Chapter Ten
Raptor's parents arrived an hour later. After engulfing Bobby in a hug, Raptor pulled away and looked at the dark-haired couple.
Alice smiled tearfully. "My little Anastasia. It's really you."
"M-mom? Dad?"
"It's us, honey," Mark assured her. "We've finally found you."
Raptor ran to them and flung her arms around them, tears running down her cheeks. "I can't believe it's really you," she sobbed. "I wanted this to happen for so long…"
"I know, sweetie," Alice said. "We all have."
Raptor wiped her eyes and glanced at the other mutants. "I'm so glad I have you back again. But… but this is where I belong now. I have a place here, people I love, quite possibly the best boyfriend in the history of mankind. I don't want to leave all that."
"We wouldn't dream of making you leave," Alice said. "Your father and I are going to buy a place in the city so we'll be nearby, but you can stay here for as long as you have to. From what Bobby's told us, this is the best place for mutants. Besides, your friends are here. We'll do whatever you want, Anastasia."
"Mom?"
"Yes honey?"
"Call me Raptor."
@ @ @
Chantelle walked through the grounds of the mansion, enjoying the sensation of grass under her bare feet, even though it was pretty late at night. As she walked past a stand of trees, she saw Solitaire sitting underneath a huge oak, wearing his ever-present Aviator sunglasses even so late at night, a pack of cards beside him. He was strumming a guitar softly, singing something under his breath.
When he saw Chantelle he laid the guitar by his side and smiled. "Hi Chantelle."
"This week has been so hectic I never got a chance to meet you properly," Chantelle said, hovering uncertainly. She wasn't sure whether he wanted to be alone or not. She was answered when he said, "take a seat. We can meet each other properly now."
She sat down and leaned against the tree. "Tonight was so intense. I've never done anything like that before. I know Logan thinks it was a… a tactical move, I think he called it, but when the other mutants attacked us I panicked. I turned invisible and I was about to run when I saw them attacking Logan. What else was I supposed to do? I attacked them… I've never hurt anyone before, Solitaire. And I… I kind of liked it. How sick is that? I felt like it was the right thing, hurting them. It's like there's this thing inside me, a thing that enjoys making people suffer. And I don't know if I'll be able to contain it next time."
Her hair had turned blue, orange and yellow-streaked as she spoke. Solitaire took her chin in his hand and turned her face to his. "Chantelle, listen to me. You're not a monster and you're not dangerous to any of us. You got caught up in a battle rage, that's all. It happens to the best of us. You saw people attacking your friend, and you defended him and yourself. It's perfectly normal."
"You really think so?"
"I don't know you very well, Chantelle, but I think if you were someone who enjoyed hurting people you'd have done more of it before now. You said you've never hurt anyone before, and I believe you. I also think that if you were what you're afraid of being, you wouldn't be able to say that."
Chantelle turned tear-filled brown eyes to Solitaire. "But what if you're wrong? What if—"
He silenced her by placing a finger on her lips. "Shh. Don't think like that. You're not evil, you're not a monster and you're not someone who enjoys other peoples' pain. What you are is a beautiful girl with a good heart who needs some more self-confidence."
"You… you think I'm… mana?" {Beautiful}
"Of course. Totoka mana, I believe is the right phrase," Solitaire said. "Don't be so hard on yourself. None of us thinks you're evil, and none of us thinks we should be afraid that you'll hurt us. Well… I'm a little afraid you might hurt me, but it's not the way you think." {Very beautiful}
"Why would I hurt you?"
"It hurts me when I see you cry, because I want to do whatever it takes to make you happy again. And I'm afraid that you won't be mine to make happy. I guess… I guess I'm afraid there's someone else. Someone who got there first."
He wasn't looking at her as he spoke, nor did he look at her when she replied.
"No, nobody got there first."
He turned back to her and for the first time noticed the lavender and pink streaks slipping in among the other colours. He gently touched the new colours. "What do these mean?"
Chantelle smiled. "The lavender, or any shade of purple really, means I'm happy. The pink… pink is for love."
"Love?"
"Yes. Solitaire, why didn't you just tell me how you felt before? We've known each other… all right, a week, tops, but surely you saw the signs? My hair turned pink whenever we were in the same room, I made excuses to see you. Why didn't you tell me?"
"I… I was afraid you wanted something else. Somebody else, a tough guy like Logan, a calm, in control leader like Scott. Not someone who sings and gets visions from packs of cards. Not someone who can't go out because of migraines that come every month and can last up to a week. It's happened before, Chantelle. My hometown is very tolerant of mutants, but the girls still want a guy who isn't stuck in a dark room five days out of thirty. They want a guy whose eyes they can see without sunglasses."
