This is Volume 42 of the 714 Universe, so you should make sure you're all caught up, cuz this directly follows the previous volume and you'll be lost otherwise *mwuah* *go forth and read my pretties!*

Chapter 1: "Aftershocks"

The sudden calm that had descended on James when he made his decision hit Rachel like a psychic tidal wave, so she was the first to realize what was going on — but not the first to act, not when she was reeling and in shock herself and convinced that her presence had tipped James just that little bit past the edge he was already standing on.

Tyler hadn't been too far away from James when he heard the unmistakable sound of his claws tearing into his own body. All at once, he was bounding across the lab to where James was, swearing at James over and over again as he saw the blood pooling around him. He called for Hank — who was more than a little surprised at the tone Tyler had taken, not to mention the language, though he quickly understood when he saw the scene.

"Don't you die on me," Tyler snarled, his lips curled back as he grabbed James's arm with one hand, putting pressure on James' chest, starting to pump his all into healing him. James had done himself some serious damage — the kid knew what he was doing — and it had Tyler growling outright in frustration as he tried to stay ahead of the curve healing James.

He didn't let up on the growl the whole time he was healing James, and once he saw out of the corner of his gaze that Hank was handling the massive blood loss, he closed his eyes to concentrate.

It took longer than Tyler would have liked to see, but he finally leaned back with a weariness to him that he didn't think was possible, though the growl still hadn't stopped, and he didn't think it would. He was too tired to stop it, anyway, because even if James' healing was shot, that didn't mean he wasn't a healer. It was still harder to heal him than it was to heal non-healers, even if the current wasn't as strong as it usually was for the moment. And he couldn't risk putting an inhibitor on James when he wasn't convinced that his healing wasn't working at least a little over the norm. Every little bit of healing mattered.

When James finally opened his eyes again after the intense healing, he was reeling as Tyler snarled at him. "You don't get to make that decision," he snapped. "Ever." He was still growling as he hauled him onto the bed a little more roughly than he'd intended to. The breath left James in a woosh as Tyler started to tie James down, his eyes narrowed. "You're not the only one hurting right now."

James closed his eyes and leaned back into the pillows, exhausted and disappointed to be waking up in spite of all that Tyler had poured into him. Now, on top of the rest of his borderline feeling of disembodiment, he could feel where his claws had sliced him open — burning even after the wounds were gone. It was all he could do to keep from falling apart in tears. But the angry chuffing from Tyler only had James cursing himself for not just putting his fist under his chin instead of his chest.

When Tyler was finished tying him down, he let out a satisfied little huff before he leveled a finger James' way. "You're not the only one that would be hurt if you were gone. Pull. Your. Damn. Head. Out."

It wasn't long at all before Logan showed up — having heard the familiar snarl from down the hall, though he didn't look nearly as mad as Tyler when he saw the aftermath. More like he had been wondering when rather than if.

Tyler spun to face Logan, still worked up, though he made a visible effort to relax when he saw the expression on Logan's face. The one that showed how intimately familiar Logan was with what James was going through. It brought up all sorts of old conversations that Tyler had with Logan years ago, and the haunted expression was the same now as when the two of them had discussed how Logan had fully expected to go to Hell. It set Tyler back, and he took a moment to compose himself, searching for something professional to say before finally settling on the facts. "He can't pull his arms or wrists out of the restraints the way we've got them. Dad and I have done it this way for you a few times too, so he's not doing that again."

Logan nodded at that and let out a sigh. "Not while he's in here anyhow."

Tyler's look of alarm was easy enough to read as he whipped his head toward Hank for guidance. "He's not going anywhere until we are both reasonably convinced that won't be the case," Hank said, frowning James' way and looking dismayed.

Logan watched James for a long moment before he turned back to Hank, though he didn't take his eyes off his son. "Then I have some bad news — 'cause that'll be what he's waiting for."

"Give me at least a little credit, my friend," Hank said. "I have seen more than my share of comrades in arms through exactly this kind of crisis."

"Voice of experience, that's all," Logan said, looking far more guilty than he should have. "That's what I'd do. What I have done."

"Yes, well, not with me on watch. I assure you that I'm not so easy to convince," Hank said.

Logan nodded, then turned to head to the other side of the lab, looking more defeated than either of them had ever seen him. "I'll clean that up."

"Nonsense," Hank said. "Stay with your son and let us handle the rest of it."

