"Untouchable"
Chapter Three
"Mind Over Matter"
(I know there is more than we can see)
The rain was gentle, pouring out of a sky turned gray. She saw her hand as it reached out, fingers eager, trying to catch the droplets. His hand, in turn, slid through her hair, tracing a half-circle around her scalp and came to rest on her cheek. His brow was furrowed, the glow of his eyes behind the ruby quartz glasses faint. He didn't look worried, he just looked... sad. She felt an ache in her chest, the knot there making its presence known.
"You don't have to move." He said, "Don't move."
Rogue looked. They were on a rooftop. Her head was on his lap.
There was a family rebars impaling her through the torso.
Oh.
There was no pain. Her body felt irrelevant somehow, as if it didn't matter at all that it was there.
"What happened?" she asked.
"You were so brave..." he said, his voice choking, "You were so strong..."
"Scott..?"
"It's me." he said, nodding, "I'm here."
"But Ah'm not safe... am Ah?"
"I'm so sorry." He said.
"It's alright." Rogue lifted a hand to caress his cheek, "You're here with me. Ah don't want nothin else."
Her body began becoming relevant again, chiming in. Pain was beginning to register.
"I saw it too late, I..." Scott choked, "I couldn't do anything."
"Shh, it's alright, sugah." Rogue said, feeling tears in her eyes, "It's alright. Ah've got you."
A sound in the distance. A dumpster being torn to shreds.
"Wha-"
"The others." He said, shaking his head, "The city is a maze. They'll never get out. If only it counted for something... I still can't save you."
"Ya don't have ta save me." pain, insistent, crying out for attention, "Ah'm too far gone. Ya just haven't noticed it, 'cause Ah ain't shown it to you yet."
"But I can." He said, "All you need to do is to let me."
"Ah want to. Ah want it... Ah want you."
A window breaking, far away and down the sprawling labyrinth.
Pain, singing. Humming nerve endings, so much like strings, being strummed furiously.
"Scott, it hurts..." Rogue whimpered.
"I know..." he said, caressing her hair, "I know."
Someone was screaming in the background.
Rogue woke up with a start, hands instinctively roaming her stomach, searching for the rebars. Her panic lasted only a few moments and subsided when she saw that she wasn't injured. Next to her, Scott stirred and tugged on the covers. Rogue's eyes darted all over the familiar surroundings of her room. Walk-in closet to her right, two dressers directly across, another closet, door half-open, to the left of those and finally, to her left, the navy blue black-out curtains, slightly ajar to let in the pale daylight.
She ran a hand through her hair, trying to get herself to calm down.
The smell of the evening, of the slowly cooling concrete (the brick-and-mortar) was still fresh in her nostrils.
Rogue laid back down and let her thoughts run for a while, eye-contacting the ceiling. She hadn't had the dream in a good long while. This was her first since the Academy of Tomorrow. The dreams seemed to have deserted her along with the echoes, save for his that always kept her company.
She glanced at Scott, sleeping contentedly next to her.
You couldn't save me... but from what? An accident? Did I fall?
...did I die?
She reached out. Her fingertips lightly touched his back, feeling the muscles under his t-shirt. She could feel him breathing. It made her ache inside. She withdrew her hand.
So close, yet so far.
It was just fabric, preventing her from reaching his flesh. It was just flesh, keeping her away from his soul.
You couldn't save me... and the weird thing is, I don't think I wanted you to.
Her eyes darted to Scott's glasses, sitting on his bedstand. The frames, glaring even in the sparse light of a winter morning, were there, right where he always put them before switching to his goggles.
Rogue saw that the lenses were broken.
They aren't made of ruby quartz, she said...
Carol stepped into Hank's lab, and stopped. She wasn't quite ready for the sight of him hanging upside down from what, to her, appeared to be a jungle gym mounted to the ceiling. He was as still as a statue, eyes rapidly scanning the pages of the book in his hand. She tried to catch the title, reading it flipped, and saw that it was Bob Woodward's The Mutant Solution. He seemed too engrossed in the book to notice her enter. She gently cleared her throat to announce herself.
Henry closed the book and smiled.
