Because of when we were writing this, it was before the last season had aired. In fact, a lot of episodes hadn't finished airing at this point - so continuity wise it starts off after Impact. The whole Apocolypse thing? Kinda went away or never happened.... lalala. So this would be alternate universe, after the actions in "Impact". Started October 9th, 2003. Please see profile for more info.
Chapter 1: Schism
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--- Introduction ---
The X-Men: heroes. Men of renown. Saviors to an ungrateful world, they have been called many things over the years but now they're being called... dead??!?!?!?!
The X-Men, the Brotherhood Of Mutants, the Acolytes, and the Morlocks have suddenly vanished off the face of the Earth leaving behind only few members to gather up the pieces--these members, all vastly different must join together to save their friends before it's too late!
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Rogue wrapped her arms around herself as she awoke to a cold chill. Her green eyes flicker open, her lips part taking in a deep morning breathe. Sitting up, she rubbed the sleep gunk from her eyes. Gasped as she found she isn't in her bedroom, but in a cave? A dark, damp cave.
Her breath haltered as she rubbed her bare arms for warmth. Bare?! A moment of surprise as she looked down at her once long sleeved pajama top. She whimpered as her sleeves were ripped right off and her gloves also gone.
"H-h-hello? Any of y'all there?" Rogue wondered out loud.
Shadows scamper against the wall of the cave. Her teeth chattered. Body shook.
"Hello?! Oh god? This has to be a nightmare."
Her eyes moved onto a figure on the ground near to her, making out it's form as that of Kitty Pryde, her room mate. Seemingly unconscious. Rogue fell to her knees and crawled over to Kitty, shaking her violently,
"Kitty! Wake up! Wake--" Her voice trailed off as another figure came into view, that of a less friendlier sight as it was the one and most certainly only Scarlet Witch. Also unconscious. "Err? Wanda?! Kitty! Ya'll wake up now, ya hear?" Rogue continued to shake Kitty desperately awaiting another sign of life.
---
The barking sound of someone off in the distance caused the Scarlet Witch to stir in her sleep. Slowly blinking only one eye open, all she could see was the vast amount of darkness that surrounded her. She quickly shut her eyes closed again, for they were too heavy to keep open. She was so tired, and her body was sore.
But there was that voice again. Why couldn't she ever sleep in peace?
"Toad, go away." She whined. Her voice was nothing but a soft murmur, she doubted he would even hear her. 'Like he'd listen' she thought.
Wanda managed to curl herself into a smaller ball as she tried to drift back off to sleep, absently reaching for a blanket that wasn't there, she was so cold. It was never this cold in the Brotherhood house. Lance must have forgotten to pay the heating bill, again. Now she wouldn't be able to get enough sleep. She was nothing less then extremely grumpy in the morning when she didn't get plenty of sleep.
She then thought she heard something again and this time she forced her eyes to fully open. There, not more then a few feet away was a figure she vaguely recognized in the dim light...
---
Kitty mumbled at the slight disturbance to her sleep. "C'mon, just five more minutes." She struggled half-heartedly in return to Rogue's shaking. She rubbed her arms and blinked. "Gyah, you like, didn't have to take my blanket. I totally get the hint." Kitty had the sudden realization that she's certainly not in Kansas anymore. She looked at her pajamas, then glanced at the other two girls with half-closed eyes.
"Whoahohoho. Uh... mornin' Rogue." She paused, then changed her tone. "Wanda..." She looked nervous, "Gawd, so like... uh... what'd I sleep through?" Kitty yawned, "Is this some kind of practical joke? Bobby is such a dweeb sometimes."
---
Callisto awoke to an unfamiliar dry chill. Of course, being accustomed to more of a rancid humidity, this sent shocks through her body. Her hyper sensitivity made her especially intune to her new surroundings. Around her, the whole world moved. The footsteps of a spider spinning its web pounded in her ears. She felt the heat of the other bodies around her, some awake, some sleeping.
Where was she?
She gazed at the girls, who had yet to spot her. Her night vision made them practically glow. She cringed at what the daylight would do to her frail senses.
