Not
Myself
By Princess
Alexandria
Princess_alex24@hotmail.com
The suit was on the bench in the locker room, obviously meant for her. As Christy changed she purposely tried to push her problems with Annie to the back of her mind, but it proved harder to just focus on the battle to come that it had been in the past.
The black outfit was a bit uncomfortable. Christy pulled her hair back into a ponytail so that it didn't get in her eyes, but some strands still fell about her face. After taking a few deep breaths she opened the door and crossed the hall to the Danger room, making sure to close the door solidly before moving to a place where she could see into the window and the observers. She didn't look too hard, because she had a feeling she had a bit of an audience and that made her nervous. She still wasn't sure how much she wanted them to see, but she was just going to do this like she really would and take whatever Scott had to say about that.
"You heard the orientation earlier. I'm starting you out at a higher level and a different setting. The enemy has a small device that you need to take from them, without getting captured."
"How important is this device?" Christy stared up at him needing to know how much she needed to put into getting it.
"You just need to focus on getting that thing."
"I need to know how important it is." She spoke coldly and could see he didn't like her.
********
Emma stood at the window watching Christy's glare focused on Scott. He wasn't used to giving detailed mission reports in the Danger room, and Emma could see the mistake he made the second he made it. Christy's eyes became cold when he said, "It is vitally important you get that device. Failure is not an option."
"Scott, maybe you should reword that." She spoke quickly as she watched Christy's tense stance.
"No, that's good enough." He muttered, barely paying attention to what his words had done. Emma glanced over at the Professor and she could see he noticed it. They were about to see something they probably would rather they didn't, and after seeing some of Christy's thoughts it really worried Emma.
She glanced around at the larger crowd than they had in the morning. A lot of X-men wanted to see what the woman could do. "Scott you need to give her parameters. You can't just send her out with…"
"I have this Emma." He turned to glare at her, still upset that she'd been in Christy's mind and didn't want to share details about how stable she thought the woman was. "Unless you have something to tell me?" He was acting like a child, but Emma just turned away and looked down at the city streets, the broken glass. Scott was trying to push Christy over the edge to see how badly scarred she was emotionally. He wanted to see what kind of a threat she could be, and was ignoring that Christy wasn't… Emma sighed as she watched. She couldn't say that Christy wasn't unstable, she couldn't make that determination, so Scott was going to try and force Christy to show it here.
********
Christy glanced around the deserted street with destroyed cars on it and glanced around to see if her hunter team was there. She almost could believe they would be. She was alone. She didn't move as she stared at the street in front of her blankly. No building was over two stories tall. That was unusual.
It was the sound of a man coming down a nearby street that pulled her out of her trance. This was just a simulation. She repeated that to herself a couple of times just to make her believe that she hadn't been sent home. She didn't have any good weapons. She would have to take care of that.
********
"She's just avoiding all of them." Logan listened to Cyke complain as Christy spent her time in the simulation investigating the shops rather than fighting the enemy. "She's wasted an hour already."
"Well, maybe someone should let whoever else has Danger room time today know it's cancelled." Logan continued to watch, while some of the others had moved back, bored with what Christy was doing.
"I already figured that out." Bobby mentioned from the debriefing table. "She can go as long as she needs it."
Logan barely nodded to him as he watched Christy rummage through shops in search of weapons, but she'd grab odd things as well. She was good at hearing the enemy approach and staying out of sight. They'd all done this sort of thing before, but they usually used the danger room to fight. They didn't use long term plans in there.
********
Christy found a knife, no guns. She had to remind herself a few times that she wasn't hunting food, because some shops actually had some, and every time she saw that her heart would beat faster and a false happiness hit her until she realized there was no one at home in desperate need of it. Every time that pulled her down, reinforced that she'd lost that battle… that it was over.
