English is not my native language. Please
forgive me my mistakes.
Disclaimer: "X-men" and all the characters here belong to Marvel, 20 Century
Fox and I intend no infringement, this is a piece of amateur fan fiction, and I
make no money of it.
Only the original idea contained within this work is the property of the
author. Please do not copy this story to any website or archive without
permission of the author.
Timeline: Set a little after the movie
Universe: Set in the movie universe. Only the movie NOT the book that goes with
it!
Romance: Scott/ Jean, Jean/ Logan,
Summary: Scott finds himself lost and alone after his break-up with Jean
but finds unexpected help from Remy.
Archiving: Want, ASK, take, have.
Feedback: Yes, please. My e-mail address is nadjalee@usa.net
Rating: PG-13
Series: part two in the "Everything Changes"
series
Thanks to Cristina for the Beta. You're the best!
Note: The
translations to Remy's French are near the end of this story! And don't worry;
it's not much.
Part 1:
Scott had been driving for so long he had lost track of both time and
direction. He did not know where he was going nor did he care. He just wanted
to get away, he needed to get away. In going as far away from the cause of his
pain he hoped to kill it or at least bury it deep in his soul.
He saw a sign saying; "Welcome to Los Angeles" and was a little surprised. Had he really been driving so far? Well, apparently he had. He found a nice looking hotel and ordered a room. When he reached the room he put his suitcases on the floor next to the bed and sat down on one of the two chairs next to the windows and looked out onto the busy street below him. The people on the street looked like puppets from the distance but still puppets with a purpose. He had lost his purpose, his goal and his dreams. Ugh, how he wished he were one of those tiny looking people going somewhere, anywhere.
With a sigh he forced his thoughts back to the present and his situation. He opened his wallet and as expected found it almost empty. The superhero business was not very profitable. He would have to get a job the next morning. He stripped off his clothes and went into the bathroom. Soon the sound of running water filled the room.
" Damn" Scott mumbled as he exited the bathroom
some 5 minutes later only wearing a towel around his waist. He had forgotten
his shampoo in his bag. Suddenly he stopped cold in his tracks. A young boy of
about 16 years was almost standing with his head inside his bag.
" What are you doing here, young man?" Scott asked him loudly, crossing his
arms in front of him.
" Hmm??" Came the intelligent answer and the boy quickly lifted his head,
knocking it up in the table, which Scott's bag had been standing under.
"Ouch," the boy complained and rubbed his head. Then he saw Scott.
"Damn," he mumbled and ran towards the door. Scott caught him before he reached it.
"Hey, let me go, man," the boy demanded and
kicked out after Scott.
"Ouch, stand still," Scott tried to restrain the struggling boy. " I won't hurt
you," he added in a calming tone. The boy relaxed and Scott released him. For a
moment they just looked at one another. The boy was good-looking, tall but
still lower than Scott, he had brown hair and brown eyes that seemed to glow a
faint red when the light fell on them. His clothes were ragged, dirty and torn
and he spoke with a faint French accent.
" If you were looking for money you came to the wrong place," Scott said and
broke the silence between them.
" Yeah? Then don't live in hotels. They tend to cost money, mon ami," the boy
said with a child's logic.
" Sit," Scott commanded and guided him towards the only two chairs in the
room.
" I'm no dog," he complained but sat.
" Now who are you and why did you try to rob me?" Scott asked in his lecture
mode. The boy looked him up and down as if considering if he should lie or not.
" Aren't you going to call the police?" He asked, trying to sound as if he
did not care either way but failing miserably.
" I'd rather not," Scott answered and the boy relaxed somewhat.
" I'm Remy," the boy said, deciding to trust Scott for the moment.
" I am Scott. Scott Summers. Now, I am going to let you go but don't steal
anymore. It is wrong," Scott said lecturing and stood up. Remy did the same and
nodded eagerly.
"Yes sir," he said but Scott just knew he was
lying. He was half way across the floor to the door when Scott's voice stopped
him.
