It is I, Jjah-Jjah! And isn't everyone excited?!
I know you're not excited. I have haven't been updating. Well LA DE FRIKKEN DA! If you had all the homework/graduation/finals/scholarship/college/driving crap that I have to deal with, you'd be slow updating too... Not to mention, I'm working on two fics now so, nyah!
Disclaimer: I disclaim.
Reviews:
roguehobbit: tehehe... guess I took a while on this chappie, huh? Oh well. At least I'm working on it. Oooh. And in an interesting point, Wanda's going to get a familiar too, at little later on.
Goober: Thank you!
****** Onward!!!! ***************************
Chapter Three: What Dreams May Come...
The pink toned sky stretched out endlessly. The sun was setting like a brilliant ruby in the west and Wanda settled down to stare up at the sky and watch the clouds disappear into the night.
She felt oddly at peace, oddly whole. She had only felt this way before in blissful, ignorant dreams. Perhaps it was Agatha's open the door trick. Maybe that was what was making her feel so alive. Normally Wanda *loathed* the color pink (because of the Barbie incident), but the color the sky was at the moment was an altogether different shade. It didn't make you think about sweet sugary things, but rather cool refreshing things like watermelon in the summer.
She closed her eyes for a moment to drink in the last blissful rays of the sun.
And when she opened her eyes everything was completely different.
The sky was black. The sun was gone. The maw of darkness hung over the land and distorted its image into something disturbing and horrible. Cold, sharp cliffs sprang like teeth out of the ground. Gaping bottomless pits suddenly lay opened in the earth. The wind blew down mercilessly. It raged and roared and threw grit and gravel into her face so it stung.
"What the hell?" She snarled, but the sound came out hoarse and was carried away by the wind before it registered even in her own ears. She brought her arms up to shield her face, and then took a few steps forward.
Then the sickening sound of crumbling rock met her ears and she was falling.... She was falling down into one of those bottomless pits and there was nothing she could do. More rock fell lose and began to rain down upon her from above. Numbly she noticed a piece that looked rather sharp as it fell towards her. Then she felt a gut wrenching pain in her abdomen. A warm wet substance flowed up her arms and flew upwards towards the light as she fell inexorably downwards. The noted the color.
Red. It's blood...
***
Wanda wrenched herself out of bed so hard that it gave her a headache. Her breathing was ragged, and she waited impatiently for the shock of the nightmare to pass. And here she thought she was done with the freakish dreams...
Cursing, she hauled herself out of bed and headed towards the blissfully clean kitchen... Two weeks had passed since her visit to Agatha and the initiation of Shader into their little group. The solitary mutant appeared to have had no experience with Magneto, but neither did he appear to have anywhere else to go; a silent yet loyal ally...
Agatha had also given them additional help, by allowing them to stay in a house on some property she owned. Wanda had been thankful for that. Not only did she not know how long she could go on pretending before somebody got suspicious, she also would have had a hard time explaining why so many mutants had begun randomly congregating around her... The house was in a rural setting in a nondescript location close enough to Bayville for it to be convenient, but far away enough not to arouse any suspicion.
One thing Wanda had noticed upon living with her new colleagues was that they all were night owls... As she walked through the living room area, she noticed Clint sprawled out on the couch snoring as the TV pressed on... Jillian's voice was coming from the kitchen. Apparently she was talking to herself again... The ominous darkness engulfing the patio even though the porch light was on indicated Shader's presence. Wanda thought about smacking Clint in the head with a pillow, but decided against it and entered the kitchen.
As she headed straight for the medicine cabinet to get some Tylenol, Wanda looked over at Jillian, who was in fact not talking to herself, but to a potato she was trying to make grow.
"Jillian."
"Wha?" Jillian sounded slightly dazed.
"Have you been sending me anymore dreams lately?"
Jillian slowly turned the swivel bar chair she was sitting in around till she faced Wanda. "How many times do I have to tell you, I sent *images*, not dreams, and it was your own deranged little mind that made them into freaky dreams, ok?"
"So you didn't send any?"
"No! And Bob Jr. didn't send any either, did you little Bob?" Jillian's attention was back on the spud.
"Why did you name it *Bob*?" Wanda groaned. Jillian was still looking at the potato when she said.
"You ok?"
Wanda paused. "Yeah. Just a freaky nightmare, that's all..."
Jillian hazarded a look over her shoulder that said, 'Really? Why don't I feel horribly convinced?' and then turned back around.
"There's some tuna-salad in the fridge in you're hungry."
"No thanks." Wanda said as she swallowed some water to wash the painkiller down. "I'll just go and watch some TV." Thus, Wanda left the room to go pursue her earlier goal that included Clint's rude awakening.
Jillian sat there for a while, then went to fridge, took out the afore mentioned tuna salad, got a spare spork, and left the room. She walked past the murder-in-progress occurring on the couch and went out onto the patio.
It was dark. Even the stars weren't in view overhead. Jillian turned and looked up above the doorframe where a shadowy figure was sitting on the ledge.
"You haven't eaten anything tonight. Come down from there already!"
"No. That's alright..."
"Don't make me come up there."
A sound like a soft sigh was heard and the figure melted down to the ground like an illusion made with mirrors and stood before her. Jillian smiled and handed the mutant the food. He seemed to shake his head slightly, but sat down at the patio table, his back to her, and began to eat.
Shader was odd to say the least. It wasn't really his appearance that made him that way, though his appearance *was* odd, but rather the way he carried himself. From what Jillian had seen his physical mutation wasn't that bad. He was tall and unusually pale. His fingernails were long and sharp. His eyes were so black no pupil was visible. The only things that seemed to be out of place were his mouth and ears. He kept his mouth covered with an ever-present black scarf. His ears were harder to hide, but he tried. Those ears, that were very long and undeniably elfin, pointed backwards poking through his hair, and tried valiantly to escape the wide brim of the floppy witch-like hat he wore. He tried to hide everything.
"It's getting cold; a storm's moving in..." She began as he finished. "You sure you don't want to come in?"
"I'm sure." He nodded and tugged his scarf back into place before he turned around. "Thank you." With that said, his shadows lifted him up and once again he was holding vigil over the porch.
