XXXXX

A Bond Between Them

Disclaimer: I don't own the X-Men or it's characters.

XXXXX

Chapter 4 – A New Encounter

-One Month Later-

After the incident in Wyoming, the X-Men have been more persistent in apprehending their old friend. The two escapees had almost no time to stop and take a breather, and finding something that would stretch to Veronica's body was top priority. In the mean time, Veronica wore Kurt's cloak and cheap clothing from the Salvation Army.

"Are you cold Engel?" (Note: "Engel" is "Angel" in German. Not much of a translation needed, I guess.)

"Nope!" Veronica smiled widely. The duo decided to run over to Europe to visit a very special person. She could fashion a suit that could stretch with Veronica when she formed into, whatever she formed into. The two traveled up steep hills, and down dangerous cliffs. Trudged through strong rivers, and harsh winds. Until they finally made it to their destination.

"A circus?"

"Ah, not just any circus, my circus." He cocked his head to the side. "Well, at least it was my circus. Anyways, my mother works there. She can hopefully make a suit of some kind for you to wear."

"Is your mother an acrobat?"

"No, but she can perform magic."

"Ah, I see." The two entered the tent.

"Kurt! It has been long, no?" A gruff, burly man approached Kurt. They gave each other a quick hug. "Who is the little Pea?"

"I'm not a Pea!"

"Of course not!" The man ruffled Veronica's hair. She quickly fixed it.

"She's Veronica, a girl I picked up a while ago."

"Kurt! You're back!" A woman in a sequenced suit tackled the Elf in a hug. This ritual of people nearly smothering Kurt in greetings went on for maybe half an hour. Every time, they asked about Veronica.

"How long has it been? Around 5 years?" A spindly old man asked.

"It's so good to see you again! It's been more quiet under the tent since you left Kurty!" A woman with blonde, straight hair shrieked.

"Hey! I call him Kurty!" Veronica laughed. All of a sudden, the crowd went dead silent. The sea of people slowly parted, and an older woman with greying hair dressed in Gypsy clothing appeared.

"Mother." Kurt smiled.

"It's good to see you again, Kurt." The woman held her arms out, and Kurt replied in a hug. The two stood their for a moment, under the safe, warm circus light.

"Come come, I know why you're here. And it's not to say hello." The woman took Kurt by the ear and started dragging him to her wagon.

"Ow ow ow! That hurts!" Kurt bent down and kept pace with his adoptive mother. Everyone started laughing, especially Veronica. Veronica followed the two to the outside of the tent, past a herd of elephants, and into a small circle with hay strewn about. They entered Margali's wagon, which was simply amazing how much stuff she was able to stuff in there. There were flyers, bits of newspaper articles, pictures, dried flowers, herbs, anything you can imagine. They all found seats in creaky wooden chairs.

"Will you help us? We can't afford her loosing her clothes every time she transforms."

Margali looked at her adoptive son with suspicion. She crossed her arms, and her voice was somewhat hoarse, but it gave it a sense of wisdom. "Why can't you go to your X-Men group?"

"I, got into some trouble with my friends. And a group of evil mutants." Margali didn't looked amused. "I got into a fight with Logan, lost big time, and I guess Veronica lost herself and transformed into, well, a monster." Kurt looked down and scratched the back of his head. "It was, kinda scary though. Engel didn't act like herself at all. She was, violent and ruthless. If my friend couldn't heal quickly, he would have surely died."

"Why do you call her 'engel' then? From what I hear, she acts nothing of the sorts in that form."

"Because she saved me!" He protested. "If it wasn't for her, I'd be pushing up the daisies, literally." The two looked at each other and chuckled. Margali cleared her throat, and Nightie quickly snapped back.

"Now that I know the girls predicament to a certain extent, care to elaborate, Veronica? Tell me all about the transformation."

Engel thought back to the day where she lost it. It was a memory as clear as day, "I was being retained by that Russian guy."

"Russians." Margali whispered with distaste. They all laughed.

"And I tried holding my forming back, but my body wouldn't listen. The first time, I was able to hold it back, and I ended up causing myself a lot of pain. I know call it my 'Grinding Gears' half stage. I felt like I was being ripped in half. But the second time, I didn't hold back. And I was pushed over the threshold."

"What caused you to go over?"

