Like clockwork I see the checkmate arise. At least now I noticed it happening. It's been two hours and we've only played two games that actually had any merit. Both were lost stubbornly and this one is two moves away from the same fate. We haven't even reached the endgame portion. It should be mentioned that I only know that because Charles has muttered about it under his breath a few times in disappointment.
"Do you know what went wrong?" Charles asks. He's admittedly a very good teacher. This is just a new way of thinking for me and will take some time.
"I can think of a few things off the top of my head. Broken swing set as a kid is the big one. That one actually started it all really," I muse and Charles gives me a flat look. "Yeah. I never considered any sort of offense and kept looking for defensive positions instead of taking any of your material."
"Precisely," he agrees. "You've got to do both at the same time. In the words of the romans, 'Offense is the best defense.' Obviously don't go overboard but I have a feeling you don't need me to tell you that. Shall we go again?"
I nod and we set the board back up. This was much more entertaining than I thought it would be. Perhaps it's just Charles. He's great company and I can tell why Erik is so secretly fond of the man.
"Tell me something about your world," Charles states as we start developing, this time I move first.
"What would you like to know?"
"How did you all come together?"
"Well, I suppose it started with my sort of boss at the time, Nick Fury," I muse, staring at the board like I'm hallucinating his queen hanging in such a precarious position. It's got to be a trap. "He wanted to put together a team of enhanced. Sort of a last resort for when things really got out of hand. The idea was scrapped fairly quickly, he had to fight for it. Most of the recruits weren't team players," I add, deciding to go for it. I'm not a fan of bishops anyways. For pieces that look so cool, they're surprisingly useless.
"Depending on who you ask though, most still aren't but I think they traded roles," I add when he plays his next piece and my bishop and king are still safe. Maybe I made a good move right then. That's cool I guess. "Thanos sent Loki here to capture and return the tesseract. In return he promised Loki the Earth. There's a whole lot more going on there that I wish I could investigate but ideally, Loki ended up on Earth with an army. Fury needed help and called in the available recruits: Tony, Steve, Bruce, Natasha, and myself. Barton was one of Loki's hostages and Thor showed up a couple hours later."
"And you fought the aliens together," he asks with a small smile, studying the board after we had made a few more moves.
"And we won after Tony threw a nuke through a wormhole right above the city. He almost didn't survive the trip too."
"That was that then? Until catastrophe?" Charles guesses and I chew on my lip when he captures my last rook. I was hoping to use it for a check in the next turn. Unlike bishops, I actually like my rooks.
"Not quite. Tony and Steve didn't really get along very well. No one trusts Natasha except for me and Clint. Clint was a bad guy for the events leading up to New York until that final battle. Tony and Bruce get along sure but Bruce is too afraid of his own shadow to keep close to anyone."
"They had to have liked you though? I mean you went to Tony in your time of need and although you parted on bad terms you and Steve were attached," Charles asks.
"Yeah, I helped bridge the gap between those two. Started dating Steve almost immediately after New York. Then when Shield fell, I got everyone pulled together. That was the most functional we had ever been. Steve took point on missions, Tony handled tech. But then we destroyed an entire city fighting some robots and that was the beginning of the end," I tell him my voice growing soft. A second later I make a bad trade and cringe. Even after this lesson I'm almost positive that I still won't be able to beat Erik without some form of cheating.
"Sometimes we can only enjoy what little time we have before it ends," Charles states just as softly.
"He misses you, you know."
"He created this distance," Charles murmurs with chagrin. I frown at the board but don't try to argue. The distance was created and maintained by both of them. Neither of them have actually listened to the other, both are on the same team and both have adopted fiercely useless methods of fighting. Together they might get something accomplished, even if it isn't the ideal world either of them see. But that isn't an argument for Charles and I. Someday when I get him and Erik ina room together again.
Eight minutes later I lost again. We called it a night even though he tried to tempt me into one more game. One more game wouldn't make a difference to my winning streak. Instead I made my way back to my room and I thought about Erik as I got ready for bed. I'd leave in the morning. It's only been four nights but I miss him too much. I think this is the start of codependency. That's probably not a good thing.
XxX
My fan club found me in the morning as I nursed some ginger tea after I was left feeling nauseous all morning. Maybe it wasn't bad eggs and instead the stomach bug that the kids are passing around. Sickness is weird with me. Usually I'm not alive long enough to contract anything. The few times I have been, I got annoyed and just took care of the issue myself. Steve always gave me a lecture but I think he was just jealous he couldn't copy me before he took the serum. I would do the same now but Erik will know and I'll have to hear it. Unlike Steve, Erik will actually find a way to make me listen. He's good at that. Usually relies on guilt tactics but I don't really mind.
The kids crowding me in the kitchen weren't anticipated. I know Clint and a good portion of these kids recognize me, but that's not exactly a reason to cozy up. Originally I assumed they were shocked I was lounging on the kitchen counter waiting for Hank or Charles to come in and yell at me. No, the kids heard about my work with Clint's name and wanted the same treatment. Explaining that I didn't know most of them did not help.
