A/N: This is the last chapter of this volume, but Volume 37, "Not Your Fault," will be up on Canucklehead Cowgirl's profile very soon!

Chapter 17: "No Means No"

When Chance got back to Canada, he was thrilled about the prospect of getting in more flight time — but also a little sad to be back when he'd had two weeks with his family. He and Charlie had their birthday party, as usual, and now it was back to the daily grind instead of horseriding in the snow and helping Kade set up mistletoe so he could "kiss bomb" all of the adults, as he called it.

He had just finished hanging the picture James had given him — a gorgeous framed picture of the full junior X-Men team in action, including Cody, so it must have been recent — when Oliver stopped by.

"Homesick?" he asked, tipping his head toward the picture. "Already?"

"Hey, it was a good break," Chance said with a smile.

"Must have been," Oliver agreed. "Mine was good, too — we went ice fishing."

"Aw, man, I love that," Chance said with a grin.

"Well, it was nice not to have any homework. I don't know how you do all this and two teams."

"Hey, I don't know how you do this and do that design work. Have you shown your mom have those sketches?"

"Mom's not big on architecture."

"Yeah, but they're great," Chance pointed out as the two of them headed down to class together - no rest for the wicked, so to speak; plus, Chance had pretty much cut it as close as he could so that he could spend as much time as possible in Westchester.

Thankfully, Chance had a better schedule for his last semester than he had the previous one. He was cutting down as much as he could so that he had time to be on two teams and fly and go to practices and do important things like sleep.

He didn't quite get the chance to appreciate the lighter schedule on his first day, though, because once more, he had to go to the liaison's office — though at least this time, he'd expected it. Mr. Box had said last time that once the suit was all set, they'd want to go over the job contract for the team. And seeing as he was eighteen now, he could be on the team without the legal ramifications of him being a minor in danger.

So, he headed to the office in what was perhaps the naive hope that this would be an easy and fast visit. He'd just want to read through the thing and sign up — make sure it was the two-year paid contract and that everything was squared away with his work visa, that sort of thing.

Which was, for the most part, how it started out — with some paperwork and such ahead of the contract itself, since his eighteenth birthday had changed a few things now.

"I trust you had a restful break?" Box said, shuffling paperwork as Chance came into his office.

"Not so much restful as fun, but yeah, more or less," Chance said with a smile.

"Isn't that the same thing for young people your age?"

Chance grinned as he sat down. "Well, yeah," he had to agree. "What about you? Happy holidays — or I guess, whatever you celebrate… I don't mean to assume."

"You're perfectly fine, Mr. Summers. I don't celebrate any holidays anymore," Box replied before he gestured to the papers. "And besides … all of that's behind us now."

Chance nodded. "Right, yeah, back to business and all that," he said. "So, sign on the dotted line, right? Two years with Alpha Flight, all that."

"That is the gist of it," Box agreed.

"Great." Chance pulled the contract over to look over it — since; as excited as he was, he also wasn't stupid, and he wanted to make sure there wasn't some clause in there that would extend his stay longer than two years somehow. But it was all there, like he expected. The suit, the team — he nodded to himself and then pushed the signed contract Box's way. "You know, I was kind of expecting more confetti," he said with a smirk, mostly under his breth. "Anything else?"

"Since you asked — yes, likely. You'll need to see Mr. Horton and make arrangements on the details on whatever he deems necessary."

"Oh, alright," Chance said, nodding. "I thought we did all the administrative stuff already, though."

"Oh, it's not administrative," Box replied, resting his hands on the top of the desk. "It's more to do with the dispensary."

Chance frowned, his head tipped slightly as if he was trying to listen a little better. "The dispensary," he said evenly after a long time.

Box watched him for a moment with a furrowed brow. "Yes. Best to tie up those loose ends quickly, Mr. Summers."

Chance took a deep breath and then settled his shoulders. "Listen," he said slowly. "Forgive me if I'm reading this wrong; I'd hate to assume this kind of thing. But I'm well-aware of the fact that there's a supply of boost on this campus, and I'm not an idiot. I'm not touching that stuff." He sat up a little straighter. "I came out here to prove I could be a hero on my own. No powers. No family connections. If you didn't want a human kid on the team, you should have been straight with me from the start, but I'm not going to have artificial powers."

