Beyond Redemption

By: B'Danya

Disclaimer: Quite obviously, I do not own Mutant X. If I did I would a) have more money, my own apartment, yada, yada, yada, and b) not have to write this fanfiction as I could have made it into an episode… or extra season… hmmm… Anyways, this is my first Mutant X fic; please review (constructive criticism would be appreciated!)

Chapter One – The Mysterious Woman

Something had been bothering Emma all week. She couldn't quite put her finger on it but Adam had seemed distant somehow. Not his usual distance – he had always held back with divulging his feelings – but somehow detached from the world around him. Oh, she knew he had many secrets, but other than that she knew only what he told her. As a psionic, though, she found it refreshing. Most people's emotions were broadcast without them ever realizing it so having a person she wasn't painfully aware of whenever he was around was a godsend.

Emma DeLauro was the resident psionic of Mutant X, a group put together by Adam Kane to protect New Mutants from the GSA. She had three other partners in crime: Shalimar Fox, a feline feral; Brennan Mulwray, an elemental who could throw bolts of electricity; and Jesse Kilmartin, a molecular who could alter his body's mass. As for Emma herself, she was a telempath: she could sense other's emotions and project her own to others.

Operating under the radar of legitimate law enforcement agencies, they lived away from the rest of the world. Sanctuary was a nice place, but they had to get out and party once in a while. 'Well, most of us, anyway,' Emma reminded herself. Adam never completely let his guard down, particularly around her. For some reason he raised his guard whenever he was near a psionic. She knew he had secrets, but what did he need to hide so badly that he practically lived expecting someone to hack into his brain?

The group made it a point of going to clubs once in a while to keep in touch with so-called 'normal' society. Most the time she enjoyed these outings, but today was different. She had been in the ladies room for half an hour nursing the mother of all migraines. She had been getting them whenever she was near Adam in the last week; it was like he was trying to keep her out.

"Emma, are you okay?" Shalimar called from outside the stall door. "You've been gone a long time, we're worried."

Rubbing her temples and opening the door, she managed to throw a weak smile at the feral. "I'm fine Shalimar. Just another one of my headaches, she replied.

Shalimar sighed. "You've been getting a lot of them recently. Have you told Adam?" Emma shook her head. "You should tell him. He might be able to help," she suggested, throwing a protective arm around the psionic's waist. They both knew that the migraines were an unfortunate side effect of Emma's telempathic abilities.

"He's got a lot on his mind right know," Emma explained. Shalimar suspected that there was more to it than Emma let on, but decided not to pry. There was a peculiar unspoken arrangement between the two, and she was content to let the two of them deal with their problems.

"I know, it's one of those things," Shalimar noted with a shake of the head. They had a long talk a while back about things that were beyond explanation. She smiled down at the younger woman. "Let's round up the boys and call it a night," she suggested. Emma nodded and rested her aching head against Shalimar's shoulder as they headed off to find the others.

Meanwhile, Brennan, Jesse, and Adam were waiting for the two female members of their team. "Emma's been gone a long time, Adam. Is everything okay with her?" Brennan asked.

"She hasn't mentioned anything to me, but it's almost like she's been avoiding me," Adam replied. He had noticed that whenever Emma distanced herself from the group she was usually having troubles controlling aspects of her abilities; keeping that in mind, he decided to ask her tomorrow if she was having problems.

They fell into a pensive silence, until Jesse nudged Brennan and pointed. "Check her out," he declared. Brennan looked and noticed a very attractive redhead headed directly towards them. Adam took no notice, lost in his own thoughts. With a grin he challenged, "I bet you ten dollars she wants to talk to me."

Brennan arrogantly raised an eyebrow. "I'll take that bet," he replied smoothly. "She obviously wants a man of worldly experience, not a spoiled kid," he taunted lightly.

The woman stopped directly in front of the three men. "Hello, Adam," she said coolly. Adam snapped out of his thoughts at the sound of the silky voice. "It has been far too long," she added, extending her hand. Shocked, he extended his, which she promptly took into her own and staring him in the eyes.

Jesse and Brennan watched first with confusion, and then with shock, as they watched the exchange. Before either of them had a chance to react, Adam's eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed, unconscious, to the floor. As they rushed to help Adam, the mysterious redhead had vanished into the crowd. "Brennan, stay with him!" Jesse shouted as he rushed into the crowd to find the woman. As hard as he looked, he couldn't find her in the crowd. He ran out the main doors, hoping she had run directly out of the club, but he didn't see any trace of her. "Damn!" he yelled, frustrated at her escape. There was nothing he could do now but go back to where he left Brennan to tend to Adam.

As Shalimar and Emma made their way through the crowd towards where Shalimar had left everyone, Emma gasped in pain and sagged heavily against her friend's shoulder. Stopping, she supported Emma's weight. "What's wrong?"

Her head swimming in pain, she managed to groan "Adam… Something's wrong…" She managed take a few deep breaths and continued, "He's hurt, really bad." Without another word, they hurried towards where a large crowd was gathering.

Pushing through, they found Brennan kneeling next to Adam. Brennan's coat was under Adam's head and was arguing with a security guard. "No, he didn't take anything! One minute he was fine, and the next he just collapsed. This has happened before," Brennan growled.

