Okay, this is insane. People don't just come back from the dead, do they?
The girl who looks and claiming to be Annie crosses her arms in front of her, "Sure, I just came out of your wood all of the sudden, but you're acting like I just said Lord Voldemort is back," She says.
Warren steps up, a half-eaten s'more forgotten in his hand, "So um, why you here?"
She brushes hair out from in front of her face and tucks it behind her ear, revealing a small metal plate on the side of her neck. "I am in much need of the X-Men's help," she sounds like this has been rehearsed several times until the words have no meaning to her, "A being beyond you imagination has been awoken, and the weight of his capture is on our shoulders. I must speak to Charles Xavier."
"How do we know you're not just trying to get into the school?" Scott asks, "You could be some spy from the Friends of Humanity," there are nods of agreement from the rest.
"Jean knows you can trust me. Don't you?" Her eyes flash with anxiety as she waits for my reply. "Jeannie, please!" She begs, "You know me! You know you do"
"I...I use too. I think," I admit. The truth is I don't know, "Annie Richardson was my best friend until she was hit by a car when we were ten. She supposedly died." My body trembles slightly as I say this.
Scott turns to me, his lips pressed to a straight line. He gives me a look like, Probe her mind.
Angelica speaks up, her voice laced with confusion, "So, uh, what's going on?"
"Beats me," Bobby sits back down in his camp chair, crosses his legs, and begins to plays flappy bird on his phone, like stuff like this happens all the time.
Scott nods at me. I take a deep breath, and even though I don't like probing people's mind and would rather leave this up to the Professor, I enter her mind.
Soon enough I find my answer. In the midst of strange faces, machines, and battle plans, there are memories from our sleepovers, field trips from school, dinners at each other's houses, even the time we had a funeral in her backyard for her pet hamster, Hamilton. I jerk away from her mind, overwhelmed with everything I saw, and I sit down.
"Yeah," I say taking a deep breath, "We can trust her."
Hank raises his hand like he's trying to silence the already silent group, "Do you want to explain what exactly is going on, Jean?"
Everyone turns to me and I completely lose my train of thought. The entire situation blurs in my mind, but the only thing I know is that my best friend who I thought dead for over five years, in alive and well and just teleported into our forest.
"I can explain," Annie says, "So, about six years ago, I received mutant powers, Technopathy. No one knew about it. I could control computers, cell phones, any machines really, and could keep it well under control. Anyway, after about a six months, a group of people known as Hydra contacted my parents about my budding mutant powers. They offered me training, schooling, and safety with only one catch, my information had to be wiped off the face of the planet." She sits down on Warren's camp chair and folds her hands in her lap like she's telling a fairytale to a bunch of preschoolers. "My parents, of course, horrified by my powers, couldn't refuse. So, a week later we planned to fake my death. Jean, am I wrong to assume you remember this?"
"All too well," I say, "But I didn't realize you were faking your death."
She ignores me, "So, on our way home from school, I dropped my lunchbox, which gave me a reason to stay behind while Jean went ahead of me. I had a drug in hidden in my box that slowed my pulse so I'd appear dead, and I popped that in my mouth as I crossed the street. We had my cousin, Jacob, he'd do anything for a buck, drive up to me and pretend to hit me, but it seemed to backfire when someone's mind decided to use telepathy for the first time," she gives a pointed look to me, "So, I had to use some acting skills. After Jean has passed out from the psychic connection she formed with me, My parents came and took me to Hydra. They had a fake funeral with a closed casket and-"
"I felt you die," I interrupt, "Your pain nearly killed me, there is no way you faked it!"
Annie frowns, "Do you think having your pulse slow down is a walk in the park? You felt my pain because what I went through was painful. It wasn't death that you felt necessarily, but it was extreme pain and fear."
I feel my own pulse speed up as anger boils inside of me, Scott grabs my hand and squeezes, Calm down, I hear his voice in my mind, Hear her out completely before acting, okay? Right, he's the only who's trying to sound rational.
I nod and take a shaky, breath.
"Did this Hydra end up being any good?" Angelica asks.
"Oh no," Annie shakes her head, "They ended up being completely evil. They trained me all right, but in the way of fighting and war. They turned me into a cyborg-" she pulls her hair up and turns around, revealing more metal plates on her neck, and taught me to kill without mercy. I obeyed them until just recently when I realized what they were doing was wrong. I found out about a secret group Hydra formed with mutants, who call themselves the Quiet Assassins. They are planning to release a being known as Oblivion, and if he is, life as we know it will change completely."
"Will it be a good change?" Bobby asks.
"His name is Oblivion for a reason," Annie says pointedly, "He will destroy the world to an oblivion."
"Sounds like a nice guy," Warren mumbles.
"What do you need from us, er… Miss Richardson?" Hank asks.
"Please don't call me that, I'm literally the same age as you." In the firelight, Annie's cheeks turned pink.
I didn't know if it was the scar going across her face, or the way her voice was twisted with wisdom, but she did seem older than 15, which makes the fact that she's only five months older than me really hard to sink in.
"Now, I think you should tell the whole thing to the Professor," Scott decides.
Annie nods and stands up, "I'll follow you then," she says. And we make our way into the Mansion.
The Professor tells us to stay in the lounge while he takes Annie to his study. Bobby curls up on the window seat, playing a heated game of solitaire on his phone. Angelica and Hank start a game of Chess, Warren sits next to the fireplace with his earbuds in, and I pace the room nervously as Scott watches.
"Do you want to talk about it?" He offers.
