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Several months later…
I woke up with an grin on my face. It was my birthday which meant no training, no studying plus I'd get to do whatever I wanted all day.
I knew exactly what to do. I ran to my father's study and knocked on the door.
"Come in" he said.
I entered the room, grinning from ear to ear.
My father was seated at his large desk, which was filled with paperwork. He smiled when he saw me.
"Happy Birthday. It's good to see you in a good mood."
"Yeah, I am."
"Yes" he corrected with a fond smile.
"Right, yes."
He shook his head. "You're picking up the speech patterns of your friends. You'd think more intelligent people would be in your chess club."
"Well, my friends are smart but even they do their fair share of YOLO-ing." I said.
"What?" my father asked, raising a eyebrow.
"Exactly! Well it doesn't matter anyway." I hopped into the chair across from him.
He shook his head but didn't probe any further. He told me to follow him to the garage.
When I arrived I see a dark blue car that definitely was not here last night.
"Is- Is that?" My jaw dropped and I pointed at the car.
"It's yours"
I continued to stare at the car, not saying a word.
"The common phrase people use in this kind of scenario is thank you." My smartass of a father pointed out.
I laughed and soon I was hugging him. "Thank you!"
He took the keys out of his pocket and handed it to me.
"Want to take it for a spin?"
I get in the driver's seat, noting that it looked exactly like any other car. It had a touchscreen that displayed the weather and judging from the way my ears rung when I used it a very powerful speaker.
Father entered the car and got into the shotgun seat "There is a button hidden in the storage compartment between us."
I look down into said compartment and saw a red button and pressed it.
The touchscreen suddenly switched from the weather to showing in big black letters "Mission- Undetermined"
Below that it said "Turbo booster fuel tank at maximum capacity."
"This car is discrete yet useful for your missions. In the back there is a hidden compartment for your equipment. You'll be able to contact me at a push of a button as well."
"This- this is incredible. Thank you Father," I said smiling at him. I was smiling so much it hurt- but I was so happy!
"You're welcome. So where do you plan on taking her on her maiden voyage?"
The idea immediately came to me. "I want to go to Seven Flags!"
My Father frowns. "Aren't you a little old for amusement parks?"
"Nope! Besides I go for the rollercoasters. If I tried some of the things they do in roller coasters when I fly you'd kill me."
"Yes, I would."
"Which is exactly why I should get on a rollercoaster! And you- you should come too!" My smile became impossibly large.
My Father on the other hand said "What?" He was a very busy man the idea of getting on a rollercoaster was unbelievable.
20 minutes later…
The first thing I did was rush over to the ride called G-Force.
Father stared at ride that seemed to do endless loops and staggeringly high drops, sometimes a loop and drop at the same time!
"Where does this death machine end?" He asked.
"It just opened." I smiled "It's called G-Force because it tricks your body into thinking you're floating. You feel weightless." I sighed. "What a thing of beauty."
"Sounds very safe." He says with sarcasm.
I immediately rushed toward the ride until I noticed I wasn't be followed.
'Father, you're not coming?" I asked.
"No, I will be here making sure nothing happens."
"I'll be fine!"
"Yes, because I'll make sure that is the case."
I decided to just get on the ride before he changed his mind.
I spend the day at the amusement park making sure to get on all of the rides and continuously tried to get my father to join me. This, however, did not happen. I did use my hand eye coordination and won several stuffed animals after knocking down all the milk cartons. I didn't even need to cheat!
"Teddy bears?" My father asked with an eyebrow raised.
I then gave them all to a family with 3 children who were nearby.
"Now tell the nice person thank you for the stuffed animals," their mother said with a smile.
"Thank you!" The kids a boy and two girls chirped.
"No prob." I smiled at them and waved as the children ran off, their parent trailing behind.
"Why are you so nice to them?"
"What do you mean?" I asked, curious.
"They'd probably hate you if they knew what you were."
"I don't know about that." I shook my head, remembering a younger me fawn over mutants like the X-Men. "When I was a kid, I thought mutants were cool and that they were like superheroes."
He smiled at this. "What about your friends?"
"The same, actually. Kids are open minded. It's adults who are scared. They see power and get frightened. Kids don't just assume you're going to hurt them."
"They won't be like that forever though."
"Well, I can't hate them for something they might do." I tapped my chin, thinking. "Maybe they'll be like who is it, Morgana- the lady from Cuba. You said she was nice."
"That is very optimistic. But… maybe."
"I don't have a problem with most. It's just the horrible people that kill people like us that get under my skin."
With that we went home.
