Wouldn't it be cool to kill her off right now? No, death by baseball is
hardly fitting. Ah well, I guess I have to through with it. By "it" I
mean a story somewhere around twenty chapters long, and that's an
optimistic projection (pessimistic is a minimum of forty). This is
exhausting (I'm losing weight). Not that I don't love doing it for you
guys and myself, but I've never concentrated on something so hard in my
life. I wish I was Pietro and could pump this stuff out and revise it
thirty times in 2.52 seconds...never mind. Being Pietro sucks. Read on to
find out why.
Oh, this is DEFINITELY a PG-13 chapter.
***
Pietro
***
"How far to Xavier's?"
"Twenty miles."
.
Pietro dropped Anita.
'Twenty...God, I thought it was 6, max of ten. I can't do this.'
He looked down at his hands and saw their fragility. He could imagine the veins underneath his skin and the blood within. It rushed through them too fast, especially through the thumb. He pinched the soft part of it, and felt a pleasant vibration. Or he would have if he were normal and knew what the Hell real time was. The super speed pulse reminded Pietro of his other pulse, deep within. He saw his heart beating like a rabbit's on crack.[1]
If Quicksilver tried to run Anita to that mansion...he saw his heart burst and saw him fall at 2700 miles an hour. Every one of his fragile, oh so very fragile bones shattered. His blood splattered for miles, a mist coating the fall leaves an even deeper crimson. And Anita...nothing but bits of scrap metal imbedded in the trees. And blood.
Pietro shook his head and looked at his hands again. Her blood clung to them, as if it were part of him. Would it harden and give him metal hands? Quicksilver hoped to God it wouldn't. It was bad enough that his bones were fragile. He couldn't even bear to think about such a handicap being welded to his skin. His father...
Pietro began to shake as he remembered the time with the nails. How much worse would it be if he couldn't run?
'Please, please wash away. Please let Anita's blood...Anita!' Pietro lunged for the girl.
He had let her fall an entire centimeter.
He scooped away the blood in the crevice to look at her shoulder's wound. He figured that if he was stuck with metal on his hands, the damage was already done. If the metal was stuck there, he might as well try to save her life instead of leaving her to die on the field. He did not want to have her blood on his hands for the rest of his life if she died. He would go crazy and become a modern-day Lady Macbeth.
When the blood was out of the wound, either in the air or on him -most of it was on him- Quicksilver looked at it. It wasn't a good thing to see right after lunch. It was a sickening sight, period.
The bones had collapsed, not cracked at all, just crunched like an aluminum can. Almost microscopic wires swayed about: the ends of ripped muscle. Blood spurted from torn silver tubes Pietro supposed were her veins. He played his slow motion view of the injury in normal people speed. He nearly went into convulsions at the thought. No hospital could fix that. The girl's only hope was Xavier, who could mentally cut off the blood flow long enough to patch her up. That still might not be enough. She might have lost too much blood by the time he reached the professor.
For Anita to pull through it would take a miracle. Or his father.
Pietro blinked with shock. The thought hadn't occurred to him, but of course. His father could save Anita. Once she was in his reach, he could heal her in seconds. It would be no work for him to replace every drop of the strange metallic blood she had lost. The Master of Metal could do it in the time it took a normal person to blink.
But there would be a price. Death was better than that price for someone like Anita.
'I want a normal life. Their looks, their fear...I hate it. I want to hate them! But they are not to blame, no one is. Someone who said that would never dominate normal people, never kill. She would hate herself. She would hate me. I can't take her to Magneto, even though she may die with Xavier. If she were able, Fahls would tell me to risk it.'
Pietro glanced once more at the silver blood. It would cover most of his arms by the time he reached the mansion. He let out a desperate prayer.
'Please let it wash away. Let it wash away so father will never know what I've done. Please, so he won't kill me.'
He looked in the direction he had to go. There were too many trees that way; he would have to follow the road. He had heard it was deserted and hoped that was the case. There could be no distractions. It would take every bit of mental training he had given himself to keep his heartbeat slow...figuratively speaking.
'God, I'm going to be in no condition to get back home from the Institute if I survive. But I'll have to get home quickly for father to not notice my treachery.'
He looked at Scott. Cyclops was a big responsible person. Someone he could trust to be quick. Quick as a normal person could be.
.
He cleared his throat and said softly, "I'll be there in 7.96 seconds. Tell Wanda where I am."
He ran off, concentrating on each step, breath and heartbeat. In his mind he repeated over and over, 'Every billionth of a second counts.'