"Young man, this is simply a step in the process, and that particular determination is not up to me."

"Well, it's not up to Horton, either," Chance said evenly. "I'm not doing it. So let's just skip that 'step'."

He waved a hand impatiently. "Welcome to the team — and the bureaucracy — you'll still need to speak with him before you can go for your flight training."

"Fine," Chance said. "Then that's where I'm headed next — unless you have something else you want to spring on me?"

"It was all in the papers," Box said.

Chance shook his head. "That's not what I asked."

He paused and took a moment to meet his gaze and take him in. "No, I don't believe so."

"I read everything; there's nothing in there about a requirement for powers or boost or anything like that, and that's what I'm telling Horton, so unless you have something else you'd like to have an exercise in futility with me over…" Chance gestured to the door.

"Have a nice day, Mr. Summers."

Chance shook his head at that and simply headed for the door, falling into a glare all the way down to Horton's office — which he was only going to do to get this over with so he could get back to flying with Mac. And as soon as Horton invited him in, he tried to pull back the glare — though not that hard, admittedly.

"Box said I had to see you."

"Yes, please, have a seat. It's long overdue that we chatted."

Chance watched the suited man for a long time before he did so. "I have to tell you, right up front: I'm not going to go along with any drug program."

Horton watched him for a long moment. "Even without hearing what we can offer you?"

"I don't want it," Chance said. "The whole point of joining Alpha Flight was to prove to the world that I could do this without family connections, without powers — just me."

"And you have," he pointed out. "And now that you have, we're offering you the chance to expand your horizons and the effectiveness of what you already know."

Chance shook his head. "No. I know what this stuff does; I know what it can do."

"You know what it does to mutants, you mean," Horton said.

But Chance shook his head again. "All due respect, I don't care if it's different for humans. I have been training to be a hero since I was five, and if that's not good enough for you, then you're just going to have to get used to disappointment."

Horton smiled tightly and nodded his head once. "If you find that you're having trouble, please come and see me."

Chance got to his feet. "And when this is all said and done and I've rocked the Alpha Flight look for two years drug-free, please feel free to apologize," he said shortly before he strode out.

As soon as Chance was well and gone, Horton reached under the edge of his desk and hit a hidden button and waited for his liaison to appear.

"That was fast," Jamie said as she made her way over to sit down.

"He's being stubborn," Horton said once she was comfortable. "Do whatever you need to do."

She broke into a broad smile at that and nodded. "What would you like?"

"A higher dependency rate than usual, I think."

She nodded thoughtfully. "I should be able to do that, though that's usually for the more obvious powers."

"Slightly augmented strength and speed would be beneficial as well."

She nodded again. "I can make it gradual, so it looks like he's just hitting a stride on his own."

"Yes, make him think he's doing it himself," Horton agreed.

Her eyes were sparkling as she leaned forward. "I can do it, but I want to make a request: I get to be the one to tell him when you decide it's time to cash in on the dependency."

Horton weighed it out for a moment before he nodded curtly. "Done."

She grinned brilliantly and got to her feet to offer him her hand. "Within eight weeks," she said, "he'll be so dependent even the weekend trips will be rough. He won't be able to function without us."

"Excellent. The sooner he cuts his ties down south, the sooner we can move on."

Chance, meanwhile, was still fuming as he headed down to the workshop to meet up with Mac — which was clearly not what Mac had expected to see, considering Chance had been so excited to fly when he saw him last.

"Woah, who got on your bad side?" Mac asked, peeking up at him from the workbench.

"Pretty much the whole liaison's office," Chance said, his eyes still narrowed.

"Oh. Pencil pushers'll do that to you."

"They wanted to put me on boost, Mac," Chance bit out angrily, shaking his head to himself as he stopped in front of his own suit and stared at it. "I don't want it. I don't need it."

"What? Why ... " Mac shook his head. "That … doesn't sound right."

"Yeah, well, it isn't," Chance muttered.

"Who was it?" Mac said, looking serious — and honestly like he was ready to go kick someone.

Chance glanced up at him and let out a breath. "Box and Horton teamed up with some line about reaching higher potential or whatever," he said, waving a hand angrily.

"Yeah … I'll look into it, but I don't think you'd need that … I … yeah, who needs powers anyhow?"

