Chapter 2

Friday, September 6th

2: 28 P. M.

Marty checked his watch. "Okay, this is definitely not like the Doc. He should have called in by now."

Clara was getting concerned too. "I know, Marty. Even if his appointment was taking longer than anticipated, he would have called in. He's not like this. Emmett would never leave us hanging."

"Leave us hanging" was an ironically appropriate turn of the phrase. The train was currently hovering over a small tract of forest someone owned, awaiting Doc's call. They had planned to fly to a more accessible place once Doc had told them he was ready to meet. Now, though, it appeared those plans would have to be changed.

Jennifer jiggled her leg nervously. She fairly new to the idea of time-traveling – most of her first trip had been spent in unconsciousness. She didn't like not having the inventor of the machine around. "Marty, I don't like this. Being in the future gives me enough willies."

"I don't like it either, Jen," Marty frowned. "Every time I've ended up in a different time period, I knew I could count on the Doc. No matter what, he'd help me. He's not the type to just go off and not keep us updated."

Clara began to pace, wringing her hands. "Do you think he – might be hurt?" she asked hesitantly.

"Jesus, I hope not. After surviving--" Marty shuddered a little. It hurt almost too much to think about the times he had almost lost his best friend. "Well, you know, Clara."

Jules plunked himself down next to Jennifer. "Mama, Marty, maybe we should start looking for Papa. If it was one of us who was lost, he'd look for us."

"Kid's got a point," Marty agreed. "I'll grab the binoculars and check this side. Jen, would you mind grabbing the other side?"

"Not at all." Marty kissed his thanks.

Clara went to the controls. "We'll see if he found his way near here first. It's a long shot, but possible. I haven't turned off our walkie-talkie since he took the other one. Buckle up, boys."

"Maybe we can find out who owns this forest too."

Clara started up the train as Marty and Jennifer started looking. Unfortunately, they were so intent on finding Doc, they missed the group of kids chatting and playing right underneath them. The kids panicked as the train began to move invisibly over them. In terror, they ran back to their school. "Hey! Phoenix! Storm! Cyclops! Wolverine!"

Wolverine – real name Logan – was the one to appear, smoking one of his cigars. His appearance normally intimidated most of the kids, but not today. There was something they were more afraid of today. He could smell their fear. It worried him. "What is it?" he asked roughly.

"Something's flying over the woods," Tracey breathlessly reported. "It was making the weirdest sounds, Logan. Whistles and crackles and stuff."

"What'd it look like?"

"Nothin'," Artie spoke up, face spooked. "We couldn't see anything. We could hear it, but we couldn't see anything."

The rest of the kids nodded in agreement. Logan frowned. This sounded pretty damn serious. After the raid on the school only a few months ago, nobody wanted to take any chances. "Get inside. I'll check this out."

"Check what out, Logan?" asked a voice behind him. Logan turned to see Cyclops – Scott Summers – behind him, face grim. "What's going on?"

"An invisible thing is flying over our woods," Kitty quickly explained.

Scott's face became even grimmer. He glanced over at Logan. The two men weren't friends, but they weren't blood enemies either. Scott decided that there was little danger in letting Logan go first in this. After all, the man was practically invulnerable. "Go on and investigate, but don't do anything drastic. I'm going to get my visor and one of the other X-Men."

"Jean?" Logan couldn't hide the hope in his voice.

Scott shook his head. "She's with Hank, tending to our new patient. The man the new kid brought in. Dr. Brown. Don't ask me why she's so interested in him." He beckoned the kids inside with a slight shake of the head. "Now where was this disturbance?"

Friday, September 6th

2: 37 P. M.

Dr. Hank McCoy finished his examination. "Yup," he sighed. "It's definitely Legacy. He's just starting to move into the later stages of the disease. That accounts for his seizure."

Jean patted Doc's head fondly. "Will the serum work on him, Hank?"

"It should. Can't guarantee it'll look for very long, though." Hank's body felt excruciatingly heavy. "Nice twist of fate the world dealt you, huh? The guy who saved your life ends up dying himself."

"I'll say." Jean summoned over the medicine and syringe. "But then, he's a brilliant scientist. You know that, Hank. He may be able to help you, once he wakes."

"Medicine isn't Dr. Brown's specialty."

"He's got a personal stake in this – his life. He can help in other ways." Like future technology, Jean thought as she filled the syringe.

There was a knock at the door. "Can I come in?" J. C.'s timid voice asked.

"Just a second." Jean administered the shot. Doc winced in his sleep. Jean wished she could quiet him, but she didn't dare. Without his own ability to stop the current in his mind, he could seriously hurt her. "Okay."

J. C. entered, looking firmly at her feet until she nearly bumped into the table. "He is gonna be all right, right?" she asked.