****
"Gah! Can't a guy get some beauty sleep around here, Beautiful?!"
"Nope."
"You know you could get off me..."
"Nope."
In the background Jillian walked by, looked at them, blinked once, and shook her head before she moved on.
"You know I can't really breathe down here..."
"Your point is?"
"Ummm.... Breathing is good?"
"That's nice."
"So... Could you let me breathe?"
"Nope."
"Arrgh!!! Dammit, Beautiful! Let me up!!!"
"Sorry. No can do."
"Wanda, I'm serious! All the blood's rushing to my head! I might explode!!!"
"Cry me a river."
"Auuuugggghhhhh!!!!!!"
"Will you two shut up and quit flirting??!!! You'll wake up my potato!!!"
Wanda sputtered and fell of the couch, freeing Clint's head, which she had been sitting on.
"We are NOT flirting, Jillian!!!!" A few glasses exploded in the kitchen in response.
"I don't know about that, Beautiful..." Clint trailed off and caressed Wanda's arm in a way she did not approve of...
"GET OFF!!!" The echo of the corresponding slap was recorded as far away as New Zealand...
"Owie..." Clint muttered, holding his reddened cheek as Wanda stormed off... Jillian was leaning against the kitchen doorframe watching the scene with wide-eyed interest and Shader's head was poked through the patio door, eyebrows raised...
"What'd I do?" Clint said mournfully.
"I think you came on too strong..." Jillian answered.
*************
"Stupid dumb blond, always.... Can't keep his frikken hands to himself..." Wanda muttered murderously as she climbed back into bed.
She snuggled into the mattress and pulled the covers tightly around her. Still muttering about the tortures she felt poor Clint deserved, she finally fell back to sleep..
**********
For one horrifying moment, she thought she was back in the asylum.
It took a few moments for the differences of the two locations to outweigh the similarities. It was a small room, metallic and white. The door she sensed she had just been shoved through was barred heavily: she could not get out. She was trapped.
That realization spurred her into panicked action.
"Let me out!" She screamed, the sound echoing and far too familiar. She banged her fists against the metal till they bled. It was then that she noticed the sudden increase in temperature; it was becoming sickeningly hot. It came from above, so she looked up. The glassy ceiling was emitting a yellow light; one that began to become increasingly brighter till her eyes teared up, burned, and then went blind. She swung helplessly at the walls, trying to find a way out, but every breath she took seemed harder than the last. It was as if all the oxygen had been pumped out of the room. Though, she could not see the following blast of red light, she could feel it against her skin. For a moment she felt nothing.
Then the horrible mind numbing pain began. She screamed, this she knew, but she couldn't hear herself. It felt as if all her bones were being snapped into pulp all at once and slowly reforming. Everything burned. She could feel the blood dripping out of her ears from shattered eardrums. The tips of her fingers and toes felt as if they had been blown off in an explosion. All along her back, neck, and shoulders she felt as if hundreds of dull ice picks were being shoved through her skin.
And still it continued.
*********
"I just don't see what I did wrong!"
"Clint darling, you have to understand. Wanda was abandoned in an asylum for the majority of her life. She was in maximum security; it wasn't as if she was allowed to socialize with a hell of a lot of people her own age, especially not guys. She's been out of the loop for so long, she doesn't really know how to react to being flirted with... And lets not forget that her first kiss was with Toad. That's enough to scar anyone."
"I see your point. But *you* know how to react to being flirted with?"
"Oh, that's easy. Just freak them out."
"Freak them out?"
"Like so..."
Jillian leap into Clint's lap and threw her arms around his neck.
"AWWWW! Cwint, you're such a cute widdle thing, aren't you???!!!" She gushed and batted her eyelashes.
Clint shoved her off his lap and retreated to the other side of the room.
"That's disturbing!"
"But it worked, didn't it?"
"If you want to send guys running screaming into the sunset, then yeah. But what if you actually like a guy?"
"Bah. That'll be the day. None of you idiots are worth my time."
A piercing scream echoed through the house.
"Wanda!!?"
******
A few moments later, three mutants rushed into Wanda's bedroom. Wanda lay thrashing on the bed, sheets twisted around her obviously in the throes of some terrible nightmare.
"Hey Beautiful, wake up." Clint said shaking her shoulder. There was no response. He shook her more firmly. "Wake up!!" Wanda kept on screaming. Jillian jumped on to the bed.
"Wanda, snap out of it!" She yelled and began trying to pull Wanda up into a sitting position. Wanda's thrashing made it impossible. "Wanda! Wanda, what's wrong?" She grabbed her friend's shoulders and shook hard. "Why won't she wake up?!!! Wanda, wake up!!! Wake up!!!"
*****
Wanda opened her eyes and she was no longer in the little room, but she wasn't in her bedroom either. It looked like a desert, sand was everywhere, but it was cold. Very cold. She slowly picked up her frigid aching body and was seized by a stronger chill. In the distance she could hear voices, carried by the wind, rising and falling like waves in the sea. She couldn't make out any words, but she could hear the tone: both mournful and angry all at once. They grew louder and louder and louder till she had to cover her ears, but the voices persisted even then. She ran, but they followed. She stopped and they swarmed around her invading her thoughts till there was no more room to think or even be. Nothing was left but the loud angry, sad, enraged murmurs, mutterings, and screams.
"Look at what you've done."
"You don't deserve to live."
"Die."
"She's gone."
"It's all because of you!!!"
"It's your fault."
"Hypocrite!"
"The guilty one...."
"Die."
"Everything's gone."
"What did you do?!"
"Stop it!"
"It never would have happened."
"Look at what you've done!"
"You bastard!"
"What did I ever do to you?"
"Die."
"I didn't want it!"
"Always the guilty one.."
"You'll pay! You'll regret what you did to us!"
"You'll never sleep another night!"
"You'll never have a pleasant dream!"
"I'll always be right here."
"You've taken everything. It's all gone."
"Monster!"
"Heartless beast!"
"You'll be punished for this crime against me."
"And you've probably forgotten..."
"The guilty one."
"Stop it!"
"The guilty one!"
"Stop it!!!"
"You're the guilty one."
"Please, stop it!"
"You must die."
"No."
"Die."
