Chapter 5
Legal Disclaimer-To own is to make money, to borrow is to write Fan fiction. I do not own these characters, they belong to others. I make no cash from this. Sorry. Don't sue me.
Authors Note-For you Aniki, you got 10 whole pages. Brigitta, thanks for the constant support. Guys, glad you like. Reviews keep me sane. I'm back as long as Real Life doesn't intercede. On the health front, I'm doing better. No really, I am. I'm currently debating just what is going to happen to Pierce. Thoughts and reviews are welcome.
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The light hurt. It hurt more than Lexa Pierce wanted to admit. She liked light. She could bend it, make it her weapon, but the pain it caused hurt more than she liked to admit. The thought that she was lying on a floor, when only moments ago she was watching Pierce play…
WHERE IS PIERCE? Panic overrode her thought process. She couldn't think, she couldn't see, and she couldn't think. She tried to take a breath in and discovered that her chest hurt. A quick self exam revealed a broken rib. She must have fought whoever put her here. She felt the back of her neck which already felt heavy and put fingers to a cold metal lump. The sub dermal governor hurt. It meant they knew she was a mutant. Hopefully they didn't put the same on Pierce. She couldn't imagine what it would do to the little boy.
Oh god, where was he? She slowly opened her eyes to the bright light and tried to lift herself up. She knew that if she did, she might be able to find the boy, but it hurt to simply move. The thought of her child in pain began to override her own. She had to find him now.
The light was so bright, the white walls of the room adding to the light. It reminded her of when she got lost as a child in a blinding snowstorm. All she saw ahead of her was white. All she saw now was white. By blinding her they controlled her, she thought to herself. Well, they could try, she could act like they were, but she would find the child.
"Nice to see you're awake," a somewhat familiar voice said, coming into the edge of her sight, "The last time I saw you, you were a goner."
She could tell it was a man whose name she never knew. He had dark air, was vaguely Italian looking and headed the old form of the dominion. She hated him the moment he told her that he could control everything in the Dominion, including her. That didn't happen then and she knew it wouldn't happen now.
"Obviously that didn't happen," she said, "What's with the bright lights?"
"You forget that we know your power, Ms. Pierce, and we have been watching you," he continued, "The light is to overload your powers."
"Overload me with a sub dermal on, that's overdoing it, don't you think?" Lexa said mockingly, "You don't know that much about me. I don't even know your name."
The man turned and looked at her.
"You can call me the Director," he said, "I'll let you sit here in the light for a little while longer. I have questions I will ask, but only when you want me to stop the pain you will be feeling. Answer the questions and I'll stop your pain."
Lexa looked at him and laughed.
"You don't know me, pain doesn't do it," she said, trying to figure out where he had stepped, "I don't react to it."
"Yes, I do know that, Ms. Pierce, but how do you react to torment?" the director asked rhetorically, "First you, the boy, and then the rest of Mutant X?"
Lexa glared at him. She wouldn't admit to being scared, but her memories of torment instantly replayed in her mind from the last time she saw the director. He had interrogated Jesse in front of her, hooking him up to machines that she knew would kill him. Jesse, the one guy since her brother had been so strong for her, but was scared like she was. She still cared about Jesse, she knew she loved him, but the love she felt now was more for a brother than for a lover. She couldn't help but remember his screams. They had torn at her heart and made her want to tell the man everything. Thankfully she did have to that time. This time was going to be worse. There wasn't a backup virus to blow up this man's computers. She couldn't get them out of this one. It was up to Jesse.
Torment was something that Jesse Kilmartin was secretly praying would stop in his life. He had felt the world go dark around Lexa, he had felt her pain and knew that she was alive, but couldn't control his own growing fear. Lexa couldn't find Pierce and was panicked over it.
He woke up on the floor soon after his head hit the computer desk. He was dazed, felt like holy hell and knew that the headache would soon follow. He tried to focus on Shalimar who had lifted him back into the chair and was trying to get him to talk. Shalimar's yell had brought Adam out of the lab and Emma in a dead run to them. He knew that Emma could help, but if he could just find his voice, it would make much more sense to him. It was very disorienting to think that he had been working on the computer one minute and the next minute be completely lost.
