Chapter 5: Return

It may have been a year. He had lost count of the days, of the months. The whiteness, the lights, the sheer, glaring brightness of it all—it drowned out his thoughts, his mind. He felt almost mad. Oh, the food came everyday and every day he hoped, he prayed that someone would come in with a spot of metal on them—a button, a wedding ring, anything!

They were careful, though, damn them. Too careful. It was becoming more than he could bare. They had even assigned him guards that had no fillings in their teeth!

To be without such a simple thing as metal, a substance he had taken for granted, he realized now—to be without it was to not breathe. Not eat. Not sleep. A sense in him was gone, a need, a feeling—life itself. His powers may not have defined who he was, but they did define what he was and he was not himself in this plastic, white-bright cell.

Charles had stopped coming some weeks ago. Oh he would come back, most assuredly. He wished he would bring him a book or something during one of his visits. Music…he could listen to some music right now.

"Adagio…Moonlight Sonata." He began to hum it. Then, the thought of a piano and its copper strings and thick metal pedals, of a violin and its strings, of all the metal that is involved in music, began to drive him insane and he stopped himself humming.

The cell door opened. Ah, Charles was back. Magneto smiled and began humming again. "You know, Charles," he said, "I've been wondering if you could bring something besides a chess board with you every time you visit me. Something to read perhaps?"

Charles stared at him. The guard pushed his chair in a little further and left. "Have you ever seen 'The Great Escape,' Eric? It's a fascinating film."

Magneto froze mid-hum. "What did you say?"

Charles wheeled closer to him. " 'The Great Escape' Eric, the one about the soldiers in a Nazi prison camp who escape, hence the name?" His eyes flashed yellow and Magneto understood.

He grinned thinly. "It's one of my favorite films, my dear."

I've been here for so long

I do not know the day

I've forgotten who I am

And the Voices in my head all say

Good bye, love, Good bye

You must let go

I tell them you are waiting

And they tell me, oh, no. No. No.

"So, where are we going?"

Magneto closed his eyes. He was listening to the all the workings of the helicopter, loving the feel of the mechanisms, each thwap of the blades going around and around and around…

It had been a long shot, this business with Stryker. He had known that going into it. It was no less clear to him now. But they had lived, they had escaped.

He had escaped.

He opened his eyes and extended his hand to touch Mystique's arm, to take her hand, to kiss her hand. She smiled, but did not lift her eyes from the controls. In another life, he may have been in love with a woman such as her…perhaps he was, after all.

The ocean came into view and they soared over it, white-capped waves splashing up and down, the sea surging with winter weather. It looked so alive. Ice shattered and formed, he could see the shadow of their helicopter on the surface of the blessed, living sea.

He had never felt freer. This had been no failure. Rather, it was the beginning of victory.

"Did you say something, Pyro?"

The boy stopped playing with his lighter. "I was just wondering where we were going."

Magneto sighed the sigh of the content. "Home, Pyro. We're going home."

Home? Home was a rock! A cave! Monstrous and without limits. A heavy black-green forest enshrouded the place. There was barely enough visible surface area to land the helicopter. There was a waterfall that looked at least a hundred feet high and cold, inky black pools all around like a moat.

The Lair…most appropriately named.

"I'm guessing you guys don't get cable here?" he muttered

Magneto laughed. The man had a wicked deep laugh. "I knew I liked you, John."

Pyro smiled. Something about being liked by Magneto made him feel stronger. That's what was different here. That's what made him more powerful than Professor X. Pyro felt limitless with Magneto, as if his powers could only increase and nobody could ever force him to hide them. He controlled fire! He need not pretend to be weaker than he was, not here, not with this guy, with these people. He could be, and needed to be, as strong as possible, as powerful as the substance he controlled.

They disembarked. The helicopter was well concealed, surrounded by all of these trees. The slate grey fortress was taller when you looked up at it. He was curious about what it looked like inside. He had doubts about it being very comfortable.

But it was fucking cool.

He followed the two of them off the landing pad. They walked slowly, talking all the while. They were kind of a weird couple. He shrugged. It takes all kinds.

Pretty soon he was ahead of them, just barely, boyishly eager to see the inside of his new "home." His eyes caught something, above him, in the trees. He stopped. He looked up. A girl looked down.

"Holy shit!" he exclaimed. She flipped lithely out of the tree and landed before him. His lighter was out and he held a ball of flame in his right hand, ready. The girl, short, slim, and kind of green smiled. She was not smiling at him. In fact, she ignored his flaming hand and raced past him as if she didn't see him. She had her arms around Magneto by the time he turned to follow her and Magneto was smiling too, though he seemed surprised.

Mystique sidled past them and walked up to Pyro. "You can put that out," she said scornfully. "She won't hurt you."

Pyro might have blushed. "She surprised me. I didn't know anyone else was here."

"Neither did I," the woman responded. "I figured she'd have left by now, but I guess she had no way off the island."

"Who is she?" They walked on towards the gaping, cavernous entrance. "She came out of nowhere."

