"Is my hair fine? Do I shine?"
"You're perfect. We can go... And action!"
"Today, we have witnessed the worse of mutant kind. Around three o'clock this afternoon in the centre mall of Bayville, a shop-keeper, Mrs Gladis Grandshaw was violently attacked by a young mutant..."
***
Logan scratched his chin, looking at the tv screen.
"Yes, it was horrible." The image of a disgruntle Mrs Grandshaw appeared. "She started spitting acid at me, yelling in a southern slang. We have enough juvenile delinquency as it is, but mutant delinquency! I dread what would have happened if I hadn't called the authorities. She had some kind skunk hair, brown and white. She shoplifted a 50 dollars top..."
"She's spittin' lies!" Rogue yelled in anger at the screen. "Ah would have gotten mah way if..."
"It's true, Mr Logan! It only, like, cost 5 dollars!"
"Miss came an' told us t' clea'r off!
"Becoze we ar mutants!"
"De femme's mental! Had t' clean up her pants in de first place!" Remy added in Rogue's head. Of course, the others didn't hear him.
Logan grunted. "It's not the point, Half Pint!" he bellowed. "Stripes!" he said turning to Rogue, looking very discontent. "Why didn't ya just knock the woman out?"
"Mr Logan!" Jean cried out. "The woman was confused, it happens..."
"Jean! 'BE' lucid!" Scott told his girlfriend rather, euh... un- gentlemanly. "The woman was nuts!"
"Yeah, it happens t' call the friends o' humanity fo' party cleansin'!" Rogue blurted out.
Meanwhile, the news was playing their screenshots of a teenager with two toned hair, fighting a giant robot...
***
It had been a peaceful day in the urban part of Bayville. As usual, cars would go about the streets; a couple of traffic jams, horn blowing at the delivery vans that stopped in the middle of the small streets... Normal.
***
"People would go to work. Work meaning means of money, and in some way, survival. It could be honourable, clandestine, just or unjust, people had kids to feed, interest to develop. Yes, it was survival; the brutal survival of animals evolved into something... more complicated, to match human standards.
"Needs make humans adapt. They first stood up on two legs, then grew taller, lost most of their fur coat: it was physical adaptation. They made weapons and means to protect themselves, cook food, make their lives more comfortable with new tactics and manipulation of their pairs: mental adaptation.
"The 20th century. Humans have again managed to adapt themselves to their time. Relations becoming more complicated, accumulation of stress and diverse emotions: to protect themselves better, from each other in the first place. And like before, they evolved this time into what we familiarly call 'mutants'. It's always about survival."
***
In the public parking of the mall in Bayville, there was a good example of what this mutation was about.
Rogue ducked behind a car as the Sentinel fired a shot of plasma. The green glue struck the near by car, turning it over with it's intensity. The automobile crashed against the van it had been parked next to, making a security alarm go off.
"Rogue! Let me take youz back!" Kurt called over the racket.
Rogue didn't listen to him.
"Gambit, show meh what ya can do," she told her Remy psyche.
The metallic surface of the car's bonnet started to glow pink under Rogue's touch. The Goth jerked her hand away, running to safer cover as the car was ripped apart by the explosion.
"Dat's enough fo' chere?" Remy asked.
"Fahne with meh..."
To protect, to survive.
***
"Stripes, ya still got some explaining to do, where did this power of yours come from?"
Rogue shied away. It was going to be complicated to explain, when she didn't even know herself.
"Just tell Wolvie dat ya absorbed someone on ya way back," Remy instructed.
"Ah absorbed someon' not long ago..." Rogue complied.
"Ya just had t'o kiss Remy..."
"Ah just.... No! Ah got in a fight with an Acolyte," Rogue quickly corrected. "Ya soo dead, Swamp Rat," she added in her mind.
She could hear Remy chucked. "Ya wound Remy, chere."
Logan sceptically lifted an eyebrow. "Is that so? How much? Ya got quite a hand on the power."
***
"Like hands, you learn to use them, perfecting your control. Mutant powers are like hands, a part of the body. You can be deafened, blinded; it's the same with powers. You can put a blindfold to stop you from seeing, earplugs to stop listening. Of course, we haven't discovered how to 'blind' the powers yet..."