"Kurt here, was fatally injured."

"How did you feel?"

"I felt immensely sad, and uncontrollably violent at the same time."

"This is, somewhat troubling."

"What is?" Kurt asked, Veronica began looking around the cabin.

"I saw this earlier in my tea leaves, the child can switch between human an mutant."

"Why is that bad? That's a great thing, in fact. I wish I could do that sometimes." He led his tail over to Engel's chin, and directed it to a corner of the room where there was a bouquet of dried poppies, Veronica's favorite flowers.

Margali sighed. "Because, it makes her extremely unstable. While in her mutant form, she holds much power, and it doesn't help that she has a strong will either. That adds fuel to the fire, and an unstable mutant with that sort of physical and mental strength is never a good thing." They both looked at Veronica. Veronica smiled widely and waved. Kurt chuckled, only to be glared upon by his mother.

"So will you help us now?" Kurt quickly changed the subject. His mother nodded, and went into the back of her wagon. In a matter of minutes, she returned with a dark purple uniform. It was open in the back, and the material went halfway down her thighs. It didn't have sleeves, only two straps going over her shoulders. It was perfect.

"It will stretch with you, and it should never tare." Margali handed the garment over and sat down.

"What if spikes shoot out of my body?"

"It repairs itself. That's my personal upgrade." Margali placed her chin on her hands, and an old smile, withered from many years of use.

"And you just so happened to have it on you?" Veronica held it up to her body.

"I saw you two coming, I prepared ahead of time. Go on! Put it on." Engel stepped out side of wagon, and came back in a few minutes with it all on.

"It fits like a glove! Thank you Margali." Veronica smiled, her expression changed in an instant. She faced the door. "Someone, er, a large group of people, are coming quickly." Veronica narrowed her eyes. "Their intentions aren't of the good kind either!" The three ran out into the open. There was a commotion in the forest, about 20 men popped out from behind the foliage! They carried guns and torches, they shouted, yelled, hollered, causing as much noise as they could. Soon the whole circus family came out to see what the commotion was.

"What are you doing here?!" Margali demanded. The strange men snickered and started to attack the circus folk! They went for anyone and everyone, they seemed to be mutants. Spikes flew everywhere from both sides! Blasts of energy exploded! Veronica could feel something inside of her spark, much like last time. Only, this wasn't as fierce and violent as the last. Kurt started going at the peculiar intruders too. Veronica's eyes changed colors, and her teeth became pointed. Margali grinned.

"So, this is the power I felt before." Her old voice whispered. "It is very interesting to see what unfolds in the girl."

Veronica's muscles bulged, she charged at the group of strangers! "GRAH!" She grunted, grabbing two mens collars, bashed their heads together, and used their unconscious bodies to throw at the others. The new suit was working beautifully, nothing tore or split at the seems. Veronica continued to fight ferociously, but it seemed as though more and more men arrived. People of the circus seemed to fall back, more and more of them became injured. Engel looked around and took an attacker by the neck.

"WHY ARE YOU HERE?" She demanded. The man fainted in fear. She scowled and tossed his body aside.

"My baby! My baby is gone!" A blue haired circus woman shouted. Veronica turned her head to the woman, BANG!

Veronica had been shot in the chest.

Engel looked down at her bleeding wound, and felt the little hole. Kurt glanced over to her and his heart sunk.

"Veronica!" Kurt shouted, ignoring his own fight. The girl dropped to her knees, another bullet ripped through her shoulder! The air around her exploded, just like before! Rocks, dirt, or anything else on the ground went flying. When the dust cleared, Veronica wasn't the white entity from before. She was still around 8 feet tall, but had brown fur covering her body. Her face had grown a stocky muzzle and her ears were pointed, sticking out of the sides of her head. Her legs were much like that of a wolves, her hands were large, with pads on the bottoms of her fingers. Veronica's eyes were silver and half closed. A tail sprang from her lower back. The outfit stretched to fit her size.

"That really hurt. If I were you-" Veronica took a few steps forward. Unlike her previous form's voice, Veronica's voice was cool, collected, maybe even calm. "I would apologize, very soon." Engel stood over the man. The man with the gun dropped to the ground, and started kissing Veronica's feet. Engel scoffed, pulled back her foot, and kicked him into a tree. She looked to the sky, sniffed the air a few time, dropped to all fours, and ran into the woods!

