By: The Uncanny R-Man & Agent-G
Shout outs:
Winblades: Yeah actually we had an idea of them visiting Voyager, maybe we can throw in the Borg too. As for Nastier the Dark Circle, mainly cause they've been around for a long time and their reach goes through time, space and reality.
X-Over: The Dark Circle will make their own team to deal with the Exiles, a new Weapon X but I'm not telling who the members will be so don't ask, it's going to be a surprise.
Ruby631: Not likely, he'll still be dating Stripperella.
Red Witch: Glad you still like the rewrite.
Chapter 11: Exiles Day Off
-THE COMPLEX-
-Teleportation Room-
Guardian was in the teleportation room, without his coat and travel bag for today. He felt like taking it easy and he wasn't thinking of traveling so he left them in his room in one of the towers. Heather had asked him to meet her there and he had a good idea for what, in fact he was surprised it took so long for her to ask him. He heard the doors open and Heather walked in. She was in more normal attire, just plain pants, a shirt and a jacket.
"So I take it you want to visit home?" Guardian asked with a smile.
"Yeah, guess you'd figure I would ask sooner or later right?"
He nodded. "Of course luckily every person has their own unique quantum signature so finding your reality is easy enough, just step on up and grab a recall device and I'll send you there."
Heather smiled, she felt so good to go home and finally see her husband again, it was so long and she missed him so much, plus it would be great to see her old team Alpha Flight again too. She was wondering how much things had changed since she had been gone as she clipped a recall device to her belt.
Guardian punched in commands to the console and waited for it to engage but instead a beeping noise sounded. He got a confused look on his face and tried again, but nothing still happened. He ran a system analysis but it showed up fine, but there was still an error message he was getting.
"What's wrong?" Heather asked him. She felt her heart sudden drop as a feeling of dread came over her. At first he didn't say anything he just kept on working.
"I'm sorry Heather but...I don't understand why but the computer can't get a lock on your world...or any world that's similar to it for about ten MWMS." (Multiple World Measurement System, a way of measuring the distance of how other worlds are different from each other)
"I can establish a lock to other worlds out side the effected area but...I can't get a lock." He looked up at Heather. "I'm sorry but I can't get you home...not now at least." Seeing the tears starting to form on Heather's face he went over to her and gently placed his hands on her shoulders. "I promise you I'll look into this, only certain things can cause this and I should be able to get you home...it will just take some time."
"You mean it?" Heather nearly pleaded with him.
He nodded to her his face very serious. "Trust me, I will get you home. This I swear."
-Later that Day-
The Exiles were in the gym doing some training. They hadn't had any missions for the last few days so they took that time to relax and train. They had already given the training rooms a workout yesterday and Blink thought they should work on their bodies next.
Morph of course had a joke about this that won't be repeated. Morph was on a jogging machine with Jono next to him on another one. It took a few minutes and a little threatening of a few of the Exiles to get Morph to stop wearing the lime green spandex.
The two were basically trying to see who could do it the longest. Heather was at the bench, pressing some weights. Well actually it was a metallic bar that had gravity generators in it so it could simulate any weight like all the equipment had. She was in some black sweats and a matching tank top.
Blink was near her working on a machine for her upper body. She was in a green one piece with no sleeves and that went down her legs to her mid thigh, working up a sweat like the others.
August and Vincent were on a mat nearby sparing. August was in an all white ensemble that was sweat pants and tank top, while Vince had a full on Karate gi on. It was sleeveless and they saw a scar he had on his left arm, they hadn't seen before since he usually kept pretty covered up all the time.
When they asked he just said he got it as a kid and they left it at that. August went for punch to the face then followed with a kick at that moment. Vince blocked the punch with his right arm and then with his left deflected her kick back to the floor, then stepped inside for an elbow strike to her gut with his left arm.
She staggered back a few steps. "You alright?" Vince asked her.
"Yeah, nice counter I'll have to remember that one." She replied straightening up.
"Nice ink there August." Morph said to her from the treadmill. From his view he could see a pentagram tattoo just above her backside since her shirt only when above the navel.
"Thanks." August said back without taking her eyes on her opponent. For the past ten minutes they had been going at it and she only managed a few shots to get past him. What was really galling her was the smile he had on his face. "You mind telling me why you're smiling so much?"