"Her name is Eden. I don't know very much about her. She's…," Mystique smiled, a thin, playful smile, that Pyro found strangely attractive, "Eric's pet."

Pyro raised an eyebrow. "Some kinda pet."

She shrugged. "He likes snakes."

It wasn't long before Magneto and Mystique left Pyro on his own without so much as a tour of the place. "Eden, she'll give you anything you need," Magneto had said.

Eden was cute. Very cute. She was slightly older than he was, he knew that. He could tell. Her eyes were older. Her face was sad, somehow, like sad with experience. Knowledge and pain had made her older. "Tell me your name," she said, smiling. Joy at their return masked any kind of tragic expression in her.

"John," he said automatically. He shook his head. "Pyro," he corrected himself. "I'm Pyro."

"Pyro," she repeated. "Are you," she shrugged, "are you hungry?"

He followed her to a kitchen. There were stores of food in here, enough for a lifetime. He sat down at a table. "So, what are you, like, the Brotherhood mom, or something?"

A smiled played on her green-red lips. "I guess," she said quietly. She opened a can of soup, put it on the stove. Made him a sandwich with butter and jam. Got him a drink of water. Sat opposite him. "There isn't very much for me to do, you see. So, I just do what I can."

He ate the sandwich, he hadn't realized how hungry he was. "What's wrong with you?"

Again she smiled, though his question was rude. "A lot," was the only explanation she gave. The soup boiled and she served it to him in a bowl.

"Thanks," he mumbled. He ate and drank.

"You want a beer?" she asked.

Oh God yes! Suddenly joining the Brotherhood had become completely worth it. "Yeah, sure," Pyro responded. She gave him a beer. A cold, icy beer! "Thanks." Delicious. Better than delicious. He downed it, grateful for it, wanting another. He was given another. "You have one too," he insisted. And she did.

They drank together and Pyro felt strangely happy. He had been almost lonely throughout their journey here. Conversation was sparse and the helicopter was louder than the X-Jet. It made him think how powerful Magneto could be with equipment such as the X-Men possessed. The odds were unfair, on a level. He hoped, with his powers and his rage and his strengths, that he could even out those odds, or at least attempt to.

"So," he said, swallowing, feeling the beer, "what exactly do you do? I mean, opening a can of soup isn't exactly superhuman."

Eden smiled. She took a swig of the beer and finished it. Then she was on the ceiling.

Pyro blinked. He shrugged. "Not bad."

She inched her way along the ceiling and hung upside down in front of him, still smiling. He nodded, impressed, but not taken. She hung there for awhile, her shirt bunching up around her cleavage. Now that was impressive…

"Not bad," he said again. "Anything else?"

The smile widened. Her lips parted, revealing two very long, very white…very sharp fangs. Her face was so close to his that he could see green veins of what might possibly be poison in the teeth and around the gums. He was no longer smiling. Her teeth bared, she opened her mouth, wider than was humanly possible, and a long, thick, narrow, forked black tongue emerged and wrapped itself around his neck.

He didn't move. He couldn't. "I've…got a thing. With snakes," he said quietly. She held him for a minute longer then retracted her tongue and flipped back onto the floor, standing upright.

Pyro remembered he had hands and touched his neck, wet with her saliva. He hadn't liked that at all. Still…a tongue like that could prove useful in other, less frightening, scenarios. "Why haven't I heard of you? Why don't we know about you?"

Eden raised an eyebrow. " 'We?'"? she said. "Who's 'we'?"

Pyro shook his head. "Them. They! The X-Men…why don't they know about you?"

She shrugged. "They aren't looking for me. They don't need to know about me."

"You're a threat to them."

"Am I?" Eden took his plate and bottles, put the plate in the sink and the bottles in a trash bin.

"Well, I'm guessing you're poisonous."

"You guess right," she confirmed. She turned the water on and began to wash his plate.

He got up. "You don't have to do that."

She pulled away from his outstretched arm. "Yes, I do."

Pyro backed away. "Whatever," he muttered, confused, but not unwilling to move. She finished washing up and turned to face him.

"You want a tour?"

He nodded. "Yeah. I do."

"Well, come on then. I'll show you around." They walked through the gaping doorway, carved out of the stone interior of the mountain itself. She turned again. "Pyro," she said.

"What?"

Eden smiled and took his hand. "Welcome home."

The metal balls above his desk ticked back and forth as he let his thoughts wander. They wandered to Charles, the X-Men, his and Mystique's new plans, freshly laid out. They wandered to Pyro, a powerful, new edition to their group, to Eden, whose unexpected presence here made him happier than he thought possible. She was here now, waiting for him to acknowledge her. She was sitting on the ceiling above the entrance.

"Come down, my dear," he beckoned quietly.

She scaled the wall and walked across the floor to him. She sat at his feet and looked up at him. Tears glistened in her eyes.

"What are those for?" he asked, running his fingers through her hair.

"Nothing in particular," she answered, letting them fall. "For you, for me. Mystique...and…"

"And Sabretooth and Toad," he finished for her. He let his hand fall and he lifted her chin up with his fingers. "Don't cry for them. Don't cry at all."