***
Rogue had managed to get at the Sentinel's feet and was busy charging two cars at the same time, crouched between them, her arms extended again each of it's doors. Hopefully it would make the statuesque robot fall over. Rogue retried back just in time, getting missed by another ball of plasma and torn apart by her own booby trap. The sentinel's foot crunched one of the charged cars and made it blow up. It was a mixture of chemical fog, flames licking the Sentinel's leg and the acrid smell o burnt. Th whole lot enflamed the near- by cars, it's fuel tanks exploding.
It's foot was disintegrated, making it dangerously sway on it's last leg. However, such a ball of concentrated high tech couldn't be destroyed so easily.
It feel to it's knees, or more lightly to it's 'joints'.
Kitty and Kurt ha disappeared from view for some time now. Rogue didn't worry too much for them, they could easily go threw or disappear from any attack.
"Mutant detection... course of action required..." the robot voice rang out over the parking.
Rogue crouched behind a expensive porch, breathing heavily. The pain in her shoulders and legs from the activity of the previous day were now making her suffer. She rolled her shoulder around. She shouldn't have worked out so much.
The sentinel wasn't too smart. It would just shoot it's green balls, too slow to get Rogue, that was for sure. It thought it was dealing with some normal mutant. Not too normal as we will discover.
"Chere, put ya finger t' the car's lock," Remy ordered.
Rogue pressed her index against the key's hole. There was a slight fuzz before it was illuminated with a soft glow: it fell away with the small kinetic charge.
"Try an' opening it, chere." Remy psyche materialised next to her, he was grinning. "Know how t' drive?"
"Nope," Rogue answered. "Ya think the guy that owns the porch mind if ah take it fo' a spin?" she asked him.
"Remy's sure he wouldn't mind."
Rogue swiftly opened the door and jumped in the driver's seat. The inside was made of leather and shiny wood. Rogue couldn't help regretting that she would soon turn the thing into a living torch. Rogue repeated the gesture, putting her finger against the ignition, starting the car with another charge. Gambit sat in the other seat.
"Ready fo' ya first lesson?" Remy asked rather good-naturally, but his usual smirk quickly took it's place back on his charming face.
***
"A Sentinel, kind of police squad for mutants, came straight away after the desperate call of Mrs Grandshaw to neutralise the hysteric mutant..."
"Hysteric!" Rogue yelled at the TV. "Ah'll give ya hysteric!"
Kitty pulled Rogue by a gloved arm, restrained her friend from destroying the TV set.
All the X-men, Jamie, the new recruit included had their eyes strained on the news. They had quieted down after have seen Rogue destroy one of the Sentinel's legs.
A shot on a porch zooming between parked cars was retransmitted. It's tires screeched and fumed as it took a sharp turn, heading directly towards the Sentinel which was on it's knees from Rogue's last attack. The shiny racing car suddenly lighted up completely in a bright pink glow. A figure jumped out just before it collided with the robot's chest. The scene was hidden for an instant by roaring flames. It finally cleared away to reveal the Sentinel, or what was left from it, a gaping whole where it's chest was meant to be.
The destroyed Sentinel was cut to the serious face of the blond reporter.
"It was unfortunately not enough, submerged after twenty minutes by only one mutant. Authorities say themselves disgruntled and put the blame on human error. Mr Grulge from the technological department of RR1 explains this defeat..."
The scowling face of a man in his forties appeared, replacing the reporter. A microphone was thrust before his face.
"The mutant was considered as minor threat, therefore our 'Sentinel' as people like to call it, was programmed to just..."
"That's enough," declared Logan turning the TV off. There were some of protests but they were shooed away, leaving Kurt, Kitty and Rogue alone with Logan.
He looked at each in the eye, trying to discern their emotions. Kitty was ashamed, Kurt didn't feel comfortable, while Rogue stared at him squarely in the eyes. Her green ones showed everything except shame and discomfort.
"If ah had t' do it again, Ah would," she declared.
"I know, Stripes," Logan cut her off before she could add anything. "And I wouldn't have stopped ya, Kid"
"Mein sister could have got killed!" Kurt protested, concerned with Rogue's safety.
