Victor paced the length of the main floor of the guest house, from the kitchen to the living room past the bathroom and back. He hated waiting, especially when he was waiting for something he didn't want to do, like facing Charles Xavier again, knowing at least some of what the man was capable of (and being wary of the rest). He hated not being in control of a situation.
If he didn't stop, he was going to wear a hole in the rug. He flopped down on the oversized couch and stared at the empty stone fireplace, trying to ignore the rest of the open space around him so he wouldn't feel like the walls were closing in like some nightmare funhouse.
When he wasn't agitated as hell, he actually liked his temporary home. He'd been surprised to find the place was fully furnished, and that the furniture under the dust covers was actually built for someone a bit bigger than him. Cain Marko, aka Juggernaut, Xavier's stepbrother, had been the last inhabitant; everything left behind had been made for his oversized frame, down to the iron clawfoot tub in the bathroom that looked more like a jacuzzi. But he wasn't going to complain about a tub he could actually sink down into enough that the water covered his shoulders.
It meant Victor hadn't needed to worry about replacing anything, which had been a concern when he wasn't sure how to pay for any of it or who he could ask for help.
Rae had strung fairy lights around the exposed rafters of the first floor and up the banister to the second floor for softer lighting at night. There were more than enough windows to let light in during the day, including a big bay window by the cute little breakfast nook in the kitchen.
The upstairs was mostly one big room which was necessary to accommodate the Alaska King sized bed. A nightstand, a dresser, a chest of drawers, and a couple armchairs took up the rest of the limited space.
He got back up with a growl. What he needed was a run in the cold where he didn't feel like the walls were judging him.
Victor found Rae waiting for him inside the main back door of the mansion, staring at her phone and smelling of agitation and annoyance.
"What's up?" he asked, wary.
"Logan just texted me to meet him in the greenhouse. I tried to tell him you have a session with Xavier and he said to ignore that and come to the greenhouse anyway." She shook her head. "And then he refused to say anything else because he's a gigantic dick."
Victor shrugged. "I ain't gonna complain about not seeing Chuck for the first time in three weeks. I don't want my head to explode 'cause he's in a snit."
She sighed and nodded. "Alright, up to you." She turned and led him down the back hallway, one Victor thought had probably been for servants when the mansion had functioned as a home instead of a school. Now it had a carpet runner in dark blue and pale grey curtains on the three small windows, none of the opulence of the rest of the mansion.
"By the way, I have a training session with Remy after. He's been wanting to teach me quarterstaff for a while and I finally gave in."
"Gonna get bruised to hell."
Rae rolled her eyes. "Like I'm not already covered in them, Mr. Grabby Hands."
Victor huffed. "Haven't heard you complainin'."
She didn't answer in kind aside from a small laugh, having come to the door into the greenhouse.
The air inside was temperate bordering on warm in wild contrast to the below freezing temperatures outside. Victor had expected a basic hothouse for storing plants during the winter but what he found was more like someone had relocated a small grove, complete with grass and wildflowers that weren't native to New York State or even the rest of New England.
"One of our residents has control over plantlife," Rae said off his bemused expression. "Millie designed the entire thing and maintains it. We have another, more traditional greenhouse but everyone likes this one better."
Victor nodded and followed her further in, into a small clearing scattered with boulders and some smaller rocks.
Betsy Braddock was sitting cross-legged on one large, flat rock, dressed in workout clothing, purple hair pulled back into a high ponytail.
Logan leaned against a bigger boulder, arms crossed and anger on his face. His scent made Victor's hackles rise.
"Sorry for the abrupt notice," Betsy said, nodding in greeting. "It wasn't our intent to startle you or be mysterious."
"What's goin' on, then?" Victor asked, doing his best to contain the growl in his voice.
Betsy cleared her throat. "Apologies are in order. It's become apparent that further exposure to Charles' 'psychological' methods is only causing more damage and, as such, it was decided that a change in practitioner is necessary if the treatment is to continue."
Victor frowned and crossed his arms, feeling annoyed. "'Decided' by who?"
Logan grunted. "Me an' her, and a little from Hank. Let the lady explain."
Victor glanced at Rae, who gave him an encouraging nod as she flopped down onto the ground, pulling her shoes off so she could bury her feet in the grass. He sighed, nodded, and dropped down next to her; if she thought they should listen, he'd hear them out.
Betsy cleared her throat. She appeared calm and collected but Victor could smell apprehension and a bit of anger.
