Chapter Four: Bardo

Once he'd been through Hell, life was easy. His parents and Emma got together for his sixteenth birthday and barely irritated him. Melody was most certainly not pregnant, although not for lack of trying. When he wouldn't see her anymore, she spread the most awful rumors. Owen and Theresa believed her and vanished from his life, but his dad said breakups did that.

For a long time, Nate didn't trust anyone. He focused on studies and sports and gradually the excitement around him died down. Ethan still talked to him. He said his friends, Honor and Tessa, were "kind of a thing", so Nate could hang out without people thinking he was a creep. Honor's mother fostered a boy, Renegade, who started hanging out, too. Nate and his friends were untouchable, which suited them fine.

Jean moved into Logan's cabin.

Rogue revealed she was pregnant. With twins.

It was just life stuff and life was easy. But easy wasn't what he craved. His father wouldn't let him join the active X-roster until he'd trained for two years, so he added mock-combat to his list of activities. The process could've been stream lined; there was too much down time. But the point wasn't really to train for two solid years; it was to test one's resolve.

Meanwhile, he partied too hard with his friends. They'd steal a car, sneak out after curfew, lie about their age, and then drink, dance, and blow away the painful meaninglessness from their easy lives. The next step in human evolution. Millions of years of survival skills honed so he could steal liquor and drugs. Very little made him proud.

Rogue's pregnancy had been high-risk due to the unstable nature of her mutation. Before Gambit left for a mission, they'd gotten into a fight and her blood pressure rose dangerously. In order to save her life, the twins would have to be delivered prematurely.

But Honor, the little girl who knew things, insisted that Nate could heal them with a touch. By faith, he succeeded.

This ability brought him gratification, but he wouldn't admit it.

Rogue safely delivered her babies, Oli and Becca, in the summer. That Christmas, his dad and Emma got married and she was already pregnant. Third time's the charm? It seemed like the elders were preparing to step aside, but the world was no more tolerant of mutants.

*The season of carnage is over,* Chiron instructed. *We are healers.*

"Whose gonna replace my dad? Mutant kind needs soldiers, not diplomats. We can heal things once we're safe."

*Things will never be safe until they're healed.*

After that, Chiron withdrew.

It was a booming year for mutant births. His dad and Emma had a little girl they named Megan. Bishop hooked up with Honor's mom and they had a daughter, too. Nate was lucky to have one hour without hearing an infant scream or some woman complain about chapped nipples. But the most important birth happened in Alaska.

She was only a little girl – just like Meg. But in Bishop's future, she'd been responsible for a massacre and a war and mutant genocide. So he killed her. He snuffed her out like an ant at his picnic.

How did Cyclops retaliate? By sending a special-ops team to murder Bishop.

Nate could justify carnage to conserve or protect, but that wasn't what his father did. He had a man murdered in cold blood. His father didn't listen to Honor sob; he didn't lament turning Bishop's daughter into a half-orphan. He had corrupted Xavier's dream.

Healing the wounds wasn't what Nate wanted. So instead he and Honor cooked up a hair-brain scheme to time travel. They'd send the baby into the distant future, making Bishop think he'd killed her, and help him escape into the time stream, too. They succeeded, but his father never trusted him again. The cranky old man was like that. With Cyclops, it was all or nothing.

The time displacement drove Gambit mad and he attacked Honor. She was badly shaken but otherwise alright. He escaped. Desperate to find him before he harmed himself, her family asked the X-Men for help. Emma found him but he wouldn't cooperate. There was an altercation and she nearly erased his mind. Self-dense? Rogue didn't buy it.

A schism deep and dark split the team. Wolverine sided with Rogue against Emma and Cyclops in a race to find Gambit while quarrelling with each other.

Nate didn't want to, but he took Honor's side. First, because he knew this was his fault, but also, he thought he'd keep her sane. He didn't realize she'd deceived him until it was too late. She and Ethan had decided that destroying Cerebro was their best chance, and when Emma stood in their way, they shattered her diamond form. She was six months pregnant with Nate's little brother.

"I'm sorry," Honor said, as if that made things better.

Nate still thought of her as that possessed little girl begging for help. He wished he'd never fallen for it. He wished he could un-do their past.

Cyclops was shattered by his loss.

Worse, Honor had locked herself in Cerebro as she detonated it from inside.

