Title: A Real Life Dream
By: X
X0832001@yahoo.com
PG-13
Disclaimer: I own nothing, I am getting no money
Chapter 3
They reluctantly parted and sat down at the table. They talked, they laughed. It was just like it had been before. They easily fell back to the friendship they shared. They weren't enemies, it didn't matter what side of the war they were on. They weren't Rogue and Pyro, just Marie and John.
The front door opened and a rumble of activity made Rogue jump up from the rickety table. Toad strolled into the kitchen focused on the fridge. He opened the door and began rooting for something. "Hey mate, who's your Sheila?" the Englishman asked with a poor imitation of a thick Australian accent.
"Bloody 'ell Toad, I left Sydney when I was seven. I'm not t' bleedn' Croc 'unter" retorted John in an equally bad mockery of Toad's homeland. They were both smiling, no anger in the often repeated exchange. Toad grabbed something and turned around, coming face to face with the love birds. Reverting back to his own York colored inflection he smiled, "Oh, I know her, one of dem X-men." Rouge felt the blood drain from her face. "Crickey mate, tell her to calm down." He threw the apple into the air and caught it with his long sticky tongue. With a nod he headed back out of the kitchen and up the stairs.
"Toad is alive?"
"Yeah, still off active duty from the Liberty Island thing. Storm scorched him pretty good. He tends to wear out a little too fast for your average mission."
"Is he going to tell people I was here? Will you get in trouble?" she was worried about what an angry Magneto might do to an already weakened John. He'd mentioned Liberty Island, which was surely an example of why one didn't go against the Master of Magnetism.
"Nah, Toad's cool" Marie still looked worried. He placed his hands on her shoulders and gently pulled her close. He kissed her, pulling back when he felt the drain. Immediately he pressed his lips to hers again, she kissed back passionately. John was unusually resistant to her powers. Sure she could drain him; she'd done so back in Boston. But John should have passed out cold with how much she pulled out of him. All he did was bend to his knees. He even stayed conscious.
So they kissed. Marie was in heaven. John pulled back, shook his head to clear it and happily started another kiss. He couldn't believe it was a wonderful reality. Any minute he expected to wake up. He pulled back and a moment later reestablished contact with his lips on her throat. She moaned happily and pressed closer to him. No dream could be this good. He broke contact again and shook his head. The movement put him off balance and he stumbled. "We better take a time out." Marie smiled as she guided him to the room off the other side of the kitchen, there was a couch in there they could rest on.
It was kind of weird; the Brotherhood's base wasn't what she'd expected. It reminded her a lot of her own home at Xavier's. It was stupid, but she'd expected John to be surrounded by their evil enemies, good but manipulated by circumstances into thinking he was bad. The other mutants would laugh sinisterly, rub their hands together, and plot ways to kill humans. But it wasn't like that. Toad and John were friends. They had some inside joke going about accents. Mystique actually cared about John, she wanted him happy.
They lay on the couch, happily leaning against each other. Both had on enough clothes, touching wasn't a problem. They just lounged there, happy just being together.
"I've missed you so much."
"I know, it's like a big weight around my neck."
"A simile, you're so artistic." John laughed at her comment. Pyro, the mutant terrorist, was artistic.
Growing serious he asked, "Do you feel this ache when I'm on the other side of a fight?"
"Every time; it's a pain in the bottom of my stomach. I don't want you hurt. I don't want my teammates hurt."
"Sucks to be us"
They sat in silence for a moment after the succinct statement. Then Marie broke that with, "Quit"
"I can't quit" he whispered.
"Why not? Quit and rejoin the X-men. Then we can be together."
"One, I don't want to be an X-man. I really do believe that the humans are going to try and crush us. I 'm going to do everything I can to prevent that." Before Marie could disagree he continued. "And two, you don't leave the Brotherhood."
"You left the X-men"
"Magneto is not Xavier. I wasn't even one of the X-men, just a kid at the school. But now, what I know isn't getting out of the organization."
"So you're trapped here?"
"It's kind of a voluntary entrapment."
She leaned against him, gently resting her head against his chest. His heart pounded a steady lub-dub rhythm. "So that's where we are?" she sighed. She couldn't make him abandoned his life, she wouldn't want to. She was embarrassed by her order to "Quit". He couldn't up and abandon the life he'd made for himself anymore than she could just leave hers. So they were stuck in this miserable situation. They were so close, but a big clear wall had been put up between them. She wanted to cry in frustration.