"You have any idea how hard it is for me to have a decent sparring partner?" Vince said to her slowly moving in a circle around her with his guard up. "I mean Heather can give me a challenge in strength but that other form she has makes for sparring a little awkward."
August considered this. "Yeah I see your point." They continued to go at it until Vincent flipped her on her butt at one point. She glared at him as she got up and he still had on that damn smile. She resolved to wipe that off of his face.
Blink was watching them go at it and decided to take a breather. "Damn those two are really going at it." She commented to Heather next to her. Heather was just finishing up her last set and placed the bar back on the holder. Even though she knew if she dropped it, the safety devices in the bar would turn the gravity to the opposite and stop the bar if it fell too fast.
Heather sat up and wiped off the sweat from her forehead with a towel next to her looking at the two. "Yeah you're right."
Thump. "Damn it." August said in frustration.
"Yeah but I think August is losing her focus." Blink commented with a small smirk on her face.
Thump. "Son of a-"
"Gee what make you say that?" Heather said slightly amused.
Thump "#&!"
Blink and Heather chuckled at her language. August was really starting to get pissed at this point. She was getting tire of landing on her butt, and if she didn't know any better she swore he was doing it on purpose.
She calmed down and decided to try something else. She got ready and charged in then as Vince threw out a punch she immediately turned her entire body to the left. Vincent tried to get his right arm out in time but she deflected it with her left and got in close enough to grab his gi with her right.
August shifted all her weight back until she was landing on the mat and used her foot to propel him back. She still had a hold on his top and it ripped right off in her hands, unable to take the strain.
She heard him hit the mat and quickly got up. "Ha! Got you, you-gasp!" Her hand went to her mouth as she saw him getting up without a top on. His back was to her and she and everyone else now could see the many scars on his frame. His back had one huge one across it and there were many little ones too and one on his right ribs.
Vincent kept his head down. He hated this part when people found out, they would ask questions he hated getting into. He hated them because they forced him to remember how he got them, and for someone with a photographic memory that wasn't a pleasant thing. He just slowly got up and started walking off, not looking at the others.
"Vincent I'm sorry I didn't know." August said to his retreating form. The other Exiles looked on stopping what they were doing. August made to go after him but Blink held her arm.
"Let him go." She said to her. "I'll find him later and have a talk with him." She said in her leader voice. August nodded.
Blink took the time to change and started looking around. She ported to his room, the library, the training rooms and the garden but so far she couldn't find him. She was walking the halls trying to figure out where he was, but the problem with the Complex was that it was so large anyone could get privacy here.
An idea hit her. "Alfred." She commanded and the green hologram showed up. "Can you tell me where Vincent is?"
"I am afraid he requested privacy." He stated in the cultured British accent of his.
"Alfred this is important I need to know where he is." Blink said seriously.
"As leader of the Exiles you have been given high enough clearance to override such commands." Alfred told her.
"Then do it." She told him. "Tell me where he is."
"He's in the lookout." Alfred told her. Blink knew that the lookout was one of four towers at the complex. The North tower was the Keep. A place that Guardian used to hold certain items that could be dangerous and his Nexus Room, his personal quarters, a personal library and other things too. The Exiles didn't have access to the lower levels of that tower since all the sensitive material was in it and they were fine with that, if that level was locked in such a secure place it most likely wasn't wise to go in there.
The south tower was basically an observatory. The east was where the all the storage rooms and teleporter was. The last one the west tower was called the lookout. It was basically what it sounded like. The top was opened up to the air and had the best view of the complex. As she stepped out of the portal she saw him there in new clothing leaning forward against the railings looking into the distance. "I was wondering how long it would take for someone to find me." He said sadly.
"Vince, you didn't have to leave like that, we would have understood." She said caringly walking up to him. She noticed in his hands a rosary.
He sighed. "I know, but...I hate the looks of pity...all my life when people see my scars they always give me that look of pity...I hate it. That...and the memories that get brought up that I like to forget, but since I can't thanks to this stupid photographic memory...the best I can do is just push it far away."
She placed a hand on his shoulder. "Vince...what happened to you?" He turned his head to face her and she saw in his eyes the look of deep pain and sorrow. He always seemed so strong to her, so confident but there was none of that here. She realized this was a side of himself he kept hidden to the world.
