If I'm Gone

By Colorain

Disclaimer: I don't own Mutant X or the characters. I apologize for any inaccuracies in setting up the medical procedures of Sanctuary; I haven't seen the show in ages and this was written at a time when I had. And any medical conditions I've described here, if I am wrong in what I've written about anything, please tell me and I'll do my best to correct them. Thank you. Set in Season One, when they only had one power each and decent hair/clothes . . . An AU, I suppose.

Shalimar left the lab in a mixture of confusion, anger, and a deep sadness. While Adam wasn't completely positive about Emma's condition, he had asked Shalimar to debrief the guys while he ran more tests. She had complied, with reluctance, of course. It was just a little difficult imagining Emma could be really sick and none of them had known. It made Shalimar think. Was there some great big flaw in the Mutant X team that they didn't even notice what was going on under their very noses?

Shalimar found Brennan and Jesse in the weight room, training. Jesse was holding a boxing pad. She felt sorry for him. Brennan was smashing at it with all his might. But he paused when Shalimar came in.

"Any news?" he asked, wiping the sweat off his face with a t-shirt. Shalimar smiled wryly.

"I was kinda hoping you wouldn't ask that." The guys exchanged puzzled looks before she continued. "Adam isn't positive on what's wrong with her. I was watching her vitals, and her white blood cell count seemed pretty abnormal." She paused. "He thinks it's leukemia."

~*~

Her head hurt; she knew that for certain. As Emma's eyes readjusted to use, she swore mentally. She was in Sanctuary. She couldn't remember getting there. She must have had a body scan when she was unconscious. Which meant . . .

Adam knew. She turned her head very carefully to look at him. He sat by her side, his arms hugging his head. He wasn't moving. Emma reached out a trembling hand and tried to brush away the lines etched so deeply in his forehead. He leaned into her touch. He was crying.

"I thought I asked you never to alter our minds without our consent, Emma." The tone was meant to be chiding, but they both knew that wasn't the main emotion occupying Adam's thoughts — and neither needed to be an empath to know what was.

Hurt. Intense, blinding, all-consuming hurt. And what pained Emma the most was that he wasn't angry with her, not even a little bit. He knew why she had done it. He understood. He just didn't want to believe it.

She could not even say she was sorry, because she wasn't. If given the opportunity again, she would not change a thing.

"If you had known, Adam, you would have tried to save me. Even if I asked you not to. I'm tired of being saved, Adam. It's time to let me fight my own battles. I'm not a baby anymore."

"But you are a baby!" Adam roared. His next words were more subdued, his breath catching in his throat. "You're my child, Emma, even if it's not by blood. I care for your safety. I would be a monster if I didn't. I'd be like . . . Mason if I didn't." Emma was pained. She knew how much Adam despised the man Eckhart had become. He hated the cold, calculating shell of a man. But what he feared most of all was that he might one day be like him.

"You're not Mason." she told him quietly. "He's a sick, sick man that will never be cured. But you can't beat yourself up over that. He's not your fault. Not everything can be fixed, Adam. Not everything can be okay."

Adam looked Emma straight on. "I want you to tell them, Emma." he said fiercely. "I want you to tell them how you lied to them."

~*~

They gathered by the reflecting pool. Assuming a basic yoga position, Emma centered herself before beginning to speak. She did not face the Mutant X team.

"I've known . . . " she began, "for four months. Four long, difficult months. I guess it started — well, after Caleb, really. I've always thought that the dead should stay dead. That those who came back needed to pay a price.

"Caleb's dependence on new mutant life force, his inability to form meaningful relationships — the realization that he was different, even from other new mutants. Those were his prices. And in paying them, look where they landed him. Death, again. But this time, there was no coming back.

"He was crazy; I don't doubt that. And I think he got that way because for him, death wasn't an issue. You become bored very quickly with life when there's never a 'last time'.

"But I'm getting off-track. He killed Pamela. He killed me. And I came back. And I couldn't help but wonder: why me? I realize it's because he hadn't had a chance to absorb my energy, but I found it incredibly hard to discover that I had been saved when others had not. I was no more worthy than the rest of them.

"Be quiet, Adam — I know you're desperate to tell me I'm a hero, and I was worthy, but I'm not going to believe you. I'm no hero. I'm just like all those other women, except for the fact that I work for Mutant X.

"I had been plagued by this self-doubt for a few weeks when I started to feel sick. At first I was a little scared. I didn't need anyone to confirm it; I had watched one of my uncles die from the disease when I was a child.

"I knew it was my price to pay. That's the thing — you can change how you pay it or how much you have to pay, but somebody's still got to. And I couldn't place my debt upon someone else's shoulders. That would have been cowardly of me.

"I didn't mean to do it the first few times, Adam — truth be told, I didn't know I could. I was just so scared that you'd find out. I kept hoping nothing would catch your attention. I just . . . projected this feeling of everything being normal. And when you looked over my results and declared me fine, I couldn't believe it. I could see problems in my body cropping up already, myself, but I didn't bring it up to you. I wasn't about to question it. It was a miracle. It was me.

"I lay awake that night in a state of constant fear. When things wore off, in your mind, what would happen? What if you looked back at the files and I wasn't there? So I tried something. I deliberately altered your mind. I wasn't sure it would work, but it did. I put a . . . a mental tag on you, if you will. Just something that would 'remind' you of what you had seen when I had been there to influence you. Me being there every time you pulled up my records would have been impractical and mentally draining. You would have found out, and I couldn't let you do that.

"I believe in fate, and me getting sick doesn't mean that I'm a bad person. It just means that I wasn't meant to be with Mutant X for the rest of my life. It's almost as if I had chosen to leave the team. I'd been harboring thoughts about doing so, actually, before someone discovered my 'little secret'. But I thought that you might try to come after me, when you have so many more important things to do . . ."

With this, Emma began to slump forward. Adam caught her before she fell and picked her up in one swoop, walking quickly back to the lab. The others started to follow him before Shalimar stopped. Brennan and Jesse turned back to her, questions in their eyes.

"What's up?" Jesse asked.

"I think that we should talk about it. Adam will take care of her."

The men shared a brief look before nodding their agreement. There wasn't anything that they could do for Emma, except wait.