I'M DYING 4: FLU MISERIES

Chapter 9

"What do you mean, he wants his mother?" Cyclops asked her.
Jean shook her head. "He's confused. He only attacked because he doesn't know any other way."

"He got something against e-mail?"

"Let me try and talk to him," she said. "He's been in the lab his whole life. He doesn't understand . . ."

"Then you'd better talk fast," Scott said, "before he squashes us like grapes."

"I'll try."

"Where should I start?" Marco asked. He'd never done five patients at once before.

And yet here he was...

This might take a while. He needed a few minutes in between healings to recharge his batteries, as it were.
"Kitty . . ." Lance moaned.
"Which one's Kitty?" Marco asked.
Magneto rolled his eyes. "She's not here. He's talking about someone else."

Marco looked at Lance and said, "He sounds pretty sick. I'll start with him."

He put his hands on either side of Lance's head, and concentrated.

A moment later, he straightened up again . . . and to his own surprise, Lance felt fine.
Marco, however, did not.
"Just gimme a second," he said . . . right before he collapsed.

Lance picked him up and laid him on the now-empty bed. "Is he gonna be okay?"

"Yes," Xavier said, "but it may take some time."

"We don't have time!" said Jean, who was trying to hold off the creature, but failing.

Wolverine lunged at it, claws out and ready to rip. The creature side-stepped and then brought his own claws up, and slashed at Wolverine.

As the two battled, Kitty tried to take it off its feet. She had no luck whatsoever.

Things were very confused for a while there . . . but instead of keeping him out, they were actually leading him onto the grounds. Soon he was poised to attack the main campus.

But at that moment, it felt like something exploded inside his mind.
He heard a voice, over and over . . .
We are your friends. We will not hurt you . . .

The creature froze. He couldn't speak, but he knew something was wrong. All of a sudden it was like he was inside a room, one he'd never seen before, but which he somehow knew was the inside of his own head.
There was a man sitting there, in a chair.

The creature dropped his aggressive stance. "What do you want?" came out of his mouth. He was as startled as anyone.
"You're not really speaking, you know," the man said.

Inside the mansion, Xavier was stunned by what he found inside the mutant's mind. Expecting its reasoning to be primitive, he instead discovered that he was actually quite intelligent. He'd just never been taught to use any other methods to deal with other people.
He even looked human inside his mind. Of course, that was probably because he'd never seen what he really looked like . . . having spent most of his existence in one cell or another.

"Who are you?" the mutant asked.
"My name is Charles Xavier," the man in the chair said. "Do you have a name?"
"Name?"
"What you're called."
"Oh." He tried to think. It was something he'd never had to do before. "Mother calls me Precious."

Precious, Xavier thought sadly.

"I'm having nasty Lord of the Rings flashbacks," said a girl with red hair, standing beside the man. "And what did you mean, Mother?"

"The one who made me," the creature said. "Where is she?"

Xavier dreaded having to answer him. "Let's talk a little more about you first."

"What about me?"

"Do you remember where you came from?"

"From the lab."

Xavier accessed the boy's (for he saw himself as a young male version of his mother) memories . . . and what he saw was quite disturbing. Michaela hadn't just molded his DNA . . . she'd twisted his brain to boot.

For his entire life (which, as far as Xavier could tell, was about five years), this poor boy had been fed the most outrageous lies about humans, mutants, and the world in general.

Magneto would be repulsed, the professor reflected, if he knew even half the brainwashing Michaela had subjected her creation to . . . most directed at him.
Must have been some falling-out they had.

He saw mental images of Michaela's brother Marco, who was a party to the torture.

It took all the self-control he had to keep from screaming in blind rage.

"What is wrong?" the boy asked.

After what seemed like an eternity, Xavier answered. "You have no idea, do you? You think this is the way people are supposed to live, because you've never known anything else."

The young mutant didn't how to respond. "What are you saying? Mother was . . . wrong?"

"About countless things."

"But . . . how?"

Now, Xavier realized, came the truly hard part. It was impossible to explain something for which the young mutant had no frame of reference. Still, he had to try . . .

Meanwhile, Marco had recovered and was now working on healing Wanda.
Lance had insisted. "I'm gonna hear the end of that story if I have to pry it outta her!"

"This might not be the best time, yo," Toad said. "That monster thingy the crazy lady created is out loose--"

"I'll get to you all in a minute," Marco said, laying his hands on Wanda.

Wanda felt a surge of energy race through her . . .

And then something strange happened. Something that hadn't happened with the others.

Wanda trembled. The energy that had been flowing into her drained back out in a rush . . . and hit Toad.

"Whoa!" He blinked, and then suddenly, he felt like he could take on the world.

Wanda, meanwhile, felt dizzy.

But that was nothing compared to how Marco was feeling.
He'd never had a healing rebound on him before. Not even with a telepath. What were this girl's powers?

