Alex, age 15
Alex picked at the food on his plate. Despite how hungry he claimed to have been earlier and how amazing the food smelled, it tasted like sawdust. He knew his mother- adoptive mother- was an excellent cook, and his older sister wasn't so bad, either. Even Lorna had helped, wanting to bond with the women in his life besides Hepzibah.
"Alex? You ok?" Alex looked up and saw his parents looking at him with concern.
"I'm fine. I think I snacked too much and I'm just not hungry now. Sorry, Mom."
"Would you like to go lie down for a few minutes?"
"I can't believe you're catering to the freak," his sister spat.
"Haley Masters!"
"It's been all over the news-"
"You realize that calling him a freak with me here is dangerous, right?" Alex looked at Lorna and smirked.
"I don't think she realizes who your dad is, Lorna. Really only mutants know that he's one of the most powerful mutants known to our world- or that you inherited his abilities."
"Did she not watch what your brother did to Juggernaut? Have you not told her that your powers are essentially the same, just from a different location?" Alex looked at Haley from the corner of his eye and saw how pale she was.
"Didn't come up. Besides, Scotty has nothing on Gabe. Nathan says he's going to be even more powerful than your dad, which is why he had to change the timeline to keep him from killing Dad and nearly destroying the world."
"Alex. That's enough." Alex shrugged.
"I meant my dad. Not… Dad. There's no reason for him to come here after Dad. Unless he hears about me being called a freak again. He was raised by a ruthless slave master. I'm sure he picked up a few things."
"Why did you even come back? We don't want you here." Haley's words stung, but Alex had heard just as bad the last few months in school and around Bayville.
"Mom and Dad think differently." Haley threw her fork down and stood. She glared at him for a moment before shaking her head.
"They don't. They just don't want your precious Major Summers to win," she spat before storming away from the table. Alex swallowed and looked at his plate, ignoring the hand on his arm.
"Alex. You know we love you, and you know your abilities don't bother us."
"Your mother's right, son. We've only been concerned for you and… your brothers. We're not ashamed of you, and you are not a pawn between us and Chris. Lorna, I apologize that this is your impression of Haley. She just doesn't know how to handle this."
"If my father had heard her-"
"Lorna," Alex warned. "That's my sister."
"Exactly. She had no business saying anything like that to you, Lex. You deserve a family who accepts you no matter what."
"We do," Joanna promised. "Haley is just worried. She sees the news and she hears what her classmates say, and… She's just having a hard time right now. It's our fault. We should have told her the truth when you first left for the Institute."
"What did you tell her?"
"That it was an elite school, and you had a scholarship since your birth father worked there." Alex put his fork down and sighed.
"I should go talk to her." He squeezed Lorna's hand and walked back to his sister's room, knocking.
"Go away!" Alex frowned and tried to open the door. Locked.
"Haley, open up, or I'll blast the door down! You know I can!" The door swung open, but Haley blocked his path.
"What do you want, Summers?"
"Mom and Dad-"
"Don't call them that! They aren't your parents!"
"Not by birth, you're right. My parents gave their lives so Scott and I would live-"
"Aren't you forgetting a brother?" She sneered. Alex blinked.
"Mom and Dad didn't tell you anything, did they?" He saw her tear up and he let out an aggravated breath. "Let me in, Haley. I'll tell you everything. Please." She sniffed, but opened the door to let him in. Alex sat at her desk and clasped his hands together.
"Start with your twin."
"Can I…" he sighed. "Gabe's not my twin. We told the school in Bayville that for paperwork purposes, and because my dad didn't want to be thought of as a cheater. He and my mom were high school sweethearts, and he didn't want… So Professor Xavier helped us fake some paperwork for him."
"Is he even your brother?"
"He is. He'll be eleven next week."
"But he's-"
"My age. Yeah." Alex ran a hand through his hair. "What I'm about to tell you can't get out, ok? If people knew about this, it'd be worse than them knowing about mutants." Haley frowned.
"There's more than mutants?"
"Can I see your computer?" She nodded and Alex opened it. Haley typed her password and Alex looked up the meteor story in Bayville from October.
"We heard about that," Haley said. "And then you went there."
"Yeah. Because it wasn't a meteor. It was my dad's spaceship." Haley was quiet for a moment and then shook her head.
"Very funny. Get out."
"Haley. Haley! I can prove it!" Alex shouted as she tried forcing him out of her room.
"You have five seconds." Alex nodded and shakily took out his phone. He dialed a number and put it on speakerphone.
"Alex! God I miss you, bro. How are you doing?"
"What are you doing up so late?"
"It's not that- shit. It's three AM?" Alex snickered.
"Not here, but yeah. It's late in New York."
"Well, I have newborns, so…" Alex beamed.
"How are they?"
"Beast says they're thriving, and we'll probably be released to the suite soon."
"That's great," he smiled, until he saw the look on Haley's face. "Scotty, I need a favor."
"What'd you do? Come on, Lex. I can't cover for you- you know what happened last time I tried. Do you know how long it took before I could sit again?!"
"You were the moron who brought up D'Ken again."
