Spring Break

--- Day 6, Thursday

"There you are." With the voice, he became aware of a soft swik-swik noise, no louder than a butterfly in flight. "Second morning in a row we've missed you at breakfast, Alex. She'd give you hell."

"Sorry. Just been thinking; I don't always realize it is time to turn around." He took the cold bottle of juice Betsy offered him with a smile. He knew she couldn't see it, but she could feel it. He held still as she sat down next to him, her white cane stretching out before her. He'd watched her using the simple fiberglass rod in training- it wasn't a foil, but she could fence with it, and it would raise a welt when it bit.

She didn't look at him, but across the road, towards where she knew the water should be. They were on the roof of the hostel, where there was a patio and lounge area. "Do you think you are the only one who misses her?"

"No, of course not." Alex looked at his friend, reading the lines of hurt and tiredness that she let slip though her mask. The young anglo-chinese warrior had a talent for hiding her emotions, the child of two cultures renowned for being reserved had a special gift for it that had nothing to do with her x-gene. He knew why she looked so tired, to- Laura was the one person who seemed to forget that Betsy was blind. When she had to say something, it was no different than if one of them had their hands full and couldn't see where they were going or there was something behind them. "But maybe I forgot. I'm sorry."

"She loves you, you know." She took off her dark glasses. She didn't do that very often. She turned, looking at Alex. In the strong, clear Florida sunlight, the dark blue of her irises was almost purple, while her pupils shown red, the fluid of her eyes stained with blood from the pressure of the explosion that had brought out her gifts. "In her nightmare, she was saving you and Logan for last. I could feel it."

Alex shuddered. It was hard not to. But Betsy hadn't told him that before. Maybe because he wouldn't have listened. "I've been selfish, haven't I."

"Yes, you have. You big jerk." She jabbed him lightly with her elbow. "I've been ok, I talked to the others. You haven't even talked to Flea about it, or Kurt or Remy. You didn't even talk to the Professor and we had to throw him at you."

"Huh?"

"Why do you think we were doing paperwork and research for him? Kitty and I thought it might get you to talk to him. You could have hurt yourself with some of these stunts you've been pulling; Laura would have my butt if you did. You need to talk to someone."

Alex didn't like the idea of someone peeking in his head. He'd already growled at Jean about her well intentioned snooping. That had really gotten Scott's shorts in a bunch, they hadn't had a fight like that since they were little kids. But he knew Betsy wasn't invading his privacy, she could read him pretty well just of body language.

"Alex, I wasn't reading you- you get all prickly feeling when you think someone is in your head. You and Laura both; like hedgepigs." She slid her glasses back on.

"Like a couple of hedgehogs?" He chuckled as he stood up, holding his hands out to her. "Come here."

She frowned, seeing the pattern of his life force with her telepathy, and took his hands, standing. She smiled as he wrapped his arms around her, hugging her tightly. He stepped back after a moment. "You know, you could find yourself a guy of your own to worry about. It's not like there is any shortage of volunteers."

Her eyebrow twitched in annoyance. Most of the Xavier students had adopted it, after having been on the receiving side of it from Storm and Logan. "They would all treat me like I was made of glass. I might be blind, but I can still see most things. And I don't know why you blokes think I'm pretty, I have seen myself before." She reached up, stroking the edge of the red birth mark that sketched over her eyes, almost dagger shaped. She knew how bad it looked, and she didn't want their pity. She hated it when people thought of her as the poor little blind girl. "And don't even think of setting me up with your roommate."

"What's wrong with Tim? Other than the fact his mind is in the sewer most of the time." They both laughed- it was true. Tim's public face was that of a 15 year old pervert with a vocabulary that could start a fire and a bad habit of cheating at cards. But they also knew that Flea could be selfless to the point of endangering himself- the public face was to keep the world at bay.

