Chapter Four
Kitty's head felt like elephants had been playing football with it. She groaned and sat up slowly, holding her head and hoping her brains wouldn't fall out if she sat up.
"Mornin', chere."
Remy's thick Cajun accent was instantly recognisable. Kitty turned to look at him and winced at the jabbing pain in her skull.
"Morning, Remy. Where the hell are we?" she asked.
Remy shrugged. "No idea, chere. But we got dese damn cuffs on again, so I'm bettin' it's somet'ing to do with Damien and dat Augmentator t'ing again."
"Wonderful," Kitty groaned. Suddenly, she remembered what she'd been doing when she was captured — more specifically, who she'd been with. "Remy, have you seen Kurt? He was with me when I was captured."
"Non, chere. Y' de only one I've seen. Rogue's missing too. We were toget'er when we were attacked, not dat long after you two."
Kitty looked around their cell. It was almost identical to the cell she'd been in when Damien had captured them all before: white walls, bare white floor, two beds, a door leading to a bathroom. She was on one of the beds, Remy was sitting cross-legged on the other, playing with a deck of cards.
The door hissed open and Damien walked in. He smiled at the two prisoners and asked, "anything I can get to make your stay here more comfortable?"
"You can let us go," Kitty said.
Damien laughed. "Except that, Miss Pryde. Surely you realise that I can't just let you go. Not until I have what I want, anyway."
"Where are our friends?" Remy asked.
Damien replied, "elsewhere. They're both fine. And if you want them to stay fine you will both cooperate with me, one hundred percent. Is that understood?"
"Can we see them?" Kitty asked hopefully.
Damien appeared to consider it. "Perhaps, if you all behave. I don't need you just yet, but I don't want any trouble or there will be consequences that aren't entirely pleasant. I may arrange for your friends to be brought here, or you to their room, if I'm feeling generous later on."
Kitty could sense that Remy was about to make some smart-ass remark, the way he always did when he was in shit with Scott or one of the other teachers. She kicked his ankle and smiled sweetly. "We'll be good. Just don't hurt Rogue or Kurt."
"I'm glad you see it my way," Damien said. "This doesn't have to be unpleasant. My people weren't exactly subtle in their carrying out of my plans, but I didn't expect subtlety. I expected results and I got them. However, I assure you that if you all behave none of you will be hurt."
He stood up and left the room, locking the door electronically behind him. As soon as the door was closed Kitty burst out, "be good my ass. This jerk deserves all that's coming to him when the others find us. And until then, we'll just have to make him regret he tried anything with us."
"Y' forgetting about Rogue and Kurt," Remy reminded her.
Kitty shook her head. "For all the threats he makes, I don't think he'd really hurt any of us. We're too important to his plans, whatever they are, or he wouldn't have bothered giving us relatively nice cells — together — or coming and telling us that Kurt and Rogue are okay. If he really didn't care, then he'd make us worry about them."
"Y' got de mind of a criminal mastermind, Kitty."
@ @ @
Storm gazed around the den, going over the students and making sure nobody else was missing. It was bad enough that Kitty, Kurt, Remy and Rogue had been taken so close to the mansion, she didn't want anyone else to be kidnapped.
Scott and Jean had gotten back that night, just after Storm and Solitaire, and were sitting on the couch together, Scott's arm wrapped protectively around Jean's shoulders. Both looked a little stunned. Storm didn't blame them. Nobody had expected Damien to attack this soon, and she had privately hoped that Dreamer's mental attack would kill the other man. Apparently not.
Logan was leaning against the wall, facing the door, a dangerous expression on his face. The students looked more than a little freaked out, especially since they didn't know why they were all there yet. The only one who looked calm was Chantelle, but her hair, which had turned yellow, betrayed her fear.
((All right… Bobby's on his way to Alabama, so there's not much we can do apart from check on him. Catherine, Debbie, Richard and Simon are on that trip to Spain, but they weren't here three months ago so they probably aren't in danger. Solitaire's sleeping off that migraine, and the Professor can probably pick up on Damien's people with Cerebro if they try to come here again, but I don't think he can find Rogue, Remy, Kitty and Kurt with Cerebro this time. Damien will have learnt from his past mistakes.))
Aura asked, "Miss Munroe, what's going on?"
"Remy, Rogue, Kitty and Kurt have been kidnapped, probably by Damien," Storm said. "Until we find out where they are and how we can get them back, I don't want to take any chances. Nobody should go outside the mansion grounds without at least two other people with them, and not without telling either myself, Jean, Scott, the Professor or Logan where you're going and when you plan to be back."
"If you see or hear anything suspicious let us know," Logan added. "We're gonna be trying to find the other kids so we need to know if there's anything going on that seems strange."
