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Falling.

It was summer, life was good.

She stood there in the small yard of their suburban home, her toes entwined with the vibrant blades of grass and her dazzling blue eyes shining. The sun left white glints of light upon her hair, like miniature stars, dazzling in the ever-moving strands.

Then everything suddenly grew quiet as a cloud dramatically blocked out the sun.

The unnatural calm before the equally unnatural storm.

And then it began.

As if a switch was flipped, in one instant, a searing pain ripped through her head, screams erupting from her lips. She fell to her knees, dimly aware of the surrounding screams and cries of pain as she clutched her own head.

Screams and sobs racked her body.

Darkness was beginning to close in. Yes! Darkness was good, the darkness brought peace from the pain.

And then it stopped, as quickly as it had begun.

Shocking and both emotionally and physically drained, the girl collapsed.

Hours later, in the early twilight, her eyes fluttered open as she awoke.

She slowly sat up, her blonde locks tousled and scratches lining her face. She stood and looked around.

There was no one to be seen, anywhere. The typically busy neighborhood was deathly quiet.

The longer she went without seeing anyone, the quicker fear enveloped her. From where she stood in her yard, she yelled for her parents and older brother. No reply.

She repeated the call once more, adrenaline pumping through her veins. When once again there was no response, she took off in a full sprint towards the front door.

She hurriedly jiggled the knob, forcing the door open. She darted through the first floor of the house, seeing no one.

Her heart beat thumping loudly in the lack of sound, she slowly took to the stairs. She climbed up slowly, a sense of foreboding telling her to turn away –to run. Run as faraway as she could get, and to keep on going when she got there.

As she mounted the top step, she turned to her brother's room first. Gingerly, she placed her fingers on the door and slowly pushed it open, fearing the worst.

She peered inside; the room was empty.

Biting the edge of her lip, she turned in the opposite direction and headed towards the den. The den sat directly between her room and her parent's room.

She pushed the door to the den open slowly, and her breath caught in her throat. From where she stood in the doorway, she could see three bodies, strewn about the room, pain etched upon their lifeless faces.

Tears welled up in her eyes as bile also rose in her throat. She backed away, slowly at first, but her pace quickening.

She bumped into the stair rail, which brought her back to her senses if only slightly. She turned and as quickly as she could, ran to her bedroom and began throwing things into her backpack and duffel bag. She could not stay here.

No.

No. No. No. No. No! No!!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Katie bolted awake, her breath quick.

She put her hand up to her chest. "Oh god," She murmured, remembering the dream. Except- it was no dream; it was reality.

Then she began to look around at her unfamiliar surroundings, the panic once again rising.

What had happened? Slowly she remembered, Xavier, and all that had just happened.

Cautiously, Katie looked around the room she was in. It was fairly large, with several other operating type tables, like the one she lay upon, were scattered about in and orderly fashion. Metallic topped counters and cupboards lined the walls, and a few silver surgical utensils were scattered about.

The room screamed of doctors, scientists, and of all those things that led right to where she certainly did not want to be.

The one thing lacking in the room, to make her vision of soon-to-be experimentation a reality, was people. There should be someone, anyone. At least she expected someone with a sedative of sorts.

But that didn't mean she wanted to wait for them to come for her. Oh no, not going to happen. She had survived things like this before, several times at that. Her thoughts became scrambled as adrenaline pumped through her veins.

She leaped off the operating table, onto the sterile linoleum floor as soundlessly as she could manage. Looking around once more, she cautiously walked towards the doorway, pausing briefly before walking out into the hallway. She had expected some form of opposition, but was met with none. With that, she broke into a sprint down the hall, her mind reeling.

'I never should have trusted Xavier!' She wanted to scream at herself for being so foolish. 'He obviously sold me out, that bastard. Ok, well- well, he won't succeed, no, no, he can't. Oh shit, where am I?' She thought as she came to a halt, her feet sliding on the overly polished floor. She looked around the empty metallic hallway, lost and confused.

The hall stretched on and on with no signs of even going somewhere, let alone stopping.

A stressed sigh escaped her lips, and she caught a look of her reflection in the strange metal walls. She turned to fully face the wall, her eyes intently studying what she saw.

The reflection was that of a typical girl in her late teens- well in pre-Cerebro earth that is. Girls her age now could literally look like just about anything. Being on the run for years had had its effect on the girl, her once carefree, innocent eyes now both cold and dark. Her clothes and face covered in a thick layer of dusty dirt, almost appearing as some sort of strange sun tan on her once deathly pale skin.

A noise.

She spun around, searching for the cause. She was met with an empty hall in both directions. This did not satisfy her though, she knew of these mutants and their powers. All too well, she knew. There could be one whose talent was to become invisible. They could be sneaking up behind her right now. Any second and…

'Stop it!' She thought to herself, annoyed at her own paranoia. With that, she calmly turned and continued walking on her path down the hall.

Wait! There was the noise- again.

Katie stopped and froze. She knew she had heard something that time. Slowly, she turned around, but saw no one. She squinted her eyes just slightly, she was tired of this game.

And then… A faint smell drifted up to her nose. She sniffed once then breathed in deeply. It smelled like brimstone. 'That's strange,' She thought, but then she quickly remembered the incident in Xavier's office.

The slight noise, the faint smell, the only thing missing was the black smoke and the demon. She smirked slightly. So that the game Xavier wanted to play. Well, fine with her.

Katie began walking again, gaining speed, going fast and faster until her walk was practically a full out run.

Bamf

There it was again. But she kept right on going, from the perspective of anyone else, she would have appeared to have completely not heard it.

Bamf!

Suddenly the smoke was in front of her, really right in front of her. The foul smelling smoke drifted around and spun in it's own delicate little pattern, revealing it's source.

Nightcrawler.

This time she expected what she saw, and was on guard for the demonic sight.

It smiled at her, and opened it's mouth to speak. It didn't get that far.

Katie swung her leg up, smacking the blue mutant on the side of the head, or at least, that's where she had aimed. Kurt teleported a nanosecond before impact, popping out on her other side. She tried to beat him of in some way, but he was able to get a firm grip across her neck.

"I am sorry," He murmured with his heavily accented voice before driving a syringe into the base of her neck.

And then, everything for Katie went black.