At birth, she'd been christened Trisha Tilby Euteneuer, but halfway through her college career in broadcast journalism, she'd realized that "Euteneuer" was a bit unwieldy. So she'd recreated herself as plain "Trish Tilby," liking the alliteration, and subsequently built a career on her hard-nosed interviewing style and a natural instinct for a good story.

She'd been following the tale of a possible viral epidemic in the Bronx since she'd gotten a tip the previous Saturday. No one was saying anything, at least officially, but Trish was no fool, and she'd done enough health and medicine-related reporting to recognize when the portcullis had been dropped while the doctors behind it scrambled to figure out what bug was loose in New York. Trish had interviewed the families of some of the victims, plus a janitor from St. Luke's, and a receptionist, too, and was keeping track of blogs. And when two fires broke out in Mutieville, turning up more bodies than such fires usually did (in a supposedly abandoned building, no less), Trish didn't think it an accident.

She'd discovered not just the name of the CDC representative sent up from Atlanta - which even the Post had - but had secured contact information for him as well. Unfortunately, he was staying on gated property at some private prep school up in Westchester where his mother worked, but Trish had learned he did stop regularly at a Westchester coffee shop called "Beans" on Titicus Road west of the reservoir, not long before he got on I-684 down to the city. Stakeouts were useful.

Thus, on Monday morning, Trish and her camera crew were waiting, concealed around the side of the shop. Once her quarry was parked and out of his car, Trish emerged with her microphone at the ready, lights glaring and cameras rolling. He'd walked around to the car's passenger side to speak to someone, but the camera crew got his attention and he straightened, looking startled as if he couldn't imagine why the press was interested in him. Charming, in a naïve way.

"Dr. Henry McCoy?" she asked, and before he could answer, launched in, "This is Trish Tilby with Channel Seven News. What can you tell us about this new Bronx Virus? It attacks only mutants, doesn't it?"

McCoy recovered quickly - and looked enormously annoyed. "Ms. Tilby, as soon as we have anything to report, I assure you, we shall do so. Until then, I have nothing to say."

"So there is a virus?"

Lips pursed, McCoy asked, "Tell me, when did you stop beating your wife?"

Tilby just stared at him. "What?" That comment had made absolutely no sense.

He smiled faintly. "You're posing assumptive questions that will allow you to make your case no matter how I answer them. 'When did you stop beating your wife?' questions." He turned then to face the camera, rather than try to avoid it or become discombobulated by it. "At the present time," he said, "we have no concrete information about the reported illnesses, and personally, I prefer facts to gossip. I assure you, we are just as interested in keeping the population healthy as the population is in staying healthy. To that end, the best advice I can offer would involve drinking more milk, less coffee, giving up smoking, getting sufficient exercise, and being sure to wear a seatbelt. If and when we have information regarding these infections, I'll be sure to pass that on, too."

Trish was staring at the big man. Who was this Henry McCoy and where had he learned to think on his feet like that? But she had a job to do and she'd be damned if she'd let an unprepped interviewee get the bit in his teeth and run. "So would you characterize 'these infections' as a mutant Ebola or more like AIDS?" She was going for a reaction shot.

Unfortunately she didn't get one. "It's a little early for characterizing it 'like' anything," he admonished. "When I can say what it is, I'll let you know."

"What are the symptoms? How's it spreading?"

"I don't know that. I wish I did. That's the whole point of an investigation - to find those things out."

"After a week, you don't have any theories?"

"After a week, we've barely got enough data. As another Dr. McCoy once said, 'I'm a doctor, not a miracle worker.'"

Trish blinked. Had he just quoted Star Trek? On purpose? She tried another tack. "So what about the fires in the Bronx on Saturday? They broke out in the same area as the first reported cases of this disease. Do you think they're anti-mutant hate crimes connected to the epidemic?"

"Epidemic?" His eyebrow went up. "More 'beat your wife' phrasing, Ms. Tilby. I'm not sure if these infections are all the same disease, much less an 'epidemic.' And as to the cause of the fires, I have no idea. The last time I checked, I was a bio-chemist, not an arson specialist."

This interview was just . . . not going the way it was supposed to. He should be flustered, angry, and thus, inclined to give away clues. "But you are working with the police?"

"My job involves investigating the infections, not speculating about fires."

"So the police aren't telling you anything, then?"

He sighed. It was the first sign she'd seen of growing irritation beyond general annoyance. "Everyone in the city is working together on this situation - and we work together best by concentrating on our jobs, not someone else's job."

"All right, doctor, when do you think you'll have something to say to the public? Just how many more mutants have to die before this goes public? Or does the fact that they're mutants mean you don't want it going public?"

Now, he was angry. He hadn't been angry before, but the hard flash in his eyes - that was real anger, and finally getting a rise out of him lifted her spirits a bit. She'd started to fear she was losing her touch. "When I have useful information to share, I will," he said. "This isn't a conspiracy. No one is 'keeping' anything from the public, but it would be irresponsible in the extreme for us to speculate wildly - not to mention that we'd be changing what we had to say every five minutes. Better to wait until we have something concrete. I might suggest that the press do the same. Good day."

And he turned, heading back around to the driver's side. "But Dr. McCoy!" she called, following him, "You're a scientist - you must have some theories!"

"Theories can be wrong, Ms. Tilby." He opened his car door and slid in. "I prefer to tell people what, to the best of my knowledge, I know to be correct. Good day."

He shut the door, started the car, and drove away. He never had gotten his coffee, and Trish was viciously pleased, considering. "Let's get back to the studio and see what I can splice together that might be useable." Trish wasn't half done with Henry McCoy. She liked a challenge. And he'd quoted Star Trek! "You're a piece of work," she muttered under her breath.