"It's only a dream."
"Die."
"It's just a dream!"
"Die."
"It's *my* dream!"
"Die."
"STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!!! It's MY dream! This is my dream!!! Stop it, stay out of it, and leave me the HELL alone!!!!!!"
And with that, the Scarlet Witch disappeared from the cold desert.
*******
Her boots clicked as they connected with the smooth stone of the floor. Wanda stopped and marveled. She stood at the entrance to a spectacular archway. She stopped herself from going in, but this place felt different. It felt safe. She was not being watched here.
She went in.
It was beautiful. It was a hall, lined with doors, which stretched out endlessly. It was all made up of jet-black obsidian that had been polished so much that it sparkled. A silvery mist drifted over the floor. She looked at the doors. They were all identical. The only way to differentiate between then was the color of the light that streamed out from beneath. The light that came from beneath the first one on her left was red. The light from the first door on her right was pale lavender. Red was her favorite color, so she chose red.
And that may have been a mistake. She opened the door and allowed herself to be engulfed by the warm red light. As soon as her vision cleared she found she was standing in the middle of a field of flames. Everything was strangely beautiful, even as it burned. She felt warm and protected in this inferno: as if nothing could touch her, hurt her, ever again. Experimentally, she passed a hand through the nearest flame. Instead of pain, she felt a strange tingling euphoria that had her yearning for more. She was about to put her other hand into the fire when she felt a strange feeling that someone was behind her. She turned and gasped.
There, outlined in the flames was the form of her father. For some reason, she was afraid. Suddenly the flames surged upward in temperature, and panicked, she leapt back to the door and ran through, slamming it behind her.
She stood in the hallway, leaning back against the closed door, as she caught her breath and sweat trickled down her brow. She had to choose another door. She had to, so she stumbled over to the once across the hall, opened it, and walked through.
And immediately fell into a lavender body of water. Sputtering she came to the surface and swore. She floundered a bit till she heard a very familiar voice.
"Well, that was graceful."
Lo and behold, sitting on a big rock that was floating about two feet above the water, was Jillian wearing a striped lavender and yellow sundress that looked really odd on her.
"Jillian?"
"Kinda, but not really." Jillian helped her out of the water and onto the floating rock. Wanda coughed for a minute and wrung out her clothes before answering.
"Who are you then?"
"I'm a concept."
"Wha?"
"A concept. I'm your concept of Jillian. Your idea of her and what she means to you."
"What does that mean? Where am I?"
"You went into the hallway?"
"Yes..."
"Well, the hallway is the reflection of your mind. Every door in it represents a different aspect of yourself. This door, for example, represents the softer, more fuzzy side of you... You know, the one that doesn't want to maim everything all the time."
"What are you doing here then?"
"Every door has a concept on the other side."
"So... Where I was before..."
"That was the aspect of you that is anger. Magneto is the concept that resides there."
"But why him?!"
"If it weren't for him, that doorway wouldn't exist."
"Why was I afraid?" Wanda was surprised to hear the words come out of her mouth.
The concept took her hand and said enigmatically, "Sometimes too much anger isn't healthy." She turned Wanda's hand over so that it faced palm up, revealing a nasty burn where she had touched the flame. Wanda sucked in her breath; knowledge of the wound caused it to start throbbing in pain. "Just because something feels good, like anger, doesn't mean that you will come out of it unscarred."
"What the hell is going on?" Wanda sighed, burying her face in her un-burnt hand. "It's a dream isn't it?"
"It was, but the moment you came to this hallway, your mind wasn't dreaming anymore."
"Do what?"
"There's an intruder here. He's looking for you, but as long as you stay in the hallway, he won't succeed. His realm is merely that of dreams; he can't delve into other aspects of your consciousness."
"Somebody else is running around in my head? Again?!"
"Afraid so."
"Damn. What the hell does this one want?"
"Why don't you ask him yourself?"
"I can do that?"
"Sure. He'll be behind the door that is the aspect of you that is dreams. All you have to do is find the right one."
"Ok. Now?"
"Why not? Just rebound off the floating rocking chair over there and happy hunting!"
"Alright. Bye then."
"Bye bye!" The concept said brightly as Wanda leapt from the rocking chair to the doorway, and then disappeared.
Once again, she found herself in the obsidian hall. She took a few steps forward. Gray light on her right, dark blue on her left. She brushed her fingertips against each door and felt nothing. She moved on. The next two doors were pink and yellow. She felt nothing from the yellow one. From the pink one, though, she felt a mild irritation, but decided her dreams would most definitely not be pink, and moved on. It went on like that for a while. Trusting her power to tell her which was the right door, touching polished obsidian and feeling nothing, till... Until she came to a green door. Dark green. She touched the surface and felt his frustration. He did not know she was there.
Reached for the knob, twisted it, and flung the door open.
The room within was cloaked, misty, and seemingly empty, save for the figure in the black trench coat that jerked around at her arrival. Wanda studied her adversary. He was several years older than she was, probably in his early twenties. He was tall, his hair was short and black, and his eyes were the same shade of green as the light that had streamed from beneath the door.
"Who are you?" He asked, his voice as cold as his expression.
"Who am I? You're the one screwing around in my head! That's supposed to be my line!"
"What are you talking about? I'm here for him, not for you. Are you one of his henchmen here to save him?"
"I don't know what the hell you're yammering on about. All I want to know is what you're doing in my dreams!"
The man had the audacity to look surprised.
"You're not Magneto."
Wanda was silent for a moment.
Then she went off.
"WHAT????!!!!!! Of course I'm not that evil, stuck up, idiotic, heartless, conniving, brainless, hopeless, worthless, toothless, old, flaming bag of monkey shit!!! Why the frikken hell would you think I'm that bastard?!!!!! Huh????"
"You have similar REM waves." He said quietly.
"And that's your brilliant excuse?"
His eyes narrowed and he began to disappear. Wanda faltered.
"Wait a minute!!!" He remained. "Who are you and why do you want to do Magneto in?"
He hesitated before answering. "I am Somnus. I wish his death for reasons of my own. Who are you?"
"I'm the Scarlet Witch, and I want to kill him because he abandoned me in an insane asylum when I was eight years old."