We headed back to his office because he said he wanted to talk to me. I didn't mind, I could play with my new drone and read the books he had given me later.
Father sat down at his desk, running a hand through his hair. He sighed. "You're 16 now. Have you thought about what you'll be doing in the future?"
My eyes lit up. "Well, I still want to be an engineer. I've always wanted to work at a really cool company like Stark Industries ever since I was a kid."
My Father then frowned. "That's impossible."
"W-why? I manage my missions and school," I stammered, suddenly wishing I still had my voices to help me out.
"No, it isn't that you're incapable- it's just that such a job would be unsafe for you. The chances of you revealing yourself would be too high. Your coworkers wouldn't be a bunch of kids just out of high school, they'd be some of the most intelligent people in the world. Someone would notice something. Then, it'd be just a matter of time until they found you."
I froze. I'd never thought of that. "I- I see. Thank you.. For telling me this."
"That is the world we live in. Even so, you'll be able to use your education to engineer things to help our cause." Father gave me a tiny smile.
I wasn't exactly what I wanted but at least my education wouldn't be completely useless.
"I also wanted to ask you if you wanted to begin training to replace me?"
I stared at my father, unable to process what I'd heard. "Huh?"
"I asked if you wanted to consider being my successor?"
"..." I couldn't even speak. The idea was just too insane. I heard him speak of this before but even so I couldn't comprehend the idea.
"Why?" I finally say
Why me? I was a shy, little scrawny toothpick of a teenager. I led the chess club but that's a joke compared to his elaborate organization that spanned dozens of countries and thousands of members.
" Because I think you'll do a good job." He smirked at me.
"That's-that's. Wow…"
I paused. Ofcourse I knew someone would have to replace my father but me? But if he had faith in me I could have faith in myself. I knew I wanted to do everything I could defend innocent mutants. But this was a lot. This was a massive responsibility.
"I don't know if I'll be as good as you'd say I'd be."
"Then how about this. We'll have a trial period for a few months and see how it goes."
"I-I guess I can do that."
A few few weeks later...
On a seemingly ordinary night in rural Montana, a 101 man strong squad of mutants was quietly waiting outside a heavily guarded factory. Barbed wire fences stretched around the factory for meters, shiny plastic reflecting the moonlight. Guard towers were posted at each of the corners with several soldiers armed and ready to fire.
Finally, a year of preparation was put to the test. I smiled, knowing that elsewhere in the state of Arizona the same was happening.
I watched the clock on my watch nervously, feeling the other soldier's gazes on me. As soon as the clock hands moved to cover 12, I looked up and swallowed anxiously before nodding to the others. I could see the fear in their eyes. I brought my arms up and with a twist of my wrists, my shields crumpled the guard towers into balls like paper with practiced ease. I then threw the plastic barbed wire fences to the side, using the same trick.
Everyone rushed into the building, myself flying close behind, searching for the sentinels. I didn't have to look far. Yells erupted from my allies as giant robots began to attack them. The mutants quickly began to kill everyone inside while I focused on destroying the sentinels one by one, crushing them into useless pieces of plastic by smashing them together with my magnetic shields.
Once we were done in the main room I used my electricity to short-circuit the sentinels, melting them into useless plastic.
Suddenly, a group of soldiers came out of the opposite entrance of the room. They began to fire. I took cover behind my own shield, holding it in front of me with both of my hands. I noticed several others taking cover behind boxes. Unfortunately the -plastic- bullets could still reach them and soon, blood pooled around the bodies. My hands began to throb and fall asleep as I tried to hold on to the shield desperately.
They were picking us off.
I knew drastic action was necessary.
I switched to using only one hand for shields, flexing the other to get blood flow going, but was suddenly blown black with the force of strong bullet. Thankfully, it didn't penetrate, but it did knock the air out if me. I grimaced and tried to concentrate. I used my free hand to send a shield to smash the men into oblivion, their blood now decorating the wall and ceiling on the other side of the room
"Great work, kid!" I heard a man shout.
"Um... No prob." I yelled back nervously.
We continued forward and found why we'd almost been killed. The team assigned to meet us in the middle of the building had been killed brutally. Some soldiers, knowing they were surrounded, had concentrated their forces on defence in hopes of survival, which had lead to the other team being overwhelmed.
We continued to kill and destroy. No one had any mercy left, as we had all seen that they had created death machines, designed to kill us. We soon met with our other squads who'd suffered casualties of their own.
Still, the oddest thing happened, as we went further into the building less personnel were found, which wasn't supposed to be the case.