"Don't let it get to you," Jean advised as Hank got back in the car. She was wearing her Raven face now, though she hadn't been when the reporters had descended on them. Fortunately, Hank had been standing in front of her, and the reporters hadn't been focused on her anyway. "Someone was bound to start asking you questions sooner or later. I thought you handled yourself admirably."

He just snorted. "She could at least have waited till I'd gotten my coffee."

Jean smiled at that, then an idea occurred to her. If she could dress herself from thin air, could she make him coffee? Raising a hand, she concentrated until a travel mug built itself in her grip, glowing from the heat of matter conversion, then she filled it with steaming black-bean. Blowing on it to be sure it was cool enough to touch, she handed it to him. "It's a first try, so you'll have to tell me if it's drinkable."

He was attempting to keep his eyes on the road, not gape at the proffered mug. Cautiously, he took it from her and sniffed. "It smells like coffee."

"It is coffee, Hank. I'm not trying to poison you." She grinned. "You can run tests on it if you like, but that'd have to wait for the hospital, and it'll be cold by that point."

Shooting her a look from the corner of his eye, he brought the mug up to his mouth and sipped. "Mmm, not bad. A little on the bitter side, though."

"Everyone's a food critic." She waved her hand. "Try it now."

He did. "Better." A pause, then, "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

They didn't talk again about her newfound TK skills, but Jean was starting to wonder if there was anything she couldn't transform - and that was a direction of inquiry she wasn't prepared to take.

No one looked twice at 'Angie Holt' when she showed up in the lab about the same time as Hank. He'd brought in her PCR primers, which were designed to detect different alleles on the X-gene more quickly. He explained to the others that they'd come from Jean Grey's lab, and he'd been given permission to use them. Then he pretended to explain to her how to run her own tests. Suppressing a cynical smile, she pretended to listen. If anyone thought she picked it all up remarkably fast, they didn't comment. They had other matters on their minds.

Everyone was waiting on word from Atlanta.

Yet by early afternoon, it still hadn't come. Jean, however, had found something worthy of note in her own work. Every survivor shared the set of primers that she'd dubbed 'second-generation' markers. She pulled Hank aside to walk down to the cafeteria together for a late lunch. "I think I may have something," she told him once they'd gotten trays and were seated at a back table near a quintet of med students recounting their on-call adventures loudly enough that Hank and Jean didn't have to worry about being overheard.

"Everyone who's survived so far has what I call a second-generation X-gene. It's a direction I've been going lately with my research - how the X-gene is mutating, or evolving itself." She wasn't sure how much of her recent work Hank had read. "It was the basis for that paper I gave at Stockholm, but a lot of what I've been doing hasn't been published yet."

Hank set down his fork. "Can we detect the presence of second-generation genes without using PCR?"

"Not conclusively, but these alleles encode proteins that have high electrophoretic mobility and they tend to be connected to complex mutations, double mutations, or extremely powerful ones. Psionic mutations are somewhat privileged, but only by a 12 percent bias." She paused, then went on, "One thing that's generally true about these alleles' presence is functionality. Take Rogue, for instance. Her mutation could be considered counter-evolutionary since it may result in her inability to reproduce . . . and she also doesn't have a second-generation X-gene."

"And the mutants who died?"

"The ones I've tested so far all lacked high electrophoretic mobility alleles, but I'm not done. I've seen enough, though, that I think I may have found our smoking gun. I'll let you know if that changes."

"What impact would this have on survival rates in the general mutant population?"

"Hard to say. Younger mutants are more likely to have the alleles - which matches what Moser already noted. Most of the survivors are young. But I think one reason we've got such a high mortality rate has to do with where this virus began - Mutieville. Many of the mutants living there have mutations that are either primitive, problematic, or counter-evolutionary. As you know, evolution's far from perfect, and mutations can be unhelpful as often as helpful. Since we're in the very early stages of this genome shift, we're going to see a number of these counter-productive mutations. The ironic thing is - from a purely evolutionary point of view - this virus appears to be clearing the gene pool. If I'm right, it's attacking only first-generation X-genes."

"Seems awfully particular."

"Not necessarily. Obviously, we haven't seen the sequence for the virus's genome, but its replication must be triggered by something on the X-gene. Even so, X-genes encoding high electrophoretic mobility proteins - second-generation X-genes - handicap its growth, allowing the immune system of those mutants to beat it off before it overwhelms them. There will be exceptions to every rule, and that's just a theory -"

"- but it makes sense," Hank agreed.

"The upshot of all this," she finished, "is that if and when this virus disseminates into the general population, we're going to see the survival rate go up, though I can't really predict by how much."

"I'd like to say that maybe we can contain it and keep it from spreading, but I fear those are pie-in-the-sky hopes."

"Unfortunately, I think you're right." Her expression was glum.


And sure enough, the latest buzz about the lab when they returned from lunch was news of two new cases that had appeared outside New York - one in Philadelphia and another in Houston, both of them businessmen who'd recently been in the city. "And both of whom," Dan told Hank, "apparently banged a mutant prostitute while here - I don't know if it's the same girl. One's cooperating about information, one's not. It seems the fellow in Houston has a wife and kids, and claims not to be a mutant himself. It's possible, but after Trask, I'm dubious."

"So am I," Hank replied, pinching the bridge of his nose. "But it looks like our cat's out of the bag . . . or the Big Apple, as the case may be."

Late that same afternoon, the faxes and files came through from Atlanta, bearing the virus' genomic sequence. Crosschecks with the sequence databanks had already shown that it was entirely new, with distinct differences from other retroviruses, if still in the lentivirus family. As Hank was head researcher, his bosses at the CDC had told him he could name it. "Legacy" was his choice, recalling a promise he'd made to Artie to honor his dead friend Leech; it was easier to say than "Danny's Disease."

With this new, long-awaited data, they worked on into the night. Jean was intent on finishing PCRs for all mutants who'd contracted the virus so far, while Hank and Dan compared the virus's PCR results with its DNA. Yet the more Hank looked at the sequences, the more questions it raised. "This just isn't natural," he said finally, in frustration. And as soon as he'd said it, he realized he was right, and beyond mere expression of frustration. "This isn't natural," he said again.

