Chapter 3: Origins

Short chapter, but chapter 4 should be longer and I may break it up into two chapters.

**Seven months later**

Wade has been active for a year and a half now and with the help of his sister, Cassandra, he has managed to destroy four of the Facility's bases and be a major pain in their ass. He has also improved on the control of his powers. Now he can run at about Mach three and has much better control over the powers he channels through Olihandrew. He was even taught a few spells by Dr. Strange, not many, but enough to be dangerous. Wade has graduated early, so he can spend more time as Crimson Knight and getting ready to take over as CEO of Prometheus when he turns nineteen. Wade finds himself spending more and more of his time as a national scale hero now that the Atlanta Saints have Atlanta pretty much handled without him. Due to acting on the national scale more and more often Crimson Knight has become quite popular and even has a large fan following across the US and Canada. Even his mutantism speeches are quiet popular even though the message isn't having the effect he had hoped it would on the public as a whole. During this time he has teamed up with the Avengers a few times and even the X-Men once. Wade is currently in LA wrapping up an investigation involving AIM when his cell phone rings.

Wade looks at the screen and sees its Cassandra and answers. "Hey Cass, what's up?"

"Hey Wade, you may want to come home. Beth is here and she has something she wants to talk to you about," Cassandra tells him.

"Our cousin, Beth, okay did she say what she wants to talk about?" Wade asks curiously.

"Yeah Wade, she's a mutant and with you being a supporter of mutant rights and all. I think she wants to just talk it out. Hell, just being a normal kid is hard and now she is a mutant too," Cassandra tells him.

Wade takes a turn into an alley and when he is sure no one sees him he starts running home with his Blitz ability. It doesn't take long for him to get back to where he parked his car and drive the rest of the way home to maintain his cover with his parents and finishes off forging the flight logs and uploading them to the TSA servers. After pulling into the drive way he notices that his parents are not home at the moment. Wade goes into the house and sees no one there, so he heads into his training studio in the backyard. Beth and Cassandra are both there sitting on the floor talking. Beth, a fourteen year old girl with brown hair and green eyes, has a very frantic look about her.

"Hey yall," Wade says with a wave and smile.

"Wade, that was fast. Cassie just called you like an hour ago," Beth says.

"Yeah, well it sounded important, so I wanted to make sure I got here quickly," Wade says and sits down next to the girls. "How long have you known you were a mutant Beth?"

"About a week now, I'm so terrified that if Mimi or anyone else finds out they'll hate me." Beth says reluctantly. "What do you think I should do?"

"Beth I hate to say it, but that may very well happen. It's not unheard of for friends and family to reject someone after coming out as a mutant, but that doesn't mean they will. If they do you are free to stay here. What gift did you get Beth?" Wade asks her.

"More like a curse, but," Beth says as she lifts her hand toward the weights in the corner and they start to levitate before crashing back into the ground. "I can do that to all kinds of things, but I can't control it for very long."

"So you're a telekinetic? Nice, I think I can help you learn how to control it enough for to manage it in everyday life, but that's about it. If you want to master it I can introduce you to some friends, but learning the baseline control is the first step," Wade explains to her.

"How can you teach me how to control it? It seems for far out of reach right now. You should see what I did to my room," Beth asks.

"Meditation should help and martial arts should help maintain focus. I was kind of the opposite from you. I was trained before my powers developed, but maintaining my training has helped me continue to develop them and learn a whole new level of control," Wade tells her with a smile.

"Wait you have powers?" Beth asks surprised.

"Yes, I'm Crimson Knight, now you and Cass are two of a very small group of people that know this secret," Wade tells her.

Over the next two months Wade teaches Beth meditation techniques and martial arts to help her learn how to control her powers. She did come out to her family and, unfortunately, they disowned her and she has moved in with Wade and his family, knowing she was a mutant of course. Even with the training she has little to no control of her telekinetic powers. They have been training in bunker Wade had built to be able to withstand all but the most powerful super beings on the planet. This is where he does most of his training and testing his powers, so it is a perfect place to train Beth and her new powers.

"Hey Wade, why don't we spar and go all out!? I want to see how well I'd do against you," Beth says with a smile.

