Title: Stormy Forecast
Author: Viral
Disclaimer: I do not own the X-Men. This is fan fiction: a fan's version of expression in which he or she whishes to portray a character(s) aside from or in addition to the creator's original concept and\or ideas.
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"I thought for sure Siryn landed on the Fire Department's trampoline, now you're telling me she collided with a dead body on the ground?" Beast asked Gambit as he hastily worked to patch up his injured friends.
"She could have bounced off of the trampoline and landed on a dead body," Miguel interjected. "At the velocity she was falling, I think that's a pretty possible conclusion."
"Who would have ever thought Storm was capable of such havoc?" Beast asked as he took a moment to rest and breathe.
Miguel spoke again, still looking out the jet's windows at Storm and Synch's hovering bodies, "What kind of question is that?"
"She only control de weather," Gambit explained for Miguel. "She should not be able to take de whole team down."
"What do you mean she only controls the weather?" Miguel asked. "Have you people lived with this woman so long that you've gotten used to her? I mean come on now... she CONTROLS the weather! What can't she do?"
"She is simply able to manipulate the atmosphere," Beast noted, pushing his glasses further back on his face.
"Maybe that's why you're whole team failed," Miguel said, almost laughing. "You underestimate her and you get yourself in trouble."
"I would never challenge her," Beast said, returning back to his work. "It is a simple fact that those who are able to produce long-range attacks have a much higher advantage over those with short range attacks." He took a breath before returning back to his original topic. "I would imagine that Storm is not as powerful as she seems. Perhaps it is not that she holds more power than anyone else on this team, but she simply has a more deadly, more spanned, and more accurate arsenal at her beckon and call."
"Would you like to test her arsenal?" Miguel teased Beast. Miguel stands up from his window seat and walks back to the infirm bed where Siryn, Rogue, and Cyclops laid in intensive care. Wolverine had died before he even had a chance. "They tested her... and failed miserably."
"Point taken," Beast said as he shoved Miguel to the side. "Now if you will excuse me, I must return to my work."
"Why you be defendin' Stormy like dat... like you know about mutants?" Gambit asked Miguel as he returned to his window seat.
"Because you all take her for nothing but a lightning show," Miguel said with attitude. "And there's plenty of proof all over this destroyed city that she's more than that. She doesn't deserve to be treated any less than she is."
"What does dat have to do wit' anyt'ing?" Gambit questioned, standing up and stretching.
"You're telling me all the time she was shivering in fear at night and becoming even more of an introvert than normal throughout the day went unnoticed?" Miguel asked. "All the crazy stuff she was going through before the Shadow King showed himself was just ignored?"
"How we supposed to know?" Gambit asked, now with anger in his voice. "She dun tell us not'ing, we don't pry! Gambit got secrets he dun want to tell, he figure everybody else got d'eirs too."
"You know what," Miguel said, as if a lightning bulb had just turned on in his mind. "You're all trying to get Storm to notice that she's not a goddess by treating her normal, that you forget that she is normal – so you hardly speak to her, and when you do its probably on a mission or just a casual conversation."
"What would you prefer we speak to her about?" Beast asked, now curious. "She is not the simplest person to maintain a conversation with."
"Believe me, she is," Miguel noted as he looked back out the jet's window. "Gambit's the only one who can really talk to her now, because he talked to her when she was in her child form." He turned to face Gambit; "I think sometimes you still see her as that little child."
"And?" Gambit asked.
"That's the easiest place to talk to her," Miguel smiled. "She's not just Storm. She's also Ororo, and when you talk to her about her past – she becomes Ororo again and you can talk to her about anything. When you can stop calling her Storm all the time, you can finally let go of the mutant powers and see a person – not a goddess, not a Windrider, but the person."
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On the Astral Plane...
The Shadow King drew his psychic sword and Synch followed suit. They each watched each other's every move, never taking a moment to fall prey to a surprise attack. The tension that danced between their eyes heated the mental struggle. The Shadow King moved stealthily in front of Synch's body, and then suddenly, like a snake, he snapped and his sword was forced towards Synch's chest.
Synch backed away and blocked the Shadow King's sword with his own. For the next few blows, they each countered each other, and all that was heard was an endless echo of grunts and clashes.
