A gloomy silence was filling the room, punctuated by the light sound of the drops of water falling from Thea's long hair onto the infirmary's tiling. She was sitting on the edge of a bed, wrapped in a long towel. She was nervously adjusting the bandage that was holding her two broken fingers together on her left hand, avoiding Peter's gaze. The young man was sitting in front of her with a similar towel over his shoulders, coughing from time to time. Charles and Raven were there too, as well as the rest of the X-men, all in their pyjamas. The only two missing were Hank and Kurt. After what felt like hours, the both of them appeared in a blue smoke, causing most of the people in the room to jump.
"Seven of them vanished," Hank said, sighing and crossing his arms on his one-pieced blue pyjama. "The rest of them..." he glanced at Thea, hesitating. "They didn't make it."
Thea repressed a moan, rested her elbows on her knees and buried her face in her hands.
"They were bad people, Thea." Jean whispered who sensed her pain and guilt, putting a hand on her shoulder.
"So that gives me the right to kill?" Thea countered, on the verge of a breakdown. What if these guys had a family? Kids?
"It was self-defence," Raven insisted with a firm voice. "It wasn't your fault."
"If anything, this is my fault," Charles said. "Knowing Stryker was after you, I should have enhanced the school security much more than I did. I should have known better."
Peter let out a loud annoyed grunt.
"And if I hadn't gone out there, all of this would have probably never happened. But this isn't a guilt-off, people. So how about we get our heads out of our asses and start coming up with a plan to get back at this son of a bitch?"
"Language," Charles simply mumbled, slowly rubbing his forehead. The kid had almost died tonight, he could give him a break just for this once.
"We can't let him get away with this," Thea said, suddenly getting up. She started pacing, a pool of boiling lava inside her widening by the second. "We have to go after him."
"I am not letting you use the X-men for your personal vendetta," Charles calmly said, sensing Thea's power building up inside her.
"This may be a vendetta, but it's not personal!" Thea exploded in a fit of rage. "Not anymore. Peter could have died tonight. How many deaths will it take for you to start doing something Charles?"
She turned to the rest of the assembly.
"Are you seriously going to let Stryker terrorise us and force us to live in fear like fugitives? Well guess what, I've been doing that for the past five years and I'm sick of it! I'm tired of waiting around for him to make his move."
The other youngsters looked at each other, unsure of what to say. Thea was their friend and they all felt the need to help her. But unlike Thea, the rest of them almost idolised Charles, the man who had saved them from a miserable and lonely life. And the X-men were not a democracy. If Charles ordered them to stay put, then that's what they would do. They didn't say anything, but Thea could feel their response like ice running down her spine. She glared at them, hurt by their reaction. Feeling guilty, they all looked down, expect for Peter who was giving her an indecipherable look.
As an awkward silence ensued, Raven let out a sigh. She didn't care for Thea's attitude, especially towards Charles. She had yelled at her old friend more times than she could count but she was the only one in this school who was allowed to do so.
"Hey," her voice broke the silence like a whip. "Let's say you go after Stryker. You somehow manage to find him. Then what? You're going to take out his army all by yourself? Even with the X-men that'd be impossible. Unlike us, these guys are prepared for that kind of attack. And what if you get killed? Or worst, taken? What good is that going to do? And what about Ellie; who will she have left?"
Thea's eyes narrowed. All the beds in the room started shaking. Peter hastily got away from his, not wanting to end up squashed on the ceiling after surviving drowning. Thea got closer to Raven until their noses almost touched. Her voice was dangerously reduced to a growl.
"Don't you dare bring Ellie into the mix, and don't you dare think for one second that she isn't behind every decision I've made."
"Is she?" Raven countered, unimpressed with Thea's little magic show. "Is that why you want to recklessly go after the one guy whose gun power we know to be too much for us?"