"Part of the job description," Tyler said in an attempt to sound a little less like he was ready to take someone's head off.

Logan ignored them and didn't acknowledge the sentiment. Instead, he continued on his way, intent on taking the time to deal with the mess so he could process what to do now.

Hank sighed, knowing he couldn't help either Logan or James and knowing that Tyler needed the space to work out how truly upset he'd gotten before he could begin to approach his stepson. He turned to leave — and realized that Rachel was still in the lab, frozen with one hand over her mouth as she tried and failed to hold back shocked tears. She hadn't moved a single step from where she'd been when she heard James' thoughts take their turn, which further tipped Hank off to something being wrong, since she hadn't even made it to a seat or a doorway; she was just in the middle of the lab, stock still.

"Rachel, come along," Hank said gently as he took a hold of her arm to guide her off.

She let him guide her, though she was still looking toward James. I killed him, she projected, panic ringing in her telepathic voice. I killed him, Hank.

No, Rachel, you did no such thing.

He's reliving the fire, not Apocalypse, she said. I did that to him.

That can't be all he's reliving, Rachel.

No, but that's what he sees when he closes his eyes. She closed her own eyes, trying to center herself. If you could hear him...

Rachel, he did this to himself.

I shouldn't have come, she said, not even listening to him.

This was not your fault, Hank insisted. "He'd been through trauma well before the Phoenix went after him. You, Rachel, have been working to help him."

Rachel finally turned his way, with a dry look. "I lost control. It was absolutely my fault."

"Rachel, no," Hank said, shaking his head as he held her by both shoulders. When it was clear she wasn't budging on her stance, he shifted gears. "Come on, Rachel, I'm sure you'd be best with your husband."

Rachel nodded tightly. "Alright."

Hank sighed heavily, then looked over to Tyler, who was tripping over himself to try and help Logan, since Logan wasn't listening to him to let him handle things. "I would feel better if I walked with you. Shall we?" He didn't wait for an answer before he led her off, frowning all the way, since he knew that no matter what Rachel had heard, she'd be blaming herself.

"You should stay with James," Rachel said quietly. "I know the way."

"James has his father and Tyler," Hank said. "He's been restrained - he is taken care of for the time being."

"I'm fine, Hank."

"Yes, and I'm well-versed in how not fine that means. I'll walk with you all the same."

Rachel sighed but knew she couldn't stop him, so, she let Hank walk with her until they reached the suite where she and Bobby were staying with their girls. Eventually, they would be headed back to Chicago — she was supposed to be running things there in Kitty's absence — but she wasn't remotely ready to do that yet.

"I trust that you'll be able to excel in a level of comfort and care that is outside of my professional standards," Hank said to Bobby with an apologetic look.

Bobby looked between the two of them, not too surprised to see that Rachel was struggling but wondering what had happened now. Still, he nodded to Hank as he made his way over and put his arm around Rachel's shoulders. "I got it," he promised Hank, glad that their girls were downstairs playing with Grannie Annie in the kitchen so he could figure out what was going on with Rachel. You look like you've seen a ghost, babe, he projected to Rachel before Hank was even out of the room.

Rachel sighed, but it wasn't until Hank left that she leaned into Bobby and wrapped her arms around his middle, projecting to him everything that had happened until he was left reeling too - and unable to come up with anything to say until he'd processed how very, very downhill things had gone.

So, he pulled her into his arms and brought her back into their room, letting her curl up with him in quiet so she could at least get her thoughts off of what had happened. That was a start, anyway.

Sying's cape was trailing behind him as he took every step, the long fabric dragging through blood and carnage as he looked around the lawn.

He had done this. He had orchestrated this battle, and here was the result of his good work.

The X-Men were dead. Their bodies littered the ground, though in some places, there was nothing to identify but charred remains where Sying had stepped in and simply blown them to pieces. Others had their necks broken by his own hand.

He walked through the battlefield and took it all in. Cody was dead. Chance beside him. Sying's sisters were both bleeding slowly to death, their healing spent…

Sying stopped when he saw a flash of purple, and for the first time, he wasn't proud of the destruction around him. Instead, he rushed toward Krissy where she was bleeding, dying, but not yet dead.

Before he could get there, though, there was a great tug, and he nearly choked as a chain around his neck stopped him, yanked him back. He looked back with wide eyes to see Apocalypse holding the other end, laughing at him as he tried to break free, tried to get to Krissy-

"Sying!"