---sb6

Jayhawk Control had just contacted them- they had one chance. The green pickup they had been looking for had just been pulled over for what the driver had been told was a bad tail light. The cop had been smart, he wasn't going to take on the monster that had killed over a hundred people, not without a lot of backup. So they now had a location.

At Scott's touch, Blackbird was howling towards that highway. They would make a high altitude pass to confirm their target, and then land for an intercept.

There was a problem. The original description of the owner of the vehicle and the inventor matched. 34 years old. Caucasian male. 5'11, 260 pounds. Hazel eyes. The picture from the department of motor vehicles showed the brownish red hair worn long and tied back, with a full mountain man type of beard, and the pudgy middle that comes from a life spent at a drafting table and before a computer. The trooper had reported that this subject looked closer to 60, and was skinny, almost emaciated. But it had been the same eyes, and the man had given the address quickly, without thinking.

They were loosing speed. Scott wanted to be subsonic when they passed the truck at about fifteen thousand feet- it was low, but they wouldn't stand out like the would if they were going faster than the speed of sound. It also made it easier to find a good spot to land.

If they couldn't do it, there was a rumor that Governor had asked her Oklahoma counterpart if a number of aircraft from that state's Air Guard could be borrowed. Kansas only had tankers and some electronic intelligence aircraft; Oklahoma had a full wing of fighter-bombers.

"The plates are right." Amara had slaved one of the consoles to the forward camera. The lens worked out to twenty power, with another twenty power equivalent of digital enhancement. At this altitude, they couldn't read the screen of a cellphone, but they could watch you dial.

---sb6

"Logan, how can you be my prototype?" Her words were harsh, but her tone was teasing as she tore his jeans open further. "Messy. Clumsy."

"Like you've never tripped. You landed in a spruce last time we went cam hrk!" He growled as she aimed her water bladder at the gash in his leg, washing it out. His jaw clenched as she shoved her fingers into the wound, pulling out a sharp flake of rock, putting it into his hand before rummaged around gently for any other debris. They both knew how much it sucked to have something in you, particularly something sharp. He looked down at the flake in his hand- it had been worked, and it was fairly large. Too big for an arrow, it was probably most of a spear head. It had lain in wait for who knew how many centuries, waiting for someone. Logan's foot had sunk through the ground, into the rabbit burrow about five inched below the hillside, then he started to slide. That was when he found this antique, at least it missed anything impor- "HOOROOWWWWW! What the hell was that!"

She held up a small squeeze bottle of dilute provodone-iodine solution that she had pulled from her pack. "Well, you worry about us being poisoned and you did catch a cold. I'm not taking chances, I don't want to have to drag you home with blood poisoning. It would be embarrassing."

"For which one of us?"

She didn't bother to answer as she examined the torn flesh. "I don't feel anything in there, I think I flushed any sand out, but you might have some fine grit in there still. Promise me you won't bleed out in the next five minutes."

"What?"

"Promise! If you bleed to death, I'm going to be really mad at you because I'll have to tell Ororo and the Professor."

"I promise not to bleed to death. What are-"

"Don't move, I'll be right back." She grabbed one of his water bottles, the one he'd emptied earlier, then headed off towards a dead desert pine she'd seen earlier. Yes, that was what she was looking for. With a few fast slashes with her claws, she found what she needed, shaking them into the bottle. "Thank you. I have need of your services, and must steal you from your colony, I'm sorry."

She'd be afraid of getting hurt if she had to wait days or weeks for small cuts and breaks to heal. She'd been shot, stabbed, burned, and broken before. She'd been up and around four days after being hit by a car once. A HYDRA instructor had once taken one of her hands as a punishment, that had hurt a lot. It was about a month to regenerate it, and another month for it to be fully back to normal; that instructor had been punished harshly in turn. She'd spent her time becoming fluent in French. She was nine then.

She went back to where he was still bleeding, slowly now, but still messy. "OK, hold this. Keep the lid on unless I tell you to take it off and shake it into my hand." She waited for him to take it, before pinching the flesh together carefully, so it wouldn't be lopsided looking. "Since neither one of us carried sutures and I don't want to just duct tape this closed so it can drain..." She held out her hand. "Shake."

