Mr. Watts stalked forward, his eyes held a silent anger that the tone in his voice hinted too. He gave a false smile and with practiced restraint said. "Terry would you give me and my son a moment pleas."
"Sure Mr. Watts." Terry looked in to Willies eyes. "I'll be right outside." He whispered and then headed for the door.
William looked his father in the eye, he had nothing to be ashamed of and he wasn't going to let his father make him feel ashamed of what he had with Terry. He just faced a fire and death and he had survived that, he could survive this to; he thought.
"Hi dad." It had taken all his courage to hide the nervousness he was feeling.
"Is that all you have to say for yourself. "Hi dad."
"I could say the same thing seeing as how I'm laying in a hospital bed hurt, bruised and a little burned and the first thing you say to me! well it wasn't hi son how are you."
"Don't try and change the subject Willie. You were kissing him. You hear how that sounds, its not right, I'm not raising no sissy. You hear."
"it that all you see dad, when you look at me a sissy, just cause I like boys. Well here's a kicker I've always liked boys. So congratulations on not raising a sissy."
"That's it, I'm checking you out, we're going home, you're not to see any of your old friends especially that McGinnis kid. When your better you'll go to school and come right home, I'll have someone waiting to pick you up; after this season is over I'm transferring you back into boarding school."
"...but"
"No but William, you did this to yourself."
Willie couldn't help but hang his head now, his father was being unreasonable. He wouldn't be able to see Terry or any of his friends now. Not really maybe as he passed them in the hall at school. Willie watched as his father walked out the door.
Terry slipped into the room a short time after to find William fighting back tears. "what happen?"
"He… He's" before William could get a word out edge wise the door opened again and a nurse came in. "I'm sorry but I'm going to have to ask you to leave." She said. "Visitation has been restricted to family only."
"What by who?" griped William.
"Your father."
William could feel Terry tense up and see the anger in his eyes. "Can he do that?"
"Your only sixteen he's your guardian, so yeah he can. I'll give you five more minutes to say goodbye."
"No the goodbye have been said," boomed Mr. Watts "good day Terry." Mr. Watts held the door open and waited for Terry to leave. "You'll thank me for this one day."
I'm sorry mouth the nurse as she approached to check the bandages. "Is it possible for me to request that my guardian not be aloud to visit me?"
"You could request not to have any visitors at all."
"Excuse me but they don't pay you to talk." Mr. Watts looked coldly at the young woman. Who gave him an equally challenging look.
"I'd like to do that." Replied Willie. The nurse just smiled. I will get right on that Mr. Watts. She walked out the door and came back with a pin and a form in no time.
"I'm going to have to ask you to leave now Mr. Watts, this client has requested not to have any visitors, we'll call you if the status changes."
"William stop this now."
"Would you be kind enough to hold the door open for my father, I'm not quite sure he can find his way out."
Mr. Watts turned and headed out of the room grumbling to himself.
"Do you think I can have a phone put in my room?"
"I'll get right on that Mr. Watts."
"It's William. I have one more question; can he really check me out?"
"Not until you're out of intensive-care, and the names Ramona."
Ring! Ring!
Proteus disguised as agent Haden had been sitting in his office planning on how to get close to Willie Watts undetected. Somehow the boy was linked to the item he needed. He couldn't figure out how it happened or for that reason why but he'd failed twice now and a third time would be unforgivable. Time was growing short. He had to retrieve the gem before the big merge and for that matter before this body waned. Proteus turned seconds before the phone actually rung. He couldn't tell who it was, a testimony to the power he'd lost. He cursed aloud and picked up the receiver. "Agent Haden."
The voice that pushed through the phone like was distinctly harsh. "Do you know who this is?"
"Yes it's…"
"Don't say my name." growled the voice that came out the line. "This is your last chance get me that gem."
"I think I have away in but it'll take time to set up."
"Just get it done before the merge."
Bruce had been doing some under cover work of his own, nothing serious though; just getting the facts together and making sense of what was going on. So-far he has deduced that the homo-superior that Terry and Emma's team got in a fight with was called Proteus and that he was connected to the recent robberies of several large Gem's. He would have never made the connection had it not been for Emma giving him unlimited access to her computers.
He learned that Proteus could transfer his mind from body to body, overriding the host mind. After seeing the brain scans of his last victim and reading the report on her recovery, he'd decided that the best way to find this mutant was to find where he'd been. Bruce pulled any hospital reports that had flag words in them. Like complaint of headaches or loss of memory stomach pain and fatigue. There were eight people in with such symptoms on his list three of which were being held by the authorities for theft.