"We hope so." Jean looked at J. C. curiously. "Are you family? His niece, maybe?"

J. C. shook her head, blushing a little. "I kinda rescued him from being beat up by a group of guys with more machismo than brains. He helped me out in the cash department. I was planning to come here anyway – you know, learn how to use my powers. He gave me the courage to get here." She grinned, flushing slightly more. "Plus, he gave me this cute grin when we were en route. . . ."

Jean smiled, sensing the very beginnings of a crush forming in J. C.'s mind. Not that she could blame the teen. Doc was possessed of a great smile. "I'm glad. Dr. Brown and I are friends. I owe him a great deal." The memories came rushing back as she spoke. Alkali Lake. . .the waters. . .bringing her friends to safety. . .Doc and Marty rescuing her at the last moment. . . .

Jean frowned suddenly. "J. C., was Dr. Brown with anyone else when you found him? Specifically, a teenager with medium length brown hair and blue eyes, about as tall as you?" She pressed a picture into the teen's head to complete the identification.

J. C. pondered for a moment, then shook her head. "Nope. He was alone, as far as I could tell. Except. . . ." She snapped her fingers. "During the ride here, he mentioned he needed to contact somebody. I think the name was Marty."

"That's the teen! Hank, we have to check Dr. Brown's pockets for a phone or the like. Marty's Dr. Brown's best friend. If he's here in New York too, he's certainly wondering where 'Doc' is." She grabbed Doc's coat as Hank checked Doc's pants.

There was a walkie-talkie in Doc's left coat pocket. Jean tried to activate it. "Nothing," she muttered. "Damn thing must be dead."

J. C. nibbled her thumbnail. "He mentioned recharging his batteries. Find some new ones."

Jean had a better idea. She glared at the set in her hand, willing it to work. Her eyes glowed faintly fire-red.

The set sputtered to life. She could hear voices – familiar voices. "I don't see anybody. How about you, Jen?"

"Nothing so – hey, wait. I just spotted somebody."

"Is it Emmett?"

"No. It's three people. Two guys and a girl."

Jean let the set go dead. "That was Dr. Brown's family. I'll see if I can find them mentally so we can bring them here."

Friday, September 6th

2: 39 P. M.

Clara continued her slow circles, gradually widening them as they ascended. "What's the report, Marty?"

"I don't see anybody. How about you, Jen?"

"Nothing so – hey, wait. I just spotted somebody."

"Is it Emmett?" Clara asked hopefully.

"No. It's three people. Two guys and a girl."

"Uh-oh. The train's noise must have attracted them. We'd better go before--"

The train was abruptly thrown on its side, throwing them all every which way. Jennifer yelled as she tumbled into Marty. "What the hell?!"

"Just what I was thinking!" Marty yelled back, grabbing her and clinging to the window frame for dear life.

"MAMA!" Jules and Verne yelled as one as they were thrown forward.

An alarm began going off, adding to the confusion. "Oh, shit," Marty moaned. "Please, don't let that be the hover conversion system!"

"No, Marty," Clara gasped in horror as the displays flickered off. "It's the time circuits!"

"Oh, perfect!"

They heard a rough voice from below, barely audible above the din. "Yeah, there's definitely people in that thing. Might be Magneto."

"If it is, you be on your guard. I'll hit it again."

"NO!" Jennifer shrieked at the top of her lungs, knowing it would make no difference.

A beam of red light shot in front of them, missing the flux capacitor by inches and digging a big scratch into the smokestack. It was quickly followed by another, which blasted through the window, zipped over Marty's head, and punched its way through the wall. The Brown boys goggled. "Wow. . . ."

"Holy shit," Marty whispered, pulling Jennifer as close as possible. "What the hell is that?"

"I almost wish I was sleep-induced," Jennifer whimpered. "I must be a bad-luck charm."

"Aww, Jennifer, don't say that." He kissed her head.

Clara moved toward Jules and Verne, making sure they were okay. "Do you have any idea what that was?" she asked the teens, shaking.

"Not a clue, Clara," Marty said. "I just hope they don't use it again. Another hit, and we might fall out of the sky."

"God forbid."

The sky outside darkened suddenly, day turning to night. High winds rocked the train to and fro, while thunder echoed in the distance. "Oh, no, not a freak thunderstorm," Marty muttered. "I'm starting to think I should have never gotten out of bed today."

"Second," Jules agreed whole-heartedly.

The winds got stronger. Clara cautiously made her way back to the controls, hoping to fly the train to safety before anything else happened. She was just about to turn, when she spotted the woman. The black woman with long white hair and blank white eyes, held aloft by the winds. Clara screamed and stumbled backward, barely keeping her hold on consciousness.

To her surprise, the woman yelped too, and briefly disappeared. "Goddess!"