"Yes, or worse," Logan agreed nodding. "This might be against Chuck's beliefs, but ya couldn't leave like some frightened mutants."
Kitty bit her lip. "Is this only the start?" she asked worriedly, her blue eyes rimmed with tears.
"Probably." The truth was hard, but Logan had to say it. It made him sad to see Kitty look this way. "Ya can leave now."
All three teen-agers got up and started exiting the room quietly.
"Except ya, Stripes. Got a few words fo ya."
Rogue sat back down, crossing her arms over her chest with a disgruntled expression. Rogue was sure that a nice little 'lecture' was going to come next on how she should act...
"I'm proud of ya, Kid."
Rogue looked up in amazement. Logan looked sincere enough, his dark eyes shining with emotions, a small smile on his face. Rogue had never seen him this way, so human...
"I don't care what ya're hiding. But what ya did this afternoon, Stripes, defending ya pride like that. I respect." He acknowledged his words with a soft nod. "Just be careful..."
"Course, Wolvie," Rogue told him with a relieved smile.
She was about to leave again, getting up, when Logan un-expectantly grabbed Rogue in a bear hug. She could hardly breathe in his big arms. Rogue tentatively put her arms around him in a friendly manner.
"Don't call me Wolvie," he grunted by her ear. He pulled away, letting Rogue finally leave. "By the way, ya're on the team again!" he called after her.
"Great!" Logan heard her yell from afar.
***
"Survival, protection. These two words go together. Mutants have developed a quite original ways to do so. Three are three categories of 'powers': mental, physical, or simply work on reflex.
"Let me explain myself: some develop a new way of communication, perception of mental waves. These waves can also be magnetic, or made by heat. Feeling them, understanding them, the brain manages to reproduce them, like speech in some ways. This generally comes from the development of the brain.
"The second, physical, is the development of the general body. Some take the traits that could seem animalised. However, you must remember that we all have about the same genes as animals, but more numbered, assembled differently in a more complex way. One's heart can be bigger; it's the same idea. One can have better view, smell, body mass. Create a protective skin...
"The third, strangely resembles reflexes. If some dust is stuck in your eye, it waters. This category of mutants, for example, could get shot, creating a chain reaction in the body to accelerate the healing process. It is tightly combined with the physical mutation, and most mutants posses it. It can go from 'six sense' to a more simple 'poisoned skin when in threat'. Like all reflexes, you can't control them.
"I believe that there is a fourth category which combines all three genres. Mental, physical and reflex. I have heard of a mutant, once, who had empathic ability, could metamorphose his body, and under reflex in critic state where he would feel threatened, manage to simply make his adversary weaken.
"And, of course, when we talk about protection, it's to give a better chance to survival.
"And to finish this speech, I wish to put a word in about the discrimination of these new species that plagues our daily life. Instead of integrating these mutants who have created a new way of adapting to their environment, they are cast out, losing the precious aid they could give us. Mutants are what we will become. Humans will be soon left to the past. So lets look ahead, together."
Hank McCoy finished his speech at stepped down from the platform. There was an unsure applause in the amphitheatre. The doctor adjusted his glasses upon his nose, hidden behind an image inducer.
It was a long way for them to see the urgent reality of things.
***
So? What do you think?
Popped up a complicated chapter... Trying to explain what Hank is doing meanwhile in his spare time, trying to explain what 'mutant' means to me. Complicated... Just tell me if you actually got something out! (looking worriedly... )
And sorry, yumiko, no explaining yet. But promise promise in next chapter. Next chapter with Remy, real.. Must understand how Rogue gets confused by the two...
ChaosCat: The sentinel was pretty lousy here, they weren't expected such a powerful attack from Rogue.
Ishandallf: Did Rogue kick enough butt?
Sarah-Crysala: Same here! (ducking under table waiting for the rotten bananas to fall...) Yeah, tried to make some more action here. But it's always a bit short...
I'm a Angry Gumball: (original name!!!) is this update soon enough? About 24 four hours between.
Well! Hasta LA Vista... (...baby.. sh...sh...sh..., any frenchies here who understand the joke and look at Canal +?)