Sure enough when Bruce checked their C.T., he found the evidence that he was looking for. There was a small laceration on the brain of each one, identical to the one he had of Emma's student.
Mr. Watts had tried going to the hospital for the past two days just to be turned away. He was furious at the staff. Willie was his son and he had every right to see him, he was paying the bill for fuck sake. But still they wouldn't let him go up and see his son, he'd been able to find out what was going on with him medically and had even been kept in the loop when the doctor changed his medication, but they wouldn't let him go up and see him. He had finally given up and gone home.
Not even five minutes after being home, his intercom buzzed. Mr. Watts clicked on the vidcam to see the doorman and a man that look vaguely familiar.
"Hi Mr. Watts I'm agent Haden, I need to ask you some questions regarding your son, my I come up."
"What the hell!"
"I'd rather talk in privet if that okay with you, we could do it here of at the station your call." Proteus could hear the reluctance in his voice and knew that this would give him the edge he needed.
"Let him up." Mr. Watts sighed. Seeing as he had little choice.
Proteus knocked on the door minutes later. Mr. Watts opened the door and was surprised at the cold rush and the flash of light he saw.
Proteus watched as agent Haden's body fell to the floor. He looked over at his reflection, not pleased at being a little on the fat side, or old for that matter, but it was only temporary. He left the apartment door open and agent Haden on the floor. Testing his voice on the ride down on the elevator, and easing into the new form, this has to work he thought, The door chimed and he stepped out.
"Mr. Watts?" questioned the doorman.
"Oh I'll be right back, agent Haden's waiting for me, the hospital called and said that I could go and get William so I asked him if he mind waiting, he said it was ok with him."
"Oh, well do you want me to stop in a check on him."
"He's and agent what, he's going to do rob me."
"You have a point."
"I'll be back."
Bruce first called Emma to let her know what he had found, then call Terry who seemed a little better after the past two days.
"Terry I filled in Mrs. Frost on what I found but I can only go so-far with following a paper trail, I need you to go and see the three people on this list."
"Sure no problem, hay one of the people on this list lives in Wills building."
Bruce could hear the waver in Terry's voice. "Is that going to be an issue?" however he need Terry to be 100 right now.
"No not at all." Terry pushed down his feelings and focused on the job at hand thankful for the distraction, he only hoped he could be as sure of himself when he walked into the building.
Terry saved the person in Wills building for last, he'd asked each person to tell them all they could remember about what happened.
Mr. Dulton as he recalled didn't remember much. What he did remember was being in a class room with about fifty people and listening to a speech being given.
It was a good speech. The old man smiled. The man at the podium was in a wheelchair and he was balled. He was talking about people and their mental habits; he said the trouble with most of us is, we'd rather be ruined with praise than saved with criticism. I have to agree. Anyway that is when, the woman got up. I was there with her but not, it was like I couldn't be seen and I had to go where she went, anyway she left the room and went to another room with a safe, I watched her melt the safe with her hand and take out this large blue gem. Then that was it. I came to in a hospital bed.
After some questioning terry realized that Mr. Dulton was describing Tanya Aims the woman arrested for that theft. He couldn't have possibly known that, he was in the Caribbean and was returning on the plain the day that happened. Yet he knew things about it that wasn't in the news.
Tanya Aims had a similar story. She saw a group of people gather together talking they called themselves the dark Illuminati she couldn't see much, each person had a black robe on and was hooded but their was a teen, and he just killed Tony Stark, he ripped his hart out. The man who she was connected to just laughed he made a sick joke he said. In the end, the red just isn't red enough. And he kept laughing like his death was funny. And that was it I woke up in jail. Lucky for me I only got put on house arrest, Mr. Xavier didn't press charges.
And now Terry was going to see Marcus Nox the last person on the list, the person Tanya had described and the one who lived in Wills building. Terry just hoped he didn't run into Mr. Watts.
Terry walked to the door and saw Dan the door attendant. "Hi Dan."
"Hi Terry, what ya doing in these parts."
"Just going to see someone." Terry really didn't want the guard to know who. Mr.
Nox had agreed to be seen only if no one knew and Terry was going to hold true to that.