Between the pain and Laura's commanding confidence, Logan was willing to let her run with this. He could manage just fine with some tape, he'd done it before, but he was watching her react. Watching her lead. He shook the bottle little into her hand. He quirked his eyebrow up when a large ant fell into her hand, at least half an inch long with large fangs.

"Cover!" Holding his flesh in one hand and the ant in the other, she pressed head against his leg. The squirming ant bit down from instinct and fear, the fangs digging into the skin, pinching it together as well as a staple or stitch would, while a little formic acid was squirted in. This carpenter carried nowhere near the bite of an army or fire ant, it still burned as it helped to clean the wound. The ant wasn't aware of it's body being snapped off for several minutes. By that time, Laura had placed another twenty five, sealing the 10" long gash in his thigh.

"Sit, let me find what I can for a crutch for you." She reached into her pack, digging down in the bottom, before she pulled out a pair of lollipops. She held them out to him, "Pick one, because you didn't fuss when I put the ants in."

Wordlessly, he picked one at random. He looked at the sweet in his hand, a color green he normally associated with toxic waste. His leg still hurt, damnit. The cut must have gone down almost to the bone, he watched her looking for debris and her fingers hand been past the second knuckle. He licked the blood off the spear head, before putting it in the small tin he carried his tinder and flint rod in. With a scowl, he drank some water to get the blood taste out of his mouth, then he popped the lollipop in his mouth.

The strength of the sour apple flavor almost brought tears to his eyes. OK, it was good and it took his mind of the itching pain in his leg, but like so many other things about this week, he wouldn't admit to it unless someone else was going to be tortured to get it out of him.

Rather than taking it for herself, Laura gave the second lollipop to the ant colony, whacking it between two rocks first, before returning the workers she hadn't needed. She looked down at the mother-queen of the ant colony, at at least the one she had assumed was. "Sorry for the disruption."

"Oh, you wouldn't know of any place where I can find a good stick, about four feet long, and straight, would you?" She paused for a minute before putting the wood she'd removed back over the opened nest.

Logan wasn't sure if she was actually listening to the ants. Maybe he'd misheard, it was about as far away as he could hear her voice.

And he didn't want to know if she really was talking to bugs. That would just be crazy.

---sb6

Cyclops stepped out onto the road, his hand raised, the other on his visor wheel. He normally wouldn't have played in traffic like this, but it was the plan. The driver of the green pickup started to slow and steer away, then the engine revved and the hood ornament looked like a gun sight. Oh yeah, not Grampa Mistaken Identity. It was aiming right at him, over a ton of metal at the hand of an insane killer. One more wouldn't bother whatever conscious Twister had left, Scott would just be a speed bump. A big juicy one that would splat on the windshield like an overgrown junebug. He had to hold his ground. Hundred feet... eight... seventy... sixty... Scott was about to jump.. fifty...

Jean and Magnus both struck at the truck from different angle, throwing it sideways and slamming into the grill. As it was barreled with a noise like an enraged boiler, Scott saw the airbag deploy with it's typical explosiveness. The tires squealed for a second before they gave out, then there was a spray of sparks as the metal screamed on the black top. Once it had lost enough enough speed, it skidded and rolled.

Scott! Jean reached down as she flew over him, grabbing his upraised hands without having to look. They didn't need to do anything so basic anymore, that was why the Professor held them up as an example to other couples. They covered the quarter mile to where the truck lay in just a few moments. I can barely sense him, it is like he isn't there.

As they landed, the driver's door exploded outward. The man was older, but it was the same one for sure. His smile was horrible, while his almost skeletally slim body moved like like it was about to explode from too much power. Lightening raced towards them, the strikes leaping towards them like a loping beast, the two of them diving aside just before it struck them. The beast had a flaming tail, the line of gas that had spilled from the torn tank and ignited by the electricity.

