"Wha..."
Around 4:20 AM, Kitty slowly started to wake up. Her vision was still fuzzy ever since some... thing... stung her neck on the way to the movie theatre.
"...what the hell...? Where am I...? Wh-what is this...?"
Despite her vision still being blurry, she could already see what was in front of her, but not where she is yet. She realized that she was lying on a white floor, in a mysterious room, and two large lights illuminating the part she is in; her arms were bound with duct tape and she spotted someone approaching her view: the mysterious man, who attacked her and Lance hours ago, crawling towards her with a camera.
"Wh-who is this freak...? What the hell does he want from me...?"
Kitty noticed that she was still wearing her dark blue jeans, and pieced together that her clothes are still intact.
"You look so... innocent, you know? Just like my previous victims." The man spoke in a disturbingly soft voice as he took pictures in front of the girl. "And those silly students I used to teach back in Blackwell before that fucking storm hit the place..."
"What is this guy even talking about...?" Kitty thought to herself. She felt the camera flash constantly in front of her face.
"This angle definitely shows your sweet, innocent face. You seem to be... gifted to have that sort of face." The man continued in his calming voice.
Kitty tried to squirm, to break free, or even phase, but it did not work out.
"Kitty Pryde! Fuck you! You're ruining my shot!" The man suddenly erupted in anger in front of the girl, making her freeze in surprise.
"Perfectionist much...?" Kitty thought to herself. "How did he even know my name...? Why can't I even use my powers...?"
"Hold on. Let me try from this angle." The man went back to his calm face and left Kitty's peripheral vision, to move to another part of Kitty lying on the floor.
Kitty barely felt her legs, which were not bound, being moved around by the man.
"You know. You remind me so much of one of my former students at Blackwell. She had an amazing gift, her purity and her... selfies. God I still hate that fucking word." The man continued speaking as she took more photos of Kitty from more angles, scoffing at the word "selfies."
Kitty tried her hardest to widen her eyes as she realized who the man was talking about.
"...M-Max...?" The girl whimpered. She could hardly speak due to her dry throat.
"Yes! That's it! Max Caulfield! Oh how I missed her so much!" The man faked happiness after he heard the name in a long time.
"Guess what, Kitty. She was supposed to be my next target, after I did all of this to that friend of hers, Kate Marsh, when she got drunk at that Vortex Club party two years ago." The man recalled the events from last year. "Yes. I still remember that fateful day."
"Wh-where's...?" Ignoring the man's speech, Kitty started to panic and tried to look around for Lance.
"I said stop moving, Kitty!" The man held her down again. "Thank you!"
"Gee.. What a bastard!" Kitty muttered in her thoughts.
"Oh, and don't worry about your little... boyfriend... Lance, I believe? He's still here, passed out..." The guy pointed at the opposite side of the room, which was unlit, but Kitty could barely see Lance, indeed passed out on the other corner of the room.
"At least he is safe from all this crap." Kitty silently was relieved that Lance was not awake.
Overtime, Kitty felt the substances in her body wearing out, and she started becoming more and more conscious of what's happening around her. However, she still couldn't move her arms, or try phasing again, so she tried to freely move around again.
"SHUT UP AND STAY STILL, WOULD YOU!?" The man forcefully held her down again. "YOU ARE NOT RUINING ANY MORE OF MY SHOTS! UNDERSTAND!?"
"NO...!" Kitty had the courage to fight back.
With her consciousness growing again, she used the opportunity to kick a nearby trolley placed beside her, spilling bottles of drugs the man used to inject Lance and Kitty onto his previous photos of the two.
"FUCK! FUCK YOU, PRYDE!" The man exploded yet again. "YOU DESTROYED MY PHOTOS!"
"So what!?" Kitty snapped back.
"Don't talk to me like that, young lady! You need another dose. Hopefully, Pryde. This time, it will fucking shut you up for real." The man yelled as he prepared a syringe with the remaining bottle.
"Now... hold. Fucking. Still." The man forcefully held her down for the last time as he injected the girl with his drugs again.
The last Kitty ever felt was the man injecting her in the neck again, knocking her out for the second time. But it wasn't the last Kitty ever heard.
"And as for your friend..."
She faintly heard a click of a gun and the sound of a gunshot, along with a faint flash from the her vision.
"...Lance... n-no...!" Kitty's voice squeaked as she lost consciousness.
The morning later, Lance found himself in the Brotherhood house. He was lying down on the couch in the living room.