-=-=-
Imprisoned on the Astral Plane...
"Everett!" Professor Xavier shouted across the abstract world. His cold blue eyes looked into the darkness. He could sense Synch in the astral plane accompanied by an unexpected amount of strength.
"Professor?" Synch questioned from what seemed like a far distance.
"Everett!" Jean yelled, almost screamed, hoping that he was the savior that would rescue her and the Professor from their prisons. "Help us! The Shadow King has us trapped!"
"Jean... do you feel the rifts?" the Professor asked. "He is battling the Shadow King!" he yelled as he finally figured out what was going on.
"Can he possibly win?" Jean asked.
"Let's pray he does."
-=-=-
Their psychic swords clashed on the Astral Plane. Synch and the Shadow King were in a gruesome face-off for Storm's freedom. Synch skillfully counterattacked everyone one of the Shadow King's moves as if he had been a psychic all his life. Reading the Shadow King's thoughts and planned attacks made the fight that much easier. "Maybe you didn't notice: but I don't just copy your powers, I can use them even better than you can!" Everett yelled as he knocked the Shadow King's sword from his grip.
"Kill me and you'll kill Storm!" the Shadow King smiled as Everett raised his sword up to his neck. "Her mind is connected with mine, and when my mind is destroyed, so is hers. There is no way you can win – no matter how smart you are," the Shadow King cackled as he reveled in his victory. "You don't believe me?" he laughed. "See for yourself: her memories are mine."
The sky was blue and sunny, devoid of all clouds. Below was the bustling city of Cairo, Egypt. Merchants were on every free space available and people dressed in traveling clothes browsed through the many objects to be bought. Although the country was at war, there was no sign of fear or hostility on the ground below as people smiled at each other, bought food, and held casual conversations.
Above the dusty streets below, N'Dare Munroe played with her daughter, Ororo. David Munroe, her father, was busy working on a news article that he was to be submitting to the New York Times back home in the United States. At first, he was very cautious to bring his family over into the war zone from the United States, but everything seemed fine except for a few skirmishes on the borders of the city. He was glad he had brought his wife and daughter with him. He was lonely without them, especially the smile his daughter gave him when he picked her up. Her blue eyes smiled with radiance and her white hair danced, as he would spin her around. But he had been working so hard since their arrival that he hadn't much time to play with her. He made up in his mind, though; after he finished that article he would finally have time for his daughter.
In the Living Room of the high-rise apartment, N'Dare now did little Ororo's hair. Ororo was about five years old, a free spirit. "Mommy, are you making my hair pretty?" she asked as she looked out the glassless windows of the apartment.
"Your hair is already pretty darling," her mom said, her African accent very strong and her English sometimes broken but understandable. "You are a very special girl, Ororo."
"How mommy?" Ororo asked, curious. She asked a lot of questions at this age, as do most five year olds. She was done being a baby, discovering the world with her mouth. She was now growing up and discovering the world with questions and answers.
"Well, you have white hair and blue eyes," N'Dare smiled as she combed through Ororo's hair. "Most Africans don't have those things. You come from a very different ancestry: a family of priestesses. Every priestess has had special powers, and because you look like they did, you will have them too, one day."
"What type of powers?" Ororo asked, now excited.
"Magical powers," N'Dare said before tickling Ororo's ribs. Ororo laughed as she fell out of her chair and softly hit the floor. N'Dare continued to tickle her, joining her daughter in the laughter.
Soon David entered the room and N'Dare looked up, still smiling as Ororo giggled. "Did we bother you and your work, dear?" N'Dare asked.
"No, of course not," David said as he bent down to kiss N'Dare's cheek. He then picked up Ororo and kissed her. Just then David caught a big explosion in the air out of the corner of his eye. An anti-aircraft missile had been fired by the Egyptian military and the plane was falling from the sky, quickly.
"N'Dare, get away from the window!" David yelled as he grabbed his wife's hand and carried Ororo in his arms. Ororo had never seen her dad this hasty and began to cry even though she didn't know what was going on.
Outside screams were heard and fires roared as debris from the aircraft fell down, but the debris was nothing compared to what happened next. The entire plane flew into the apartment building where Ororo and her family were residing. The high-rise began to shake and vibrate. David fell to the floor with Ororo in his arms. N'Dare quickly fell as well. The ceiling began to collapse under the pressure of the plane, the lost support from the walls, and the fire, which was overtaking the floors above them.