"You know I can't let you go up to the Watts house right. Mr. Watts said some pretty colorful things about you, I kept trying to tell him that you were a good kid, you know how you helped Willie out and all, but he wasn't hearing it, he said… who cares what he said, even if it were true it shouldn't be repeated. But to be honest I never would have guessed."
"Yeah well Mr. Watts is a lot of colorful things too, but I'm not going there. look Wills not even home so I got no reason to go up there."
"Well okay then, that's good enough for me go on in Terry."
"Thanks Dan."
Terry hesitated in the elevator for a moment then hit the button to go to the fifth floor. He rung the bell and waited for Mr. Nox to come to the door. He was surprised when a young blind man ambled to the door and ushered him in.
"Hi you must be Terry I'm Marcus Nox, do come in."
The young man had a warm smile but his eyes hid pain. "So you said you wanted to talk."
"Yeah can you tell me what you remember about the night you were found."
"I can remember everything. Everything I did and said, the only problem was it wasn't me doing it or saying it."
Terry must have looked surprised because Marcus stopped talking for a bit. "You can remember everything."
"Yes, some of the thoughts are mine and some aren't but I can remember it all, I haven't been alone in my head from that night on."
"Just start from the beginning if I have any questions I'll ask them."
"Okay well for me I guess it started when the young man outside Gotham mental institution collapsed into a coma. I was a patient there, autism. Well anyway he collapsed and they brought him in. I don't remember much of my life before that point but I can recall a lot of his. He called me over, not with words with his mind, he told me to touch the body. I didn't know much of life as I said but I do know that I wasn't scared. I touch him and I kind of went to the back and he was in the front. I was a witness to my own life and for the first time I understood people. Are you following me."
"Kind of so far, go on." He still had those sad eyes.
"oh right this is important, My mutation caused my autism. I don't have it any more but I exist in all locations within time and space at once. It's enough to drive anyone crazy. But back to the story he rode me like a bike and took me places, most of the time to meeting with men in robes. One night there was a man there, umm; his name was Steven, Steven something, umm storng, straing, strange. Steven Strange. That was it, he was there and I had to watch myself kill him. It was horrible he used me to kill him."
Terry was obviously confused. "Steven Strange, you couldn't have killed him he's alive.."
"I know, and that's what the cops said but I know I killed him, I mean he used me to do it, just hear me out. We were in a dark room and there were six other people there all in robes, but I couldn't see them but he knew one of them. The one that told him to do it, to kill Steven. His name was Tony Stark but he wasn't the real Stark. Anyway I watch myself, I could feel something ignite deep within me. He said to Tony mockingly Oh here come the big lights, time to say night. Then he focused my power on him. at first it was only a little to watch him writhed in pain in he pushed all of it on him he said I can see the whole of time and space, every single atom of your existence and I divide them…"
The pain that Terry had seen in Marcus's eyes soon turned to tears as he relived the moment. "he cried out in agony and I couldn't do anything to help him or stop it all I could do was watch as one by one Mr. Strange's cells were divide and scattered across time and space, and then someone who looked like the man I killed took his place. He made me do so many atrocities after that and then I managed to gain control for a moment and burned out my eyes. He couldn't use me after that so he jumped to another body but not before locking my powers first and leaving me with the knowledge of everything that happened."
"Is that all?" Terry knew he was telling the truth but it was still hard to believe.
"Yeah thats all."
"Okay then thanks Marcus. I'll show myself out." Terry was half way out the door when he heard Marcus call out to him.
"There's one more thing. I know crazy, I was crazy, he's not whole, David that is, half of him is missing, it's like someone shattered him and left him that way. That's all."
Proteus arrived at the hospital an hour later but had been stopped by the guards from going up to Willies room. Now how the hell was he going to get there. Then it came to him. Proteus watch as the janitor turned the corner.
"Excuse me but there's a flood in the bathroom." As he suspected the man made his way to the room he'd indicated, mop in hand, muttering a string of profanities about kids and stuff. It was almost two easy.
He was sure the thud of Mr. Watts hitting the floor could be heard from the hallway and it was best to cover his tracks, not that he thought anyone would thing anything. Proteus ran out the room yelling. "Help, someone get a doctor, he… he just passed out."
The commotion that follow was the perfect distraction he slipped by the guards without a care and made his way to Willie Watts room. He opened the door after telling one of the nurses that he was only going in to get the trash. He closed and locked the door behind him.
"Hello Willie, remember me."