Part 37 – Final Stage

Whenever some one says to let out your anger, normally it leaves you feeling refreshed somehow. Once it's all gone you can relax, now that you've beaten down a door out of rage or something. Now, to Kari, John was that door, and it wasn't beaten enough.

She had hit him for the first time on her own. She was feeling a bit guilty, but that feeling was now being drowned out by more anger. People, who you might say have anger problems, like to hit or throw things when they're mad. Or like the raging bull who ran through the china shop. That was her right now. If she were in that china shop, she would smash everything to bits, and then move to the next one. Her fist was throbbing from her punch, because unlike when she used her mutant powers, when she was much stronger and could endure more pain, she had done this completely as a human, and her hand was stinging like some one had shut it in a car door.

Her fingers were still clenched into tight balls, and were now going numb, and she could feel the blood pounding in her head, the birthing of a gigantic migraine. Maybe she could find a cliff somewhere to just throw herself off of.

I'm sure John would love that, she growled in her head. When she didn't get a sarcastic reply from Crevan, she got a little sad. She had sort of grown attached to him, as much as she didn't want to admit it. She was concerned from his lack of dialogue since she had awoken from the lake. She wondered what had happened to him, and wished she could know at that moment before that also made her angry.

Somehow, feeling like it was needed, she pounded the side of her head repeatedly with her fist. With one last smack, she stopped. She dropped her hand at her side, wincing as it fell limp because the injury on her shoulder throbbed.

He would never understand. NEVER. If all of what she had been through meant nothing, then what was the point of continuing it?

A loud rumbled was heard overhead and she looked up past a few trees. A flash of lightning went across the sky over a hill, threading its way until it disappeared.

"Fucking pathetic fallacies," she grumbled irritably. It began to sprinkle lightly and once they became what she labeled "real raindrops" she gritted her teeth in annoyance. She felt on drip into her eye and she let loose. She flailed angrily, in hopeless fury at the falling water drops around her, not knowing what the hell she was doing it for, or what she was trying to hit. She just wanted to hit something. She almost tripped over a tree root, and kicked it irately, earning a throbbing pain in her foot. She yelled out in anger and threw her fist into the rough bark.

She stared with half wide eyes at her fist, dripping blood from the impact. Her eyes narrowed to a sad stare and the rain started fighting back, pouring down, dripping from her shirt into her pants, soaking her through and through. It wasn't long until her boots began to soak as well, and the soil turned to mud around her. It was the first time then she noticed the cold. It became so frigid she felt rough goose bumps all over her body as she began to shake. She pulled her hand from the tree and looked at her torn knuckles, watching the rain wash the blood from it. She shook not only with cold, but now with growing anger again.

Staring at the hand she knew had caused so much damage to everyone. Whoever she had punched, whoever she had grabbed by the throat, whoever she had touched with that hand had been hurt. Bobby. Kitty. Rogue. Xavier.

John.

The thought of his name pissed her off so much she clenched her teeth as hard as she could, feeling the tension as her ears rang from the pressure until they started throbbing. She hit the tree again. Then with her other fist. Again and again, refusing to stop. She punched the bark so many times with her knuckles that she became lost in her fury and she started banging on it with the sides of her fists, until she realized she had fallen to her knees and was pathetically beating on it as she cried. She had screamed and screamed, and now her voice was gone, and all she could do was whimper. She kept smacking it lightly, until her hand fell on it, no longer able to move.

The burning in her back began again, this time expanding from the shoulders to the middle of her arms. She just smirked in her head.

Go ahead, burn. I don't care. Do it as much you want, I don't freaking care. I can take it.

She was beginning to think she had nothing to lose anymore. Her family resented her. John hated her. The X-Men thought she was dead. She didn't even consider the Brotherhood, seeing as Magneto would kill her as soon as he got…her…

She stared at the ground, completely frozen, even her breath stopping.

DNA.

It all came to her. The clones. The DNA. That's how he had done it. At her house. And at Dr. McCoy's laboratory. That's why no one could ever find him. He was off gathering samples off their medical records. Dr. McCoy had tested everyone over a course of time. He must have gotten access to the samples. And that's what he was using to make the clones. They had tested everyone. Everyone except her. She was the one he needed to complete the group. That was why John had kept her alive. If not…he would have left her there.

It all hit her at once. It was all a joke. A cover up. He had pulling her leg the whole time. When he said he had been worried about her, it had been a lie.

But then she began to wonder if that was the only lie. How long had that been going on? Had he been lying in the beginning. Was he with Magneto before she had even gotten to the school? Was he a spy?

Now that was just ridiculous. She was getting carried way. But the realization that he had lied came to her so hard it almost knocked her senseless, and before she knew it she had turned around and stomped back to where she left John Allerdyce.

"Shouldn't we go back? It's gotten really late, and we all need rest," Kitty suggested as they trudged around, separated slightly to cover a bit more ground.

"We have to find Magneto's base, it's the only thing that matters now," Storm stated flatly.

"Oh, now you guys are persistent."