" Do you have a place to live?"
" Yes," came the answer a little too quickly.
"Oh, well. That's good. I was going to say you could stay here but…." Scott
began not really knowing why he choose to help the boy but something in Remy
reminded him of himself.
" I could stay," Remy said eagerly and looked at the warm cosy king size bed.
It looked warm and comfortable. How long it had been since he had last been
warm and safe. He was no fool however and knew he was running a big risk
agreeing to Scott's suggestion. In his world everything cost money and a place
to stay had to be paid for somehow but Remy was confident that if Scott tried
anything he could hold him off with his mutant
powers.
"I won't try to touch you. I'll sleep on the floor," Scott said, having guessed his thoughts. Remy nodded, calmer but still not sure if he believed him. Well, the coming morning would tell for sure.
"Take a bath. I will find something for you to wear," Scott pushed the boy towards the bathroom. Soon, over the sound of running water, Scott heard the faint sound of a French love song that sounded faintly familiar. It reminded him of Jean, yet everything reminded him of Jean, so instead of thinking more about it he looked through his suitcases to find something for Remy to wear. He laid a pair of black pants and a woollen black shirt to him.
Part 2:
" Now, we are going to get a few things straight," Scott said as he and Remy
sat the next morning in a small breakfast restaurant eating for the last of his
money.
"You will not lie, betray or steal from me,"
Scott continued. Remy nodded in between bits of his chocolate muffin. To Remy's
somewhat surprise Scott had kept his word and slept on the floor, not coming
one inch of him. Because of that Remy had found he trusted Scott. Maybe there
were heroes left in this world after all, he thought with light amusement.
" You have parents?"
" No."
" Guardians? Someone who will miss you?"
" No."
" Where did you live before we met?"
Remy made a gesture towards the park and street
they could see from the restaurant.
" Where I wanted to," he answered, defiance in his voice. On the street, Scott
thought and felt sorry for the boy.
" I suppose you haven't been going to school?" Scott guessed. Remy nodded.
"Okay, well you are going to now."
Scott looked through the job advertisements in the paper and found one that caught his eye. A local public school ' The Claimant School' was looking for a full time teacher in mathematics, physics, English literature and car maintenance, the latter being an optional subject. It was a combined grade and high school.
"You know this place?" Scott asked and showed
Remy the article. Remy nodded.
"It's in a rough neighbourhood. Not a place where teachers like to come."
" Okay, we are going there," Scott said and stood up.
" We??" Remy asked disbelieving and followed him out. "Remy, cet homme va être
votre démantèlement[1]." Remy whispered to himself under his breath.
" I heard that!" Scott said.
"Grand. Au juste de ce que j'ai besoin. Un homme instruit. [2]" Remy said
sarcastically. Scott laughed for the first time since he had found Jean in
Logan's arms.
Part 3:
"Excuse me but can you tell me where the principal's office is?" Scott asked
one of the two police officers who stood by the metal detectors at the entrance
of the school.
"When you get in just follow the signs," the officer answered and
gestured for Scott and Remy to go through the metal detector. They did and
following the spray-painted signs Scott knocked on the principal's office.
" Come in," a voice said and Scott and Remy entered.
" Hey, I am Scott Summers and this is my…..son," Scott said and nodded towards
Remy.
" Write him in here," the principal said disinterested and gave Scott a paper
that he signed.
" I came about the job," Scott said as he gave him back the paper.
" Did you?" The principal, Jameson, Scott read his name was, asked surprised. "
Why the Hell would you want to work here?" He asked and gestured towards his
room and the rest of the obviously badly kept school.
" I need the money," Scott answered, annoyed at the man for his distaste in his
own work.
" Very well, it's your funeral. Write here," Jameson pushed another paper
towards Scott and when he had signed it he gave him his timetable.
" Don't you have any other mathematics teachers here?" Scott asked surprised at
his long schedule with classes for all ages.