She wasn't used to being in enemy territory alone. She had no lookouts, no backup. It was a very lonely and scary feeling. Once she felt she had as much as she would get, because the shops themselves had obviously only been minimally programmed to have things, Christy found a stairwell to a rooftop. It was risky, but she hadn't heard any helicopters so perhaps it was safe and she needed some idea of what she was facing.
In the distance she thought she saw two camps. Some people were in the area around them and they were blocks apart. Small groups of people walked the broken streets, but Christy wasn't looking for a small group. She had no backup. She needed a lone idiot to take down. She needed information that Scott had been unwilling to give her and she needed more than a knife.
********
"I think she's finally going to do something." Hank said something. He'd been monitoring the readouts from the suit and there was no food to suddenly elevate her heart rate like that, so she must be making plans. The fact that finding food on the floors of grocery stores had consistently affected her was sad. The conditioned responses to such a find were still very strong with her.
They had more of the monitors in the suit active for her because Hank still had questions he couldn't answer about their dimension shifting visitor. He monitored her heart rate, her breathing, everything that was possible to monitor with her.
A few of Hank's sitting and bored compatriots wandered to the window now that the shopping trip appeared to be over. Christy had a backpack of supplies that she hadn't gone into the simulation with.
*********
Her target was a block away and far enough from the others that he was a good mark. Christy moved down from the roof and out the store door quickly. She stayed to the side of the street even though she hadn't seen other enemies around, in case they were in the buildings.
Once she was close enough to see him she slid into the shadows to watch. He was a thin man. Christy may even get some clothes out of this. She pulled out a rope and walked up behind him. His hands were down. She'd only get one shot at this. She'd picked a thicker rope, hoping that she could do this without killing him. She'd never actually tried to take prisoners before. Normally she had to kill quickly.
With a grimace she moved quickly to wrap the rope around his neck and held on tight as he jerked back. His fingernails ripped at her arms but she didn't lessen the pressure. She needed him alive, but unconscious was good. He backed up hard against the wall and the breath was driven from her lungs as pain erupted in her back, but still she held on. A low growl escaped her lips as he tried that again. Finally he started to get weaker. Christy held on tightly until he stopped moving completely, and just a little longer.
Once he was down she rushed to steal his clothes, ripping his military shirt off and then tying his arms to a pole outside of the shop she'd been slammed against. Her back ached, but she ignored the pain and spasms while she started pulling his pants off. She had to leave the black outfit the X-men gave her on, but she put the new clothes on top of it. It was hot and not that comfortable, but she'd stick out less. People might assume she was one of them.
She didn't check to see if she killed him until she was dressed and ready. Good, a steady heartbeat. She tied his legs together as well and then slapped him hard and glare at him when his eyes opened. "So… I hear you have a device? Where would that be?"
"I'm not telling you anything you fucking bitch." He glared at her, trying to be menacing, but in his underwear that wasn't too successful.
Christy leaned forward and spoke quietly. "You really want to give me what I want. I can be a bit of a bitch."
********
Emma watched the cold eyes stare back at Christy as the man spit at her, but Christy seemed to expect that and it missed. His scream was a shock and Emma glanced down at the monitor to see a knife in his thigh. Christy had stabbed him.
"I'll carve you up alive if you don't talk." Christy spoke quietly, and sounded just a hint irritated, as she twisted the knife. Her captive screamed. Emma started to wonder if Christy had ever done that, since she knew Christy had carved people up when they were dead. The images of that had been horrifying.
He then proceeded to tell her which camp had the device, but that was all he knew. Christy rammed the handle of her knife into his temple so hard it might have killed a real man and then moved to the street, checking for company before starting towards another shop, with her new gun in her hand.
"Jean, check out the readings from her… interrogation." Hank spoke quietly and the redheaded telepath moved to see the readings the suit had on Christy. Emma was too busy watching the woman on another rooftop checking out the position of the enemy to go check, but she'd get a printout later if she was still curious.
"I'm going to up the pressure on her." Scott told the Professor and Emma really did wonder how Christy would deal with that.
