Lucky Me

Chapter 082


My eyes were nothing but slits.

"I gave you an answer." I spat it out. I was sick of being interrogated by the X-Cops in front of me. "It's the same answer I've given you since you asked."

"Which is why we want you to clarify what you mean." Professor was making this song and dance all too familiar. "Do you know anything about the death of George Wilder?"

My eyes rolled as I let out a huff. "Yes."

"How? What do you know?" My eyes went into a relaxed, frozen expression. His voice was irritated and demanding. As headmaster he desired honesty from all his students. Even the thick headed ones.

When the common answer came forth, they all seemed to go to upset times ten. My answer? Complete and utter silence.

Want to know how this got started? Of course, you'd be completely lost if I didn't go back to the day at the hospital, a week after D-M had been admitted. That morning the people who were there decided to have breakfast in the cafeteria and picked the tables right next to the television.

It was after the announcement that Scott looked at the enlarged image of George, the killer of innocent men when it started. He said he thought he recognized the man's face. Then they showed the area around where the body was found.

The place was pretty close to my old house, so close in fact that you could see the old, ugly paint of the house in the background.

"He was with that gang who attacked us!" Dad said proudly, then instantly got confused. "I don't remember tying him up though." His brow knit together. Scott tied all those who attacked us to a tree with a rope they had meant to tie us up with. Ironic wasn't it?

"Did you hear anything?" Jean questioned. Scott shrugged and said it was hard to hear over the jaws cracking and cursing. Then they asked me and Chris. The boy muttered that he was knocked out during the fight. When they asked me, I turned my nose up in the air and said I didn't know anything about it.

It took them two days to find out I was lying.

Wolverine had gotten wind of the crime the same day, and since he had a suspicion, he took a plane with Bishop and went to Washington without anyone else knowing. Whatever they found had Mr. Logan storming into a meeting between Scott and the Professor. That, in turn, led to them stewing in suspicion until I came back from the hospital that day with Jean.

It had been the same song and dance routine since. Every time they'd ask the same question, they got the same answer.

"We want to believe you are innocent, Kerry, but we need proof."

"Isn't my word good enough?" I quipped. My back hurt because I had been sitting like a body with rigamortis for so long.

"But you haven't said whether or not you have done anything, only that you do know something." Professor tried again. I guess he was a firm believer of the old saying of 'try, try again'.

My eyes floated over to Dad who looked uncomfortable and Jean who seemed upset in a sad way.

"Don't you know my well enough by now?" Yes, I was trying to turn the conversation but I was merely an apprentice, the pro was not fooled.

"Please satisfy our curiosity. For if you don't, I'm afraid that the evidence has provided might prove to put you in a great deal of trouble." Ah, he used this tactic as well. I refused to let him know what happened, to let any of them know.

"You seem to have already made up your mind about me," I stated with a bored tone. "Besides, isn't this what you're teaching us, Professor? To take out those who threaten mutant kind? George was a part of the F.o.H. Tell me, was his murder a bad thing for humans or a good thing for mutants? So what if there is one less closed mind twit in the world."

Scott's eyes must have been widened considerably because his jaw even moved slightly.

"So you did do it," Professor, with a mild depressed triumphant sound in his voice, concluded.

"I never said that. I hate guns. I think they are one of the worst inventions which have ever been made." I shifted in the chair, crossing my arms tightly across my chest. "And after a year plus training how to use my body as a lethal weapon—if I still had to rely on a gun then that means I would have flunked all the courses."

Was I messing with their heads? Maybe, maybe not. Why didn't I come out and just tell them the truth? Easy, I didn't want them to know. I was partly ashamed and the rest was beaming with pride.

"If we could telepathically scan your thoughts…"Jean trailed off. She knew it was impossible to do without making me have a seizure or something close to that. My shields were thick and sky high. To try to pry into my brain would cause so much internal damage it wasn't worth it to them.

