Part 5
Jealousy overwhelmed Adam as he watched Emma and Brennan huddled in a corner, talking in low tones. The one time he'd approached them they'd looked at him with almost identically haunted eyes, and Adam had been forced into the realization that although he'd been the one to instigate the search and rescue for them all, the young mutants were bound together in a way he could never understand, sharing the same feelings of what, relief, joy, and violation? Anger and hatred? He didn't know, and never truly would.
So instead of spending the time while the child rested reuniting with his two walking wounded team members, he retreated to the kitchen and there found Magarathea huddled over a mug of hot chocolate. She looked tired and drawn, suddenly years older than her usual cold and hard façade indicated.
Quietly, Adam got himself a coffee and sat down opposite her. She stared intently at him for a moment, the shield rearing back up before she seemed to come to a decision that there was nothing to hide from here and now.
"So," Adam began, "I can take it that the child, the boy, was responsible for the fact that my people escaped the explosion unscathed."
"Not unscathed." Magarathea's voice was harsh, but with what, Adam couldn't tell. "I was caught in it as well, and he healed me. "
"But?" Adam prompted.
Magarathea sighed heavily. "But my own psionic defences were shattered and they were. they were all screaming. The feral was screaming so much, I - Daryl had no choice but to kill or cure them, and he could never kill."
"Daryl? The boy?"
"My son. He nearly died trying to save your. people in order to save me. Your molecular was so badly burned, healing him was almost more than Daryl could take."
"But you sold them. How could you do something like that?"
Magarathea shrugged and looked Adam straight in the eye. "It's what I do, and I'll keep on doing it. Supplying whatever is demanded. Whether it's slaves, guns, information or holy water." She stiffened slightly, eyes unfocussed for a second. "He's ready."
And that was, apparently, the end of discussion.
Daryl's entry into Shalimar's cell was cautious, and it seemed that his caution was not unfounded when the feral yowled, eyes blazing as her territory was invaded. Adam was interested to see Jesse placing himself between Daryl and Shalimar, his arms up towards Shalimar as if to defend himself.
The feral prowled back and forth as Jesse kept himself between her and the boy, and Adam wondered how much of the world Jesse was actually aware of, or whether it was strictly Shalimar he was reacting to.
In the end, it was Daryl who took matters into his own hands, stepping right through Jesse to lay hands on Shalimar who hissed and writhed in anger and terror as the glow surrounded her, her protestations rising to a howl that ended abruptly as she fell to the floor.
Adam, with Emma materializing hard on his heels, opened the cell up to see to Shalimar, but the feral was already stirring, panic on her face.
"Where is he?" she cried, looking straight at Adam. "Where's Jesse, what have you done with him?"
Adam glanced at the spot where he'd last seen the molecular, but there was no sign. Brennan followed Emma in, and Shalimar threw herself at him. "I thought you were dead!" She hugged him tightly, and Brennan returned the hug with as much force while Emma held on to them both.
And Adam was standing on the sidelines once more.
A flutter at the edge of his vision, and Adam saw Jesse very briefly standing by the group hug, his face screwed up in anguish as his hand went straight through Shalimar's hair. Jesse too was apart, unable to join in, and Adam tried to touch him with as little success, his effort going ignored before Jesse flickered and phased and vanished.
Adam was fairly certain that Jesse hadn't dissipated, was just invisible as he'd been on and off since Adam had first rediscovered him. The only worrying thing was that Shalimar could no longer sense him, although it seemed that Emma could feel traces.
"We need to understand what happened," Adam said, "to understand what's happening here." He looked at Magarathea, silently inviting her to fill in the gaps since she seemed to be the only one who retained any memory of the explosion.
Scowling, she complied, explaining that she had sent a psionic burst out reflexively, her power being the ability to augment or suppress a mutant's power within the scope of their current abilities. The burst she had projected had apparently pushed each of their abilities to the maximum possible level within their current mutations, without consideration for sanity, morality or physical capability.
"I guess we should be grateful that Jesse didn't just mass into a solid lump," remarked Brennan.
"So how do we get him back," hissed Shalimar, her expression making it clear that she blamed Adam for everything.
"Well," began Adam slowly, trying to think of anything that might help that didn't involve Magarathea's powers as, without knowing where Jesse was, she would only be able to send out a broadband blast which would disable them all. And with the boy to lay hands as well, any damage would only be exacerbated. There were just too many unknown quantities.
Emma broke in. "Shal, why don't you concentrate on Jesse and I'll try and reinforce your senses?" she suggested.
"You're sure he's here somewhere, right?" Brennan asked. "So we just need for him to appear long enough for the kid and the, uh, her to their stuff."