One of the girls... looked familiar. Well, actually, so did the little brunette. The third girl was a mystery to her, but she could tell a mutant when she saw one.
Callisto grabbed her jacket ( her makeshift pillow) and put it on. Her small collection of crude knives rested safely in the middle of the bundle. She silently assembled herself, before contemplating her next move.
Finally, convinced she could defend herself, she stepped out of the darkness, and in a low growl, she asked, "Where the #! am I?"
---
Now Wanda knew that she wasn't in the Brotherhood house any more.
It took a few moments for her eyes to finally adjust to the poor and pathetic lighting in this dark and damp.. .whatever it was she was in. From what little she saw she knew it was, well, dark and damp - almost like a cave. A really gross and smelly one at that. The scent kind of reminded her of how Toad smelled after he finally took a shower. The smell was still there, only difference was he was wet.
A few feet away she could make out two figures, one she knew was Rogue and the other was the girl that could walk through walls. The one Lance always had a thing for, her name was on the tip of her tongue but she couldn't quite remember it. Cathy, Kathryn, Cat, Kit, Kitty. That was it.
But there were others out there too, she could feel there power around her, but it was faint. Very faint. And someone else was awake now, but for now Wanda decided to play possum, though it wasn't really her style.
Her style would have been to jump up and hex them all until she got answers, but she knew that wouldn't work in this case, she was still sore and still tired. She wanted answers, but she knew she would have to wait. And she hated waiting.
---
Rogue gazed down at the awakening Kitty, letting out a sigh of relief. "Ah..." Rogue looked to Callisto, trying to recall the mutants familiarity. She was sure she recognized her from some where. Rogue looked to the quite unsettling sight of the seemingly unconscious Wanda. Her body vibrated as the quite vivid memories of the incident at the Bayville Mall when they first had met the Scarlet Witch. The X-men's secret weapon certainly didn't prevail that day...
Rogue came to her feet, her knees shaking.
"Now, calm down, sugah." Rogue breathed halter into rapid huffs as the realization of her situation finally began to sink in... she was in a cave, a dark, wet, cold cave... with one obviously pissed off mutant, the destructive daughter of the X-Men's greatest foe... her dumbfounded, half asleep team mate... and god knows who else.
Kitty let her eyes adjust to the cave lighting. She squinted again. "That's a very good question. Like where... ARE... we?" She stood up and took in the surroundings.
"Whoa, Rogue. You look like you're about to fall over." Kitty moved over to Rogue's side, carefully touching her friend on the back to support her (and making sure NOT to touch skin her bare skinned arms). She mused out loud, "This totally looks like a girls sleepover party gone horribly wrong. This does NOT look good. You okay, Rogue?"
Rogue moaned softly, managing a weak, faint smile at Kitty "Ah'm all right." She rubbed at her arms, feeling uncomfortable, then looked to Callisto
Callisto sniffed the air and dragged herself toward the cave entrance. She gazed into the near blinding sun as she tried to adjust to her surroundings.
"Were somewhere atop Bayville. " She said, crouching at the mouth of the cave. She ran her hand on the ground, before pulling it back.
"Sulfur." Callisto grumbled, wiping the hand on her pants.
"Sulfur? Does that mean..." Rogue let out a faint gasp, "Kurt! Well that'd explain us all getting here." She looked to Wanda, and then back to Callisto. "'cept ya'll why would Kurt bamf you two here?" Her eyes shifted over to Kitty, "Why would he bamf us?"
Rogue stumbled forward a bit, collapsing onto her knees by the seemingly sleeping Wanda, "Erm..." She looked back at Kitty, "Should we wake her or somethin? She'll freak out when she sees us here." Rogue bit down on her bottom lip, drawing a trickle of blood as she fought with herself whether to wake the sleeping menace, fearing how she'd react when she awoke.