He looked down into her eyes. His chest ached at the sadness he saw there, he just couldn't stand it. He took a deep breath, "No." She returned the solid statement with a skeptical raised eyebrow. "I love you Marie. I'll do whatever it takes so we can be together."
"But Magneto…what will he do to you?"
"Maybe nothing; maybe he'll let me step back."
"And if not…"
"I will do whatever it takes Marie. It'll probably take some time, but we're going to be happy." She smiled at this.
They spent the rest of the day in each other's arms. Toad stayed in his room. Magneto and Xavier did not get mentioned again. John and Marie excluded Pyro and Rouge, and just enjoyed being with each other. It was the best day either had experienced in quite some time.
Later, Mystique called asking if John wanted any Chinese food since they were stopping on their way home. They'd be back in twenty minutes. Knowing the truth it was a pretty thinly veiled excuse to say when they'd be back. But the oblivious Magneto and Sabertooth had no reason to be suspicious. It was a tearful goodbye, filled with uncertainty. They kissed. It was a slow lingering kiss that made both weak in the knees.
Marie ran to the car, tears already running down her cheeks. John's eyes were glassy with unshed tears. Toad, the pervert who'd been watching from the stairs even had to hold back a sniffle. He'd had every intention of teasing Pyro some more, but the whole goodbye had just been too sad. Life was so unfair.
A few days later Pyro was lying on his bed in the new compound. His eyes were closed and 2 notebooks lay beside him.
"Finish your story?" His dark eyes popped open. Mystique was in his room, standing over him.
"Yeah, I did" he looked at her curiously. "Did you need something Mystique?"
"I want to read the end of your story; the suspense is driving me nuts."
"You've been reading my story?" he rolled off the bed onto his feet. He was angry that his privacy had been invaded. Sure the story was obviously fiction, but the feelings behind the characters were his own. It was a little like she'd read his diary, of coarse John didn't keep a diary. But more than angry he was confused. Why would Mystique want to read some romance novel-esq story he'd written? If she just wanted a book there were plenty around, written by actual authors. She could have brought a trashy romance novel at the drug store where she got the notebooks. There was no reason to wait for the next installment of what he was doing.
"Why?"
"You're good John, really good." He was shocked, not just because it was the first time he could recall her using his real name. But the idea that he was good was so weird. He wrote because he liked to, he liked making up stories, he liked reading what he wrote. But he'd never really shown anyone else anything he'd written unless you count school projects or the occasion letter like the one he'd written Marie.
"You liked it?"
"You've got talent." She picked up the last two notebooks and took them back to her room. This time he knew full well she had them, but she didn't care. Deception like this was pointless. He was good and he should know it. With that established she left John alone with his thoughts.
He typed, he revised, and he tweaked his manuscript for about a month. Mystique watched him doing this, curious. Magneto had deemed him ready to work again so his literary project filled his time back at the base between jobs. After the month he presented a thick stack of paper to Mystique.
"Will you read it for me?" She gave him a look.
"What are you up to kid?"
"I wanna step back from this, be with Marie. If I can make a living doing this writing thing, I'll still have time for the Brotherhood, and be able to have a normal life with Marie." It really was sweet, that same womanly part that cared when he got hurt was touched by his goal. She smiled and nodded, taking the pile with her as she headed for her room. Getting published was hard. A man getting published in the romance genre was hard. Convincing Magneto to let you leave to be with the enemy you loved wouldn't be as hard as John thought. Erik was a little soft when it came to young mutants in love. But even so, it was quite an undertaking John had begun. The least she could do was make sure he used commas and that his verbs agreed.
Marie was lying on her bed. Her grounding was over but she really had no need to be anywhere else. It hadn't taken long for her lie to be discovered. One didn't bring a blanket to Mississippi this time of year. But respecting her privacy Xavier hadn't pried. She refused to say where she went, and accepted her punishment. She was off X-missions for three months and had been grounded for two. It was a little weird to be grounded at her age, but she'd kind of expected it.
