My Brother's Child.
Chapter Five: Lost and Found.
Kids were everywhere as the blonde woman walked up to the front door of the building she was dressed in a suit and looked more like a lawyer than someone heading to a school for the gifted. She stepped up to the door and smiled this had been her safe haven for so many years, being a mutant was hard but at least she was one of the lucky ones, she had a loving family who supported her. For Jessica Fury her family, whether natural or surrogate, were her life line to sanity and she'd do anything for them. That's what she was doing here now, Professor Charles Xavier had needed her help and as usual she'd dropped everything to provide it. She reached out her hand and opened the door, walking inside she side stepped a couple of the younger mutants running at full speed in her direction.
"Hello Jessica," her smile broadened when she heard the professor speak to her telepathically, she'd missed this, "I'm glad you could help us"
"Glad to help," she replied with her own psionic powers. She walked across the large hall and entered his office.
"Any more luck finding Clarice and her new friend?" Charles said using his usual voice now.
"As a matter of fact yes," she took out a laser disk from her pocket and placed it on the table in front of him, "you were right that place is psi shielded, but with Shield on the job it wasn't too hard to find out where they were being held, even without my powers helping."
"If the place is shielded then we had best be very careful, we will have to use another means of communication to keep the team in touch with each other." The professor looked out the window and watched some of his adopted children play in the basket ball court above where the Blackbird was kept.
"Not a problem Chuck, Dad'll get you all the gear you need and he's authorized me to assist you in rescuing them." she smiled at her old teacher and Charles noted the spark in her eyes that she had always had before going into action.
"Thank you," Charles picked up the disk and stared at it before carrying on, "there is one thing that we must do before we can leave to find them," he paused, "Kimieko tells me that the boy Clarice is with has a family in the city living in the sewer," Jessica raised her eyebrows at this, "she wishes to find them and feels that they have a right to know where he is and help if they can, and I must agree, I have pinpointed their position using Cerebro and Scot will give you the map and the directions, Kimieko wishes to go herself as she believes she knows one of them I would like you to go with her."
"Why me professor?" Jessica asked out of curiosity even though she was quite happy to go along with Kim, "Why not Scot or Storm, or even Logan?" She made it a point not to mention Jean as she'd sacrificed herself but a few weeks ago to save her friends.
"These people have lived in fear all of their lives, I have found them with cerebro but I sense such distrust for the world particularly with one of them, I fear a male escort would not be as easily accepted as a female and although Storm is quite capable of looking after herself, from what I have been told by Kim they are very competent martial artists trained in the ninjitsu style, I fear they might over power her, you on the other hand are a trained Shield agent and are quite capable of fighting against any style." Jessica nodded and left to find Scot and then Kim.
The Cat watched the city from the rooftops searching her brain for somewhere she might have missed, she refused to believe as many of the others were starting to believe, that Leonardo was dead. He was way too good for that, too smart to get killed. But if he'd been caught off guard then maybe. . . but no, she'd known him for only a few short years but living in such close quarters she'd got to know his habits pretty well. She sighed and thought back to the last few weeks, the frantic searching, the worry the panic and now, now Raph had become so over protective of his family, new and old that it was almost suffocating. Cat tried to rein him in and help him to realize that the others were fine and that he couldn't watch over them all of the time but he wouldn't listen to her and right now he was crashed out in his room fast asleep, his body no longer able to cope with the constant searching and worrying, coupled with the lack of sleep he was getting. Cat took one last look at the city and headed off for home.
Once to the warehouse she got into the space age lift that she had always thought belonged in Star Trek, as the lift took her down to the lower level she sensed something wrong, she heard fighting. One fighter sounded like Raph, the other a woman she didn't recognize and that wasn't good, Raph was in no condition to fight, especially if the woman was good. She prepared herself to pounce and as soon as the door opened it took her a split second to take in what was happening and she stood up in confusion. Firstly Donnie and Mikey were simply standing and watching whilst their exhausted brother fought a blonde woman about April's height and age, then she noticed her old friend Kimieko standing on the other side of the room shouting at them to stop fighting and as she got closer she realized the woman was only blocking Raph and he was still losing.
"What is going on here?" She asked as she approached the scene.
"Nikki!" Kimieko yelled, "am I glad to see you! Would you tell this idiot to stop attacking my friend for no good reason!"
"You know these two?!" Raph yelled at her, his body shaking with the effort of using energy he no longer had.
"I know Kim, and so do you but you're so exhausted you don't recognize or remember her!" Nikki clenched her fists her temper warring thin, "However I don't know who she is," she pointed to the blonde and turned her full attention to her boyfriend and her voice began to rise, "and I don't know why either of them are here but I'm sure there must be a good reason as that blonde was only blocking you not attacking so why don't you simmer down and find out why they're here!"