"Marvelous piece of fly-on-the-wall journalism." He said, "I always imagine Woodward as a small, ill-fitting figure in a meeting room in the Pentagon, crouched in a corner, short-handing every word that's being said onto a pad with a Uniball. It is as if he goes completely unnoticed by everyone else; like a ghost witness, who just happens to be a terrific writer."
"It's often been said." Carol said.
Hank jumped down with a graceful move, landed on his free hand, and pushed himself up. He slid the book into the side pocket of his white lab coat.
"You look lovely today." He said with a warm smile, "I suppose you want your results."
Carol smiled sheepishly.
"What's the diagnosis, doc?" she asked.
"Would you float for me, please?"
"Excuse me?"
"Would you float? I'm afraid there isn't enough space in here for you to fly."
Carol, confused, rose a few feet into the air, holding the exact same posture. It was as if she was still on the ground. Hank's eyes darted to her shoes, polished to perfection, to see if she had gone en pointe, as fliers tended to do. Subconscious aerodynamics, he called it. She, however, hadn't, which made her the only one in his repertoire of fliers.
"Fascinating." He said, "I don't know if you're manipulating your mass, or adjusting the gravity around you at will. It is usually the latter. What I do know, however, is that you are not doing it because of the X-Gene."
Carol dropped like a stone and stumbled, but managed to keep her footing.
"The X-Gene inhabits the 23rd chromosome," Hank said, "The reason is still unknown, but that's where the anomalies are. Your DNA, on the other hand, is perfectly normal – that is to say, there are no chromosomal anomalies that I could find. Simply put, Ms. Marvel, they were wrong in dishonorably discharging you for the reason that they did. You are not a mutant."
Charles pulled his tie into place. The knot was a bit thinner this time, he felt, but he also knew that he alone could tell the difference. He found bowties distasteful, and favored by and large by positive sciences professors. A tie was a catch-all, and it afforded him the image of an everyman, one of the sapiens, almost.
Almost. Not quite.
He secured the tie with his silver pin, a family heirloom. He began buttoning up the vest of his three-piece suit, from the bottommost button up.
It was routine, rigorously enforced, and it allowed him to focus his thoughts. Presently, however, nothing was helping with Logan standing there, hands in his jeans' pockets, looking at him expectantly.
"Can anything in the security systems corroborate that?" Charles asked. He took his jacket from the low hanger bar.
"No. Last thing Beast remembers is giving us to go-ahead. The security footage just shows you for hours. Nothin' 'bout how we ended up back in bed, right as rain."
"I suppose it is possible to manipulate the systems." Charles slipped the jacket on and worked at settling it – it'd be his skin for the day, "Any technopath would have the ability."
"Chuck, why're ya dodgin' the question?" Logan felt for the small device in his left pocket, "Ya know we didn' jus' have the same nightmare."
"I am not." Charles turned his wheelchair around to face Logan, "But what would you have me do..? I cannot afford to disappear at such a crucial time. I cannot let the students know, because they would panic, and we are not in a position to afford mistakes borne from fear. So, I ask you: what would you have me do?"
Logan smiled.
"I have an idea, or three."
"I'm open to suggestions."
"Ya ain't gonna like it."
Carol sat down on the nearest available stool. Hank let her process what she had just heard. He himself was having trouble with the idea that a non-X-Gene carrier could possess the abilities that she did. To him, the prospect of studying her genetic make-up was an exciting prospect, and given that he had actually gotten quite a lot more than his DaVinci sleep last night, he was raring to go.
But Carol wasn't a lab animal, he knew, so he provided her with some human decency, so to speak.
"Then..." Carol licked her lips, "...what am I?"
"According to this," Hank pointed at a small mountain of spreadsheets and print-outs, "You are a baseline human. Nothing out of the ordinary, well, perhaps with the exception of your Chem 9. Every variable is perfect. It's almost machine-like, the way your body keeps everything at exactly the median."
"But what does it mean?" Carol asked, "I am not a geneticist, Doctor, I'm a fighter pilot. At least, I used to be, and you're telling me that I lost everything because of too good health?"
"There are other ways to interpret it. I need a little more time."