Amara dropped from Ororo's grasp and rolled,thankful for the padding and thick skin of the jacket that protected her from the asphalt. She knelt before the flames, holding her hands out. Heating things was easy now, she was still working on controlling flames themselves. Magma could feel them, dancing and slithering over the surface of the ground and the pavement, hungry, mindless. She lifted them from the road, cutting them off from their remaining fuel. They flickered and died before the flaming embodiment of the goddess Vesta. She wanted to giggle with joy, she'd never been able to do anything much bigger than a candle before.

Storm rode her own wind, closing with Twister. "Surrender. We do not want to hurt you."

"Too bad, witch!" He thrust with one hand, sending his own blast of air under Storm's, breaking the air cushion she was riding on. Sparks of lightening flickered at the corners of his eyes and mouth, and arced from his feet to the ground. "This is your doing!"

It was only training and grace that allowed her stay on her feet. She struck, this time with a bolt of lightening. He reached up and caught it with his hand, letting it run down and out through the fingers of the other.

While Twister was preoccupied by Storm, Magnus drew several lengths of steel wire rope from around his waist, guiding them to wrap around the enemy.

---sb6

Charles glanced in the mirror as he slapped the turn signal on in annoyance. Seeing and sensing no one coming, he pulled from the parking space.

The interview with Cecilia had gone about as well as the first one had. It wasn't being turned down that had him so testy. It was the way she said it. 'I won't patch up your toy soldiers. They might be becoming adults, but they are still children, Charles.'

It was the third time in less than a week someone had accused him of using his students as a private paramilitary force. The Senator. The entity he was still trying to categorize. And now one of their own, a mutant.

"Damnit, is that how we really look?" But he knew the answer. The difference between what he and Erik had believed was less than he'd usually admit in public. He glanced at the people on the sidewalk, the normal, ordinary, mundane humans. He knew that as a group, they feared and distrusted the unknown, and he and his children were something new to them. If he was a more obvious mutant, like Hank or Kurt, some would scream in fear. Someone would shout an insult, a slur. Mothers and nannies would take their children away. The bold and brave would take protective or challenging postures Then a crowd would form.

He knew they would come one day, like a pitchfork and torch bearing mob out of an old movie. His X-men had to be ready for that. They had to be able to defend themselves. He preferred a passive defense, the were to run while a few of the bravest bought them time, but all his kids would fight if they had no other choice. But he didn't want that war, he would do everything in his power to prevent it.

Magneto had wanted to start that war at a time and place of his own choosing. And there was a wisdom to it- if you get to pick the battlefield, you have the initiative. Magnus wasn't sure where he stood now. He still believed that the war was coming, but he knew they were no more ready now than they were twenty five years ago when they had quarreled.

A quarter century. Even if the x-gene did habitually extend the span of ones life, would any of them die in their sleep from old age? A generation's worth of time, wasted. He wasn't sure if he should have been stocking up supplies for this war that might come one day, or if he should have been training more students, or playing the political game.

As he waited at the stop sign, he rubbed his eyes tiredly. He wasn't sleeping. That was part of the problem, it made the difficulties before them seem so much larger. Or maybe he needed a break, maybe he was starting to lose perspective.

---sb6

Twister was running, only sporadically able to fly. He'd slow every twenty, thirty yards, twisting to lash out with lightening and softball-sized hail. The X-men were falling back a little bit. They had been concerned that he might try something like this, and they had planned for it. At Scott's signal, there was a glint in the sky.

From above, Blackbird dove like a falcon, pulling out only a few hundred feet above the deck, the thrust from the engines being diverted to stop the jet in hover mode. The down blast was had over 10,000 foot-pounds of force. Only a fraction of that hit Twister, but it threw him through the air like a kite in the middle of it's own dirt storm. In the cockpit, Bobby watched the temperature readings on the engines as he feathered it sideways- they weren't designed to keep the aircraft up by pure brute force for more than a few minutes. He herded the the fleeing killer towards his teammates as they closed in. He pulled further away as the gauges twisted up towards the caution point, and put the wheels into the freshly furrowed field with a soft thud and the squeak of the landing gear's suspension.

