Hey everyone, sorry about the late update. I've been down with a cold for a week, and just got a new puppy as well. For adroable little balls of cuteness, they can sure kick up a stink at night. Anyways, chapter 21! As promised, and more Chaos Q&A at the end. Uh...oh! Jayne!
Jayne: What?-!
D-I-N: Disclaimer.
Jayne: Fine. Difference-is-normal doens't own Wolverine and the X-men, she only has the copyright of me, Alenka, Kenzie and all the other OC's in the story as well as the stroy plots that doesn't occur in the series.
Rover.
"What the hell happened to you?" Jayne asked me as she walked in the front door.
"Had a fight last night with the Juggernaut, making sure Kitty didn't kill Bobby when he drops ice cubes don't her shirt." I shrugged, heading towards the stairs, "What do you expect from a mansion full of mutants?"
"Uh...Juggernaut?" Jayne questioned as she followed me. I almost face palmed myself when I remembered that Jayne doens't know all the bad guys that we usually fight on a regular basis.
"Really big and nasty mutant." I summarized for her, "And when I mean big, I mean big. And strong to boot."
"How strong?"
"He threw Kenzie through a building pretty easily, when said friend was in dragon form." The look on her face would normally get me laughing, but my mind was...elsewhere.
"But apart from some nasty bruises, everyone else is pretty much ok." I assured her as I led her into my room. While she promptly sat on my large bed and picked up a random magazine I had laying around, I searched through my drawers and closet to find something nice and clean to wear. When I looked in the mirror to decide what clothes I should wear, I noticed Jayne looking at me, like she was trying to see something inside my mind. "What?"
"You've got a glow about you." She told me, her eyebrows furrowing as she tried to decide what it was, "There's something about you now that just seems...bright and chipper."
"What are you on about?" I asked her, pretending I had no clue what she was talking about. Key word: pretending. If I let it slip that I finally got to kiss Logan this morning, twice, she'd never end about it.
"You did what to who how many times?-!" She exclaimed, and I just realized that I murmured that out loud. That, or Armageddon burst the bubble and told her without me knowing he did. Either way, the cat was out of the bag. Crap!
"So let me get this right: you finally got to kiss Logan this morning, twice, and he didn't hurt you for it?" she asked, in a quite serious tone of voice that worried me a little, as she got up from my bed and walked over to me. Was she really expecting Logan to hurt me if I did kiss him? OK, seriously, I know Logan can be a bit of an ass sometimes, but geez Jayne! Give him some credit.
"Well...actually he kissed me." I mumbled out, rubbing the back of my neck and hoping to God she didn't hear me say that.
"He kissed you?-!" She exclaimed in a hushed voice, pressing her hands against her mouth in surprise. Oh dear God, this was not going to work out well for me today. Only I was really surprised myself when a hand from her mouth and punched me in the shoulder.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"Hot dammit, I knew that guy had the hots for you big time!" She cheered, throwing her fists high into the air, "Ok, so it took 10 months for it to happen, but it happened! Yes!"
...
...
...
...Oh-kay...mind...blown.
"...um..." Was about all I could say in that point for what she was rambling about. Jayne rolled her eyes and slapped her palm to her forehead before punching me in the shoulder again, making me exclaim in pain again.
"Geez, someone's thick this morning." she grumbled before grabbing both my shoulder and started shaking me back and forth, "Are you insane? You've finally gotten the man of your dreams to kiss you, and you are not acting properly!"
"Ok I get the gist." I managed to say in between the shaking gestures before pulling her hands from my shoulders and glaring at her, "So will you give the chance to be all girly?"
"Yes." She answered.
"Thank you." I replied with a slight nod of my head before, simultaneously, we started jumping up and down excitedly while squealing like junior cheerleaders who just discovered something ridiculous. "I can't believe it! I can't believe it!" I squealed at her before fanning myself, "Hoochie mama, he is one hot man!"
"And he is definitely your type." Jayne agreed in the same excited voice, "as a friend, I will say this: you have done worse, now things are only going to go up and beyond!" We both looked at each other for a second or two before squealing in happiness again.