Kitty and Jubilee had refused to speak to her for 4 days, and since she was stuck in her room that had wound up pretty awkward. Luckily for that situation as teenage girls Jubilee and Kitty soon realized it was about a boy, and different rules applied to such situations. Marie was still wrong, but it was understandable and the four days were enough punishment. The two had done their best to find out who the mystery man was, but all attempts were futile. So, they continued to refer to him as "Mr. Mystery" and only pestered her occasionally about his identity.
"You've got mail" announced Kitty happily as she appeared at the door. Marie looked up. She and John had been writing secretly since the day in Canada. John used fake return addresses and a PO Box so it was a slow system, but it kept them in contact. She missed him, and missed him more than ever when she read his letters, but it prevented that horrible ache of secretly loving him from afar. Since she was off X-missions for another three days she hadn't even gotten to see him as an enemy minion. She wasn't too upset by that since those situations were even worse than not seeing him at all.
It was usually when the letters arrived that the onslaught of "Why won't you just tell us who he is" would begin. But in Kitty's hand wasn't a letter, it was a package. She knew this was going to make more urgent demands. She might actually have to tell them after this. Requiring privacy she took the package from Kitty and shut herself in the bathroom. Tearing off the brown paper she found she held a book.
Lines Blurred was the title, written in shiny gold metallic embossing. Under that was "By: St. John Allerdyce". Marie nearly dropped the book. There was a note.
Marie,
It's an advanced copy of my book. I did it; I'm starting a normal life we can share. I'm a novelist. I've gotten an apartment; a writer needs a steady place to get mail delivered to. If you want, you can join me here.
We'll work out whatever we need to. I'm not demanding you quit the X-men. I just want to have a place where we can go and be together, where our ideas on humans and mutants don't matter. I want to wake up and have you near me, I want to close my eyes at night and know you're safe, that you're right beside me. And I want the time in between these activities to show you just how wonderful you make me feel.
I know we're still young, that we have all our lives ahead of us and there's no need to rush into anything. But, I hate being apart. The roads we are on are separate and only take us farther apart from each other. We really don't know what will happen in the future, the future of mutants remains hazy. So I don't want to spend any more time feeling as I have the last two years.
I love you.
John
Marie was grinning from ear to ear as she left the bathroom. "What did Mr. Mystery send?" Kitty demanded, trying to sound angry but clearly happy to see Rogue happy. It was time. She was going to put everything out in the open. It didn't matter now, if they made a fuss or disowned her for her love of a traitor. She and John were going to have a life together, a nice normal life.
She held out the book. Confused Kitty took it from her hand and read the cover. She looked up at Rogue still not understanding the significance. It took about 15 seconds, a long time in this sort of situation, for her to remember John's real name. She hadn't really thought of him as John in so long. Since he'd defected he had really just become Pyro. But his actual given name was St. John Allerdyce.
Her mouth dropped open and hung there. Jubilee rushed over and read the cover of the book that was leaving everyone speechless. She recognized the name, "Pyro!" Then a moment later she put 2 and 2 together and vocalized the thought that was on the tip of everyone's tongue. They just weren't sure they wanted it out loud. "Your mystery man is Pyro, John" she quickly corrected. Rogue was dating John, not the Brotherhood super villain.
"Yeah, Ah'm in love with him." She braced herself for the yelling, being called an idiot and the warnings that were sure to follow. But her two best gal pals did nothing of the sort.
"Awww, that's so cute. You're in love" Cooed Jubilee. Rogue was confused.
"You're OK with this?"
"Girl, we totally knew"
Rogue was floored, "you knew?"
"We saw that letter he wrote you. You tried to play it off like no big deal, but come on!" Kitty chuckled.
Jubilee jumped in, "I know that was like pre Bobby break up and all, but you could tell."
"I'm that transparent?"
"No, no, not at all. It's just that we know you… and…" Jubilee faded and the more articulate Kitty took over.
"We weren't totally sure, we just had the idea, you know like a shadow in the back of our minds. Then you did the whole disappearance thing, then the super mopey grounded thing, we could tell it was pretty serious."
"Does Xavier know?"
"Who knows, he's like an all seeing Yoda guy."
"Want to come with me when I tell him I'm moving out to go live with John?"
"No dear, you've made your bed and now you have to lie in it."
"With Pyro" added a giggling Jubilee.