I land unsteadily in about a foot of water, which makes enough of a splash that the high edge catches at my sleeve and soaks it. "Lovely," I mutter, glancing quickly up at the arpeture of wan-starlight overhead. There's the faint cast shadow of a wheelchair hovering vaguely in the center of the circle that light makes on the water, like a malformed Bat Signal. Hah hah.
"Hey, Xavier! Which direction?"
"North."
"Which direction is that?"
"The opposite one you're facing."
"Thanks."
I turn and wade into the rank darkness, again wishing for Callisto-ish eyes. Honestly, she could run right past me and I wouldn't see much more than a blur on the black, if that. At the same time, I'm a little hesistent about actually calling out her name, because that just feels silly, you know? Besides, what if there's a dozen Callistos wandering the sewer and they're all in my vicinity . . . ?
Oh, all right.
"Callisto!" I shout and it bounces through spaces I can't actually see and echoes back, let alone that nice walkable corrider I'm assuming is still in front of me. No answer. Well, why would she answer? She's as paranoid as me, at least. I keep wading, repeating the call at intervals, and the hair on the back of my neck rises about a second before something knocks me backward into the sewage.
I curl up and take most of it on my back, although my head is pretty well dunked in it despite my efforts. And wow, but it smells. I struggle sidewise into a balanced sprawl, trying to place my attacker, although I have a fair idea of who it is.
And thank goodness, I don't have to look far. She's standing above me, straddling the river of filth (I should have thought of that. Cleaner), a pole crossing her trunk diagonally and pressing against either wall. "Who are you?" she growls. Yeah, it's her all right.
"Well, uh, gee," I try to shift into more of sitting position. "I guess it's been a while. I'd think you'd recognize me immediately, but it's kinda dark." And you can see anyway! Come on!
"Name."
"Forge ring a bell? Maybe?"
"I'm not sure. Why would you be carrying that name?"
Definitely more paranoid than me. I suppose it has been ten years. "It's mine."
"Really."
"Yes."
"The only Forge I know is dead."
"As I remember, that particular Forge had a bad habit of ruining towels for no good reason." The stench is so . . . strong. I guess one gets accustomed to it. I focus my eyes on the glitter that has to be her sole one and smile crookedly and will her to know me.
She whips down and drags me up by my shirt-front (you know, I really hate that) and stares at me hard, her face a millimeter from being pressed against mine . . .
Then she laughs and it's all right. "You. You're still insane. Just waltzing in here like it's a field of flowers instead of the leavings of every toilet . . . " And still in that half dangling position, she brings her other arm suddenly around and hugs me so fiercely my ribs twinge. "I missed you, Forge. Oh, I missed you!"
I'd cry if I could breathe.
She lets me go carefully, withdrawing to a ledge before she does, although I'm dripping enough anyway. "Y-you know, Callisto . . . I just took a shower."
She laughs again. "Oh well! Come on, let's get up on the street. You're blind as a bat down here, I know."
"So she did kill you again," she sighs as we finally pause next to a streetlight, our shadows stretching out behind us, pale on the sidewalk.
"But it's over. I'm here now. Just here." I spread my arms. "Done. I can just be myself . . ."
"Can you?" There's a sad lilt to her voice as she stares past me into the straggling traffic. "It hasn't been easy for any of us, adjusting. Hiding in the shadows because it's too much to trust the light just yet . . . and, Forge, you've never trusted anything."
I blink at her echo of what I told Xavier earlier. "I trust you."
"No, you don't. You like me, but that's not the same thing."
"Like you?"
Her shoulders heave as she sighs again. "Why were you always so set on dying, Forge? I don't think you had to. If you really wanted, you could have . . . maybe escaped with us."
"No! No, Callisto, I couldn't. Well, maybe I could've, if I'd had more time, but, you know . . . "
She takes my hand and holds it tightly, her expression hard, her scar stretching white against her skin. "No hedging. No modifiers. I want this straight. Do you actually love me?"
I'm baffled. Can't we keep on one thread of conversation? I can't follow all this jumping . . . And I'm immediately ashamed for thinking exactly what she's probably afraid I'm thinking. Not even related to the subject she's intent on, detatching myself automatically from anything that's too hard . . . . And there I go again.
I have to swallow twice before I can answer her.
"Yes. Yes, Callisto."
"Then why couldn't you let me help you? If I'd been there . . . "
"You would have still left and I would have still stayed. There isn't anything . . . "
"In what you saw. You never let anyone else look. You're the master of all there is to know. Didn't it even occur to you . . ."