He jerked awake, still in a clear panic and barely able to draw a breath, the memory of the feeling of the chain around his neck making it hard to pull in the air that he needed to calm down.

Krissy was beside him, her tail wrapped around his wrist and her eyes wide as she watched him struggle. He could hear her whispering to him in a soothing tone and felt her brushing his hair back, but he couldn't quite hear what she was saying over the rush of blood in his ears and the pounding in his head.

And when she took his face in both of her hands to try to get him to focus on her, it had the opposite effect. All of a sudden, all he could remember was anger and rage flooding through him, and he let out a little noise of terror as he simply shoved her back away from him, hard, scrambling out of the bed and practically falling to the floor as he did so. She stared at him, wide-eyed, her tail going still as she was at a complete loss for what to do to help him to feel better.

He had meant to scramble further away but couldn't get that far, simply folding in on himself and struggling to breathe, unable to focus through the memory of all of the anger, all of the pain.

Krissy stared at him as he curled in on himself on the ground for a moment longer before she called for help, and to her relief, Hope was the one to get there, frowning when she saw Sying on the ground before she swept over and crouched down in front of him. She didn't touch him, not when she could glean from Krissy's mind what had happened when Krissy tried to hold him, but she did reach out into his mind.

Sying, you need to focus, she told him firmly. You're home, with Krissy. I need you to breathe.

By that time, Sying had curled into a protective ball, almost like he was defending himself from any blows, his hands over his head and his knees pulled up to his chest, and he simply didn't seem to be able to focus on what Hope was saying.

Hope let her shoulders drop as she saw some of what it was Sying was reliving — not just being War but the other times he had been imprisoned and enslaved. The Russians and Shi'ar were blending into his experience with Apocalypse, and it was clear that he simply couldn't find his way out from under the weight of all that misery.

With a sigh, Hope reached out to his mind and simply let him sleep, watching him carefully as unconsciousness evened out his breathing. Then, she looked up at Krissy, who was still clearly terrified on Sying's behalf and watching the whole thing with her lips parted and her eyes brimming with tears. "It should help him to sleep," Hope explained gently. "But right now, he's having a hard time with reliving what happened to him — and not just with Apocalypse."

Krissy's ears drooped as she nodded her understanding, gently making her way down to the floor to sit beside Sying and Hope. "What can I do?"

"Don't try to hold his head to make him focus, for one thing," Hope advised, knowing from Sying's memory of it that it had been the reason he'd pushed her away. "When the four of them were taken over, that was part of it — they couldn't look away from him."

Krissy nodded softly as she brushed Sying's hair away from his face. "He's hurting so much," she said quietly, sounding outright heartbroken. "He sounded so terrified when he was dreaming."

"I'm not really surprised," Hope admitted. "What those four went through was torture — mental, physical, emotional, all of it." She let out a sigh as she watched Sying's even breathing. "It's not something you bounce back from." She put a hand on Krissy's shoulder. "Even with amazing support and great news to look forward to," she added with a warm smile Krissy's way. "But I promise you, that part is helping."

Krissy nodded quietly, leaning over until she had more or less fallen onto Hope's shoulder. Eventually, Krissy let Hope go, but Hope wanted to wait until Sying woke up. If he woke up swinging, Hope didn't want Krissy to get hurt — but she wasn't telling Krissy that part.

Thankfully, though, Sying woke up quietly, curling into himself more than anything and looking positively miserable when he glanced over at Krissy and let out a little noise. "I'm so sorry…"

Krissy rushed forward to close the gap between them and to pull Sying into a hug. "It's okay," she promised, stroking his hair as he laid his head on her chest. "It's okay. You're allowed to be 'not okay' after everything that happened."

"I didn't mean to — I don't want to hurt you," he muttered quietly as she pulled him tighter and Hope quietly excused herself to give the two of them some privacy.

"It's alright," she promised. "Hope explained what the problem was, and I won't do it again. It's fine." She kissed his forehead and resisted the urge to cup his face to get him to look up at her. "I'm alright."

"You're pregnant," Sying said softly. "I shouldn't have shoved you."

"Yeah, don't do that," she said with a small smile. "Sying, you weren't thinking. It's alright. Come back to me and stop getting lost in it. We're going to work through this and get you some help, and it's going to be alright, I promise."