"And why did he do that?" The two began to circle one another.
"Because he didn't feel like playing daddy to a difficult child..."
"He's your father?"
"Yup. And didn't I turn out fine?" Wanda allowed herself one of her classic through-the-bangs death glares that hinted of total insanity.
Somnus raised a brow, and then nodded. "I see."
Abruptly, the surroundings began to melt away with a gesture from the mutant.
"Hey. What are you doing?"
"I'm leaving. You will not hear from me again."
"You can't get off that easy." She muttered, and then lunged. She grabbed the other mutant by the front of his coat, and for a moment, she could se into his own hallway of aspects and concepts. Realizing her intent, Somnus grabbed her and threw her off of him before disappearing completely.
The world continued to fade until Wanda opened her eyes.
*********
The first thing she noticed was that she was very wet. The second was that Jillian was jumping up and down on the bed chanting, "Wake up, wake up, wake up, ect."
Wanda's eyes snapped open. "Would you stop that?!" She yelled, sitting up.
"It lives!" Clint proclaimed.
"Wanda!!!!!!" Jillian screeched and jumped down to enfold Wanda in a crushing hug. "We were so worried! You just started screaming bloody murder and you wouldn't wake up!!! And then, Clint tried to wake you up and that didn't work, so I tried and that didn't work, then Shader tried, and you kinda sputtered for a minute, but you didn't wake up!!!" Wanda looked over at the shadow painter who was sheepishly holding a pitcher of water.
"Wanda, what happened?" Clint asked, sounding serious. Wanda was still for a moment, and then she jumped out of bed, dragging Jillian with her.
"Beautiful?"
"Everybody get dressed, we have to go somewhere."
"What are you talking about?"
Wanda pulled her red trench coat out of the closet. "We're going to go pay someone a little visit..."
********
Clint had been only slightly concerned when Wanda had declared that they go pay a visit or something like that, but now that they were in Boston, Massachusetts for no apparent reason, he was beginning to think that she might be delusional. She had just strolled up to the nearest airport, slapped down the money for three tickets (Shader didn't need one, he hid in the shadows), and hopped on the fastest jet to Boston. It was a mite scary. And now that they had arrived, she seemed to know exactly where she was going. Jillian, on the other hand, did not seem concerned at all. In fact, she was currently singing The Lumberjack Song, from Monty Python. Shader followed in the silent form of a shadowy puddle. Clint stirred his cup of coffee slowly and took a sip. He was becoming a tad bit frightened.
Wanda stopped in front of a deserted looking house in the suburbs. This was the place she had seen.
"I wish I were a girlie,
Just like my dear papa!" Jillian finished.
Wanda walked up to the front door, and found in unlocked. Cautiously, she stepped inside, Jillian, Shader, and then Clint followed. It wasn't that the house looked deserted. Everything was spotlessly clean, only there was no furniture. The adjoining rooms were empty, so they climbed the stairs. Clint and Jillian saw Wanda halt at the top then say,
"It's nice to meet you in the flesh, Somnus."
She stepped forward, Shader returned to his normal form, and her three followers came up to see Wanda conversing with a tired looking, black haired, green eyed, young man.
"What do you want?"
"I want to know about you and Magneto. What did he do to you to make you hate him?"
Somnus smiled coldly. "You really want to know?"
Wanda gave him a look that said, 'Duh.'
He nodded. "Three years ago, in Europe, Magneto approached my fiancée Isolde and I. We were both young, and confused as to what we were. He said he could provide answers by giving us this... wonderful opportunity. He told us that he had a machine, that would advance our mutations to their finest point, so that we would never have to deal with the pain and alienation that would take place if they advanced naturally."
"And you took him up on it?" Wanda asked.
He laughed humorlessly. "No. Actually, we didn't. We decided that we were better off taking things as they went along... Only Magneto didn't tell us one thing... His machine was experimental... And he needed guinea pigs. He and some of his lackeys came back later, and kidnapped Isolde. I found out and followed, but it was too late."
Somnus shook his head and strode out the room, throwing a random door open and beckoning for them to follow. They stood in the doorway and he gestured towards the bed.
"That," He said, "is the reason I *hate* Magneto."
Stretched out on the hospital-like bed, was the slender, pale, form of a rather pretty young woman. The bed seemed to swallow up her thin frame. Her long auburn hair, that seemed to be tangled with feathers, lay lovingly brushed out against the white pillow. A series of machines and wires were attached to her. Her lungs rose and fell under nearly translucent skin. A steady beeping mimicked her heartbeat.
"She's been in a coma ever since he tested that machine on her..."
"The nightmare." Wanda hissed, realization dawning. "The part of the nightmare where I was trapped in that small room, that was really through *her* eyes, when she was caught in the machine."
"I wanted Magneto to have a taste of his own medicine. I apologize, you were not the one meant to experience that."
"But I did." Her own experiences were bad enough, now to fully realize what he could do to other people... It only made her more determined. She watched as Somnus walked over to the bed and sat in a well- used chair beside it.
"Does it bother you that I'm his daughter?"
"I feel sorry for you."
Wanda snorted. She wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. She watched at he straightened the sheet around the woman.
"Why not join us?"
He looked up.
"We all have reason to hate Magneto, but if we all just go after him on our own time, he'll be ready for us every time. However, he won't expect all his enemies to suddenly start working together."
"You want me, to join you, in this..." He gestured towards her and the others. "Carnival?"
Wanda opened her mouth to reply, when a large smile graced her features. "Exactly. The Scarlet Witch's Carnival: a menagerie of freaks and demons whose prime mission in life is to make Magneto afraid of clowns. Will you assist us in this quest?"
Somnus stared at her for a moment, then glanced down at the bed.
"I cannot leave Isolde... But when the battle begins, I'll fight with you..."
"Thank you." Wanda nodded, then turned around. "Alright. Let's go back home."
"Back home?" Clint whined, "but we just got here!"
"Now when Wanda says, Wanda says, you should know that Birdy!" Jillian babbled, dragging the protesting mutant back towards the airport. Shader shrugged, and went after them. Wanda followed.
The sound of mechanical heartbeats filled the room.
*****************
Well! This is probably the second worst thing I've ever written. Ah well, if you're reading, review anyway....