I flinch and she breaks off, but her hand on mine is trembling with something. Whether it's rage or not I'm afraid to know.
"I'm sorry. It was ten years ago. But . . . I always had to wonder if there was some way I could have gotten you out, if you let me."
"I didn't want to die, Callisto."
"Yes, you did. You wanted to die from the first moment I saw you aware of yourself. And you still want to die."
"No."
"Yes. You succumbed to it, Forge. We all do, to some extent or another, but She really got to you. You can't see it, you never could, but you reek of despair to everyone else. Even drifters and idiots like Scaleface were able to read it in you and listen, it hasn't gotten any better."
"Are you sure you're just not smelling sewer?"
"Listen." She takes my chin with her other hand and forces me to look at her. Sometimes I wonder if it's exactly this mandatory eye contact that makes me hate these positions so much. It's my instinct to break away as quickly as I can and I have to beat down the impulse to stop standing like an offended statue. "We're all scarred and I'm not asking you to be all right. I know you can't help it. I know you're not doing it on purpose. But I want you to remember that . . . you . . . have . . . me. I don't care if that means anything to you right now, but eventually, even if everything else in whatever life you've come back to falls apart, even if you find another She, I want you to be able to remember that I care for you and, so help me, I don't care if it's selfish, if you try to burn yourself to ashes again, I'll do everything in my power to stop you."
I bring my hand up, placing it on the back of hers, but it's calculated and I know it.
You don't love her, a voice hisses nastily. I ignore it, or try to. Because in the same instant it fades, I have to agree with it.
I don't love anyone. All the promises she's making to me now should wrench at my heart and force compliance, or at least tears. Intellectually, I care for her. But that's all. My anticipation was great, but once she came to me, my mind left. It's like I'm hovering over myself and pulling the strings and calling out dialogue that will lead to an appropriate reaction, but . . . but . . .
Well done, the voice snickers. Nice to see you finally admit it.
I open my mouth to respond, to somehow cancel out everything I just said and explain to her that she should really turn around right now and find someone who's not obligated to love her when it's all empty banter and posture in the end, I'm sorry . . . when there's a high pitched whistle. Slight at first, but ascending so fast that my eardrums pop and the sidewalk and Callisto and everything is gone in an instant.
It ranges up to a single-toned scream and stops. The world is grey again and I'm just sitting in it, too shocked to react beyond that.
Just between you and me, Forge . . .
And me!
Okay, just between you and us, Forge, this whole "Let's make fantasy worlds in our heads and play around for years" is getting a little annoying.
"Fantasy world?" I squeak, grabbing one arm with the other. It didn't seem like a . . .
It's time to wake up. You've had your fun, but we have better things to do than find oppurtunities to drill reality into your head.
Exactly. We could be shopping for bodies. I almost had Brad Pitt's, too. Just a slightly higher bid on e-bay . . .
I bend over my arms, trying not to listen. Oh please, not this again . . .
While you've been asleep, we've been watching. We've been doing all the work. You've got to take on the load, now. Things are changing and you're needed.
I mean, we understand and all. You're not going to like waking up after an extended fantasy about waking up. It's human nature! You don't like doing things twice, even if the first time was a sham.
But you've got to. Sorry, kid, but hanging out in your parents' house and searching for Morlocks just isn't on the agenda.
"Morlocks?" I finally croak. "What are those?"
Like we said, we've been doing all the work.
You had your nap, we did research. Lots of it.
"What the crap are you?" I snap, a little weakly.
That's none of your business, buddy. We stick your necks out for you and, therefore, we just ain't obliged to give you any information we don't want to.
Besides, we're pathological liars.
"You and everyone else. What do you mean, waking up?"
We mean that you keep getting yourself killed and you haven't actually revived yet. You just dreamed you did and that was really annoying.
I groan and make a fair attempt to smash my face in with my elbow.
Cut that out! It won't do you any good, since this is just a dream, too!
"I'm so frickin' sick --" I start, but the grey suddenly gets more oppressive and the words gum up in my throat.
Language, boy. Calm down, it'll just be a moment now.
Oh, he really won't like it.
It doesn't matter. He doesn't like anything. He's such an ungrateful brat.
Not to mention a sociopath.
Tsk tsk. Now, Forge, you're exactly the kind of crazed nut who dreams up alternate realities to give himself the illusion of being "happy" and having "friends" and "not being a total putz." I'm afraid that reality-reality is a lot nastier than what you thought you saw.
You keep taking the information we feed you in an attempt to make you, I don't know, do something, and turning it into utopia. It's true, there are people called Scott and Kurt who need your help, but they don't look like that.