"Engel! Where are you going?!" Kurt chased after her, with much difficulty. Veronica was going extremely fast, and even at her speed, she didn't run into any trees or any foliage. "Engel!" He shouted. "Are you listening to me?" He demanded.

Veronica didn't even glance at him. She stopped, sniffed the air. Kurt was huffing and puffing, he was growing weaker. Keeping up with the child took a lot of teleporting and extreme acrobatics skills. For a moment, Veronica's teeth chattered. Kurt cocked his head to the side.

'She only does that when she's excited, or eating ice cream.'

"Oh! This feels so nice!" Veronica said to herself, chattering her huge chops again. "I feel so careless." She set off again. Kurt decided to follow her.

"Is this a trap? Those men from before seemed, familiar." Kurt delved into his memory from the Grey Suits headquarters. They might have been passing goonies in the many, identical hallways. He shook it off, but was sure to tuck it in the back of his head.

Veronica perked her ears. She must have heard the babies cries. She picked up the pace. So did Kurt. He could hear the babies wails. Veronica heard them a lot sooner than Kurt did. Kurt stopped, he had reached the end of the forest, it opened to a glade with the baby and man in it.

"You!" Veronica's hair bristled on every inch of her skin. She startled growling, baring her teeth, her muscles rippled under her skin. "Leave her be!" Veronica's cool exterior from before was quickly deteriorating. "Give me the baby!"

"Oh Veronica, haven't you been taught any manners?" The man snickered. "It certainly questions your upbringing." The baby screamed. Veronica snapped her jaws, her lips pulled back in a full growl. "You certainly have come a long way since I last saw you. You were just a little baby when I last saw you."

Veronica lashed out, bounding towards the villain with her pearly whites barred. The aggressor tossed the baby into the air! Veronica changed her path and instantly leapt into the air. She caught the baby by it's clothing, carefully holding the baby with her teeth. Veronica set the child in a nearby tree and turned her attention to the man. She sniffed the air.

"You smell foul."

Veronica lunged for the man, he pulled out two knives. He slashed her face, she grazed his. Veronica turned around and stared at the man. He snickered, slicing his blades together. He wiped away the blood on his face. Veronica lunged again, aiming for his stomach. She was able to pin him down, she snapped at his neck. The man held one of the blades in between her jaws and attempted to slash at her with the other one. Veronica took one of her paws and hit it away. The attacker kicked Veronica in the stomach, she flew back. Veronica growled. She lunged again, this time chomping down on the mans right leg.

"You certainly have, gotten stronger." She was biting into metal. She shook her head, whipping the mans body around. Nothing snapped. "It's too bad this form can't shatter cyborg models." He said simply. He wasn't even bleeding. Veronica took him and smashed him into the ground and put her front paws on his chest. Her exterior cooled, and became relaxed again.

"Well, if I can't kill you, you must not be a human. So all I need to do is to find your off switch." Veronica continued to snap, slash, crunch at every one of his limbs. Nothing happened. "You seem pretty calm for someone who is about to die." Veronica made sure the man was pinned down securely.

"I can't. Get that through your head. I can always get repairs."

"Fine, then I'll just rip off your head. Not even cyborgs can live without a head, right?" Veronica took his neck and ripped it off. Wires flew everywhere. Engel dropped the head far away from the body. The baby wailed. Veronica stood on her hind legs and walked to the child. She frowned. Veronica's features of a person slowly started to return. Her tail receded, her paws became full hands, she shrunk in size, her fur became skin and her face shrunk back to human features. "Aw, no more happy feeling." She took the baby from the tree. Kurt bamfed behind her and put his hand on her shoulder.

"They're coming." Veronica soothed the baby as well as she could. Nearly half the circus arrived, Engel walked to the crowd.

"Here, the baby is safe." The distressed mother came forward, her hair was still blue. She was sobbing.

"My baby! My baby! Thank you so much Veronica!" Her expression changed like she was slipping on a mask. Her hair turned red.

"You're welcome. I think she's okay." Veronica handed over the child. The baby cooed and reached out to her mothers warm cheek.

"But are you? For God's sake you were shot twice!" The burly man asked.

"I'm fine! It seems as though my wounds have healed over!" The crowd erupted into random chatter.