I know you're not excited. I have haven't been updating. Well LA DE FRIKKEN DA! If you had all the homework/graduation/finals/scholarship/college/driving crap that I have to deal with, you'd be slow updating too... Not to mention, I'm working on two fics now so, nyah!
Disclaimer: I disclaim.
Reviews:
roguehobbit: tehehe... guess I took a while on this chappie, huh? Oh well. At least I'm working on it. Oooh. And in an interesting point, Wanda's going to get a familiar too, at little later on.
Goober: Thank you!
****** Onward!!!! ***************************
Chapter Three: What Dreams May Come...
The pink toned sky stretched out endlessly. The sun was setting like a brilliant ruby in the west and Wanda settled down to stare up at the sky and watch the clouds disappear into the night.
She felt oddly at peace, oddly whole. She had only felt this way before in blissful, ignorant dreams. Perhaps it was Agatha's open the door trick. Maybe that was what was making her feel so alive. Normally Wanda *loathed* the color pink (because of the Barbie incident), but the color the sky was at the moment was an altogether different shade. It didn't make you think about sweet sugary things, but rather cool refreshing things like watermelon in the summer.
She closed her eyes for a moment to drink in the last blissful rays of the sun.
And when she opened her eyes everything was completely different.
The sky was black. The sun was gone. The maw of darkness hung over the land and distorted its image into something disturbing and horrible. Cold, sharp cliffs sprang like teeth out of the ground. Gaping bottomless pits suddenly lay opened in the earth. The wind blew down mercilessly. It raged and roared and threw grit and gravel into her face so it stung.
"What the hell?" She snarled, but the sound came out hoarse and was carried away by the wind before it registered even in her own ears. She brought her arms up to shield her face, and then took a few steps forward.
Then the sickening sound of crumbling rock met her ears and she was falling.... She was falling down into one of those bottomless pits and there was nothing she could do. More rock fell lose and began to rain down upon her from above. Numbly she noticed a piece that looked rather sharp as it fell towards her. Then she felt a gut wrenching pain in her abdomen. A warm wet substance flowed up her arms and flew upwards towards the light as she fell inexorably downwards. The noted the color.
Red. It's blood...
***
Wanda wrenched herself out of bed so hard that it gave her a headache. Her breathing was ragged, and she waited impatiently for the shock of the nightmare to pass. And here she thought she was done with the freakish dreams...
Cursing, she hauled herself out of bed and headed towards the blissfully clean kitchen... Two weeks had passed since her visit to Agatha and the initiation of Shader into their little group. The solitary mutant appeared to have had no experience with Magneto, but neither did he appear to have anywhere else to go; a silent yet loyal ally...
Agatha had also given them additional help, by allowing them to stay in a house on some property she owned. Wanda had been thankful for that. Not only did she not know how long she could go on pretending before somebody got suspicious, she also would have had a hard time explaining why so many mutants had begun randomly congregating around her... The house was in a rural setting in a nondescript location close enough to Bayville for it to be convenient, but far away enough not to arouse any suspicion.
One thing Wanda had noticed upon living with her new colleagues was that they all were night owls... As she walked through the living room area, she noticed Clint sprawled out on the couch snoring as the TV pressed on... Jillian's voice was coming from the kitchen. Apparently she was talking to herself again... The ominous darkness engulfing the patio even though the porch light was on indicated Shader's presence. Wanda thought about smacking Clint in the head with a pillow, but decided against it and entered the kitchen.
As she headed straight for the medicine cabinet to get some Tylenol, Wanda looked over at Jillian, who was in fact not talking to herself, but to a potato she was trying to make grow.
"Jillian."
"Wha?" Jillian sounded slightly dazed.
"Have you been sending me anymore dreams lately?"
Jillian slowly turned the swivel bar chair she was sitting in around till she faced Wanda. "How many times do I have to tell you, I sent *images*, not dreams, and it was your own deranged little mind that made them into freaky dreams, ok?"
"So you didn't send any?"
"No! And Bob Jr. didn't send any either, did you little Bob?" Jillian's attention was back on the spud.
"Why did you name it *Bob*?" Wanda groaned. Jillian was still looking at the potato when she said.
"You ok?"
Wanda paused. "Yeah. Just a freaky nightmare, that's all..."
Jillian hazarded a look over her shoulder that said, 'Really? Why don't I feel horribly convinced?' and then turned back around.
"There's some tuna-salad in the fridge in you're hungry."
"No thanks." Wanda said as she swallowed some water to wash the painkiller down. "I'll just go and watch some TV." Thus, Wanda left the room to go pursue her earlier goal that included Clint's rude awakening.
Jillian sat there for a while, then went to fridge, took out the afore mentioned tuna salad, got a spare spork, and left the room. She walked past the murder-in-progress occurring on the couch and went out onto the patio.
It was dark. Even the stars weren't in view overhead. Jillian turned and looked up above the doorframe where a shadowy figure was sitting on the ledge.
"You haven't eaten anything tonight. Come down from there already!"
"No. That's alright..."
"Don't make me come up there."
A sound like a soft sigh was heard and the figure melted down to the ground like an illusion made with mirrors and stood before her. Jillian smiled and handed the mutant the food. He seemed to shake his head slightly, but sat down at the patio table, his back to her, and began to eat.
Shader was odd to say the least. It wasn't really his appearance that made him that way, though his appearance *was* odd, but rather the way he carried himself. From what Jillian had seen his physical mutation wasn't that bad. He was tall and unusually pale. His fingernails were long and sharp. His eyes were so black no pupil was visible. The only things that seemed to be out of place were his mouth and ears. He kept his mouth covered with an ever-present black scarf. His ears were harder to hide, but he tried. Those ears, that were very long and undeniably elfin, pointed backwards poking through his hair, and tried valiantly to escape the wide brim of the floppy witch-like hat he wore. He tried to hide everything.
"It's getting cold; a storm's moving in..." She began as he finished. "You sure you don't want to come in?"
"I'm sure." He nodded and tugged his scarf back into place before he turned around. "Thank you." With that said, his shadows lifted him up and once again he was holding vigil over the porch.
****
"Gah! Can't a guy get some beauty sleep around here, Beautiful?!"