"Yes, sir," she whispered. He wiped the tears away with his thumb and forefinger.

"You've been alone for a long time," he said. "I understand. I've wept myself, when no one was looking. Prison is a strange and lonely place. I suppose this was your prison, in a sense."

"Yes, sir," she said again. "I'm glad I'm not alone anymore."

"I'm sure you are," he said. Magneto watched her. Her thoughts wandered as his did. "What are you thinking about, my dear?"

"Pyro," she answered. "I think he'll do well here."

"You like him?"

She frowned. Shrugging, "Yes," she said. "I think he'll obey orders."

"I think so too," Magneto agreed. "He is vengeful, and vengeance makes one powerful, though, at times, not as easy to control."

Eden looked up at him. "Yours is the path to achieve vengeance."

"Among other things."

"Of course."

He stroked her hair again and observed how it twisted between his fingers and fell against her face. He looked at her eyes, slit-pupils reflecting his gaze. A sense of peace came over him. "Eden, I have decided that you and Pyro shall work together."

Her eyes widened. "Work together? You mean, I'm going on missions?"

Magneto was glad to please her. "Yes."

Eden was speechless for some time. "I don't understand. I thought—"

"Pyro will do the heavy work. He's more than capable. There will be certain tasks, however, that will be more sensitive, less," he grinned, "explosive," he finished, pointedly. "Those tasks will be yours."

"What kind of tasks?"

"All in good time." Magneto smiled down at her. "I'll also need you to keep Pyro in check when Mystique and I are on assignments of our own. You have a calming affect on the more rage filled creatures."

"Anything," she said, "anything you want. I'll do whatever you want."

"I'm counting on that," he said. She took his hand in hers and kissed it. Twice, three times.

"Thank you," she said.

"Go on, now," Magneto said, "get to know our friend better."

She got up and kissed his cheek. She left.

Pyro found himself drawn to an area of the Lair that Eden had called her favorite. The deep black pools and waterfall that drowned almost all sound. Above him were stars such as he'd never seen. The great, cavernous walls were wet with the falls' spray and all around him it was dark and the night was heavy and full. The moon glistened off the walls and the pools, its reflection shuddering with the breeze. It filled him with a sense of awe and a peculiar belonging. The moon there in the deep black water…

"Show me your powers."

He turned at the sound of her voice. She stood on the other side of the pools, wet and dripping. How long had she been swimming there?

He said nothing. He took out his lighter, flicked it and a ball of flame erupted in his hand. The flame grew, he felt the fire in him, around him, like always. It grew and flooded the sky. He shaped it. It twisted and writhed and grew a long body and a snake's head, fangs, tongue and all. He sent it to her. The water caught the orange light and illuminated her.

She felt the heat and stepped back instinctually and he pulled it away, sent it upwards. It crawled across the sky, slithering around the stars and then he wrapped it around the moon. She came to his side, swimming across the water. "It's beautiful," she breathed. He made it seem as though the flame-snake devoured the moon and she gasped and laughed. "Oh!"

He looked at her and the fire was in her eyes as she gazed at it and it made them beautiful. He wanted her to laugh again. Pyro changed the fire into the shape of a cow and made it leap over the moon.

"And the cow jumped over the moon!" she laughed. He did this several times, tried to remember the rest of the rhyme. The dish and spoon…he made them too and they ran away, back into his hand.

She turned her attention to his hand. He made the snake again and it slithered between his fingers. "Fantastic," she said, barely audible over the waterfall. He extinguished the flame. She grabbed his hand and ran her fingers over it, checking for burns. Her fingers stroked his gently as she turned his hand over and examined it.

"It doesn't hurt me," he said.

"Would it hurt me?"

"Yes. Just, not me," he replied. She stopped examining his hand but still held it. She looked up at him, into him, her eyes deep green and violet, the pupils slit, oblong black diamonds. "Your power is amazing," she said to him.

"Thanks."

They stared at each other for some time, but he had to look away. He never looked into peoples' eyes. He had learned not too. It frightened him. It made him feel vulnerable.

"I didn't show you your room!" she said suddenly. "Come on," she got up. "You can come back out here later, if you want. Come have tea with me and I'll show you where you'll sleep."

"Ok."

Pyro didn't drink tea. And he didn't want to go back inside. But he did both that night.

He was happy to do both.

…and somewhere…farther away…a man writhed and screamed…memories of past tortures flooded his consciousness along with pain…the Voice spoke to him and he told it things he would never tell…had sworn not to tell…

…each time he told the Voice one thing, it asked for another….pain…and another….more pain…and another….on and on….and on…

The pain was great…but, not as great as The Toad…I AM THE TOAD…

No…he would not tell the Voice this one thing…no, he would not…

Who do you work for?

NO!

Who is your leader?

NEVER!

Who saved your life? Who? Who?

NO! I WON'T TELL YOU VOICE!

You will, Mortimer. I promise you that. You're wise not to tell me now, though. It's the only thing keeping you alive.