Reunion
"You scared, Rogue?" Jennifer asks, grinning. She yanks Rogue to her feet and tears the gag away from the girl's pretty face. "The girl that totally abandoned you at Weapon X is on her way here. And the best part of it is, she won't even recognize you. Doesn't have any idea who you are. What if she thinks you're the enemy? What if I make her believe that I subdued you and managed to save myself? You think she might kill you for messing with her head and the happy life she's created for herself?"
Rogue is crying. She had pushed Donovan as far from her mind as she possibly could, knowing that she would never see the girl again. But now she is going to see her and she might be the cause of Donovan's death. She closes her gorgeous green eyes and bows her head.
"You understand what's happening, don't you?" Jennifer asks. She lets go of Rogue and walks toward the window. "Today's the day you die. If Donovan doesn't show up, I'll kill you. If she does show, I'll kill you slowly and painfully. Either way, you're going to be wishing you'd never been born."
Suddenly, a huge figure crashes into the cabin, rendering the door to splinters. He looks up, revealing a bloody mug. He bares his sharp teeth at Jennifer. "How's it goin', Granger? Long time no see…"
"Sabretooth!" Jennifer gasps. Her mind flashes back to her gruesome mauling. She involuntarily screams and jumps back, forgetting about her new enhancements momentarily.
Donovan flies into the cabin quickly, looking around. She sees Sabretooth cornering another woman, someone looking more mechanical than human. She remembers the voice having a machine-like quality to it. She clenches her fists. "You did this! You called me out here?"
"Donovan, wait!" Warren shouts as he follows her inside. He spies Rogue tied up in the back of the cabin and heads toward her. "You okay, honey?" he asks as he unties her. "What's going on here?"
Sabretooth turns and stares hard at Donovan, as though not recognizing her this time. He is salivating heavily, anticipating the potential fresh kills surrounding him. He lunges for her. "No way, dirt ball! She's mine!" Jennifer snaps out of her fear induced paralysis and draws her gun. She begins to shoot at him madly.
Donovan uses her wings as a shield when Sabretooth begins his assault, tearing and ripping at her. She feels the strange sensation that goes with being chipped and scratched at the same time. It's not exactly painful but it's not the most pleasant experience, either. Donovan throws her shoulder against the bulk of Sabretooth in her fury. "What the hell is going on here?"
1407 GREYMALKIN LANE:
X-Men, to me! We have a crisis! Professor Charles Xavier's voice practically screams into the heads of the X-Men, an elite group of mutants attending the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters. In full uniform in the library in less than five!
The whole team is assembled in less than three minutes. Cyclops and Marvel Girl are there first, looking very flustered. Wolverine is next, takes one whiff of the couple and starts to growl. It's apparent what they'd been up to all night. Storm and the Beast follow Wolverine, take one look at each other, and move to opposite sides of the room. Colossus plows into the room in his armored form, followed by Gambit, who's sleepy but dressed. Kitty Pryde sneaks into the library as well.
"Before I address the issue, I'd like all non-active members of the team to return to her bedroom," Charles says curtly, glaring at Kitty.
"You gave the call in my head, too, though!" Kitty exclaims. Her mother allowed her to enroll in the school only under strict assurances that her training would be restricted to power control. After what had happened to the former Iceman, who had been terribly wounded on a mission, the school is under hard scrutiny and Kitty's activities are monitored on a fairly regular basis. "That must mean, subconsciously, you want me to go on this mission!"
"That means, young lady, that I am tired and under a considerable amount of stress and made a grave error. Now, return to your room or I will have you escorted there," Xavier snaps. He rubs his temples and watches Kitty leave. "Now that I have your complete and undivided attention, we need to head out to the Canadian Rockies in regards to unresolved issues with the Weapon X program.
"What?" Wolverine shouts. His claws burst from his knuckles. "Those slimy sons of…"
"Not them, exactly. I sense the activities of Sabretooth and Rogue, as well as three other mutants in a great struggle directly related to the incidents that occurred at the facility," Charles explains.
Wolverine is growling viciously. "This just gets better'n better. Sabretooth's involved?"
"Uh, s'cuse me for de interruption, but if dat maniac's involved, I'd really like t' be left behind on dis mission, neh? Me an' him don't get along so good," Gambit says quietly. He shivers at the thought of having to face that nightmare of a man again.