"May I go now?" Proper, yes I know. "I still have homework to do."

Dismissed with a wave of the hand, I walked out to the balcony, and then with one flap of my wings I was in front of my window. Slipping inside I locked the window soundly to make sure my point got across.

The questions weren't over.

Jack sat on my bed, flipping Stitch over between his hands.

"Did you do it?"

"Hello to you too." I rolled my eyes and went to cross the room. What ended up happening was me being pulled, by the arm, into his lap where he caged me in his arms. Struck speechless I could only raise my eyebrows and stare at him a dumbfounded.

"Did you do it?" He asked again.

I sighed.

"Not you too."

"I just want to know. I won't tell the Prof, but I want to know."

I frowned slightly.

"Do you think I did it? Do you think I killed him?"

"No." I love the way there was no hesitation or uncertainty. The one worded reply brought a smile to my face. The first one in nearly two weeks since this whole thing started.

"Then believe that."

"But is it the right thing to believe?" He questioned again. It broke my heart to see so much pleading in his eyes because I knew I'd never be able to make the pleading count. It wasn't his problem. It was mine. It was my business.

Of course just try to get the New England Busy Body League members to accept such an answer would never work. Just because Wolverine and Mr. Bishop went to Acola, found my 'scent' all around the murder scene didn't mean I actually did it. Of course I had yet to say that I didn't do it either.

Jack put his face against my neck. In the three weeks since this started (it began when D-M went into the hospital) he has become bolder, and I really couldn't say I had a problem with it. After all, for once he's not trying to put on a show for other people's sake.

That was until he fell asleep, lost his balance, and had us both slammed on the floor. The slam which accompanied our fall was heard below. Dad came up to investigate and I was lucky enough to have enough wit to shove Jack into the closet.

Dad just raised his eyebrow when I said I merely fell off of my bed because I was…trimming my wings.

"Next time, learn to do so quietly."

Yeah, tell that to the bonehead in my closet.


Daisy's eyes were glazed over, like someone sucked all the life out of them and replaced them with plastic or something. She had been in this place for three and half weeks. They still had her on oxygen and her vital signs were all good and enter a lot of medical jargon here.

"Hi, D-M," I greeted with fake cheer.

The doctors and nurses told Chris and I (the ones visiting at the time) that if we got into another grudge match like last time, we'd be forbidden to visit her. Any depressing or upset 'vibes' coming off of us could upset Daisy even more and be damaging to her recovery efforts.

So I was told to smile like Barbie and act like Wal-Mart door greeter. Chris they told to just not say anything and stick to the shadows since his scowl was something they considered as permanent.

Daisy-Mae's eyes drifted over to me before blinking and looking the other way once again.

She'd been unresponsive to everyone or at least that was what I was told by everyone. Chris, who did not take the nursing staff's 'advice', stomped in with his arms crossed. Daisy's face lit up slightly at his approach.

Please do not tell me she still had the hots for him?

Oy! Talk about confusing. I thought of dubbing my life 'Days of Our X-Lives'.

"What are you still doing in here?" Chris snapped at D-M who gave a hint of a smile.

Oh peachy, she was one of those girls who loved being fused at. Weirdo.

Sighing, I picked up a magazine and decided to let them have their time together. I wasn't too sure of it but I didn't think there were any feelings on Chris' side regarding their past fling. And if there was or if there wasn't, it really wasn't my problem so why should I care?

I opened the magazine so rough it tore on the top and bottom of the page.

"Something bothering you, Kookie?"

My nose was firmly planted in the magazine, pretending to read.

"Nope," I said, accenting the answer with a firm head shake. "Just don't try to make out with her oxygen mask. It would be a pathetic way to die."

"Then I'll make out with my hand. The way you do." Chris' arrogance didn't need to be seen, it could be felt. My grip on the innocent publication tightened.

"Bite me, Christopher."

"Mark a mile."

D-M's heart monitor started to beep a little bit faster. Oops, guess we should have learned to pipe down.