Kitty waved politely to Callisto, then made a face at Rogue's question. "Uh, Kurt? Well uh... he does play jokes, but he's not mean. Kurt wouldn't just drop us off somewhere, y'know? I mean, it's not like we're far from home or anything, right? Maybe I could phase through the mountain and see what's out there?" Kitty asked this, but didn't move to do it. She looked over at Wanda then said, "Yeah, wake her up and we'll all be doomed. Like maybe we should hold up little white surrender flags so she realizes we're totally not here to bring her harm or anything. Just an idea."
---
A figure stepped carefully among the rocks as he slowly walked through the cave. Stopping to get his bearings, he held the palm of his right hand out, holding the candle-sized flame up to get the most light to spread through the chamber.
The flame's light bounced off his torn orange nomex suit, the flame pack was gone, ripped off by something he couldn't remember, but luckily his faithful Zippo Sparky was always in his pocket. He wanted to make the flame bigger, to shed a little more light on the situation, but seeing as how he was in a cave with a limited supply of oxygen, he was hesitant.
Sighing John looked back down at the flame as he continued to trek up through the cave.
"This little light of mine..." He sang quietly to himself, "I'm gonna let it shine..."
John stopped his whispered singing as he heard voices in the distance. Shielding the light with his other hand he crept forward as quietly as he could, finally reaching an outcropping where he took refuge.
John peered around the corner, daylight stinging his eyes. There were three of them, no, four. Two of the X-Men, some lady he didn't recognize and... "Oh dear Lord..." John muttered, but quickly slapped a hand over his mouth and hid behind the outcropping. Wanda? The Boss's daughter? What was she doing here? What were they doing here? More importantly, what was he doing here???
Peeking back out around the rocks he could see the end of the tunnel. Sighing he let the small flame in his hand disperse, knowing that it would only draw unwanted attention. They were between him and the exit of the cave, so John decided to just hang low and see what he could discover.
His stomach growled, and John just hoped they wouldn't hang around for long, apparently he missed breakfast.
---
"Now were did dat homme go now? Trackin' him is harder den Gambit t'ought."
Remy held the two of spades in his hand and he charged it with kinetic energy. He had lost sight of his red headed ally and since he didn't know Remy was there, he wasn't about to wait up for him. Remy was still confused at how he had gotten there but he knew that all he wanted was to find Pyro and get out.
Remy moved to the side of the cave and laid a fingerless gloved hand on the moist rock.
"Gambit could blow a hole t'rough dis but den de cave might collapse." He said thoughtfully to himself. "Perhaps jus' a little one t'see how t'ick de walls are?"
Instead Gambit walked on hoping to find any sign of Pyro. When he doesn't, he decided to cause a small explosion. Pyro would probably hear that and come to him anyway.
"Well, here goes not'ing." Remy charged the card a little more and threw it at the rocks.
The sound of the small explosion echoed off the walls and traveled through the cave. Remy then moved away so that if anyone or anything did respond, he would be out of sight.
---
Rogue let out a gasp as a loud rumbling sound echoed off of the cave walls, deserting Wanda and bolting to her feet, "Kitty, yeh stay here with Wanda." Rogue took off forward, arms still wrapped around her she ran toward the cave exit. She stopped as she met the end, the morning light shining brightly down on her. "Kitty! Yer right..." Her voice dropped to a whisper, "We're not far from home." Rogue gazed at the gazebo, where just weeks ago she pushed the stone form of her foster mother, Mystique, off. She wandered forward, unfolding her arms and greeting the suns warmth, letting out a shriek as she tripped forward over a round stone.
Rogue let out a whine, sitting by the cliffs edge nursing the wound on her knee, "Well that was stupid." She muttered. "Note ta self, Ah don't do well without mah morning coff..." Her voice trailed off as a familiar scent tickled her nose, the distinct smell of smoke... who smoked? No sign of fire... so that must have meant someone was lighting up.
Logan smoked... at least she thought he did... but who else? If it was Logan he would have already shown himself, and smelt them with his enhanced senses.
Now the origin of the smoke was a little more clear, recognizing it's ghastly smell from that day at that abandoned warehouse when she had come face to face with that stupid cajun, the one who hypnotized her with those red eyes and made her let her guard down.
...stupid cajun...