Dear God. Where's that bucket of water? Armageddon asked the Lord above, making me and Jayne chuckle. "No, seriously." he whined as his astral self of a golden wolf.
"Nice way to ruin the mood, Armageddon." Jayne commented with a smirk. He just stuck his tongue out at her in a childish gesture before turning his head away in disgust. Which only made the both of us laugh again. Who would've thought that after a night of fighting an opponent who was insanely tall and strong would end up with a great morning?
Jayne and I calmed down from our laughing fit, and as Jayne was asking Armageddon something I realized that I was in trouble: I couldn't hear what Jayne, or Armageddon were saying.
I was about to use my telepathy when some strange force assaulted my mind, everything inside feeling like it was moving back and forth at rapid light speed, the painful sensation forcing my eyes to jam shut to block out the pain but it wasn't working. There was something else...
Fire...
So much fire...
A shrill cry of a bird-like creature surrounded by flames...
A human's cry of pain as the flames-
"Alenka!" With a gasp I woke up. I was lying on the ground, with something propping my feet up an a cold cloth pressed against my forehead, and Jayne kneeling over me with an anxious look on her face.
"Alenka? Are you ok?" she asked, her voice very soft. Aside from having a really bad feeling of something trying to shake my head open and then douse me in flames, I'm just peachy.
Hey, go easy on her Armageddon scolded me as he appeared in my view, She nearly had a heart attack. Twice. Twice?
"I'm fine. But what happened?" I asked back, attempting to sit up only for her to press her hands against my shoulders to keep me from moving. By the look in her eyes, it was a serious thing for me not to move at the moment. And that worried me. "We were talking about Logan finally making a move when you had some kind of seizure and passed out." She explained, "You were out cold for about an hour, and when you started coming round you had another one and passed out again. It's nearly dinner time." And there was the reason why she was so anxious.
"Sounds like fun." I mumbled as I rubbed my hand over my brow, "At least I wasn't going down the staircase." That would've been an adventure and a half. Jayne's face turned into a grimace, meaning she clearly thought the same way I did about it. Glad to know we have the same train of thought, well... sometimes. Other times, that girl thinks of the scariest things. After a few more minutes of staring at my ceiling from the floor, Jayne ad Armageddon eased me into a sitting position then up to my feet...when I really needed to have a conversation with the toilet bowl.
#######
"Have you found him yet?" I heard Jayne ask just as I finished my third conversation with the toilet, and finally managed to have a settled stomach.
"Found who yet?" Armageddon asked her.
"The Oh, God! Of Hangovers." She replied innocently. Even though my stomach and esophagus were burning, I managed a weak sounding chuckled as a reply for her answer: she's been reading Terry Pratchet too many times.
"We need to get you new reading material." My second spirit commented flatly before sighing, "But first, how about you get Alenka a glass of water?" With a small shrug she pulled herself from the edge of my bathtub and left the room to fetch what he asked for.
"Feeling better?" Jayne asked a while later as we made the trip out of my bedroom.
"A little." My stomach did settle down, after another conversation or two with the Oh, God! Of Hangovers and three more glasses of water. But now everything was calm and settled...and it's nearly tea time so that should be interesting.
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"Are you sure about staying up here tonight?" I asked her again, the both of us descending the stair case, "I mean, Remy's gotta be wondering what you do with your time up here."
"Eh, he's out on a work thingie." She shrugged, "and who I do my time with is none of his business. Though, I wonder where Forge is."
...
...
"Please tell me I just didn't hear you say that." I pleaded. I only had to look over at her to notice the bright red blush on her face, meaning she realized how she said her sentence and the way in came out. I know she's my friend and all, but I couldn't help laughing at her mistake, which only made her more annoyed.
"Oh, zip it, mutie!" she whined at me as I cackled like mad.
"That was—ha ha!—so funny!" I snickered behind my hands. I let that go for another minute before stopping. Mainly because Jayne was starting to sulk, and because I just know that she'll do something equally devious to get back at me. And I'm not particular about being the recipient of her revenge schemes.