And your parents are still alive and, sure, they probably still keep your clothes in a holy dresser, but they've moved to Canada.
And Callisto's not waiting for you. Nor would she say any of those things if she did run into you.
We only let you dream about her so you'd wake up.
Smell the manure.
You're not meant for her.
You're not meant for anyone.
You're not even alive.
Never have been.
Never will be.
So let us wake you up. And you'll do what you need to. Then we'll let you die. In what sense you can.
We'll dismantle you and turn off your worrying. How's that?
Now wake up.
I do. Mid-scream. How over-dramatic it is to scream, but I do, and my scream is unfortunately not facilitated by air. I breathe in something thicker, thicker than water and even blood, although it tastes like blood (albeit blood with more sodium than it than's good for you) and my immediate thought is that waking up hardly matters if you're going to die again immediately.
But whatever the voices keep muttering, I'm not ready to go again right yet. I flail around for boundaries, for bearings, and my numb fingers brush against glass. Another second, and I've forced out my arm-thing. Use it to batter the glass, over and over again, even as the rest of my body starts slowing into a dying tingle and in what has to be the last moment, it shatters.
I pour out with the liquid, and there's a brief stab of pain as a sharp edge of the glass snags my shoulder. I land heavily on my upper back and the rest of me somersaults over the landing point. I'm face down in grey-red jello and start coughing and intermittently throwing up. Have to get rid off all the junk collected in my lungs somehow.
"Well, crap," I mutter, when I can breathe again.
I'm not sure where I am. The lighting is very dim. I seem to have fallen out of the busted glass cylinder set on a shortish platform. It's looming over me now, about a fourth full. The hole I came from is about halfway up and hairline cracks skitter around it in a vague aura, some widening, all dripping. There's wires visible that seem to have been forcibly snapped. Huh. And a sensor readout perched next to the cylinders and connected to the wires is reading a flat, beeping line over and over again.
The rest of the room that I can see in my peripheral vision is all boxes and shadows and very uninteresting, with no clue as to why on earth I'd be here. But, honestly, apparently what happens to be me isn't allowed to make sense. I don't think there's much doubt now I've totally lost it . . . I mean, you can only live in this seperate reality, than that seperate reality, for so long before . . .
I turn around, slipping on the jello, and there is one other inhabitant after all.
It's a large, glassed off area, like a snake cage in a zoo, and although the lighting is wan, there is more of it than outside where I'm sprawled. An old, ratty mattress is lumped in the center and someone is sleeping on it. Well, maybe not sleeping. He's lying at an angle where even faint light glances hard off his glasses and makes it difficult to see beyond them.
"Hello?" I say tentitively, struggling out of the jello and trying not to inhale through my nose. I know I'm doused in the stuff, but one sense's information on that front is enough. Well, two. I can see it and feel it dribbling down the front of what's left of my shirt. Allow me an ew or so. I think I'm allowed, no matter how used and over-used I am to the sensation.
There's a groan from the man in the cage and he shifts audibly on the mattress springs. His glasses now point in my direction and his brow furrows with some automatic confusion. There's something odd about him, but it's hard to place. I'll have it in a moment when my brain clears.
"You're the man in the canister," he says. His tone is blunt, but his voice proper is soft. Very weak.
"Um, I guess," I say, squinting at him to get a better feel. Very odd . . .
"You looked pretty dead," he points out, propping himself tentatively on a skinny elbow. Even that strain seems on the verge of breaking him. I expect a dead faint any moment.
"Suppose I did. What're you in for?" Squint, squint, come on!
"I've got a disease," he whispers flatly, "that kills mutants on touch. I emit spores and they're deadly."
Got it. "No, they're not," I counter, my voice rising with inevitable excitement. "Unfertilized, they're harmless, not that I know what they do when they're fertilized, but it's really not that much of a worry, because if you're that dangerously unique, there can't be too many spore people running around, so it's probably just fine and you can at least come out for a walk."
He stares at me. "What?" he finally gasps.
"You're fine," I summarize succinctly. "I mean, nothing personal, but you look a little ragged and whoever's keeping us both here really doesn't seem to have much sense of hygeine, if you know what I mean. So, I don't know, hanging around here might not been in your best interest." I don't add that he looks on the edge of starvation. Keep people happy, if we can.
"I'm fine?" He repeats, his position on his elbow looking more precarious by the moment.
