The air blurred and moved around Moira. She knew that, one by one, the teens were getting their gear, getting ready to fight. The last time they had done so, they had helped take her to safety.
"They won't let me go with them, will they?" asked Emma.
She turned and put a hand on Emma's shoulder. The girl was shaking and, for the first time, Moira saw that she was just on the verge of all out panic. It was a drawn collected motion, but the girl was near her breaking point.
"They won't let me help," Emma said.
"No," Moira said.
"Because I'm weak?" she asked.
"Because you're not trained," Moira replied.
The girl looked longingly at where the rest of the teens were, and bit her lip. Moira knew what she was going through. She'd felt it in Cairo, while children and her friends had gone out to fight an ancient evil.
Even now, she felt that helplessness. If things were different, if she weren't pregnant, would she be out there with them? Moira wasn't sure if they would, or if Charles would want her monitoring communications and movements. It was still an important job, granted, but she knew what Emma meant.
Scott saw Emma looking and jogged over. He swallowed, one of his hands adjusting his bandolier.
"We're gonna get Laura back," he said, "We've only ever failed once, and that's never gonna happen again. We've got more people, and we'll even be able to bring back your grouchy brother-in-law."
He smiled.
"Besides, you should hear Peter," he said, "He's dying at another chance to kick these guy's asses."
Moira wanted to hug him. He might only be a teen, but it was thinking like that which made him seem so much older. The words were cocky, but they were also strong. They were the kind of words someone in Emma's situation needed to hear from the person going to rescue what little family she had left.
However, she didn't need to hug him, because Emma did it first. Scott blinked, his mouth opening and closing once or twice. Emma released him after a quick second, her breaths shallow and her eyes locked with his.
"Bring them home," she said.
"Yeah, of course," Scott said, "It's what we do."
"Hey, Cyclops!"
He turned to where Peter was making an impatient gesture at him. He wasn't the only one watching though. Moira could see Jean staring at them, wide-eyed. For a second, Moira got an uneasy feeling.
Then, they were gone, swallowed by black smoke and the swish of wind. Moira guided Emma to a chair, surprised at how easy it was.
"You can watch with me," she said, "We'll make sure everything goes alright, and we'll figure out when to send in reinforcements."
Emma nodded, her hands folding in her lap.
"Moira."
She looked over her shoulder to where Charles was.
"I need to get to Cerebro," he said, "There's no time to get the cell phones: we'll have to do this through telepathy. Only send in Mystique and Nightcrawler when you're absolutely sure."
"I will," she said.
He looked up and managed a smile.
"For what it's worth, I'm glad you're going to be so close," he said, "I know...I know how that sounds, but..."
She leaned down and kissed him briefly. His lips lingered on hers as she drew away, and she saw the worry, the fear in his eyes. Silently, she pulled one of his hands to her stomach where their son or daughter was growing.
Moira didn't know the gender yet, but the child was already precious to her, so very precious, a little promise who had only moved for the first time less than a week ago.
"He's never getting our child Charles," she whispered.
His fingers twisted in the cloth of her blouse for a moment, then he let go.
"He's never getting anyone here," Charles said.
He gave her one last look, then pushed himself down the hallway, an unspoken promise lingering in the air:
Because I won't let him.
Laura looked at Essex, willing herself to scream, to cry. She wanted to do something, and she thought of what her aunt had told her only that morning. For the first time, she thought her aunt was wrong: there was no such thing as happy tears.
"Sir," one of the men said, "We're getting confirmation X24 is just reaching the target's location."
"Well, the timing really seems to be coming together this time around," Essex said, "Prepare to leave when X24 returns."
His smile broadened. He looked at her for a moment longer, taking his hand away and wiping it on his shirt. Without another word, he got to his feet, still smiling, and moved over to a box on the table.
She recognized it, with its shiny metal and thick clasps. So many new memories had been made in the last month, of warm beds, friends with pink hair, boys with pretty smiles, cookies, family and books. The memories of the boxes were always very, very prominent though.
As she watched him undo the clasps, distantly, she remembered watching him before. She'd usually been curious and, as time went on, frightened. Laura had learned that those boxes never meant anything good for her.
"Now, I have a welcome home gift for you," he said, "I had to make it just for you, because you just can't mass-produce good things any more."
Laura felt cold. It was a secondary feeling, as though she was cold inside, separate from her actual skin.
"But, once it's working," said Essex, "We'll be able to ensure you never wander away from home again. Won't that be wonderful?"
Everything inside her sank as he turned. She saw a collar in his hands. Again, she thought of the warm beds, of family, of being told she was lovely, or funny, or even people trying to spend time with her. The bright yellow cookies, a gift, stood out in her mind. It was all going away, and she couldn't even run.