"Dad's going to bust your ass-"
"Scott Summers! You are holding your daughter!"
"Sorry, Maddie. Look, Alex. You know anything else, I'd help-"
"My parents never told Haley about… what really happened. She still thinks Gabe and I are twins. I was hoping for some… um… proof." There was silence.
"Is she with you now?"
"Yeah."
"Can she hear me?"
"I can," Haley answered.
"Switch to video, Lex." Alex did and saw his brother holding a small bundle in his arms. "You realize Dad's gonna take a belt to you for this, right? Not that you're telling your sister, but that you're doing it without permission." Alex blushed, but nodded.
"She found out we were mutants with the news, Scotty. They… They kept everything from her." Haley motioned Alex over and he sat on the bed next to her.
"Hi, Haley. I'm Scott. I don't think we've met." Haley shook her head. "What has Alex told you that you want proof about?"
"He said something about your dad and a spaceship. Are you not even human?" Scott smirked.
"We are. Alex, Gabriel, and I are the sons of Major Christopher Summers of USAF, and he's the son of Captain Philip Summers of USAF. We can trace our line back to England in the 1800s, but our ancestor changed his name to Summers, so it's hard before that. I don't know much about our mom's family. Her parents died when she was in high school, and she was an only child. Dad never really looked for… But we know our abilities come from the Summers line for reasons that I'm really not allowed to talk about.
"So the accident that separated our family… Aliens abducted our parents before the plane blew. Dad had pushed me and Alex out. We were it. When they were abducted, the emporer of the race that abducted them, D'Ken, turned our mom into, um…" Scott shook his head. "Into a concubine. He made our dad watch as he raped her. Dad broke free and went to attack him, and he killed our mom and cut out the baby she was carrying. Dad thought that was the end of both of them. D'Ken actually put the baby in an incubator and sped up his growth until he was old enough to learn a trade and gifted him to another alien as a slave. That was Gabriel. He'll actually be eleven next week, but he looks closer to fifteen, just like Alex.
"Dad was thrown into the slave pens, and when he saw the guards about to rape another woman, he and some of the other prisoners stopped them. They escaped and became space pirates- the Starjammers. Any questions?"
"Can you prove it?"
"The other members of the Starjammers were at my wedding last month. One looks like a lizard man. Lex?" Alex nodded and pulled up the picture on his phone to show Haley.
"How do I know that's not another… mutant?" She asked once Scott was back on the screen.
"You met our stepmom, Hepzibah, right?"
"Yeah?"
"She's the alien our dad saved."
"Again, I don't have proof." Scott carefully rubbed his forehead.
"If Dad finds out I sent this, it'll be my ass on the line, forget our deal." The screen froze and Alex waited until his phone buzzed, showing a text from Scott. "Lex, let her watch it and then you'd better delete it. If I find you didn't, your next DR session will be absolute torture. I'll let Wolverine at you."
"Got it, Scotty. Thanks." The baby started wailing and Scott began bouncing her to soothe her.
"Gotta go, Lex. Talk to you later. And hey! Call Mom and Dad. Dad's… He misses you and Mom won't stop talking about her Alex-boy."
"I will, Scotty. Thanks." Scott nodded and the screen went black. Alex went to his texts and clicked on the link from Scott. Alex saw what he knew was the hall in the lower levels. Chris was on a stretcher surrounded by Hepzibah, Ch'od, and Raza.
The man on the stretcher shot up, grabbing his head.
"What the hell was that?" he asked.
"Corsair!" Scott stopped walking as it seemed the group needed a minute.
"Did the Shi'ar get us?"
"They blasted our ship," the lizard man told him. "We got knocked to Terra."
"Are you sure Ch'od?" The lizard man, Ch'od, nodded. "Damn. Where are we?" The crew looked up at Scott. The captain turned to look with them and saw a kid.
"Um. You should still get checked out, even if you're awake now. It's safe here for… everyone." Corsair got off of the stretcher and held a hand to his head.
"Hello. I'm Corsair, and this is Ch'od," the lizard man nodded, "Hepzibah," the cat woman nodded, "and Raza," the one with a metallic eye nodded. "We're the Starjammers. And you are?"
"I'm Cyclops."
"Where are we?"
"Great," Haley said. "What did I just watch?"
"Sh," Alex commanded as the video switched to Chris' classroom.
"Good evening."
"Good evening, Corsair," the teens responded.
"Last week we talked about the Shi'ar royal family. Today, we're going to go over some of the weapons the guards use to protect that family." Chris pulled out several different guns and pointed them at targets, shooting to show their abilities.
"That's… What is he shooting at?"
"Looks like cut outs of the Shi'ar. Yeah- that one right there? That's D'Ken. That's the guy who killed my mom."
"He's real?"
"Yeah. So that's… That's the truth about Gabriel and what happened to my parents, and why my dad didn't look for us."
"Ok… Say I believe you. If your dad didn't know about Gabriel, how did he come into the picture?"
"That's hard…" Alex took a deep breath. "You saw Scott holding my niece, right?"
"Yeah?"
