Of God and Man
Disclaimers: See chapter 1. I'm tired of writing them. Thanks Stan.
A/N: Thanks to all my reviewers and a special thanks to dizi for her help with this story.
Feedback: Love it. Crave it. Will write for kudos.
Chapter 8: Confrontation and Confession
Carolyn remained secluded in her room for the rest of the day. She refused to come to the door for anyone. She didn't eat and Jean reported that she didn't sleep. Logan and Rogue were becoming concerned about her state of mind. Charles and Jean attempted to read her emotions using Cerebra but they were unable to get past her shields. This bothered them more than they would ever admit. Using Cerebra, they were able to read anyone, anywhere, except Carolyn. Charles had never felt such tight emotional control before and he knew that it wasn't healthy.
The next morning, she returned to her schedule of training and teaching, but with a difference. She no longer joked with Logan or her class. She became withdrawn and humorless, a pale shadow of herself. Her students didn't like this woman. Neither did Logan.
He put up with it for a week before confronting her in the Danger Room about the cold shoulder treatment she was giving them.
"I can't let my emotions rule anymore," she informed him during a break in training. "My ability to project emotions has made me a target for every megalomaniac crackpot out there."
"That doesn't mean ya need ta hold in yer emotions," he argued. "It ain't healthy ta be so cold ta yer friends."
"I can't afford to have friends anymore," Carolyn told him, her voice flat.
"Bull shit," he exploded. "Ya ain't getting' rid of me so easy. The others'll say the same thing. Ya ain't gonna push yer friends away just 'cause yer scared."
"I'm not afraid, Logan."
"I wouldn't know," he growled. "Ya have yer feelings so locked down that I can't even smell 'em. It ain't healthy ta lock yerself up like that. Yer human. Ya got feelings. Holding 'em in like that is gonna kill ya."
"I'm going to die anyway," she told him. "I'd rather it be on my own terms. No fear. No anger. No hate. I need to be clear headed so the X-Men can find me and kill me."
"I ain't gonna let that happen," he said angrily, shaking her so hard that her head snapped back.
"You can't stop it," she said.
"I'll protect ya," he said, still angry.
"You can't be with me twenty-four, seven. It's going to happen, Logan. It's just a matter of time. God and Charles have given me strong shields so I can't be manipulated telepathically but what if Sinister gets me? What do you think he will do with my DNA? What if he forces me to have a child for him? Can you imagine his choice of sire? I can't allow myself to be used like that.
"My faith in God is strong but I know a child or clone of mine raised away from the church and in the hands of an enemy would be impossible to defeat."
"Ya been thinkin' 'bout this fer a while," he remarked, his anger draining from him.
"Ever since Charles told me the possibilities," she admitted.
He blew his breath out sharply, knowing he lost the argument. "Whataya want me ta do?"
"If it's apparent I'm going to fall into enemy hands, I want you to kill me." She was beginning to show some emotion. He could smell her conviction and sadness.
"Why me?"
"You're the only one I can count on to go through with it. The others will let me go in the hope they can rescue me later. They mean well but are misguided. You know what they'll do to me and you won't let it happen. You won't let my DNA fall into enemy hands."
He looked at his feet. He hated that she was right; they couldn't risk having her DNA falling into the hands of their enemies. It would be a disaster of global proportions.
"I'll do it," he agreed, "but only if ya talk ta Chuck and Cyke about it first."
"I will," she said then gave him the first smile in over a week. It was a sad smile, as if she were resigned to her fate. "I knew I could count on you."
"How'd ya figure that?"
"You try to hide it but you're a smart man," she told him.
"Ya tell anyone, ya die a slow and painful death," he laughed. "It's good ta see ya givin' yer feelin's some slack. I didn't like the woman ya became after the test."
"I know you didn't," she said, "but that is how I'll be on missions. I can't afford to loose concentration in the field."
"Long as it's only in the field, I'm okay with it," Logan said. "But if it starts happenin' at home, I'll turn ya over ta Cyke fer one 'o his 'talks'."