He pressed a button, and the collar sprang open. Laura wished the last words she'd said to her aunt had been different. She wished she'd had a chance to thank her friends again, for Kevin for smiling like that and getting her help when she needed it. She wanted to thank his mother and father too, because they had helped her have what she knew was the best month of her life.
But she wanted something else. She wanted one more hour at the school, to turn back time, so she could have one hour knowing her father. He was waiting for her, and now she'd never get to meet him.
The collar was close enough for her to touch when she heard the first scream. Essex's head whipped around sharply, just as a man was thrown into him, knocking him back. The collar flew onto the ground, skidding away.
"X23, stay!" Essex screamed.
Laura wanted to scream back at him, tell him she couldn't leave, and he knew that, and he was mean, and he was a goddamn bitch. The words stopped before her tongue even twitched in response to her feelings.
Arms circled around her, lifting her up into the air. Thoughts of relief were quickly superseded by another thought, pulling at her, that she needed to make this person let go. She felt like she was suffocating, that she was in danger.
The strange smell burnt through her nose again. Her claws slipped out of her hands and feet. The soles of her shoes ripped, and she saw red.
The morning was quickly turning from bad to worse. He'd known something was wrong when Emma had come running down the hall, frightened and asking if he'd seen Laura. He didn't even know what she looked like, and Emma knew that, so he knew she was frightened.
He'd been able to smell the young girl who had been in Chuck's office only a few minutes earlier. The scent was a strange mixture of his own, of Kayla's, and something that was just Laura.
And he'd taken off after her. Every now and then he could see small, scattered footprints, sloshing in the mud and soft earth. There was a shred of pink cloth on a branch, like a little girl's dress.
Logan had known then that this wasn't just a child wandering off, not that anything was that simple. No, this girl had been fleeing. But why had she come out there instead of going to Emma, to anyone else she knew at the school?
The rancid smell that met his nostrils seconds later had been worrying, but only in a way that had made him vaguely uneasy. It had been too chemical, and it felt like someone had shot napalm up his nostrils. If she was anything like him, that scent must have been driving her mad.
Then, he caught a glimpse of her, a little girl in a dirty pink dress, her hair wild around her. Sweat had been running down her face, but he hadn't been close enough to get a good look. All he'd seen was Essex, and he'd known that, whatever else happened, he was going to have that man's head.
Right after he got Laura out.
So he'd dived in, yanked her away. But the sharp, stabbing pain in his arms drew him up short. He looked down, saw a version of his own claws, how they had once been, ripping into his arms and tearing flesh from bone. He yelled, but didn't let her go.
She was Kayla's girl. Letting go wasn't an option.
"Laura! Stop!" he yelled.
She slashed at him again, and he realized she was trying to get away. All around him, people were rapidly regrouping. Essex was scrambling to his feet, furious. Logan looked down at her, wanting to figure out why she was doing this, wondering how he could get her to realize that he wasn't going to hurt her. She didn't know him, didn't know who he was.
But then he saw her eyes, and he'd known that this wasn't fear she was feeling. Laura's face, while so reminiscent of a woman he'd last seen in pain and bleeding to death, was missing everything that would've made her human.
She was blank, only a dead echo looking back at him. Even with her kicking and slashing at him, with blood pouring down his arms and chest, he found it in himself to be furious, because Chuck had told him she had her mother's eyes. He'd told him that's what they were like, and that bastard had stolen the spark again.
He looked up, snarling, angry, not even thinking. Something pummeled into him, knocking him to the ground. Laura flew from his grasp, and immediately sat down, her dead eyes looking at him again. Her face was smudged with his blood and her hands covered in it. It churned up the feeling deep within him, and his claws came out as he turned into the next impact.
His brother's sneer met his eyes, but it became pained after Logan's claws sank into him. Logan kicked him away, then dodged a slurry of bullets. When his brother tackled him again, he let out a snarl, digging his claws deep into his back.
"She's your goddamn niece!" Logan screamed.
The words came out before he could think what they meant. It was him thinking out loud, furious to have to fight his brother over the future of his daughter. But it was Vic, and he knew they would have no impact before he even finished saying them.
Vic looked at him incredulously, and then threw him off. He started laughing.
"It's not your goddamn daughter: it's a thing Jimmy," snapped Vic.
He slashed at Vic's face, only just missing him. His brother laughed again, shoving him back. Logan hit something hard, a truck maybe. He couldn't tell because, right after impact, he felt the bones in his back break. He shouted, the searing pain pulsing deeper and deeper inside of him.
His brother walked closer, grinning.
"Dammit, anything ta do with that woman makes ya all mushy, dun it?" he asked.