********
Christy sighted the camp she needed and took note of the groups of people on the streets, picking the safest route. She only made it one block before she heard people too close to avoid. She stood taller and took a deep breath. She needed to see if the clothes fooled anyone and doing that away from the larger groups of people would be best.
"Hey Jameson, you were supposed to be on the other block." One of them said and Christy's heart sank. She pulled her gun out of her newly acquired pants and turned. If they knew the guy she'd robbed, they'd know she was an intruder. Two gunshots ran through the air and one man fell before the two others with him were in motion.
She moved quickly trying to find cover, and barely noticed the darts hit her side as she moved into the doorway of the building so that no one could sneak up behind her. She wasn't the only one taking cover though and when she turned she didn't have a clear shot of the two men. She noticed the dart on the ground and realized they weren't going for the kill.
A clear memory of pulling darts out of her skin when the F.O.H. attacked came to her and she smiled. "I could get used to being a mutant." She muttered as she stepped out of her cover and took aim, shooting one man in the head. She wasn't using darts. She had real bullets. The soft thud of darts hitting her chest went ignored as she shot the other man.
********
"Well, she's finally using some powers." Bobby muttered while he stared at the woman that had just strode right out and let those men turn her into a pin cushion. Christy was pulling darts out of her body with one hand and keeping her gun ready in the other as she continued to walk towards the place with the device she was after.
He didn't realize she had some sort of healing thing like Logan or something.
She was almost to the area when Scott hit a few more buttons on the controls. That always meant he was up to something. Bobby leaned a bit closer to the window to see what happened.
********
She was making her way down the street when he just stepped out from a small side street. Christy stared at the tight outfit, overcoat and sunglasses and knew she was in trouble. He wasn't regular military and he was no civilian. Probably a mutant. Christy moved to run back from where she came from, but the man tossed something at her. The street lamp she was near went down after it exploded. "Give up cheri." He spoke and Christy knew who it was.
********
"I thought he was out of town." Bobby muttered as Gambit moved towards the center of the street Christy was on.
"He is. This isn't really him. I want to see if she can use her information against us."
"That only works if she knows him." Bobby watched Christy duck behind a car. Bad move, the gas will explode.
"Well, he has been with us a while. She might."
********
Gambit. Christy took the first side street she found and she could hear him chasing her. She didn't want to bet she could take one of his cards to the chest and survive. She just made it out when he sent a card towards the car, the explosion and very uncomfortable heat giving her some cover.
She didn't know what kind of range he had with those cards. She did know he could fight, and his eyes had good night vision. Nothing that was going to help here. Well, he wasn't bullet proof.
She moved behind another car, but stood tall and aimed, knowing he would be coming around the corner soon. He noticed her too quickly and her shot missed. He was like an acrobat. "Now, Now cheri…" He pulled out yet another card and Christy waited until it left his hand before moving. The force of the explosion tossed her into the air, but at least it didn't hit her. She skidded across hard concrete and got onto her feet as soon as she could.
She ran down the main street. A stupid move, proven even stupider when the jeep stopped in front of her with two men in it. She started shooting while running. One died. She started to just walk really fast up to the other man. "Lights on…" She growled at the driver, noticing the bright hunting lights this vehicle had. He looked confused so she shot the ground near him and watched him jump nervously. "Lights on!"
The bright light hit Gambit right after he'd sent a card at her and Christy was tossed to the side. Her gun clattered to the ground and she scrambled across the street on her hands and knees to try and get it before he recovered from the light. She didn't make it. A foot landed in front of her hand at the last moment and she looked up into his face. "I believe Gambit won dis round cheri." He held a card out in a threat, like he'd just drop it if she tried anything.
"Dammit." Christy laid back on the road. She didn't have a plan to get out of this one.
Gambit started to fade, answering a question she had about his being real. The city around her started to fade as well and Christy found herself laying on the floor in just the clothes the X-men gave her, none of the army clothes she'd used to cover it up stayed.