"You're perfect. We can go... And action!"
"Today, we have witnessed the worse of mutant kind. Around three o'clock this afternoon in the centre mall of Bayville, a shop-keeper, Mrs Gladis Grandshaw was violently attacked by a young mutant..."
***
Logan scratched his chin, looking at the tv screen.
"Yes, it was horrible." The image of a disgruntle Mrs Grandshaw appeared. "She started spitting acid at me, yelling in a southern slang. We have enough juvenile delinquency as it is, but mutant delinquency! I dread what would have happened if I hadn't called the authorities. She had some kind skunk hair, brown and white. She shoplifted a 50 dollars top..."
"She's spittin' lies!" Rogue yelled in anger at the screen. "Ah would have gotten mah way if..."
"It's true, Mr Logan! It only, like, cost 5 dollars!"
"Miss came an' told us t' clea'r off!
"Becoze we ar mutants!"
"De femme's mental! Had t' clean up her pants in de first place!" Remy added in Rogue's head. Of course, the others didn't hear him.
Logan grunted. "It's not the point, Half Pint!" he bellowed. "Stripes!" he said turning to Rogue, looking very discontent. "Why didn't ya just knock the woman out?"
"Mr Logan!" Jean cried out. "The woman was confused, it happens..."
"Jean! 'BE' lucid!" Scott told his girlfriend rather, euh... un- gentlemanly. "The woman was nuts!"
"Yeah, it happens t' call the friends o' humanity fo' party cleansin'!" Rogue blurted out.
Meanwhile, the news was playing their screenshots of a teenager with two toned hair, fighting a giant robot...
***
It had been a peaceful day in the urban part of Bayville. As usual, cars would go about the streets; a couple of traffic jams, horn blowing at the delivery vans that stopped in the middle of the small streets... Normal.
***
"People would go to work. Work meaning means of money, and in some way, survival. It could be honourable, clandestine, just or unjust, people had kids to feed, interest to develop. Yes, it was survival; the brutal survival of animals evolved into something... more complicated, to match human standards.
"Needs make humans adapt. They first stood up on two legs, then grew taller, lost most of their fur coat: it was physical adaptation. They made weapons and means to protect themselves, cook food, make their lives more comfortable with new tactics and manipulation of their pairs: mental adaptation.
"The 20th century. Humans have again managed to adapt themselves to their time. Relations becoming more complicated, accumulation of stress and diverse emotions: to protect themselves better, from each other in the first place. And like before, they evolved this time into what we familiarly call 'mutants'. It's always about survival."
***
In the public parking of the mall in Bayville, there was a good example of what this mutation was about.
Rogue ducked behind a car as the Sentinel fired a shot of plasma. The green glue struck the near by car, turning it over with it's intensity. The automobile crashed against the van it had been parked next to, making a security alarm go off.
"Rogue! Let me take youz back!" Kurt called over the racket.
Rogue didn't listen to him.
"Gambit, show meh what ya can do," she told her Remy psyche.
The metallic surface of the car's bonnet started to glow pink under Rogue's touch. The Goth jerked her hand away, running to safer cover as the car was ripped apart by the explosion.
"Dat's enough fo' chere?" Remy asked.
"Fahne with meh..."
To protect, to survive.
***
"Stripes, ya still got some explaining to do, where did this power of yours come from?"
Rogue shied away. It was going to be complicated to explain, when she didn't even know herself.
"Just tell Wolvie dat ya absorbed someone on ya way back," Remy instructed.
"Ah absorbed someon' not long ago..." Rogue complied.
"Ya just had t'o kiss Remy..."
"Ah just.... No! Ah got in a fight with an Acolyte," Rogue quickly corrected. "Ya soo dead, Swamp Rat," she added in her mind.
She could hear Remy chucked. "Ya wound Remy, chere."
Logan sceptically lifted an eyebrow. "Is that so? How much? Ya got quite a hand on the power."
***
"Like hands, you learn to use them, perfecting your control. Mutant powers are like hands, a part of the body. You can be deafened, blinded; it's the same with powers. You can put a blindfold to stop you from seeing, earplugs to stop listening. Of course, we haven't discovered how to 'blind' the powers yet..."