"How about this, you score two points on me using everything you have and I'll start using my powers. It's a point if my shoulder, knee, or head hits the floor. This is exactly how my master handled this when I pushed for him to fight me all out as well," Wade tells her and walks over to the wall and picks up a bladeless sword to use in the fight.

"Okay, but I won't be holding back," Beth tells him with a smile and her powers flair up as a green aura around her.

Wade readies the sword to fight. Beth fires a telekinetic blast at Wade, which he jumps out of the way of. Beth grabs Wade in the air with her powers. "Smart," Wade tells her reaching into his pocket. He pulls out a small metal ball and throws it at Beth's face. As she catches it she loses focus on Wade and he charges her. Beth pushes the ball right back at Wade, but its small and he easily dodges it. Wade swings the sword at Beth, but she puts up a telekinetic shield to stop Wade's attack. When the sword hits the shield and it stops, Wade spins and sweeps her legs out from under her with a kick, causing her to fall to the ground.

Beth stands up quickly and lifts some objects from around the room with her powers and throws them at Wade. Wade starts dodging them as they come at him jumping and weaving through getting farther away from Beth to avoid getting hit. Wade sees an opening and charges her and hits her with the pummel of the sword.

Beth grabs her face, now with a bloody nose, and then brings her hands to her side with an angry look on her face. "DAMNIT! WHY CAN'T I HIT YOU!?" she screams and pushes both her hands toward Wade sending a huge wave of telekinetic energy at him. Wade instinctively jumps back to avoid the physical strike, but is hit by the wave sending him and everything else in front of Beth flying. Wade manages to flip and land on his feet by bracing himself with both hands. He skids pretty far on the ground before he stops, but he was clearly damaged by the sheer force of the blast. Wade's shirt is tore up a bit and his arms and face is dripping with blood.

"Oh god! Are you okay Wade?" Beth says running over to him.

"Yeah, I think that's a point," Wade tells her with a chuckle. "So that was unexpected. You might be the second strongest telekinetic I've seen. I think I need to introduce you to some people."

"Of course I am. I'm awesome remember?" Beth says with a smile. "But are you okay? Oh and are you ready to fight me seriously now?"

"There was a reason I didn't use my powers Beth. You saw how I was avoiding your attacks and made you drop me by throwing a small metal ball at you?" Wade asks Beth as he sits down on the floor.

"Yeah I saw it, what about it?" Beth asks sitting down as well.

"Master Osen told me this while I was training Beth, "Using your powers is fine, but don't ever think that your powers make you stronger than you are without them." Then he beat my ass as I used my powers against him while he wasn't using his. I can still see him standing there telling that. He is everything I inspire to be," Wade tells her. "He was the one that saw I had the potential of developing a soulforge and decided to train me. Of course I wanted the life as a hero with or without powers, so most of my training came before my powers even developed. Starting that kind of training at eight wasn't easy and the cost of having a soulforge is a pain in the ass sometimes, but I can live with it and the benefits far outweigh the price I have paid for it." He tells her with a smile

"So you trained with him for seven years and he taught you all of this?" Beth asks.

"Yeah, he taught me strategy, tactics, to many swordsmanship and martial arts styles to count, critical thinking and problem solving skills, the Uberman sleep schedule, deduction and crime scene investigation, and a few other things plus what I learned on my own," Wade tells her. "I owe him so much. I have very few regrets so far in my life."

"You know you aren't old at all right?" Beth tells him.

"I know, let's get cleaned up then get something to eat," Wade tells her.

"Okie dokie," Beth says hopping to her feet.

"You are way to chipper you know that?" Wade says getting up and dusting himself off.

"What? I love my life," Beth says with a smile. "And who are the people you want me to meet?"

"The X-Men, or more accurately the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. They'll be opening their doors in a few weeks. I think it would be a good place for you to learn about your new abilities," Wade tells her. "I'd like to take you their tomorrow to meet the new headmaster and headmistresses."

"Alright, sounds fun," Beth says.

The next day Wade uses his blitz ability to get himself and Beth to the Xavier Institute. The mansion is still under construction from the destruction caused by the attack led by Magneto, in the guise of Xorn, and his Brotherhood.

"Wow, this place is so cool," Beth says looking around at the school.