"Appear solid for long enough," Magarathea interjected. "We can't heal what he can't touch."
"But Jesse phases before human contact," Adam pointed out.
"Before you can make contact," snapped Shalimar so sharply, Adam couldn't help but flinch. "I won't have that problem."
It really didn't take long for Jesse to materialize in front of Shalimar, although when she tried to touch him her hands passed straight through. But she talked to him, and Emma and Brennan were both there supporting, gently encouraging as Shalimar and Jesse sat, palm to palm, until she whispered with a hesitant joy. "I can feel you!"
At her words Daryl was there, wrapping his small hands around theirs, using Shalimar as an anchor, while Magarathea's face was rigid with effort and the glow enveloped Jesse, sending him into a wild frenzy of phasing and massing.
At first it was a silent scream, but as the magic worked they could hear him, fuzzy at first but growing clearer, like tuning a radio. Finally, yelling loud and clear, he fell into Shalimar's lap. She stroked his hair back as he gasped for breath. "You ? I'm here?" he asked.
"Yes, sweetheart, you're here." Shalimar looked at Emma and Brennan and amended, "We're all here."
*****
Watching his team huddled together in the meditation room, Adam once again felt pangs of jealousy at not being a part of them. They were talking in low voices, touching each other constantly as if to reassure themselves that they were still there. Occasionally one or another's voice would rise in anger or anguish, which would result in a spontaneous group hug.
In some ways Adam was grateful. As well as going through the whole reuniting and rediscovery of each other, they were clearly counselling each other too which had to be a big help for each of them in the healing process. Brennan possibly had the easiest transition back to reality, but he'd apparently done some appalling things that could make it hardest to forgive himself. Whereas Emma and Jesse both had the most difficult road back to reality having been cut off from it for so long, and Shalimar surely had to deal with deep issues of violation and degradation.
Adam wanted to help them and he knew he could, if they'd just let him. Why had he never realized before now that he cared so deeply, that it could hurt this much?
"You always have, dear," Magda was leaning against the opposite wall, cigarette in mouth, arms folded. "You've always been a soft touch for those kids of yours. And I don't just mean those four, the rest of them too. Feeling guilty?"
"Wouldn't you?"
Magda shrugged. "It's you we're talking about." She peered past Adam through the doorway into the meditation room. "Doesn't seem fair, does it?" she said, taking a drag before pulling the cigarette from her mouth and glaring at it.
"What doesn't?" Adam frowned.
"That I can't seem to find a nicotine rush in the eternal fag, and you don't seem to be deserving of their gratitude."
"I don't deserve their gratitude," Adam protested. "That's not what this is about!"
Magda cocked her head at him. "Sure? Because it seems to me that you've done a hell of a lot for them kids recently for no personal gain. Or am I wrong?"
"No, you're right," Adam admitted, "but I've never expected anything from them."
"Now I know that's a lie," Magda snorted.
Adam chuckled slightly. "You mean the expectation that they'll help me make the world a better place, etcetera, etcetera?"
"Yadda yadda. That's the one."
"Maybe. But on a personal level I've never expected anything from them."
"And that would be another lie."
Rolling his eyes in exasperation, Adam retorted, "No, it's not!"
"All together, boys and girls, oh yes it is." Magda waved her cigarette in the air. "You've virtually dragged Shalimar and Jesse up by yourself and the other two might as well have been overgrown little orphan Annies when they arrived here."
"You're reaching," Adam told her, not feeling quite as confident as he sounded. "Jesse and Shalimar both had their own families around to do the parenting thing so don't lay that at my doorstep. And Emma and Brennan are both very mature young adults."
"Pah!" Magda choked on her phantom smoke. "Shalimar's father had no business raising gerbils, much less kids, the way he treated that girl. And as for Jesse, his family may well have more money than God, but the mental abuse of a child is still a crime. The psionic bint was a scared child when she got here and Sparky was trouble trying very hard to happen. It's you that's turned them all around, Doc, and don't you dare give yourself any less credit than you deserve." Magda sniffed, seeming as surprised as Adam at her outburst. "So there," she finished, as if that were that.
Adam couldn't find anything in what she'd said that he could disagree with and, as Magda vanished, he was stuck with the thought that no matter what the kids had been through, he really didn't deserve to be excluded like this.
*****
Thinking how stupid he was to be feeling so nervous, Adam resolved to talk to his team. He tracked them down in the dojo, using the training platform as a lounge area. But he was stopped in his tracks when they abruptly ceased talking and turned to him as one, with sad and haunted eyes.
