I'm trying to see how long I can keep these time related chapter names going. I'm running out of ideas that make some sense as to what's going on in that particular chapter. Sigh. But anyways, I think I figured out how the story is going to end now. So... lets start going in that vague and general direction.
*EDIT* Sophi: Oh man, thank you so much. I thought I had included that in this chapter, but it must've been in the one I scrapped. I forgot to put that part back in. But she's normal size whenever she switches between the two forms, it's only the griffins height that's affected. My only reasoning for that is that Lorelei's not made of stone when she's human. Thanks for catching my slip-up though! I fixed the chapter up, it should make a little more sense now. A little. Like... very...very... just. Small. Just very, very small. XD
Ernest Stillman walked down the hall with his hands clasped behind his back, taking in the large portraits that lined the red colored wall. She's late. Lorelei was supposed to give him her report three days ago. She hadn't even come in to eat. What could she possibly be up to? There's no way she'd sit still for over a week.
He had left in search of someone to help him fix his telepathy shield just a little while after Lorelei went back to her perch. He'd been gone just over two weeks, and was now waiting for his wife and daughter in the parlor. Mrs. Stillman was the first to arrive.
"About time you came back you deadbeat," She greeted him.
"I've missed you too, Ava."
"Your daughters missing."
Oh. Well then.
"Missing? How? Why? Where did she go?"
"Well if I knew that she wouldn't be missing, would she?"
Mr. Stillman looked over his wife. She didn't seem to be pulling his leg. Not that she lied a lot, she was usually very blunt. And rude, and sarcastic, and foul-tempered. And… pretty. He got up from the chair and went over to his wife.
"You should follow her example." Mrs. Stillman hissed.
"And leave my beautiful bird?" Mr. Stillman asked in mock horror.
"I hate you."
Ernest chuckled softly. "I know." He pushed a stray piece of brown hair behind her ear. "We should find her. When did she go missing?"
"Ha, that's your baby. You go look for it." Mrs. Stillman waved her husband off and made her way over to the bookshelf passage. She turned just before she went down, "Garvey's dead too, though. If you're really serious about finding your daughter, go start in the backyard."
Mr. Stillman watched her walk down the stairs and felt a knot form at the bottom of his stomach. Did the X men actually attack?
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
Lorelei sat very still. There were a couple of claws pressed up against her neck, and she'd hate to lose an artery. Not that she had any. Hank was still fixing her head.
"How much longer s'this gonna take?" Logan growled.
"No much longer…" Dr. McCoy trailed off.
"You said that three hours ago! My arms are startin' ta ache!"
"Take it easy Wolverine. I think I've almost got it."
"You think?!"
"Hey guys!" Kitty called from the open door.
"WHAT?" Logan shouted.
Kitty nibbled nonchalantly at the juicebox straw she had in her mouth. "Prof wants to know how it's going."
"FUCKING FANTASTIC!"
"Swimmingly!"
"'Kay. I'll pass that along. Oh. Wait, Professor wanted me to give you this..." Kitty walked over to one of the counters and placed a little brown baggie next to a microscope.
"Thank you Kitty. I'll get to… whatever that is. What is it?"
"Dunno, Professor had it in his drawer." Kitty waved and skipped out, "See you guys later!"
Dr. McCoy continued fiddling around with different materials, trying to find the right ratio of elements in Lorelei's body; but each time he made a new sample Lorelei's stone form refused to take it. After several hours and fourteen coffee breaks he gave up, perplexed, and told Wolverine he could leave.
"Finally." Logan stretched out his arms and sheathed his claws. "What the hell was that for anyways?"
"I've noticed that Lorelei's body reacts strangely to your adamantium claws. Instead of a clean cut like most other substances make, your claws seem to make the wound harden up… almost like a scab. On the other hand, water appears to corrode her body at an accelerated rate… a bit like acid."
"Great. Now we know her weakness."
"Except the scab part. The tip of her broken ear doesn't corrode." Dr. McCoy placed a drop of water on Lorelei's broken ear, and another one on her claws. She jumped up and lashed out blindly in Beasts general direction when she felt a piece of her claw disappear.