Thea could almost hear the others hold their breath. They knew what Thea was capable of when she was pissed off and really didn't want to be in the room when it happened. The young woman, trembling with rage, was trying her best not to punch Raven in the face out of frustration. She knew she was right, which made her even more furious. Eventually, she clenched her fists until it started to hurt and the room fell silent again. In their own way, these people were trying to help her. They had enough problems as it; infighting was the last thing they needed. Thea finally broke eye contact with her mentor and left the room, slamming the door behind her. She heard Charles' voice calling in her mind but she shut him out, heading to the school's basement. This was where Hank and she resumed her parents' research for the past weeks. They were trying to recreate the molecule Pascal and Marie had synthesise but to no success. They seemed to be missing something and even both their brilliant minds put together couldn't figure out what it was. Thea walked to her desk and feverishly went through the endless piles of papers swamping her work space. She wasn't sure what she was trying to achieve. Maybe she was hoping to find something she had missed all this time, the answer to all of her problems. She hated herself for not being smart enough to figure it out.
Her life was a mess and it seemed like every decisions she had made in the past months had made it worst. What if Stryker decided to use her love for Ellie against her? If she had to choose between her and the rest of the world, she wouldn't hesitate one second. Ellie was everything to her and she'd surely die if anything happened to the little girl. Sometimes she felt like Ellie would be better off without her, that maybe she would have gotten an actual chance at a normal life if Thea had left her with Alex, a kind and loving man who would take care of her better than Thea ever could.
Sensing the pain and frustration rise in her, Thea let out a loud "merde" and sent the papers flying in the air, clearing her desk of everything that was on it.
And that's when she noticed it.
She was resting both her fists on the desk, heavily breathing and ignoring the agonising pain in her left hand, when something caught her eye. Right there, on this pile of crumpled yellowish paper, something was... popping out. Putting back her messy hair behind her ear, she slowly crouched, gathering the sheets that had caught her attention. It was a dozen hand-written notes that neither Hank nor Thea could make sense of, even though the latter had spent hours if not days working on it, recognising her mother's hand writing. She smoothed them out on her desk and put them in a pile. She raised it above her, putting it right in front of the light. And there it was. A large, bold word appeared in front of her, made of dozens of others words written on the sheets. What Thea thought to be rambling notes from a brilliant mind were a very specific pattern, meant to lead her to one word. 'Joseph'.
"What?" Thea murmured, confused. Her heart was racing. Deep down she knew this was something extremely important –otherwise her mom wouldn't have gotten through all this trouble to hide it-, but she couldn't make sense of it. This name didn't ring any bell. Was it someone she worked with? Someone associated with their enemies?
Feeling her head swirling from excitement –and probably exhaustion-, she decided to go through the rest of the papers again, not even bothering to put them back on the desk. Kneeling on the ground, she tried to read them backwards, from afar or very close, but she didn't find anything else.
She was running a frustrated hand in her hair when the door opened up. Charles wheeled in and Thea immediately felt his concern. He stared at her, this crazy looking girl sitting on the floor in the middle of mountains of paper, before coming closer to her.
"Thea, I know this is upsetting but you've been in there for hours, you need to rest-"
"I found something," she cut him off, struggling to get up without slipping on the sheets. "It's a- well I'm not sure what it is. Some kind of clue. A name."
It was always hard to sense the professor's exact emotions since he had such a great control of his mind, but Thea was certain to have seen a strike of apprehension in his eyes.
"The name was Joseph," she slowly said as he quickly composed himself and questioningly looked at her. This time, she didn't feel anything odd going on in his mind.
"Does that mean anything to you?" she asked after a brief silence. "You said you used to work with my parents. Could it be someone they knew?"
"I'm sorry Thea. I don't know."
She peered at him but he mirrored her gaze. Thea repressed a sigh and gave up on trying to read his emotions. Trying to figure this man out was like a puzzle. You don't know where to start, you usually fail and end up with a bad headache.
"There has to be more to it," she whispered, rubbing her forehead. "Stryker has part of my parents' data correct?"
Charles reluctantly nodded, knowing where this was going.
"We have to retrieve it," Thea stated, determination making her blue eyes shine.
"We talked about this, Thea."
"I know- I know," she stuttered, coming closer to Charles, eager to rally him to her cause. "But this is different. I'm not talking about a blind and reckless attack, I just need to get those papers back; if we locate Stryker's labs, we have enough powers here to get in and out without notice. I mean come on, you broke Erik out of the Pentagon, so how hard can that be?"