"We can't count on using Cerebro to locate them," Storm said. "Those karamantium cuffs make it virtually impossible to track the brainwaves that make mutants stand out from humans. We were lucky last time, but I doubt Damien will give us that advantage again."
"Miss Munroe?" Dreamer said tentatively. "Ah might be able ta find out where they are. An' Ah don' have ta use Cerebro."
"Your dream-power," Aura exclaimed.
Storm frowned. "I'm afraid I don't quite understand what you're trying to say."
"One of mah powers is th' ability ta get inside people's dreams," the blue-haired teenager replied. "It's th' reason Ah'm called Dreamer. If they have any idea where they are, Ah'll be able ta find out."
"Would you be in any danger?" Jean asked.
Dreamer shook his head. "No more'n dreamin' could hurt ya. Only ya'd have ta drug me. Ah don' sleep more'n a few hours a week an' Ah cain't make mahself sleep more'n Ah have ta."
"All right," Jean said. "I suppose you can't be hurt in a dream. If you're sure you want to do this."
"Ah'm sure. They're mah friends. Ah have ta do what Ah c'n ta help them."
Jean, Scott, Storm, Dreamer and Jubilee headed up to the infirmary. Jean had insisted that the 'experiment' be done there where she could monitor Dreamer's heart and brainwaves in case something went wrong. Jubilee had refused to let her boyfriend do this alone, even if she couldn't exactly go into his mind with him.
Jean measured up a dose of sedative. "All right, this should be enough to keep you out for an hour or so. Are you absolutely certain you want to do this, Dreamer? Nobody would blame you if you backed out now."
He looked nervous but shook his head. "Ah'm th' best chance we've got raht now, Dr Summers-Grey. Ya an' th' other telepaths cain't get through th' interference from those karamantium cuffs Damien has. Ah c'n get past pretty much any mental block he tries 'gainst me."
He was sitting on one of the examination beds set up in the infirmary. Jubilee was sitting next to him, a scared expression on her face, her right hand holding his left hand in a death grip. He smiled at her.
"Don' worry, Jubes. If there's any danger at all Ah'll wake up. Survival instinct kicks in when ya dream. Ah'll be fine."
Jean stuck the syringe into his arm. Dreamer lay back on the bed and let the drug do its work, felt his limbs grow heavy. His subconscious pulled away from his unresponsive body. He could 'see' all the other conscious minds clustered around his: Jubilee, Storm, Jean and Scott. He drifted past Raptor's bed and jolted back, startled. An image seared into his mind.
…Bobby and Raptor, sitting on the grass in the mansion grounds. Raptor was laughing at something Bobby had said…
Memory! And memory couldn't be present without consciousness. He made a mental note to talk to Jean about this and moved on.
He sent out probes to locate Kitty, Kurt, Rogue or Remy. If any of them was sleeping he could find them. And maybe do a little snooping around… wherever they were.
He found the echoes of Rogue's mind first and followed the trail to the vortal nexus where he could speak mind-to-mind with the other Southerner. Of course, it would be much easier if he could find her dream. He grasped the strands of her subconscious and pulled the image.
It flickered like a bad recording and he couldn't stay focused. ((They must be wearin' those cuffs,)) he thought. Nothing else would cause so much interference.
He tried again to enter Rogue's dream. He bumped into a barrier that raced along his nerves and electrified his mind. He pulled away, gasping. Nothing he'd ever come up against had been so powerful.
A voice suddenly appeared out of the vortal nexus, speaking the way Dreamer did in dreams. D'ya really think Ah'll let ya by? Ya mus' be dumber than ya feel.
The voice stirred memories that Dreamer had thought were long buried. He pulled away from the vortal nexus, spinning out of control through the subconscious astral plane.
As he plunged back into his own body, he vaguely saw Jean's worried face. As his consciousness dimmed, he thought, ((maybe this wasn't such a good idea…))
@ @ @
Bobby looked at the slip of paper in his hand, then at the address on the house. They were the same. This was the place.
He knocked on the door and a woman in her late thirties answered. She had black hair cut in a bob and dark eyes. Raptor looked like a younger version of her.
Bobby's throat was suddenly dry. The woman asked, "can I help you, young man?"
"Alice Hawke?"
"Yes, that's me. What can I do for you?" she asked again.
He replied, "I think I have some important news for you, Mrs. Hawke. Maybe you should sit down."
"Please, come in," she said, moving back. "I'll get my husband."
She called, "Mark! We have company," and a man a few years older than her entered the room. He was also black-haired and dark-eyed. He shook Bobby's hand and all three sat down.