"What's going on?" he asked a little nervously as they moved into the positions he recognized their classic defensive battle stances - Jesse at the front, ready to mass and defend, Shalimar and Brennan slightly behind and to either side ready to both defend and attack, while Emma stood at the back, protected by the others but ready to attack.
Shalimar's eyes glowed as she broke the silence. "You're not welcome here."
"You hurt us," Brennan spat.
"Made us hurt each other," Jesse added.
"Get out," said Emma, a bubble forming ready to blast. "Get out of him and get out of here."
"Excuse me?" But no one was talking anymore as Emma's blast came straight at him. Throwing himself to the side, Adam called for backup, relieved to hear Natasha's declaration that she'd taken over the internal systems and the boys' announcement that they were on their way.
Sanctuary's internal defence systems came online and Jesse was kept busy deflecting the lasers as best he could. Adam was trapped by Shalimar and Brennan, with Emma bearing down on him, when a blast of air knocked them all off their feet and a shield of rock appeared between Adam and his attackers.
Emma was the fastest to recover, a psionic blast aimed straight at David who had no time to duck. But it seemed to have no effect. Emma seemed shocked, and aimed another at Corey who, although he spun away, caught a glancing blow that also seemed ineffective.
To Adam's practiced eye, his first team were unsure, unbalanced and uncoordinated, which was only to be expected given their experiences, but it was painful to see them all so clearly off kilter and hurting. And what had possessed them to attack him? He didn't want to see them hurt anymore, and with every whirlwind David produced, every missile Corey threw, every laser Natasha fired, he held his breath expecting the worst.
And behind his first team, Magarathea and her boy stood unmoving and silent, looking on with detached interest.
Jesse cried out as a stray laser slashed his arm when he took a breath, while Brennan was horribly silent while he suffocated and Shalimar howled at her own ineffectiveness, pinned to the wall by rock.
Adam looked on, full of panic and confusion, and completely out of control of a situation where he needed to be in charge.
*****
Then Magarathea stretched out an arm towards him and he felt an internal tug before the world stopped. Completely. Rock and paper and Jesse, mid- kick, froze in mid-air, while Magarathea walked among his first team, touching and whispering to each one of them. They all seemed unaware except for him and he couldn't fathom why.
"That's because it's your power she's used," Magda leaned against Adam's rock shield, and he found that although he couldn't move, he could talk. "No you can't," Magda disagreed. "You just think you can. Thought's a powerful thing, you know."
"What do you mean, my power?"
"Well, okay, not yours then. Mine."
"But you're a ghost."
"Well," Magda looked up speculatively. "That depends on how you define ghost. I mean, I am real. But then again, only you can see me."
"I don't understand!" Adam groaned. "What. Is. Happening!"
"Well, let's start with Magda here, shall we? If I'd picked anyone else to use, and you have a lot of ghosts in that noggin of yours, you'd have tied yourself in knots trying to find any anomalies in your own make up. As it is, you just accepted me."
"You mean, you're not Magda?"
"Congratulations, mastermind. I mean, I took her almost wholly from your memories, and she was a smart cookie, so it's been fun playing games with you. But no. You do know me, though. We had fun with your team. Don't you remember?"
Something, an echo of a memory suppressed, a curtain drawing back and oh God! Memories of Jesse screaming, and Brennan crying. Of Brennan writhing in agony and Jesse lying shattered. Shalimar throwing herself at the bars of her cell until she bled in her efforts to get to the boys, of Emma's constant weeping. And Magarathea's boy-child healing them so they could start all over again.
Now he knew why they hated him so much. He couldn't have done all that, could he? The mere idea sickened him, the memories would have made him nauseous if time weren't stopped.
"Absalom," he muttered, knowing now who had been responsible right from the beginning. All the time he'd thought he'd been the good guy. And he'd just been a marionette for the bad guy.
"Well done again," Magda. no, Absalom using Magda's form, sneered. "Took you long enough."
"How long have you been in my head?" Adam asked, trying to think when the parasite might have taken him over, knowing the answer but needing it ratified.
"Why, since I invaded Sanctuary when that brat of yours phased my previous host into the wall. I didn't exactly have a lot of choice, what with you being the only non-mutant around at the time. Apart from that ever so brief interlude when the ice-queen over there lost control of her kid."
Adam was at the complete and utter mercy of Absalom, and could see no way of turning this into happy ending. "So what happens now?"
Absalom looked through the rock shield. "Well, I'd say the hard bitch has just about finished giving your boys and girls a pep talk. So either you kill them, or they kill you, and I know which option I'm not letting you choose. Don't worry about the psionic chick, she can't hurt any of us while I'm about. So I say let the rest of them nuke each other, while we take care of 'Thea and her brat."