Most of the other lab workers had gone home for the evening. It was just he, Dan, and Jean-Angie. They both glanced over as he spoke. "What do you mean?" Jean asked.

"Well, look at this," he said, clicking through the screens of sequencing data. I thought at first maybe something was just wrong with the tests - it's missing whole chunks of code. Then I realized, the virus is missing those chunks, not the sequencing. It looks like a lentivirus with filovirus glycoprotein genes replacing lentivirus glycoprotein genes, like gp160 - so we've got filovirus surface proteins on a lentivirus. And see here? There are additional filovirus sequences inserted into other parts of the lentivirus genome, with precise deletions to compensate for the differences in size, as well. So it acts like Ebola, not AIDS. None of this is natural. I might believe it if it were . . . messier, like a natural hybrid - if that were even possible - but this is too neat, and it's been fixed so it won't mutate much, at least, not immediately."

He looked across at them. "It's bloody beautiful engineering. But it is engineered."

"Damn," Dan muttered. "Who the hell would do something like this?"

"Someone who doesn't like mutants," Jean-Angie said. "Has the CDC figured this out?"

"I'm sure they have by now. They sent us the sequences as soon as they had them, but they're looking at it all, too. As soon as you have the sequences to compare to the database information, it's obvious."

She rolled her chair across so she could see the sequencing data, long lines of four letters ATGC representing the different nucleotides. "Now that, there - that viral sequence? That's almost exactly the same one as the recognition site where the X-gene transcription factor binds to DNA and turns on the genes that cause mutant phenotypes. And that? That's why it's hitting people harder who carry the first-generation X-gene. The sequence has been engineered so the second-generation X-gene won't bind as efficiently to the integrated viral DNA, so the virus can't grow as well and that makes it less virulent. That also means we'll see a difference in onset from the time of infection. The slower the onset, the greater a person's chance that their immune system can contain the virus and they'll survive."

Too late, Hank realized that Dan was staring at Jean-Angie as if he'd never seen her before. She wasn't talking like a lab tech, not to mention she was still around, long after everyone else had gone home. "Who are you?" he asked.

Jean and Hank looked at each other. Well, should we tell him? she sent, Or should I wipe his memory?

Hank wasn't sure whether he found her question more innocent or more horrifying. And yet the professor wiped memories from time to time when necessary. I think we should just tell him, then see how he reacts.

So Jean turned her back and the short, curly blonde hair grew longer, darkening to auburn. (Hank was glad she'd realized it was a bit disturbing to see her melt her own flesh and form.) When she turned back, Dan Moser's jaw dropped open.

"You said you'd really like to have Jean Grey's input," Hank said. "Well - we've got it."

"But you're supposed to be dead!" Dan said. "And how did you do that?"

"It's a long story," Jean told him, expression wry. She gave an abbreviated version, leaving out her time as Madelyne Pryor, and the X-Men. Moser seemed torn between utter fascination and guarded suspicion, but he agreed to keep their secret, and Jean seemed content with that. Hank supposed she'd know if Dan were lying, though he wasn't sure how Xavier would react when he discovered someone outside the mansion knew the truth.


Jean and Hank had alerted Scott about Hank's interview earlier that day, and as they doubted they'd be home at any reasonable hour, they'd asked him to tape the Channel 7 News to see what kind of hay Trish Tilby had made of Hank. Somehow, word of this got around, and curious students began crowding the den for a glimpse of one of their own on TV. Ororo sat among them, tucked in a corner of the couch with Kurt perched comfortably on its arm.

This wasn't how she or Scott would have wanted the children to find out about the virus, though it didn't look as if there'd be much choice. Thus, before the news came on - and with permission from Xavier - Scott gathered all the students together, even those who hadn't intended to listen to the broadcast. There, in his first 'official' act as new headmaster (beyond hiring new staff), he told them about the disease. Xavier was present, but very deliberately stayed to the side and let Scott take front and center. "You are now headmaster," he'd said when Scott had offered to defer earlier. "I haven't changed my mind about that, even with Jean back."

"Gee, thanks."

Xavier had smiled faintly, as had Ororo. She thought her friend more than ready for the responsibility.

So Scott faced their students and told them a new virus was attacking mutants. Predictably, this generated a lot of questions, but on Xavier's advice, he'd timed his announcement just before the news broadcast, so the questions had to wait. It would allow things to settle down a bit.

Trish Tilby's story aired about ten minutes in, and Ororo didn't find it as bad as Hank had feared. It was clear that Tilby had edited her tape, but she seemed to have been fair about it - which was more than Ororo could say for a lot of TV reporters. Tilby had even left in Hank's admonition to the press to be patient, though she'd added some concluding remarks, calling for rapid disclosure from the medical community, "Before more people fall victim to this terrible epidemic."

"Epidemic?" came several voices on the heels of that. "You didn't say it was an epidemic, Mr. Summers!"

Coming forward again, Scott hit the TV off button, saying, "I didn't because it's not, yet. Real confirmation that this is even something new came only today - this afternoon, in fact, after Dr. McCoy was interviewed this morning. The only reason I even know it is because Dr. Grey told me. The news media likes to blow things out of proportion."

"Dr. Grey's involved?" and "I wondered why we hadn't seen her today," came from the kids on the floor, chairs, and couches.

"Yes, Dr. Grey went to St. Luke's this morning with Dr. McCoy. It's not public knowledge, obviously, but she's there." He gave what Ororo recognized as his coach's smile, meant to be encouraging. "We have the world's leading expert on the mutant genome and one of the smartest people I've ever met working on this. You don't get much better than that."

"When will they find a cure?" Terry asked, cutting to the chase.