He had already released the pilot's harness, twisting free as the computer finished the shutdown cycle, the skin and engines popping as they cooled. He was spinning an icerail for his smooth soled boots to ride before the hatch was even fully open, bringing him down next to Twister as the others got there with him.

There wasn't much finesse as they tackled him.

He thrashed and bucked, writhing in their grasp as they held him down. He looked older now than he had just minutes before, like his powers were aging him. Scott knelt over his back, hands on his shoulders, while Storm and Bobby had an arm. Magnus and Amara wrangled his feet.

Jean held his head. Her grasp was far from gentle as her mind attacked his. He pushed back with his rage, a mental snarl like a wounded beast. She pushed again, harder, feeling his walls crumble before her strength. He was shrieking, threats so horrible as to be ludicrous, as she pushed deeper. As he passed out, she could still feel his mind rioting against her control. That is when she found them.

Images. Sounds. Memories.

Of a happy life. A good life. A man trying to save the world for children he hoped to have with a loving partner, more than just a wife, his equal and compliment in their business and mission. A man devout in his beliefs. A caring man, a giving man. Then that horrible, horrible day. They day the world learned that mutants were really real. The day so many of them had learned what they really were.

People fell in the streets, their bodies, their genes rebelling, changing. Some were murdered where they lay, burned or beaten or crushed as witches and demons. Some died from the changes themselves, the day the X-men fought Apocalypse. In that one hour that it took to get Rogue's team to the Spinx, the ancient madman's dream was barely glimpsed, but it changed thousands. Cerebro had cataloged about twelve thousand, but the Professor estimated that might only be a tenth or twelfth the true number. On a planet of six billion, these were acceptable numbers for saving the world. Theirs had been no hollow victory on what they privately called Apocalypse Day.

Armageddon.

A-Day.

Twister had lived, but his life was ruined. His partner, mate, wife, leaving with their unborn child. His family turning away. His minister declaring him an unholy creature in a stolen human shell.

Twister envied the dead. He was a monster. He did what a monster should.

Jean wept for her enemy.

---sb6

This is where they'd been heading when he'd slipped. Now he was just watching her work. If he tried to get up, she'd growl at him, even if his leg was nearly healed.

She was gathering stones, for later. She had said she was tired of running from a ghost, from the past. She knew she could face it if it came back, but she didn't think it would. She was stronger. She was wiser. She was tougher.

She was loved. She was trusted and forgiven.

She had friends. She had teachers and a prototype.

That was why she'd beaten the past. Why she'd changed and evolved.

After several hours, he finally whistled softy to get her attention. "Take a break, I'm getting tired and all I'm doing is watching you."

She glanced at the pile. She had almost enough. "In a bit."

She was true to her word- in about half an hour, she had enough stones. Now she could rest for few minutes. She took a drink from her pack and sat next to him. "Does it hurt?"

"Itches, but thats normal." He stretched his leg. They sat silently for a while.

"Do you think I'll make a good aunt?"

He shook his head and laughed. "Is there something your roommates should be telling the rest of us?"

"No, not yet. Rogue isn't sure if she can have children, and I don't think Kitty and Kurt have done anything yet." She closed her eyes, laying back. "But I wonder if I'll be a good aunt for my friend's children, a good mentor."

"I think you'll do fine. And I think you'd make a good mother, if you ever find the right guy." He watched her for any reaction. There wasn't any. "So, are you an Alex..." This shouldn't be this hard to say. I can know conceptually that Halfpint and Stripes might be getting it on, but the idea of Laura... "Are you two..."