"No," there was nothing to talk about. My best friend from elementary school basically just came back from the dead, I just had to get through it by myself.
"What the hell is a psychic connection anyway?" Bobby asks without looking up from his phone.
"I'm not sure exactly, all I know is when she was supposedly hit by the car, Her pain filled my body because my telepathy connected us. I was put in a coma for six months, but we all thought she died. She had a tombstone at the cemetery and everything. I and my mom went to visit it before I came here."
"Am I the only one who had a somewhat decent experience when my powers kicked in?" Bobby asks.
We all ignore him.
"Here, Hydra is a terrorist organization that is based on an island literally called Hydra Island." Warren holds up his phone, showing a screen full of small print.
"Where did you find that?" Scott asks. His face is paler than usual.
"I hacked into SHIELD's database," Warren shrugs,"They have a huge section on Hydra."
"You can just hack into the SHIELD database on your phone? Won't you be detected?" Hank asks.
"Nah, my phone has super advanced software. Some dude who my dad knows did it. I also have unlimited data, texts, and calls." He shrugs and pops his earbuds back in.
"So, your friend was involved in a terrorist group," Scott says, "That sounds suspicious."
I sit down next to him, "I probed her mind, I know I can trust her," I say.
He rubs the back of his neck, "I don't know, Jean, If they had enough technology to turn her into a cyborg they'd have enough technology to block your powers from the truth."
"For someone who was begging me to trust you earlier, you sure don't have any trust in me," I cross my arms in front of my chest and don't say anything else.
Soon, the Professor comes in, followed by Annie, who looks anxiously around the lounge, not meeting anyone's eye.
"She's telling the truth," The Professor says, "However we cannot fight the Assassins without knowing anything about them."
"Where does that put us, Professor?" Scott asks.
"It appears we are going to need to go on an informational mission, Scott, and since it's a weekend, assemble the whole team. Even I don't know what going to be waiting for you at the Hydra headquarters."
Angelica speaks up, "Uh, question, Professor, am I on the team? I mean I may be of good use." She raises her eyebrows slightly as she waits for the answer.
"No way!" Scott says, "You have zero training, it would be suicide. Professor, you're not going to let her go, are you?"
The Professor considers this, then the corner of his lips curl up just slightly, "I'm sure we all appreciate your concern for the team, Scott, but yes I am going to allow her. Like she said, her powers may come into great use, and there are enough trained people on the team to cover for her."
Scott hesitates, he usually isn't one to question the Professor's authority, but he says, "And what happens if she or someone else gets killed, I'll have to-"
Annie interrupts by stepping up so she's only a few inches from his face. She's the only one who has him beat with height, towering over him by at least three inches. "It's Scott right?" She asks.
Scott steps away from her, "yes."
"Well, Scott, I've seen a lot of heroes like you. Obsessed with self-sacrifice, not wanting what they consider the" weaker link" on the team because they could get a boo-boo, but do you know what always happens to them?"
"Uh, no," Scott looks at me like he's trying to say, help.
"They always end up being killed, but not because of self-sacrifice, but because they are too confident in themselves and take on too many enemies at once." The more she talks, the quieter her voice gets, until she's whispering.
Scott pushes past her and out of the room. I start to go after him, but the Professor shakes his head, "He'll be fine, Jean."
I stay where I stopped, in between the couch and the coffee table, but I can't help but think he's wrong. That Scott won't be okay. Not for the mission anyway.
"So…" Warren says, "Do we go get ready for the mission or do we just stay here and wait for Four-eyes to calm down?"
"Four-eyes or not we have to go," Annie snaps, "Oblivion isn't going to wait for him to calm down."
Twenty minutes later, we are loading into the Blackbird, the school's plane. Scott is piloting with Hank as the co-pilot, but he's quiet.
Warren walks along the rows of seats, occasionally sitting back in his own seat, only to get back up and pace more. "So, do you know anyone who's on this assassin team?" He asks Annie.
"Actually yeah, Some of them were trained with leader I knew before I went to Hydra. " She turns in her chair to look at me, "Do you remember Simon Niles?"
Air catches in my throat. "He tried to strangle me once," I say.
"Son of a bitch" Scott hisses from the front of the plane. I notice his grip on the joysticks tightens so his knuckles are white.
Annie nods slowly, picking at the collar of her uniform. The Professor insisted that she wears one, even though she said she'd be fine. The black leather looks strange on her. "Remember how he'd use to get his way with everything?" she asks, "He would basically brainwash the faculty. Hydra had him trained up so he can also shadow travel and now he has an insane healing factor."
"What's shadow traveling?" Hank asks.
"Have you ever seen a shadow move in the corner of your eye?" Annie asks.
We all nod.
"That is a shadow traveler. It is a group of trained individuals who travel within the shadows."
"So," Bobby begins, "we're going against some brainwashing, fast-healing peter pan and his evil gang of mutated lost boys. Great."
"Peterpan didn't travel by shadows, Bobby," Annie corrects.
"Ah, guys, were going down." Scott says.
He shifts the throttle and we go down into the great unknown of Hydra island.
To Be Continued.
Author's notes: well, what do you think? It was actually my friend Nat's idea to bring Annie back. So huge thanks to her! I forget to mention last chapter about Angelica Jones. I'm not sure if any of you have seen the old Spider-man and his amazing friends show, but if you did you would probably reconize her as Firestar. And acording to that, she was an X-Man when she was a kid, so I figured why not put her in here. Of course, I sort of shifted her story slightly. Anyway, comments, critism and any ideas are welcome!