"What's going on?" Magneto demanded.

"It's Wanda." said Toad. "Somethin's wrong with her, yo." After a short pause he added, "Physically, I mean."

Wanda glared at him, but she was too weak to do anything else.

Marco turned to Magneto. "What does she do? I mean, what powers does she have?" It was hard for him to think straight, let alone get a sentence out.

Magneto told him.

"Hex bolts? What are those?"
"I'm not sure," Toad said, "but don't ever stand in the way of one."

"Oh boy . . ."

"What does that have to do with whatever happened to her?" Lance asked.

Wanda coughed and then looked at Marco. "What did you do to me?"

She stood up unsteadily . . . but she didn't stay on her feet long.

"Great," said Lance. "Now I'll never hear the end of the story!"

Xavier, meanwhile, was still inside the mind of the Sandoval mutant. He was seeing still more disturbing images. Michaela had never actually beaten her child, but what she did do to him came alarmingly close. And the worst part of it was that he thought it was perfectly normal.

Xavier could see that his work was just beginning . . .

The other X-Men, meanwhile, stood around wondering what was going on.

"What's stopping him?" wondered Cyclops.

"I don't know," Shadowcat said, "but maybe Jean can tell us."

Jean concentrated. It was hard to maintain a link with . . . whatever he was (she saw him as a horrible creature and at the same time as a confused little boy, all at once), and keep another part of her mind on the here-and-now. Nonetheless, with Xavier's help, she was able to report back to the others what was happening.

What they heard nearly made their hair stand on end.

Michaela had twisted the young mutant's mind up in knots, and it was looking more and more likely that he would need help to overcome her systematic, lifelong brainwashing.

The first step, of course, was making him see that what she had done to him was wrong. This would be the hardest of all.

"I'm ready to try again," Marco said.

"I'm not sure I am," Wanda groaned.

"I'm pretty sure I think I know what went wrong last time."
"Oh, wonderful."
"Just lie still and don't think of anything."

Though it was incredibly hard, she did just that.

Marco concentrated.

This time it went much better. Whatever had blocked the healing energy wasn't there anymore, whatever it had been.

When Marco was finished, Wanda sat up. "Whew, that feels much better." She looked around and asked, "Where's Dad?"

He was lying on the floor.

"Oh God!"

"What is it?" Marco said, as soon as his stomach settled.

"Dad's out cold . . ."

"You're still finishing your story," Lance said.

"Okay, okay," Wanda sighed, but before she could say a word, Mystique's voice came over the intercom.

"Is that healer still there?"

Marco answered. "Yes, I'm here . . . but we have a bit of a problem right now."
"Problem?"

"It's Magneto." Marco knelt down beside him and checked his vitals. He was clearly in serious trouble.

"What is it?" Wanda asked. "Don't tell me he's picked up the bug."

"I'm afraid he has," the boy sighed.

"Well, can you help him?"
"It's not that simple . . ."

Wanda didn't like the sound of that. "What's wrong with him?"

"He's got it worse than the rest of you."

"Can you help him?"

"Not just yet. Not after the other healings. I need to recharge my batteries first. Can someone bring me some food?"

Pietro jumped up and raced to the kitchen, bringing back an energy bar someone had stashed in the fridge.

"I don't think you should be up and around just yet," Wanda said.
"Why not? I feel great! Absolutely fiiiiiii--" The sudden energy burst wore off, and he collapsed.

"Can you please finish the story before we all die?" Lance asked.
Wanda threw her hands in the air. "Fine! I'll finish the story!"

She took a short breath and said, "Well, when we were three, we had the measles. And Dad took us onto his lap, and sang to us."
"And where does Boo come in?"
"I'm getting to that!"

"Geez, you don't have to snap my head off!" Lance complained.
"Why shouldn't I? All I've heard from you is 'Finish the story, finish the story.' I'm trying to finish it, if you'll just shut up and let me!"
"Okay, okay!" Wanda went back to the story. "Anyway, Dad didn't know a lot of songs. At least, not kid-friendly ones. So he came up with a really old one."

"Which one?"

Wanda started singing it. It was about a dog. A dog named Boo. Lance would have laughed . . . if he hadn't been mesmerized by her voice. Who knew?

"Anyway," she said, when she was finished, "that's where Boo came from. Pietro loved that song. And if you give him a hard time over this . . ."

"I won't! I promise."

The intercom crackled again. "How's it going down there?"

"Better than it was a few minutes ago." Marco had recovered somewhat and was ready to try again.

Magneto began to stir. "Wanda?"

"Dad?" She went to him and helped him into a chair. "It's going to be all right now."

Elsewhere in the Institute, Xavier was still communicating with the Sandoval mutant. The creature was lowering its defenses, so the X-Men started to pull back.

"What's he doing now?" asked Scott.

"I think we're getting through to him," Jean said.