The Warrior with No Name
By: The Odd Little Turtle
(Characters are Marvel's. This is a work of fan fiction.
Thanks everyone who has been following this thing so far.
A few explanations ahoy. I believe this has been my longest chapter. Input welcomed.)
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I shouldn't say things like that about Kitty. She is the light to the darkness that has been in my heart since I lost Zilya.
David knew it. I want to believe that Evie knew it as well. I miss not being able to ask her for advice.
Damn David. Damn him for using Zilya against me. I will never forgive him for that. At least Kitty was there with me. I have been meaning to speak with Kitty about it in greater detail, but she has been busy. Illyana has turned to her to help her adjust.
Illyana.
I could have lost my little sister to whatever demons she faced in her Limbo, and I would have never known. I would have blamed David for her permanent disappearance. He is a bastard. Illyana has already threatened to feed him to the N'agarai.
I have chosen not to question her ability to control the N'agarai demons.
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The smell of freshly sown wheat tickled his nose as he inhaled a great lungful of air. Piotr blinked. That hadn't been what he had smelled before. Wasn't there smoke? There was some kind of fire. It was daylight. He looked up at the blue sky. A few white wisps of clouds glided overhead, blocking the noon sun, casting shadows on the pastures and farming fields. Wasn't there danger? Where was—Home.
Piotr blinked once again, thick-lashed eyelids slipping down over his blue eyes in rapid succession. Home? Wasn't that in an apartment in the city? No, this was his motherland. This was Russia. How was--?
His breath caught in his throat. By the White Wolf. He couldn't swallow for the lump that was his beating heart. So he simply stood there—wearing baggy denim overalls, no shirt, worn steel-toed boots, leather work gloves, and a Gatsby cap to protect his head from the sun—in the middle of the potato patch, leaning on the hoe, and took in the collective farm's sights.
Each field (potato, wheat, turnip, rye and barley) was sectioned off by wooden fences. Men, women and the older children worked the collective fields getting their minimum required days or risked being sent to the Gulag. The black smithy was nestled further back into the woods, and beyond the woods was the federal road to the coal mine and also to Irkutsk, though only those with passports were allowed to travel there. Piotr felt lucky that he was one of the few in the Collective that possessed one since his older brother had been chosen for the space program.
The collective's wooden houses were in neat rows, some along the edge of the river, others closer to the farming fields, and some built along the edge of the forest. Each house sat on an acre of land and each house having its own private garden for food as everything grown in the collective fields had to be sold to Mother Russia. Some families had a small chicken coop, others had a small stable with a cow for milking, and still others had goats or pigs behind fences. There was a central area that kept the collective's livestock, a chicken coop, and large barn that held the workers' machinery. Beyond the fields, the houses, and single government building, the Kuda River lapped at its bank as it made its way to the Angara from Lake Baikal. From where he stood, Piotr could hear the great saws at the lumber mill at the Kuda's edge.
Children under the age of ten or deemed by the State too small or young to work, played near the little school house, but there seemed to be something wrong with that idea. Then he dismissed the notion. Illyana was fifteen. She was probably working one of the fields today. He hoped she wasn't off goofing around with that damn boy. What was his name again? Sam? They both had quotas as well as he did. He did his best to provide for the State.
Beyond the battered fence of the potato field, one of the collective workers, Johnny Storm, drove a tractor with a trailer, while his comrade, Ben Grimm, walked along and stabbed sown wheat stalks with a pitchfork and filled the trailer. They both wore denim overalls and work boots. Ben wore a big straw hat on his large orange head. Johnny had a New York Yankees baseball cap on backwards.
There was something strange about the sight before him, but, for the life of him, Piotr couldn't image what. It was a normal daily phenomenon. They were his neighbors. Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm always fought over who navigated the slow moving tractor. He shouldn't worry about it. So his face split into a smile as he observed the two arguing men.
"It's my turn to drive," Ben insisted loudly over the tractor's sputtering engine, as he walked, pitchfork in hand, next to lumbering machine. "You got to last time. And the time before that. And the time before that. And the time—"
"Reed's in the barn refurbishing that other one, Grimm," Johnny hollered back. "You can drive it after he finishes that one."
Ben nodded, stopping to fork wheat into the trailer. He came to an abrupt halt as what Johnny said actually registered. "Now, waitaminnit, Matchstick." He jogged up beside Johnny. "I'm gonna drive that one when he gets done with it."
That started a whole new dispute, and Piotr laughed at his neighbors. He shook his head and got back to digging potatoes. He had just sunk his hoe into the ground when a familiar voice yelled from further away and behind him. Turning, Piotr's breath caught for a reason he could not identify as he saw the source of the voice. Didn't he live in the city? Which city? There was a fire in the city. Two fires, as a matter of fact. Was that why he had come home? When had he come home? Was this his home?