"Shower quickly and get up here for debriefing." Scott commanded. Christy sighed and rolled off of her back to comply. She did feel sore, being tossed around by explosions would do that. She had never fought a mutant like this, and really up until this moment she never even considered that she'd have to. The training she did with her kids were never this intense, it was never really a battle with powers. Her enemies had always been human, the raiders, the F.O.H. This was humbling and she could empathize with her kids even more. Even though she knew she would lose eventually, because Scott wouldn't let her win, she couldn't help but hate that people saw that.
She pushed open the Danger room door and headed back across the hall to take a fast shower and change. She didn't like this suit.
********
"She went after his eyes." Scott glanced at Bishop and knew they shared the bit of discomfort. Remy's eyes were a weak point and Christy had known that. The mutation that gave him good night vision left him vulnerable to bright lights.
"She has potential." Logan added and Scott had to think about that one. Potential to do what? Leave bodies in her wake? She'd done alright against humans if a bit too deadly. Scott tensed his jaw. She said she didn't know how to fight one on one, and he'd given her a simulation that he thought would require that. She'd adapted it to her own fighting style.
He glanced over at Emma and saw the woman was being quiet and looked distracted. She'd been looking distracted ever since she woke up. Whatever she saw in Christy's mind shook her and things rarely shake Emma. So why wasn't she sharing? Was Christy a threat? Emma wouldn't even answer that simple question.
"I'm going to go see if she's injured." Jean spoke quietly to him. Scott glanced over at Hank when Jean slipped out the door and he was going over all the readings the suit gave him on Christy's body, a serious expression on his face. Something was up there.
"Hank?"
"When I have something to tell you I will Scott." Hank sounded irritated, "but I really believe my patient should hear this first."
********
Christy was just stepping into the shower when she heard the door open. She hated public showers, it was awkward being naked around other people and even more awkward to have them naked around her. She didn't want anyone thinking the lesbian was taking advantage of the opportunity. In high school she'd gotten very good and looking at the floor and staring into her own locker so she wouldn't have anyone think she'd been staring.
"I came to see if you were hurt." Jean's voice came over the shower wall and Christy sighed. She'd barely turned the water on.
"I'm fine."
"I need to see your back." Jean spoke softly and Christy didn't like how nervous this made her. "You took some big tumbles."
Christy held the shower door closed and her voice had a hint of a growl. "Do you do this to everyone after a session?" Jean didn't make a move to open the door.
"Only when we're trying to understand someone's healing ability." Jean spoke with a bit of a clip.
Christy sighed and let go of the door. "Just my back?" She turned away from the shower door and heard it click open.
"Just your back. You ended up on it a few times, and there was also being rammed into the wall."
The touch on her back made her flinch, but she adjusted to it quickly. Jean wasn't anything but professional. "No bruises, no cuts… no blood." Jean's words trailed off. "Does it hurt?"
Christy had to think about that. She hadn't let herself think about her injuries too much while in that room, because that sort of thing only made them hurt more. She'd fought injured before. Her muscles felt tense, a bit sore, but really after the beating she took she should feel worse off. "Just a little sore." Was all she said and Jean's hand fell away.
"Well, that's all I wanted to know. I wanted to get to you before too much time passed. Logan heals fast, I've learned to look quickly." The door closed, but Christy turned to look over the door at Jean. She felt a bit more secure that nothing was visible.
"Jean?" She spoke a bit hesitantly and Jean turned to face her. Christy thought that Jean had to have been through a student hitting on her and would have some advice. When Christy looked into Jean's eyes she changed her mind. She didn't want to pull other people into what was a very private matter for her and Annie. "Nevermind."
"Do you remember the way back to the booth?" Jean asked and Christy just smiled and nodded. It took Jean a moment to turn around and leave. She obviously wanted to push for why Christy had tried to stop her, but she left. Christy didn't think that Annie wouldn't appreciate it if Christy ran around asking her new teachers how to deal with this.