"Ouch," her mouth twisted in chagrin.
"Back ta work," he announced.
"I have one more thing I need you do take care of," she stopped him.
"What's that?"
"I need you to make sure my body is cremated immediately," she told him. "I hate to get her involved but Jubilee is the only one who has the powers to do it without having to get a crematorium involved. She can destroy my body on a sub-atomic level. You may have to make her angry to pull enough power from her but she has it in her to do the job.
"You will need to make sure Hank destroys all of my tissue and blood samples. I know he'd like to keep them and do more experiments on them but it's like having the Hope Diamond in your sock drawer. It's too big a temptation to many people."
"Blue can keep track of them," he argued.
"Logan, the only way to be absolutely sure is to burn them, my brushes and combs included.," she reached up and stroked his cheek. "Please do this for me. As a friend?"
"Alright," he sighed.
She smiled a real smile. The first one in almost two weeks. Then she dropped suddenly into a crouch and swung her leg around, taking his feet out from under him. He landed on the Danger Room floor with a thud, looking up at her in astonishment.
"You let your guard down," she beamed triumphantly.
She didn't sit on her laurels. She sat on the Danger Room floor in pain several times but definitely not on her laurels. It hurt for her too much to sit anyway. She taught her class standing up.
The next morning, Logan, Ororo and Jean began to teach her to multi task her powers, attacking more than one person at a time. Attacking two or even three people with the same emotion wasn't too bad as long as they didn't move. She had trouble maintaining her lock on the minds she needed to track. She was also having trouble maintaining her power levels on all three threads. Logan proved that when he broke free from the sadness she was projecting and slammed her to the floor.
"Did you feel Logan break free?" Ororo asked.
"I guess so," she replied. "I almost felt like a pinch in my head."
"Remember that feeling," Jean told her. "That's the feeling of someone breaking a telepathic thread. You will eventually learn how to tell who broke it. If it's broken by someone other than your target, it feels different."
"Different how?" she asked.
"I can't explain it," Jean said. "What I feel won't be what you'll feel. I'm also not an empath. I'm not sure if an empath will know where the outside break comes from but I'm sure you'll know it's from outside. I'm always aware of who broke the thread and where they are because of my awareness of other people's minds. You don't have that advantage."
It took her three months of hard training to learn to split her empathic thread and still keep the power level high enough to incapacitate her opponents. When she was able to keep the three of them down for two minutes, Jubilee, Bobby and Scott joined the training. They were added one at a time to teach her fine control without overtaxing her shields. At six months, she was able to take out the entire team, except Rogue. She would hold them long enough to deliver each of them a blow that knocked them unconscious, but not Logan. She didn't care to break a hand or foot on his adamantium skeleton so she would place her foot on his throat and put enough pressure to make it clear to him that she would crush his throat if he moved. Then she would release them.
Logan became accustom to finding himself on the floor with Carolyn's foot pressing heavily on his throat. It happened so often that he complained that if she was going to do that, she could at least wear a skirt so he'd have something to look at while he was down there. She never took offense at his innuendos. He was just being Logan and she wouldn't have him any other way.
She had been at the mansion for just over two years when Rogue asked her about going to Mass. Carolyn hadn't been to church since Mother Superior threw her out of the only home she had since she was eight. She hadn't been able to find a church in Salem Center that was tolerant of mutants. She asked the other residents if they knew where they could go and it was Logan who gave her the best advice.
"Call Elf," he told her around a huge cigar. "He's Catholic and I know he's gone ta Mass here."
Kurt had called many times since he left and went to XSE but she had never thought to ask him where he went while he was here. She knew XSE frequently made trips to Europe on missions and Kurt was able to slip into a Mass in the church he had been baptized in but she didn't know where he went now.
"There's a small parish in Rye that has accepted mutants," he told her on the phone that afternoon. "The pastor, Father Kevin Ryan, is a mutant himself but hasn't told the congregation or his Bishop. He will hear your confession and give you communion."