"That, no one can say," Scott replied, but he didn't tell them what Hank had told the adults the other night - that it would likely be some time before there was a vaccine, if one ever could be developed. "Right now, the best advice is to avoid situations where you might catch it. At least now that we know what it is, we can say a little more about how to do that.

"I'm sure Dr. McCoy will want to talk to all of you himself, but I can pass on a few things that Dr. Grey told me. This virus is what's called a 'lentivirus,' which means it's a relative of AIDS." That got a few indrawn breaths, but he held up a hand and went on, "Believe it or not, that's good news, on one level. All lentiviruses are fragile - they're not airborn, and die rapidly outside their human host. Just like AIDS, this virus can only be passed via body fluids. You can't catch it just from being in the same room with another person who has it, or even by touching them.

"But the virus's first symptoms are like a flu - sneezing, coughing, that kind of thing. So don't let people cough or sneeze on you. If they do, go wash your hands and skin immediately."

Ro noticed that he'd passed over the nastier symptoms of vomiting, diarrhea, or hemorrhaging. While she wasn't, generally, fond of sugar-coating the truth, the wide eyes trained on him now suggested a little amelioration wasn't a bad idea. They'd hear the rest soon enough.

"Now, there's no reason to assume anyone in the mansion has been exposed to infection, but just in case, should any of you start sneezing or coughing, report to the medlab immediately. Also, as a general precaution, don't leave Kleenexes lying around, use your own toothbrushes, and if you get cut, put bandages or anything else with blood on it in plastic baggies. Obviously, don't touch anyone's blood but your own, and while it sounds nasty - folks, don't pick your noses and rub snot on the furniture." That elicited the groans one would expect, but also lightened the mood by his frankness. "Be sure your bathroom trash bins have plastic bags in them, and throw those bags away on trash day, don't just empty them - and don't go digging in them for anything, either."

"Ewww!" greeted that, too, yet Ororo was impressed by Scott's knowledge of proper AIDS-preventive hygiene. Then she recalled what Mystique had told her months before and reconsidered. It had never occurred to her to wonder if his knowledge might be personal rather than intellectual, and once again, she was blindsided by what she knew about him that he didn't know she knew. It made her frown down at her hands.

"What's going on?" someone whispered in her ear, and she turned to find Warren. He must have slipped in while Scott was talking.

"Henry was 'ambushed' this morning by a reporter," she whispered back. "He was on the news. And information arrived today from Atlanta, so Scott is telling the students about the virus."

"Ah," he replied, kneeling down behind the couch, arms folded on the back between she and Kurt. He watched Scott. "He's pretty good at this, isn't he?"

Ororo shot him an amused glance. "And you are not the least biased."

"I'm not," he replied.

"Not at all, no."

Warren elbowed her playfully and Kurt watched them with a bemused but not hostile expression. She wondered what her very-Catholic friend thought of her teasing Warren about his one-time crush on a member of the same sex. She and Warren had known one another long enough to be perfectly comfortable with it, but Kurt was different.

Yet he didn't seem troubled, and they returned their attention to Scott's handling of the question-and-answer session. Warren was right; he was rather good at it.

Somewhere in the middle, Doug Ramsey ambled in to lean up against a doorjamb. Ororo tried to pretend she hadn't noticed.

"Who's that?" Warren asked.

"The new math teacher," Kurt said. "You did not meet him yesterday?"

"I was a little distracted yesterday. Introduce me later?" Warren asked, and Ororo turned in time to see him give Doug a once-over, which left her feeling slightly jealous.

After Scott was finished, the students broke up into little groups, discussing, while Kurt escorted Warren over to introduce him to Doug. Ororo abruptly decided that she'd put this off long enough, and approaching Scott, she asked, "Could I have a word with you in private?"

"Yeah, sure," he said. "I was thinking about heading to the stables. The sun's still up enough for a short ride." She noticed, then, that he was already wearing his riding boots and must have planned this earlier as an escape from fielding questions all evening. "Walk with me?"

So Scott alerted Warren to where he was going, and they headed out, talking of inconsequentials on the way. The stable was deserted, the groom having gone home for the day and the students all back at the mansion. Scott collected Farolisa's tack while Ororo fed the mare 'horse cookies' - little oat treats. She didn't like riding such big animals, but had gotten past her fear of their teeth. As Scott approached, she said, "They have very gentle lips for such large mouths."

"Like velvet," he said. "A horse's lips and nose are like velvet. I know it's a cliché, but it's true."

And with him there, the mare immediately shifted her attention from Ororo to her Person. She knew she was going out, and became restless. He opened her stall to let her into the main stable aisle, leading her to the tacking station. As he set about putting all the very confusing, far-too-many hooks, leads, and straps equipment on her, he asked, voice deliberately casual, "Did you want to talk to me about Jean?" He wasn't looking at her.

Ah, he must think she wanted to discuss the events of the day before, and while she couldn't say she had no reservations, Jean wasn't on her mind. "In truth, I wished to talk to you about you."

That got his attention, and he halted in putting on Lisa's bridle. "About me? What about me?"

Frowning down at her hands, she said, "I have no wish to pry, Scott. We have always respected one another's boundaries. Yet some months ago, I was told something about you. I kept it to myself as you had not confided this information to me, and I thought that - had you wanted me to know - you would have told me. But I realized tonight that I am . . . no longer comfortable knowing this without you realizing that I know." She looked up at him finally. Glasses or no glasses, his face was completely blank. "Besides, it seemed fair simply to ask you, in case it was untrue."

"What?" There was a multitude of things compressed into that one syllable.

"When Mystique was here, she told me that before you came to the mansion, you spent time on the street as a prostitute, not a con artist and thief."

Now he did react, but only to return to bridling his horse. To anyone who knew him less well, he would have seemed very calm, but she could see how tight his jaw was, and he swallowed before he answered. "Would it matter if I was?"