Christy always treated her kids like they had a brain and could make decisions. She was going to just have to talk to Annie privately and explain why she was such a bad choice for a crush. Christy wouldn't even need to go into the numerous reasons why she shouldn't be with someone as innocent as Annie. The age difference alone would be enough. Christy just needed to try and salvage their friendship. She frowned as she showered. She didn't want to lose that. Annie was like family to her, more so than her doubles family. Annie helped her so much… Christy owed her so much and Annie didn't even know it.
********
Those that hadn't left as soon as Christy was done with her session sat around the table waiting for Christy to clean up. Emma noticed that Hank hadn't moved from his spot near a computer console to join them yet. "What is so fascinating about her readings?" She asked him.
"She's very unique." Hank said distractedly and didn't elaborate and Emma wanted to ask more questions, but it was obvious that the researcher was too consumed with studying the readings.
Jean came in the door. "Not a scratch on her." She mentioned to Hank and then moved to sit on the other side of the Professor. "She should be just a little longer. She was in the shower when I left."
"Was she treating this like a video game or is that how she'd normally fight?" Scott was still thinking about the body count during the simulation and Christy's not hesitating to shoot. Emma knew he would focus on that.
"I am not sure." She answered him. She'd already explained about the slow connection with her and that she had only gotten some of Christy's time as a hunter.
On the screen in front of the meeting table they re-ran parts of the session. These would be used to discuss what she'd done and how she could have improved.
********
Christy continued to sit when the debriefing was over and some of the others started to get ready to leave. "Christy, I am as ready as I think I'll ever be to talk about your test results." Hank moved from his seat to the one beside her.
"Oh, yeah sure." Christy noticed Hank looked a bit reluctant to have this talk and it didn't help her relax. She'd already be nervous about this talk and then to have the doctor look like he wasn't looking forward to it didn't help.
"Are you going to have a friend to lean on like young Annie did earlier?"
Christy just stared at him a moment. "Do I need one?" If this was bad news, and she wasn't sure what could be bad about it, then she wanted to mentally prepare.
Her question seemed to fluster him, but before he could say anything Emma moved to stand behind Christy's chair. "I could go with you. You can hardly have one of the children go if you plan to keep them in the dark about your true identity."
"Fine." Christy glanced up at the blonde surprisingly offering to back her up. She then looked at Hank and sighed. "Let's get this over with."
********
They walked in near silence to Hank's lab. Emma noticed the rigid posture Christy had and bet that she was worried. She couldn't get into her thoughts to verify that, but she tried as gently as she could.
~Hank, is this really bad news?~ Emma sent to him as they walked. She'd volunteered to be the second person for a few other students at times, and asked questions that the students were too overwhelmed to think of, but Christy wasn't a student.
Hank was taking too long to answer. ~She isn't ill, not that we can determine. There were a lot of problems with the tests.~ They were already at his office door and he held it opened for both of them.
********
Christy sat there and watched Hank shuffling through the file. It was taking too long. "Just say it." She ordered him. It was cruel to scream with your body language that things aren't good and not just say it. Emma sat in the other seat, but Christy didn't want to have to rely on anyone, and hoped that she wouldn't be embarrassing herself in front of Emma. Whatever he said she could deal with it.
"You're tests were… inconclusive in many ways." He started to talk. "I can't say that I've ever seen results like the ones I got from you." He looked up. "Christy, the scans I did on you… the first three came out with nothing. It was like you weren't even in the machine. When I told you I was scanning for bones… bones suddenly appeared. Those scans are supposed to do everything at once. When I said I was just looking for bones… that was all I got." Christy stared at him, trying to understand what he could be saying. He continued to talk but Christy was still struggling with the concept that the scans showed she wasn't there. "When I told you I wanted a picture of your lungs, that's all I got… and Christy… The blood I drew from you…" He shook his head, obviously confused. "It wasn't blood when I went to test it. It was water."
