James Redbourne never in his life hit his children, for fear he'd send them beyond his reach. This fear was well grounded, in one sense, but as he was a good man and raised his children well, he rarely had a need for severe discipline.
James met Margaret Owen when he was twenty-three, and swore afterwards that he loved her from the first instant he saw her. He'd always been shy, but he was determined to win her love, and she soon succumbed to his gentle persuasions.
Three months after they met, he told her his secret. To say she was surprised would be an understatement, but she took it remarkably well after the initial shock. She was a smart woman and not given to prejudices. When she told him she preferred his honesty to anything else, he proposed and they were married within a month.
James Redbourne was a mutant. He kept it quiet until the call for mutant registration came, but in hopes of proving that mutants were trustworthy, he registered. Luckily he owned his own business, with the partnership of a childhood friend, or he might have been one of the victims of company 'downsizings' that swept the country.
It was a fairly harmless power, James was sure, but he was careful nonetheless. He could 'push' things into the future, making them disappear for however long he chose. He thought it was a rather useless talent, but he did find occasions to employ it.
"James?" Margaret asked her husband. "Do you know where my glasses are?" They had been married for almost six years.
"I know where they'll be in about an hour and a half," he replied without looking at her.
She gave him an annoyed look. "I have work to do, you know."
Now he looked at her. "Come here, my darling, and I will make the time worth your while."
Their first child was conceived, quite by accident, on that night.
Ruby Margaret Redbourne came into the world on a freezing February morning. Her parents named her Ruby because from time to time her eyes would flash brilliantly red. (She gave the hospital nurses quite a scare.) It was clear she was a mutant but appeared, for the time, to be a purely physical mutation, as no other effects were noted. Around her first birthday her eyes stopped turning red, and they would remain a startling blue for another fourteen years.
James discovered that he could move living creatures forward in time, completely by mistake. When Ruby was five, she requested a kitten. Since Margaret had wanted one anyway, she brought home an American shorthair they named Pillar, who constantly got underfoot. James tripped over the cat and landed so that the dratted animal was pushed out of the way, and disappeared. For three days the family mourned the cat, until he appeared in the same spot he'd disappeared from, and with a hiss of disapproval ran to the basement.
When Ruby was eight she noticed a strange swelling around her mother's waistline, and before the year was out, she found herself possessed of a baby brother.
James William Redbourne II, Jamie, was born on a hot July afternoon, and Ruby found him to be annoyingly cross-eyed and time consuming. He showed, by the time he was four, a knack for making things disappear. He was also the only one who could find them. James Senior, after a headache inducing conversation with his son and some lengthy observations, finally figured out that the boy could somehow carry things around in a pocket of some other dimension. Since he never moved anything very heavy or large, James guessed that the power was limited to things that Jamie could carry, though he suspected his ability might grow in time.
Ruby started having nightmares when she was fifteen, about the time she started menstruating. Her parents would find her, crying or screaming, talking in strange voices, with her eyes glowing red.
After a late night of consoling her daughter, and a rough time getting Jamie to school – he was already a handful and since Ruby was staying home sick, he wanted to stay home, too – Margaret sat down to watch the news.
She frowned as she listened to a report of a horrible plane crash. For some reason it seemed familiar. Listening to a witness report, she suddenly put two and two together.
She dialed her husband's number frantically and had to calm herself down so he could understand her.
"The nightmares, James – she's somehow seeing the future. I remembered – put it all together – there was a plane crash on the news and a witness report! Those strange voices – she said the exact same thing!"
"I'm coming home," James told his breathless wife. "Just try to calm down – don't scare Ruby."
Far from being frightened, Ruby was relieved. She hadn't known what to make of the dreams – even if she only remembered the vaguest impressions of them afterward – and knowing where they came from made all the difference. Though they were still almost always distressing, she could now assure herself that, though some might consider her a freak, she was at least sane.
When Jamie was eight he started an irritating habit of taking his big sister's things. As she was now sixteen and her baby brother was above all things, "a total draaaaag!" this tactic usually infuriated her out of all proportion.
It was when he took a picture of her boyfriend that her second power came to light. She chased him through the house screaming, but when she caught up with him, he refused to retrieve it from wherever he stowed those things that he took.