"This is just too easy." One woman muttered, clutching her gun tightly.
"That's what worries me. They could've escaped, or maybe-" I trailed off, thinking hard.
We walked out of the factory. A floodlight turned on blinding us, revealing three tanks along with a several dozens of soldiers.
"-they we're all right here." I finished.
"Fire!" A man ordered.
The tanks launched killing 5 or so mutants. Even over the sound of explosions, I could hear their bones breaking with a crack.
Damn you!
I couldn't even help them. It happened too fast.
I was already angry with the losses we'd been taking but seeing that pushed me off the edge.
I wasn't quite thinking anymore. If I had been, I definitely wouldn't have begun to walk towards the lights slowly.
I'm sure they were confused as to why some kid in a brown trenchcoat and a tee-shirt with jeans was walking to them.
They soon learned, though. I reached out and pushed my hands together. The discarded guard plastic guard tower balls rolled over the men, leaving only broken bodies and tanks in its wake.
I later learned that of the men and women that joined the mission, only 20 survived. All 20 of which were assigned to fight with me.
We had been with 100 when we walked in.
"Congratulations," my father said cheerfully as I entered his study. I frowned.
"I'm glad that those monsters are gone, but with so many of my teammates dead it doesn't seem like much of a victory."
He nodded. "I understand. But remember that thanks to you and the others, millions of mutants are safe. That is a victory. We shouldn't forget that."
I nodded, feeling a bit better.
"Thanks. Wanna go rub this in Xavier's face?" I grinned. Now it was my father's turn to frown.
"No," he said.
"Well, I'll do it and I'll even tell you the results…" I coughed, putting my hands in my pockets nervously. "You know, I think we should think about working with professor Xavier." Father scowled.
"Why would you think that? He kidnapped you."
"I'm still not pleased about that but I'm sure that it, if anything, would be a wake up call to the man," I tried to reason. "Since we're all mutants we should work together. He doesn't want anyone to to die, right? Especially his students."
My father stared at me. His eyes said 'are you kidding me?'.
"No, really. I feel this way." I shrugged. "I don't know, I guess seeing all those people die today put things into perspective. We can't afford to be so stuck on the past that we don't make alliances that could help us in the future. Like for when they rebuild those monsters." I shivered.
I was being very serious. Having dozens of people die in front of you often leads to you reevaluating things. Xavier's X-Men were strong and leaving that kind of power on the table made no sense.
"I'll think about it," Father said, tone implying that he wouldn't. He rubbed his forehead and sighed. "You're dismissed."
Once I left my father's study, I punched in Xavier's number in my phone.
"Hello," he said before yawning.
"Xavier."
"Chris?"
"Yes." I replied.
I coughed. "Today, while you and your students were sound asleep, my Father and I destroyed thousands of robots built to kill our kind." I heard some shuffling, probably Xavier sitting up. He sounded much more awake when he spoke again.
"The Sentinels are back?"
"Were, we took care of them. But they'll definitely be rebuilt."
"Oh- oh. Oh my God," he stammered.
"Now do you see what my father has been saying?"
"But- but Hank, he's advising the president," Xavier sputtered. "The president couldn't have."
"He did." I said, cutting him off. "We have evidence. We have his signature on the papers authorizing the Sentinels. And Dr. McCoy, of course, didn't know because they didn't tell him. He was just given office to convince mutants that they had nothing to fear. At the end of the day, he's only an advisor."
The man said nothing in response.
"Look, I think it would be best if my father and you talked again to discuss how we will respond to any attacks on your school or on any other innocent mutants."
"I thought you hated me."
"Oh, I'm still angry about the kidnapping, but I'm also not stupid enough to pass up a potential ally. 100 people walked into a factory with me to destroy those monsters and 20 returned. Do you understand what could happen if we're unprepared?"
"Yes. I understand."
"I'm going to figure out how to get him to meet with you without anyone almost dying this time." With that, I hung up. It was going to be a long day.
The next day we were back at Xavier's, and by some miracle my father hadn't tried to kill Xavier… Yet. The meeting in Xavier's cozy study was far more tense than the battle the day before. So many emotions flowed freely, rage and pain from my father and sadness and regret from the professor.
I decided to sit on the couch to the side and hoped for the best. For a moment, no one said a word.
My father spoke first. "My son convinced me to come here. I thought you wanted to talk to me about the protection of mutant kind. Don't waste my time, Xavier." He said with his shoulders crossed seated in a chair directly across from the professor.
Even from my seated position, I could the icy chill in his voice.