***
Rogue had managed to get at the Sentinel's feet and was busy charging two cars at the same time, crouched between them, her arms extended again each of it's doors. Hopefully it would make the statuesque robot fall over. Rogue retried back just in time, getting missed by another ball of plasma and torn apart by her own booby trap. The sentinel's foot crunched one of the charged cars and made it blow up. It was a mixture of chemical fog, flames licking the Sentinel's leg and the acrid smell o burnt. Th whole lot enflamed the near- by cars, it's fuel tanks exploding.
It's foot was disintegrated, making it dangerously sway on it's last leg. However, such a ball of concentrated high tech couldn't be destroyed so easily.
It feel to it's knees, or more lightly to it's 'joints'.
Kitty and Kurt ha disappeared from view for some time now. Rogue didn't worry too much for them, they could easily go threw or disappear from any attack.
"Mutant detection... course of action required..." the robot voice rang out over the parking.
Rogue crouched behind a expensive porch, breathing heavily. The pain in her shoulders and legs from the activity of the previous day were now making her suffer. She rolled her shoulder around. She shouldn't have worked out so much.
The sentinel wasn't too smart. It would just shoot it's green balls, too slow to get Rogue, that was for sure. It thought it was dealing with some normal mutant. Not too normal as we will discover.
"Chere, put ya finger t' the car's lock," Remy ordered.
Rogue pressed her index against the key's hole. There was a slight fuzz before it was illuminated with a soft glow: it fell away with the small kinetic charge.
"Try an' opening it, chere." Remy psyche materialised next to her, he was grinning. "Know how t' drive?"
"Nope," Rogue answered. "Ya think the guy that owns the porch mind if ah take it fo' a spin?" she asked him.
"Remy's sure he wouldn't mind."
Rogue swiftly opened the door and jumped in the driver's seat. The inside was made of leather and shiny wood. Rogue couldn't help regretting that she would soon turn the thing into a living torch. Rogue repeated the gesture, putting her finger against the ignition, starting the car with another charge. Gambit sat in the other seat.
"Ready fo' ya first lesson?" Remy asked rather good-naturally, but his usual smirk quickly took it's place back on his charming face.
***
"A Sentinel, kind of police squad for mutants, came straight away after the desperate call of Mrs Grandshaw to neutralise the hysteric mutant..."
"Hysteric!" Rogue yelled at the TV. "Ah'll give ya hysteric!"
Kitty pulled Rogue by a gloved arm, restrained her friend from destroying the TV set.
All the X-men, Jamie, the new recruit included had their eyes strained on the news. They had quieted down after have seen Rogue destroy one of the Sentinel's legs.
A shot on a porch zooming between parked cars was retransmitted. It's tires screeched and fumed as it took a sharp turn, heading directly towards the Sentinel which was on it's knees from Rogue's last attack. The shiny racing car suddenly lighted up completely in a bright pink glow. A figure jumped out just before it collided with the robot's chest. The scene was hidden for an instant by roaring flames. It finally cleared away to reveal the Sentinel, or what was left from it, a gaping whole where it's chest was meant to be.
The destroyed Sentinel was cut to the serious face of the blond reporter.
"It was unfortunately not enough, submerged after twenty minutes by only one mutant. Authorities say themselves disgruntled and put the blame on human error. Mr Grulge from the technological department of RR1 explains this defeat..."
The scowling face of a man in his forties appeared, replacing the reporter. A microphone was thrust before his face.
"The mutant was considered as minor threat, therefore our 'Sentinel' as people like to call it, was programmed to just..."
"That's enough," declared Logan turning the TV off. There were some of protests but they were shooed away, leaving Kurt, Kitty and Rogue alone with Logan.
He looked at each in the eye, trying to discern their emotions. Kitty was ashamed, Kurt didn't feel comfortable, while Rogue stared at him squarely in the eyes. Her green ones showed everything except shame and discomfort.
"If ah had t' do it again, Ah would," she declared.
"I know, Stripes," Logan cut her off before she could add anything. "And I wouldn't have stopped ya, Kid"
"Mein sister could have got killed!" Kurt protested, concerned with Rogue's safety.