"Has he seen you without your image inducer?" she asked.
"I cannot go to Mass without it but he has seen me in my own skin and is not afraid. I will call him and ask him to call you."
Fr. Ryan called the next morning. The conversation was stilted, both conscious that his phone lines could be tapped. They made arrangements to meet at the church at the end of the week.
Carolyn never learned to drive in the convent and when she came to the mansion, Charles didn't want her to drive until her powers were completely controlled. By the time she was able to control them, she had lost interest in learning. It was a good thing she didn't learn to drive. Scott had tried to teach her to fly the Blackbird but failed miserably. She had some sort of mind block when it came to complex machinery and nearly crashed them twice before he made her go back to the simulator. She didn't do any better in there. She now holds the record for failed simulated flights and it was unlikely to be broken anytime soon. Rogue decided to drive her to the church.
Logan hit the roof when he found out about their plans. He hadn't told her that the Hellfire Club had made two attempts to grab her, the last one only two weeks ago. Charles had asked him not to tell Carolyn but upgrade the security systems in and around the mansion. He wasn't happy. He felt she should be told so she would keep her guard up. Charles argued that she would return to the humorless woman she became after her rating test. Logan reluctantly agreed not to say anything unless he had to.
With her demands to go to church, he had to tell her. She took the news with a shrug saying she figured they had started. Charles may be a powerful telepath but he couldn't lie for beans. His face gave him away every time.
"Now that the attacks have started, Logan, you have to stay near me. You made me a promise," she reminded him.
And that's how he and Remy ended up spending a perfectly good Friday in church.
Fr. Ryan was a rotund man in his late fifty's with a full beard and a bald head. He had a lilting Irish brogue that Carolyn found charming. Rogue liked him. Logan was watching him for clues that he would attack. Remy found that he felt more uncomfortable with Fr. Ryan than he did with Carolyn.
"Kurt told me you wished to come to Mass," Fr. Ryan said to her. "You haven't been able to find a church in Salem Center that meets your needs."
They were sitting in the back of the empty sanctuary, talking. The church was beautiful. Built in the 18th century out of native stone, it had stained glass windows high on the walls, letting in dappled sunlight. The light reflected off the water in the baptismal font, throwing glittering rainbows across the high ceilings The pews were hard wood, dark with age and use. Logan could still smell the pitch used in the torches that lit the church before electricity was installed. The scent of expensive Frankincense and beeswax hung heavily in the air. He wrinkled his nose at the cloying scent.
"You might be more comfortable outside Logan," Carolyn told him. "We are just past Easter and the incense burned during the Triduum, the three days before Easter, can be overpowering. I don't smell it now but I'm sure you can."
"I'll live," he growled. He wasn't about to let her out of his sight.
"Remy'll go," Gambit jumped from his seat and tried to leave.
"Siddown, Gumbo," Logan barked. "Ya got some place more private Father. Too many doors here."
"Of course," he said and he led them to a small house behind the church.
"This is what we use as the rectory," he told them. "The parish is too poor to afford a full time housekeeper for me so one of the parish wives comes in once a week to clean. Now," he said a he lowered himself into a large, overstuffed chair, "what can I do for you?"
"Carolyn and I have been praying every night," Rogue spoke up first. "I've been curious 'bout why ya do what you do. I have faith in God and the prayers are comforting but why do ya say them? Why do ya baptize babies? How do ya take adults inta the church?"
"Essentially 'why do we do the things we do?'" he paraphrased.
"Yeah."
"We have a two thousand year history," he told her. "The answered to your questions are long and very involved. Let me ask you one. Have you been baptized?"
"My parents were Baptists," she said. "They threw me out when my powers manifested and I hadn't been baptized yet."
"So your soul still hold the Original sin," he remarked. "Christ has said that you cannot enter His Kingdom if your soul has the stain of sin on it. Baptism removes that sin. There is no other way to remove it."
"What sin is that?" Logan asked.