"Thank you." she pouted. I gave her a smile before looping my arm over her shoulders and guiding her to the kitchen; my stomach craved something (preferably) edible and food-ish, not something Forge and Bobby cooked up.
"It could be worse." I pointed out to her as we walked through the door...only to see everyone else gathered and looking a little out of sorts, like they just received some bad news. Even the air was tense with disbelief and anger. Even though she's not a mutant, Jayne felt it too.
"Uh...I think we came at a bad time." She mumbled before stepping further into the room, "Something wrong? Or is it mutants-only?" Behind her back I sent a challenging look to Logan, saying that if he said mutants-only, then we were going to have an unpleasant conversation. In the Danger Room.
"It concerns just us. You should go home, Jayne, and stay there."
"Scott!" I exclaimed, my head snapping around to where he was sitting. He just looked back at me behind the tinted sunglasses he always wore in a calm manner.
"Rude enough?" Jayne scolded sarcastically, crossing her arms over her chest. Not only was it rude to her, but I took offense to that as well.
"He has a point." Kitty agreed with him. Soon a few others were agreeing as well. And choosing the wrong actions. Jayne was a part of the team, regardless if she has no powers: what she lacked with mutant powers she more than made up for in other areas, especially being the one who keeps everyone centred to the ground when everything hits the roof and goes through the fan.
"Are you guys kidding?" Forge asked them, one of the few who didn't agree, "Jayne may be a human but she has her own talents. Some we need in the next few days." That's when he turned to Scoot and levelled the most flattest look I ever saw. "And Scott? In eight days, there's not going to be a home for a lot of people to go to, so we need all the help we can get."
...
...
... "Ok, I'll bite." I said in a dead quiet voice as I crossed my arms over my chest, "What's happening in eight days?" Forge turned in his seat and looked at us both. But before he got a word out, Logan did the honors for him.
"Summers took a trip down memory lane, with Emma tagging for a ride." He told us both from his seat at the head of the table, "And they found out what caused the explosion a year ago."
"Explosion?" Jayne asked.
"The one that destroyed the mansion." Hank answered. Ah that one.
"So what caused it?" She asked, on page with what they were talking about.
Everyone went quiet and looked at each other, like a silent communication. The glare returned on my face as my arms crossed over my chest. "Either willingly or by force, the answer is coming out." I warned them all. Bobby was the first to cave.
"Jean did." He answered. The world around me seem to freeze for a few seconds as his words were being processed through my mind. Either I was sicker than I thought, or it just sounded like Jean caused the explosion a year ago.
"Jean? As in the class 5 mutant that's gone missing?" Jayne asked them all, "How could she cause an explosion that big? Unless she used telepathy on someone that causes explosions, or caused everything in the mansion to go up with telekinesis." The look on a few peoples faces said they weren't liking her trail of thought, but I was with her on that. There was just no way a telepath-telekinetic mutant could blow a whole mansion up, even a class 5 one at that.
When I looked to Logan for confirmation, I could see it in his eyes. There was something else he hadn't mentioned to everyone else yet.
"So what happens in eight days?" I repeated my earlier question, steering the attention to me.
"According to Charles, at 9: 43 p.m. in eight days from now, there'll be a great fiery tide that sweeps across the earth and wipes out the humans." Hank explained to us both, "And the Sentinels will take over, hence the future the Professor is in now." Jayne and I were quiet for a few moments, but it wasn't in disbelief: we were both thinking.
"I hate to sound like a broken record here, but again: Jean's a telepath and telekinetic." Jayne said, "If she caused the explosion, then how is she gonna do that again? We don't even know where she is!"
Unless...
"Unless it's not her that causes it." I spoke up, realizing a second possibility, and one that seemed more likely. Everyone turned to me, having thought the same thing.
"Now, you causing a globe fire tide, I can believe." Jayne commented, "I mean you may have a great stretch of patience—having to deal with Logan and all—but there's gonna be a time where you give up."