"Yeah, a lot of these students have nowhere else to go, this place is the only home they have now," Wade tells her. "Let's find Scott or Emma. They'll be inside the school. It looks like most of school is complete."

"Okay, let's go," Beth says.

Wade and Beth enter the mansion and see Scott Summers, Cyclops, talking to Henry "Hank" McCoy. Both turn and see Wade and Beth enter the mansion. Hank and Scott both walk over to greet them.

"Wade it's good to see you again," Scott says extending his hand.

"Likewise Scott," Wade says shaking his hand. "This is Beth, my cousin, I told you about. I'm hoping you can help her."

"Ummm hello, my name is Beth Burgess it's nice to meet you," Beth says and extends her hand nervously glancing over at the big blue and furry cat-like man.

"It's nice to meet you. I am Scott Summers and this is Dr. Hank McCoy, though you may know us better as Cyclops and Beast. I believe you are a telekinetic?" Scott says and shakes her hand.

"Truly a pleasure Beth," Hank says and shakes Beth's hand after Scott.

"Yes, I've only known that I was a mutant for a few months. I don't have too much control over it," Beth tells him.

"I think we can help you with that. We have another telekinetic student starting here as well. We'll need to see the limits of your powers first," Scott tells her.

"Um okay, where too?" Beth asks.

"The Danger Room," Hank says with a smile.

Wade and Beth follow Hank and Scott as the led them downstairs into the underground base of the X-Men and to the Danger Room itself. Beth enters the actual room while Wade, Scott, and Hank go to observation room above.

"Ms. Burgess, we will be monitoring the entire situation from here in case of an emergency, but please show us what you are capable of. We are going to raise the difficulty incrementally," Hank tells her over the speakers.

"Okay," Beth says as the first training target spawns holographically and it opens a canon from one of its arms. Beth throws a telekinetic blast at the target sending it flying into a wall. Three more spawn and one of them charges her with sword arms while the other two fire energy blasts at her. Beth flies up in the air and picks up the two ranged targets telekinetically. She smashes the two together and sends the remains into the last target with the sword arms. Beth continues fighting targets with increasing difficulty until it is her and a very heavily armed robot about ten feet tall with more firepower than a tank. It fires a large energy canon rapidly at her. Beth puts up a barrier to stop the blasts, but as each one hits it seems as though the barrier will break with the next hit, but she holds it together. She screams and falls to a knee. Hank goes to shut down the program, but the entire danger room explodes in a green flash. When Scott and Hank go down into the Danger Room, the entire room is trashed and offline. Beth is on the floor, asleep.

Wade follows Scott and Hank into the Danger Room. "So now you see what she is capable of. Can you help her? I have no idea how to help her control this. None of my mental training can help her with this."

"Yes I think we can," Scott tells him. "We have another very powerful telekinetic here. He has mental barriers in place to limit how much power he outputs. I think we'll need to put those safeguards on her too," Scott says looking around at the Danger Room.

"Thank you Scott," Wade tells him. "Please look after her. I wonder if she'll want to be an X-Man?" He asks smirking.

"I'll take care of her I promise and if she wants to be an X-Man that'll be entirely up to her," Scott says picking Beth up.

They go to the medical room where Hank and Wade stay behind to look after Beth, while Scott leaves to attend other business. Wade and Hank talk about the last time they worked together, back before Xorn trashed the school was trashed and killed Jean Grey-Summers. Beth wakes up after about two hours and finds Wade seemingly enjoying a conversation with Hank.

"That's strange, you actually seem like you are having fun Wade," Beth says drowsily.

"I enjoy conversation sometimes, beside Hank is a rare individual," Wade tells her with a smile.

"Did I pass?" Beth asks sitting up.

"My dear, it was never a test you could fell, but you did destroy the Danger Room, so you did exceed expectations," Hank says. "Now would you like anything? A drink perhaps?"

"No thank you," Beth says. "When is orientation?"

"Orientation is in three weeks my dear and Emma and Scott are both forming a team of students this year. Those teams will be confirmed in about three months," Hank tells Beth.

"Good then I have time to make a good impression and get on one of those teams!"

"Do whatever you think is best Beth. I'll support you whatever way you choose to go," Wade tells her. "Not that you need it. You'll be fine without it."