Every member of Mutant X knew that it would cause major problems if Adam's identity was discovered. They were all prepared to ensure that wouldn't happen. Emma could tell the guard wasn't buying the story, and decided to take matters into her own hands. "Sir, he's diabetic. It's probably just low blood sugar," she explained with a disarming smile and a slight telepathic nudge, encouraging him to trust her. 'I just hope no one gives it away,' she noted mentally.

After a tense moment, the security guard nodded. "Just make sure he gets home safe," he admonished her. She nodded, and he turned to the crowd and yelled "Back off people, this isn't a freak show! Nothing to see here!" With those words, the crowd slowly dispersed.

Brennan carefully picked up Adam and carried him to the car. They caught Jesse on his way back into the club. After getting everyone seated, Brennan peeled out of the parking lot, in a rush to get Adam back to Sanctuary. Shalimar and Jesse quickly admonished him for it: they didn't know if Adam was in any condition to be jostled.

They drove for what felt like an eternity without a word. Brennan was the first to break the silence. "Jesus, she only took his hand for a second! What the hell did she do to him?" he shouted.

"He knew her, Brennan. That was the weird thing… he didn't seem to believe what he was seeing," Jesse noted. "He looked like he had seen a ghost." For the tenth time, he checked Adam's pulse. It was weak, but racing.

"Would someone care to explain what the hell happened?" Shalimar growled, her eyes flashing bright yellow in the dark. She loved Adam like a father; her feral instincts were always triggered when he was in danger. 'No one harms my pack mates and gets away with it!' she thought to herself after Jesse explained what had happened.

Emma sat in the passenger seat, cringing from the emotions being thrown around the car. "Shut up, all of you!" she snapped as her own emotional control disappeared. This was a psionic migraine of new heights and she began to sob in pain.

Everyone was shocked at Emma's tears, but soon realized the problem: they had all been focusing so hard on their own emotions that they forgot she could feel everyone's, not just her own. "Sorry Em," Shalimar said softly, forcibly controlling her feral side. "There's some Advil in the glove compartment for your headache," she added.

"Thanks," she replied, quickly taking two. Breathing deeply, she ignored the migraine and stretched out towards Adam. "He's still there, but I can't reach him. It's almost like… like… I can't describe it!" she groaned, angry at herself for not being able to explain what she felt.

"Emma, you've got to try harder. Adam's life might depend on it," Brennan said, an edge of fear in his voice.

"Don't you think I know that?" she snapped. "I've never felt anything like it," she said, a little calmer. She paused, unsure of how to convey the feeling to her team-mates. "I mean, Adam's hard to read on a good day. This is different. It's like he's trapped… I can see him, but it's like… like a peep hole," she told them. "I can see him, but not his surroundings. He's scared and hurt… but I can't tell you much more than that," she finished, drawing her mind away from Adam's and slumping exhaustedly into her seat.

Even though Brennan had wanted to go faster, they still made it back to Sanctuary in record time. Jesse and Brennan carefully carried Adam into the medical bay and laid him down on the bed, while Shalimar and an exhausted Emma followed. Jesse ran scans of Adam, and shook his head. "This makes no sense! There's nothing physically wrong with him," he sighed. "But look at the brain wave patterns, they're completely abnormal."

Emma looked up at the readings for a moment, then at him with no surprise on her face. "He was probably attacked by a psionic." They all eyed her with disbelief, wondering how she came up with that idea. "No one but a psionic could have caused the damage I saw in there. Take a close look at the scans: his brain function is that of a coma patient," she explained. Adam had once made her study brain wave scans, telling her it would be important sometime. "It would be a simple matter to induce one, but whoever is doing this would be stuck in a trance state to maintain it," she guessed.

"Can you find out who did it?" Jesse asked "Like tracing a hacker?"

Emma rubbed her temples. "It's really different than that, but I'll try…" she answered. She was tired, but this was important. She brushed Adam's mind with her own, and began looking for the minute traces of telepathic contact. 'There, right at the back of his mind… What is that?' she asked herself. Stretching her abilities to their limits, she tried to identify it. Just before she could, she was dragged back into her body. She looked around, confused. For some inexplicable reason, she was now in a chair, with her friends surrounding her. "What happened?" she asked, coming slowly to her senses.

"Here," Brennan said, sounding worried. Looking down at his hand, she saw a tissue. At her questioning look he added, "For your nose."

She touched her hand to her nose and noticed it was bleeding. "Thanks," she said, taking it and pinching her nose with it to stop the bleeding. "How long was I gone?" she asked them.

"Two hours," Jesse replied. "It was really creepy, Emma. You opened your eyes and they were darting around in your head, then you were mumbling incoherently. What the hell were you doing in his head for two hours?"

Emma looked at them in shock. "It felt like only a couple of minutes," she explained. Her trance states usually left her a bit shaky, but this one made her want to collapse. "There's something there, I just can't reach it!" she lamented.

"Get some sleep, Emma," Shalimar said reassuringly, pressing a cold glass of water into her hand. "It'll help. I'll stay up with Adam, and I'll let you know if there's any change," she told everyone.

"If you get tired I'll relieve you," Jesse told her. "Come on Emma, let's get you to bed," he told her. She nodded and stood up on shaky legs. Another awkward silence fell upon the group as three of them headed to bed and Shalimar pulled a chair up next to her mentor and settled in for a long night.