Something was very wrong with Lexa. Jesse knew that Lexa was in trouble the second that his vision had blackened and he felt an overwhelming fear. Lexa stayed calm in nearly everything that they had done together, but this time, he knew something was horribly wrong. She was never this scared. He wanted to reach out to her, tell her that everything would be fine, but he couldn't. His frustration at the block of this new power ate at him instantly. He could feel everything that was happening to her but he could do nothing. Panic had grabbed her again and he felt like couldn't breathe.
Emma grabbed Jesse's face and turned his panicked eyes to meet hers. She didn't have to speak; he became silent and stared back. Shalimar had backed away, knowing that Emma could do wonders when Jesse was this far gone, but she was a bit brutal. The situation did call for unusual measures.
"Jesse, what do you see?" Emma asked, breaking the silence, "You are seeing something, come on, tell me what you see."
Jesse nodded, his eyes growing colder. His breathing had changed to normal, but his expression was almost blank. He started to speak, stopped and tried again.
"It's Lexa. First it was all darkness, now it's light, bright light. God, it hurts," Jesse's voice was soft and low, almost sounding childlike, "It's so bright she can't see."
Breathlessly, Brennan joined them. He had heard Shalimar's call and ran upstairs to see what had happened. He could tell it was bad from the body language that Emma was radiating and how Jesse looked so alone. Adam was in the shadows near the couple. Kane didn't speak, he just watched.
"What the?" his question was interrupted by Shalimar's hand grabbing his arm.
"It looks like Lexa and Pierce have been kidnapped, Jesse felt everything and passed out from it," she said, under her breath, "Emma's got him talking, he really wasn't here a few minutes ago."
Brennan nodded. Shalimar knew just the way to tell him, her calmness took his concern down a small notch. Jesse didn't look like he had come back. He was staring straight ahead at Emma, but you could tell that he couldn't see her. He held back his own panic on Lexa. He knew that wouldn't help Jesse. He thought of Lexa. In the few years he had known the other elemental; she would never let herself get kidnapped. This was bad.
"Any idea on where she is?" Brennan asked.
"She's in light," Jesse said, breaking his gaze from Emma and turning to Brennan, "She's just covered in it. She won't admit it, but she's scared."
"What scares Lexa?" Brennan asked, "She doesn't scare easily, Jesse."
"She's terrified, Bren," Jesse said, the light returning to his eyes, "She doesn't have a clue on what to do, either."
Brennan moved closer to his friend, not breaking Jesse's distant yet aware gaze. He knelt next to his friend's chair. Jesse was looking more and more like himself, but he could still see the fear in his body language.
"How is this affecting you?" Brennan asked, "Can you communicate with her, or is this one way, Jess?"
"One-Way, dammit," Jesse looked at Brennan, unable to hide the bitterness and the frustration in his voice, "I can't send anything out to her at all. And nothing from Pierce."
He hit the desk with a fist in frustration. He took a breath and massed his fist, wanting to hit the desk again, knowing it would shatter, and then took a moment to stop. He took a deep breath. He closed his eyes, letting go of Emma's hand to rub them.
Brennan took a moment before answering him. Jesse this frustrated was rare and he kicked himself internally for not helping him through it earlier. He wanted to help him now but felt powerless to do anything. He left his mind open to the possibilities of helping him, trying to be the calm that Jesse was craving.
"Jesse, I know this is killing you but think, is there anyone who wants to take Lexa?" Brennan asked, "Think, bro. We know the guy in the chair is gone."
"His name was Abraham," Adam said softly from his perch in the shadows, "Good thought though Brennan, who could be after Lexa? More Dominion people? You guys were close."
"Were the operative word here, Adam," Jesse opened his eyes and looked at Emma, "I thought Lexa and all of this was out of my life until you called Shalimar. Lexa got her own life and never looked back."
"You're wrong on that, she kept in touch," Shalimar said, "And without her, you wouldn't have Pierce. Have you felt anything from him? You passed out after you told me that something had happened to Lexa. Anything else come up?"
Jesse looked at Shalimar.
