They Didn't Close Her Eyes
Spain is nice this time of year, apparently – or it's supposed to be, anyway.
I wouldn't know.
The sun warms the room around me, and I can feel its energy recharging my plasma reserves, but there is no heat strong enough to warm my heart. No heat that can really burn away the feeling that I could have done something to save her – save the woman I loved.
I can still see her – her face still haunts my dreams, every night since I saw her lying lifeless in that body bag. Her eyes were open and staring at the sky, yet seeing nothing – their blank gaze is something that still chills me, even though the memory of it is fading.
They didn't close her eyes.
How could they do something so insensitive?
I have no idea, and that hurts me more than anything. It hurts me, too, that they could treat a human being so casually, as if she was nothing but a piece of meat that they were going to throw to their dogs, and it hurts me that I can't feel anything but this all-consuming emptiness where once there was a feeling of the greatest joy I have ever known. I feel as if I have had a huge, bloody chunk of my soul gouged out and shredded – shredded by the monster Beast calls Vargas.
They didn't close her eyes.
Didn't they know what that would mean to me? Didn't they know what would happen when I saw her?
Stupid thought, really – of course they knew; they've probably dealt with this kind of situation before, after all. They probably knew what to do as easily as if they had it written on the backs of their hands. It was probably all so easy for them to get on with – it was just another job, right? Just another opportunity to work for a fat paycheque and to get a little vigorous exercise? Just another way to see the "mutie freaks" up close and personal?
Damn them all... I hope they reincarnate as cockroaches. That's what they were like in the tunnels – they swarmed all over us. They wouldn't let Rogue go, no matter how hard she shouted, just so they could poke and prod her as much as they liked. It was like they were treating us like lab rats, even while they were giving Beast the medical help he needed – as if they were looking at this rescue as if we, the X-Men, were amoebas in a Petri dish. As if we were little more than a living experiment – something to be poked and prodded and manipulated to their heart's content.
They didn't close her eyes.
That was when it really hit home, I think. When I saw my face reflected in the pupils of her beautiful purple eyes, I couldn't see anything that had been there the last time I'd looked into her face – nothing of the passion and fire that we'd only recently shared. There was nothing of her there. Nothing left of the woman who had fallen in love with me – who I'd loved back, I suppose, in my own insignificant way. Nothing left of Elisabeth Braddock but a shell, a fragment of her being – nothing left but an empty house, with all the lights smashed. There was nothing there. She was gone, and there was nothing I could do to save her.
I think I actually hated her for an instant or two – hated her for being so foolhardy and so utterly self-assured, hated her for trying to protect her friends, hated her for not running like hell when she had the chance.
I hated her for leaving me. I hated myself for not being there to say goodbye.
And I hate Vargas for taking her away from me. He took her away from me, and for that he will suffer. I'm not sure how, and I'm not sure when, but Vargas will pay for what he did, as surely as night follows day.
I'm coming for you, old man. I'm coming for you, and there will be nowhere for you to hide – I promise you that.
They didn't close her eyes.
And I'm going to kill you for it.