What had their war won them?

*Have you had your fill of carnage?*

Chiron returned and he was able to re-create Emma from the shards. Miraculously, the baby survived, too. He discovered Gambit had fled to the Shi'ar. Their solution was the same as Emma's, to erase his mind, and he'd gone along with it. Nate returned his memories, helped him find his way home, and telepathically delivered this information to Rogue and Wolverine. Then he gave Emma and his dad a glimpse into Rogue's heart. Words never would have convinced them. Finally, Honor wasn't dead (and he didn't even have to time-travel). She'd been rescued from her suicide mission at the last moment by Nightcrawler.

In the aftermath of suffering, Nate wanted peace, but Chiron demanded to bring peace where there was strife. His cosmic overlord commanded him to venture into the unknown. Graduation was just around the proverbial corner. That was unknown enough. By now, he'd determined not to follow his father, so he'd move back to Alaska and help his mom and Uncle Alex with their flight business.

*You must go into a foreign land,* Chiron argued.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you to look before you leap?"

*We have served our time! You are a freed slave who clings to the safety of the chain!*

Easily said by one who needs nothing to survive. Nate wasn't going to rush head-long into the unknown, no matter how much his tyrannical conscious demanded it.

Once again, Chiron abandoned him.

"Say cheese!"

Nate, wearing blue cap and gown, stretched his lips grotesquely and squeezed his eyes shut.

His mom smacked her lips. "Not like that, Nathan! I want a real smile!"

She followed him with that damn camera all afternoon and only got a "real" smile when Uncle Alex shouted joyously and threw Nate over his shoulder. When he was lined up in the hall, she crept in and demanded to get a picture with him and his friends.

"These people aren't my friends, Mom. Our last names happen to be close in the alphabet."

"Don't be such a sour puss!" Melody chided him. "Your mom's proud of you. Cheese!"

For some reason, she hugged him and smiled broadly. They literally hadn't spoken in years, but here she was, pretending to be his friend. And his mom, not knowing any better, took the picture.

"Burn that picture!"

"Why? She's a pretty girl. What's her name?"

"Satan. Burn that picture or my soul is hers."

"Oh! They're starting the ceremony."

She blew him a kiss and waved as if he were starting kindergarten, not graduating high school. Moms.

They gathered in the stadium, front and center while teacher after teacher made a political statement disguised as valuable life advice. Valuable or invaluable? Were they the same thing? Hopefully the advice would be better than his education. Nate looked up and down the line, mentally calculating how long it'd be until his name was called. That's when he heard a whistle.

"Missile!" he shouted a second too late.

It slammed into the ground, throwing bodies and dirt aside. Pandemonium sparked immediately. Parents ran for their kids, students screamed for their friends.

Nate summoned Chiron but it didn't answer.

The exits exploded, debris sealing off any escape. People stampeded in blind panic but Nate couldn't move. Across the stage, he watched Sophie and her sisters collapse from telepathic assault. This was the moment his father had trained him for, but now that danger had come, he stood frozen. Fear hadn't imprisoned him. Chiron had.

Outside the stadium, he heard a series of explosions. Someone had gotten out and flanked the attackers.

*Now!*

He soared into the air and to the action. Kitty Pryde and Honor were the heroes of the day! They'd managed to sneak out and destroy the missile-launching vehicles. Honor blasted, ran, ducked, and then stood to blast again. Kitty displayed impressive control over her powers by phasing through bullets and barriers but returning to full-form to attack.

Nate erected a psionic barrier and swept the villains together.

'They have biological weapons!' Honor broadcasted.

He realized if the Purifiers couldn't massacre the student body, they would settle for inflicting the Legacy Virus. The fatal disease was a brutal and certain death.

Chiron snapped up the bio-weapons, shot into the atmosphere, and then soared into deep space. The Virus was a living thing, which meant it had limits. (Apparently he learned more from science than vocabulary.) After two days without warmth or air, the Virus ceased to be a threat and he returned home.

X-DHEC was waiting.

"Quarantine! Now!" barked Wolverine.

"Alright, alright. Bring my X-Box though. I'm bored."

He thought himself invincible, but while waiting out the quarantine period, he started to feel sick. Very sick.

"This doesn't make any sense," he whimpered.