"What? Sexually active? Physically intimate? Understanding the Birds and the Bees?" That was how Scott and Jean phrased it. If he couldn't say it, she would. "Exchanging biological potential? Scratching an itch? Knocking boots? Making the beast with two backs? Riding pogo? Shocking the horses? Spanking the cat? Bumping-" She stopped when he groaned in pain. She looked at his leg, it looked fine. She couldn't keep the tired frustration out of her voice. Give me some credit. "No, Logan, we aren't having sex."

"Oh." His guts untwisted. The list of euphemisms had made it worse- Flea just went on his shitlist for all time. "Look, I know you'll know when you are ready, and I'll support you decision. I know you know about the fishbowl in the infirmary, but if you want we can get you the pill or something, you know, just to be sure."

"It isn't needed."

"But I know you two, you both can be impulsive."

"I'm immune to all known illnesses, I can't catch anything. Alex is a virgin. And I can't get pregnant." Her voice didn't change as she unknowingly dropped the grandmother of all bombs on him. "About six months before I left HYDRA, they harvested my eggs. All of them."

Laura was annoyed by it, nothing more. Between the chemical exposures as a HYDRA agent and the limited adamantium treatment, most of them were most likely damaged. She'd read a few of the Professor and Jean's genetics books, just out of curiosity, she knew that the odds were good that of the few thousand eggs HYDRA had gotten only a handful were probably useful. They might have missed a few, but they'd used nanites to scout about in her body, it was unlikely. Besides, as a professional hero, the idea of 'monster stomping' with an big belly sounded too impractical. But they hadn't asked her.

Logan felt light headed. The world was spinning. If he wasn't seated, he'd have fallen. He was fully prepared to find out that she and Alex were having sex. He could have dealt with that, so long as they were safe. But this... This was something different. It was a violation, and he hadn't been able to stop it. It didn't matter that he didn't know she had existed, he hadn't stopped it. He felt he should have stopped it. He could feel the tears in his eyes. He took a breath, ragged and shuddering.

He wanted to scream, but his throat was clenched. He wanted to smash things, kill people, but they were all dead. He couldn't take his vengeance against them again. Those bastards. Those fucking bastards. Why did they do that to my little girl. Why! WHY!

"Damn them. Damn them all," he rasped. It was the first time in his memory Logan prayed.

Laura watched him for a moment with growing fear and doubt, then wrapped her arms around him. "Shhhhh... I promise, I'll be a really good aunt."

This was all wrong. This was backwards. Logan couldn't cry. Tears meant you were weak, you were broken. Like her. Logan couldn't be broken. She felt clumsy, stroking his hair hair, holding him. This was Logan. Logan wasn't the prototype, he was the original, she was just a copy made from parts that hadn't been quite right to start. Laura was the knock off.

She had learned it was ok to be weak sometimes, if there were people there to carry you. But no one could carry Logan, Logan was their Atlas...

---Author's notes:
My mother grew up in west Africa, she has a scar (with a great story) on the back her hand that was stitched with ants. I'm not sure if North American carpenter ants would actually work, but I'd be willing to try the big ones if I had nothing else. The formic acid helps kill any bacteria on the fangs, so it is as sterile as anything out side a proper medical setting will be (and without the MRSA risks- I'd rather get sewn up by a vet in my kitchen than in an ER!), and the chiton is hypoallergenic, so unless you are hyper sensitive to formic acid the only real issues are all psychological.

Thanks to Les Stroud, everyone knows about the agave needle trick now, but there are actually some allergy issues if you can't rinse the slime out, and there wasn't enough spider web around to use it as clotting accelerator. So I went with the ants. Besides, I'd rather have staples than stitches.

The printed version of Magma has, along with the other gifts we've seen in the Evo version, the abilities to shape earth and fire.

Many may know why I'm using 12K changed and known, and twelve times as many actually chosen, but only one of the reasons. Many cultures find the same numbers fascinating.

The Logan as Atlas line was a late addition, added on a whim.

And this HYDRA's final crime, breaking Logan.