This was the hurt and painful side of his being. He started to tell her his life story, how at three years of age he was taken, his mother killed in front of his eyes by men in black combat suits, they shot her right in front of his eyes when he was just three years old. How he and eleven other children were experimented on, they were trained in barbaric fashion, drugged up, and even beaten. How he escaped that place when it was under attack, how there was a hole he had jumped through to his death, not wanting to be 'saved' by the scientist. He fell to what he thought was his death into a river, but the experiments had activated his powers early and he had survived the fall. He told her how he spent a whole year on the streets completely alone in the world until he found his way to Toronto and Father Michaels the priest in charge of the orphanage had given him a home when he was seven years old.
At the end he had a few tears falling and she too couldn't help to either.
"I know what Hell is Clarice." He told the girl looking into the distance. "It's where you have no hope. Where there is light everywhere yet nothing but darkness surrounds you. Instead of a lake of fire, there's nothing but cold metal and stale air. Where demons wear the faces of humans in lab coats and hide behind the titles of doctors."
"It's a place where you are totally alone in the world, you have nothing, you are nothing. And there's nothing but a great emptiness in you that never fills. And your days are filled with only pain, suffering and despair." He put his head down and shut his eyes. "It's a place where innocence is stolen, and you aren't even treated like you're a living being."
"I lived for three years in a hell on Earth, my childhood stolen from me, my identity taken, my life and whatever I could have been was destroyed. I was nothing, had nothing, and no one cared."
She placed a hand on his. "I know what that's like too." He looked into her eyes and even though they were pure green he could tell she did know. "When I was growing up on my world, my town was attacked by Apocalypse's forces led by Sinister. He put my family in one of those god awful camps...I never saw them again and I'm pretty sure they died in that place." She wiped away a tear; she barely even could remember their faces anymore. She crossed her arms hugging herself thinking back to her childhood years.
"Then I was taken to one of Sinister's experiment camps. A place where he like to experiment on kids...I was one of them. For years I was in a cell as he did things to me...to other kids. It wasn't until Mr. Creed saved me from that place and raised me like a father."
Vincent placed his hand on her shoulder. "Kind of ironic...here we both are bot similar pasts, our worlds gone...it's strange, almost makes a person believe in fate."
"You don't believe in fate?"
Vincent got a grin look on his face. "No...I refuse to believe that kind of stuff happens for a reason, there was no reason behind that, and I can't believe it was all planned out...if it was then everything I was taught to believe about God by the priest that raised me would be put into question...that...and I don't like the idea of our lives being controlled."
Blink thought about how Timebroker had done that to her and her friends. "Yeah...I can see your point. But things got better, they are better now aren't they?" She asked him.
He got a small smile on his face. "Yeah, things are better now." They both looked over the view just standing there and enjoying the peace and quiet. They both felt a type of peace that for years they both had searched for.
"I like this place." Blink said quietly.
Vincent nodded. "So do I...It's one of the few places where I can find a sense of peace. If you want...I can show you a few more places you might like that I found."
Blink looked at him and smiled. "I'd like that."
IN THE GARDENAugust was in the garden of the complex, it was a huge area in the center of the building with many plants from all over the multi-verse, some that were the last of their kind in their respected realities, as well as a Japanese rock garden, a small hedge maze and a small temple for meditation. In one area of the garden there was an open circular area where people could eat, drink or whatever at the tables and chairs there. An order-bot was there, which was a spherical shaped robot that would take order and would bring them back on a tray connected to the bottom of it.
August was swirling a spoon in her coffee. Alfred had told them that Blink had found Vince and they were having a talk, there was also a message from Blink to August that said Vince didn't hold any ill feelings to her.
She was happy about that but her thoughts were on other matters now. I had been nearly a month since she was freed from Limbo and she was enjoying her new life. But she missed her old one, especially a certain someone she whished was right beside her now.
"Penny for your thoughts?" August turned to see Heather walking up to her now in a plain pair of jean and a yellow silk shit. She sat down next to her. "What's wrong?"
August sighed. "Do you ever miss it? You're old life?"
Heather's face grew solemn. "Yes...especially my husband James."