"The only way you're going to conquer your fear is to face it, my friend," Colossus says. "Don't worry. We'll be there to watch your back."
Gambit shakes his head but doesn't argue. He leans against the table. "Move out, people. We don't have much time," Xavier barks.
EN ROUTE TO GREAT SLAVE LAKE:
Cyclops is piloting the Blackbird with Colossus at his side as the co-pilot. He is using the mini-Cerebro tracking unit to locate the group of individuals. Marvel Girl is leaning over his seat and talking softly into his ear. She could easily just converse with him telepathically but prefers to use her own voice in light of the recent complications regarding her psychic abilities.
Gambit is trying to convince Beast and Storm to play a card game with him but neither is willing to do anything remotely friendly with the other. He sighs and decides to calm his nerves with a game of solitaire.
Wolverine is in the back of the jet, prowling. He is very angry, not just with the current crisis in the Rockies but with his annoyance at the Marvel Girl/Cyclops situation. He wants to kill Cyclops so badly that he can practically taste the man's blood on his lips already. But he calms his rage as he catches a new scent on the plane.
He sneaks up to a group of large storage bins and knocks off one of the lids. Kitty is curled up in it, staring up at Wolverine with a look of shock on her freckled face. "Hey, Logan. Hehe, what's up?"
"You after I throw ya from the plane!" Wolverine roars. "What the hell are ya doin' here? You heard the professor! Y' ain't t' go on any X-Men missions!"
Kitty climbs out of the bin quickly. "I know what he said. But you didn't feel him in your head the way I did. I don't think he really wants to me to stay at home while you guys are out fighting. I think he wants me to do this. To prove myself to you, him, and my mom so that I can be a real X-Man!"
"No, no, no," Wolverine snaps. "You're gonna stay right here on the Blackbird while we go out there and murder us some Weapon X scumbags."
"But, Logan!" Kitty cries. She follows him to the main passenger area. She ignores the shocked expressions on the rest of the team's faces. "Hank, listen to me. I think the professor wants me to be part of the active roster. That's why he called me tonight and pretended it was an accident! And he would have detected me listening at the door when he was talking. He would have known I was thinking about jumping into the storage area on the Blackbird! He's one of the most powerful psychics in the world!"
Storm shakes her head. "You certainly know who to preach to, kid," she narrows her eyes in Beast's direction.
"Give it a rest, Ororo," Beast says angrily. He looks into Kitty's eyes. "If you think you're being manipulated, Kitty, why let it happen?" Kitty doesn't respond. Beast looks at Storm and sighs. "I think that maybe I've been wrong. Although not in the way that you want me to be."
Kitty realizes that she's been forgotten. She breathes out in exasperation and hurries after Wolverine. Storm moves to sit across from Beast. "In what way have you been wrong, then?"
Beast reaches out and takes Storm's hand. She flinches slightly but then grips it tightly. The feeling of it makes Beast's heart soar. "Perhaps the professor is manipulating us, as some of us are starting to believe. But if so, why should I just assume it's for purposes other than a good one? Yes, Bobby was hurt but only trying to defend you. If the professor hadn't given him that nudge, you may have died. We all may have. Bobby was hurt but he knew what he was getting into when he got into the superhero game. And the fact that we've all grown since enrolling here must be more of a beneficial nudge than a malicious one. None of us were very mentally stable when we got here but his help has set us on the paths to becoming better people."
There are tears in Storm's eyes. "What about us, though? Why would the professor make me love you, Hank?"
Beast shakes his head. "Maybe he didn't… maybe you genuinely do love me… and I was too insecure to fathom why you might."
Storm throws her arms around Beast. They stay together like that for the rest of the flight.
A/N: the Ultimate Universe X-Men are created by Marvel, obviously, but this version of them was actually based on two stories written by an author on this site called Kizmet (user ID: 28797). The stories, Road's End and School and Home, introduced Remy LeBeau, aka Gambit, into the X-Men. With his permission of course, I used his stories as a kind of past history for this story. So his stories, as well as my own Wrong Crowd can be considered prequels for this fiction. I hope you read and enjoy his work as much as I did!