She was trapped, there was nowhere to go as the walls closed in around her. She didn't have the strength to rise, to push against her enclosure.
"Liar," a voice called, echoing in the small space, making it sound powerful. Even in her curled position, Storm peered through her arms. Immediately the smallness of the room hit her, making her crawl back into herself.
"Liar," the voice repeated, accusing.
"What?" Storm shouted back, her own voice small and weak. Still she could not bear to open her eyes.
"You say you are not strong enough," the voice continued. "I say you lie. I can't help you if you refuse to help yourself. You have never needed anyone to carry you before, you don't need me to pick you up now."
Storm ceased her rocking, listening intently though she feared what would happen should she open her eyes.
"I can't," she called. "I can't! The walls…"
"Don't matter," the voice broke in. "Reach inside Ororo. What do you find there?"
Almost unconsciously, Storm did as she was bidden. Somehow, underneath all her fear, her crippling fear, she could sense something, something good, something primal, something strong.
Without opening her eyes, she rose to her knees, then to her feet, every movement filling her with new confidence.
"Open you eyes," the voice commanded.
And she did. She saw the hand before her, not the walls closing in. She saw this strong hand, promising safety as she stood on her own two feet. Everyone needs a little help. She grasped the pale hand in her dark one.
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Jean tried and tried but there was not a thing she could do. He was slipping away before her very eyes, drifting to a place where she could not follow. The pebbles spun faster and faster as she reached deeper and deeper, finding nothing but a huge well of power that could possibly be directed or controlled. It was like trying to cling to a slippery rope.
Suddenly she felt a something seize her face and felt a pull on everything that made her her. Desperately she swotted it away. It was trying to defeat her, drain her and make her powerless. And then Scott would be truly lost
"Don't fight me," a voice hissed, its tone a mixture of annoyance, desperation, and if she wasn't mistaken, pain. "Its not shameful to let someone help you. You can't do this alone, you can't hold that sort of power, locked up within one person. Share your burden with me, the only one who can. We can save Scott, together for we cannot do it alone. Let me help you."
For a moment, Jean felt like refusing saying she could go it alone but as she looked down at Scott she realised that was impossible. No man was an island. She glanced up at the girl before her, a girl with two-toned hair who had fought her way through a barrier of pebbles just to stand at her side with her hand outstretched ready to help her.
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Never be human.
The words rushed around his head, filling every sense as he sat in the cubicle of the boy's toilets of Bayville High. A small part of him wondered why, when he had the ability to be anywhere he wished, he had chosen to release his sorrow in the third cubicle down. But that was an issue he did not care about at this specific moment of time.
He had dealt with cruelty before; it was something he had long expected. But not from Scott, not from his friends. Their betrayal, for it was a betrayal, cut him deeper than any knife ever could, severing from the only sense of society he had ever experienced.
A crash made him look up from his knees. Underneath the door he spotted booted feet, thudding determinedly through the bathroom. They did not stop to push open the first three doors but marched straight to his. Despite its lock, at the touch of the arrival, it swung gently open to reveal a girl with two-toned hair. A girl he knew so well.
"Rogue?" he whispered confused, not only because she was in the boy's bathroom but also because she looked pale, paler than usual and she was looking at him with eyes that betrayed immense relief. Then anger resurged in him. She had turned away from him when he had needed her most. She must have seen rage contort his features as he rose to his feet because she frowned, as though unsure of what he was so angry about.
"Get out!" He shouted at her, making her jump slightly as he raised his voice above his normal level. "Don't look at me as though you have no idea about what I'm talking about! You abandoned me, you ignored me! I am outcaste! Scott revealed everything in front of everyone and you just sat there as though you never knew me!"
Comprehension dawned on her face, as though she were piecing together two sides of the story and finally coming up with a whole.
"Oh Kurt," she began calmly but Kurt cut across her.
"No Rogue, I will not be convinced by whatever you say! Actions speak louder than words and what you just did told me everything I need to know! I do not belong here! I WILL NEVER BE HUMAN!"
She moved like lightening, her strong pale hand clamping over his mouth, silencing him.
