The voices of the various military officials bounced off the tile walls of the lab. Howard bustled nervously at the command board next to me, shaking hands flipping switches and pressing buttons, mumbling math equations under his breath. My foot tapped impatiently against the floor as I pulled in another lungful of smoke.

"Eleanor."

I blew the smoke out towards the ceiling as I harshly flicked the ash off. My eyes unlocked from the far wall to the pod in the middle of the room, the prone body laying in it unfocused and blurry.

"Eleanor."

The smell of antiseptic watered at my eyes as Erskine prepped the injections, humming Edelweiss as he went. I screwed my eyes shut and pulled in another inhale.

"Eleanor!"

The S.S.R. lab snapped away and Hank took Howard's place, the same nervous look about him. I shifted my stance and glanced around the room, double checking that I was in the young doctor's machine and not the basement lab.

"This is going to work, right?"

I looked back to Hank. "What?"

"You looked over my research, you talked about it with Dr. Stark. Was I right? Will it work?"

"Dr. Stark?" I repeated absently, my foot tapping faster. "Right, um, from what I understood you were right, and it will work. Dr-Dr. Stark agreed with me. Plus, Charles seems to have a pretty good handle on his mutation, so I don't think we'll have to worry about him too much. We're not going to put his brain through a blender."

"Blender?"

I nodded my head to the side. "I was concerned that the amplification would overwhelm his brain and just-" I cut off to make a whirring noise.

Hank paled and looked back to his machine. "I didn't even consider that," he admitted, a nervous edge to his voice. "What if I kill him?"

"I think brain damage is more likely than death," I told him. "Though he might accidently kill us. Trigger strokes or brain bleeds."

"Oh God," he breathed before rushing over to the controls.

I sighed and leaned further back against the railing, watching Hank run around like a chicken with its head cut off wondering if I had time to grab another cup of coffee before the shit show started.

"Don't worry, darling, I brought you one."

Turning around to look down at the trapdoor stairs, I watched Charles make his way up with a large coffee cup in hand. I waited till he was offering it to me to speak. "You're reading my mind for coffee orders now?"

He rolled his eyes and held the cup out further. "You've been thinking about it rather loudly for the past hour now," he defended. "You really should get this caffeine addiction under control, you know. I watched you drink 6 cups at breakfast and now this?"

I glared as I took the cup, sipping at the perfectly doctored drink. "I have a high caffeine tolerance."

His look turned critical. "High tolerance, eh?" he pressed.

I took another sip. "Yep."

Charles hummed in affirmation before looking over to Hank. "Good morning, Hank!" he called, making a beeline for him. "Everything ready for our little experiment?"

Hank had spun to look at the other Mutant, that frantic expression still on his face. "Uh, yes, yes I believe so," he answered, shooting a glance towards me. "Director Rogers suggested that I adjust some of the input levels to help with output stability, so I've done that. Also, I had some ideas on how to make the connection between you and the machine more consistent, so if we could just shave your head-"

"We are not shaving my head," Charles interrupted, all jovial tone gone from his voice.

"But-"

"No."

"Maybe just on the-"

"No."

"It'll really help with-"

"Hank, I said no."

Erik and Raven made their way up the stairs as the bickering continued, both hesitating once they reached the top.

I spared them a glance before going back to my coffee. "Hank wants to shave Charles' head."

Raven's eye lit up as she let out a snort. "Charles would cut his arm off before he'd let anyone touch his hair," she said, rounding the railing to join me. "Hank isn't going to win this."

"I feel like he'd be less cocky if he didn't have the hair."

"He'd have to overcompensate for it some other way."

"True."

Erik shook his head as he took the spot on my other side. "Now I wonder what you say about me when I'm not listening."

"Only embarrassing things, I promise."

"Hank, if you ask me to shave my head one more bloody time, I will make you think you're a twelve-year-old girl. We'll have a tea party and Raven will paint your nails."

Hank's attention snapped to the blonde as a blush creeped up his neck.

Raven gave him an appraising once over. "I have a lovely purple that will compliment your eyes."

His blush deepened and he cleared his throat. "Fine," he gave in, "but it would help."

Charles patted him on the shoulder. "I'm afraid we'll have to make do without. Now, what do I have to do?"