Pietro's chest began to ache and he reached into his mind to a place that had taken him weeks to find, veritable centuries for the speedster. It was the involuntary part of his mind, a throb of rhythm that never ceased, so was never noticed. He followed the beat to its harmony, the part that controlled the heart. With a massive tug, he closed that part off in a massive labyrinth.
No matter how his muscles screamed, the heart would go no faster than its current slightly elevated rate. The nerve messages would become lost in the great maze and never come out. Even if one managed to reach that part of his brain, it would never get out. The heart would never receive a message to speed up.
He would let his muscles suffocate; let them die so he would not die instead.
Pietro lost feeling in his feet and hands. His brain grew a little fuzzy, but he held the maze in place with all his diminishing will. As his arms grew numb, Maximoff somehow found the will to do another involuntary miracle. He reached for the arteries in his arms and dilated them. Blood rushed to the arm muscles and he renewed his grip on the dying girl.
Weren't they a pair? A boy a dying girl hardly knew was attempting to save her life, killing himself in the process.
.
The gates of the Institute appeared several thousand yards into the distance. Quicksilver allowed the labyrinth to crumble to mental dust and concentrated on stopping safely. He was still going twenty mph when the gates were ten feet away. It would have to do.
Pietro threw himself to the ground and coasted the rest of the way on his back. He hurt so much.
'Hyperventilate, let the heart explode, just end the pain.' He crawled at a snail's pace one last time into his mind to turn off his pain receptors. He reached the switch, but someone snatched him away from his salvation at the last moment.
The monster wrapped metal vines around Pietro and he screamed in terror. Every memory of his father surfaced and he struggled like a madman. The vines abruptly became true vines made of plant fiber. Pietro calmed down and allowed them to immobilize him. They dug into his skin and wrapped around his out-of-control heart, slowing it. They reached down his throat and gave him air. They dug into his spine, the cerebral cortex, and his brain to take away the responsibility of his life from them. The vines wrapped him in a womb.
*Sleep, Pietro. Nothing may harm you here. You are safe. You saved her life, and now you must sleep.*
*What are you?*
The voice of the vines gave a deep and gentle chuckle. *A friend, Pietro. Rest child, I will not let Magnus harm you again.*
*Magnus...but only person who calls father that is Prof...*
The vines in his brain pulsed and pulled his mind into oblivion.
***
Creepy images, huh? Don't say I didn't warn you guys. In the summary, no less.
***
1: I took that from a review by ishandahalf for my fic "Thief of Spirits." I fell off my chair laughing and had to use it.
Oh, this is DEFINITELY a PG-13 chapter.
***
Pietro
***
"How far to Xavier's?"
"Twenty miles."
.
Pietro dropped Anita.
'Twenty...God, I thought it was 6, max of ten. I can't do this.'
He looked down at his hands and saw their fragility. He could imagine the veins underneath his skin and the blood within. It rushed through them too fast, especially through the thumb. He pinched the soft part of it, and felt a pleasant vibration. Or he would have if he were normal and knew what the Hell real time was. The super speed pulse reminded Pietro of his other pulse, deep within. He saw his heart beating like a rabbit's on crack.[1]
If Quicksilver tried to run Anita to that mansion...he saw his heart burst and saw him fall at 2700 miles an hour. Every one of his fragile, oh so very fragile bones shattered. His blood splattered for miles, a mist coating the fall leaves an even deeper crimson. And Anita...nothing but bits of scrap metal imbedded in the trees. And blood.
Pietro shook his head and looked at his hands again. Her blood clung to them, as if it were part of him. Would it harden and give him metal hands? Quicksilver hoped to God it wouldn't. It was bad enough that his bones were fragile. He couldn't even bear to think about such a handicap being welded to his skin. His father...
Pietro began to shake as he remembered the time with the nails. How much worse would it be if he couldn't run?
'Please, please wash away. Please let Anita's blood...Anita!' Pietro lunged for the girl.
He had let her fall an entire centimeter.
He scooped away the blood in the crevice to look at her shoulder's wound. He figured that if he was stuck with metal on his hands, the damage was already done. If the metal was stuck there, he might as well try to save her life instead of leaving her to die on the field. He did not want to have her blood on his hands for the rest of his life if she died. He would go crazy and become a modern-day Lady Macbeth.
When the blood was out of the wound, either in the air or on him -most of it was on him- Quicksilver looked at it. It wasn't a good thing to see right after lunch. It was a sickening sight, period.