"But is that close to your final diagnosis? Far as you can tell?"
"As far as anyone in this room, or up there can tell, you are..." Hank smiled, "...somewhat paradoxically, a normal mutant."
Carol couldn't help but laugh.
Rogue practically kicked down the French doors leading to Charles' bedroom, storming in with her fists clenched. She ignored the mid-conversation that she had entered into, ignored Logan's hand rising to tell her to wait. She stood in front of the professor and with a flick of her wrist, threw him the frames of Scott's broken glasses. He caught it.
"Stripe, what're-" Logan began, but Rogue spoke.
"Explain." She said to Charles, "The first thing Cassandra Nova said was they wasn't made of ruby quartz. Scott optic blasted 'em to bits. How?"
Charles twirled the frames in his hand. The lenses were broken, and by the angling, he had no choice but to conclude that the force had come from the inner side.
"...Logan, I take that back. You are right." Charles said.
"Right about what?" Rogue asked.
"This may have happened once," Logan said, "But I'd put odds on it happenin' again. Call it bein' paranoid, I'll take it – but I'd rather take some precautions before squarin' off against that psycho bitch."
Charles raised an eyebrow.
"I'm not gonna pull punches just 'cause she's in yer body." Logan said.
The day was indistinct for most, comprised mostly of trying to find a bit of joy in the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads. Each of them, even the most free-spirited, felt the weight of yesterday's decision. Some took to the streets of Bayville, much to the protestations of the other and their teachers, in attempt to try and enjoy what they were sure was their final days of freedom.
Kitty dragged Lance through every place that he had avoided, to show him everything that she had found wonderful about what had become her home. Whenever someone sneered at them, whenever someone yelled a portend of doom, she just raised her fist into the air in defiance, as if to say: mutant and proud.
Rogue spent her last day of freedom in the gazebo, wondering. If she had just been Anna Marie in the first place, she thought, none of this would have happened. Maybe Anna Marie would've been beautiful, maybe Anna Marie would've been a singer in some band nobody would ever hear of, and maybe Anna Marie could hold her lover's hand without panicking.
Or maybe Anna Marie didn't know who the fuck she was and the Rouge was always clearer.
The night came fast. Despite attempts to rest during the day, those chosen for Logan's vigil shuffled off to the locker room to put on their combat uniforms did so feeling tired already. When he got to the Danger Room doors, he found Jean waiting for him there. In full uniform, arms crossed, her face carrying her trademark come-fuck-with-me expression.
"I made the call, Red." Logan said with a sigh, "You're out."
"But why? You're perfectly fine with putting Scott in there!"
"Yeah, 'cause he ain't a telepath. I'm guessin' –and work with me here- if Cassandra Nova shares a body with Charles, she has access to his telepathy. And so yours."
"Mine?"
"Is Chuck a telekinetic or somethin'?"
"No. Well, just a little – every telepath is. He has enough power to move marbles, very small objects..."
"Not enough to tear chunks offa the walls, is what you're sayin'."
Jean thought about it. She hung her head.
"Yes."
"I thought that if somethin' tried to fuck with our heads in there, you'd come in. I was wrong. It turned you into a weapon against us, piggybacked on your power. Can't have it. 'sides, if shit goes south, I'd rather have the team leader where she can lead, not fightin' for her life in the crisis she's not even supposed to be managin', get me?"
Jean nodded.
"Now take that off and get to bed." Logan said, "If anythin' happens, I'll scream."
Logan smiled. Jean didn't.
Charles did not enjoy sleeping while wearing his day suits – it was something he had done many a night in his Harvard years, huddled in the corner of the library, clutching a book for dear life, trying to shut out the voices that his weariness kept letting in. This was not going to be quite the same, he knew. He was presently in the center of the Danger Room, having taken a relaxing bath, changed into a navy blue suit and refreshed, so to speak, for the night ahead. Around him, lining the edges of the room, was his guard detail for the night, and, he assumed, for the nights to come... at least until he was required to find a more permanent solution.
If the same thing happened.