"And where I'm from, the guys want a girl who can't tell when they really love her or if they just want a quick lay. A girl whose hair doesn't change colour when her mood does. They want a girl who actually cares about the size of their muscles and not what's in their heart."
Chantelle reached over and took one of Solitaire's long-fingered hands in her own. "People want someone who's not different. Well, I'm different, and I want someone who's different. I want the sensitive singer. I want the guy who wears Aviators because he needs to, not because they look cool. I want him to trust me enough to let me read his emotions, because they've been closed to me until now. You're one of the only people I've met whose emotions I couldn't feel. Remy and Dreamer are the other two, because they have such strong psychic shields. I think I can't feel yours because you're afraid to let me."
"I… I don't know how."
"Let me show you how."
Chantelle extended one hand toward him, at about chest height. "Take my hand," she said. They clasped hands and Chantelle closed her eyes. "Just trust me. Think of things that you love. Things that you hate. Just let me see what's really inside you. Let me see what makes Solitaire."
At first there was nothing in the link but emptiness and fear. Then, slowly at first but growing stronger by the second, emotions and images flooded the link.
Solitaire kneeling in front of a small gravestone, tears falling from underneath his sunglasses. Long fingers shakily touching the carved name, 'Emily Jackson'. A single long-stemmed rose laid across the grave, tucked into the arms of a baby doll. Another long-fingered hand, this one belonging to a dark-haired older woman, placed on his shoulder. "Come on, Max. It's time to let go."
"My… my sister. She died five years ago, when I was eleven. When I was fourteen they told me I had to let go and get along on my own, without my sister. That was when I started calling myself Solitaire. Solitary enough to live."
Playing poker with some other boys. Touching the cards and feeling a spear of pain in his head. Images of a dark boy holding a basketball. Saying "we need another player. You wanna play?"
"TJ Rameski. The first guy to be nice to me after my powers manifested. The others weren't really nasty, but they didn't know what I could do so they were a little nervous. The folks back home were like that. They didn't care if we were mutants, they were just cautious until we figured what we could do. TJ didn't care."
Lying in a hospital bed, almost crying from the pain in his head, the voices outside the room obscenely loud. His mother and a doctor, discussing his migraines.
"It's not normal for migraines to be so frequent, Mrs. Jackson. You must prepare yourself for the worst. These headaches could be preceding a worse condition."
"What are you saying, doctor?"
"I'm saying there might be a chance your son has brain cancer. We won't know for sure until the tests come back, but frankly I can't think of another explanation for why he has such severe headaches so frequently."
"It wasn't cancer. They never did figure out why I get migraines so often. I just remember thinking that I couldn't let my mom go through that again, losing a kid. It was bad enough with Emily, I didn't want her to have to lose her son as well."
Another hospital bed, a white-haired woman walking into the room. Storm. Explaining who she was, even though he already knew from the cards. Voices, Storms and another girls', voices he was hearing in his head, not with his ears. A pain-filled car trip that he was only vaguely aware of, still caught in the grip of the migraine. Arriving at the mansion only slightly better, sleeping for two days until the pain in his head lessened enough for him to stomach food again.
"I barely knew where I was when I woke up. I remembered Storm and leaving Ohio, but most of the past few days was a blur. It's always like that when I have a migraine. I have to look at a newspaper or ask someone what date it is before I know how long I was out."
Walking into the den, seeing for the first time a tall, slender girl in a crimson gypsy skirt and hiking boots. Long purple hair that grew streaks of light pink as she looked up at him and smiled. "Hi. I'm Chantelle de Courcey."
"You were the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen. That's all I remember thinking. All I could think of that night was you."
Chantelle opened her eyes. She could feel the love radiating from him, as well as uncertainty and awe at what they'd both experienced. And she could feel the truth, that for as long as he lived, Max Jackson, the telepath and visionary who called himself Solitaire, would love the empath called Chantelle de Courcey.
@ @ @
Sabrina sat in Damien's office, watching as he studied the one-way mirror window into the white room. He turned to her and smiled. "You put on a good act, Sabrina. And you pulled off this command with no mistakes. I'm proud of you."
"It wasn't hard. The X-Men are too naïve. They don't see that what seems straightforward can be a ruse. That we'd allow ourselves to be temporarily damaged to aid the main plan."