*Now. Now we journey into unknown land.*

Time didn't exist in the land of illness. Agony unparalleled ripped through his flesh, and the pain compounded with loneliness. The demons were back. Tiny metallic atoms devoured him from the inside, and every wave he defeated brought fresh recruits. There was no epiphany. No escape. This was suffering without end.

He awoke dying of thirst. For some reason, the doctors had encased him in steel.

His mom pounced on his arm. "Natey? Oh, my baby!"

Struggling to breathe and speak, he managed to croak, "Mom…? You were right… No one should… see you without make-up."

"You spoiled rotten brat! I haven't slept in months! Doctors told me you wouldn't make it and I prayed every day and God answered my prayers and this is the gratitude you show me!" She showered his face with kisses.

Turns out, the hospital hadn't covered him in metal sheeting. That was him. The Legacy Virus turned its victims into solid steel, but it hadn't conquered all of him. Part of his chest, his left arm, right eye and part of his dick were permanently disfigured. But he was alive.

While Nate struggled through physical therapy, Emma had a baby boy, Alexander. As he learned to contain the still-active Legacy Virus, Honor partied in Paris. While the school was re-built and his friends left for college, he waited for X-DHEC to determine his contagion threat.

Mom wanted him to return home, which had been the plan prior to his illness. But Chiron still beckoned him into the unknown. When he told Mom his completely ill-defined plans, she raised hell. His dad, however, was up for an adventure.

"We'll gas up the Cessna and let the winds guide us."

"If action movies have taught me anything," Nate said, "we'll end up fighting grizzly bears and eating tree bark."

They hitched a ride to the airport with Honor's parents. She was returning from her holiday in Paris. The summer had been kinder to her. Her strawberry-blonde locks were cut boyishly short (very European) and she now filled out a sweater. When she saw him, she giggled and ran to hug him. Equally juvenile, he lifted her off her feet and swung her around. A bolt of lightning struck through them. He shouldn't have been so immature – she wasn't a little girl anymore.

Helloes and good-byes later, he and his dad followed the Northern breeze.

Nate mentally replayed that embrace for days. Each time, he cursed himself for everything he did and didn't do.

Cape Spear, Canada
They'd only planned to pause for gas and supplies, but a dense fog delayed them. Nate didn't mind. He was getting sick of Rush.

They grabbed dinner at a nameless diner straight out of the X-Files. A lot of drivers and pilots did. As their food went cold, the fog became impenetrable, and Nate could hear himself breathe in the crowded, stark restaurant.

His dad put a quarter in the jukebox. Another damned Rush song. If he thought the noise would break the tension, he was sorely mistaken. Every off-key shrill made their solid shoulders stiffer. Nate was so desperate that he considered ripping the box from the wall.

Something slammed against a window. The lights flickered and the song skipped.

'Truth is false and logic lost-
Truth is false and logic lost-
Truth is false-'

"Forget this!" a man declared and stormed out.

Nate's stomach dropped. He shouldn't have left – the fog was certain death. It was creeping inside through the juke box.

"Something followed us," his dad said quietly.

"No," he said, "Something called us."

Before his courage failed, Nate walked over and grabbed the juke box.

Floating in glass
Bubbles circle over
An unborn fetal mass
Lighter than a prayer.
Teeth rip open clean
A pack of wolves devour
Humanity's unborn dreams
Rendered broken.
Sinking in despair,
Hope circles over
Pieces trying to repair.
Yearning for each other,
Yearning for each other.
Painful to the touch,
Cannot surrender to embrace.
Darkness claims much,
Fueled by light misplaced.
Each yearning for the other,
Yearning for the other.

*I am light you can reach.*

At first, the dark brushed him with reluctant, ghostly tentacles. When it realized he spoke the truth, it devoured him. Wave after wave of agony and ecstasy shook him until his bones dislocated.

*That's enough, you'll kill me!*

Drained, he collapsed on the floor. For a long time, he was too weak to speak or open his eyes. His dad helped him back into the booth. After a soda, Nate realized the diner had emptied. The fog was gone, too. Everything throbbed.

"I gotta pee," he mumbled.

"Sure you don't need a doctor?"

He waved his dad off and stumbled into the restroom. Standing at the urinal, he saw the Legacy Virus had claimed another inch of flesh.

…

To Be Continued..