"Probably." I partially agreed with her, "But in the event that my patience does give, the most I do is just hit someone." Logan knows all about that. "It'll take a lot to make my use my powers, especially for the fire tide on a global scale."
"How much stress are we talking about?" Kenzie asked.
"Ballpark? Ah, Kelly making another move that really ups the ante, someone I know personally getting hurt by said ante-upper...basically a lot." I shrugged as I answered him, "What we're dealing with now I can handle."
"What about Fiendrich?" Emma asked me, "going on the presumptions that he's a mutant and has a vendetta against you, he might cause you to lash out." Ah, yeah...that was a problem. And a big one too: I hadn't had a visit from that slimy git in a month, and there's no telling what he has planned for me when he does show up again.
"So let me clarify: eights days from now, world goes kaput. And it's either Jean (doubtful) or Alenka (very likely) that causes it." Jayne recapped everything we had just discussed.
"Pretty much." Logan nodded in agreement, making her go silent. Reading her aura told me she wasn't that worried about this mess, and I think it was because she plans on keeping my as calm as possible in the event that I do cause trouble.
"I'm going to die now." Jayne suddenly said, "I'm going to frickin' die now." What the heck?
"Total Drama Island?" Bobby asked her, which she answered with a nod, "So why are you going to die?"
"With what I'm thinking." She replied. Suspicious of what she was thinking, I tapped into her mind...and exclaimed in protest.
"Jayne, there is no way in hell you're dipping me into a vat of strawberry jelly!" I railed at her, "Even if the apocalypse is coming!"
"Damn." At the pointed looks everyone was giving her she shrugged, "Well she's gonna make the world go screwy in a few days, so I figure I might as well get my 'before I kick the bucket' list over and done with." To the ears of the teenagers, that seemed like a valid excuse. But there was no way in hell they were going to tag team and drop me into that vat of jelly. Where would they even get one in the first place?-!
"While you lot discuss your life's goals—without involving me in embarrassing situations—I need a word with Logan about something." I commented before sending a telepathic message to said man, And no you're not getting out of it. He didn't reply as he got up and followed me out of the room and out the backyard.
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(Logan's POV)
:Damn, what now?: I asked myself as I followed Alenka outside for our talk. If it was about this morning, there was no chance that she was going to come out of it with her head held normally. What I was going to tell her would definitely cripple her, and it was something I really wanted to avoid.
"What's up?" I asked her, speaking when she hadn't, and praying that she wasn't going to ask something painful.
"The others may have missed it, but I didn't." She told me, planted herself firmly in front of me and crossing her arms over her ample chest. Oh, crap, stop thinking about her like that! Concentrate!
"What do you mean?" I asked, hoping against everything that she was just playing with me, "About what?"
"About Jean." For some reason, a weight fell off my shoulders and allowed me to breath a little bit easier than before. Mind you, I was kind of hoping that she didn't pick up on that. But since it could hold a key to the next few days, and Layla was the only mutant who could contain it, then it was worth telling her the whole truth.
"Earlier, when Summers and I were telling Chuck about Jean being the source of the explosion, he froze Scott out to tell me something." I told her, sitting down on the concrete bench behind me and resting my chin on the backs of my hands, "Turns out she's a bit more powerful than the others thought."
"Meaning what exactly?" Layla asked, taking a seat beside me. She placed her hand on my knee, sending every fibre in me into an frenzied overdrive. It took everything to stop the urge of kissing her senseless, and the decision I had to let her go was weighing heavily as well.
But with the deadline in eight days, was it really worth dealing with heartbreak and the end of the world, or just settle for the lesser of two evils?
"Logan?" Layla asked softly, calling me back from my thoughts and forcing me back. Composing my thoughts with a heavy sigh, I forced myself to look up at her, into her sky blue eyes that bore right into mine.
"Despite everyone thinking that it might be you that causes the apocalypse, Charles mentioned to me that he'd seen that psychic fire before." I explained to her, "In the memories of one of the few survivors in the future who saw it happen."
"Psychic fire?"