His vigil consisted of Cyclops, Rogue, Jean and Logan, the same intercept team that had gone in the previous night. It was tactically sound, he had to admit: long-distance, jack of all trades, and killer. It disgusted him to think of Logan that way, but knowing that he was indeed the best at what he did didn't give him much of a choice.
There was, however, one more member, one that he didn't quite understand. Charles glanced over his shoulder, at Carol Danvers. She was standing there at full attention, as if she was just a cadet in the Lackland Base, her eyes locked onto him. She had been Hank's suggestion, and her role in a possible altercation was, as he had said, the element of surprise.
"Everything's all set." Hank's gentle voice faded in, "Psi-shields are up. We're standing by, Charles."
"Very well."
Charles held the neuro-suppressor firmly. It was round, black, made of some composite polymer that he couldn't identify. The side facing him had small, chrome claws lined in a circle, like the mouth of an octopus. The other side would have a chrome circle, and an LED light to indicate that it was working. He took a deep breath and steadied himself.
Then, with one swift move, Charles attached the device to his forehead. He registered the barest hint of a pinching sensation before all went black.
The first hour passed without incident. Nothing was said. It took most of them ten to fifteen minutes to start settling into more comfortable positions. Carol remained the same. Hank checked in every fifteen minutes to keep them focused. It failed after the first call. They started talking about the finer points of the Registration Act to pass the time. Hank joined in after not too long a while, correcting a mistake Rogue made – that the law wouldn't require them to out themselves as mutants, and the disclosure of mutant identities would be a felony. They would, however, be required to make the specifics of their mutations available to the government, most likely by submitting forms to be included in a database.
The discussion was nearing the slippery slope arguments when Carol shifted. All present turned their attention to her. She took one shaky step forward, and then another, and on the third, she dropped, limbs flailing as she fell. Scott moved, sprinting to get to Carol, followed by Rogue.
Carol crumbled in a heap on the ground, her eyes closed.
"The fuck is –" Logan began, but something hit him – lifted him up and slammed him against the glass of the observation deck. The force withdrew immediately after the impact, and let gravity do its work. Logan fell down with a metallic sound.
Scott turned towards Charles, hand on the firing stud, but as soon as his fingertips had touched it, his knees buckled. He went down fast, his consciousness slipping almost instantly.
"Scott!"
Rogue got to Scott's side and went down on one knee. She took him by the shoulders and began to shake him.
"Scott, come on!"
In her head, there was a whisper, faint but insistent:
The city is waiting.
Logan growled in frustration as he was lifted up again. He circled the air and slammed against the armored glass once more, creating splintering cracks, before being allowed to fall again, hands clawing the air.
Rogue's eyelids grew heavier and heavier, and she tried to hold on, but all she could do in the end was to grab hold of Scott's hand before she collapsed between him and Carol.
The streets aren't safe when you are there, Anna Marie.
"Hank!" Logan managed to let out as the glass crunched, the cracks growing wider every second, signaling that it was ready to break, "What the... fuck..."
Logan spun as he fell again, this time on her back, and before he hit the ground, he saw the bright overhead lights of the Danger Room, like the light at the end of the tunnel, gleaming.
Silence in the Danger Room. Quiet in the mansion. No sound recorded in the stock footage cameras left outside.
The first steps of Cassandra Nova echoed in the Danger Room as she stood from the wheelchair that had bound her brother for most of his life. She was used to the flurry of inputs, the unfiltered feedback of the physical; having a penis, for instance, when she wasn't supposed to. Feeling its presence there, still virile but forgotten, buried beneath the mind. The legs, too. Weaker than they were supposed to but still moveable with just a little telekinetic energy.
"Finally free." Cassandra said, Charles Xavier's voice already distorting into her own, "Finally born."
She inhaled deeply, drinking in the rich sensorium fuel of different scents, experienced through the noses present. Smelling, by proxy, the ripples made in their subconscious minds by the olfactory input. Freak perfume, distinguished not by the actual scents, their textures or indications, but by the experiences closely tied to each one. Metal, unconsciously smelt, was prison for one. Pain for another. Loss for another.
For her, it was pure pleasure.
"Welcome home." She said to herself and giggled like, as Charles would say, a schoolgirl.