"Don't worry Lorelei, I'll fix your foot when I find some sand for you."
"She can't hear you."
"It's more for me; you have to think positively!"
Logan groaned and had to keep himself from facepalming. "So why the hell did you make me stay down here and scratch her neck? To make her invincible?"
"No. the adamantium rearranges the makeup of her… oh forget it. It's a science thing."
"Fair enough."
Kurt popped in, "Did something interesting happen?"
"We found Lorelei's weakness and her strength!" McCoy announced excitedly.
"No that's lame." Kurt turned and teleported away again.
"Well I think it's exciting." Beast mumbled.
Logan clapped him on the back. "You're the only one. Now I'm gonna make like Kurt and get the hell outta here."
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
Mr. Stillman stopped next the broken angel fountain in his backyard and took in the chaos. The entire back of the estate was charred, and part of the first floor was exposed due to the fact that there was a large portion of wall missing. There was a crater in the wildflower field; the backdoor had claw marks on it that were not Lorelei's, and the forest was nothing but tree trunks and crispy squirrel bits. Most frightening of all, the ledge above the door was grotesquely griffinless.
But Mr. Stillman knew his daughter, and he knew the X men. The X men were not as ruthless as some of his associates made them out to be – they wouldn't harm a child; they would pacify it. Lorelei was just a kid who would run away scared shitless when up against something more powerful than she. They wouldn't hurt her. She must've run away... or they took her with them.
Ernest scowled. I ask her to guard the place and what does she do? Gets herself kidnapped. He turned and hurried back into the house. This might be a good time to see how well those drugs in States are going…. Isn't there only a lake between Michigan and New York? X men are in New York, right?
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
Lorelei didn't hear Beast when he told her to stay in the lab. He didn't expect her to leave, and was mostly just talking to her just to ease the silence. Dr. McCoy eventually went off to bed though, leaving Lorelei spread-eagled on the tiled floor. Fucking bored… she groaned. She wasn't sure if she could transform back into her human form. She could feel the little switch at the back of her mind, but didn't want to hit it. What if I come out the other side without a head? Then what? She wasn't missing an ear in human form from when Logan chopped it off when she was a griffin; but heads are something completely different. I don't have my senses this time… what if I lose my head as a human? I should stay like this. Better safe than sorry.
But that didn't solve her bored problem. There must be something fun to do without a head. Maybe I'll go… uh… trip people… Or something. What time is it? Lorelei shuffled about the edge of the room and eventually found the lab door. It opened without a protest when she leaned against it, and she fell into the hallway. No one saw that… now where's the elevator?
After much internal huffing and angst-ing, she eventually collapsed at the top of the flight of stairs. It had taken her the better part of an hour to find the hidden doors, and even longer to walk up the stairs. Screw the elevator. I'm burning calories this way. Lorelei thought back to her danger room episode earlier that had made her collapse like she did now. Baldie definitely did that danger room stunt on purpose. He's probably trying to make me totally dependent on the X Men! Next thing you know I'll be eating out of Blue Monkeys hand like a COMMON PIGEON!
She blindly slammed into the Washington bust and an age old question popped into her head. If a Washington bust falls over in a hallway and Lorelei can't hear it… does it make a sound? Apparently it did, because she soon felt someone picking her up again and carrying her somewhere –probably downstairs again. UNHAND ME HEATHEN! She shrieked with her mind.
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
Jean woke up. She wasn't sure what woke her up, but she was wide awake now. She looked over at the clock; it was only one in the morning. She rubbed her eyes and sat up and listened. If it was a noise, she reasoned, Logan would have gone to investigate by now. She listened closely, but couldn't hear anyone, or anything. She turned to Scott and considered waking him up, but thought better of it.
The wooden steps felt cool under her bare feet, and she tried to stifle a yawn as she reached the foot of the stairs. Jean peered down the main corroder and wondered what woke her up. Her eyes came to a rest on what looked like a broken vase; a broken vase that was flopping around like a fish out of water. Griffin, she sighed. She walked over to the little lion-bird that had a piece of Washington's forehead and right eye jammed over her neck.