Hank didn't look any less disappointed. "You just stand up there and put that thing on your head," he explained, gesturing vaguely towards the center of the golf ball. "The thing does the thing and you can think further than you could before."

A sympathetic whine left Raven at his blatant dejection. "Come on, Hank, don't be like that," she said. "I didn't get to see the research; I want to know how it works."

"Yeah, Hank," I added, pushing a spark of excitement at him. "I want to see how it works too. So does Erik, right?"

Erik made a dismissive noise that cut off into a grunt when my elbow caught his ribs. "Yes. Yes, I would like to see it."

Hank looked between all of us before a smile spread across his face and he stepped away from the controls. "Right, well for starters I call it Cerebro."

Charles let out a laugh. "As in the Spanish for 'brain'."

Hank flushed again as he nodded. "Yes. Okay, so, the electrodes connect to Charles to the transmitter on the roof," he explained, once again pointing to the wire covered helmet. "When he picks up a Mutant, his brain sends a signal through a relay and then the co-ordinates of their location are printed out here," he finished, showing off the section of machine with a modified printer.

Raven looked genuinely impressed. "You designed this?"

His flush went deeper. "Yeah."

Erik dismissed the machine and moved back over to Charles; a hand hooked at my elbow bringing me along. We watched with equal apprehension as the Telepath stepped up onto the platform and pulled the helmet onto his head.

"What an adorable lab rat you make, Charles."

"Don't spoil this for me, Erik."

"I've been a lab rat. I know one when I see one."

I made no effort to hide my smirk. "Und ich dachte, ich hätte schlecht geflirtet (And I thought I flirted badly)."

It was Erik's turn to elbow me in the ribs. "Trink einfach deinen Kaffee (Just drink your coffee)," he sneered out, his eyes never leaving Charles.

I winked at Charles as I took a gulp of my coffee.

He raised an eyebrow in question but was distracted when Hank came up behind him to adjust the helmet.

"Okay, great. Are you sure we can't shave your head?"

"Tea party, Hank."

"Right," he conceited, pulling away to fiddle with the control board again.

An uneasy groan left me as Cerebro powered up, the lights flickering and a humming building in volume. I drained the last of my coffee before reaching out to pull Raven into my side, leaving my arm around her shoulders. "He's going to be okay," I told her, tampering down her sudden nerves with some confidence. "With our luck he'll break the damn thing and the whole state will lose power."

A weak laugh left her as she wrapped her own arm around me. "Maybe it'll make his hair fall out."

"Holy shit, I didn't even think of that!"

"You two aren't funny," Charles told us before his eyes snapped shut and he grabbed at the railing, his knuckles going white as Cerebro hit full power. After a moment of tension he let out the breath he had been holding and relaxed his hold. "There's so many of them," he said with wonder, his unfocused eyes opening. "I had no idea…"

The arm of the printer jerked across the paper as coordinates came through.

"It's working!"

Charles' joyous laughter echoed off the walls.

~/\~

~\/~

*Several Hours Later*

The pizza boxes were spread out across the same coffee table as the night before as Charles sorted through the stack of names and locations. He had gone through the list once before, circling the names that had stood out in his mind for further research. Now, between bites of food he narrowed the list down to the ones he thought would work for a team.

"How many people do you want?" I asked around a mouthful of pepperoni. "I'm all for having a strong team but we have to train them. For their specific Mutations. Somehow."

Charles cocked a brow as he looked up from his list. "Eleanor, while I usually enjoy your natural pessimism, I believe in this situation it would best be served silently."

A shocked scoff left me. "Cripes almighty, where did the sass come from?"

"Where did 'cripes almighty' come from?" Raven demanded with a face splitting smile, her glee at getting to tease someone other than Charles obvious.

I glared as I pointed my pizza slice at her. "You respect your elders, young lady."

Erik snorted. "You're everyone's elder, Oma."

"Nu-uh, Victor is older than me."

"What does Oma mean?"

"It's German for grandmother," Charles answered absently as he crossed a name off. "Don't let her fool you, Raven, Eleanor is far older than she leads you to believe."

Another scoff left me. "What the hell, Charles?"

He shot me a wink.

"You can't be that old," Raven protested, looking me over as if she could spot the 'old' on me. "I mean, you only look a few years older than me."

I snarled at her and looked back to Charles. "You don't even know how old I am," I argued.