"That isn't normal! Even for a mutant, being shot twice should have taken her down!"

"What if she heals quickly?"

"Even then it wouldn't have taken her less than a minute to recover!"

"I wonder if they were real bullets."

"Is that new outfit Margali behind her lack of injury?"

Veronica turned to Kurt. "Um, us this our cue to leave?"

"You are correct." He whispered. Just as the two were about to make their daring escape, Kurt's mother arrived, again.

"What's this I hear about small children being shot?"

Engel gritted her teeth. "Yes, I was shot twice, once in the chest and the other in the shoulder."

"I know that! You're outfit has almost finished regenerating." Margali poked her fingers in the two, small round holes in Veronica's suit.

"Don't worry about me, I seem to be healing over."

"Describe how it felt before and during your form."

Veronica leaned into Margali, and whispered so nobody else could hear. "The pain was all washed away and replaced with euphoria as soon as I stood in that form." She smiled and looked at the crowd. "Quite an odd night for me, eh?"

--

The two travelers were invited, well, more like kidnaped and forced to have dinner with, the whole circus that night. It was loud, but all the voices seemed excited and merry. Wether it was about the sudden arrival of Kurt, or it was just how circus folk always talked. From what Veronica saw, all of these people were happy, decent people.

Dinner was delicious. For the rare occasion, Veronica enjoyed eating red meat and vegetables. They had seasoned steak, green beans and mashed potatoes. If you're wondering just where the circus cooks got all this food, one member of the circus could make duplicates of objects other than himself. Feeding a circus is easier that way.

"So, where have you been young man? Running away in such short notice like that." A good friend of Kurt's demanded. Veronica was sitting closely to her surrogate father, she wasn't enjoying the large crowd very much.

"I've been really busy. Somehow, I've gotten into trouble with my X-Mutant Men friends."

"But you had enough time to take in a little girl?"

"I'm not little!" Veronica corrected. "I'm just vertically challenged." The other two laughed.

"We met in Chicago, and she hasn't left me since." He grinned. He then goes to say in an exaggerated, silly voice "My DEVILISH good looks made her tag along with me. No one can resist the Nightcrawler." He smoothed back his hair and flashed a smile from ear to ear. The two girls burst out laughing. The rest of dinner lasted for about half an hour. Then came dessert, which was vanilla ice cream. Veronica gobbled hers up faster than anyone in under the tent.

"Don't you ever get brain freeze?" Kurt asked his half-adopted daughter.

"Nope!"

"Ugg, just watching you eat that so fast makes my head ache."

Veronica smiled. "I know!" The two chuckled. Veronica looked around as everyone began finishing. "Who washes all the plates?" Kurt pointed to walking mannequins. They took the plates and carried them off. "Cool!"

"We have a lady here who can turn in inanimate objects to life. It's really cool to watch her part of the show, she'll bring cars, statues, trees even the entire tent to life!" Veronica smiled.

"That's so cool! May I see her?"

"You're looking at her!" The woman sitting next to Kurt waved. She had curly brown hair and light olive skin.

"Can you make the dish run away with the spoon?" Were the first words out of Veronica's mouth. The woman laughed.

"Of course!" She touched a dish and a spoon, her hand glowed blue. The silverware jumped to life! The two got close to each other, and literally, ran away together. Veronica laughed.

"What's your name?" Veronica asked, still watching the plate and spoon run around the dinner table. Now that they had run away, they had no place to run to, so they ran around in circles bumping into each other or random things.

"Ariana."

"That's a pretty name." Engel looked up.

"Thank you!"

Kurt yawned. "Excuse me!"

"You're excused." Veronica too, yawned.

"I think it's best; we should get going." Kurt proclaimed, standing up. Ariana pulled him back down.

"No! Stay with us!" Her big brown eyes begged for him to stay.

"Okay, I suppose we could stay the night."

Veronica brightened up. "Sounds good!"

"Can you feel any of them?" Kurt asked Engel quietly.

Veronica zoned out, staring at her plate. After a minute, she had an answer. "Nope. For now, it's just us."

The two, well, more like Kurt, talked to everyone for a while. It was after 12 when they finally retired to Ariana's wagon. Her assistant was sick, and was getting treatment for the night, so there was an extra bed for Kurt and Veronica to squeeze into.