"No," she said, but then shook her head. "And that is a lie. Yes, it would - but not in the way you fear."

He stopped again (to Farolisa's confusion; she was trying to nudge his shoulder) and looked back at her. "I was a con artist and a thief. I didn't lie to you about that. It just wasn't everything I did out there. I had to survive, Ro -"

"- I am not judging you. I have no right."

At that, he seemed to relax a little. "It was a long time ago. I've dealt with it." Giving into Lisa's insistent head-butting, he went back to his work tacking her. Not sure what else to say, Ororo simply watched. Neither was self-revelatory by personality, and normally, she appreciated the chance simply to be quiet in Scott's company. But this silence wasn't comfortable.

Finally, finished with the bridle, saddle cloth, and even the saddle, he paused to play with the reins in his hands. "Is there anything more you wanted to know?"

"No. If you ever wish to talk, I would be willing to listen, but I was not idly curious. Mostly, I was uncomfortable knowing a secret about you that you did not know I knew - and without finding out whether Mystique had told me the truth."

He nodded once. "Thanks," then he paused, still clearly disconcerted, and asked, "What did you mean, that it mattered, but not like I thought?"

Feeling a bit silly just standing there in the center of the aisle, she leaned up against a feed barrel. "I am well aware of the assumptions made about men - or boys - who hustle. I am also aware that they are assumptions. We do what we must to survive - you taught me that, Scott. You taught me not to be ashamed, and that I was more than what necessity had made me. Yet I said it made a difference because it explains some things that I have sometimes wondered about you."

He was still tense. "How's that?"

"You have always treated me as an equal. When we are in the field, you do not try to 'protect' me unnecessarily."

He grinned. "If I did, you'd kick my ass."

Her eyebrow flickered in shared amusement. "True. Nonetheless, I . . . appreciate that awareness." She was struggling to find the words she wanted, to get this across to him, but not insult him in the process. "Now I believe I know from where it comes - you understand what it is to be patronized, and dislike it with equal intensity. That is something I can trust. It is honest, not . . . politically correct."

It clearly wasn't a connection he'd made before, given the surprise washing his face, and she held her breath, in case he took offense. Instead, he laughed. "I guess that's true." He glanced away, then back at her. "All my friends have usually been women. Except Warren. And Hank. Even my horse is a mare." He stroked Lisa's forelock.

"But Warren is bisexual. And Hank is . . . Hank."

Scott grinned at that. "Hank is Hank. But Warren being bisexual isn't necessarily an easy thing."

"Warren's attraction to you may not be an easy thing, but I think you are more comfortable with Warren than you are with Logan - and not only because of Jean. As I recall," she added with a teasing edge, "you and Logan disliked each other on sight."

He snorted. "True enough. But I've gotten used to Logan."

"Yet men - and boys - like him . . . ." She trailed off.

"I'm not comfortable with men period," he admitted. "There are obvious exceptions, but it takes time. Trust isn't my default reaction."

She nodded. "I gathered that years ago, but now, I understand why. Again, as I said, knowing makes a difference - but not necessarily a negative one. It helps me to understand you better." She paused, then added, "Thank you."

"For what?"

"Answering honestly."

He shrugged and mounted Lisa, who'd been shifting, impatient. "It's not that I really mind you knowing - you, especially - but it's kind of awkward to talk about. There's no easy way to bring it up without sounding horrible: 'I was a teenaged prostitute.'" He snorted again. "See?" He walked Lisa closer to her. "Like I said, it was a long time ago - fourteen years this September that I left that life. I've been to therapy, talked to counselors - it really isn't something I think about much anymore, unless there's a reason. We can get past the past. Mostly."

"I know," she said, smiling up at him and feeling better, a knot undone inside her. "You and I are both proof of that, I think." Sobering, she said, "I admire you, Scott. I thought you should know that." Then she patted Lisa, who was stamping and shaking her head to jingle her bridle. "Now, go ride your white girlfriend before she becomes too jealous to forgive me."

Clucking to the mare, he and the horse set off down the aisle at a brisk walk, leaving Ororo by herself. She headed out after, nearly clearing her skin when she turned the barn corner only to run into Warren slouching there, clearly waiting. "You! You were . . . ."

"I heard; I'm glad he leveled with you finally."

"So you know?" She shouldn't have been surprised by that.

"Scott was here only three months before I came."

"If I may - who else knows?"

"Xavier, of course. Hank, and Jean." He eyed her. "You're okay with it?"

"Yes, I am okay with it." She frowned down at the dirt and grass. "Mystique knows, as well. She told me."

"Fuck. She must know because Erik Lehnsherr told her. Erik found Scott."

"So she said."

Warren snorted. "I just bet she did. And Scott hates Erik for a damn good reason."

"I have gathered that, as well."


Essex had what Sebastian Shaw considered to be an unhealthy fascination with all media reports on his virus. He collected them, like a serial killer's trophies. Shaw was coming to regret having the man as a guest in his house, though it had allowed him to keep a close watch on Essex, and the Shaw mansion was certainly large enough. Shaw usually tried to avoid Essex if he didn't need him for something, but this evening, Essex was in the drawing room, flicking through the local news reports and taping them, when Shaw entered for a brandy decanter. An interview with Henry McCoy came on one station, and Shaw glanced up. Essex watched a moment, then grew uncommonly agitated, leaping up to cross to the television, where he stared intently at the glass screen for several moments.

When the interview was over, he did (for him) a surprising thing. Instead of seeking more news, he rewound the McCoy interview and watched it again - five times, all the while muttering to himself. Shaw couldn't make out what he said, and Essex didn't seem to care that anyone else was in the room. It was just such singular focus that Shaw found so disconcerting about the man. As one continually aware of others' awareness of him, Shaw didn't know what to make of Nathaniel Essex's hermit-like insularity.