"Man... my head... it felt like a bizarre dream..." Lance rubbed his throbbing head as woke up.
"Hey. Look who's finally up." Wanda spoke up, sitting at a stool beside the couch. Toad, Fred, and Pietro were also in the room with Wanda.
"H-how did I get here- Aghh!" Lance also asked, before his head in pain again as he tried to sit up.
"Hey. Easy now, pal! I just patched you up!" Pietro assisted Lance when he wanted to sit down. The white-haired mutant did a somewhat... sloppy effort with patching the boy as his bandage didn't really wrap around his forehead neatly.
"We saw you at the front door all passed out and with that nasty bruise on your head a couple of hours ago. I take it was a crazy night?" Toad asked.
"I don't- W-what are you talking about...?" Lance was perplexed.
"Man, you don't remember? That movie night you told us yesterday!" Fred said.
"Oh right. Well..." Lance cleared his throat. "Kitty and I were about to go watch a movie and..." Lance realized what he was talking about. "Oh shit..."
"KITTY!" The memory of Kitty falling unconscious near the theater right before he did triggered in Lance's head. Covered in adrenaline, he ignored his headache and immediately ran out of the Brotherhood house to find Kitty. "I have to go!"
"Wait! Lance-!" The Brotherhood tried to stop the brunette boy, but he already ran out the door.
In a panic, Lance ran back to the jeep to drive back to the movie theater, where he and Kitty last were.
"Come on! Come on!" Lance said as he tried to start his jeep only for it to run out of gas. "Are you serious!? Now what!?"
Then an idea sparked in his head. "Hang on. Maybe Xavier knows where she is!"
He went through his idea of running instead to the Xavier Institute, even if it was a few miles away.
The Xavier Institute was in a panicked frenzy, after Kitty didn't return hours ago. All of the residents, including the new additions Max Caulfield and Chloe Price, started searching for the young girl within the Institute grounds.
"This is just crazy, Chloe. I can't believe this shit is happening again!" Max was with Chloe at one of the hallways of the mansion.
"Hey. Don't start with that deja vu crap, okay Max? I know what you're thinking about." The two girls stopped midway as Max started panicking.
"I just can't help it, you know? We've been here with Kitty for nearly a year and for her to just disappear one night like that? I don't want another Rachel or Kate in this life! What if-" The haunting memories of finding the truth about Kate Marsh and Rachel Amber played in Max's mind again.
"Stop that, Max! I thought you've worked with the Professor over this!" Chloe got Max back to her senses.
"Ever heard of PTSD, Chloe? Like what your step-"
"I know what that means, Max!" Chloe interrupted Max, then sighed. "I've just learned to move the fuck on."
"You have no idea how hard it is for me to do just that. Especially since I was the cause of... all that shit that happened last year. And I don't want to be reminded of that again!" The two continued walking, this time completely silent as they roamed the mansion.
Kurt, and Jean were out in the city to find Kitty there, with Kurt teleporting around and Jean telekinetically scanning the area from the rooftop of one building.
"Jean. Anything?" Kurt asked Jean.
"I don't know, Kurt. I've scanned the whole city. Somehow, something's preventing me from entering Kitty's mind! That's why I can't find her!" Jean explained.
"Great! What do we do now?"
"Hang on. Someone's coming to the Institute. It's Lance! We have to go back!" The redhead picked up someone approaching the Institute.
The two teleported back to the mansion.
Meanwhile, Scott was still in the mansion with the Professor.
"What do you mean you couldn't find them through Cerebro!?" Scott was arguing with Professor Xavier outside the Cerebro room.
"Neither Lance nor Kitty have used their powers within the past few hours, Scott." Charles explained to the young man.
"There's no way either of them could just stop using their powers like that, Prof! I mean, what if Lance-" Scott grew more and more worried.
"We have no proof it could be Lance, Scott! For all we know, they just... disappeared and chose not to use their abilities just yet."
"Or what if someone or something just deactivated their powers somehow...?" Scott thought of something else.
The other mutants were searching for Kitty outside the mansion. Bobby, Sam, and Amara were around the gates when they heard Lance come nearby.
"Lance!" Bobby was the first to notice the boy.
"What happened to you!?" Amara noticed the bandage on his head.
"Hey!" Lance ran up to the gates, exhausted. "Is Kitty there?"
The three mutants just shook their heads.
"No. We were just looking for her." Sam spoke up.
All Lance could do was gasp in horror.
So. What's gonna happen next? Find out in the next chapter coming soon!