"I'm sure you are. Listen, I bet I'm in here for the same reason as you. We can become dangerous in certain situations, I mean, I'm really a little bit of an inhuman sociopath, but I'm a fairly nice guy in most circumstances, do you know what I mean?" The words are spilling out at a quicker rate than I can control them and I run my fingers through my hair to distract myself from the man's desperate stare. Of course, this is a mistake, since my hands are filthy. Then again, so is my hair. Whatever. "What I'm saying is that you could be, well, maybe, dangerous if other factors were to combine, but probably, they won't, at least, not in your first five minutes of freedom, so I think I'm going to let you out."
"Can you?" he asks.
"Don't see why not. Do you know what's in these boxes?"
"Not a clue. I've only been inside here . . . " He loses his balance and the elbow squews one way and the rest of him another. He curses under his breath. Something about that strikes me as familiar.
"Well, all right, I have a tool or two built in." Arm-thing comes out again, clicking and clacking eagerly. The young man's stare, even though sidelong now, manages to become more intense.
"I've seen that before."
"Oh, so have I." It's niggling now. Something's funny here, there's some connection you're supposed to make.
I decide, forcefully, that I don't care.
"Now, maybe if I bang this thing hard enough against the glass . . . that worked the first time . . . " I step up to the glass and, without warning, my arm-thing expands and splits into several prongs. Without my control or thought, one prong after another sinks into the glass, forming a rough circle with the middle bare.
"Huh, it's never done --"
I'm interrupted by a sudden vibrating climbing up my shoulder. In an attempt to confuse me further, my arm-thing has produced something like a jackhammer to attack the center of the circle and in a matter of seconds, the glass reduces itself to sand-size shards and there's a wide, clean hole perfect for escaping.
"Cool," I admit. The young man tries to hoist himself off the mattress, his expression different (not gleeful or thankful, but different), but doesn't seem to have the strength.
Something breaks through the indifference I've been maintaining so well and the next thing I know, I've withdrawn the arm-thing, and gone to his side, fighting a hurt back down my throat that's really inappropriate for a stranger . . .
Stranger . . .
"Here, take my shoulder." He tosses a bony hand at it, but doesn't quite make the distance. That's fine. I scoot closer, one hand firmly on the shoulder farthest from me and the other on the arm closer, and hoist him to his feet. The fact that I can actually do this without straining something is a bad sign for the kid.
"I think I know you," he gasps, as his feet flail a little sideways against the floor. All my deep compassion aside, I don't think I'm up to carrying him.
"That's funny. Oh, um, sorry, I'm really dirty at the moment."
"That's all right."
You know who he is. Stop being difficult.
You shut up, I snap back. You're only allowed to intrude when you gotta wake me up, remember? So butt out.
"You know," I say anyway, hating myself. "There is something about you . . . that's familiar, I dunno . . . "
He's fainted.
"Well, okay, I'll quiz you later." I heave ####### his arm and drag his body over my shoulders. I think I'm going to tip over on my face, but, magically, one knee juts out for balance while the other leg juts backward, and, gradually, I begin a slow walk toward the hole.
There's a skittish movement in the shadows, which coalesces into a pudgy character, too big for his clothes and swelling them, his hands strangling each other and his eyes wide.
"Ya can't bring 'im out!"
"He's not going to kill you," I snap. This isn't the time for shenanigans. "See? I'm, like, carrying him and I've never been happier in my life!"
"You're the dead man," says the bright boy, but he doesn't come any closer and I ignore him. Stagger, stagger, lift a leg high enough to clear the glass, and we're through. By that time, someone else has joined the boy, a worn-out girl who's built like seventeen and wrinkled like thirty.
"Who'd've thought. Rescued by the Thing. 'Ey, Thing, yer breakin' decency laws," she purrs. That's harder to ignore. Who purrs?
"By doing what?" I mutter, looking for an exit. My back is already popping a little from the strain.
"'Oney, you been in that cylinder fer years an' clothes start fallin' apart, even if you don'."
"Not my concern at the moment," I say so smoothly. Never mind that I'm blushing. "I'm getting out of here. If you could, you know, point the way . . . "
"I am the way," says a dark voice that I know. "You have to leave through me, Forge."
"Magneto?" I ask, searching the shadows.
"Over here." And he emerges dramatically, older, white-haired, but less bent than I am. Then again, I am hauling an invalid, here.
"Hi." I can't think of anything else to say at the moment.
"I see you're awake. I knew you would, eventually."
The crap. "Um, great. Mags, nice to see you. Been a while, a lot to catch up on, but I think my buddy here's fading. Nearest hospital, if you please."