"Agh. Hold still Lorelei, let me get this thing off you." Jean grabbed a hold of the porcelain and pulled it out of Lorelei's neck. There, she sighed, now back downstai-
Jean froze as a familiar wailing sound filled her ears. It started out like a faint singing, then howling. She was gripped with fear as the static noise rose quickly, surrounded and smothered her mind. It wanted her to let go. It was screaming for her to let go. She had to let go.
Unhand me.
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
"Goddamn kids." Logan snarled.
He ripped the sheets (literally) off of him and threw open the door, banging it against the wall.
"Hey!" Kurt teleported in front of Logan, "I vasn't sleeping, but if I vas that totally vould of woken me up!"
"Great." Logan shoved him out the way and went for the stairwell.
"Are you getting ice cream? I vould like ice cream too right now." Kurt trailed after Wolverine and hoped there was still death by chocolate in the freezer.
"I'm not getting no goddamn ice cream!" Logan snarled. "There's someone downstairs."
"I hope they're not eating my ice cream…"
"Shut up 'bout that for a second, there might be trouble."
"Oh."
Nightcrawler and Wolverine made their way downstairs, and noticed Jean hunched over at the end of the hallway.
"Jean?" Logan asked. She didn't respond.
"Vat are you doing on the ground?"
No response. Jean just sat there, staring at whatever was in her lap.
Logan took a half step towards her. "Jean…? Are you-"
Jean looked up, and the two men took an unconscious step back at the gleam in her eye.
"Shit… ELF!"
Kurt was two steps ahead of Logan, and grabbed a hold of Jean and teleported her once outside the mansion, twice into the forest, and thrice – dropped her over a lake. He managed to teleport away just before the blast could singe his beloved tail.
Logan took the steps four at a time and barreled into the professors' room, accidentally ripping the wood off its hinges at the bottom. "Fuck these useless entryways, JEANS TURNED PHOENIX!" Professor X was already sitting upright, with a pained look on his face. "I can feel it. Where's Lorelei?"
"That's not the problem right now!"
"It is if Kurt teleported Jean while she was holding her!"
You could almost hear the click in Logan's head as he connected Jean's sitting position with the fact that she was looking at something. "FUCK!"
Kurt poofed into the Professors' room. "Jean is-"
"I know. Take me to where you dropped her."
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
For the second time in her short span of life, Lorelei drowned. It was very painful, all this dying. Her last thoughts were of home, psychedelic blue monkeys, and her flower that was probably dead by now.
~~~~~~~~OoO~~~~~~~~~
Professor X, Kurt, Logan, and most of the mansion spent the rest of the day looking for Lorelei. Jean was back in her room, both her headache and the Phoenix had disappeared the instant she hit the water. She fell asleep once Kurt had pulled her from the lake, and showed no signs of waking up anytime soon.
It was almost nightfall again when Beast approached the Professor, weary and downhearted.
"I fear," He started, "We've lost our little griffin."
Colossus lifted a massive bolder and howled under it for Little Bird to stop hiding.
Professor X watched the sad scene unfold in front of him. Lorelei hadn't cared much for them, but most of the mansion had grown accustomed to her stony indifference and silly antics.
"It must have been the water."
"Kurt's really beating himself up over this." Dr. McCoy looked over to Nightcrawler, who was teleporting water from one side of the lake to the other. He seemed to be trying to get to the lakebed to make sure if Lorelei wasn't stuck between two rocks.
Professor X sighed. "Let's call it a night. We can come back tomorrow."
The X men left the forest with students in tow and made their way back to the institute. The giant house seemed somehow less welcoming without the knowledge that there was a headless griffin in the wings to make their days a little brighter, and slightly stonier.
Right, well, I have to take a break now. Y'know... School and all. But I'll still update this thing seeing as I HAVE NO LIFE OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL. Buuuut whatever XD
Thanks for reading (and reviewing to catch my mistakes.)