Everyone halted sporadically, and turned surprisingly, expecting the voice to be Bobby's. Even he was surprised that it came from Kitty this time.

"What do you mean, now?" Jean asked.

"The only time you feel it's necessary to actually ACT upon something is when half of our kind is already DEAD!"

"What are you getting at here?" Scott asked.

"Did you guys ever stop to actually ACKNOWLEDGE Kari?"

Everyone remained silent, but there were a lot of "Oh God" looks along with "Here we go," muttered by Logan.

"She was the only one who had the guts to keep going after Magneto with everything she had! She knew if he got away the real damage would start. All you guys wanted to do was run!"

"Kari was suicidal," Logan said blatantly.

"For once, shut your DUMB ASS MOUTH," Bobby snapped, "LET HER FINISH."

Logan moved for him and Jean made a narrowing motion with her eyes, and he bumped into an invisible force, and restrained himself from carrying out the impulse to break the teenagers neck.

"We understand what we did wrong, and we're sorry for that," Storm tried to explain.

"No you didn't. She risked her LIFE, something you may never understand —"

"We'll never understand?" Scott cut her off.

"I hate to debate the age thing again, but you guys are still kids. You may be smart, but we risk our lives all the time. We're experienced in this field. We know how hard it is, we've seen things YOU'LL never understand!" Logan cut off Scott.

"Everyone just STOP!" Kurt shouted. Reluctantly, everyone fell silent. "Each of us has gone through something everyone else may not understand. Something easy for you could be hard for some one else, and something hard for you could b easy for them. We all should know this. Some of us are stronger than others, some of us are braver. We value different things, we love different things. But we also value the same things as well. We all loved Kari. She was without a doubt the most intriguing girl of her age I've ever met, and it's a terrible thing she's gone. We all feel differently about this. Some miss her more than others, and it affected others more. You all need to get this through your heads. We can't keep fighting over all of this! All Kari wanted was to catch Magneto and stop him, and she died believing that was the right thing to do! So if you all just want to stand here and bicker the hell out of yourselves over who's smarter and who gives a shit or not, I SAY THAT'S A CRAPPY WAY TO RESPECT HER SACRIFICE!"

Everyone stared is disbelief. Kurt was the one you would least expect in the entire population of the world to speak that way, not to mention the use of vulgarity. And though the silence seemed to say otherwise, everyone was settling into the truth of this rant. He was completely right, and Kitty and Bobby almost felt like fools for not realizing it beforehand.

"Look. We understand you guys are hurt. We know how it feels to lose some one important, and we're sorry. We did wrong, and we understand that. We know you're angry, we know you're sad, but Kurt is right. If we really want to appreciate what Kari did, we'll follow in her steps and catch Magneto."

Kitty looked at Bobby after Jean's words and they both let loose silent sighs. Bobby nodded, and soon after Kitty repeated the action. Everyone exchanged slightly foolish glances and everyone took a long deep breath.

"He's right, we're being childish. Let's focus on finding Magneto," Bobby said quietly. "Kitty," he whispered once they had finally started moving again.

"What?" she asked, obviously still annoyed with him.

"What if we find Kari with Magneto?"

"Get off the subject, Bobby, she's DEAD."

"What are you guys talking about?" Kurt asked, slowing his pace to walk with them.

"N-nothing," they both stammered. He raised one of his eyebrows thoughtfully, then ran to catch up with Storm. They had a hushed conversation, and Bobby and Kitty sighed.

"You've killed me Allerdyce…"

It kept echoing. He blinked a few times before staggering against a tree to support himself. He felt the side of his face. It hadn't been the first time she had hit him. But this time it was different. It had felt different. It wasn't the usual "I'm in a homicidal mood, my mutant side has taken over" hit. This was a hit that had a feeling in it. A meaning.

The feeling that she had MEANT to do it. He rubbed his fingers over his cheek, which was already bruising.

Like it wasn't already, he reminded himself. He felt that unnatural sweat wash over him again followed by the waves of nausea. He tried to keep himself on his feet, pushing himself into a standing position with his arm until he was no longer leaning on the tree. He staggered one more step as a headache started, then all of the sudden, he heard an ear splitting scream close by. He raised his head quickly. It wasn't even twenty feet away. Just behind a bunch of bushes and a few trees. It came again and he moved as quick as his body would allow. Once he cleared the bushes, he saw a figure do a pinball impression through the trunks of the trees, staggering into one, then tripping over its feet into another. It was groaning, and crying out sporadically, then it tumbled towards him, trying to keep on its feet, he backed into the clearing and it tripped over the bushes, landing on its knees with a small yell.

"Kari!"

She shouted something and grabbed the sides of her head.

"OH GOD! AAAAGGGHHH!"

It was a terrifying note, a complete clip out of some psychotic horror movie. It was a haunting scream, like some one was repeatedly stabbing her in the back. It would end and then started again louder. She fell forward on her hands, and that's when he finally heard it.

The disgusting, horrifying sound of ripping flesh.