"Yes, or worse," Logan agreed nodding. "This might be against Chuck's beliefs, but ya couldn't leave like some frightened mutants."
Kitty bit her lip. "Is this only the start?" she asked worriedly, her blue eyes rimmed with tears.
"Probably." The truth was hard, but Logan had to say it. It made him sad to see Kitty look this way. "Ya can leave now."
All three teen-agers got up and started exiting the room quietly.
"Except ya, Stripes. Got a few words fo ya."
Rogue sat back down, crossing her arms over her chest with a disgruntled expression. Rogue was sure that a nice little 'lecture' was going to come next on how she should act...
"I'm proud of ya, Kid."
Rogue looked up in amazement. Logan looked sincere enough, his dark eyes shining with emotions, a small smile on his face. Rogue had never seen him this way, so human...
"I don't care what ya're hiding. But what ya did this afternoon, Stripes, defending ya pride like that. I respect." He acknowledged his words with a soft nod. "Just be careful..."
"Course, Wolvie," Rogue told him with a relieved smile.
She was about to leave again, getting up, when Logan un-expectantly grabbed Rogue in a bear hug. She could hardly breathe in his big arms. Rogue tentatively put her arms around him in a friendly manner.
"Don't call me Wolvie," he grunted by her ear. He pulled away, letting Rogue finally leave. "By the way, ya're on the team again!" he called after her.
"Great!" Logan heard her yell from afar.
***
"Survival, protection. These two words go together. Mutants have developed a quite original ways to do so. Three are three categories of 'powers': mental, physical, or simply work on reflex.
"Let me explain myself: some develop a new way of communication, perception of mental waves. These waves can also be magnetic, or made by heat. Feeling them, understanding them, the brain manages to reproduce them, like speech in some ways. This generally comes from the development of the brain.
"The second, physical, is the development of the general body. Some take the traits that could seem animalised. However, you must remember that we all have about the same genes as animals, but more numbered, assembled differently in a more complex way. One's heart can be bigger; it's the same idea. One can have better view, smell, body mass. Create a protective skin...
"The third, strangely resembles reflexes. If some dust is stuck in your eye, it waters. This category of mutants, for example, could get shot, creating a chain reaction in the body to accelerate the healing process. It is tightly combined with the physical mutation, and most mutants posses it. It can go from 'six sense' to a more simple 'poisoned skin when in threat'. Like all reflexes, you can't control them.
"I believe that there is a fourth category which combines all three genres. Mental, physical and reflex. I have heard of a mutant, once, who had empathic ability, could metamorphose his body, and under reflex in critic state where he would feel threatened, manage to simply make his adversary weaken.
"And, of course, when we talk about protection, it's to give a better chance to survival.
"And to finish this speech, I wish to put a word in about the discrimination of these new species that plagues our daily life. Instead of integrating these mutants who have created a new way of adapting to their environment, they are cast out, losing the precious aid they could give us. Mutants are what we will become. Humans will be soon left to the past. So lets look ahead, together."
Hank McCoy finished his speech at stepped down from the platform. There was an unsure applause in the amphitheatre. The doctor adjusted his glasses upon his nose, hidden behind an image inducer.
It was a long way for them to see the urgent reality of things.
***
So? What do you think?
Popped up a complicated chapter... Trying to explain what Hank is doing meanwhile in his spare time, trying to explain what 'mutant' means to me. Complicated... Just tell me if you actually got something out! (looking worriedly... )
And sorry, yumiko, no explaining yet. But promise promise in next chapter. Next chapter with Remy, real.. Must understand how Rogue gets confused by the two...
ChaosCat: The sentinel was pretty lousy here, they weren't expected such a powerful attack from Rogue.
Ishandallf: Did Rogue kick enough butt?
Sarah-Crysala: Same here! (ducking under table waiting for the rotten bananas to fall...) Yeah, tried to make some more action here. But it's always a bit short...
I'm a Angry Gumball: (original name!!!) is this update soon enough? About 24 four hours between.
Well! Hasta LA Vista... (...baby.. sh...sh...sh..., any frenchies here who understand the joke and look at Canal +?)