"Give it back!" she shrieked, and felt something loose inside herself.
The framed picture dropped out of nowhere and fell to the ground with a clatter.
Another phone call brought James home from work.
After a long afternoon of experimentation, Ruby was able to duplicate the effect with a strange result on both her father and brother.
That night James explained to Margaret: "As near as I can tell, she's pushing our powers into the future – effectively shutting them off for a certain amount of time."
"Are you sure it's not hurting you?" was Margaret's main concern.
James dismissed that with a wave of his hand. "I wonder if the effect would be the same on a really powerful mutant?" he wondered aloud. "Do you think it's limited to the psionic mutations, or do you think she could shut down a physical mutation for a time, too?" Margaret rolled her eyes and, leaving him to his musings, went to check on her daughter.
Ruby was struggling through her French lesson and seemed unconcerned by her new development. "At least Jamie can't take my stuff anymore!" was her rather vehement comment.
Jamie caused trouble throughout elementary school. He played pranks against his classmates and teachers alike, making things disappear when they were needed or when someone made him angry – and no one could prove he had them. Soon he was blamed any time anything went missing, which only fed his resentment. By the time he was twelve, he had an infamous school record.
Ruby was filling out a transfer application to U at Albany – her two years at community college were drawing to a close – when she heard her parents talking.
"I don't want to send him away, James!" Margaret said sharply. Ruby crept to the door of her room to listen.
"He's getting into trouble here, love. His teachers don't like him and under that they're scared of him!"
"He's just a little boy! We can explain – he just needs to be understood!"
"People are scared of mutants – more all the time! If we send him to this school, he will be understood. He's a smart kid. I know they'll take him."
"But – "
"Ruby won't be around to control him anymore, Margaret! What's more, she shouldn't have to. At least at this place they can train him, and no one will take advantage of him."
Ruby felt a strange lurching sensation, a thing that had never before come unaccompanied with a nightmare. "Mom!" she managed before she collapsed.
James and Margaret rushed to her room. Her eyes glared red up at them, and this is what they heard in a strange impression of their own voices: "'They're coming!' 'Oh... how could we trust him?' 'Margaret, don't – Ruby! Look out!' 'Ruby!' 'Oh, god, I...' 'James! Oh, please tell me... - ' 'Margaret... it'll be... years....'"
Margaret looked at her husband, meeting his eyes across from her daughter, and seeing her growing horror reflected in his face. A new voice intruded through Ruby's lips.
"'Where is she?' 'You'll never find her...'" Ruby's body convulsed and she moaned in pain.
"Ruby!" her father yelled, yanking her into a sitting position and shaking her until she came out of the trance.
Her eyes fluttered open and faded back to blue. "Mama," she said weakly.
"Oh!" Margaret's arms went protectively around her daughter.
"Ruby..." James said slowly, "What did you see?"
His daughter winced and rubbed her temple. "I don't remember this time, Daddy."
Her parents exchanged a long look, but the matter wasn't mentioned again.
After Jamie got all D's and F's on his next report card, Margaret agreed and Jamie was sent to a school for gifted children in Westchester, New York. His father had a long talk with the owner of the establishment and Jamie was allowed to attend in spite of his grades. "The professor seemed to think that would change with proper guidance," James consoled his wife. "And, dear, he's only a few hours away."
Ruby, meanwhile, loved college. Her parents had arranged for her to have a room by herself, in case she had any visions, particularly waking ones. As it turned out, they needn't have worried. She saw so little over the next two years that she sometimes wondered if she'd pushed her own power into the future.
She discovered that having sex was a phenomenal trigger for her second power, but since her boyfriend wasn't a mutant, it had no effect on him.
Well, that wasn't something she would share with her parents, no matter how curious her dad tended to be about her powers.
One night after dinner, Richard asked her to marry him. She was delighted but suddenly frightened – he didn't know she was a mutant. She told him she'd have to think about it and arranged to go home for the weekend so that she could talk to her parents.
Margaret was pleased to hear about Richard. She cautioned Ruby: "You've got to be honest with him, sweetheart. And surely you can wager what his reaction will be – at least a little bit. I mean, you know how he feels about mutants, right? And you know how he feels about you...."