"Ororo, run!" David yelled as he forced his daughter out of his arms. He pushed her away as he tried to help N'Dare up, but it was too late. The ceiling, furniture, and large pieces of the fallen plane fell on David and his wife. Little Ororo turned around just in time to see her parents buried. She ran back for them, screaming crying. Before she reached them, she too was buried. Because her body was small, the debris did not crush her, which was now a large, heavy tent around her body. She would be in this dark, narrow space for days to come. She could only see outside of the debris that covered her through one hole, and that hole showed her a scene that would be in her nightmares for years to come: her parents, laying together, dead with blood seeping from under the dust and rubble.
Synch's astral body shivered as Ororo's memory vanished. He still held his sword to the Shadow King's neck. The feeling, the stench, and the burning that accompanied this memory were unbearable. "Why did you show me that? What was the point?!" Synched yelled, demanding an answer from the Shadow King.
"It was to prove that Ororo and I are now one in the same!" he chuckled. "I have completely assimilated her mind, her memories, her attributes. If you destroy me, you destroy her. Where do your loyalties lie? Would you sacrifice the life of the innocent just to get to the villain? Can you live with that?"
"Everett he is lying!" the Professor shouted through the Astral Plane. "He and Ororo are not one in the same. He may be able to memorize her past, but he cannot be her."
"Believe Xavier and sacrifice her life!" the Shadow King taunted.
"NO!" Everett shouted, "This battle ends now!" A rift of psychic energy ran through the Astral Plane, creating a vortex that resembled a black hole. As it pulled the Shadow King inward he struggled to get away from it, but to no avail.
"You can't do this to me!" the Shadow King yelled, "She is mine! Her power is mine!" The Astral Plane went completely silent as the Shadow King was pulled into the vortex and it disappeared completely.
"Let me out, please," Ororo's voice whimpered through the Astral Plane. Her voice sounded weak and frail. Jean and Xavier were finally let out of their prison cells with the Shadow King's absence. Jean, Xavier, and Synch joined together in the search for Ororo's captive mind.
When they finally found her, her mental project was floating lifelessly. "Is she...?" Jean asked, looking at her sister with worry in her eyes.
"No, she is alive," Xavier said as he held her mental body. "We must simply get her mind back to her body." This task was the easiest of them all. After Ororo was returned to her body, the other three effortlessly returned to their own.
-=-=-
Ororo opened her blue eyes, her body enshrouded with lightning and the sky growing dark. She soon grunted with exhaustion and her body plummeted to the ground. Synch, who had been hovering all this time, fell in exhaustion as well. Jean telekinetically carried the two into the jet where they rested. Miguel sat at Ororo's side, holding her hand as the jet engines began to roar.
"Do not be alarmed, Miguel," a telepathic message came from Xavier to Miguel's mind. "Ororo will be fine. She has been through quite a lot. When she awakens, she may need your help. I request that you stay with us at the mansion, one more night."
Miguel answered, "Of course." He then looked to Ororo, remembering a conversation they had over the phone once before.
"You know you don't have to feel lonely," he began, the compassion in his voice evident. He soon noticed the passionate side of him showing and covered it up with something more masculine, "I mean after all, a beautiful woman like you shouldn't really have a hard time finding a date."
"Finding a date is not a problem," she answered with another sigh. The sighs were becoming, more-or-less, a part of the communication itself. "Finding someone I would want to be with is most definitely the problem."
"What's wrong with me?" Miguel said, smiling on the other side of the phone line.
"I am a mutant..." Ororo quickly answered with no caution of thought, "And you are a normal human."
"So? It's not like you're a different species or something. And beautiful people deserve to give each other the chance."
"So you think you are beautiful?" Ororo laughed.
"Some things are just undeniable," Miguel answered slyly.
-=-=-=-
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Ororo stood, dressed in black at Logan's gravesite. She had been the one, after all these years, to take his life. She felt miserable and guilty. How could she now stay with the X-Men after this? She closed her eyes to stop the tears. It had been years since Ororo cried, but now it felt like it was time once more.