"Never say that!" She said fiercely, her eyes burning with conviction. "Never say that! You are more human than so many people in this world! When you are injured, do you not bleed? When you are happy, do you not laugh and when you are sad, do you not cry? Oh Kurt, you are not afraid to feel. I can't do that. I cannot wear my heart on my sleeve; I want to encase it in armour because I'm so scared that it will be broken again. And that makes me cold and unfeeling; it makes me less than human. I envy you Kurt because you will be more human than I will ever be."
She fell to her knees before him, tears running down her pale, drawn cheeks.
"On my knees, Kurt, I beg for your forgiveness. I turned you away when I should have welcomed you with open arms, delivered to me after so much longing and hoping. Forgive me Kurt because if I don't ask for it now I never will. Forgive me Kurt, for I have forgiven you everything. Forgive me."
Kurt stared down at his sister, on her knees before him. He could not recall when he had ever heard her speak in such a way, when tears had flown so freely from her eyes so that they matched his. And in that moment he realised their similarities. He felt his own wet cheek and gently touched hers, feeling the same wetness under his fingers. He was as human as she was. He collapsed to his knees and threw his arms around her slim frame, clutching her close, as he had never done before. Further still, she clung to him as a drowning man clings to a rope.
Finally they broke apart. She raised her pale, smooth, five-fingered hand and he pressed his blue, furry, three-fingered hand against it, palm to palm.
"I love you Kurt."
"I love you Marie."
Their fingers closed, entwined.
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Lance could not think outside his panic. He was dumb to everything else. He fingers raked the walls, making his nails bleed and leave bloody trails. He could hear them coming drawing closer, making his heart thump faster and faster riving his mind right to the teetering brink. Then a voice broke through. For a moment he thought he had dived headfirst into insanity but then he realised it came from the earpiece he wore, exactly the same one he wore on missions.
"Lance," Rogue's crackly voice called over the airwaves. He welcomed her calming tones, allowing himself to be filled by the confidence she oozed. "Lance calm down. Remember, you are a mutant, you are not restricted by human law."
Those simple words told Lance exactly what he had to do. With a roar he planted his feet, eyes rolling back and allowed shock waves to ripple through the ground. The walls, for all their height, were powerless against the onslaught to their foundations and immediately began to tumble. When Lance looked up, the walls that were once his obstacle were rubble at his feet. He picked his way across it. He reached the centre of what used to be a maze. Now it was an eerily quite wasteland. Then he heard a small sound. Panic flared for a moment as he thought it was a siren. But no cries followed, no torches spun looking for their target. Instead a cat stepped gingerly from the rubble, its fur as black as night. Lance didn't hear Rogue step up behind him as he stared at it.
"Well you don't need to be a high school graduate to work out what that symbolises," she said, nodding towards the four-legged creature winding its way round Lance's leg. Lance looked at her bemused.
"You know you never have to go back to that life," she continued with a sigh, completely changing the subject with ease.
"That's because of you," Lance said. "You gave me something, a mission that gave me a purpose."
"I did, didn't I," she said with a smile. "But don't pretend that it was me that you did all this for." She looked down at the cat again. "Lance, don't let her go, not now that you have her. Let her become your life, your purpose."
"But what about you?" He asked innocently.
"She is your past and your future," she replied sadly. "I was merely here to fill up the time in between. Besides, it doesn't matter now." He gaze wandered into the distance for a moment before fixing on him once again. "Love her Lance, she deserves it."
"Is that an order?" He joked, winning a smile in return.
"Yes. Come," she held out a hand. "I shall deliver you to her."
"You always have."
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Kitty fell, screaming endlessly, earth rushing past. She could breathe but he mind still rushed with questions. Would she suddenly stop or would she fall straight through to the other side of the world? And no one could help her. She was alone, with only herself to rely on.
"Do you trust me?" Something asked. Was it inside of her or some other force? Could she trust so freely, even if it was herself? Everyone in her life had let her down. She had been left alone in a foreign land, a street kid with no money and no passport and no one had come for her. How could she trust anyone again? But she trusted herself. She had survived because she made it so.
Despite it all, she felt her scream cease and allowed her mouth to form one word.