Yes, it has occured to me that Magneto is in this warehouse, talking in very familiar terms, as if he's been quite aware of my every movement for who-knows-how-long and that the keep apparently has nicknames for me and they're all responsible for the person on my back. But sometimes people like you to play clueless. Makes them feel superior. And then they do what you want out of flattered pity. Sometimes.
"A hospital won't do him any good, Forge."
This is getting into the aggravating stage. "I think it will do just fine for all the extraneous symptoms like starvation."
"I can't let you take him."
"Come on, I know he's not deadly. He will however, be dead."
"A few minutes won't make a difference, Forge. I need to talk to you."
"My back is breaking here, sir."
"Then put him down."
"Not gonna happen, man. Show me the way out and we can have lunch later."
"Very well. Tabitha, Lance. Start packing up. Forge, follow me."
I weave after Magneto, and when he waves hidden doors open and the breeze blows in, I can't help but shudder. I feel so exposed. The weight on my back isn't lessening, but my muscles in that area are starting to numb and that will be a comfort up until I collapse.
"You'll want to go to the Xavier Institute, rather than the hospital. They'll have the facilities to take care of him, no questions asked."
"Xavier . . . " I gasp.
"Xavier has been the equivelent of his father for a long time now, Forge. Do you know who he is?"
All right, all right. "Scott. Yes, I know who he is."
We've stopped on a metal platform. Magneto raises his hand and it rises with a long groan.
"I know something about his stay in the She's prison, Forge."
I look up at him, a somewhat awkward move in my current position. "You do. Prison."
"He's built to be activated, Forge. It would really be better if he died."
This is too weird. I know very well that Scott is not . . . or wasn't . . . "If he dies, Magneto . . . " I make my voice as threatening as I can without the lungs to back it up. "If he dies . . . you'll pay for it. I don't care who you are or what you know."
"I suppose that attitude's only appropriate," Magneto sighs. "But I will talk with you. Soon."
"Whatever," I snap and the platform comes to a halt. The wall opens up into a parking lot and a horizon scattered with taller buildings than I used to associate with Bayville.
"Give me your hand, if you can," Magneto says flatly. With a scowl, I shift Scott's weight to one shoulder and proffer a palm. Magneto drops a set of keys into it. I could swear they were kept in a freezer previously, they're that cold. "The sole car in the parking lot is yours, Forge. We won't be here if you come back and I won't come for it. I don't need it. The Xavier Institute is on the opposite side of Bayville from here. Just turn right and keep driving in as much as a straight line as possible. You'll find it."
"I don't suppose you have any pants stuffed under the driver's seat?"
Magneto smiles. "I'm afraid not. If you'll wait, I could get a pair for you."
"Never mind. I'll try not to get pulled over."
I close my hand tight over the keys and pull Scott into a better position. Resume the stagger.
Technically, I should be thanking Magneto for letting me go and giving me a car and keeping me fresh and hearty in a giant lab tube, but I'm too angry at the moment. Scott's in really bad shape, terminal neglect, here, and . . .
Come to think of it, how did I end up in a giant lab tube? Question number one for proposed lunch date. Question number two, why is Scott . . .
But stop it now, Forge, there are far more important things to think about. Like driving really fast (in a lawful manner) and saving Scott's life. If possible.
Not if possible. No, the life has to be saved, the end.
I slide Scott gently down against the pavement so I can unlock the car. Then (and my muscles are screaming to give out, but I manage) I lift him up into the front-passenger seat and buckle the belt, just in case. I know how long it's been since I drove.
Luckily, the inside of the car isn't so alien that I don't think I know how it works. I don't know what half the dials on the dashboard are, but I didn't know what half the dials on the dashboard were on my old car, either. I could find out by staring real hard at them, but I didn't want to then and I didn't have time now. As long as the car didn't fly or drill underground, they wouldn't be any use anyway.
I back out, turn around, and go right.
And realized just how foreign an environment I'd woke up in.
There. Are. Cars. In. The. Street. A whole lot of them.
My hands immediately tense on the wheel.
"Scott, if I kill us both, please forgive me. It's not intentional. Oh cra-a-a-ap."
There are four lanes now? Since when does anyone need four lanes? I was always happy with one, or, if you had to be excessive, two. Of course, it didn't use to be that big of a town and there were already too many roads for the houses and . . .
An angry chorus of honking comes from behind me. I can't figure it out. I'm in the lane. I'm not swerving yet. I don't think I've run over anyone's cat . . .
Oh, I guess I am going five miles per hour.
That's counterproductive.
Reluctantly, I press on the gas.
Xavier, Xavier, here I come. And don't you dare go kaput on me, Scott, or I'm going to feel very useless, okay?