"She's got a twin brother. Nathan. When we were in Alaska with our grandparents, we met him-"
"What?" Alex ran a hand through his hair.
"Nathan can time travel. He came to Scott at fifty to tell him about Gabe."
"And you expect me to believe that?" Alex deleted the video on his phone and went looking through his photos until he saw a picture of Scott, Maddie, Nathan, Nate, and Carrie from the wedding.
"That's Carrie, the baby you just saw Scott holding. Beside her is Nate, her twin, and behind Scott and his new wife is Nathan, the older version of Nate. You can see- Look at their arms. The hair. They're the same guy."
"Why are their arms metal?"
"That's not something I'm allowed to talk about. So the Nathan in the back came to Scott and told him about Gabe. Now he's with us. Next?"
"Is Lorna's dad really…?"
"Powerful?" Haley nodded. "He's one of the top two mutants alive right now. Him and Professor Xavier. Nate will be up there with them, soon, and Gabe… Nathan told me and Scott that we're Alpha level mutants. Gabe will be an Omega level. He said if Gabe didn't want to be stopped, he wouldn't be. Part of why it was so important for us to get to him sooner than later." Haley looked at her floor in thought.
"What determines mutation?" Alex shrugged.
"A gene like what determines everything else. It usually appears during puberty, but Scott's powers came early. If they hadn't come when they did… We would have died from the plane crash."
"Why does he wear glasses?"
"He was protecting me," Alex told her, looking at his hands. "He turned and took the impact of the rocks we fell on so that I'd be safe."
"How old was he?"
"Seven. He damaged his brain- the part that controls his powers. So he wears the glasses to keep it under control." Haley nodded.
"Why… why didn't they tell me any of this?"
"You'll have to ask them. I definitely didn't ask for it to be kept quiet."
"Was this why they didn't want me to come at Christmas?" Alex frowned.
"They told me you went on a cruise. I was expecting to see you…" Haley shook her head.
"They said only parents were allowed to go, and…" Haley wiped at her eyes.
"I'm sorry. I never asked them to keep this from you. I'm…" Alex sighed.
"I thought you saw yourself as superior-"
"No. Just different. But I'm still Alex, Haley. I'm still the same kid you chased with water balloons through the house. Still the same kid who can kick your ass in a surfing competition-"
"I don't surf."
"I know," he smirked. "Doesn't make it any less true." The two were silent for a few minutes. "Are we ok?"
"Yeah. I'm sorry, Alex. I was just… You left and you acted like everything was great, and when you came home after Christmas, it was like you didn't want to be here-"
"I didn't," he frowned. "There was an attack and Gabe was hurt really bad. My dad had to take him to space to keep him alive. I was upset, and my grandpa," Alex swallowed. "He… hurt Scott after Scott tried to protect me. Mom and Dad saw that and they forced me home."
"Oh."
"Scott and I… We were supposed to be able to support each other while Dad and Gabe were gone, and I failed him. Mom and Dad wouldn't even let me talk to him." She shook her head.
"We should just… I know they planned on a few things, but we should just blow them off and go to the beach like we used to. We can show Lorna our spot, and she can watch you surf."
"I'd like that. Thanks, Haley."
"You promise you don't see me as less than you?"
"Only because you're my sister," he smirked. "But not because you don't have powers. You're my big sister, Haley. I'll always need you."
"Are you going to come back home?"
"Every summer, at least. Maybe for a month or so. But I… Before the X-Men, I hurt, Haley. My hands always burned. My powers acted up at the worst moments. Scott started working with me, and now, I feel like it's just another muscle that I stretched. I feel better. I can't let it out here, and with as destructive as my powers are… I have to let it out or it'll do it on its own." He powered up his hands and showed her. "I can kick some major butt with these."
"Can you show me?" Alex got his hands under control and used Haley's computer to look up the fight with Juggernaut.
"Watch." She saw Cyclops blasting Juggernaut and frowned.
"Is that-?"
"Scott? Yeah. That's what my hands can do. His powers are just from his eyes. It's not often siblings have essentially the same… We think something from the plane crash caused it. We know fraternal twins whose powers are nothing alike, but then Nate and Carrie will both have telepathy and telekinesis. Nate will have a few more things, but those are their main abilities. Maybe it's just a Summers thing. I don't know." There was a knock at the door and Haley wiped her face before opening it.
"Hey, Alex. Maddie texted me. Wanted me to check on you."
"We're ok, Lorna. We're going to take you to the beach tomorrow. You interested?"
"Sure. Will I finally get to see you surf?"
"Yeah." Lorna looked at Haley.
"His mom was a champion snowboarder. Has he told you?"
"No," Haley said, looking at Alex.
"She was. My dad says that's where I get my competitive nature from. Scott and Gabe take after him more, but I'm…"
"Does he treat you ok?"
"Who, Dad?" Haley nodded. "Yeah. He's great. I've really been enjoying getting to know where I came from, you know?" Alex stood up and stretched. "I'm going to go look over my board and make sure it's safe to use after months of inactivity. Lorna?" Lorna took Alex's hand and the two walked out of Haley's room.