"If something gets to be too much, it'll cause Jean to lash out. Something caused her to do the same last year." I added, helping her connect the dots, "Charles is worried that the war now will get to Jean, and make her lash out again, this time with bigger consequence." The frown marring Layla's face didn't sit well with me.
"That's just something I'm having trouble swallowing, Logan." She finally told me, looking down at rose bush in front of us, "Class 5 or not, Jean shouldn't have that sort of power without something tapping it down."
"How do you figure that?" I asked her, before remembering that she was the only class 6 mutant in the world, so this was really something up her alley. Dumb ass.
"Jean's like me, Logan: we're both super powerful, even to mutant standards." She replied, shaking her head, "But the law of nature is that for a great and dangerous power, something is needed to keep it in check, like Armageddon for me and my powers." I didn't get where she was heading before it smacked me between the eyes. Painfully.
"You think Jean has a second spirit, too?" I asked, clarifying what she could be thinking.
"That's the only theory I have for her psychic fire." She agreed with a nod, "I'm going through Scott's thoughts now to see what he saw in the memory. Something about the explosion just screams a second being involved with it." Something else told her that it hit a little more closer to home for her than she told me, but she couldn't quite place her finger on it.
In any case, it just meant we had to be careful about where we stepped from now on.
"Well, regardless what you guys think, if Jean is the cause of the fire tide, Jayne will find her." Layla said with determination, "She may be human, but she's more resourceful than she lets on."
"You really think she'll find Jean?" I asked her, "Not even Emma can."
"Maybe it just takes the right person to look for her." she shrugged simply, then looked at me with a caring grin, "I mean, you found me right before Grimm killed me." Remembering that night in particular sent my gut burning with rage and hatred, even despair.
I had left Moss strapped into the machine he used on countless victims to extract information when I smelt the blood and heard the screams. Fearing the worst I just followed the sound till I came to where was coming from: the torture chamber. The moment the door opened and I saw that poor girl strapped to the table, beaten, bloodied and bruise, I just snapped and launched at him. There were so many ways I could've killed that bastard, but Layla needed help fast, so I took care of her first.
Ever since I did...it's been one hell of a ride. :And something,: I realized in hindsight, :that I was going to miss if I called it quits.:
"I did, didn't I?" I mused out loud before wrapping my arm around her shoulders and pulled her close, "It's gonna get rough the next few days. Think you can manage?"
"As long as you keep me grounded, then I'll take whatever the world throws at me." She smirked, leaning her head on my shoulder and let out a sigh, "right?"
"Right." But would she do the same for me? My temper was strained as is, but the added pressure of the deadline to the end of the world would be enough to break me down, and not a lot of people had any luck in calming me down.
Would the truth in Harada's word come out then? Would I really hurt Layla in my anger?
That, more than anything, strengthened my reluctant decision to let her go.
OK, that's it for another chapter! And like I promised earlier, it's time for another...
CHAOS Q&A!
Q: Ok then, this question- or rather, questions- is from Tiryn. Long time no hear from, sweetheart. Anyway, question 1 is in regards to Logan's temper and couldn't Alenka help him get it under control. The second, where's Angel now that he's turned into a metallic mutant that also happens to be out of his mind.
A: Ah. Well, the first one's a bit tricky, sheila, because (as Jayne will point out in the next chapter) while Alenka is patient with Logan, there are some cases where her patience snaps, and seeing as she's a class 6 mutant, that's generally a bad thing. So, in a way, Logan is looking out for her alot more than we realize.
As for Angel, well it's anyone's guess wher ehe went. All I can say is that wherever Samantha (the mute girl with the MLIA moment t-shirt) is, Angel...i-i-is probably not that far away from her. Trust me, it'll be explained in a few chapters.
Well that's it! That's all, and yes, I shall get the next chapter out in two weeks and not three! But I would like to have at least 10 reviews before I post the next chapter up, because I'm feeling unloved here. Seriously I only had about 3-4 reviews. So, if you really love me, then let me know.
Well, Instead of gas-bagging any longer, I'll just sing off here and let you guys enjoy the wait, so sieh Sie alle nächstes Mal!