"Logan sought my advice the other day, in an effort to gain insight into how telepathy can and should be utilized to treat trauma and the fractured memories caused by said trauma. I don't have the expertise or education of Charles or even Emma, but I do have experience with this sort of thing."
She shifted on her rock, the movement slightly nervous. "We discussed the sessions Logan had with Charles and how they frequently led nowhere, supposedly due to memory blocks placed by God-knows-who. It became increasingly clear in our sessions that this may not be entirely true."
Rae made a little angry noise. "Meaning what, Xavier wasn't actually trying to help Logan or Victor?"
Betsy nodded. "That is precisely my fear. But as I have a sample size of only a single twitchy feral, I cannot say for sure."
She fixed her gaze on Victor, as if taking his measure. It made him want to growl but he just stared back.
"If you are willing, I can assist you in navigating your memories. I will not force the issue, nor will anyone else, but I find myself curious as to what exactly Xavier hoped to accomplish through his methods."
Victor huffed. "You gonna be insulted if I say I ain't completely comfortable with that?"
Betsy dipped her head in acknowledgement. "And that's why it's merely a suggestion, not an order or command. In your place I wouldn't exactly be eager to trust a telepath, either."
He glanced aside at Rae, then looked at Logan. "I'm guessin' you're in favor."
Logan grunted. "No shit. I trust Bets to have my back in a fight, an' I trust her if I gotta have someone pokin' around in my head." He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, restless. "Ain't just my memories, though. Always got the feelin' Chuck was holdin' back, or lyin' about somethin'. His little shitfit a few weeks ago makes me powerful curious."
He smelled like anger, laced through with betrayal. It was obvious the shorter feral had trusted his mentor, believed Xavier wanted what was best for him, and finding out that may not be true had to sting like a bitch.
Victor just breathed for a few moments.
Rae reached for him, fingers wrapping around his wrist. He smiled crookedly at her, then looked back at Betsy.
"Alright. I want Rae with me when we do this."
Betsy nodded. "I expected you would, and I have no objections. If you feel safer with her presence that can only be a benefit." She clasped her hands together and breathed out. "I will need time to prepare, and will not be around much for the next couple weeks. We can begin on the New Year, if that works for you?"
Victor nodded. "I'm good with that." He got to his feet, waiting for Rae to put her shoes back on before he offered her a hand up. "Got a weird question, though. When I came here, and y'all locked me up, did I have anything on me?"
She cocked her head. "What, like a phone?" She shrugged. "I wasn't here at the time. I think the only one who was is Henry."
"Any idea where I could find 'im?"
Her eyes unfocused for a moment. "In his workshop in one of the sub-basements."
"Am I allowed to go there on my own?"
"You are now." Rae pulled out her phone and tapped the screen a few times. "Won't give you access to anything you don't need. Your phone will let you pass."
Well, then. "Guess I'll see you in a few weeks, then," he said to Betsy. "An' thanks."
She nodded again as they left.
Rae waited until they were back in the hallway to speak. "Wonder if they've told Charles yet."
Victor snorted. "We're all still standin', so maybe not." He shook his head. "Wasn't expectin' that. Skin still crawls thinkin' of someone in my head but I need to make sure the old me ain't lurkin'."
She slipped her hand into his, lacing their fingers together. "He isn't, but I know you need peace of mind. We'll get you through this and move on from there." She glanced at her watch and breathed out. "You want me to come with you to visit Henry? I've got time."
He thought about it for a moment and then shook his head. "Nah, gotta do some things on my own."
"Fine by me." Rae squeezed his hand and let go. "Got something I wanna check on before I let Remy pummel me. You want company for dinner?"
Victor grinned. "An' other things."
Victor felt his heart racing as he exited the elevator and wasn't sure why until he turned a corner and found himself facing the detention cells.
He stopped a few feet away, one hand on the opposite wall to steady himself. How long had he been locked up, a couple months? It had felt longer than that, interminable and suffocating when he didn't know if he'd ever see daylight again instead of harsh, artificial illumination.
His vision dimmed and he leaned his entire body against the wall, hands clenching into fists. He wasn't in that cell anymore but it still felt like the walls were closing in, the ceiling lowering and the floor rising up to meet it. He could feel the manacles around his wrists, his ankles, his neck, cutting into his skin whenever he had the urge to break free even though he knew he wasn't strong enough.
Pain in the palms of his hands brought his awareness back to the present. His breathing was harsh and shallow and he consciously retracted his claws where they'd embedded themselves in his skin, forcing himself to count his breaths like he'd helped Rae do more than once.