Below, Scott and Logan both gasped as the flying thing above them revealed itself. "It's – it's – it's--" Scott stammered, one hand frozen on his visor control.

"It's a train!" Logan yelled, for lack of a better thing to do. "A damn flying steam train!"

Kids were thronging to the scene now, drawn by the commotion. All were just as shocked as their teachers. "Since when can trains fly?"

"Do you think it's Magneto?"

"I wouldn't put it past him. . . ."

"This is the weirdest thing. But then, who are we to judge what's weird?"

Marty peeked out his window. "Jesus! You're not going to believe this, but it's a bunch of teenagers! And younger!"

"Kids?" Clara said, baffled. "We're being attacked by kids?!"

Scott was preparing to fire again when Jean came racing up. "No! Wait! Scott! Don't shoot!"

Scott paused. "Jean? What's wrong?"

Jean didn't answer him. "Ororo, who's up there?"

"In the – it's a woman, two small boys, and two teenagers."

Jean looked horrified. "Scott, did you already fire at them?"

"They could be from the Brotherhood, Jean. I'm taking no chances."

The telekine shook her head. "They're not from the Brotherhood." Looking up, she yelled with both her mind and her voice, "Marty? Clara?"

Marty blinked. He had suddenly heard a familiar voice both outside and in his head. He looked out the window again. "Holy shit!"

"Marty, I don't think I can take any more surprises," Jennifer complained.

"Me neither. And please, watch your language."

"Sorry, Clara, but Jean's out there!" He got up and threw open the window. "Jean! I'm glad to see you!"

All eyes went in astonishment to Jean. "You know these people?" Scott demanded.

"Know them? Scott, these are the people that saved my life!"

Scott went pale. "What?"

"Hey, what's going on?" Marty yelled. "We were gonna head out to look for the Doc when somebody started shooting some sort of – death ray at us!"

"That was my boyfriend," Jean said, trying not to laugh. "Are you hurt?"

"Her boyfriend?" Jennifer said incredulously.

Clara came to the window. "Jean, have you seen Emmett around anywhere? We need him rather desperately now. Your – boyfriend ruined some important parts of the train."

"He was just brought in by a new student!" Jean called back. "He's had a seizure. You'd better land and come inside."

"Seizure?" The three glanced at each other. "What do you mean, seizure?"

Jean felt her happiness at seeing her friends fade. "He's very sick. I can explain better once you're on the ground."

"Is Papa okay?" Verne asked, holding tightly to his brother.

"We hope so, honey."

As the train landed, the kids crowded tightly around. "Man, an actual flying train."

"Was that who I thought it was inside?"

"Maybe one of us should get Dr. McCoy to look at this."

"He wouldn't know what to do. Besides, he'd be too busy drooling over it to help us."

Marty was the first to emerge. Jean came up and shook his hand firmly. "It's nice to see you again, Marty."

"Same here. Do you guys make a habit of scaring the heck out of people?"

"Hey, you scared us first!" Artie squawked.

"How the hell do you have a god-damned flying train?" Logan demanded, getting straight to the point.

"It's my friend's. He's – ah – improved it. He's an inventor."

"Could you please watch your language?" Clara added, holding her boys tight. "There's young children here."

"Don't worry, ma'am, we've heard worse from Jean," an anonymous voice said.

"And Papa," Jules grinned. "Remember when he was wiring that up?"

"Don't remind me." Clara looked at Jean worriedly. "Where is Emmett? How is he?"

"In our lab. He's fine – for the moment."

Nobody liked the sound of that. "Jean, we know he's sick. That's the whole reason we're here. To see what it is he's got and if anybody can help him."

Jean frowned, feeling worse now. "You don't know what the disease is?"

"All our doctors were able to tell us was it's doing something to his DNA," Marty confessed. We're from 1987.

I thought you might be. "Rewriting it?"

"Yes," Clara nodded. "If it changes enough, he'll--" she stopped, not wanting to admit the reality.

"I know," Jean whispered.

"You know what it is?" Marty asked eagerly.

Jean looked into his desperately hopeful eyes. How could she tell him? She'd be breaking a promise and dashing his hopes at the same time. Yet she had to. . . . "Yes, I do. I'll explain inside. Everyone else--"

"It's all right, Jean," a cultured voice said behind her. She turned to see Professor Xavier wheeling up. "I've explained what I can to those who didn't get a chance to see." He regarded Cyclops, Wolverine, and Storm sternly. "I thought it was customary to alert all the X-Men, including myself, in case of emergency."

Cyclops had gone very red in the face, almost matching the ruby quartz of his visor. Wolverine, however, snorted. "Something was scaring the kids. I could have checked it out myself, but Scott insisted in bringing in reinforcements."

"Those were noble sentiments, but nevertheless, you have to follow the rules. Had this really been one of our enemies, you three might have gotten seriously hurt."