"Apparently, I still do," Chance bit out, arms crossed as he settled into a real glare and sat down on the workbench.

"Yeah, I don't think so, kiddo."

"You know that, and I know that," Chance said, gesturing between himself and Mac. "But I swear, this is exactly what I came out here to put a stop to and I just — there's nothing wrong with me!" he said, his tone rising with the color in his cheeks.

Mac smirked up at him from where he was still seated. "Nothing at all," he agreed. "So … you wanna vent or do you wanna go kick the crap out of someone?"

"I'm not gonna lie: I really wanna kick the crap out of someone."

"Well, let's start with testing out your lasers," Mac said with a laugh. "I'm sure it'll help right now."

Chance almost smirked at that. "Yeah… if this was my brother, there'd be a hole in the wall, I'm not gonna lie."

"And now you have some on your wrists … or you will once you suit up."

"No, I know, it's just…" He smirked at last and shook his head. "Seems like a family thing. Get mad, get the lasers involved. I mean, mine are actually lasers, but — you know."

"Yeah, I just didn't see it until just now," Mac laughed.

"They pissed me off, Mac, what did you think I was gonna do when I got mad?" Chance asked. "My mom's worse."

Mac was laughing outright by that time though, shaking his head with one hand over his stomach.

"Hey, I'm serious," Chance said, though he was starting to smile too. "She wins arguments at home, man."

But that had Mac in tears, trying hard not to completely lose his composure, even though he was close.

Chance shook his head at that. "Okay, okay, come on. You said something about lasers."

Mac looked up with a grin and waved toward where Chance's suit was kept. "Let's go blow things up."

Box — whose real name was Jerome Jaxon, but he wasn't going to give that name to anyone affiliated outside of Weapon X, no matter how naive the Summers boy seemed to be in matters of the department — barely looked up when the door opened to admit Horton. He saw in only a second how annoyed Horton looked and then turned back to his files.

"I take it the meeting didn't go according to plan," Box said dryly.

"When does it ever?" Horton asked in a tone that conveyed how inconvenienced he was by Chance Summers going against his plans. "It's just like the last time around. Anytime we've stepped in to deal with the bureaucracy of governmental politics and military advances, some upstart has to get all … moral. As if anyone gives a damn about heroes." He huffed and tossed the file folder on the desk in front of himself. "He'll get over it. And he'll get on board. One way or another."

"I should hope so," Box replied. "We've put a lot of money into this one based on several recommendations. I'm surprised, frankly, that the boy's public interest levels are so high. Seems to be an oddity to the public that his old man didn't toss him out when he didn't come up with an x-gene. We can make use of that. Though it would be better if we could discredit the old man first. Rescuing an abused human from a mutant family would play better in the press."

"That could prove difficult," Horton said slowly. "But I'll see what we can do. What's more interesting is how much he knows."

Box looked up, more interested whenever the conversation turned to intelligence of any kind. He was constantly on the lookout for leaks and spies, and to be frank, he hadn't trusted the Summers boy's interest in the Canadian program at all. "What does he know?"

"Nothing about us," Horton swore, holding one hand up in front of him, though he was smiling crookedly to himself. "It appears we were right all along. The X-Men have been using our wayward weapons to build up their own little army. They've been using X and K to train the young mutants that go through their 'school'."

"That confirmed?" Box asked, already clearing his desk off so he could let his fidgeting habit roam freely, one hand already tapping out a specific pattern one finger at a time.

"The Summers kid keeps bragging about what they trained him to do — and he certainly has some positive markers that each of them had engrained into their programming. There's no way he'd have learned that on his own. He had to have picked it up from them."

"Was the training forced? Or did X and K teach him voluntarily?" Box asked. "We need to know these things. If the X-Men found a way to make those two work … I want to know how before we recover our investments."

"The plan I'd like to propose will involve finding out exactly what Mr. Summers knows about them, about how they're getting the two Howletts to cooperate, the details on their security, what other mutants we can sequester from their stronghold … all of which can be done while we use him for our PR campaign."

"Just make sure that when we burn the X-Men's reputation to where it belongs, he doesn't take us with him," Box warned. "And if you don't keep a separation between us and the Summers boy, it'll be your head on the chopping block. Not mine."

"Understood."