"Nope."
"You know you could get off me..."
"Nope."
In the background Jillian walked by, looked at them, blinked once, and shook her head before she moved on.
"You know I can't really breathe down here..."
"Your point is?"
"Ummm.... Breathing is good?"
"That's nice."
"So... Could you let me breathe?"
"Nope."
"Arrgh!!! Dammit, Beautiful! Let me up!!!"
"Sorry. No can do."
"Wanda, I'm serious! All the blood's rushing to my head! I might explode!!!"
"Cry me a river."
"Auuuugggghhhhh!!!!!!"
"Will you two shut up and quit flirting??!!! You'll wake up my potato!!!"
Wanda sputtered and fell of the couch, freeing Clint's head, which she had been sitting on.
"We are NOT flirting, Jillian!!!!" A few glasses exploded in the kitchen in response.
"I don't know about that, Beautiful..." Clint trailed off and caressed Wanda's arm in a way she did not approve of...
"GET OFF!!!" The echo of the corresponding slap was recorded as far away as New Zealand...
"Owie..." Clint muttered, holding his reddened cheek as Wanda stormed off... Jillian was leaning against the kitchen doorframe watching the scene with wide-eyed interest and Shader's head was poked through the patio door, eyebrows raised...
"What'd I do?" Clint said mournfully.
"I think you came on too strong..." Jillian answered.
*************
"Stupid dumb blond, always.... Can't keep his frikken hands to himself..." Wanda muttered murderously as she climbed back into bed.
She snuggled into the mattress and pulled the covers tightly around her. Still muttering about the tortures she felt poor Clint deserved, she finally fell back to sleep..
**********
For one horrifying moment, she thought she was back in the asylum.
It took a few moments for the differences of the two locations to outweigh the similarities. It was a small room, metallic and white. The door she sensed she had just been shoved through was barred heavily: she could not get out. She was trapped.
That realization spurred her into panicked action.
"Let me out!" She screamed, the sound echoing and far too familiar. She banged her fists against the metal till they bled. It was then that she noticed the sudden increase in temperature; it was becoming sickeningly hot. It came from above, so she looked up. The glassy ceiling was emitting a yellow light; one that began to become increasingly brighter till her eyes teared up, burned, and then went blind. She swung helplessly at the walls, trying to find a way out, but every breath she took seemed harder than the last. It was as if all the oxygen had been pumped out of the room. Though, she could not see the following blast of red light, she could feel it against her skin. For a moment she felt nothing.
Then the horrible mind numbing pain began. She screamed, this she knew, but she couldn't hear herself. It felt as if all her bones were being snapped into pulp all at once and slowly reforming. Everything burned. She could feel the blood dripping out of her ears from shattered eardrums. The tips of her fingers and toes felt as if they had been blown off in an explosion. All along her back, neck, and shoulders she felt as if hundreds of dull ice picks were being shoved through her skin.
And still it continued.
*********
"I just don't see what I did wrong!"
"Clint darling, you have to understand. Wanda was abandoned in an asylum for the majority of her life. She was in maximum security; it wasn't as if she was allowed to socialize with a hell of a lot of people her own age, especially not guys. She's been out of the loop for so long, she doesn't really know how to react to being flirted with... And lets not forget that her first kiss was with Toad. That's enough to scar anyone."
"I see your point. But *you* know how to react to being flirted with?"
"Oh, that's easy. Just freak them out."
"Freak them out?"
"Like so..."
Jillian leap into Clint's lap and threw her arms around his neck.
"AWWWW! Cwint, you're such a cute widdle thing, aren't you???!!!" She gushed and batted her eyelashes.
Clint shoved her off his lap and retreated to the other side of the room.
"That's disturbing!"
"But it worked, didn't it?"
"If you want to send guys running screaming into the sunset, then yeah. But what if you actually like a guy?"
"Bah. That'll be the day. None of you idiots are worth my time."
A piercing scream echoed through the house.
"Wanda!!?"
******
A few moments later, three mutants rushed into Wanda's bedroom. Wanda lay thrashing on the bed, sheets twisted around her obviously in the throes of some terrible nightmare.
"Hey Beautiful, wake up." Clint said shaking her shoulder. There was no response. He shook her more firmly. "Wake up!!" Wanda kept on screaming. Jillian jumped on to the bed.
"Wanda, snap out of it!" She yelled and began trying to pull Wanda up into a sitting position. Wanda's thrashing made it impossible. "Wanda! Wanda, what's wrong?" She grabbed her friend's shoulders and shook hard. "Why won't she wake up?!!! Wanda, wake up!!! Wake up!!!"
*****
Wanda opened her eyes and she was no longer in the little room, but she wasn't in her bedroom either. It looked like a desert, sand was everywhere, but it was cold. Very cold. She slowly picked up her frigid aching body and was seized by a stronger chill. In the distance she could hear voices, carried by the wind, rising and falling like waves in the sea. She couldn't make out any words, but she could hear the tone: both mournful and angry all at once. They grew louder and louder and louder till she had to cover her ears, but the voices persisted even then. She ran, but they followed. She stopped and they swarmed around her invading her thoughts till there was no more room to think or even be. Nothing was left but the loud angry, sad, enraged murmurs, mutterings, and screams.
"Look at what you've done."
"You don't deserve to live."
"Die."
"She's gone."
"It's all because of you!!!"
"It's your fault."
"Hypocrite!"
"The guilty one...."
"Die."
"Everything's gone."
"What did you do?!"
"Stop it!"
"It never would have happened."
"Look at what you've done!"
"You bastard!"
"What did I ever do to you?"
"Die."
"I didn't want it!"
"Always the guilty one.."
"You'll pay! You'll regret what you did to us!"
"You'll never sleep another night!"
"You'll never have a pleasant dream!"
"I'll always be right here."
"You've taken everything. It's all gone."
"Monster!"
"Heartless beast!"
"You'll be punished for this crime against me."
"And you've probably forgotten..."
"The guilty one."
"Stop it!"
"The guilty one!"
"Stop it!!!"
"You're the guilty one."
"Please, stop it!"
"You must die."
"No."
"Die."
"It's only a dream."
"Die."