"Do I have any choice?" Adam desperately tried to think of something, anything to get them out of this. Even if it meant he had to die. It would be the least he owed them.
"Not while I'm in here," Absalom chuckled and vanished as time resumed.
Adam spotted his solution at a nearby console; a loose wire, several thousand volts of electricity and the mutants could carry on without either himself or Absalom.
But thought is faster than physical action ever could be, and Adam was stopped in his tracks before he even started, Absalom chuckling in his mind as they watched the battle taking place. Which left Adam feeling helpless as a newborn.
Emma sent blast after blast of ever increasing psionic energy at David and Corey as well as Adam, with no effect. Brennan, his lips turning blue, found the deep well of his power and sent a rocket blast of electricity at Shalimar, shattering her prison so that she in turn, with superhuman speed and agility, could take out both David and Corey in one long, graceful sequence. Jesse in the meantime massed to deflect the lasers from the combatants and as the last one fell, phased into the wall to disable the wiring, leaving Natasha blind and helpless in the control room.
With what sounded suspiciously like a squeak, Absalom released Adam from his temporary freeze and bade him run. Away from those who would kill him, away from Sanctuary, and Adam had no choice but to obey.
But what about Magarathea? Adam thought as he ran. You wanted her dead.
I still do, Absalom replied, but her power makes her as powerful as her enemy plus one degree. That makes her more powerful than I, and your second team was not as powerful as I'd hoped. She can wait.
Adam skidded to a stop, his way barred by Daryl who simply stood and stared at him with his customary silent intensity, and to Adam's bewilderment, he realised that Absalom was scared. Scared of a mute little boy with the power to heal. Absalom urged him to run, but Adam stood his ground. It was much harder for Absalom to force him to physically do something than to stop him. Calling upon his not inconsiderable willpower, Adam concentrated on making his knees buckle, falling slowly to the floor, making Absalom's will that much harder to bring to bear. But Absalom was not yet out of options, reinforcing his will with iron sharp spikes of pain that brought tears to Adam eyes.
Absalom couldn't make him run, but Adam's will was weakening against the powerful onslaught, his body crawling away from the unmoving statue that was the boy.
Feet and shoes entered his wavering vision and he squinted up to see four pairs of eyes staring back down and he was winning the battle, losing the war, and everything was such a mess and it all hurt like he'd never believed possible.
A small hand touched his cheek and Adam screamed as Absalom screamed, the ripping apart of two minds more than he could bear. For a moment he felt light as air as Absalom left him, quickly followed by an oppressive pressure that had him pressed to the floor. The only thing he could see was his own hand, the skin bearing the red and black markings that were Jesse's massed trademark, blue lightning skipping over the top, while unsolicited thoughts of bank vaults and brick walls battered at his mind. And in the distance he could hear Absalom screaming, but it wasn't him anymore.
Eventually the pressure lifted leaving him weak and exhausted, and Adam felt as if he'd burst into tears at any second when Shalimar lifted his head onto her lap, her eyes still haunted, yet mixed with worry for him. He looked about and the others were there, guarded and wary, yet concerned. For him.
*****
In the meditation room, Adam allowed the soft trickling water to soothe his soul and help his mind calm its chaotic tumbling. Satisfied that they could look after themselves, Natasha, Corey and David had said their goodbyes and taken their leave.
The battle for his mind had not been an easy one and a dead-eyed Magarathea had taken her son away. The child had burnt himself out and his mother had held little hope of recovery. But perhaps that would be for the best, for the reason that Magarathea needed the money she made was that Daryl could heal everyone of anything, but could not heal his own wasting body.
Absalom, though, was well and truly dead and Emma had come close to burning herself out too with her psionic shield, only the added support from Brennan and Jesse helping her keep her defences and mind intact. After three days, she still mostly slept.
They were all walking around like open sores, each largely eschewing the others' company in favour of solitude. Except Jesse, who seemed to need to be with someone or something that could reassure him he was still a part of the world at all times.
Somewhere, probably the dojo, Adam could hear Shalimar and Brennan arguing over something, their voices quieting quickly, meaning it was no doubt something trivial. They were all healing slowly but surely, and at the end, Adam had a certain parental pride in the way they'd handled themselves.
Absalom had recreated Magda from his memories, so Adam felt no guilt or worry that some of what she'd said made sense. In one way or another, each one of those four young people were his children, and there was nothing wrong in taking a paternal pride in anything they did and no shame in caring about each of them as if they were his own.
He looked at the ring glinting silver on his finger, then took a good look at his surroundings. Today they'd each taken their rings back, and for the first time he noticed that the plants around the pond were blooming, their vibrancy echoed in the colours of the fish.