"They know where Leo is," Mikey's small voice piped up beside her, "Raph thinks they're the ones who are holding him." Cat looked over at Kim expecting an explanation and received one.
"Well I don't know how they got you're brother but I was with him and," she told them everything that had happened from the moment the armed men had flung Leo into the back of the armored vehicle to the moment she had woken up in the mansion, the only detail she missed was the information about Raphael and Nikki's daughter. "This is Jessica Fury she's found out where they're being held and we came here to tell you we were going after them and that he'll be home soon."
"We?" Jessica asked looking at Kim's arm which was still in a sling.
"Okay Jess and the X-men are going after them." Kim rolled her eyes at her older companion.
"Where is he?" Donnie spoke up for the first time since the two girls arrived at their doorstep, Kim shrugged but Jessica stepped forward to answer.
"They're being held in Japan, according to what I've found out it seems that the place is some sort of laboratory on mount Fuji," she noted that the three boys had a pained look on their faces at the mention of a lab, it was obvious they now feared the worse, "He's being held there along with a fellow pupil of Kim's, Clarice. I've not uncovered any information about their condition or what they're doing there but I do know they're alive."
"I wanna go with you." Raph stated.
"No." Nikki stepped in full of concern for him. "You'll kill yourself, you're exhausted!"
"I don't care," he bit back, "I wanna save my brother!" he said like a pleading child momentarily losing his hard attitude, too tired to keep it up. Cat's eyes softened, she reached up to stroke his face and looking into his dark eyes hiding behind his bandana she sighed.
"All right, just be careful," she turned to his two brothers, "take care of him." They nodded and smiled. They would have Leo back soon and they would be a family again.
"We'll Chuck did say you guys could come if you wanted to," Jessica said as she watched the two lovers talk to one side quietly, "maybe you should come to the mansion, we're planning on leaving at about six tomorrow morning."
"Just tell us where to go miss," Donnie told her, "and we'll be there."
"I can do better than that," the blonde smiled, "I can show you." She walked up to the turtle in purple and placed a hand on the side of his face and concentrated, she placed all of the information he needed into his brain and he gasped.
"Amazing."
"Well see you in the morning." Kim said as she grabbed Jess and activated her power not worried about what they'd think now they knew she wasn't a threat, she grabbed Jess's hand and pulled her through a shadow and to the mansion where they went to tell the professor what happened and prepare the team for the next day.
On mount Fuji, Japan:
In normal circumstances and if they were two ordinary people the scene in the lab cell would be touching, they looked like two lovers embracing each other, something you might see on a beach perhaps. But unfortunately for the two souls in the cell things were anything but happy. The girl wept as the boy tried to comfort her, her naked body was battered and bruised and he did his best to recover her dignity by wrapping the thin cotton sheet they had given the two of them to share he hugged her tightly desperately holding back his own tears. He stroked her hair and tried not to think about the past few days, his brother Raph had told him about the tests Power's men had carried out on him, but Leonardo would never had guessed that scientists could be so cruel, so heartless. He had met his niece here and she was reasonably healthy but she was petrified of her own shadow and had scars all over her arms and legs where various needles had been inserted among other things. The young mutant turtle wasn't sure how much longer he and Blink could take the tests and the humiliation and hoped for a miracle that he knew would never come. It was hopeless and he knew it, he who was so used to being in control had none and would die in a lab at the mercy of a bunch of scientists. It had been Splinter's worst nightmare, his worst nightmare.
The door opened and a guard came in with their food, Leo felt Blink's hold on him tighten, placing it on the floor the guard started for the door but stopped again and turned towards them.
"Better say your goodbyes now freaks," the man said with a heavy Japanese accent, "cause in a couple of hours turtle boy you're not going to remember anything but what we tell you, Powers San wishes to have a new assassin and you're his choice." He left and everything was silent again save for Blink quiet sobs. Leo closed his eyes and had to admit he was scared, they were going to take his free will away from him and turn him into a cold hearted killer. He looked at the girl in his arms and wondered if she would ever like him the way he had grown to like her, given the chance he might even love her but now because of what these monsters would make him do, he would deserve no body and who would want him?
Hey hey, well another chappy, whadya think. Any of you who are true x-men fans, or even just marvel comic fans should know that the colonel of Shield is Nick Fury, in my story Jessica is one of his daughters. Jessica is borrowed from another story I have written, but that died a death and I like her a lot so I brought her back in this one. Toodles, Angel!