"Come on, just give me anything. You can't let Clint be the only one with a cool name. That's just unfair," a kid named Barnell rants. I hide my amusement with my mug and take a sip of the warm drink. The fact that he thinks Hawkeye is a cool name proves that he has poor taste. Hawkeye sucks, but I'm pretty sure Coulson came up with it so that might be why I'm not allowed to mock him for it.
"Please? I just want some more options," another girl pleads. "Ghost just sounds too obvious," she adds with a frown.
"Alright, what's your shtick?" I ask with a sigh. Not wanting to be called Ghost is something I can definitely get behind. Elysium was a fight.
"I can astral project," she says brightly. Hopefully she isn't looking for approval because this is the wrong place. As someone who comes by a bunch of different abilities, I know it is solely about how a gift is being used, not what the gift is.
"She turns into a ghost," Barnell points out. I narrow my eyes.
"Alright and what can you do?" I ask him flatly. He grows a beak and talons very proudly and I nod and purse my lips allowing myself to show that I'm impressed. "Beak," I tell him with a wink. If he likes obvious things so much then there you go.
"Hope, show her yours," he says with a frown but he doesn't contest my verdict. Honestly I like Beak as a call sign. Better than Natasha's. Black Widow doesn't roll off the tongue that well and giving your call sign a nickname kind of defeats the point.
Hope astral projects and I see a faint trace of a leash-like lifeline tying her ghost form back to her body. She could definitely benefit from a chat with Strange. He could offer her some guidance, insight into how to make the most of this ability. Her physical body though is left behind, not quite hunched over but almost like a marionette waiting for her puppeteer to return. No good in a fight, there's got to be a way to leave her with some sort of defense. She fell into a trance.
"Trance," I test out. I like it, hopefully she will too.
"That's perfect," Clint pitches in with an enthusiastic nod. He's easy to please though.
"What about me?" Another guy asks softly. He's keeping his distance from the others, protecting his left side. For a big guy, he's really trying his best to make himself small. I remember him from one of the first labs, he had helped with some of the younger kids. He stood out because he had to have been in unimaginable pain and he still helped the others. They had pretty recently done some work on him when Erik and I got there. In the weeks prior, they had taken his arm. When we got there he was recovering from surgery where they had taken a sample of his brain tissue. At least they patched him up. Now his dark hair hides some of those scars. Unfortunately, it seems like not all of his scars are physical. He reminds me of Bucky.
"What's your name?"
"James, ma'am, my friends call me Jimmy."
"James….?"
"Barnes. James Barnes. I Uh, I have super strength, among other things," he says shyly.
"Well Jimmy, you're going to do great things. If Magneto ever comes through here, don't tell him your full name. In my world, the path you traveled was very rough. He's a hero, no matter how the media paints him because he makes the decision to be every day. But as for a name, I don't want you to have either of his. The bad guys gave him his first one and I don't have the right to give you his second one," I tell him.
"And me?" A Russian drawl springs first. The source is a blonde, leaning against the door to the kitchen, feigning disinterest the same way that Natasha would. Dressed in all black, hands stuffed in her pockets she reminds me too much of Nat.
"That depends on who you are?"
"You didn't rescue me," she points out with a smirk. "I rescued myself."
"Where?"
"Did my accent give it away?" She asks sarcastically and I just raise a brow. "A place they called the Red Room."
"How many more of you were there, and did they also get out?" I ask immediately, snapping into business. Natasha didn't say much, most of it was in the stuff unsaid. The red room is horrific.
"I blew up the man in charge so I'm sure they've all scattered across the Earth into hiding. Does this mean you know me?"
"Is your name Natasha?" I ask flatly. I know it's not because Nat despised blonde hair. It was always a last resort for her and I'm sure that would transcend the multiverse.
"Yelena Belova," she challenges.
"Nonetheless, you should still go on as Black Widow. No better way to say fuck you to those assholes," I tell her. She eventually nods. I'll have to go digging though. If there's a Red Room here, I'm tearing it apart. "Drop Black though. Too much of a mouthful."
"What about you?" The newly ordained Beak asks.
"What about me?" I ask.
"How did you get your name?"
"Elysium is the ancient Greeks heaven. Only heroes and the people to truly do good moved on to it after their death. Everyone else would go to the fields of asphodel or the fields of punishment. We chose Elysium as a promise, that even though heroes may fall, better will come," I explain softly.
"But you're a siren," Trance points out with a frown.
"And I got my voice from drowning in the Potomac. I traveled across the river Styx, received judgement from the Fury's, and dipped my fingers in the Lethe. Then I return to my unwelcoming body with the magic of Elysium turning the saltwater to my favor."
Clint raises his hand with a serious expression. I raise an eyebrow in acknowledgement. Did he really just raise his hand? What kind of Charles Xavier teacher recruitment propaganda is this? Does Barton need permission to speak in this world? Maybe I should bring him back to talk to my Clint.
"Can I be you when I grow up?" He asks and I roll my eyes. That's a line my own Barton would say.