"No," he said, "Nothing at all."
"He's probably unconscious," Emma said, putting her hand back into Jesse's, "You and Brennan are the only ones I can get when you're out; I haven't tried to do it with Pierce. I would rather that you try it first. You have the stronger connection to him that I do."
Jesse looked back at her. It all made logical sense, but it was still something he knew he couldn't do. She was telling the truth but he had to admit, he felt very alone.
"I can't," Jesse replied bitterly, "I have tried and tried. I get nothing Em, nothing."
Jesse got up and walked away from the group. The edges of their emotions were beginning to get to him. He knew they were concerned about him, that concern flowed over him in deep waves. He looked out the window.
"What we need is someone who can travel into the unconscious," Adam said aloud, "Henry Voight"
"Henry?" Emma asked, "We put him into the underground. Very far into the underground if I remember right. Finding him will be impossible."
Jesse turned back around. Henry would make sense. Even though he had used his powers against them as a team, he would be able to get to Pierce and Lexa in his own way. Henry traveled in dreamscapes and made sure that the team paid for what he thought was killing his wife. When they helped him find his very much alive wife, Adam put him into the safety of the underground, and onto the steps of a new life. While Jesse had felt he really didn't deserve it, he knew in the long run that it was the right thing that Adam did.
Reaching Henry wouldn't be hard. All it would take would be his clearance with the Service. Jesse sighed. He hadn't thought of the service in the six weeks since he had met Shalimar at the bar. His life had changed so severely. He didn't even feel like he was the same person. He knew that he wasn't.
"It won't be impossible. I can find him," Jesse said, "But he hasn't met Lexa or Pierce, how do we know if it's going to work or not?"
"It will have to," Adam said, "We'll have to find a way."
Jesse rested while Brennan, Shalimar and Emma worked with Jesse's computer clearance to find Henry Voight. Jesse had the highest level and could access records that they were never able to touch in the years in Sanctuary. Shalimar worked quietly, thinking over their last meeting with Henry and hoped that this one would end differently. Adam had to bargain their lives and found Henry's wife deep in the halls of Genomax, locked away in stasis.
She hoped that Henry was having a happy life. His need to be with his wife was understandable. Brianna was his life. To lose her he lost himself and actually started working for Eckhart. Even though he had tortured her in the dreamscape, she did have compassion for him. If anyone had done that to Brennan she would kill them first and ask the questions later.
She looked over to where Jesse napped. Adam had checked on him regularly, making sure that if any other contact from Lexa happened not only would he let them know, he also wanted to make sure that Jesse had no physiological damage. Adam worried about them, and she could tell by his look that what had happened to Jesse bothered him greatly. He wasn't talking about it, though. She knew they would talk eventually, but after what the Creator did to Jesse, she hoped that Adam wouldn't lose himself in his rage. She already feared that Jesse had. The look on her surrogate brother's face had scared her more than she liked to think. She had seen the strong confident Jesse she knew and loved vanish in a heartbeat. The frustration she knew he felt ached with her as well.
Emma stopped typing and stared at the screen.
"I found him," she said, staring at the screen, "Damn, Jesse was right, it wasn't impossible. Brianna is in the file as well, and, so is their son, Joshua."
"Where is he?" Brennan asked, trying to link to her file.
"D.C., believe it or not," she read aloud, "Henry's working for the DC metro system, and Brianna is teaching violin. Pretty normal lives."
"Not normal enough," Adam said, coming up behind Emma, "Wife, kid, no mention of a picket fence or a dog. He's also raising a child. Not normal thanks to the Creator. Brennan, why don't you and Shalimar go see him. Ask him if he is willing to help us. I know we have nothing to offer him, but, he might help us."
"He will," Brennan said, grabbing his jacket, "He's a dad. I think he'll understand."
Adam could understand. As much as he would deny it, he was a father to all of them in the room, and felt grandfatherly to Pierce. He wanted to help Jesse, but the younger man wouldn't take the help. Jesse needed to sort all of this out on his own, but there was little time and there are lives at stake. He didn't need to be psionic to feel the guilt washing over Jesse from his inability to use his powers.