"I know how old you aren't."

"What the fuck does that even mean?"

"It means that I know the age on your CIA profile is staggeringly wrong."

"It's the CIA, of course they're wrong."

"I imagine that you're the reason they're wrong."

"I'm the reason they're wrong for a lot of things, but that has nothing to do with my age."

"I bet it does."

"I bet I can rip your spine out with my bare hands."

The room went silent as the two of us stared each other down. He pushed against my mental walls and I pushed against his, neither of us willing to give an inch in either direction.

"Uh, guys, you might wanna stop doing that."

Charles and I broke eye contact just in time to watch the lights flicker before settling back to their usual blaze.

"Huh."

"We probably shouldn't do that again."

I hummed in agreement and shot a look towards Erik and Raven, the two watching us with cautious expressions. I flashed them an unease smile. "So, back to my question, how many people are you thinking of recruiting? Pessimism aside."

Charles, allowing my subject change, held his list out to me. "I don't expect the majority of them to say yes, so I'm picking the ones who…." He trailed off, trying to think of an eloquent way to say what he wanted. "Who are in situations in need of improvement? In situations that allow them to say yes? They are in situations where-"

"They're in situations where joining a Mutant Special Ops team would be better than the alternative?" I supplied, reading down the list of names to see if I recognized any of them, stopping when I saw Alex Summers. "He's going to be interesting,"

"You know him?"

"Of him. I tried to get him into S.H.I.E.L.D. custody when he was first arrested but he refused to speak with me. Or Howard."

"What did he do?"

"Lost control," I answered with a shrug. "He has a combative Mutation that he doesn't have a handle on. I've never seen him use it, but I saw the damage afterwards and I was impressed. The accident didn't kill anyone, but a lot of people did get hurt."

Charles thought on that. "We'll have to think of something clever to help with that," he mused. "I'm sure it's psychological as well as physical."

I held my opinion and went back to the list. "So, all of these are troubled cases?"

"I wouldn't call them troubled."

"You wouldn't."

"What was that?"

"Nothing," I dismissed absently. "Do you know how you're-" the words caught in my throat when I read the last name on the list. "Fuck me standing."

Raven chocked on her sip of Coke.

"Who did Charles find?" Erik asked as he took another bite.

"My brother."

It was his turn to choke. "Victor?"

The name snapped me out of my shock. "What? No," I said, giving the stack of print outs an untrusting look. For all I knew he could be in there. "He found Jimmy."

"Bloody hell, there are more of you?" Charles demanded, eyeing the print outs as well. "Which one is your brother?"

"James Howlett."

A stricken expression crossed Charles' face before he schooled it. "Well, that certainly explains a few things."

I snarled at him. "What does that mean?"

He gave a small shrug. "It explains why his mental walls were as strong as they were," he answered. "It also explains your anger issues. It's hereditary."

"What was he doing?"

"Either starting a pub brawl or breaking one up, I'm not really certain."

I wasn't certain either. "How did he look?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did he look okay? Healthy?"

He was quiet for a moment. "How long has it been since you've seen him?"

I hesitated for a beat. "Almost 16 years."

Sympathy radiated off him as he sighed. "He looked as well as he could, given the circumstances. I could show you if you'd like?"

I was shaking my head before he had finished speaking. "No, I don't want…" I trailed off, clearing my throat and picking up the pen to scratch Jimmy's name out. "He isn't going to talk to you, so I'll handle it."

"Are you sure, darling?" Charles asked, looking cautiously to Erik. "If you don't want to-"

"I'm sure," I interrupted, tossing the pen and list down on the table. "Listen, I'm going to update Howard about the situation. See if S.H.I.E.L.D can use some of its influence to get us in to see Summers, though at this point I think the prison would pay someone to take him. One of you should update MacTaggart as well. She's probably losing her mind about not being involved in this part of the plan."

Charles looked ready to protest again when Erik shot him a look. "Very well. I'll bring the list to dinner, shall I? See if any of the other names are of the familiar kind?"

I cringed at the idea of that but nodded anyway. "I'll give it a look through," I told him as I got to my feet. "When you get your list narrowed down, I want you to write down as much about them as you know. Location, Mutation, appearance, something embarrassing they did in the 5th grade."

Charles struggled to keep his smile down. "I'll try my best."