It was Friday when the ominous Nikki-Jo slammed my locker door shut and looked at me through her heavily massacred eyelashes.

"It's been a while, Cooker."

I frowned.

"It's Kookie." Okay so how much dignity could I have when I admitted that my name was a baked good? Not much let me tell you.

"Whatever. You seem to know Daisy-Mae; do you know where she is? I know she's getting home schooled now because of some reason but I haven't heard from her in a couple of weeks and we were supposed to do something this weekend."

Half of me wanted to flip my hair and say 'no clue' but the other half (the friendlier half by far) just sneered at her and willed me to tell the truth.

"She's sick." So it wasn't the full drawn out truth complete with orchestra and dancing girls, but it was still true.

"Like what, flu sick?" Nikki didn't seem happy to be conversing with the common rabble. My eyes narrowed slightly.

"No. A little more sick than the flu. If you want to know, then check with the hospital. I'm sure they'd admit you." To the psyche ward. Her eyes blazed with understanding. "I mean, they'd permit you to see her."

Without so much as a word, the girl turned and took off down the hall. Good riddance to overly perfumed rubbish.


Friday night and we were wasting time in the Danger Room.

Until the power was cut. The team groaned in unison. Great.

"What's the problem?" Julie screamed. She was adjusting to bringing pain to the populace a little too easily. Of course she's a natural born sadist so I didn't think it surprised me too much.

The doors slid open and we stared at Dad with his visor glowing rather eerily. You could only see the two bright balls of red where his eyes were supposed to be.

"Change in plans, kids." My eyes rolled of their own accord I swear! "We let you have 'together' time instead of training with me so you could participate in a little outdoor activity."

We conned Adam into doing it as well, poor boy. He was slightly out of practice, still intent on leaving as soon as D-M was promised to be okay.

"It's raining!" Julie complained, stomping her foot once we made it outside.

"How observant," Chris drawled, rolling his eyes.

"Today's exercise is going to be a bit you've done before," Cyclops explained as he walked into the downpour.

"Sit on our duffs and see what's on the telly?"

"You're not going to be able to sit when we're through with you."

I heard 'snikt' and my feathers would have turned yellow if I had any say over it. Wolverine was releasing his claws. We'd be lucky to breathe after this!

"Game starts as soon as you leave the stoop."

Those in my team looked at each other and we shrugged. It was unofficially decided, we just wouldn't leave the stoop.

"Time to play!"

Without warning Dr. Hank, er, Beast pushed us out into the open and before we had a chance to catch our balance they started to shoot, throw, and fly at us.

Squeaking, I took to the sky.

Bad idea. Rogue and Archangel guessed I would pull something like that and down went Kerry.

Smack into a healthy pile of mud.

"Gross!" I wiped the brown muck off of my face just in time to be railroaded by Adam. He ran us both into the nearby woods. From the two second break we were allowed, I could see Julie's flames in a spectrum of color, Chris' electricity rippling through the sky, and flashes of light off of Adrian's hand blades.

Then they all turned tail and ran.

"We can't keep running from them." When Gambit sent a few bright red cards in our direction, Adam suddenly changed his mind. "On the other hand, running is great for the cardiovascular system."

Slamming me in the back to give me, what I guessed, was a better start, I went one way and Adam took the other.

This path led me to trouble. Every course would have if I thought about it. There were probably ten million X peoples waiting for us, to pounce as soon as we showed up. I couldn't fly because of Archangel and Rogue, my running blindly through the woods wasn't exactly intelligent either. I mean, Wolverine could be lurking around in here and the—

ZAK!

Or some other person with a really big gun. I screeched and tried to do a U-turn to prevent me from getting shot into crumbled Kookies.

The gun fired again and I was on the run again. Deciding being flung around in the air was more pleasant than being roasted on the ground, I took to the air. Even through the rain and the night, I could see where I was headed which was good thing since I had no clue why I was headed that way.