As Brennan and Shalimar took the Strand into DC to find Henry, Jesse and Emma worked on his control and attempted once again to reach Lexa. Adam had tried to monitor Jesse, making sure that the molecular's life signs stayed regular. Jesse had waved him off. He was more irritated that this new power would not work when he desperately needed it to.
Adam stayed where he could watch Emma and Jesse. He regretted never telling the rest of the team that Emma was still alive. He knew that it was to save her life, but it still hurt to have to lie. This team of people had trusted him with their lives and for that he knew he had a responsibility to protect them as they had protected him.
After he was abducted by the Creator, he didn't want to lie to anyone anymore. He had lived a lie up until that moment and knew that he would live the rest of his days telling the truth until it killed him. He watched it kill Abraham, the man who tried so hard to keep Lexa alive in the Dominion, and he watched it nearly kill Jesse. He hoped and prayed that Lexa and Pierce were not victims of the lie that his very existence had become.
He watched Jesse struggle with trying to remain calm. The molecular had been so stubborn and headstrong when he first joined Mutant X. He was also so sheltered and sensitive it was hard to get him to come out from behind the keyboard and be a person. He was very proud of him, the thought of him being in the Secret Service was the perfect job for him, yet, he could see the pride he took in the job, realizing that while he had to know a tremendous number of things, and he could balance it with his sense of humor. He was so proud of all the younger man had done; he realized that it was a feeling like that of a parent.
He also watched Emma. The scared psionic he remembered from the bar had become a beautiful and talented woman. She spoke her mind when she needed to, worked on becoming a friend to her husband's ex-lover and was a part of the team. She didn't have to fight to fit in. She was trying so hard to get Jesse to concentrate on Lexa she did everything but slap him.
Emma knew what she had to do, and she knew that Henry Voight would be a great asset once he got there. Adam had warned them that when Jesse could let his walls down, he would be in a world of pain and hurt. Emma had to convince Jesse that this was the only way to get to Lexa and Pierce. This might work, and now that Brennan and Shalimar were out finding Henry, they could give it a try. Emma had Jesse working on a meditation when she got up and motioned for Adam to head into the lab with her.
"I have an idea, but I need you there in case he goes down," Emma started, the strain beginning to show on her face, "You said that when he lets the walls down it could be worse than when you guys found him, right?"
"Right," Adam remembered the moment when Jesse had begged him to get them to stop screaming, not knowing that Jesse had become psionic due to experimentation that kept him alive.
"When you and I are here, Jesse tends to be calm, two people's thoughts and emotions are doing wonders for him to handle, I think we can do this now, and we have to," Emma continued, "If he crashes, I'll help you bring him back, but he needs to do this now or he'll never be able to function."
Adam stared at her for a moment. The Emma who always asked if this was the right idea was long gone. A more confident woman stood in her place.
"Tell me what you want to do," Adam said, his eyes mirroring his smile.
Shalimar and Brennan were having great luck as well. The address the internet gave them was correct; if the wind blew right you could hear the whine of violins being practiced. The house was non-descript and in a small neighborhood. Brennan and Shalimar sat in a car they rented to watch the Voight house hoping that he could catch Henry leaving for work and talk to him that way. Brennan really didn't want to walk up to the door and knock, it wasn't in his nature. If they approached him together, he knew it would work.
He never saw Henry coming. Voight had walked up behind the car and stood there until Brennan realized that the man was staring at him. Shalimar laughed and got out of the car. She had told Brennan that they really should just go knock.
"You do realize that you can't sneak up on psionic, right?" Henry asked, "I'd ask you the how, but, Mr. Mulwray, I already know."
"Okay," Brennan said quickly, he still hated it when anyone wandered in his mind, even the ones he knew, "If you know how, you know why. I'll cut the crap, Henry. Can you help him or not?"
Henry Voight took a moment and stared at his two guests. Shalimar had a hard time believing it was the same man who had walked through her nightmares. He had cleaned up and looked peaceful, happy and the perfect family man.
"Thank you, Ms. Fox, I think you look happy as well, but the fears for your friend are quite intoxicating," Henry began, "I know you want me to help him. I think I can, but I don't know about the woman or the child. Let me tell Brianna what is going on. You contact Adam and tell him I'll come."