"What?" Christy just stared at him. She was almost ready to demand he dumb this down, because she was obviously not getting it.
"Christy, even the samples that Jean took… disappeared." Christy glanced at Emma and she looked a bit confused too.
"What does this mean? What are you saying?" Christy's eyebrows were drawn together as she waited. Hank seemed to be thinking before he tried to talk.
"This is new. I'm not sure what it does mean." He spoke more gently. "It could be that you aren't getting hurt because… because you don't have a typical body to get hurt with. This is just a guess at this point, but the darts and the stab wound may have not affected you, because…" Christy was staring so hard at him that he couldn't flinch without her seeing it. "unless you want blood to appear it doesn't. If you don't think about a major organ it isn't there. During the Danger room session I found several times that you stopped breathing, and even more times that your heart just stopped beating. Logan already told us that you sometimes loose your scent. I'm supposed to be able to monitor much more than that, but those were the only things I could on you. I couldn't monitor your adrenaline or bloodflow, or any of a number of other things the suit is designed to monitor."
Christy's eyes fell to his desk and she barely noticed Emma sitting forward and a little closer as she tried to grasp what this meant. Her body wasn't really there. In some strange way it was only partly there, and apparently she could control what parts were there. "I'm not real?" She whispered out and hearing the words made them so much more real… more real than her.
"No, I'm sure that isn't true." Emma spoke quickly. "You have thoughts, you have a body. There is just something different about that body."
Christy slumped forward in her seat, looked up at Emma and just stared for a moment. "You said it's like I'm not there when you try to scan me."
"If that were completely true we wouldn't be able to focus on you enough to give you a headache." Emma seemed to hesitate, as she stared at Christy. "You have a psychic presence… and all shields have some weakness. Yours is just a bit more… complete than most. I have to concentrate to have a shield that makes me appear invisible to another telepath, but you do it naturally. It doesn't mean you aren't really there."
********
Emma could see the fear in Christy's eyes at the idea that she was that different. She almost resorted to telling Christy that she had been able to scan her mind. That alone proved that Christy existed. She decided to wait and see if the other reassurances worked first. She wanted to be able to get the full story out of Christy's mind about her time as a hunter before telling the woman she was doing that. Christy would never volunteer information like what Emma had already uncovered, and they needed to know. Some of the others wouldn't trust Christy until they knew.
They sat in silence and Emma lightly brushed her mind against Christy's shield on the off chance she could find that breach and see how she was really taking this news. She couldn't find it without Cerebra.
"So…" Christy's voice broke up the silence. She sounded resigned. "What will this mean?"
Hank glanced at Emma and she established a connection. ~Emma I was thinking of seeing if Rogue can touch her. If she has skin that Rogue's power can interact with.~
~That may not be a good idea.~ Emma glanced at the woman that seemed a bit less alive because she thought she might not be. Christy sat like she'd been defeated. ~If it works Christy may have problems keeping her form, and if it doesn't she'll feel even less real.~
~Yes, we don't want to lose the patient in our efforts to diagnose her.~ He agreed easily enough, but Emma could tell he was a little disappointed. Christy was a medical puzzle to him and he would have liked to work until he had all the answers.
"You could consider your mutant power to be your control over your body. It's only because we can't do the testing that we can't verify it… but it seems most likely." Hank addressed Christy with a bit more authority in his voice. Doubts didn't help Christy now.
"And the dimension hopping?" Christy asked, but she was sitting up just a little more.
"We can't verify whether or not that was you." Emma slipped in to answer that. "But we do know you have the other power." If both she and Hank refer to this as a power rather than a medical mystery or a problem then maybe Christy will see it that way. "The question now is to figure out how much control you are capable of having. Is it just the healing and masking your scent, or is there more?"
That got Christy's attention. Emma smiled at her as Christy started to consider that.