Erik caught the back of my shirt as I walked towards the door. "Geht es dir gut? (Are you alright?)" he asked, a knowing look in his eyes.

Knowing I couldn't lie to him, I gave a small nod. "Ich werde sein, (I will be)," I told him. "I'll see you later."

I made a quick getaway as they stared after me, all of them aware of my sudden need to escape. Charles had found out more about my family than I had wanted him to, but whether I liked it or not it was only a matter of time before he knew as much as everyone else did. I had taken a stubborn front on keeping him out of my business, mostly just because he was used to getting his way. I only had room in my life for one spoiled man and Howard wasn't moving out any time soon. Besides, he had bigger things to worry about other than my life. Him finding Jimmy was like adding orange icing to a fruit cake, something nobody wanted in the first place but now it definitely won't get eaten out of politeness. Shitty analogy but it was a shitty situation.

I didn't bother turning on the lights as I got to my room, just locking the door and heading straight for the phone. Much like I had the other day, I plopped in front of the phone and lit a cigarette.

"Should I be flattered or worried that you're calling me so often?" he asked after the fourth ring.

"Both probably," I answered around an exhale. "I don't see this situation getting better any time soon."

"Did Dr. McCoy's machine not work? There weren't any power outages or mass mind fuckery."

I smiled at that. "No, no mind fuckery, it worked perfectly. A little too perfectly. He was hooked up to the thing for 3 hours and he says he only got a fraction of the Mutants recorded. I'm half tempted to tamper with the fucking thing when this is all over so that he can't find them all. That is if we make it through this."

"Have I ever told you that I love your optimism?"

"Don't you start too."

"I was serious."

My smile widened at his sincerity. "And I love you for it, Howie," I assured him. "How about I get Hank to join our side instead of breaking his toy? We'll get him and the machine."

"And if he says no again?"

"Well, then I'll do what I always do when we work with the CIA. I'll get rid of the evidence and move on with my life."

He hesitated for a moment. "Fine, but I vote we try to bribe him again before you start breaking things."

"He seems to admire you so, I'll let you take care of that," I told him, flicking off the ash into one of my empty coffee cups. "But listen, Howie, that's not what I wanted to talk about. Well, it's kind of what I wanted to talk about but it's not the right context."

"This is gonna to be good," he muttered, clearing his throat as the sound of shifting followed. He was getting comfortable for the impending shitshow. "What context would you like to discuss."

"The names on the list. A name."

"Oh," he said, understanding in his voice. "Who is it?"

I pulled in a deep drag before answering. "Jimmy."

His silence stretched to an uncomfortable length. "I'm going to be honest here, El, I thought it was going to be much worse. I was expecting you to say he found Victor."

I exhaled a cloud of smoke. "He's not a plague."

"No, but he is terrifying," he reasoned. "Jimmy in comparison is a goddamn teddy bear."

"I don't need a teddy bear right now. I need someone who will rip Schmidt's face off."

"Jimmy can do that too."

"Sure, but not with his teeth."

"I'm sure he'd be more than happy to if you asked."

I hummed dismissively and took another drag. "If it was Victor I wouldn't even need to ask. I could just point. No talking involved."

He considered that for a moment. "I always underestimate how long you can hold a grudge," he mused. "It's been nearly 18 years, El. Are you really still mad at him?"

A snarl curled at my lips as I swallowed down smoke. "You know what he said, Howard. Do you really expect me to forget that so easily?"

"I agree that what he said wasn't okay, but he was coming from a good place," he defended. "You know better than anyone else how shitty your family is with communicating. Brutal honesty seems to be the only way you guys can get a point across."

"It doesn't excuse what he said."

"No, it doesn't," he agreed, "but you wouldn't have called me if you weren't thinking about seeing him."

He was right and it frustrated me to no end. "I told Charles that I would," I admitted before I cleared my throat. "He won't know either way if I do or don't. I can lie to him."

"Sure you can, but again, you wouldn't have called me if you weren't thinking of doing it."

I huffed out a growl and took the last drag, stubbing the cigarette out on the porcelain. "How the fuck would I even go about it?" I demanded. "Just walk in and act like nothing happened?"

He didn't answer.

"I can't just walk in and act like nothing happened, Howard!"

"Well why not?"

"Because something did happen, and I'm still upset about it."