"Adam and Eve's sin against God in the Garden of Eden. You aren't Christian," Fr Ryan remarked.
"How'd ya guess?"
"Christians know the Original sin. Mankind has been paying for it forever. Baptism frees us from that sin. And you Carolyn," he turned to her. "What do you want from me?"
"Reconciliation and Eucharist," she told him.
"The official view of the Church is that mutants can't receive the sacraments. I am of the opinion that all Catholics in good standing have the right to receive any sacrament they are ready for."
"Thank you Father," she smiled.
"And you Remy," he turned to the nervous Cajun. "What can I do for you?"
"Gambit don' need nothin'," he said, a sour look on his face. "Gambit here ta watch over the femmes."
Fr. Ryan cocked his head and looked into Remy's red on black eyes. Gambit quickly looked away.
"Walk with me," Ryan ordered.
"But.."
"Go with him Gumbo, I'll watch the ladies."
Remy sighed in defeat and followed the black suited figure out the door.
"You were brought up Catholic weren't you?" Fr. Ryan asked.
"Oui," Remy said, his head bowed.
"Why do I make you so uncomfortable?
"Remy hasn't been ta church for a long time. Too many sins ta confess. Done too many things for God to forgive."
"We're all sinners Remy. As long as we're sorry for what we've done, God will take us back."
"Remy not sorry for what he did. I did what I had to do to survive and I'd do 'em again."
"All of them?"
"I've killed, Pere. I didn' wan' to, but I did. I was a t'ief. I lie n' cheat. I lust after many women but love one I can' touch. The only t'ing I regret is the killin'. The rest is part of who I am. I loss' myself long time ago. I can' be saved now."
"The Jews thought the same of Simon Peter. He became the Father of our church. No one is irredeemable."
"Mebe I am," he whispered. He turned and walked back toward the house.
"Is that why you won't look at Carolyn? Does her salvation make you uncomfortable?"
Remy froze in his tracks. Slowly, he turned back to him.
"She was t'rown outta her convent," Remy said. "A nun told ta leave by her convent is bad news. How bad was her sin that the other sisters wanted her out? Bad enough ta draw the devil? Bad enough ta damn us jus' by bein' wit her? How bad is bad?"
"Would you feel better after she does her penance and is absolved?"
"I dunno," he said truthfully.
"Have you talked to her?" Remy shook his head. "How can you live in the same house with her and not speak to her?" Kevin shook his head in disgust. "Talk to her. She may give you the truth. If she was a nun, she probably will."
"I'll t'ink about it," Remy promised.
They returned to the house and for the first time, Remy looked Carolyn in the eyes. His expression was flat, not giving anything away but Logan's training helped her to see that he was willing to give her a chance. The ice was beginning to thaw.
Against Logan's wishes, Fr. Ryan took Carolyn to a small spare room to hear her confession.
"Go outside Logan," she told him. "Confession is private and your ears are too sharp. Remy and Rogue will keep me safe."
He did what she asked but he didn't like it. He lit a cigar and prowled outside the house, waiting for her to come out and get him. She was in there for over an hour.
"How many sins can a celibate former nun have?" he grumbled to himself.
Finally, she came out and called him.
"What did ya say ta him?" he growled in her ear.
"That's between me, Fr. Kevin and God," she told him. "I didn't tell him about the X-Men if that's what you're worried about. He would be in danger if he knew."
"Rogue," Fr. Kevin was saying as they entered the house, "there aren't enough adult catechumenates in this parish to hold classes so I've asked Carolyn to teach you. If, after a year, you are still interested, I will baptize you. It will need to be after midnight on Easter morning. I can't baptize you during the Easter vigil as dictated by the church because you're a mutant but I promise you, I will baptize you, if that is what you want. Think about it and pray for guidance from Christ. He will let you know what you should do. I will see all of you on Sunday for Mass."
He escorted them to their car and waved as the drove away. None of them saw the woman across the street who watched them leave, her face thunderous.