"He sounds like a teacher lecturing his students," Jennifer mumbled.

"Well, he is. This is a school for mutants. Scott, Ororo, and I were some of the first students." Glancing at the highly-embarrassed Cyclops, she added, "I guess we still are, in a way."

Xavier turned to the time trippers. He looked friendly enough, but Marty felt a little frightened by those eyes. It felt like Professor X could look right into his head. Is he a telepath, like Jean? "Welcome. I am Professor Charles Xavier. This is Dr. Jean Grey, Professor Scott Summers, Professor Logan, and Professor Ororo Munroe."

"We've met," Clara said, hesitantly shaking Xavier's hand. "I'm sorry for the disturbance. We were looking for my husband in your airspace. That's probably hard to believe, but. . . ."

"I've heard stranger." Yes, I am, he thought over to Marty. That's part of how I know you're not a danger to us.

"Dr. Grey said you have Papa," Jules said politely. "Can we see him please? Mama's really worried."

"Shortly. He's still recovering from the seizure that brought him here." Xavier turned his thoughts to Jean. I understand your problem very well, Jean. It's hard to tell someone you care about that someone they love is a mutant. These are the people who saved you, correct?

Exactly. That's why I'm so scared. I promised Dr. Brown not to reveal his secret. How do you tell the parents, Professor?

You just have to tell the as soon as possible. It's hard, but it's always better for them to know. What happened with Robert Drake's parents has convinced me of that.

A girl tapped Marty on the shoulder, holding a piece of paper and a pen. "Excuse me," she said shyly, "but can I have your autograph?"

"My autograph?" Marty glanced at Jennifer, who shrugged in bewilderment. "Well, okay. Who do I make it out to?"

"Marie," the girl said, her Southern accent becoming stronger with her excitement. "Marie and Bobby. We're both big fans of yours."

Marty grinned, scribbling, To Marie and Bobby, Marty McFly. "There you go."

"Thanks." Marie brushed her white-streaked hair out of her eyes. Marty noted that almost every inch of skin on her was covered, despite the warmth of the day. "You know, you look younger in person."

Normally, Marty would have been more intrigued (and happy) about this. But right now he was more worried about the fate of his best friend. "Yeah. Listen, did any of you see the Doc when he was brought in? He's a tall guy, long white hair and brown eyes."

"Yeah, some new kid brought him in," someone answered. "He didn't look too good. Like he had Legacy."

"Legacy?"

Jean laid a hand on Marty's shoulder. "Come inside, I'll explain," she said softly, leading them all to the mansion that now doubled as a school.

They reached the door at the same instant that J. C. did. "Dr. Grey? Oh, listen, Dr. McCoy said – ah. Hello," she greeted them, looking puzzled at the new arrivals. "Are you enrolling today too?"

"This is Dr. Brown's family, J. C.," Jean explained to her. "What did Hank want you to tell me?"

J. C. seemed more reluctant to speak. "That stuff you gave him is working fine. He thinks Dr. Brown's going to wake up soon."

"Good. Thanks a lot, J. C."

Professor Xavier looked at J. C. with a frown. "I haven't seen you before, and I make it a point to know all my students."

"You must be Professor Xavier then. I want to enroll here. Can we talk? Please?"

"Of course. Come with me." They went off together, J. C. starting in on what promised to be a lengthy story.

"Stuff? What stuff?" Marty asked.

"What did you to Papa?" Verne asked, half accusingly.

Jean sighed. Maybe I can skirt the issue. . . . "When Emmett was brought in, Dr. Hank McCoy and I identified him as having the Legacy Virus." A nervous ripple went through the students. "It's a very new disease, a mutation of AIDS. We don't know where–" –or when– "– he picked it up. That seizure we mentioned was caused by him entering one of the later stages of the disease. Hank and I administered a serum that would temporarily bring him into remission. Until that wears off, he'll be all right."

Marty looked broken-hearted. "When--" he whispered, lip quivering.

"We don't know. Maximum is three to four years, but I doubt it'll last that long. He may be able to tolerate another injection once this one wears off."

Clara sniffled a little, then straightened her back. "What about us? What should we do to protect ourselves?"

Jean hesitated. "You should be fine, it's hard to transmit to others."

"Please, Jean, tell us. Emmett wouldn't want us to get sick as well. He cares too much about us."

Jean's shoulders slumped in defeat. "Clara, you don't have to worry at all. None of you do. Legacy is a strictly mutant-based disease. It doesn't affect baseline humans."

"But it – attacked. . . ." Marty's voice died. The truth hit him like a ton of bricks. Legacy only went after mutants. And it had gotten Doc. Numbly, he shook his head. "No way. It can't be."

"I'm afraid it is," Jean sighed. "Emmett Brown is a mutant."