" No. No one else wanted the job," he said and made a dismissive gesture.
" Wait. What class is….my son to go in?" Scott asked when he was almost out.
" Pick one," James said disinterested with his eyes on his papers.
" Thanks," Scott mumbled sarcastically under his breath as he and Remy walked
out.
"Just how old are you?" Remy asked as they walked down the corridors,
Scott in search of the book store to pick up the books he wanted to teach from
in his first class today, the 10. Grade.
" Twenty- three. Why?" He asked as they reached it and Scott found the books he
wanted to use.
"Here, hold these," Scott said and put stables of books in Remy's arms while he looked for other books he could use. All the books were in poor condition but it had to do.
"You can just start in my first class, the 10.
Grade," Scott added and took some of the books back from Remy as they moved
down the corridor towards the classroom.
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. But back to me being your SON. You are 23 and I am 16. I
thought you were a arithmetic teacher."
"I am but I had to come up with something quick, ok?? Besides having first said
it, it would be more suspicious to change it half way than let it be," Scott
said, more annoyed with himself than Remy. " Let's just say you are my kid
brother if anyone are to ask again, okay?" He added.
" Okay," Remy agreed.
Scott took a deep breath before he entered the classroom. Here goes nothing, he thought grimly.
Part 4:
It was a battlefield. At least this classroom looked and sounded like it.
" Okay, class settle down," he yelled as loud as he could in the hope of making
himself heard above the noise of chatter and music if that awful noise could
even be called music. The class totally ignored him. Ok, if that's the way you
want it, Scott thought and went over to the radio and disconnected it. He
placed it on his desk.
"Now, maybe we can get started."
"Who the hell do you think you are?" A young man asked him threatening and
stood up, obviously the leader of this little rebellion. Scott went to him.
" I think I am the teacher here and you the student so that means you sit down
and shut up unless I tell you otherwise, got it?" Scott asked harshly, his eyes
glowing red beneath his glasses. Startled the boy fell back down on his chair.
"Good. Now I will teach you but whatever you
wish to listen is up to you. I …" Scott began, turning his back to the boy and
walked towards his desk and did not see the boy taking a knife from his pocket
and going after Scott.
"Scott, Derrière Vous![3]," Remy yelled and switched over to French as he
always did when he was excited, and Scott quickly turned around and kicked the
knife out of the boy's hand and for good measure twisted his arm behind his
back.
" If I am to die by back stabbing it will not be from yours," Scott hissed and
his eyes glowed dangerously. "Either get out or stay and do as I tell you,"
Scott demanded and released the boy.
" Ha, I don't need to hear this," he said defiantly and his eyes settled on the
knife that lay on the floor.
" I wouldn't if I was you," Scott said pleasantly but with a dangerous edge.
" I'm out of here. Who are with me?" He asked the class. A few went to him but
the rest of the class pretended they did not hear him.
"You are idiots. All of you. Do you really believe he gives a shit about any of us?"
No one answered.
"Ah," he growled in frustration and left with
his small group.
"Now, as I was about to say you can either listen to me or not. That is up to
you. But while you are in my classroom you do as I say or you leave," Scott
said and took up the knife as he moved towards his desk.
" But know this: Only through knowledge will you ever be something. Someone more than you are now. You all have that power in you to make something of yourselves. I am giving you a chance to use it."
Scott had reached his desk and thrust the knife into the table with a loud noise. Then he handed out the books.
"Good, now we can start. Open your books on page one."
Part 5: Six months
later:
Ring, ring!
" Okay, please read chapter 4 till next time and I expect your homework on
chapter 3 next Monday as well."
The class quickly dissolved and Scott caught Remy before he went out as well.
"Remember to be home at six."
"Ouais. Sûr. [4]" Remy answered, his left hand safely inside Ruth's black
one. Remy was one of the few white students and that, together with his French
charm of course, made him very popular with the girls, in the beginning simply
because he was different and interesting and later because his charm was in
some way irresistible. Sometimes Scott wondered if his charm could be a mutant
power or something.