"Fuck, maybe I shoulda brought her with me," Victor muttered, head tilted back so it didn't feel like his throat was so constricted.
He opened his eyes and looked at the cell again. Ain't in there anymore, he told himself. Got a chance to never end up in another one ever again an' I ain't gonna waste it.
It took a few minutes to get his breathing back under control and move on.
Victor found Hank with his entire upper half shoved inside some immense machine, the blue mutant's mutters echoing off the metal.
"You got a second, Doc, or should I come back later?"
Hank didn't startle but he also didn't emerge. "I can spare a moment if you don't mind me continuing my work."
"Fine by me. I just wanted to ask if I had anything on me when I showed up on your front step."
Somehow, that startled the other man. He cursed and wriggled his way back out, blue fur sticking up in tufts and covered in grease.
"I recall some things we put in a storage locker, though not what the contents were. Why do you ask?"
Victor shrugged. "Just occurred to me, to be honest. Ain't much different from bein' let outta jail, gettin' my personal effects back."
Hank cocked his head, smelling amused. "You aren't wrong." He reached for a rag on a nearby work table, using it to clean grease off his hands. "It's just down the hallway."
Victor followed him out of the workshop, down said hallway (past that fucking cell) into a room that was nearly identical save for the rows of lockers and boxes stacked on shelves in a somewhat orderly manner.
The other man headed for one locker in particular, entering a code into the keypad that held it closed before stepping aside. "Close the locker door, please, when you're finished," he said, gesturing at it. "I'll leave you to it."
Victor waited a moment, wanting to be alone. For the first time he had access to his old life, or at least pieces of it, and rifling through it with company made him feel vulnerable, even more so after his reaction to the cell.
He wasn't sure what he'd expected. Inside the locker was a cellphone in a black, heavy duty case, a brown leather wallet, and a handful of what turned out to be bone beads. As soon as he touched them he remembered binding them into his hair; he'd carved designs into them with his claws, abstract waves and animals and even flowers on one of them. They warmed up quickly in his hand.
Amber beads and the incisor teeth of a predator animal (wolf, his memory told him) were strung on a necklace of some kind of braided fiber.
Feeling even more unsettled, he shoved the jewelry in his pocket and took the phone and wallet, closing the door to the locker.
Like a child afraid to be caught with contraband, he fled the storage room and headed for the guest house where he could dig into his past in peace.
The wallet told him next to nothing, containing several credit cards and a Canadian driver's license issued in Alberta. He snorted at the birthdate that said he was 36; he wasn't entirely sure how old he was, but he knew he was probably several times that.
Someone had powered his phone off leaving it with 75% battery life. His fingerprint unlocked it and he sat there for a moment, unsure where to look first.
The glut of voicemails that popped up he immediately ignored, same with the text messages. Instead he swiped through the apps, noting email and navigation, and one he immediately recognized as being tied to a bank.
His thumbprint got him access to that, too. He thought maybe he was having a stroke for a second, or experiencing an hallucination, as he took in the numbers on the glowing screen. It was enough for several lavish lifetimes, bordering on obscene.
He set the phone on the coffee table and walked away from it, though only as far as the kitchen. He'd hoped having his stuff back might help, if only to make the empty places in him a little more whole, but all this did was make the jagged edges even more prominent.
He stood there long enough that his newer phone buzzing in his pocket startled him back into the present.
A chat bubble from Rae blinked on his screen.
Next time I say I'm going to let Remy teach me something, call me a dumbass. Please.
Victor laughed. I mean, I told you you'd get bruised to hell.
Rude.
He watched the little bouncing ellipses indicating she was still typing.
Anyway, you still up for company?
Victor hesitated a moment before replying, Yeah.
Alright, let me get a shower and I'll be over. Oh, no pressure, I have a Christmas present for you but I don't expect anything in return. Just wanted to give you a heads up so you have a couple weeks.
He stared at the phone. Yeah, okay. See you in a few.
"The fuck am I gonna find in two weeks?" he muttered, staring off into the cabin.
Victor paced in the kitchen. The only light came from the fire still going in the stone hearth, dying down for the night.
He'd told Rae to go to sleep without him because his mind wouldn't shut up, thoughts careening around inside his head to the point he couldn't settle and didn't want to keep her up. Didn't want to explain what he was afraid of, what he'd learned about himself, that he'd done worse things than she knew about and he'd gotten paid for it.