Brennan smiled. For the first time in weeks, things were going their way.
For Jesse to let down his barriers, it was going to be painful. He knew that. He also knew that this might not work. The night he woke up to the whispers of the children he knew that he would never again doubt the sincerity of his wife's abilities. Psionics were rarely understood unless someone walked a mile in their shoes. He heard everything from that moment and couldn't find his own thoughts in the mix. Going completely mad was one of his biggest fears. To let down the walls that Emma had helped him build was only going to make it worse. Or kill him. But, it gave him the chance to help Lexa and hopefully Pierce. He had felt and heard nothing from his child since he so brutally took the images from his mind of the dreams he had mentioned. Jesse still hated himself for that.
Emma touched his leg and he opened his eyes. She had returned to him and he found himself remarkably calm.
"Jesse, you're going to do this in a controlled situation," she began, "I want Adam to monitor you so you're going into the lab, do you understand?"
Jesse nodded. He had no other choice. He stood up and followed her into the lab. His blue eyes followed her as she helped Adam connect monitors to him. The need to be silent was obvious; he needed the quiet to stay calm for what was coming. Adam smiled at him.
"We're ready when you are," Adam said.
Emma took his hand in hers.
"How do I do this again?" Jesse asked softly, trying to break the seriousness of his mood.
Emma smiled.
"Think about when Sanctuary exploded," Emma suggested, smoothing out a lock of his hair on his forehead, "Use the same idea on your own walls. Blow them out of the water."
Jesse smiled. It was a great analogy. He closed his eyes and thought about when Sanctuary then the Helix exploded. He was already beaten from the Dominion, his hand hurt badly from the electrical torture that they had used. He held onto Lexa's hand and ran, ran as fast as he could and knew that if he got away, he could be okay.
He thought of Lexa. There was a time when he thought he could love her forever. She had taken his heart when Emma's "death" had broken it into a million pieces. He loved her. She had become more of a person to him during their brief time as a team. She wanted to be loved and he wanted to love her. She only had to accept him and it took a long time for him to succeed.
He breathed in. The walls he knew were there seemed smaller. He could feel the outside world beginning to creep in. He thought of Lexa again, their conversations and their arguments. Sometimes she could make him so angry.
The walls dropped even further. He could feel the panic that played with the calm that made up Adam Kane. Adam was nearby, reading every single reading several times, making sure that Jesse was well enough to continue. He also felt the extreme rage that he had over the treatment given to Jesse by the Creator and his frustration at not being able to reverse it. He wanted to help Jesse through this and hoped and prayed it would be easy. Sadly, it wasn't.
Emma's love radiated to him as the walls dropped further. He felt her trying to help him, her mind completely open, full of doors he could wander into, emotions of love and understanding flowing from her.
He watched the rest of the wall in his mind go down, thinking that kicking it might help it go. He put a foot out in his mind and thought like Brennan, one swift kick and it would be in pieces. It was, but he realized that with it, the voices had come back.
"Oh, God," he said, his hands going to his ears instantly, "This has got to stop."
He opened his eyes and could see Emma staring into his, with Adam behind her checking the monitors.
"The walls are down?" Emma asked, "Jesse can you hear me?"
Jesse saw her lips move, but couldn't really hear her. The voices were talking all around him, their volume drowning out everything else in his mind. He couldn't find his inner voice and felt like he was trapped. He tried to breathe in and could not. The thoughts were causing him not to think. He felt like he was falling. He tried to reach out for Emma, who took his hand.
Emma calmly stared at him. He wheezed, trying to bring more oxygen into his lungs, but it was obvious that he was scared.
"Just focus on my words, Jesse," she said aloud and his mind, "Mine only."
Jesse closed his eyes and tried to hear her. Her voice was lost among the din. Shouts were added to the chaos, and he couldn't focus. He pulled himself up into a ball and felt his hands go toward his head. He just wanted them to stop.
"JESSE!" Emma screamed in his mind.
Jesse's eyes grew blank and the blackness engulfed him.