"Papa!" his daughter called happily as she ran from their house and into the potato field, her long yellow-gold hair flaring behind her, her green eyes big and bright. The little girl wore a red jumper with a white short sleeved top and little brown boots on her feet. She was out of breath by the time she reached him, and he scooped her up with a smile, her slight weight a miracle in his arms.
"Zilya?" he asked tentatively. This wasn't right. He kept his face a happy smile as he looked into his five-year-old daughter's eyes. She smiled back at him. His heart sped up.
"Mama says it's lunchtime," she announced. He wondered absently why he thought she may speak in Russian, but dismissed the thought. He and his wife only spoke English around her. Didn't they? She pointed to the sky above them. "The sun is straight up. And don't wear your boots in the house. Mama says that's a no-no."
His dismay grew, but he kept his voice light and good-natured as he held on to the tiny girl. "She said that, did she?" Zilya should not be here. Zilya never saw the Mother Land.
"Uh-huh." Zilya nodded, her yellow-gold curls bouncing, and kicked a little for her father to set her back down. What on earth is going on? He put her down and followed her to the nearest house determined to find out. Wet laundry hung on the clothes line in the back next to a small garden. He could see the great heads of cabbages that looked ready to be harvested. The wooden cottage had a small porch with a two person bench. The front door and windows were open to let the summer breeze in as it didn't have air conditioning. Canary-yellow curtains blew in the gentle breeze as did the oil lamp on the hook on the porch. There was one pair of smallish boots sitting beside the door. Zilya was already sitting on the colorful rug and tugging off her boots.
"No boots in the house," she reminded him and waited with a child's patience as he stepped onto the porch, stripping off his work gloves. He sat on the bench, placed the gloves beside him, and dutifully removed his mud-caked shoes. "Hurry, Papa! I'm hungry!"
He laughed, wished desperately that this was real. This couldn't be real. It has to be a dream. "What is on the menu today, Dewdrop?"
"Mama burned the borsch," she whispered loudly, holding her hand to her face as though someone might overhear. The little golden-haired girl's brilliant green eyes darted left and right before she continued, "she had to make kosher tuna sandwiches instead."
He blinked. His wife couldn't cook? He thought Anya cooked quite well. But then something told him he was angry with Anya, and he suddenly lost his appetite. He didn't want Anya to be here. She had betrayed him. She had taken Zilya from him. Hadn't she?
A brunette appeared in his mind's eye.
Katya. Where is—
"Come on, Papa." His daughter tugged on his arm. "Mama will get mad."
He didn't budge. "Dewdrop, what color hair does Mama have?"
"More school?" she asked in distaste, wrinkling her stub nose at him. Piotr waited patiently, unlacing and taking off his other boot. He wrinkled his nose at the smell of his feet. This was the strangest dream he had ever had. "Mama has brown hair with curls like me. Her eyes are what she calls hazel. When she's mad they turn dark. When she is happy they are light. They're kind of spooky when she's sad."
Not Anya. Anya had yellow-gold hair and green eyes. Zilya took after her mother. So who was—
"Kitty? Katya?" he called into the house as an experiment. Kitty walked out onto the porch, confusion etched onto her face, the midday light catching the green and gold flecks in her odd-colored eyes. She looked him up and down, studied his overalls, his shoulders, his face, his feet. Her eyes darted back to his. His gaze brushed her face, and then he studied her just as openly. Her curls were up in a messy twist tied with a pink ribbon. She wore a white, pink and green button up sleeveless shirt that accentuated her breasts and gray Capri pants that hugged her hips and exposed her delicate ankles and just enough of her tanned legs to entice him. Her feet were bare save the hot pink nail polish on her toenails.
"Peter?"
He inhaled the country air. "Is this a trick?" he wondered aloud.
"Probably," she admitted, though she still seemed confused as she looked around the porch and to the fields beyond. "First, I'm at Xavier's having a discussion with my late fiancé and some trampy fairy, and now I'm here. On a farm." Her gaze wandered back to his. "With you. Where ever here happens to be. There's no microwave here." She looked down at Zilya, looked truly perplexed. The little girl smiled up at her, and for a split second, Kitty looked fearful, but she took back control of her facial expression and returned the child's smile with a grin of her own. Piotr's heart thudded in his chest.
"Oh, and whatever was cooking when I got here is thoroughly scalded. Beet stew or something."
Piotr nodded, indicated Zilya. "You've already been properly tattled on," he smirked. "Borsch. You are in the Ust-Ordynsky Collective in Siberia. In my mind, I think," he added.
"Stranger things have happened," Kitty conceded with a shrug. He had to laugh at that, remembering his time with the X-men. "I expected Siberia to be… a little colder." She frowned slightly when Zilya hugged her legs.
"Are the sandwiches done, Mama?" the little girl inquired. Kitty blinked a few times. She looked like she wanted to cry. Piotr felt like he would join her if she did. This is how it should have been, he thought. He averted his face when his vision blurred, rubbed the back of his hand across his eyes.
"Sure, kiddo. They're on the kitchen island."
Zilya bounced into the house. Kitty sat beside him on the small bench. