Why are you here and why were you trying to piss me off?" I asked, going on a rant and almost losing it again.
"You are Alexandra Calderon, are you not?" he asked, walking back over to me.
This guy really can take a beating can't he?
"Yeah and? What's it to ya? What do you want with me?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest and putting all my weight on one side of my body.
"You really have no idea how valuable you are, do you?" he asked, searching me with his eyes as if he were looking to see if he could use that against me in any other way than just trying to get me to be on his side by flattering me. "You don't know what you can do for us, do you?"
I stared at him for a while, just taking in his appearance. He wore what seemed to be a weird sort of insolated suit and a red almost burgundy cape over that with that weird helmet. He seemed to be a bit off his rocker, but the way he spoke to me and the way he seemed to really want me to listen to what he had to say made me believe my instincts in telling me that he was wearing that for a reason and that that reason might be that he's one of my kind. It made me believe that he wasn't here to hurt me, but to help me. Or he could've been there to hurt me…. I didn't know, but I always went with my gut feeling and it made my life easier and go better off so that's what I was going to do now: go with my gut and listen to him.
"No…. What – no why am I worth something to you and this Charles?" I asked and I let the nasty emphasis on the other man's name linger because from the simple statement that this man made about him made me want to slap him already and I never even met him. I don't like it when people try to push their way into running your life by fabricating some story about helping you. Maybe this guy is trying to do that very same thing, I thought as I waited for a response from the man.
"Your power – the ability to bring back the dead and visa versa – it has so much potential, child. Do you know how many people would give life and limb for just one last glance at their passed loved ones? Imagine what they'd give if they could have them back…. You could have this world eating out of the palm of your hand if you wanted to…. Of course, this is only if the other part of your mutation doesn't stop you from properly using this part…. You have trouble with that, don't you? It's the reason you learned to fight instead of just perfecting your mutation…why you hate humans with a passion because you know that you could kill them in a split second for doing what they did to you and your and family, but you're stopping yourself from doing it because you can't control half of your powers…."
"How could you possibly know this?" I asked after a few seconds of staring at him, my mouth agape.
"What, did you really think that in all those doctors' visits no one caught on? There're drawers full of files on you, Alexandra. Don't you remember those nice doctors giving you candy every time you brought back someone they showed you a picture of – someone dead? Or even when they asked you to make them fly like Peter Pan? No, I guess you don't. You were too young…. But you do remember what you had to do four years ago, don't you? You remember the pain you suffered when you watched them die and the psychological damage it did to you when you had to bring them all back. You remember the trauma you had to go through convincing yourself that they'd never died, right? All the pain and exhaustion when you just gave up, went to sleep and then woke up the next day and all of it was gone?"
I stood there, feeling numb. I, in all honesty, couldn't ever remember what the hell happened during those visits when I was younger. I just always thought I was really sick because I was told that your X-gene, if you have one, doesn't awaken until puberty. I didn't even remember what he just told me happened, but at that moment, everything came rushing back in a flood….
Anthony fell in slow motion, blood spilling from the three holes in his chest and staining his pure white shirt a crimson color that soon turned black as he lay there. He was dying, the blood pooling around him, sucking him in like he was nothing and stealing that special glint in his dancing eyes.
"Anthony! No!" I screamed and ran up the rest of the way up the block to my house and the up the driveway. I didn't even acknowledge that the teens were now pointing their guns at me and were about to shoot. All I saw was them flying in midair a second later and landing hard across the street.
The rest of my cousins and my brother came out of the house at the sound of gunshots and screaming and saw Anthony on the ground, still being stolen by the crimson pool around him. Eduardo stared at him, his breathing becoming fast and uneven and then stopping completely when he looked up and saw what I hadn't because I was too busy looking at them for help.
"Move, Alexandra!" he yelled, jumping from where he stood and pushing me to the floor before I heard a loud gunshot and felt something wet soak through my shirt and touch my skin.
I looked down at my side and saw blood being absorbed by my shirt and then I looked over at my cousin.
He was on the ground, convulsing and coughing up blood. There was a huge wound in his chest and it was gushing – no splattering blood everywhere.
I stared at him, twitching and coughing, until he died and I couldn't feel anymore. I wanted to feel something so badly, but I couldn't. I wanted to be angry. I wanted to be sad. I wanted to be pissed the fuck off beyond any kind of belief you could ever have…but I couldn't. I just sat there, staring as the rest of them tried to do something.
My brother tried to use his mutation to pull electricity from the electromagnetic field that surrounded our satellite dish, but as he reached up toward the dish one of the teens (couldn't have been much older than me) took the opening and shot him.
I wanted to throw up. I don't even know what happened to the other two because I just sat there and stared at my brother as he went down in shock. I mean, how could he be taken down? He was the fucking wall of Jericho! How the hell was I supposed to survive if he didn't? He was the one who always protected me and now he was gone! I just sat there, hearing yells and screams but not listening to them until I felt something cold touch my temple. It was one of the teens holding a gun to my head and telling me to get up.
"Get the fuck up, bitch! Get up!" he yelled again when I didn't respond.
I turned to face them, feeling the dried blood that had splattered on my face a few seconds before crack when I did, and stared at them…. Did they really think they were going to live past this moment? I didn't and the fact that they were still pointing their guns at me and threatening me after just killing my family was hilarious to me. So I just burst out laughing. Oh, how insane they must've thought I was after a minute or so.
"Hey, have you cracked, kid?" one of them asked, poking me with his gun.
I only laughed harder and stood up, staggering and straightening myself up by grabbing onto one of them. He squirmed out of my grip and I laughed hardest at that: he was disgusted by me…. He'd just killed my brother and four of my cousins and I disgusted him. Do you see something wrong with this picture?
"C'mon, Parker, she's lost it. Just shoot her and get it over with," said the one that shot Anthony and my brother.
The one that shot the other two nodded and aimed at me.
I immediately stopped laughing and said, "You've got to be kidding me. Yeah right."
There' something I have to explain about my powers before I continue with this. My power consists of two parts that to some seem to have a connection and none to others. I have a physical part: the bringing back of the dead and visa versa and also a psychic part. I don't really know how or why I got this power, but I've had it ever since I was a small child along with the other part. This is why I was always at the doctor's as a kid and why I was being studied. I guess they wanted to know not only what my abilities were, but also how they worked in sync with each other. I honestly don't know what ever became of those studies because one day my parents stopped taking me to the doctor's. So, it's still a mystery to me and everyone how my powers work with each other because they've yet to do so, but they work just fine separately and that was good enough for me…until now.
I felt myself grow in strength and I didn't where it was coming from until the three teens were being lifted into the air and were promptly slammed back down onto the ground. I walked closer to them and one by one, let the flow of energy become shifted, which allowed for my energy and life to stay in me while theirs slowly and visibly flowed into me. That's how my ability worked: I could shift the flow of energy from organism to organism that was always unnoticeable to most and cause it to speed up as much as I wanted it to be sped up and become noticeable. I've never really used it much before this time and never have I used it to make anyone suffer but they'd gone too far and I was just evening up the score.
About ten minutes later, they were all lying on the ground, dead and I was working on releasing the energy I'd taken from them and transferring into my brother and cousins. It was weird though, having to bring them back. I mean, I just saw them killed and then they were all stretching twenty minutes later and talking about how pissed off they were now.
"Do you see now, niña? Do you see what we mean?" my cousin asked me as I sat there and watched them, trying to calm myself.
I was still so angry and I knew that if I didn't calm down, I'd kill them all again or maybe send them flying somewhere. "Yeah, I get it now…. It's just…I never knew anyone could be so…mean for lack of a better word," I said, moving over of the stairs so he could sit down. "I just thought there were exceptions to the stereotypes, you know?"
He shook his head and said, "There are, but not around here…. This is suburbia, sweetie, not the ghetto. We can't be what we are down here. We have to hide it."
I nodded and said, "Yeah, I guess so." Man, when the hell did anyone become an exception to the Declaration? I thought to myself as I let the anger rise in me again.
Eduardo stared as a garden decoration floated by and flew into the wall of the house. He then pulled me into a hug and said, "It's okay, Alexandra. It'll be okay."
I was so sure I could believe him and that scared me because he and my brother were the only ones I could ever really count on to make me feel better about things like this. But I just couldn't bring myself to trust that statement. Would everything really be okay? Those Friends of Humanity people and the cops and eventually some support group that the neighborhood drags up in time due to the 'rising mutant pandemic' would hunt us now. We'd never be safe again and I knew it. So I decided then and there whose side I was on. No more benefit of the doubt for the humans and no more looking down upon my own kind for doing what we do. I now knew why we had to fight and why we even had to kill…. I understood and I wanted nothing more than to join in on it because I needed a way o vent now. Just killing those fuckers wasn't enough for me…. No, I'd make them all pay for what they've done…all of them….
"They all died…they died," I whispered. "I…I…brought them back."
The man nodded and said, "See? Do you remember now? Do you remember the childlike trust you had in them being broken the minute that trigger was pulled?"
I just stood there, trying to remember anything else but to no avail. I just couldn't for the life of me remember those doctor's visits. Had I really made someone fly of my own control? Had I once been able to control both parts of my powers? Was I able to make them work together too?
A minute and then two passed with no sound and then there was the sound of a door creaking open and then the voice of my brother asking, "Alexandra, what are you doing up? Go to sleep."
I jumped and a few trinkets fell from the hallway table near my bedroom door.
"Calm down, it's just me. I wanted some – Alexandra, what hell? Who is that?" he asked and in one swift movement raising his hand and pulling unseen electricity from the light bulbs above.
"I am Eric Lehnsherr, but you may call me Magneto," the man said, stepping forward and not even taking a fighting stance. He was really fearless. I admired that and feared it at the same time.
"Who? Wait! Magneto? Are you serious? What're you doing here? What do you want? Alexandra, did he touch you?"
Magneto scoffed and said, "I am not here to molest your sister, Cesar. In fact, since you know who I am maybe you know what I'm here for."
I looked at my brother and wondered how he knew who this guy was. I racked my brain for a minute as I waited for my brother to respond and then it hit me. "Oh shit! You're that guy who too that bridge to Alcatraz, aren't you?" I asked, looking up at him in awe. I wasn't going to lie, that shit was hot.
He smirked and said, "Yes, I am. Now, the reason I'm here is because I need more comrades on my side of this war between not only humans and mutants but also subgroups of mutants."
"Huh?" I asked, feeling confused and wondering what the hell he meant by what he'd just said.
"Well, the best way I can explain it is that there're mutants who're fighting war in one way and others who do it in another way. My group, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, fights for us by any means necessary while another group called the X-Men try to pacify those filth breeders they call our brothers and sisters for what they do and then when something like what happened to them about five years ago they do nothing," he said, his voice rising and falling at certain points signaling he was fairly angry about this.
"Oh…."
"What does 'by any means necessary' include?" my brother asked, stepping closer and dissipating the ball of electricity he'd made.
"Anything to get what we want," said Magneto.
"And you're looking for recruits?" I asked, trying to seize my chance at a way to get back at the humans. This might've been a bad idea in hindsight. But I was working purely on instinct and not intellect.
He nodded and said, "Anyone who wants remuneration for all they've suffered can join." He was making the whole thing sound like it was some big business proposition and that's most likely where I should've seen what was coming, but I was too blind and stupid and it didn't get any better as I went along.
"What d'you think, C? Angry enough to go along with him?"
"Are you?" he asked, cocking an eyebrow and staring at me as if trying to figure me before I could.
"More than you could ever know," I said and nodded. "I'm with you, Magneto…but only if my brother and cousins are with you, too." I looked at my brother and pleaded with my eyes for him to join in as well.
He sighed and said, "Fine, I'm in. I'll go wake the rest of them."
I smiled and watched him walk away. Then a thought hit me. "Hey, in one of those threats you made a while back after the Alcatraz thing and the 'cure' I saw a kid not much older than me. He had blonde hair and he was making fireballs in the background. What happened to him? You called him your 'esteemed apprentice' and I was just wondering what you were doing without him."
He sighed and said, "That's what your first mission as a Brotherhood member will be: to find him. He'd been out and drinking as usual (he swears I am oblivious to what happens in my own home) and I noticed that he hadn't tried to sneak back in at his usual three in the morning and then I went to the front door to see if he was passed out on the front lawn or something, but instead I found a note from an old comrade."
"Yeah? What did it say?" I asked.
"It said that if I wanted to see him alive again, I'd meet her at her hideout and make a deal with her in order to get him back in exchange for a favor," he said, his eyes getting this look that shown with pride. "She's smart that one. Mystique always knew what would make a person give into her."
"Wait, I thought you two were comrades. How come she wants to threaten you?"
"Four years ago, she took a bullet for me…it held the cure in it and she became human…. I left her behind when she asked for help. She then told the government all that I was planning to do and tried to stop me from succeeding but the X-Men beat her to that."
"You're mad grimy. How're you gonna say she's your comrade and then abandon her when she needs you?"
"She was human and I didn't know that the cure wasn't permanent," he said.
I nodded and said, "Alright…. So, what's this favor she asked of you?"
"She needs someone with influential status to get a message across."
"So she's basically asking to be back on the team?"
"Maybe…. With Mystique you never know," he said, smirking and watching as my brother came back with the other four.
"I already explained to them what you're asking and we'll join, but only on one condition."
"Name it," Magneto said, raising himself up off the ground and floating over to the window.
"We do what we want when we want. If we want to leave then we leave, no questions asked," Eduardo said sternly.
"Fine…. I'll be back later to take you to my hideout. Take only what you'll need and nothing else," he said before opening the window and flying out.
"Was that a good move?" asked my cousin Anthony.
"I dunno, but it was a move and that's good enough for me," I said, going into my room and started to pack. I heard them do the same and I was left alone with my thoughts. Maybe the decision was a mistake. I didn't know and at that point I didn't care. All I cared about was that I was getting my chance to get back at the humans. You're probably wondering why I'm still so angry after I already killed them. You'd understand better if someone tried to kill your family for no reason except for being what he or she was and not even giving him or her a chance. I hated them for that and I always would.
I packed clothes into an old Nike gym bag and when I had stuffed about a week's worth of clothes in there I got my notebooks and shoved them in there. Those notebooks held my poems and stories in them and I knew I'd never forgive myself if I left them behind so I made sure I had more than enough room for them in the bag. I was done packing fifteen minutes later and then I just laid on the bed, waiting for sleep to come and wondered what the future would hold. How would it be with Magneto? Who would I meet and who would be on my side. What kind of mutants would I fight alongside? I shut my eyes and let the dream world surround me as I continued to wonder these things….
Hey, I hope you enjoyed it. Please leave a review as you leave. TX. Well, I g2g sleep before I pass out here. Abrazos y besos para todos.
1,
NY GE Pyromaniac