"No. Death is inevitable and permanent and if I catch any of you trying to prove otherwise, you will not like the consequences."
"Ah-hem," Charles announces himself. I look to the other side of the kitchen to see him looking very worried in his wheelchair.
"Hi professor," the kids all chorus. Charles just raises an eyebrow and looks to me for an explanation. I don't know what he's expecting from me though. I don't organize these things. Hopefully they're skipping class right now though. That's the type of people I want in my fan club.
"Why are you sitting on the counter Miss Quill, I'll point out the perfectly good chairs behind you," he drawls.
"Because I was expecting Hank to come and yell at me first and I wanted to be taller than him," I retort in the same tone. My fan club disperses and I let out a quiet laugh. Charles really is a principal. What a nerd.
"Miss Belova, I believe you have class now?" He says pointing out the blonde lingering just out of sight. Yeah, I'm going to have to look into that one with extreme prejudice.
"You're such a principal," I complain but I don't mean it and when he meets my eyes and fails to hide his smile I know he knows.
"And you're a horrible influence," he teases right back, playing astounded.
"Oh the kids love me, you're just jealous they don't come to you for nicknames."
"Are you using a mug for tea?" He asks with a glare. I smile widely.
"Yep."
"Raven told you."
"Yep."
"American."
"And guess what!"
"What," he mutters with a sigh, his eyebrows even flatter as he glared at me.
"I left the teabag in."
"I expect to be respected in my own house," he states.
"Mhhmmm, and how's that going for you principal Xavier?" I ask smugly, taking a long sip of my tea. Maybe I'm enjoying this too much. "By the way, are we ever going to talk about your missing pet werewolf?" I ask, seriously trying to change the subject.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You know, your missing pet werewolf. I didn't get an accurate description of what he does either besides those gross claw things and a mean right hook but I figured he was a werewolf."
"Logan?"
"Well I certainly wasn't talking about Hank."
"Do you antagonize everyone like this or am I just lucky?" Charles asks, his patience disappearing.
"Little bit of both I think."
"Well I can see why Erik likes you," he replies, shaking his head. "You're both annoying pricks when you want to be."
"Thank you, very, very much. That's very touching, and I have been trying all week to get you to swear in front of a student," I tell him sincerely, my eyes flick behind him and he whips around, eyes wide in horror as he looks for the student that isn't there. I laugh and he narrows his eyes, ignoring the fact that 'prick' isn't quite an actual swear either.
"Okay but seriously, with a background like Dreykov or anyone similar, that kid is going to be brilliant at lurking in doorways and not scared off by detention for missing class. I'm going to start digging and make sure that place is really gone. As for Logan, I've got no clues as to where he could be. Erik wasn't paying much attention when he tossed him. Also if someone else picked him up, they're not logging it anywhere I can find. I think he just doesn't want to be found."
"Well, where would you go if you didn't want to be found?" Charles asks.
"Alright, I'm gonna stop you right there," I state, setting my tea on the counter next to me and swinging my legs over so they hang. "The difference between Logan disappearing and me disappearing is incomparable. If Logan wants to disappear I will put down money that he just ran off to play cave man in the woods somewhere and went completely off grid. Meanwhile, I've been here for three and a half months and I've already got three different lives lined up in case Erik decides to take over the world and I need to go into hiding."
"And what are the odds of Erik sending you into hiding?" He muses.
"I would say about 20/70," I reply with a shrug. "I mean, the last guy I liked even a fraction this much got me on the world's most wanted list, exiled from my friends, and dead—several times."
"From what I've learned about your ex fiancé, Erik is nothing like him. At least, not where you're worried. Steve seemed the type to put the world first, a true hero of the world. Erik may be a good man, but he is not a hero. He'd trade the world to keep his loved ones safe, his own kind safe. I will admit, they do seem very similar in other aspects."
"Okay, like what?" I ask flatly, wondering what he's managed to learn about Steve from my head. Frankly I'm impressed he learned my fiancé is Steve aka Captain America. I've never mentioned his name in connection to being my fiancé to my knowledge.
"They both pick fights they have zero odds in winning but they still manage to come out on top," he suggests with a shrug.
"They could do it all day," I murmur with the hints of a smile.
"How would you hide from me?" He asks a few seconds later.
"Easy, I'd get Hank involved and just stay here right under your nose."
"That wouldn't work," he decrees firmly. I sense the doubt in his voice though. He's right, but I'm not going to tell him that. "Get off my counter, go make yourself useful, aren't you supposed to be hunting down your mother? I've got classes to teach so I can't babysit you. I'll have to hand you off to Hank," he announces and I do get down, but I stick my tongue out at him in protest.
He goes off to teach and I head in the opposite direction towards an office space that Hank got set up for me while I'm here. Charles has too much money. He and Stark would know each other if they existed in the same universe. I can't tell if they'd be friends or not. Tony certainly wouldn't like the whole mind reading thing, especially not after Wanda played mind games with him. If Charles thinks I get on his nerves, I might not actually want to see what Tony could do to him. I shake the thought off and get to work.