Rogue cleared her throat, "BETTER GET OUT HERE, SWAMPRAT!! BEFORE AH GO AND FIND YEH!"
Remy grinned as he watched the two-toned haired girl. He had seen her before. She had intrigued him. Not only was she an attractive girl but the challenge of her untouchable skin was irresistible to Remy.
Remy stood from his hiding spot and quietly crept behind her till they were almost touching.
"And what would ya do once y'found me?" Remy asked, his lips only inches from the Goths ear.
Rogue gasped, turning to face to Cajun. She wrapped her arms around herself again gazing into those deep red eyes... snapping out of her trance, she backed away from Remy almost fearfully
Remy grinned as Rogue gasped and turned around, wrapping her arms around herself. He mentally laughed in triumph as she simply maintained eye-contact for a couple seconds. She then seemed to snap back into reality and backed away from him. Remy was inclined to walk towards her at first but waited to see what she had to say.
"Ah--Ah--Ah--" She tried to get a hold of herself, rubbing at her arms nervously, "Is this one of Magneto's tricks? What am Ah, and Kitty doing here? OR Wanda OR that other chick? What's going on, Cajun? Yeh better start explaining or AH may have ta get physical." For emphasis she held out her ungloved hand.
Remy furrowed his brow in thought. "Mags didn' send me. Remy didn' even know dere was ot'ers here." Remy then glanced down at the hand she held out challenging though found it more seductive rather then challenging. He was curious to feel the deadly touch of the Rogue.
Remy stepped forward closer to so her hand was nearly touching his neck, "An' Remy not afraid t'get physical chere."
---
Kitty blinked as Rogue took off. "What do you mean, 'Watch Wanda'? She's like, not a TV show! I like to investigate strange noises too!" Kitty scrunched her face a little, moving over to the seemingly sleeping Wanda.
Kitty pondered to herself, 'Yeah, anything better than here. You know, when she's sitting there all quiet and non-threatening, she doesn't seem all that intimidating. Shyah, just wait until she wakes up. I swear, I hope this doesn't turn into some stupid conflict over a non-issue.'
She sat next to Wanda, pantomiming poking her, but never touching the young witches' body. Kitty glanced at Callisto and made a side comment. "So, what are YOU in for?"
"Oh. Me? I'm a Morlock. Hypersensitivity. " Said Callisto, in regards to the brunette.
The pulsing of another heartbeat penetrated Callisto's ear and her guard flared up. She fingered the brude switchblade on her wrist, and turned slightly toward the darkness of the cave.
---
"Gambit?" John asked quietly to himself as the explosion echoed down into the cave.
Carefully looking back around the corner he saw the Rogue girl running to the cave's entrance, leaving the other three behind.
'Wait a minute...' John thought. 'The explosion sounded like it came from the cave's entrance. That means Remy is up there, and since I'm down here.' John smiled. 'We got em surrounded.'
John tried not to laugh aloud as he struck a flame from Sparky, pulling it into his hand and forming it into the size of a softball. It was all just too good.
He checked around the corner on last time. The taller woman was still watching the entrance where Rogue had left through, and Shadowcat still kneeled over the fallen Wanda.
John was about to jump around the corner, but a slip of his foot caused several rocks to tumble away, and echo loudly in the cave.
"Crap..."
The sound of a trip, of a fall, thudded in Callisto's system. She cringed and turned toward the direction it came from.
Kitty rubbed her arms again, still a little chilled from the air. She let out a leftover yawn when the sound of rocks drew her attention away from Wanda and to the other corner of the cave.
"What was that?! Another person?" She stood and moved toward the noise, still keeping half her attention on Wanda, "Who's there? Kurt? Come out!"
The Brunette went to investigate the noise, calling it Kurt. Callisto reached out and grabbed the girls arm. "Stay still, child." she hissed, pushing past Kitty and standing between the brunette and the unidentified stranger.
Kitty was about to step forward before Callisto told her to step off. She let out a bit of a 'tsk' noise to display her annoyance. Kitty rolled her eyes then looked to where Wanda was.