"It's just a dream!"
"Die."
"It's *my* dream!"
"Die."
"STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!!! It's MY dream! This is my dream!!! Stop it, stay out of it, and leave me the HELL alone!!!!!!"
And with that, the Scarlet Witch disappeared from the cold desert.
*******
Her boots clicked as they connected with the smooth stone of the floor. Wanda stopped and marveled. She stood at the entrance to a spectacular archway. She stopped herself from going in, but this place felt different. It felt safe. She was not being watched here.
She went in.
It was beautiful. It was a hall, lined with doors, which stretched out endlessly. It was all made up of jet-black obsidian that had been polished so much that it sparkled. A silvery mist drifted over the floor. She looked at the doors. They were all identical. The only way to differentiate between then was the color of the light that streamed out from beneath. The light that came from beneath the first one on her left was red. The light from the first door on her right was pale lavender. Red was her favorite color, so she chose red.
And that may have been a mistake. She opened the door and allowed herself to be engulfed by the warm red light. As soon as her vision cleared she found she was standing in the middle of a field of flames. Everything was strangely beautiful, even as it burned. She felt warm and protected in this inferno: as if nothing could touch her, hurt her, ever again. Experimentally, she passed a hand through the nearest flame. Instead of pain, she felt a strange tingling euphoria that had her yearning for more. She was about to put her other hand into the fire when she felt a strange feeling that someone was behind her. She turned and gasped.
There, outlined in the flames was the form of her father. For some reason, she was afraid. Suddenly the flames surged upward in temperature, and panicked, she leapt back to the door and ran through, slamming it behind her.
She stood in the hallway, leaning back against the closed door, as she caught her breath and sweat trickled down her brow. She had to choose another door. She had to, so she stumbled over to the once across the hall, opened it, and walked through.
And immediately fell into a lavender body of water. Sputtering she came to the surface and swore. She floundered a bit till she heard a very familiar voice.
"Well, that was graceful."
Lo and behold, sitting on a big rock that was floating about two feet above the water, was Jillian wearing a striped lavender and yellow sundress that looked really odd on her.
"Jillian?"
"Kinda, but not really." Jillian helped her out of the water and onto the floating rock. Wanda coughed for a minute and wrung out her clothes before answering.
"Who are you then?"
"I'm a concept."
"Wha?"
"A concept. I'm your concept of Jillian. Your idea of her and what she means to you."
"What does that mean? Where am I?"
"You went into the hallway?"
"Yes..."
"Well, the hallway is the reflection of your mind. Every door in it represents a different aspect of yourself. This door, for example, represents the softer, more fuzzy side of you... You know, the one that doesn't want to maim everything all the time."
"What are you doing here then?"
"Every door has a concept on the other side."
"So... Where I was before..."
"That was the aspect of you that is anger. Magneto is the concept that resides there."
"But why him?!"
"If it weren't for him, that doorway wouldn't exist."
"Why was I afraid?" Wanda was surprised to hear the words come out of her mouth.
The concept took her hand and said enigmatically, "Sometimes too much anger isn't healthy." She turned Wanda's hand over so that it faced palm up, revealing a nasty burn where she had touched the flame. Wanda sucked in her breath; knowledge of the wound caused it to start throbbing in pain. "Just because something feels good, like anger, doesn't mean that you will come out of it unscarred."
"What the hell is going on?" Wanda sighed, burying her face in her un-burnt hand. "It's a dream isn't it?"
"It was, but the moment you came to this hallway, your mind wasn't dreaming anymore."
"Do what?"
"There's an intruder here. He's looking for you, but as long as you stay in the hallway, he won't succeed. His realm is merely that of dreams; he can't delve into other aspects of your consciousness."
"Somebody else is running around in my head? Again?!"
"Afraid so."
"Damn. What the hell does this one want?"
"Why don't you ask him yourself?"
"I can do that?"
"Sure. He'll be behind the door that is the aspect of you that is dreams. All you have to do is find the right one."
"Ok. Now?"
"Why not? Just rebound off the floating rocking chair over there and happy hunting!"
"Alright. Bye then."
"Bye bye!" The concept said brightly as Wanda leapt from the rocking chair to the doorway, and then disappeared.
Once again, she found herself in the obsidian hall. She took a few steps forward. Gray light on her right, dark blue on her left. She brushed her fingertips against each door and felt nothing. She moved on. The next two doors were pink and yellow. She felt nothing from the yellow one. From the pink one, though, she felt a mild irritation, but decided her dreams would most definitely not be pink, and moved on. It went on like that for a while. Trusting her power to tell her which was the right door, touching polished obsidian and feeling nothing, till... Until she came to a green door. Dark green. She touched the surface and felt his frustration. He did not know she was there.
Reached for the knob, twisted it, and flung the door open.
The room within was cloaked, misty, and seemingly empty, save for the figure in the black trench coat that jerked around at her arrival. Wanda studied her adversary. He was several years older than she was, probably in his early twenties. He was tall, his hair was short and black, and his eyes were the same shade of green as the light that had streamed from beneath the door.
"Who are you?" He asked, his voice as cold as his expression.
"Who am I? You're the one screwing around in my head! That's supposed to be my line!"
"What are you talking about? I'm here for him, not for you. Are you one of his henchmen here to save him?"
"I don't know what the hell you're yammering on about. All I want to know is what you're doing in my dreams!"
The man had the audacity to look surprised.
"You're not Magneto."
Wanda was silent for a moment.
Then she went off.
"WHAT????!!!!!! Of course I'm not that evil, stuck up, idiotic, heartless, conniving, brainless, hopeless, worthless, toothless, old, flaming bag of monkey shit!!! Why the frikken hell would you think I'm that bastard?!!!!! Huh????"
"You have similar REM waves." He said quietly.
"And that's your brilliant excuse?"
His eyes narrowed and he began to disappear. Wanda faltered.
"Wait a minute!!!" He remained. "Who are you and why do you want to do Magneto in?"
He hesitated before answering. "I am Somnus. I wish his death for reasons of my own. Who are you?"
"I'm the Scarlet Witch, and I want to kill him because he abandoned me in an insane asylum when I was eight years old."
"And why did he do that?" The two began to circle one another.