Almost, Shaw asked Essex what had caught his eye as Essex removed the tape and headed out, but then shrugged and let him go. If he spent time worrying over Essex's many and varied peculiarities, he'd never get anything useful done.


When Ororo left, Warren went in to saddle the horse he boarded there, a Tobiano Priesian - a cross between a black Friesian and a pinto Saddlebred that had produced a black-and-white paint with a Friesian's tempermant, paces, and mane. Warren had come to prefer more predictable warmbloods to fiery hotbloods like Scott's little mare. For one thing, they had less tendency to shy at his wings. But the truth was, Warren had seen this horse advertised, and had simply had to have him. Not because he was expensive (Scott's Spanish Andalusian had cost three times as much), but because he was beautiful and unusual, and Warren had a penchant for both things.

Now, he tacked the gelding and swung up into the saddle, taking him out after Scott, who'd gone through the orchard on the short trail. Hearing him coming, Scott pulled up Lisa to wait beyond the trees. Still at the height of summer, everything was viridescent, the setting sun casting a golden sheen over the squat apple trees with their branches choked by small green apples. Warren drew even with Scott. "Jean coming back tonight?"

"I doubt it. Anytime I 'ping' her telepathically I get back a 'Later.'" Scott snorted. "You'd think a link would be useful for something besides being put on hold."

Warren laughed. "She has a new puzzle. She'll come up for air eventually."

And it was nice to walk their horses and talk about Jean as if she were no different than she'd always been. "How are you?" Warren asked.

Scott shot him a look. "I'm all right. We're all right."

"After yesterday?"

"After yesterday. Don't be scared of her - she's worried about that."

"Scott, you saw what happened to the house -"

"- and you remember what I did to the den, three people, and a good portion of the second story thirteen years ago. At least she fixed it - and didn't kill anyone."

"Those men were scum; they would've killed us."

"Doesn't make them less dead - and by me. You've never killed anyone, Warren."

Annoyed, he replied, "Don't start that; it's a fucking weird way to put me in my place."

"I wasn't trying -"

"Yes, you were. And you didn't wreck the den on purpose."

"Neither did Jean. What happened in Cerebro was an accident."

"Scott, she went into Cerebro knowing Xavier didn't want her to. She didn't think it mattered."

"She made a mistake." Scott pulled up Lisa and half turned on the trail to face Warren. "What the fuck is wrong with you? We've all made mistakes, including stupid ones we should've known better than to try." They glared at each other and Warren felt his stomach roil. "I know what it is to be deadly, War, and to pray to God every fucking day that I don't hurt someone by accident. I didn't ask to be this way and you don't blame me. She didn't ask either. Give her a break, okay?" Turning Lisa, he clapped his heels to the horse's sides, heading back up the trail towards the barn.

That night for the first time in months, they both slept under the same roof, but not in the same bed, even if Jean wasn't there.


Jean became aware of Scott's unhappiness late the same evening as her revelation to Dan Moser. She'd taken a bathroom break, then went to get coffee from the vending machines because the cafeteria was closed for the night. While down there, away from the intense concentration required for her work, the red pulse of Scott's mood slipped across their link to her. Sitting down in a steel blue chair in a waiting area, she closed her eyes and reached out to him. What's wrong?

His momentary surprise washed over her, but it was brief. They'd grown used to communicating this way (if not quite so far apart) in Anchorage, and now, he handed over memories of his earlier fight with Warren. It merely confirmed what she'd gathered already, and she struggled not to feel blindsided by Warren's doubts. Yet she could be more understanding, ironically, because it was personal. Scott, hon, his fears aren't unreasonable, even if I'd like to think they're unfounded.

He knows you as well as I do. But he doesn't trust you?

It's not a matter of trust entirely; it's a lot of things, including feeling shut out again. Even if he doesn't want to feel that way, he still feels it. Take this link - we have one, but I don't have one with him. I can remedy that, though, if he's willing.

And she could feel Scott's resistance to the idea, though he didn't vocalize it and tried to suppress it - yet it made her sigh. This was the heart of the problem, all this unacknowledged jealousy. Warren was jealous of her, and Scott was jealous of Warren. Jean liked to think she wasn't jealous of either, the curse of telepathy being to understand the fears and insecurities of others. Nonetheless, all of them had been ducking the fundamental reality. They were Three. They'd always been Three - a mutant triumvirate, and the sooner they started acting like it, the less they'd continue to wound one another.

Listen, she sent to Scott now, you're not really mad at Warren - you're miserable. And so's he. Would you please go talk to him?

Aren't you furious?

Why? Because he has doubts? Yes, on one level, it hurts. But you know damn well the real problem isn't about me, Scott. It's about you. We've been ignoring this, suppressing it for years. It's time to stop. Warren loves you . . . just as much as I do. Warren and I love each other - but it's different. It always has been. I told you before, I wasn't angry that you turned to Warren when I was gone. I was happy. Scott, I can share you. It doesn't have to be a competition. Really, it never was. It's society that sets it up that way, but it's not. We can both love you. We both already do. And you love us. Just . . . let it be, dammit.

There was no immediate mental reply to that. Finally, he said, Jean, it's not that easy. It'd be nice if it was . . . but it's not. And it's not because of my past. I do love him, but what he feels - or really, felt - for me isn't the same as what I feel for him. I'm not suppressing. It's just not there. It's not in me. He paused, then added, Warren knows that - he's okay with it, or as okay as he can be. Don't push it.

She didn't believe him, not for a minute. It had everything to do with his past, whatever he said. But he wasn't ready to listen to her right now. All right, fine. But don't leave this argument between you. Go talk to him.

Another pause, a hesitation, then, Maybe. Don't push, Jean.

It was the best she was going to get from him right now, so she broke their contact, but she wasn't leaving it there. Despite the fact she didn't have a link with Warren, her link to Scott anchored her, and she reached out from that, like a swimmer with her eyes shut, playing Marco Polo, listening and feeling in the wash of minds for the other whom she loved best in the world. She guessed he'd be nearby.