FINIS
Jealousy overwhelmed Adam as he watched Emma and Brennan huddled in a corner, talking in low tones. The one time he'd approached them they'd looked at him with almost identically haunted eyes, and Adam had been forced into the realization that although he'd been the one to instigate the search and rescue for them all, the young mutants were bound together in a way he could never understand, sharing the same feelings of what, relief, joy, and violation? Anger and hatred? He didn't know, and never truly would.
So instead of spending the time while the child rested reuniting with his two walking wounded team members, he retreated to the kitchen and there found Magarathea huddled over a mug of hot chocolate. She looked tired and drawn, suddenly years older than her usual cold and hard façade indicated.
Quietly, Adam got himself a coffee and sat down opposite her. She stared intently at him for a moment, the shield rearing back up before she seemed to come to a decision that there was nothing to hide from here and now.
"So," Adam began, "I can take it that the child, the boy, was responsible for the fact that my people escaped the explosion unscathed."
"Not unscathed." Magarathea's voice was harsh, but with what, Adam couldn't tell. "I was caught in it as well, and he healed me. "
"But?" Adam prompted.
Magarathea sighed heavily. "But my own psionic defences were shattered and they were. they were all screaming. The feral was screaming so much, I - Daryl had no choice but to kill or cure them, and he could never kill."
"Daryl? The boy?"
"My son. He nearly died trying to save your. people in order to save me. Your molecular was so badly burned, healing him was almost more than Daryl could take."
"But you sold them. How could you do something like that?"
Magarathea shrugged and looked Adam straight in the eye. "It's what I do, and I'll keep on doing it. Supplying whatever is demanded. Whether it's slaves, guns, information or holy water." She stiffened slightly, eyes unfocussed for a second. "He's ready."
And that was, apparently, the end of discussion.
Daryl's entry into Shalimar's cell was cautious, and it seemed that his caution was not unfounded when the feral yowled, eyes blazing as her territory was invaded. Adam was interested to see Jesse placing himself between Daryl and Shalimar, his arms up towards Shalimar as if to defend himself.
The feral prowled back and forth as Jesse kept himself between her and the boy, and Adam wondered how much of the world Jesse was actually aware of, or whether it was strictly Shalimar he was reacting to.
In the end, it was Daryl who took matters into his own hands, stepping right through Jesse to lay hands on Shalimar who hissed and writhed in anger and terror as the glow surrounded her, her protestations rising to a howl that ended abruptly as she fell to the floor.
Adam, with Emma materializing hard on his heels, opened the cell up to see to Shalimar, but the feral was already stirring, panic on her face.
"Where is he?" she cried, looking straight at Adam. "Where's Jesse, what have you done with him?"
Adam glanced at the spot where he'd last seen the molecular, but there was no sign. Brennan followed Emma in, and Shalimar threw herself at him. "I thought you were dead!" She hugged him tightly, and Brennan returned the hug with as much force while Emma held on to them both.
And Adam was standing on the sidelines once more.
A flutter at the edge of his vision, and Adam saw Jesse very briefly standing by the group hug, his face screwed up in anguish as his hand went straight through Shalimar's hair. Jesse too was apart, unable to join in, and Adam tried to touch him with as little success, his effort going ignored before Jesse flickered and phased and vanished.
Adam was fairly certain that Jesse hadn't dissipated, was just invisible as he'd been on and off since Adam had first rediscovered him. The only worrying thing was that Shalimar could no longer sense him, although it seemed that Emma could feel traces.
"We need to understand what happened," Adam said, "to understand what's happening here." He looked at Magarathea, silently inviting her to fill in the gaps since she seemed to be the only one who retained any memory of the explosion.
Scowling, she complied, explaining that she had sent a psionic burst out reflexively, her power being the ability to augment or suppress a mutant's power within the scope of their current abilities. The burst she had projected had apparently pushed each of their abilities to the maximum possible level within their current mutations, without consideration for sanity, morality or physical capability.
"I guess we should be grateful that Jesse didn't just mass into a solid lump," remarked Brennan.
"So how do we get him back," hissed Shalimar, her expression making it clear that she blamed Adam for everything.
"Well," began Adam slowly, trying to think of anything that might help that didn't involve Magarathea's powers as, without knowing where Jesse was, she would only be able to send out a broadband blast which would disable them all. And with the boy to lay hands as well, any damage would only be exacerbated. There were just too many unknown quantities.
Emma broke in. "Shal, why don't you concentrate on Jesse and I'll try and reinforce your senses?" she suggested.
"You're sure he's here somewhere, right?" Brennan asked. "So we just need for him to appear long enough for the kid and the, uh, her to their stuff."