The bones had collapsed, not cracked at all, just crunched like an aluminum can. Almost microscopic wires swayed about: the ends of ripped muscle. Blood spurted from torn silver tubes Pietro supposed were her veins. He played his slow motion view of the injury in normal people speed. He nearly went into convulsions at the thought. No hospital could fix that. The girl's only hope was Xavier, who could mentally cut off the blood flow long enough to patch her up. That still might not be enough. She might have lost too much blood by the time he reached the professor.
For Anita to pull through it would take a miracle. Or his father.
Pietro blinked with shock. The thought hadn't occurred to him, but of course. His father could save Anita. Once she was in his reach, he could heal her in seconds. It would be no work for him to replace every drop of the strange metallic blood she had lost. The Master of Metal could do it in the time it took a normal person to blink.
But there would be a price. Death was better than that price for someone like Anita.
'I want a normal life. Their looks, their fear...I hate it. I want to hate them! But they are not to blame, no one is. Someone who said that would never dominate normal people, never kill. She would hate herself. She would hate me. I can't take her to Magneto, even though she may die with Xavier. If she were able, Fahls would tell me to risk it.'
Pietro glanced once more at the silver blood. It would cover most of his arms by the time he reached the mansion. He let out a desperate prayer.
'Please let it wash away. Let it wash away so father will never know what I've done. Please, so he won't kill me.'
He looked in the direction he had to go. There were too many trees that way; he would have to follow the road. He had heard it was deserted and hoped that was the case. There could be no distractions. It would take every bit of mental training he had given himself to keep his heartbeat slow...figuratively speaking.
'God, I'm going to be in no condition to get back home from the Institute if I survive. But I'll have to get home quickly for father to not notice my treachery.'
He looked at Scott. Cyclops was a big responsible person. Someone he could trust to be quick. Quick as a normal person could be.
.
He cleared his throat and said softly, "I'll be there in 7.96 seconds. Tell Wanda where I am."
He ran off, concentrating on each step, breath and heartbeat. In his mind he repeated over and over, 'Every billionth of a second counts.'
Pietro's chest began to ache and he reached into his mind to a place that had taken him weeks to find, veritable centuries for the speedster. It was the involuntary part of his mind, a throb of rhythm that never ceased, so was never noticed. He followed the beat to its harmony, the part that controlled the heart. With a massive tug, he closed that part off in a massive labyrinth.
No matter how his muscles screamed, the heart would go no faster than its current slightly elevated rate. The nerve messages would become lost in the great maze and never come out. Even if one managed to reach that part of his brain, it would never get out. The heart would never receive a message to speed up.
He would let his muscles suffocate; let them die so he would not die instead.
Pietro lost feeling in his feet and hands. His brain grew a little fuzzy, but he held the maze in place with all his diminishing will. As his arms grew numb, Maximoff somehow found the will to do another involuntary miracle. He reached for the arteries in his arms and dilated them. Blood rushed to the arm muscles and he renewed his grip on the dying girl.
Weren't they a pair? A boy a dying girl hardly knew was attempting to save her life, killing himself in the process.
.
The gates of the Institute appeared several thousand yards into the distance. Quicksilver allowed the labyrinth to crumble to mental dust and concentrated on stopping safely. He was still going twenty mph when the gates were ten feet away. It would have to do.
Pietro threw himself to the ground and coasted the rest of the way on his back. He hurt so much.
'Hyperventilate, let the heart explode, just end the pain.' He crawled at a snail's pace one last time into his mind to turn off his pain receptors. He reached the switch, but someone snatched him away from his salvation at the last moment.
The monster wrapped metal vines around Pietro and he screamed in terror. Every memory of his father surfaced and he struggled like a madman. The vines abruptly became true vines made of plant fiber. Pietro calmed down and allowed them to immobilize him. They dug into his skin and wrapped around his out-of-control heart, slowing it. They reached down his throat and gave him air. They dug into his spine, the cerebral cortex, and his brain to take away the responsibility of his life from them. The vines wrapped him in a womb.
*Sleep, Pietro. Nothing may harm you here. You are safe. You saved her life, and now you must sleep.*
*What are you?*
The voice of the vines gave a deep and gentle chuckle. *A friend, Pietro. Rest child, I will not let Magnus harm you again.*
*Magnus...but only person who calls father that is Prof...*
The vines in his brain pulsed and pulled his mind into oblivion.
***
Creepy images, huh? Don't say I didn't warn you guys. In the summary, no less.
***
1: I took that from a review by ishandahalf for my fic "Thief of Spirits." I fell off my chair laughing and had to use it.