Sying held onto Krissy tighter, barely even picking up his head, before he breathed out, "I wanted to help him."

Krissy shook her head lightly as she smoothed back his hair and kept up with the little kisses. "No, Papa said you would think that, but that's just not true," she promised him. "He made you think you chose it so you would serve him as well as you could instead of fighting him every step."

"He said I needed to prove I was a better War than Deathbird," Sying said, still in that same bare whisper that Krissy almost had to strain to hear.

Krissy let out a breath and pressed a long and lingering kiss to the side of his head. "He knew what strings to pull, especially considering your past with the Shi'ar," she said softly. "That doesn't make it your choice. That's just what he dressed it up as: a Kree-Shi'ar competition."

"I should've fought him harder. I was a good little soldier for him, reporting on the others…"

"Do I need to sing Celine Dion again about the coulda woulda shoulda?" Krissy teased lightly. "Because I will."

"Krissy-"

"No, seriously." Krissy pulled back and ducked her head down to catch his gaze. "Did you go marching up to him to volunteer? Be honest. Because I'm pretty sure Charlie said James had to stab you just to get you there."

Sying shook his head lightly. "No-"

"Mama told me about your dad," Krissy continued, not breaking his gaze. "She said he was engineered to be the perfect weapon. And you've got a lot of that in you, too." She brushed back his hair gently. "So if you want to blame someone, blame the people who did that. Blame Apocalypse. But stop blaming yourself."

"I still did it, Krissy. All of it. I enjoyed tearing apart those weapons facilities and-"

Krissy pulled Sying into a long kiss that wasn't polite in the least as she snuck her hands up his shirt and kept right on going until she had hooked her knees around his hips and was on top of him, still kissing the sense right out of him. By the time she let him even really get his breath, he was smiling despite himself with his hands caught in her hair.

"You are the sweetest man in the universe," Krissy told him. "And that's why I married you. So stop listening to someone else's lies and spoil your pregnant wife."

Rachel and Bobby's kids had been asleep for a long while after having had their fill of Annie's spoiling, but Rachel was still awake — and therefore, so was Bobby. She hadn't really had the time to come out of the settling depression since James had tried to kill himself, and he was worried.

Especially considering the subject matter.

"So… penny for whatever thought's been floating around in there for about the past half an hour," he said when she was still quietly awake and lost.

Rachel was too tired to figure out what he was getting at, and besides, she had her mother's tendency to jump into other people's minds to get to the heart of any conversation. When she saw that, from his point of view, she was adrift from him, she sighed and let her shoulders drop before she moved back to lean against him. "I'm tired, Bobby."

"I think everyone is," he pointed out, though he rearranged himself so she'd be more comfortable. "But, ah, you're not sleeping. So that kind of doesn't work here."

Rachel blew out her breath and turned to face him. "What do you want me to say?" she pointed out. "I nearly burned him to death, destroyed his mind, and I'm supposed to be surprised that he doesn't want to live with that?"

"Hey, you remember that was the Phoenix, right?"

"Not all of it was," Rachel argued.

"Pretty sure you don't burn people alive, Rach. That's a Phoenix issue, and you know it."

"Bobby…"

"I'm not wrong. I mean, tell me I'm not wrong. I didn't marry a secret murderous rage monster, right?" he asked, trying to get a smile out of her.

"Judging by the teenager that just tried to kill himself because of what I did to him? Yes, it seems like you did, because he wasn't like that before."

Bobby shook his head. "You're still forgetting that the Phoenix did that. You have been trying to help everyone. All of the Horsemen, James included."

"You didn't … you can't possibly ... "

"Hey, I know you," Bobby said. "You've always had a tight lid. I mean, I've seen the Phoenix come out to play, but you usually rein it in. Can't get mad at yourself when the one time you lose control, it was because of Apocalypse. He's a whole other level of bad."

"It wasn't Apocalypse."

Bobby frowned. "O...kay. I think I'm missing something here."

Rachel nuzzled deeper into his neck. "I thought he was going to kill you," she explained.

"Oh," Bobby said softly. Then, when it really sank in: "Oh."

Rachel smirked when she could sense the surprise radiating off of him. "After all this time, is it really so hard to believe that I don't want to live in a world without you?"

Bobby was slowly transitioning to a more crooked smile. "Dramatic Summers."