And he was. Almost as soon as she tap-tapped on his mental shoulder, he answered, I wondered when you'd show up. His signature was fuzzy with pain and alcohol. Come to play peacemaker?

You're mean when you're drunk, War. It was more blunt than sympathetic.

I assume you've heard the whole story from Scott?

I'm not here to berate you. He's protective.

You scare me. He was sloshed enough to be honest. But a brutal honesty had always been their saving grace.

Sometimes, now, I scare me, she replied, and felt that give him pause. But when I was in Cerebro yesterday, taking the house apart, you barreled in there with Scott and Charles to stop me. You weren't afraid then.

You needed me.

Yes, and you were there like you always have been. And we both know what you're really scared of isn't me, or not my powers. You're afraid of losing us again. We drifted apart before; that should never have happened, and I won't see it happen now. Like I said the other night, we belong together. All three of us.

She could feel him moving almost violently around his suite. And you're fucking out of your mind! What you're suggesting isn't possible, Jean, not being who we are. I know what it is to keep secrets - I struggle all the damn time with the fucking wings. And Scott's headmaster now of a ritzy private school whose best protection is not stirring up attention. And you - you're the face on mutant rights, or will be, when you come back. People like us . . . we can't afford to be a public scandal!

Who says we would be? Who has to know?

These things have a way of coming out! Dammit, Jean, quit being a romantic idiot! We do not live in Oz. We live in the big, bad, cutthroat reality of New York society.

Where secrets have been kept before. Even public secrets.

Maybe in a bygone era. The modern world has paparazzi and the Internet. And some secrets are more socially acceptable than others. I could have a wife and three mistresses, and no one would give a damn, but if I'm sleeping with a respectable, married couple -

- we've never been that, War. There's no ring on my finger. I doubt there ever will be. I'm getting used to it.

Still. You know just as well as I do how tongues would wag. And all that flat ignores the fact Scott would never go for it.

You might be surprised.

No, I wouldn't be.

You're an exception to him.

But I shouldn't be. Do you want to screw him up again? He's not there yet!

He loves you.

And I love him - which is why the answer is no.

And with that, she felt him shut his mind. She could have kept on talking, but she respected the barrier. "So much for making peace," she muttered. Now they were all annoyed with one another.


Frustrated after his telepathic conversation with Jean, Warren needed another drink, so he headed downstairs. It was almost midnight, and he padded out in just his pajama bottoms, no shirt. At this hour, he didn't really expect to run into anyone, and so was surprised when he found the light already on in the staff kitchen and Bobby Drake there, eating ice cream. Since when did the kids eat in the staff room? Bobby glanced around at the sound of footsteps. "You'll give the girls a heart attack, running around like that."

Warren chose to ignore the commentary. "Good evening to you, too," he replied, heading for the big fridge and the bottle of Grey Goose in the freezer. It was hidden under some bags of peas and carrots. Pulling it out, he poured himself a healthy glass of vodka, straight up.

"I wondered who that belonged to," Bobby said now.

Warren looked around. "You snooping?"

"Stumbled over it by accident. You might want to hide it better. The kids don't come in here much, but sometimes they do. And I don't suppose you'd be willing to share? I am eighteen."

"But not twenty-one." Warren put the bottle back, adding packages of frozen pasta to the pile on top. Then turning, he leaned up against the counter, wings fanned out, ankles crossed. He was disconcerted to find Bobby there. It wasn't that he disliked teens, but they made him uncomfortable, despite having lived with them for months. He wasn't really the teacher type. "What's up?"

"Nothing."

"You always awake at midnight asking for vodka?"

Bobby shot him a look. "Ha, ha." He took a sip of what smelled like hot tea. Warren sipped his own drink, and neither said anything. Warren wished the boy would go away, even as he realized the kid was probably wishing the same thing about him. Suddenly, Bobby said, "Would you be insulted if, um, I asked a kinda nosey question?"

Warren's eyebrows lifted. "I can't know until you ask. How about you ask, and I tell you if I want to answer?"

"Fair enough." Bobby had been frowning at his tea. Now he glanced up once, then back down, the frown still there. "There was some talk, about you and Mr. Summers. They said you were sleeping together."

Warren literally spit vodka out his nose. "What?"

"So you weren't?"

"Where did you hear that?" Warren reached for a towel to wipe eyes streaming from the burn of alcohol on sensitive membranes. He didn't want to explain that he and Scott had, indeed, been sleeping together - and that was all. He doubted the kids would believe it, or understand.

"It's been around the school," Bobby said now, "among the older students."

Good God, what were they saying? And Jean wanted to try a genuine ménage-à-trois? Bobby was watching him carefully. "Mr. Summers," Warren said, "is very straight, and very in love with Dr. Grey."

Curiously, Bobby's face seemed to fall at that, rather than appear relieved. "I figured it was just gossip."

Now, it was Warren's turn to frown. Picking up his vodka and coming over to the little eat-in table, he pulled out the chair opposite Bobby's, sat down, and studied the boy's face. "Why did you want to know?"

"Just curious."

"I don't think so."

Bobby didn't answer. Warren, who'd learned patience when dealing with people, waited him out. Bobby was looking at the black-and-white tile, the chrome appliances, the overhead lights - everywhere but at Warren. Finally, he said, "I just . . . I don't know. If you and Scott had . . . you know - well, I know you're close. I just . . . wondered how you felt? With Jean back, and all."

In truth, Warren didn't want to talk about that. He'd come down here after vodka so he could stop thinking about it, but the boy's mixture of trust and embarrassment over his line of inquiry wasn't something Warren could ignore. "Is this about Rogue? Is she seeing someone else?"

To his surprise, Bobby jerked to his feet and stalked away - then back. "No! It's not about Rogue! Would people quit asking me that?"