"I'm sorry you two, it's a bit messy." She apologized, attempting to clean up a little. Her room was draped with rich colors, especially purple, red, blue and white. She had many little trinkets, some of them were moving around. There were dolls of every sort everywhere, dancing, having tea parties, playing school, anything. Children Books and Comics were nostalgically scattered about her room and on her bed. There was a snow globe where two ice skaters were skating together inside. From what Veronica could tell, Ariana was a true child at heart, despite her age of around 26.

"It's no problem." Veronica looked around her small room, she had personal letters written in Greek pinned on the ceiling above her bed.

"Are you Greek Ariana?"

"I am. Why do you ask?"

"I can't read that." Engel pointed to the letters. Ariana smiled.

"They're letters from my parents and fiance over in Italy. My parents moved to Italy from Greece, but don't know a thing of Italian. My fiance is Italian too, but he only knows that I'm in a traveling circus, my parents think I'm working at a law firm in England." She rolled her eyes. "What a boring life."

The three got ready for bed, by brushing their teeth and changing. Kurt and Engel squeezed onto the mattress, and Ariana just simply flopped down onto hers. After an hour, Kurt was still awake, but Veronica was asleep.

"Oi, Ariana." Nightcrawler whispered.

"Hm?" Ariana was face down.

"You asleep?"

"Not now."

Kurt chuckled. "Sorry about that."

"It's okay, sleep has avoided me lately anyways. What do you need?"

"Where is, Amanda?"

"She's in Russia right now, with business."

"Oh, okay."

"Do you miss her?" She asked, restraining a yawn.

"Ja, it's been, too long since I last saw her." Kurt sighed and curled his toes.

"Why don't you go see her?" Ariana asked.

"Well, a few reasons. One, I haven't known where she is. Two, well, I just don't know how to approach her at this point. I mean, we haven't seen each other in over 6 years."

"Stop worrying so much, I'm sure Amanda misses you too. Don't worry about it."

"Okay, thanks Ariana."

"Who's Amanda?" Veronica sat up.

"Bah!" Ariana fell out of bed! Kurt started laughing hysterically. "Both of you! Sleep now!"

--

The parting of Kurt and the circus was very lengthy and boring. The same thing said over and over, 'we'll miss you', 'visit us more often'. They were given new clothes and clean cloaks as parting gifts. Veronica soon grew annoyed, and thought up a clever plan.

"Kurt, I can feel them coming." She lied. Kurt looked down at her and smiled.

"Yeah right. Keep trying Engel." Veronica huffed.

"Oh phewy." She exasperated. It was a boring half an hour. Before they left, Margali came up to Veronica and pulled her aside.

"Now Veronica, I want you to tame that fire inside of you. Once you learn how to control it, it will become a beautiful thing."

"How will I do that?"

"You don't let your emotions take over so easily. Try focusing on forming on your own at any given time."

Veronica looked at the old woman. "Okay, I will."

-Three Days Later-

The two made it to a small city in Austria. Engel took in all the smell, sights, and sounds of that city. The air was thick with street vendor's food, it smelt like roasted nuts and crepes. The beautiful, ancient architecture of all the houses was amazingly detailed, untouched and unaltered since the days of Mozart. Even the major political buildings were unchanged, and their handy work was even more beautiful; angels, gargoyles, women, anything and everything was etched into the old stone. Music lazily wafted through the air, a violin Sonata. Veronica searched for the music, and found that someone was practicing on their balcony. The girl smiled as they passed the balcony. The violin man smiled heartily down at Veronica, and gave her a friendly nod. The cathedral bells sang a beautiful song, before chiming 9 times.

Kurt had other things on his mind. Perhaps what that Grey Suit back in Germany was just a coincidence; but how did he know Veronica? It was unlikely she was connected to them, they wouldn't have let a little girl get away from their tight grasp so easily.

"Kurt, I've been thinking-"

"What?! You? Thinking? Are you feeling alright?" He felt her forehead.

Veronica was not amused. "Yes. Believe it or not, I do think."

"Okay, good. As long as it's a normal thing."

The two laughed. "What do you need to tell me?"

"Since you just can't get yourself to hide your energy, I've heard of a trick we could try out."

"Which would be?"

Engel looked up at Kurt. "I was wondering if we could link energies."