"Not really," she said quietly. "He would have killed you. He absolutely would have."

Bobby sighed and pulled his arm tighter around her shoulders. "Gonna take more than Wolverine's kid to knock me out of the game, Rach."

"Good," she said and pulled her arms around his waist, content to drink in his presence for a long time.

Chloe felt so dumb.

She didn't want to draw attention away from the former horsemen and the ones who were recovering from the terrible things they've been through, because by comparison, her own guilt felt so… small.

But she had been carrying around this horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach for a while now, and couldn't seem to get rid of it. She just… couldn't believe she had forgotten that Sinister was working with Apocalypse! She had been with Sinister just days before Apocalypse started his rampage, and yet, somehow, she hadn't warned anyone.

Yes, her memories had been wiped, but she had still managed to retain some vague recollections. Why couldn't she have remembered something that important?

Every time she thought about Cody, the sick feeling only got worse, too. What if the reason the Marauders had been willing to kill Cody was that Sinister had moved on in interest from Cody to Chloe? She'd been gone for a long time, after all, and she didn't remember any of it. And she had a feeling that Sinister would have tried harder to protect Cody if she didn't think Chloe was a better target or something.

She couldn't sink this nagging sensation in the back of her mind that kept telling her it was her fault. That Cody was gone and she could have stopped it.

But who was she supposed to talk to about something like that? Charlie was despondent these days and barely functioning by keeping her powers turned off and keeping to herself. Chance was doing his best to rally in order to support Elin, but both Elin and Chance had clearly been devastated having been the ones to find Cody. She didn't think they were going to shake it. And Annie was focused on Scott — as she should have been.

There wasn't room for Chloe. So she wound up hiding in her room, absently putting together the one thousand-piece puzzles that Cody had once had hanging in his room. The mansion had been compromised, and they'd been living in temporary homes for so long that so much had changed and had to be renovated when they got back. She didn't like that Cody didn't have a spot anymore.

Besides, for some reason, the simple act of putting those puzzles together for Cody helped Chloe feel a little bit less like she owed him.

She had been separating edge pieces from the rest of the pieces in the box when she heard a bamf sound and looked up to see Kaleb making his way over. He and his family had been more somber than usual as well, even with Krissy's good news. They'd lost a bamf, after all. And so his tail wasn't moving with nearly the same energy it usually had.

"I thought I might find you here. You weren't helping to rebuild the gardens," he said.

"Pull up a chair," Chloe said, gesturing with one hand.

Kaleb nodded, working in silence next to her for a long time before he finally ventured, "So, what's got you tweaked?"

"Kaleb…"

"It's not just Cody or you wouldn't be isolating," Kaleb explained. When Chloe glanced up, he smiled lightly. "Hey, I know I want to be like Dad, but don't discount the Hawkeye in me, either. I know you, Chloe. You don't hide if what you're facing is a shared stress or grief. You hide when you think you can keep it to yourself to save others the same pain."

"You make me sound like some poetic hero," Chloe teased.

"You are," Kaleb said, bumping shoulders with Chloe with an easy smile. When she didn't return it, though, he dipped his head to catch her gaze. "Seriously, what's up?"

"I'm fine, Kaleb."

"You're not."

"I'm fine."

Kaleb threw up both hands in a defensive gesture. "Woah, first of all, I'm not here for an interrogation. I'm here because you can't possibly be fine. No one is fine. But your 'not fine' is different, and I'm trying to help, because my 'not fine' gets easier to deal with when I help. Make sense?"

Chloe frowned at him for a long time before she sighed out a breath and shook her head. "It's dumb anyway."

"Try me."

Chloe nearly bit back with a caustic remark, but when she looked up at Kaleb, he looked so open that she couldn't help but sigh, shake her head, and lean back and away from the puzzle. "I should have known it was coming, Kaleb. I spent two weeks with Sinister, and I didn't even have an inkling of what I should warn people about."

Chloe fully expected Kaleb to tell her that she was overreacting, that she couldn't have known what Sinister had taken from her, that it wasn't her fault, or any of the other things that she had been trying to tell herself over and over again.

Instead, Kaleb darted forward and wrapped Chloe in the warmest, tightest hug she had ever gotten from him. He didn't say anything; he just hugged her until she went from simply hugging him back to leaning into him to stay upright.

And honestly, that was exactly what she'd needed.