"Appear solid for long enough," Magarathea interjected. "We can't heal what he can't touch."
"But Jesse phases before human contact," Adam pointed out.
"Before you can make contact," snapped Shalimar so sharply, Adam couldn't help but flinch. "I won't have that problem."
It really didn't take long for Jesse to materialize in front of Shalimar, although when she tried to touch him her hands passed straight through. But she talked to him, and Emma and Brennan were both there supporting, gently encouraging as Shalimar and Jesse sat, palm to palm, until she whispered with a hesitant joy. "I can feel you!"
At her words Daryl was there, wrapping his small hands around theirs, using Shalimar as an anchor, while Magarathea's face was rigid with effort and the glow enveloped Jesse, sending him into a wild frenzy of phasing and massing.
At first it was a silent scream, but as the magic worked they could hear him, fuzzy at first but growing clearer, like tuning a radio. Finally, yelling loud and clear, he fell into Shalimar's lap. She stroked his hair back as he gasped for breath. "You ? I'm here?" he asked.
"Yes, sweetheart, you're here." Shalimar looked at Emma and Brennan and amended, "We're all here."
*****
Watching his team huddled together in the meditation room, Adam once again felt pangs of jealousy at not being a part of them. They were talking in low voices, touching each other constantly as if to reassure themselves that they were still there. Occasionally one or another's voice would rise in anger or anguish, which would result in a spontaneous group hug.
In some ways Adam was grateful. As well as going through the whole reuniting and rediscovery of each other, they were clearly counselling each other too which had to be a big help for each of them in the healing process. Brennan possibly had the easiest transition back to reality, but he'd apparently done some appalling things that could make it hardest to forgive himself. Whereas Emma and Jesse both had the most difficult road back to reality having been cut off from it for so long, and Shalimar surely had to deal with deep issues of violation and degradation.
Adam wanted to help them and he knew he could, if they'd just let him. Why had he never realized before now that he cared so deeply, that it could hurt this much?
"You always have, dear," Magda was leaning against the opposite wall, cigarette in mouth, arms folded. "You've always been a soft touch for those kids of yours. And I don't just mean those four, the rest of them too. Feeling guilty?"
"Wouldn't you?"
Magda shrugged. "It's you we're talking about." She peered past Adam through the doorway into the meditation room. "Doesn't seem fair, does it?" she said, taking a drag before pulling the cigarette from her mouth and glaring at it.
"What doesn't?" Adam frowned.
"That I can't seem to find a nicotine rush in the eternal fag, and you don't seem to be deserving of their gratitude."
"I don't deserve their gratitude," Adam protested. "That's not what this is about!"
Magda cocked her head at him. "Sure? Because it seems to me that you've done a hell of a lot for them kids recently for no personal gain. Or am I wrong?"
"No, you're right," Adam admitted, "but I've never expected anything from them."
"Now I know that's a lie," Magda snorted.
Adam chuckled slightly. "You mean the expectation that they'll help me make the world a better place, etcetera, etcetera?"
"Yadda yadda. That's the one."
"Maybe. But on a personal level I've never expected anything from them."
"And that would be another lie."
Rolling his eyes in exasperation, Adam retorted, "No, it's not!"
"All together, boys and girls, oh yes it is." Magda waved her cigarette in the air. "You've virtually dragged Shalimar and Jesse up by yourself and the other two might as well have been overgrown little orphan Annies when they arrived here."
"You're reaching," Adam told her, not feeling quite as confident as he sounded. "Jesse and Shalimar both had their own families around to do the parenting thing so don't lay that at my doorstep. And Emma and Brennan are both very mature young adults."
"Pah!" Magda choked on her phantom smoke. "Shalimar's father had no business raising gerbils, much less kids, the way he treated that girl. And as for Jesse, his family may well have more money than God, but the mental abuse of a child is still a crime. The psionic bint was a scared child when she got here and Sparky was trouble trying very hard to happen. It's you that's turned them all around, Doc, and don't you dare give yourself any less credit than you deserve." Magda sniffed, seeming as surprised as Adam at her outburst. "So there," she finished, as if that were that.
Adam couldn't find anything in what she'd said that he could disagree with and, as Magda vanished, he was stuck with the thought that no matter what the kids had been through, he really didn't deserve to be excluded like this.
*****
Thinking how stupid he was to be feeling so nervous, Adam resolved to talk to his team. He tracked them down in the dojo, using the training platform as a lounge area. But he was stopped in his tracks when they abruptly ceased talking and turned to him as one, with sad and haunted eyes.