"True. Which is why we succeed. Tell me, Sabrina, how is Adam doing? Settling in all right?"
"He's fine," Sabrina answered, smiling. "He already established dominance over the younger mutants with lesser power. I think he's well-suited to our purposes. He knows by now that Daniel is his brother, of course, but he understands why we are against the mutants at the mansion, which I hadn't expected. I'd thought that once Adam knew Daniel was his brother he'd want to go to their side, but that's not the case at all. He honestly believes that what we're doing is the right thing and he says he won't turn his back on that for anything. But he does want to recruit his brother by whatever means necessary."
"Good. I've had my eye on Daniel, Kristin and Remy for some time, you know that," Damien said. "Of course, the man who trained them has been looking for them for even longer. His main interest lies with the boys, but if I can obtain a mutant good enough to trade he might let me keep Daniel. Or let Adam keep Daniel, whichever way you want to put it. I think I can find someone whose power will appeal to my associate's curiosity."
"So you'll allow Adam to recruit Daniel?" Sabrina asked. Damien nodded. "I don't see the harm in it. After all, brothers belong together, don't they? And it would be to our benefit to have two dreamseekers among us. From what I've been able to find out, Daniel's powers are at the same level as Adam, but they both have plenty of room to improve and apparently the man who trained Daniel, Kristin and Remy placed a little surprise in their minds."
"A surprise?"
"He implanted powers into the depths of their minds, inaccessible except by a skilled telepath. Someone like Professor Xavier. However, since I'm sure the good Professor wouldn't willingly unlock the secrets of our young friends' minds, we will have to either find a skilled enough telepath who will, or find the means of coercing the Professor," Damien said calmly, as though he was discussing the weather.
"What if Daniel can't be convinced to join us?" Sabrina asked. Damien shrugged. "We will have to use unfriendly persuasion. However, I'll leave that up to Adam. When he feels ready, if it doesn't interfere with my other plans, we can obtain his brother for him. And if we happen to obtain Kristin and Remy as well, then that will be a bonus."
"Kylie doesn't believe that Discordia will be able to pull this off," Sabrina commented. "She says that if Mystique couldn't get past Logan's nose how does Discordia expect to."
"Kylie is foolish sometimes," Damien replied. "Discordia's shapeshifting power is far beyond Mystique's. When Discordia shifts into a mutant, she acquires their power, their body, the way they walk and talk, their mannerisms and, above all, their scent. She is, for all purposes, a clone in every respect but her mind. And I fitted her mind with an overlay in case their telepaths go into her mind. All they'll find is a normal mutant mind with nothing to suggest Discordia is Discordia."
"I think she can pull it off. For however long it's needed," Sabrina said. "I've seen her shift before. When she became Rogue, she could absorb, just as the real Rogue can. She's one of the best fighters I've seen in a long time. But above all, she can take on the mannerisms of a person after watching them for ten minutes. With all the studying she did, she'll be impossible to tell from the real thing."
She stood up and walked over to the one-way window. Damien joined her and they looked down at the room's single occupant, still unconscious on the metal bed.
Sabrina smiled. "Poor baby is sure gonna be upset later on."
Damien was silent as two white-garbed nurses fitted karamantium cuffs on the prisoner's wrists and drew blood into a needle. Once the nurses had left, Damien spoke.
"Wouldn't you be upset? After all, we've done the unthinkable. We've replaced an X-Man… with a spy."
To be continued in Dark Rising 3: Illusion Of Innocence.
Well, what'd you think? Write the sequel? Leave it there and let you wonder?
Screw that. Sequel's getting written whether you like it or not. I'm on a roll here. By the way, Cat, you rock. Thanks for reviewing so much.
Anyway, tell me what you think. Is that bit with Solitaire and Chantelle a bit much? (One of my Muses likes romance. One hates it so he's trying to make me eradicate all romance, but the first Muse overruled him.)
The next fic is going to be kinda different. It's going to delve into Remy, Dreamer and Aura's past a lot, maybe some of the other characters. Kurt may find out the truth about Mystique if I can fit that into the storyline. It all depends. Tell my Muses to give me good ideas, okay?
Whew, this is long, isn't it? Last bit, I think. Read "Macbeth, X-Men Style"! Please! Although I'm not very nice to Xavier. Or Magneto. Or the girls. Or the guys in general. And I have a lot of canon characters even though I know jack about them so…
Well, thanks for reading. Review me please, and see you later in Dark Rising 3: Illusion Of Innocence.
—Ares