He really did it this time. They had to know he was down here after that. The Shadowcat even identified him as 'Kurt', and unless he could turn blue, grow a tail, and pull off a good German accent in the next five seconds John was screwed.
"Who in the # are you, and why in the hell are you stalking around in the darkness?" Callisto spoke.
'Yep, busted.' John thought. Well, no need in putting it off any further. John took a deep breath, The Shadowcat was no problem, and even though he didn't know what the older womans powers were, he was sure he could hold her off until Gambit got down there.
"Here we go." John broke the ball of flame into two, one for each hand, and stepped around the corner. Two mutants were going to be a cakewalk.
"Here I come Remy!" John yelled, hopefully alerting his teammate and preparing to light the place up, but he instantly regretted stepping around the corner.
---
The thought to just open her eyes and scare them all was so tempting Wanda could feel it. But she didn't. They knew as much as she did. Nothing.
But she was sick of lying here on the cold rocky ground. She was fed up with this, she was getting up. This was pointless. Next time she was going to go with her instincts. 'Hex first, ask questions later.' She thought as her eyes popped open. She saw the brunette valley girl right next to her. She was looking at someone.
"Who's there? Kurt? Come out!" Kitty had said.
With out a word she slowly rose, her stiff and sore muscles screaming out but she paid them no mind. The Scarlet Witch did not show weakness in front of anyone. She now stood fully tall and looked over to where Shadowcat was looking, the girl looked scared more then anything of her. That brought a smirk to Wanda's face. But when she saw who Kitty was looking at before made her blood boil, and deep scowl had replaced her small smirk.
Wanda had gotten up...
John had caught her off guard the last time they had met, but she would be dammed if she let the same thing happen again. Wanda and John never did get a chance to finish their fight on that bridge, she was holding back too. But this time she was going to finish it.
Wanda prepared herself for battle, a small blue charge growing in her each of her hands, ready to strike at any given moment. "Leave him to me." Wanda said in a deadly tone, she knew that Kitty would listen to her, but this other girl, she believed she was an ally of Calliban, but she was not to sure about her just the same. "He's mine." She said as her piercing blue eyes flashed a shine pure rage and anger. This was going to be fun. She thought as she saw John stop dead in his tracks, her small smirk slowly returning to her face.
John smiled hearing Wanda's words. 'So she does remember me.' He thought, flashing back to the attack on the bridge.
The attack itself was nothing but a ruse, just bait, including the ski pass he had conveniently dropped to get Wanda to come to her father. In truth Magneto was more afraid of his vindictive daughter than he had been of Apocalypse. And why wouldn't he be, from what John had heard he figured Magneto deserved whatever Wanda would have given him. John briefly wondered where Magneto and the mind-altering mutant were, but pushed the thoughts out of his head as he had more pressing matters to attend to.
In truth he was glad she remembered him. Who knew just how much of her memories Magneto had erased?
What very little Wanda remembered that day, she remembered their fight. She remembered mainly him, him and his stupid laughing antics, it was almost as if she was being drawn into a trap. But there was a block there, everything else was blocked and hazy, and she just wished that kiss Toad had given her was just as hazy as the rest of her memories, but it wasn't.
"Pleasure to see you again Sheila." John smiled, the flames growing larger around him as her blue hex bolts did around her. "It's been awhile."
Sheila? Who the hell was he to call her Sheila? Oh she'd Sheila him, she'd hex him right to kingdom come.
Kitty then turned to notice John appear with two flaming hands. Kitty made a face, "Great. This day is just totally turning out wonderful." She made her voice louder, "Hey Rogue, you shouldn't have woken me up!"
Kitty gymnastically-tumbled over out of the pathway of the two energy wielding mutants. She started to move over toward the area where Rogue went, "I think this is a good time to check up on my team-mate..." Her pace a little faster than usual.
Wanda glared at him, he looked like he was about to strike, and that Kitty girl had disappeared some where. Like she cared.
He grunted, throwing a ball of flames at Wanda but it never hit.
She sent her first hex bolt out, flying his flame right back at him...