"What's going on?" he asked a little nervously as they moved into the positions he recognized their classic defensive battle stances - Jesse at the front, ready to mass and defend, Shalimar and Brennan slightly behind and to either side ready to both defend and attack, while Emma stood at the back, protected by the others but ready to attack.
Shalimar's eyes glowed as she broke the silence. "You're not welcome here."
"You hurt us," Brennan spat.
"Made us hurt each other," Jesse added.
"Get out," said Emma, a bubble forming ready to blast. "Get out of him and get out of here."
"Excuse me?" But no one was talking anymore as Emma's blast came straight at him. Throwing himself to the side, Adam called for backup, relieved to hear Natasha's declaration that she'd taken over the internal systems and the boys' announcement that they were on their way.
Sanctuary's internal defence systems came online and Jesse was kept busy deflecting the lasers as best he could. Adam was trapped by Shalimar and Brennan, with Emma bearing down on him, when a blast of air knocked them all off their feet and a shield of rock appeared between Adam and his attackers.
Emma was the fastest to recover, a psionic blast aimed straight at David who had no time to duck. But it seemed to have no effect. Emma seemed shocked, and aimed another at Corey who, although he spun away, caught a glancing blow that also seemed ineffective.
To Adam's practiced eye, his first team were unsure, unbalanced and uncoordinated, which was only to be expected given their experiences, but it was painful to see them all so clearly off kilter and hurting. And what had possessed them to attack him? He didn't want to see them hurt anymore, and with every whirlwind David produced, every missile Corey threw, every laser Natasha fired, he held his breath expecting the worst.
And behind his first team, Magarathea and her boy stood unmoving and silent, looking on with detached interest.
Jesse cried out as a stray laser slashed his arm when he took a breath, while Brennan was horribly silent while he suffocated and Shalimar howled at her own ineffectiveness, pinned to the wall by rock.
Adam looked on, full of panic and confusion, and completely out of control of a situation where he needed to be in charge.
*****
Then Magarathea stretched out an arm towards him and he felt an internal tug before the world stopped. Completely. Rock and paper and Jesse, mid- kick, froze in mid-air, while Magarathea walked among his first team, touching and whispering to each one of them. They all seemed unaware except for him and he couldn't fathom why.
"That's because it's your power she's used," Magda leaned against Adam's rock shield, and he found that although he couldn't move, he could talk. "No you can't," Magda disagreed. "You just think you can. Thought's a powerful thing, you know."
"What do you mean, my power?"
"Well, okay, not yours then. Mine."
"But you're a ghost."
"Well," Magda looked up speculatively. "That depends on how you define ghost. I mean, I am real. But then again, only you can see me."
"I don't understand!" Adam groaned. "What. Is. Happening!"
"Well, let's start with Magda here, shall we? If I'd picked anyone else to use, and you have a lot of ghosts in that noggin of yours, you'd have tied yourself in knots trying to find any anomalies in your own make up. As it is, you just accepted me."
"You mean, you're not Magda?"
"Congratulations, mastermind. I mean, I took her almost wholly from your memories, and she was a smart cookie, so it's been fun playing games with you. But no. You do know me, though. We had fun with your team. Don't you remember?"
Something, an echo of a memory suppressed, a curtain drawing back and oh God! Memories of Jesse screaming, and Brennan crying. Of Brennan writhing in agony and Jesse lying shattered. Shalimar throwing herself at the bars of her cell until she bled in her efforts to get to the boys, of Emma's constant weeping. And Magarathea's boy-child healing them so they could start all over again.
Now he knew why they hated him so much. He couldn't have done all that, could he? The mere idea sickened him, the memories would have made him nauseous if time weren't stopped.
"Absalom," he muttered, knowing now who had been responsible right from the beginning. All the time he'd thought he'd been the good guy. And he'd just been a marionette for the bad guy.
"Well done again," Magda. no, Absalom using Magda's form, sneered. "Took you long enough."
"How long have you been in my head?" Adam asked, trying to think when the parasite might have taken him over, knowing the answer but needing it ratified.
"Why, since I invaded Sanctuary when that brat of yours phased my previous host into the wall. I didn't exactly have a lot of choice, what with you being the only non-mutant around at the time. Apart from that ever so brief interlude when the ice-queen over there lost control of her kid."
Adam was at the complete and utter mercy of Absalom, and could see no way of turning this into happy ending. "So what happens now?"
Absalom looked through the rock shield. "Well, I'd say the hard bitch has just about finished giving your boys and girls a pep talk. So either you kill them, or they kill you, and I know which option I'm not letting you choose. Don't worry about the psionic chick, she can't hurt any of us while I'm about. So I say let the rest of them nuke each other, while we take care of 'Thea and her brat."