"It was a desperate situation," Charles tempered as he shook his head.
"And this one isn't?"
The professor sighed in defeat, powerless against Thea's determination.
"We don't have to talk about this now. For the love of God Thea, go get some rest. You are no good to us if you die of exhaustion."
The young woman sighed as well but admitted that she could use a good shower right about now.
"This conversation is not over," Thea said as she raised a finger towards Charles. The latter couldn't hold back a smirk.
"You are just as stubborn as your mother."
And for the first time since Thea had gotten to the school, she and Charles exchanged a knowing smile.
...
She rushed back to her room, not wanting to run into Ellie in the state she was. The sun was already high in the sky and the younger students were about to go to class. When she entered the common room, all her friends were there, anxiously waiting for her. They all got up and rushed to her, except for Peter who stayed behind peering at the young woman. He had slipped into a comfortable navy blue hoodie and sweat pants.
"Are you ok?" Kurt asked with his thick accent. "We were worried sick about you."
"Yeah, you disappeared all night; did you get any rest?" Jean added, a protecting hand on her shoulder.
"Guys, guys," Thea said as she raised her hands in front of her, overwhelmed by their concern. "I'm fine. I just- we have a lot to talk about."
"But not until you get some sleep," Scott said with a scolding look. "We're going to practice anyway. It can wait."
Thea actually felt like it couldn't but the pain and fatigue from her fight was starting to freeze her brain. She finally gave in and nodded, letting the others leave but not before they all gave her a tight hug. As she was about to head to her room, she noticed Peter was still here, hands buried in his pockets. Ignoring her body that was begging her to go lay down, she awkwardly came closer to him, narrowing her eyes. Something was different about him. He wouldn't look at her and it was as if a light had been turned off in his dark eyes. He looked exhausted and Thea felt her heart tighten with guilt when she realised she hadn't checked on him all night.
"Are you ok?" she whispered.
"Yeah," he simply answered, his eyes glued to the carpet, his foot slowly sweeping the floor. "You?"
"I'm fine."
Silence. They both knew they were lying.
"Peter..." she started, hesitant. They were a million things she wanted to say to him, but he cut her off.
"Scott is right, you should get some sleep. You look like crap."
"Gee, thanks. So do you."
He softly scoffed and finally glanced at her. He looked like he was going to say something but eventually left, heading to his own room. Thea noticed he didn't run out using his powers like he usually would, but simply walked out, feet dragging and head low. She sighed. Was he still mad at her about their fight earlier? Did he blame her for what happened to him? He would have every right to. She felt terrible that he got caught in the crossfire. That was precisely the kind of things that made her push everyone she cared about out of her life. She was a danger to them.
Too tired to feel anything, she chased these dark thoughts away and almost fell asleep in her shower before finally crashing on her bed. She looked at a picture of her, Marie and Pascal on her nightstand.
"I'm coming for you," she whispered before falling into a deep, dreamless sleep.
...
"You were too hard on her, Raven."
The accused and Hank were standing across from Charles in his office, his massive wooden desk between them.
"And you're too soft." countered the woman who had turned back into her natural form. "She's out of control. Believe it or not, I care about her and without some boundaries, she's going to get herself killed."
"She is not a child anymore, she can make her own decisions."
"But this isn't just about her," Hank softly chimed in. "If Stryker gets what he wants, he could be a danger to everyone. Not just the mutants."
"And what am I supposed to do?" Charles replied, frustrated. "Lock her up until we figure this out?"
"Isn't that basically what we've been doing for the past month?" Raven scoffed. A dismayed silence followed her comment. "You're going to have to tell her the truth, Charles." she added with a softer voice. "Otherwise she's going to find out by herself, she's smarter than we all are. And when she does..."
"I'll lose her trust," Charles sighed, causing Raven to laugh again.
"I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, but she never trusted you. And she never will."
A/N: Things just don't seem to get better for poor Thea...
As always, thanks for the follows, favs and reviews, I love writing this story and it feels great to know that other people are enjoying it as well. Until next time!