"Bye, Scott," Ruth called after him as Remy pulled her with him before he shut
her effectively up by putting his lips over hers. Scott half smiled at them
before the well-known pain of Jean came back to him and his smile became a
frown. But Remy had helped him cope with the pain of Jean in ways he had never
imagined. When he had left New York and Jean he had been sure he would never
smile again, not even for a moment in time yet here he was, able to forget his
pain for just a moment. And he owned that glimmer of hope, that flicker of
happiness that he had to Remy, a boy who had become like the brother he had
told people he was. Like the brother he had never had.
Remy had stayed with Scott since their first
meeting and Scott had helped him caught up on his studies and Remy had learned
to trust Scott completely, finally able to believe that there really was people
who cared about others. Besides buying him clothes and putting him in school
Scott had also taken Remy to the doctor to get him checked out. He had been
worried that he could have had AIDS. He knew that it was hard to survive on the
streets and though Remy had never said it Scott knew that he had probably had
to sell himself when times were hard. He had been very relived to learn that
though Remy had caught some illnesses which were unavoidable considering his
life he didn't have AIDS or any other deadly illness.
" Mr. Summers?"
" Yes?"
Scott turned towards Charlotte, the nicest but
also most quiet of the students in his class.
"Have I done this right?" She asked and showed him a piece of paper. Scott read
it through.
" Yes, this is very good but you can also do like this," Scott showed her. She
listened intensely to him with stars in her eyes.
" Ok, now I think you should go out to the others."
"Alright," she said sadly and went out.
Scott sighed. He knew that Charlotte had a crush on him but even though she was a nice girl with skin like mocha and hair as black as the raven his heart was still too hurt to even open up to the possibility of love again. Besides she was a student and he never got involved with students.
Later that day:
The clock on the wall read 20:30 and Remy still wasn't back. Damn, didn't the
boy know how to read the time? Ever since Remy had run into some trouble with
the police down at the mall where he had hardly gotten away Scott had given him
curfew at 18 o'clock in the hopes that it would make him stay out of trouble.
Scott had found a small apartment five months earlier where he and Remy now
lived but Scott's salary barely cut it and sometimes money did seem to appear
when he needed them the most. He knew Remy had something to do with that even
though he had told him repeatedly to stop stealing.
Oh, to Hell with it. I am going after him and when I find him…Scott thought and grabbed his coat.
Part 6:
Scott went to the mall and started looking for Remy but he couldn't find him.
Think, damn it. If you were Remy where would you go?
The answer came to him when he walked past a
jewellery store that Remy had had an eye for. Scott had repeatedly warned him
off because of the rumour that it was a blind for a drug dealer's money
laundering. Scott looked into the store but still couldn't find him. He saw
that the store had a room behind the shop, which lead to an alley. Fearing the
worst and hoping the best he ran to the ally. As he came close to where the
store joined the allay Scott could hear voices and the agonising sound of
someone in pain.
" That will be enough. Hold him up," a voice said. Scott came around the last
corner and saw two men holding a bleeding and bruised Remy between them while
another man, probably the one who had spoken before, held a gun to his temple.
" Noooo," Scott yelled and without thinking twice he quickly aimed at the gun
and lifted his glasses. Red energy shoot from his eyes and the gun exploded.
Without his visor he could barely control the energy nor really guide it but the
three men did not know that. As he stood there, his eyes glowing red he looked
like the Cyclops he was named after.
" Run, he's a mutie. A freak," the man on the
left side of Remy said and ran off. The other man did the same and Remy fell to
the ground with a small gasp of pain.
"Come back, you idiots," the third man yelled after them.
" If you want something done properly, you have to do it yourself," he added and took out a knife with his left hand since Scott's energy blast had crippled his right one. He put the knife at Remy's throat.