Mr. Warren and Miss Rogue were either looking the other way or just didn't feel like beating me up anymore. Whatever the reason, I landed at the edge of the woods, about ten feet from a cliff that nosedived a good five hundred feet. Got to love misplaced geography.

Wiping some of the rain from my eyes was a bad thing. It took that nano second for my predator to hunt and attack.

A painfully firm hand shot out and held on to my throat like it was trying to pop it off my head or something.

"I've got her." The deep, cold male voice announced over the X badge. Good, at least he was still part of the X-peoples. But then again, I thought as he tightened his grip, there were no witnesses and I might have ticked him off somehow.

Better think of a distraction before I ended up with a bruised neck! (or beheaded)

"T-This was all set up to get to me?" I struggled against the iron like grip of my captor. As he slowly walked us out of the dark trees and closer to the cliff, I understood why it felt like iron. Stable? Gabal? Cable? What was his name!

"Cable," he stated simply.

Oh crap, could he read my mind?

"All of your strength and fear is focused on my grip, not my mental attacks." My shields slammed down as I released my grip on his hand and hung limply by the throat.

"Cute." He remarked dryly.

"Waa-what do you want?" Hey, have you ever tried to talk while have the Jaws of Life clamped around your throat?

"To find out what you know about George Wilder."

My eyes wanted to bug out (due to surprise and complete lack of oxygen) I trembled slightly as I felt the edge of the cliff under the back half of my heel. "And to get to see how good my 'little sister's' teachers are doing."

I gagged on my words and his grip loosened enough to allow me a decent helping of air.

"I know he's dead. I know he was shot and I know everyone thinks I did it."

Yes, I chose to ignore the last half of the statement.

"Did you?"

I flailed around, not really keeping tabs on the dramatics. His one eye glowed with gold energy, making me have flashbacks to that albino-vampire from the base where all the people had been gutted. I knew what she meant when she said she wanted freedom. It was the same thing I was longing for at the moment.

For another half minute and I gasped and struggled with his metal hand, even through the thick glove I felt the chill of cold metallic skin. It was creepy. I slid my foot further back until my boot heel caught the edge of the cliff.

With a smirk I would be later eating no doubt; I used my strength to lock his wrist between my flesh handcuffs (aka hands with claws).

"That'd be telling." I then used my heel to push against the ground. As expected it caught him enough off guard to have us tumbling through the air in less than two seconds.

His curses were very colorful and in several languages.

I flipped over, so I was facing the ground and spread my wings. They slowed my descent drastically and waited to see a silver haired man hit the ground. No such victory ever came. Weird, I looked around and then behind me.

My wings should have just stayed closed. There he was, in all his bad-boy glory glowing like a night light (yeah, manly image there) and frowning at me with his whole face.

"That wasn't very nice."

Oh flying spit bunnies.


When I came thru in the Med. Lab, Adam told me that Cable said I gave an okay-for-a-rookie fight before finally losing consciousness. My old teammate also clarified that as soon as Cable got me, the rest of the team just stopped fighting and was pretty much left alone. Well, after they had cried out 'surrender' or in Chris' case, got knocked out cold.

They said Cable had not come just to play cat and bird in Dad's twisted game, but was actually compiling information on the three bases we hit (and were hit at, my threat to that tree still stood!). Also, this was his vacation. I couldn't see where this would be a world class resort. Instead of going to the pain and suffering, let the pain and suffering come to the convenient spot of Salem Center!

I spent the night in the medical bay, listening to the voices from the hall. Dad and Jack were fighting the others verbally, in hushed voices as whether or not they should keep pressuring me with something I might have or might not have done.

Shivering, I turned over on my side. My wings started to throb but I chose to ignore them for the time being. Closing my eyes, memories of how the gun smelt, the way it vibrated, the sound of it as the trigger was pulled. No, no they would never know what I did.

Not until I was on my death bed or dead!