"Then bite the bullet and have a conversation with him. You're upset and that's fine, but nothing is going to change if you don't talk to him. You'll stay angry and he'll stay gone, and I know you miss him."

Another snarl left me.

"You can nash at me all you want but it won't change the fact that I'm always right."

"You're not always right," I argued.

"Unless you have data to back up that claim I'm not acknowledging it," he dismissed flippantly. "Listen, El, I only see one option that's not going to send you into another 18 years of the morbs-"

"No one has said 'the morbs' since the 1800's."

"-is you having a conversation with your brother in a well-insured establishment. Or an establishment with an owner you can pay off. Either one really, I don't think that detail particularly matters."

"You know, despite what most people think I am capable of having a civil conversation with people. It doesn't always end in a fight."

He made a noise of non-committal.

"It doesn't."

He made another noise.

I groaned and grabbed for another cigarette.

"You do miss him, right?" he pressed, his tone clear that he already knew the answer.

My fingers fumbled on the roller of the lighter before it sparked to life, the small flame dancing in front of my face. He was right; I did miss Jimmy. Sure, there had been times when we went a while without seeing each other, the various wars we'd participated in seeing to that, but it had never been this long. Not 18 years.

"El?"

I flipped the lighter closed and curled my fingers around it. "Yeah," I answered softly, putting the new cigarette back. "I just don't know…"

"We've all lost a lot over the years, El. Bring your brother back for us, huh?"

A sniff left me as I gripped the lighter just a bit tighter. "I can't promise to bring him back, but I'll talk to him."

"Atta girl!" he crowed, losing all somberness. "I knew you had it in ya!"

If it had been anyone other than Howard I would have hung up. "Sometimes I can't tell if you have genuine mood swings or if you're just a good manipulator."

"What are you talking about? Mood swings? What mood swings?"

"Or maybe you're just like that. Kind of like a birth defect. Or a Mutation."

"Hey! I don't have a birth defect! And I'm not a Mutant!"

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure, I tested for it!"

"You tested for it?"

He was quiet for a moment before he cleared his throat to fill the silence. "I wanted to know if I was Human smart or Mutant smart."

That didn't really surprise me. "Do you feel more superior being Human smart?"

"Actually yes."

"Of course you do."

"How did we get on the topic of me?"

"We always get on the topic of you," I reminded him, picking the coffee mug up and getting back to my feet. "I'm pretty sure that's your Mutation."

He considered that for far too long. "How do you test for that?"

Knowing the science blackhole this conversation was heading towards I threw myself back into the trench. "You have fun figuring that out, Howie. I'm hanging up now."

"Huh? Oh, okay. Call me for bail or gossip."

"I'll be sure to. I love you."

"I love you too."

I hesitated for a moment before lowering the receiver back to the cradle, setting it down far more gently than necessary. Somehow over the years Howard, unstable and reckless as he was, had become somewhat of a lighthouse for me. It never mattered how far I wandered from S.H.I.E.L.D. or the personal lives the two of us had fought so hard to keep, he'd be there to lead me back in. My brothers had been like that. When we were kids, during the wars, and the peaceful times between. We all had our own lives, but we were never far from each other. Where one went so did the others. Now, I had no idea where Victor was, and Jimmy was waiting in a dive bar for a conversation we'd spent 18 years avoiding.

In a way, I had replaced them with Howard.

My stomach rolled at the thought of that, but I quickly shoved it away. No one had been replaced, roles had just been shifted. I had looked to Howard for comfort when shit had hit the fan and he hadn't faltered. All those years on the ship looking for Steve, all those years establishing S.H.I.E.L.D., all those years being each other's only confidant. It wasn't one sided and that was the only saving grace. We had leant on each other and there was nothing wrong with that.

But now…..now I needed to be the lighthouse. Now I needed to bring someone in from the cold.

~/\~

~\/~

Happy Solstice everyone!

I'm sorry for the ridiculous delay in this, but I've recently started school so my free time has been lacking. I'll continue to update when I get a chapter done but I can't promise a consistent schedule.

So, what do you guys think the fight was about? What could possibly have been bad enough for Eleanor and Jimmy to avoid each other? Where the fuck is Victor?

Also, are there any past characters that you want to see come back in future chapters? Any fan favorites out there? Let me know :)

Reviews=Love

Thank you all! 3