That revelation still made his skin itch. He'd apparently lived like a hedonist, too, if the multiple properties on multiple continents he'd found were any indication (four in the States alone), not to mention the various apps for airlines and car services and luxury hotels on the phone.
He'd stashed it on top of the kitchen cabinets where no one under 7 feet would find it.
Well, except the cat who'd taken up residence before Victor did. He'd been right about the scent he'd picked up of an unfixed tom; the animal had gotten in through a broken window in the attic and made itself at home.
They'd repaired the window but Victor hadn't wanted to kick it out, especially since the big Maine Coon wasn't feral and wasn't harming anything. So the window was left cracked and Victor had a roommate.
The cat trilled at him from its perch on top of the kitchen cabinets.
"What?" Victor asked, like the cat was going to answer him in English.
Another quiet trill and the cat flopped onto its side, looking at him upside down.
Victor chuffed at it and reached up, scratching the cat's neck. A rumbling purr nearly made the dishes in the cabinet rattle, it was so intense.
It wasn't just the very literal blood money that was eating at him. He'd hoped that being away from Xavier's tender mercies meant he'd stop having nightmares, but he'd been wrong.
And he hadn't expected that panic attack down in the sub-basement. He still wasn't sure what else the more recent memories had dragged up with them, pain and suffering at the very least but from when or where… If he chased them, they fled.
Which was why he'd accepted Betsy's offer. What if the shit he was starting to remember was what had driven him to kill in the first place? Because no matter what Rae said, no matter what she believed about him and his nature, she hadn't been in his head. She hadn't seen the things that woke him up in a cold sweat, tasting phantom blood in his mouth.
The cat trilled again, this time in greeting to Rae.
"What're you brooding down here for?" she asked. Even in the dark he could see she'd stolen one of his t-shirts to sleep in since she hadn't brought her own clothes, not intending to stay overnight. It hung off one freckled shoulder, the bottom hem hitting her at mid-thigh.
"Ain't broodin'," he replied, and even in his own ears his voice sounded petulant.
She raised an eyebrow but moved forward when he held a hand out to her. "Okay, fine, not brooding. What are you doing?"
Victor sighed and shrugged. "Fucked if I know."
Rae wrapped her arms around him, head resting against his chest. "This isn't gonna work if you shut me out, Vic. I'm not a telepath."
He stiffened, arms dropping back to his sides. He just breathed for a few moments into the silence, then stared down at her when she lifted her head to look at him.
"I didn't mean to-" She began pulling away. Only then did he touch her, pulling her back into his arms.
"I don't know how the fuck to do this," he confessed. It felt like the words were dragged out of him, up from his gut, painful like broken glass.
Rae's fingers clenched against his back. "Just… talk to me. Tell me what's going on in your head. Tell me how things went when you talked to Hank?"
Which was exactly what he didn't want to talk about. The urge to close himself off and deal with it himself was almost stronger than him.
He shifted to lean against the kitchen counter, keeping her in his arms.
"Went past the cell I was kept in," he said finally. "Think I had a panic attack or somethin', or a flashback. Or both, I dunno."
"About being locked up?" she asked.
"Yeah. Bein' locked in the dark, shackled so I couldn't move…"
Rae pulled back to look at him again in confusion, her scent full of concern. "We never had you shackled, Victor, not even when we moved you between the cell and the Danger Room."
He blinked at her. "Then I dunno what the fuck that was. An older memory, maybe." He shuddered. "Felt like I couldn't breathe."
Her hand touched the back of his neck, drawing him down so his forehead touched hers. "I'm sorry that happened. I wish I'd been there."
He laughed softly. "Yeah, me too. But I got through it." He closed his eyes and breathed her scent in; more often than not these days she smelled like him and it soothed a part of him, that she was marked as his in more ways than one. "Ain't lookin' forward to workin' with Betsy, knowin' what it could drag up."
Rae's fingers dug into his hair, grounding him. "That I'll be there for." She pulled him down a little further, pressing her mouth to his. "You wanna come to bed now?"
Victor resisted the urge to look up where his old phone was, an idea having worked its way through his mind. "Gimme a little bit and I'll be up."
"I mean, you're kinda 'up' now," she said, smirking.
He laughed, and it felt genuine. "Jesus Christ, frail. I'll be there in a few minutes. Promise."
She let her fingers drag down his chest. "Don't be surprised if I get started without you," she warned.
Victor bared his teeth at her.
When she was gone, he pulled the phone down and powered it up. He'd thought of one thing he could use the money for, and it might even get here before Christmas.