"Yes."
She felt a hand seize hers and pull her sharply up.
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Despite the storm, he could see the sun, a blurry orb above him, fading as he sank deeper into the ocean's embrace. The something flickered in his mind, a single word. Hope.
Some part of him found the strength to kick his legs, ceasing his downward tumble. Fire was insatiable; it would not be so easily beaten. Fire was life, fire was love, fire was hope. Despite the sting his eyes stayed open, focusing upwards as his arms floundered and struggle upwards. Yet even as he fought he knew it was not enough.
But Hope would not abandon him. A shadow drifted across the sun and a hand plunged into the depths. He stretched, recognising the rings of his leader, his Lady Hope. His fingertips brushed hers. It was enough. Hope hung on pulling his upwards to the fiery orb of the sun.
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His tears could not stop, would not stop. He did not know how long he sat there, weeping but then a hand touched his shoulder. He whirled round, ready to let rip his anger out on any who dared disturb his time with her. But it was the not the face of Scott, his own tears covered by his glasses, that met his eyes. Nor was it Logan, his craggy face impassive with shock, nor Jean, not a hair out place, nor Kitty, needing comfort, nor Kurt. It was her.
She stood before him, her green eyes full of tears but shining with life. The church was completely empty save himself, her body and what must be her ghost. He could not speak.
"Oh Remy," she whispered. "If I could spare you this, I would. God knows I would."
"But you are here," he answered, a smile beginning on his grief stricken features. "You are here, my Marie. You came back to me." It occurred to him that he had not touched her but as he extended his hand she skipped away from him.
"You know I have not," her face was haunted with sorrow. "You know I cannot."
"I don't understand," he said, stepping closer. He just needed to be near her, to feel her.
"Neither do I," a tear slipped down her cheek. She looked over at her body, eyes travelling up and down it. He followed her gaze.
"I should have saved you," he muttered, hanging his head in shame, allowing tears to run off his nose onto the cold floor of the church.
She made as if to go to him but something restrained her. Unable to look, she allowed her eyes to travel the building, taking in the cold white lily flower arrangement. She had always liked those flowers. Then she spotted something.
"Oh Remy," her voice drifted though the stillness of the church. "Don't you know you already have?"
He looked up sharply towards her, his eyes fixing, surprisingly not on her but the board at her side.
Marie LeBeau
Beloved wife and mother
It was simple, so simple it was almost stupid but the enormity of those simple words hit him heavily. Part of his heart lifted. She was his, his completely and no one else's. He staggered forwards, away from the open coffin that held her earth bound body in eternal slumber, and towards everything that defined her, everything that would be his to cherish for the rest of his life. He fell to his knees before it, tracing the words with his fingertips.
"My wife," he uttered, a genuine smile, not hopeful, not sad but a genuine smile spread across his features, bring them to life again. "Our children." He looked up at her, standing radiant with a stained glass window at her back. Tears ran freely down her cheeks, though now he felt no sadness, his heart was filled with hope. All because of her.
"You are mine," he whispered happily. "Now and forever."
"Always," she sobbed, her word almost like a promise.
"Do not cry my love," he longed to lift her chin, so that she could look up into his eyes. "You shall never leave me. I have a piece of you, here, in my heart, and every time I look at my children, our children, I shall see a piece of you in them. You are not gone, Marie, you are with me still."
"I wish I could give you all of that," she wept, staring up at him and watching his face crumple in confusion. What was she talking about? She had given it to him. His bemused face made her cry all the harder, so that she doubled up and sank to the floor. He followed her down, kneeling before her. She raised her hand and made to touch his cheek but she found she could not. She was weakening. "I will wait for you," she sobbed. Rushing forward, she pressed her ghost lips against his and although she felt nothing physical, she felt all the love in her heart seem to burst open.
He reached out his hand towards her and she tried to touch hers to it but found her hand drift through. Breaking apart, he saw determination through the tears. Her face seemed to be completely devoid of colour, as though she were fading from him. For all his words he felt panic seize him and he flung out a hand.
"Stay with me," he cried. And his hand closed over hers, holding her there as she pulled him free.