"Mr. Hawke, Mrs. Hawke, did you ever have children?" Bobby asked.
Alice replied, "when we were much younger, we had a baby girl. She disappeared when she was six and we never found out what happened to her. She'd be about seventeen now."
"What was her name?" Bobby asked.
Alice smiled. "Anastasia. I used to tell her stories about how there was a land made of fairy floss and sugar, where the angels lived."
"I know this is going to be hard to believe, but your daughter is alive. I know her. And if you want I can take you to her. She lives with me and other mutants at Professor Xavier's School for the Gifted. But you need to know, she is a mutant."
"Why should that matter? We have to go to wherever this school is," Mark said.
Bobby hesitated. "Mr. Hawke, Mrs. Hawke, Raptor was injured a few months ago. She's in a coma. We're not sure she's ever going to wake up."
Mark looked Bobby in the eye. "Mr. Drake, whether our daughter lives or not, I want to see her again. I believe that she'll recover. Nothing ever got her down when she was a little girl, and I always said she'd be a tough teenager. But if she doesn't make it, I want to see her before she dies."
Alice nodded wordlessly. Bobby smiled. "She thought so when she asked me to find you," he said. "The school is in Westchester, just outside New York. We can get the first plane out."
"I'll ring for tickets," Alice said. She stood up and went into the kitchen.
Mark said, "if my daughter asked you to find us, she must trust you."
"Yes. We were very close," Bobby said.
Mark smiled. "I remember what she was like as a little girl. I still carry a picture in my wallet, even after all these years."
He showed Bobby a small picture of a dark-haired girl with solemn black eyes, about four years old. She was wearing a pink sundress and lilac sneakers. Bobby smiled. "I can't picture Raptor like this. I knew her as a teenager, not a little girl."
"And I knew Anastasia as a little girl, not a teenager," Mark said. "I can't thank you enough for finding us and telling us about Anastasia. You don't know the hell we've been through trying to find her."
"What happened?" Bobby asked.
Mark sighed. "We were living in a communal home, and not all the people in the neighbourhood thought it was a good place for a little girl to grow up. We never found any proof, but I know one or more of them took Anastasia and put her up for adoption in a 'better' home."
"Well, you've found her," Bobby said. "She wanted to meet you all her life, from what she told me. I promised her I'd find you."
Alice came back into the living room. "We're on the red-eye flight to New York tonight," she said. "We have a few hours to pack. We can get the rest of our things sent over to New York later if we decide to stay there."
She looked over to Bobby. "I took the liberty of booking a ticket for you as well," she said. "It's the least we could do after you returned our daughter to us."
@ @ @
Jubilee glanced down at Dreamer, a worried frown on her face. Aura was sitting a few metres away, playing with a strand of red-and-green hair, watching Jubilee pace.
Dreamer was still unconscious, even after six hours. His face was unnaturally pale, and his breathing was slow and shallow. The two girls hadn't left the infirmary since he'd collapsed after the monitors had gone nuts.
Jean came in and Aura practically leapt on her. "He's never been out this long before! What if something went wrong?"
Jean replied, "while he was trying to contact the others, his heart-rate, pulse and alpha brainwaves were higher than normal. His body and mind were under a lot of pressure and he needs time to recover. I'm sure he'll be fine."
She glanced at Jubilee. "Why don't you two go get some sleep? It's almost midnight. I'll tell you when he wakes up."
Jubilee nodded. "Yeah. Probably a good idea," she said slowly. She and Aura left the infirmary.
Instead of going to their rooms, they went to Dreamer's and sat on the bed. Aura sighed, "I've never seen him this bad before. I mean, I've seen him after an attack, I've seen him at his worst, but that was nothing compared to this."
Jubilee nodded. "But Jean's right. He'll be okay."
She picked up an old, torn photograph that was lying on the table. "Hey, who's this?" she asked, looking at the two boys. Both blue-haired, about five and six. The older-looking one had purple eyes, the other dark gold eyes.
Aura looked at the picture and replied, "that's Dreamer and his brother."
"Brother?"
"Yeah, Dreamer has a brother somewhere. Their parents were killed in an accident when Dreamer was six and his brother was hurt pretty bad. By the time he got out of hospital Dreamer had already been fostered out."
Jubilee looked at the picture again. The two boys looked a mix of happy and sad, as if they knew what would happen not too far in the future. Aura pulled her hair into a ponytail and said, "we'd better do as Jean said. If someone does attack we don't want to be dead on our feet. That's a sure way to get killed."
TBC. In Chap. 5, Dreamer wakes up, Adam and Discordia break into the mansion, Remy and Kitty talk. Review me PPLLEEAASSEE!