Xavier frowned. "Erik… I'm sorry…. I didn't get to say that before."
My father narrowed his eyes. "I'm not interested in your excuses-"
"But you're right. Let's talk."
He continued. "My students' well being is the most important thing to me… I didn't think those monsters would be rebuilt. Especially now that Hank is advising the president…"
Seeing the man's sadness made me feel a bit sorry for him. I remembered when I was as idealistic as him.
My father's words were strained. "In the event of the school being discovered, I'm willing to take in your students as long as those who are capable fight with us."
"The children fighting," the professor repeated dumbly, clearly horrified.
"In case you haven't noticed, they've declared war on all of us, Xavier. Children included. We'll all have to fight when the time comes."
"You have point." Charles sighed. "Look, Erik..." Xavier swallowed, obviously nervous. He steeled himself before continuing. "I don't want to lose you. We were good friends."
Father's face was blank. His eyes took on a steely look. "Yes, we were."
The finality in that statement rang out like a bell.
I decided to leave the toxic room and ask Doctor Grey about Marie.
Outside wasn't much better, sadly. Scott, Bobby and Wolverine all gave me intense glares when I passed by them. I responded with my own glares. The other students were still afraid of me but more than a few were curious. Whispers of killer robots spread around the mansion.
I found the Doctor in the garden, hand reached out towards a watering hose floating in air.
"Doctor Grey." I said.
She turned around, stunned. "Chris?" I gave her a small wave.
"How's Marie?"
Dr. Grey frowned. "She- the voices in her head are persistent. It seems that they're immune to medication and we can't get in while they're there."
"I see."
I'd been fearing something like that. But why? My voices were eradicated with the medication I take now.
Again, the red haired woman looked at me with shock.
"Chris- I can… Sort of read your mind?"
You can? I thought at her. Dr. Grey's voice rang out, sounding like one of those toy microphones.
It's a bit buggy. I'm missing a lot- It's like static, but I'm here.
Interesting.
It turned out I wasn't the only person that Marie snapped at. She'd become paranoid, believing that everyone wanted to harm her. If she wasn't watched carefully she'd grab weapons and try to harm students. She also suddenly displayed a sudden proficiency with knives.
The last part confused the woman. However, it made me think back to my knife collection at home.
What other skills could she have absorbed from me? Did she have more compromising information? I knew a lot of Brotherhood secrets.
If I told my father, he'd most certainly want to kill her. But if I didn't…
It wasn't even a choice. I had to take the chance.
I hadn't even thought about the fact that she knew about the people I killed. Everything happened too fast for me to process it.
I left the befuddled woman in the garden.
I sighed. Just what I needed. More bad news.
Not only would I have to look my father in the eye while not being sure what secrets my friend could spill, but she hadn't even gotten better.
It had been a secret wish of mine that my friend would suddenly recover again. That things could go back to normal. We'd hang out again and make fun of each other. She'd call me a nerd and I'd say that accepting mediocrity is a way of life for her. Then after some verbal sparring we'd laugh at each other and forgive and forget.
Maybe one day.
Xavier was the best telepath in the world. I needed to trust him. Of course I'd soon learn he wasn't the strongest but that's a story for another time.
I returned to Xavier study and saw that the men had just finished a chess game, black beating white. My father always played black if he had the chance, so he'd probably won. Not that it was surprising. Xavier wasn't exactly in the best state of mind with his hopes of a peace between mutants and humans being crushed before his eyes. And his best friend had rejected him. Of course he had kidnapped me first, so my Father's anger was justified. But even so, the man looked so dead inside. Even I felt a little sympathy for him.
"Chris, just as I was going to have someone look for you." Xavier said.
Without acknowledging the other man my father said, "Electron, we're leaving."
I nodded and I headed out.
As we left, Father asked, "What were you doing after leaving the room?" My heart raced, mouth suddenly gone dry. I thought as fast as I could. What could I possibly tell him?
"I talked to Dr. Grey about Marie." I tried to make my voice sound as normal as possible and stared straight ahead. My blood was rushing. I just hoped with all my might that Father would buy the lie.
Father glanced at me with a frown. "You're leaving something out." I almost couldn't stop myself from flinching, mentally screaming for him to just leave it alone. I licked my lips nervously.
"...She hasn't gotten any better." I stammered after a beat, trying to make it sound like that was what I had been trying to hide. I swallowed, looking at my feet. "It's really…"
Father put his hand on my shoulder. "It's okay if you don't want to talk about it," he soothed. Once his back was turned, I sighed. My friend was safe.
"Thanks."