August's head snapped up. "Oh God I didn't know you were married! How was he? I mean is he still back in your world?" Heather nodded and August couldn't help but feel her pain. She reached over and took her friend's hand. "I'm sorry to hear that, do you think that maybe Guardian could you know...bring him here?"
"I asked him that...he said he would try but something is messing with him trying to get him from locking on to my world and a few others too. But he told me he would find a way...it would just take some time.
"That's good, hope can be a thing that can keep a person going." August told her.
"What about you? I know you lost you fiancée...if you don't mind, you want to talk about it?" Heather asked.
August thought about it. She missed Kurt so much, and everyone she had known was now gone, it would be nice to have someone she could share her memories of him...if would be nice to have his memory live on. "Well what can I say about him?" She said with a smile growing on her face. "He was such a kind, gentle soul, who cared for everyone. I couldn't help but fall hopelessly in love with him when we met. He was so charming and sweet, and even romantic too."
Heather sighed. "Sounds nice."
"It was." Then August got a grin on her face. "Plus there were things he could do with that tail of his that made my eyes roll back too."
"August!" Heather said blushing a little. "A little too much information!" She said then started to laugh. August blushed too and then joined in. They talked about Kurt and Heather's husband and shared their memories of their loved ones. All the good memories, the bad, the moments that were hilarious, everything.
REC. ROOMMorph was looking through the data crystals in the older on the wall next to the Vid-screen.
"Will you just pick something already?" Chamber said annoyed that the shape sifter was taking his sweet time. Guardian then walked in seeing them. Chamber looked to him. "Don't tell me we got ourselves a mission."
He gave a small laugh. "No you don't but I was wondering if all of you would like a tour to one of the cities?"
Morph and Chamber looked at each other. "Sure thing Guv, I could use some time away from here, not this place isn't great, but we could use the time among other people you know?"
The immortal nodded and grinned. "Oh I do know that's why I'm hoping you all will enjoy Haven City. It's the fist city made on this world and should have everything you all will need to see."
"Cool I'm up for it!" Morph said standing up. "Are we taking the teleporter there?"
"Uh...that's a little extreme to use a device used to take a person through space and time and other realities just to go to a city several kilometers away." Guardian said. Morph looked a little sheepish at his suggestion. "Besides I think I got something to take you all there."
"Really? What?" Morph asked excitedly.
"Come with me and see." Guardian said and walked to the door. After calling on Alfred the other Exiles joined up with them all at an elevator on the West end of the Complex. They asked Guardian what he was going to show them but he only smiled and said it was a surprise. They all rode in the large circular shaped elevator down into the mountain that the Complex was built on. When the elevator stopped and opened everyone was surprised to hind themselves in a huge hanger area that was about one hundred feet high.
"Damn, what's with the tall ceiling?" Morph asked.
"It's for those." Guardian said and pointed to the far wall to several very large robotic like machines.
"You got Gundams!" Vincent said looking at them. Everyone gave him a questioning look. "It's an anime, I used to be into giant robots, you know stuff like Transformers and stuff...at least I used to think they were cool." He explained. There were a variety of other craft, some even familiar like a ship that looked like the Millennium Falcon from the Star Wars movies only more smooth and shiny, an X-wing, a Viper from Battlestar Gallactica and many other vehicles too.
He led the group to what looked like a futuristic black limo, with a very sleek design. He touched a small pad on the door and it slid open. "You can all fit in and you can ask the robot river to take you to Haven City. If there's anything or something you'd like to see ask him, I programmed him with all the latest information on the city."
"I got a question how does this thing drive?" Heather asked looking at the bottom. "There aren't any wheels."
"It flies." He said simply then pulled out what looked like a garage opener and when he pressed the button the far end of the hanger opened up to show it was a massive double doors and not walls. "I hope you enjoy your trip."
"You're not coming?" Blink asked as some of the others were getting in.
"No, but thanks for the offer." He said with a smile. "I got a few things I need to take care of." He said giving Heather a look and she nodded her thanks and with that he nodded off and walked back to the elevator.
"Hey guys, you coming?" Morph said popping his head out of the sunroof. They all shared a look and smiled and they all climbed into the limo.
TBC...NEXT UP: THE CITY