"I know, Mom. And I've never lied.... I just wish I'd already told him."
James had taken a phone call and they looked up in surprise as they heard him yell, "You stupid shit!" Since her husband almost never cursed, Margaret rose in alarm. She gestured for her daughter to stay put and moved to the other room to see what was wrong. Ruby followed her.
"Sorry? How can you say that? How could you do this? This is my family, Thomas!"
Margaret frowned a question at her husband. Thomas was his business partner.
"I trusted you! How could you tell... well, you better just hope your warning is enough." James slammed the receiver down and glared at the phone.
He looked up and saw his daughter, and Margaret's alarm rocketed when she saw the sudden fear in his eyes. His voice was calm and steady when he spoke. "Thomas informs me that he told someone about Ruby's precognitive skills and that the same person offered him a very large sum of money to be paid upon receipt of her to be caged and tell the future for him." He moved to grab his daughter's arm. "He told them where we are – Ruby, you've got to get out of here."
"But, Dad – "
There was a crash of glass from downstairs and they heard the door opening.
"They're coming!" James hissed. Feet on the stairs.
"Oh, how could we trust him?" Margaret moaned – then she gasped, realizing as a night flashed in her memory, years ago. She turned to rush out the door.
"Margaret, don't – " A tall, pale man appeared in the doorway and aimed some kind of gun at Ruby. "Ruby, look out!" James yelled, and as the man pulled the trigger he pushed his daughter with all his might –
– pushing her out of harm's way –
– pushing her far, far into the future....
"Ruby!" her mother screamed.
James staggered as he realized what he'd done. "Oh, god... I...."
"James!" Margaret's eyes were desperate. "Oh, please tell me – " She froze as the tall man moved into the room.
James didn't seem to notice. In a stunned voice he told his wife, "Margaret... it'll be... years...."
"Where is she?" the intruder demanded.
James laughed weakly. Margaret groped around her husbands desk for paper and pen. "You'll never find her..." James said through laughter that now sounded more like sobbing.
Margaret wrote quickly and didn't see the man take out another gun. The explosion of powder was much louder and she shrieked in fright, turning to her husband.
James looked down at his chest, watched the red blossom across his shirt. Suddenly he remembered what his wife had recalled much sooner. He dropped one eyelid in a slow, deliberate wink, a longtime sign of affection between them. "Never find her now...."
They were his last words.
Margaret turned to the intruder. She was aware of the gun, but the last thing she really saw was the look of annoyance on his face.

***

Jamie was a tough kid, although his time in Westchester had certainly improved his temperament.
All the teachers were touched by the brave boy who took the news with such dignity.
Professor Xavier – Professor X, the kids called him – took the boy aside himself. "Jamie, I'm afraid I have some terrible news for you."
For a moment Jamie was sure the Professor was going to tell him he failed the history final.
"No, Jamie," said Professor X with his uncanny insight. "You may want to sit down."
"What's this all about, sir?" Jamie was annoyed that his voice cracked.
"It's your parents, and your sister. I'm so terribly sorry to tell you... Your parents have been killed."
Jamie stared at the Professor in disbelief... yet if there was one person he trusted without question, it was this man.
He found his voice, and this time it was steady but he didn't notice. "And my sister?"
"The police are afraid she's been kidnapped. There's been no sign of her, but there was an anonymous tip."
Jamie found it hard to breathe.
The Professor held something out to him, a piece of paper. There were strange, rusty marks on it. "The police wanted to keep this, but I convinced them to let you have it."
With trembling hands, Jamie took the paper and turned it over. He recognized his mother's handwriting.

Jamie,
Your father had pushed your sister. He said years. I love you. Take care of her when she comes back.
Mom

Professor X looked at him intently. "Do you understand it, Jamie?"
James William Redbourne II took a deep breath and nodded. "It means, sir, that my sister wasn't kidnapped." He turned to go.
"Jamie..." The Professor hesitated. "Jamie, let us know if you need anything, all right?"
The boy nodded again, then looked the Professor right in the eye. "Please call me James from now on, sir." He paused, then added, "I'll be okay, sir. I have to wait for my sister."
With that he squared his shoulders and walked out, seeking privacy in which to grieve.