"Do I have any choice?" Adam desperately tried to think of something, anything to get them out of this. Even if it meant he had to die. It would be the least he owed them.
"Not while I'm in here," Absalom chuckled and vanished as time resumed.
Adam spotted his solution at a nearby console; a loose wire, several thousand volts of electricity and the mutants could carry on without either himself or Absalom.
But thought is faster than physical action ever could be, and Adam was stopped in his tracks before he even started, Absalom chuckling in his mind as they watched the battle taking place. Which left Adam feeling helpless as a newborn.
Emma sent blast after blast of ever increasing psionic energy at David and Corey as well as Adam, with no effect. Brennan, his lips turning blue, found the deep well of his power and sent a rocket blast of electricity at Shalimar, shattering her prison so that she in turn, with superhuman speed and agility, could take out both David and Corey in one long, graceful sequence. Jesse in the meantime massed to deflect the lasers from the combatants and as the last one fell, phased into the wall to disable the wiring, leaving Natasha blind and helpless in the control room.
With what sounded suspiciously like a squeak, Absalom released Adam from his temporary freeze and bade him run. Away from those who would kill him, away from Sanctuary, and Adam had no choice but to obey.
But what about Magarathea? Adam thought as he ran. You wanted her dead.
I still do, Absalom replied, but her power makes her as powerful as her enemy plus one degree. That makes her more powerful than I, and your second team was not as powerful as I'd hoped. She can wait.
Adam skidded to a stop, his way barred by Daryl who simply stood and stared at him with his customary silent intensity, and to Adam's bewilderment, he realised that Absalom was scared. Scared of a mute little boy with the power to heal. Absalom urged him to run, but Adam stood his ground. It was much harder for Absalom to force him to physically do something than to stop him. Calling upon his not inconsiderable willpower, Adam concentrated on making his knees buckle, falling slowly to the floor, making Absalom's will that much harder to bring to bear. But Absalom was not yet out of options, reinforcing his will with iron sharp spikes of pain that brought tears to Adam eyes.
Absalom couldn't make him run, but Adam's will was weakening against the powerful onslaught, his body crawling away from the unmoving statue that was the boy.
Feet and shoes entered his wavering vision and he squinted up to see four pairs of eyes staring back down and he was winning the battle, losing the war, and everything was such a mess and it all hurt like he'd never believed possible.
A small hand touched his cheek and Adam screamed as Absalom screamed, the ripping apart of two minds more than he could bear. For a moment he felt light as air as Absalom left him, quickly followed by an oppressive pressure that had him pressed to the floor. The only thing he could see was his own hand, the skin bearing the red and black markings that were Jesse's massed trademark, blue lightning skipping over the top, while unsolicited thoughts of bank vaults and brick walls battered at his mind. And in the distance he could hear Absalom screaming, but it wasn't him anymore.
Eventually the pressure lifted leaving him weak and exhausted, and Adam felt as if he'd burst into tears at any second when Shalimar lifted his head onto her lap, her eyes still haunted, yet mixed with worry for him. He looked about and the others were there, guarded and wary, yet concerned. For him.
*****
In the meditation room, Adam allowed the soft trickling water to soothe his soul and help his mind calm its chaotic tumbling. Satisfied that they could look after themselves, Natasha, Corey and David had said their goodbyes and taken their leave.
The battle for his mind had not been an easy one and a dead-eyed Magarathea had taken her son away. The child had burnt himself out and his mother had held little hope of recovery. But perhaps that would be for the best, for the reason that Magarathea needed the money she made was that Daryl could heal everyone of anything, but could not heal his own wasting body.
Absalom, though, was well and truly dead and Emma had come close to burning herself out too with her psionic shield, only the added support from Brennan and Jesse helping her keep her defences and mind intact. After three days, she still mostly slept.
They were all walking around like open sores, each largely eschewing the others' company in favour of solitude. Except Jesse, who seemed to need to be with someone or something that could reassure him he was still a part of the world at all times.
Somewhere, probably the dojo, Adam could hear Shalimar and Brennan arguing over something, their voices quieting quickly, meaning it was no doubt something trivial. They were all healing slowly but surely, and at the end, Adam had a certain parental pride in the way they'd handled themselves.
Absalom had recreated Magda from his memories, so Adam felt no guilt or worry that some of what she'd said made sense. In one way or another, each one of those four young people were his children, and there was nothing wrong in taking a paternal pride in anything they did and no shame in caring about each of them as if they were his own.
He looked at the ring glinting silver on his finger, then took a good look at his surroundings. Today they'd each taken their rings back, and for the first time he noticed that the plants around the pond were blooming, their vibrancy echoed in the colours of the fish.
FINIS