The Aussie smiled, forming a flaming tennis racket in his right hand. "Now serving, St. John Allerdyce." He called, cackling madly as he struck the ball back at Wanda.
Instead of waiting around John ran to the side, where a group of rocks ran the length of the cave. Hopefully the returning ball would distract her long enough he could get along side and flank her.
'Where the hell are you Remy?' Even if the Shadowcat went up there, it shouldn't have taken him this long to deal with her and the Rogue. John slapped a hand to his head as he continued to scramble around Wanda. 'Of course. Rogue.' Gambit never really did put work before pleasure.
'What the hell was he doing?' Wanda thought. This was not tennis, this was a fight. A fight she intended to win. No mater what.
Ready with the other hand Wanda flew her second Hex bolt out towards the ball of fire, but instead of firing it back at him she dissolved it in mid air. But when she looked back up to where he had been to fire another Hex bolt at him. He wasn't there. He was gone.
---
Rogue drew her hand back, glaring at him, her body shaking with such fury. "Fine, if ya'll don't have anything ta do with it then Ah'm gonna go and find out who did but first..." She cleared her throat, pointing to his trench coat. "Off with your coat and give it to me" Rogue looked to his gloves, "And your gloves, Ah can't be walking around uncovered, or there will be an unfortunate accident, get it darlin?" She paused as she called him 'Darlin', her cheeks reddened.
Instead of touching him, the Rogue pulled her hand back. Remy couldn't help but slightly smirk at this. Remy grinned but obeyed her requests. He pulled off his fingerless gloves and pulled off his trench coat. He then whirled it around so it was over her shoulders and he was right next to her. He then held out his gloves to her.
"As y'wish chere."
Suddenly something out of the corner of his eye caught his attention. Further down in the cave it lit up orangish yellow. Obviously fire had made that light.
"Merde!" Remy muttered. "Sorry chere, but Gambit t'inks his friend in trouble"
Remy turned around and ran in the direction of the fire-lit part of the cave.
Rogue gasped, before she could utter a word of thanks or goodbye he was off. Slowly she fit the coat around her, and twirled around. She blushed, "Damn... Ah feel like a little girl..."
Rogue stopped and looked to the mouth of the cave and saw Kitty emerge, Rogue ran to her teammate who looked just a bit paler than normal. "What's up? What's going on..." Rogue then gasped, "Friend -- Remy --" Her voice trailed off "Kitty!"
Rogue let the sleeves fall over her hands so she could pull them into her palm like gloves, quickly she grasped Kitty's hand in her own and ran into the cave to see what sight would greet her.
Remy got the mouth of the cave where Wanda and some other chic were and looked back to see Rogue and Kitty trailing him. He immediately held his arms out to block them from going in. Wanda was trying to kill Pyro. She had just thrown a hex bolt but dissolved it at the last moment.
Gambit didn't like the looks of the battle and he moved to the side of the cave unnoticed by everyone besides Rogue and Kitty. He placed a hand on the moist rock and with one quick exertion charged the whole area with kinetic energy. Only Kitty and Rogue were out of way of the rock if he exploded it.
The cavern suddenly became completely lit red with his kinetic energy.
"Okay, de fightin' stops now or Gambit'll blow de place up." He said, his eyes set and glowing, his facial expression hard and determined.
Remy turned to look at the two-toned haired girl. "Chere, y'might want t'stand back."
---
To be continued..
Authors Notes:
This piece of fanfiction is a collection of several months of roleplay in a Yahoo Group based environment. Certain characters were handed to people to control the actions of, to tell their part of the story which sums up the overall feel of this. Over time we've had eight fantastic writers come in and direct the story one way or another, and it is my pleasure to have been (and still be) part of this ever growing story. We all started writing this story around October 9th, 2003.
-- Characters/Authors --
Casakitten: Rogue
Eixid: St. John "Pyro" Allerdyce
Alice Storm: Callisto
KiyoneKatz: Kitty "Shadowcat" Pryde
Sarah Crysala: Remy "Gambit" LeBeau
Roguestar1: Wanda "Scarlet Witch" Maximoff