"Because he didn't feel like playing daddy to a difficult child..."
"He's your father?"
"Yup. And didn't I turn out fine?" Wanda allowed herself one of her classic through-the-bangs death glares that hinted of total insanity.
Somnus raised a brow, and then nodded. "I see."
Abruptly, the surroundings began to melt away with a gesture from the mutant.
"Hey. What are you doing?"
"I'm leaving. You will not hear from me again."
"You can't get off that easy." She muttered, and then lunged. She grabbed the other mutant by the front of his coat, and for a moment, she could se into his own hallway of aspects and concepts. Realizing her intent, Somnus grabbed her and threw her off of him before disappearing completely.
The world continued to fade until Wanda opened her eyes.
*********
The first thing she noticed was that she was very wet. The second was that Jillian was jumping up and down on the bed chanting, "Wake up, wake up, wake up, ect."
Wanda's eyes snapped open. "Would you stop that?!" She yelled, sitting up.
"It lives!" Clint proclaimed.
"Wanda!!!!!!" Jillian screeched and jumped down to enfold Wanda in a crushing hug. "We were so worried! You just started screaming bloody murder and you wouldn't wake up!!! And then, Clint tried to wake you up and that didn't work, so I tried and that didn't work, then Shader tried, and you kinda sputtered for a minute, but you didn't wake up!!!" Wanda looked over at the shadow painter who was sheepishly holding a pitcher of water.
"Wanda, what happened?" Clint asked, sounding serious. Wanda was still for a moment, and then she jumped out of bed, dragging Jillian with her.
"Beautiful?"
"Everybody get dressed, we have to go somewhere."
"What are you talking about?"
Wanda pulled her red trench coat out of the closet. "We're going to go pay someone a little visit..."
********
Clint had been only slightly concerned when Wanda had declared that they go pay a visit or something like that, but now that they were in Boston, Massachusetts for no apparent reason, he was beginning to think that she might be delusional. She had just strolled up to the nearest airport, slapped down the money for three tickets (Shader didn't need one, he hid in the shadows), and hopped on the fastest jet to Boston. It was a mite scary. And now that they had arrived, she seemed to know exactly where she was going. Jillian, on the other hand, did not seem concerned at all. In fact, she was currently singing The Lumberjack Song, from Monty Python. Shader followed in the silent form of a shadowy puddle. Clint stirred his cup of coffee slowly and took a sip. He was becoming a tad bit frightened.
Wanda stopped in front of a deserted looking house in the suburbs. This was the place she had seen.
"I wish I were a girlie,
Just like my dear papa!" Jillian finished.
Wanda walked up to the front door, and found in unlocked. Cautiously, she stepped inside, Jillian, Shader, and then Clint followed. It wasn't that the house looked deserted. Everything was spotlessly clean, only there was no furniture. The adjoining rooms were empty, so they climbed the stairs. Clint and Jillian saw Wanda halt at the top then say,
"It's nice to meet you in the flesh, Somnus."
She stepped forward, Shader returned to his normal form, and her three followers came up to see Wanda conversing with a tired looking, black haired, green eyed, young man.
"What do you want?"
"I want to know about you and Magneto. What did he do to you to make you hate him?"
Somnus smiled coldly. "You really want to know?"
Wanda gave him a look that said, 'Duh.'
He nodded. "Three years ago, in Europe, Magneto approached my fiancée Isolde and I. We were both young, and confused as to what we were. He said he could provide answers by giving us this... wonderful opportunity. He told us that he had a machine, that would advance our mutations to their finest point, so that we would never have to deal with the pain and alienation that would take place if they advanced naturally."
"And you took him up on it?" Wanda asked.
He laughed humorlessly. "No. Actually, we didn't. We decided that we were better off taking things as they went along... Only Magneto didn't tell us one thing... His machine was experimental... And he needed guinea pigs. He and some of his lackeys came back later, and kidnapped Isolde. I found out and followed, but it was too late."
Somnus shook his head and strode out the room, throwing a random door open and beckoning for them to follow. They stood in the doorway and he gestured towards the bed.
"That," He said, "is the reason I *hate* Magneto."
Stretched out on the hospital-like bed, was the slender, pale, form of a rather pretty young woman. The bed seemed to swallow up her thin frame. Her long auburn hair, that seemed to be tangled with feathers, lay lovingly brushed out against the white pillow. A series of machines and wires were attached to her. Her lungs rose and fell under nearly translucent skin. A steady beeping mimicked her heartbeat.
"She's been in a coma ever since he tested that machine on her..."
"The nightmare." Wanda hissed, realization dawning. "The part of the nightmare where I was trapped in that small room, that was really through *her* eyes, when she was caught in the machine."
"I wanted Magneto to have a taste of his own medicine. I apologize, you were not the one meant to experience that."
"But I did." Her own experiences were bad enough, now to fully realize what he could do to other people... It only made her more determined. She watched as Somnus walked over to the bed and sat in a well- used chair beside it.
"Does it bother you that I'm his daughter?"
"I feel sorry for you."
Wanda snorted. She wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. She watched at he straightened the sheet around the woman.
"Why not join us?"
He looked up.
"We all have reason to hate Magneto, but if we all just go after him on our own time, he'll be ready for us every time. However, he won't expect all his enemies to suddenly start working together."
"You want me, to join you, in this..." He gestured towards her and the others. "Carnival?"
Wanda opened her mouth to reply, when a large smile graced her features. "Exactly. The Scarlet Witch's Carnival: a menagerie of freaks and demons whose prime mission in life is to make Magneto afraid of clowns. Will you assist us in this quest?"
Somnus stared at her for a moment, then glanced down at the bed.
"I cannot leave Isolde... But when the battle begins, I'll fight with you..."
"Thank you." Wanda nodded, then turned around. "Alright. Let's go back home."
"Back home?" Clint whined, "but we just got here!"
"Now when Wanda says, Wanda says, you should know that Birdy!" Jillian babbled, dragging the protesting mutant back towards the airport. Shader shrugged, and went after them. Wanda followed.
The sound of mechanical heartbeats filled the room.
*****************
Well! This is probably the second worst thing I've ever written. Ah well, if you're reading, review anyway....