(I'm sorry. I was hoping to post much sooner then this but with college starting back up and I'm now looking for a new temporary job, I haven't been able to work on this as much as I wanted to. Don't worry, I'm not done with this fic by a long shot though. I actually expect to keep working on it for years possibly. Hey as long as I have stories to write and people who will read 'em, I'll keep 'em comin.)
The weekend went by fast for the X-Men who were repairing the damage done by Petra. But things were somewhat tense at school with the Brotherhood. Where the hoods would normally tease or insult their rivals, they didn't even speak to the X-Men at all.
All except John who only talked to Amara who were both sitting out in the quad having lunch. "Lance still hasn't left the house?" asked Amara. "Nah, he's been taking rather rough as you can imagine. Won't talk to any of us." said John.
"I wish there were something we could do for him." said Amara. "Don't think we haven't tried it already sheila. I don't think anybody can bring him out of this except himself." said John.
Nearby, Rogue and Lorna were sitting at a picnic table. "Man, killing your own mother. Ah can't imagine how ah would feel if that happened to me." said Rogue. Lorna's mind was pre-occupied with something else.
For the past few weeks, she's been hiding a piece of shrapnel she picked up back at the scrap yard where she rejected Magneto and joined the X-Men. The metal shard had blood on it, specifically Magneto's blood.
He fell onto it when Rogue and Lorna blasted him with a powerful magnetic blast. Polaris held onto it, wanting to know if the big question all the X-Men had: Was Magneto Lorna's father?
She had the shard hidden away in her room, just waiting to get the nerve to put it through a paternity test with her own blood. She never really thought about it before but with the incident with Lance's mother, Polaris had been thinking a lot about it.
She managed to bribe an analyst to do the test thanks to some money she kept when she left the Brotherhood. She wasn't going to say a word about this to anybody, especially Xavier. Despite his good intentions, he tries to protect his students even when they don't need protecting. And right now Lorna didn't need protecting, she needed the truth.
"Hey, ya'll still on Earth?" asked Rogue. Lorna snapped out of her daze. "Uhh, yeah." said Lorna. The bell rang, signaling it was time to get to class. "Remember, we need to do finish up the annex for our paper tonight so how about we take care of it after school." suggested Rogue.
"Uhh…I can't. I've got something to do." said Lorna. "Like what?" asked Rogue. "It's nothing. We'll finish it tonight." said Lorna, who headed off to her next class.
Kitty wasn't one to usually skip school but she could barely sit for a minute let alone a few hours. She hadn't talked to Lance in days and with the other Brotherhood members at school, now was her chance.
She had to walk all the way there but it wasn't very far. Mystique had the Boarding House built only a few minutes drive away from the school. She phased through the house and couldn't find anyone home. She checked out the back and saw Lance sitting underneath a tree, his mind seemingly elsewhere.
She approached him slowly, not exactly sure just how he was going to react. "You don't have to sneak around." said Lance, who wasn't looking at her when he said it. Obviously she needed to work on her stealth skills. "Yeah, I kinda need to work on that." admitted Kitty, who sat down next to him. He didn't protest. "Why didn't you call me?" asked Kitty. Lance sighed.
"Kitty, I don't like help from other people. I always take care of things myself. Guess that's the reason why I got so used to being alone. Heck, I didn't care about any of my foster parents. Most were either jerks, nut jobs, or people who wanted me just for the checks from social services. But she was…she was my real mother. Someone who actually loved me for being me. And I killed her...Everything always ends badly for me. Story of my life." grunted Lance.
"Tell me this Lance, do you like me?" asked Kitty. "Of course." responded Lance. "But why? If everything ends badly for any connections you have with other people, why bother?" asked Kitty. "I guess…I just ran with it. I liked you and I didn't really what would happened and I didn't really care. I was in the moment and for months, you were all I could think about." said Lance.
"So despite your whole theory about personal relationships not working out, you didn't give up on me. How many months did you try to ask me?" asked Kitty. "Two months, twenty six days, seven hours, and thirteen seconds." replied Lance.
Kitty threw him a look. "Actually, I just made that up." chuckled Lance. Kitty smiled. "And you haven't left here either." pointed out Kitty, indicating the Boarding House. "Yeah well, I've got no one else to go." said Lance.
"Well that's a lie. You could find plenty of places with Toad's smell, Pietro's arrogance, Fred's endless appetite, John's fire accidents…" explained Kitty. "Okay okay, I guess I do kinda like these guys. They're…like family. A family that actually accepts me for who I am." admitted Lance.
"Same as me." said Kitty. The two were silent for a moment, their faces close. "NOOOOOOO!" yelled Kine. Kitty and Lance both glanced over to see Kine, Chris, and Pietro all watching them. "They were going to kiss. I win, pay up." said Pietro, smiling. The other two grudgingly handed over money.
"How about we continue this conversation somewhere more private?" suggested Kitty. "Fine by me." said Lance, giving the three snoops a death glare.
Lorna stood in the empty parking lot, waiting for her contact. The guy was quite paranoid about someone from his job seeing him and getting him fired. Personally, Lorna thought the guy was too overprotective but she wanted those results and this was the only way.
She waited for almost fifteen minutes before the man finally showed. In his hands was a folder. "You've got the money?" he asked. Lorna handed it over and took the folder. Now that he got what he wanted, the man simply left but Lorna didn't care.
She went through the test results, eager to get an answer. And sure enough she got one. The test came back positive. Lorna's genetic probability with Magneto was one hundred percent. That meant he wasn't an uncle or distant relative. A one hundred percent can only occur from one of the biological parents. Magneto is her father.
Lorna couldn't believe. She should have expected this outcome but she always had her doubts. She was actually afraid to test the sample ever since she got, afraid of what she might find out. And now it was official, she was the daughter of her greatest enemy.
The embodiment of all that she swore she would fight against was her own flesh and blood. How could she fight him again knowing this? She dropped the folder and the papers inside fell out to the ground.
That's when she felt a presence behind her. She turned and floating in the air was the familiar figure with a billowing cape and red metallic armor with a helmet that completely covered his face. Magneto.
"Hello Lorna. We need to talk." he said.
(That dialogue between Kitty and Lance took me forever to write. I kept writing something, hated it, erased it, then wrote something else and the cycle repeated. But I'm glad how it turned out. Lately, I haven't been giving a lot of spotlight on several people including Cyclops, Shadowcat, Beast, Jean, etc. Yes, I know I've been working more with Jean now because I started realizing that I've been neglecting some characters. Well I'm going to try and fix that. I thought this chapter was a nice way to start with Kitty. Aaah, I'm writing too much. Time for a preview of the next chapter. Can you say Hex Factor? That's right, Wanda's coming to the Hood House and you know what happens next. Please review, you have no idea how much I enjoy feedback.)