"Don't," Scott pleaded but knew he would kill him anyway. He had
only one chance and it was to act now. He did not like that Remy was so close
to where he had to shoot but he did not have any other choice. Mumbling a
prayer he thought he had forgotten long ago he quickly aimed and fired. The man
screamed in agony as red energy destroyed the knife and everything close to it.
With his heart in his throat Scott ran to Remy and knelt beside him. He
gathered the boy in his arms and began to carry him away.
" Hey, man. What about me?" The man asked him pained.
" Frankly, I don't give a damn," Scott said coldly and continued to run away.
When he came out on the open street with Remy he could see all the bruises and
cuts he had all over. He was no doctor but he had been in enough battles to
know that he had gotten a rough beating with at least a few broken ribs. But
the thing that caught his eye was the angry red bruise which covered half his
face and which had made a small cut in his head. It was his energy beam that
had done that, Scott knew it. Just as he knew that a cut to the head could be
fatal or worse. He gently put Remy on the front seat of his car and drove like
a mad man to the hospital. He has to be okay. He just has to. That was all
he could think of.
Please let him be okay.
Part 7:
" Are you Scott Summers, Remy LeBeau Summers' brother?" A doctor
asked.
" Yes," Scott answered and jumped up from the chair in the waiting room.
"Is he going to be okay, doctor?" Scott asked
him nervously.
" You better sit down."
" I want to know," Scott said, too nervous to sit, He is dead. Oh, God he is
dead.
" He had some superficial cuts and cruises and three broken ribs. What concerns us is the strange energy burn to his head."
The doctor sighed deeply.
" It has left him in a sleep like coma and we don't know if he will ever wake up. The good news is that he seems to have some kind of mutation that results in his body lying in static, just like sleep. He could quite possible "sleep" like this for the rest of his life without needing nourishment. A very interesting condition, to be sure. "
The doctor saw how sad Scott looked and smiled friendly to him.
" Everything will be fine. After all it was not your fault," the doctor said and excused himself when he was called over the intercom.
But it was. It is all my fault, Scott thought
sadly and buried his head in his hands. All my fault. All my fault.
" We need to see him."
" Sorry it is not possible. No one is allowed to see him. Please come back
tomorrow."
" This boy may be a wanted felon. We have to see him."
The voices awoke Scott from the slumber he had fallen into from sheer exhaustion. He saw two police officers argue with a nurse and pointing towards Remy's room.
Oh, no. It looked like things had just taken a turn from bad to worse. Remy hated being robbed of freedom like any man would. After all the wrong he had done Remy the least he could do was to ensure that he was free to find his dreams. He wasn't going with them.
He deserves better, more than a life in
imprisonment or at an orphanage, Scott thought determined and sneaked into Remy's
room. The sight of Remy lying in bed with his eyes closed, looking close to
death made his heart ache in agony.
"Come on. We are getting out of here," Scott whispered to him and gathered Remy
in his arms.
Part 8:
Scott looked at Remy out of the corner of his eye. He looked so still, like
death.
Oh God, please let him be ok, Scott prayed fanatically. He had to be ok. He just had to.
'You are now leaving Los Angeles,' a sign said and Scott drove once again away with nowhere to go and nowhere to be. Only this time his heart was even heavier than before because he had found a brother and lost him again.
It is all my fault. That thought kept ringing in his head again and again and his eyes clouded with tears that he angrily blinked away.
You should have known better. You know how dangerous your eyes can be, Scott scolded himself sternly, not making his mood any better.
Everything I love, everything I touch ends up dead or broken. The thought ran through him like an unwanted reminder of days gone by.
It's all my fault. It is all my fault.
Alone a red car speeded across the land with nowhere to go and nowhere to hide.
Alone and lost.
Alone, always alone.
---------------------
The End of "Lost"- continues in "Praise the Goddess"
---------------------
Translations from French:
[1] French for " Remy, that man is going to be your undoing."
[2] French for " Great, Just what I need. A educated man."
[3] French for "Behind you!"
[4] French for " Yeah. Sure."