"Sorry." Warren said nothing else, hoping the boy might give him more clues.

"It's just - he left, you know? He was supposed to be my best friend, but he left - to go join Magneto. And my family doesn't want me, or wouldn't if they knew the truth. And now Rogue doesn't want me either."

Warren decided to shoot at the rabbit that had run across first. "Who's the 'he'?"

"John." Bobby sighed out and dropped back into the chair, which scraped a little against the tile. "St. John Allerdyce, my roommate."

"Did you love him?"

Bobby jerked his head up. "What made you ask that?"

Warren held up both hands. "It's just a question, not an accusation. I'm a pretty tolerant guy, Bobby. And there are many kinds of love. I didn't ask if you'd fucked him; that's your business. I asked if you loved him."

Bobby's face was scarlet, eyes a little wide at Warren's bluntness. "It wasn't like that. We were best buds, y'know? At least, I thought so. He's been gone nine months, and I still think about him. Dr. Grey coming back . . . it kind of brought it all up again. Made me remember."

Instinctively, Warren reached out to pat Bobby's hands where they were folded together in front of his tea cup, but the boy jerked back. Rolling eyes, Warren said, "That wasn't a come-on, you know. Anyway, if you've been really close to someone and lose them, you miss them, even months later - and you miss them even if you're mad at them. As for what you're feeling - it's okay to love your friend."

"Do you love Scott?"

The question shut Warren up momentarily. Was the private life of the adults the business of the kids? But Warren didn't have to explain the whole complicated mess. "Yes," he said finally. "We've been very close for a very long time. Scott's like the brother I never had."

Bobby nodded. "I thought John was - well, not the brother I never had. I've got a brother, but we don't get along too well. Johnny was different. I thought."

"Love sucks sometimes," Warren told him. "And not just the romantic kind. Family, friends - none of it's easy."

"Gee, thanks," Bobby replied.

Great. Warren could run a multi-billion dollar corporation, but didn't know how to cheer up a kid. Rising, he took his glass of vodka and said awkwardly, "You'll get past it." Patting Bobby's shoulder, he headed back upstairs.


Dawn brought a bleary-eyed Hank McCoy and Dan Moser to the front steps of St. Luke's, following a night of work and a very early conference call with the CDC in Atlanta. They'd all agreed it was time to talk to the media. Good Morning America had wanted an exclusive, but didn't get it. If Hank hadn't been ready to speak before, now that he was, he wanted the information disseminated as widely as possible, as quickly as possible.

After a shower and shave and a change of shirt, Hank appeared, with Dan for backup, in front of the hospital to face a crowd of reporters and their blinding lights. Spotting Trish Tilby, Hank nodded gravely to her, and she nodded back - like martial artists prepared to engage. Questions were already being fired, but Hank ignored them to issue a general statement to the sea of mics.

"I know all of you have been anxious to find out the details of these recent illnesses in the Bronx. Unfortunately, the necessary tests took time to complete, and it was only yesterday afternoon" - he glanced pointedly at Tilby - "that we received conclusive results. It seems we have a new virus on the loose, one that attacks only those who carry an X-gene, commonly known as mutants."

Reporters waited, cameras trained on him, and taking a breath, Hank told them what he knew, ending with, "This is not an epidemic yet, and won't be, if people take the precautions we've outlined. Nor is the virus always deadly, so it's essential that anyone experiencing severe flu-like symptoms seek medical attention immediately, even if one doesn't believe he or she is a mutant. Thank you."

The air nearly exploded with follow-up questions, and Hank stayed another ten minutes, assuring the public as best he could that the virus was fragile, difficult to pass, but not to be taken lightly. The reporters also wanted to know about the threat to non-mutants. "Non-mutants are unaffected by the disease," Hank replied. "And so there is no reason to attack mutants who may be ill."

"You fear a rise in mutant-related hate crimes?" That question had come from Trish Tilby.

"In the present social climate, unfortunately, yes, even though non-mutants are not in danger."

"But don't viruses mutate? This may be limited only to mutants now, but what about in a year?"

Hank's voice was grim. "We have reason to believe that this virus will mutate slowly, if at all."

Tilby looked skeptical, but another reporter leapt in with a question about vaccines, and Hank was grateful not to go into how he knew it wouldn't mutate. The one detail he hadn't shared involved the engineered nature of the virus. That would generate all kinds of flak, and he wanted to be absolutely certain he was right before publicly accusing some unknown individual of an act of bioterrorism.

After a few more minutes, Hank had reiterated all the salient information and reporters were just repeating their questions in different words, so he called a halt and went back inside. Mostly, the reporters dispersed, but he heard a tap-tap of heels behind him and turned. Trish Tilby caught up to him. "Ms. Tilby," he said. "If you're hoping for a private interview, I've already given all the information we know."

"I doubt that," she said, head tilted skeptically, then barreled on before he could object. "But I don't want to ask more questions about this virus. I'd like to ask you questions about the whole process, to understand better what's involved in viral research, so I can help viewers understand."

Suspicious that she might just be looking for a chance to get him alone and press him further, he said, "Right now, I'm really rather tired. We've been up all night; the data came in late yesterday afternoon, and - "

"Tomorrow then," she interrupted. "We could do lunch - or breakfast, if you prefer. I know where you get your coffee."

Her face was serious, but her eyes were . . . not entirely. Hank narrowed his. "All right. Breakfast - but Thursday, not tomorow. Same place? I believe they have pastries."

"Thursday it is." And turning, she tap-tapped back out in her spike heels. Hank tried not to notice that her dark blue suit fit her - and her derriere - quite well.

"I think she likes you," Dan said, half laughing.

"I think she's hoping for an exclusive."

"That, too," Dan agreed.


Notes: Trish's interview questions owe a great deal to assistance from ridesandruns, and just for her, I put in The Pony. Trish Tilby is a canon comics character. As always, thanks to Leslie for the virus information.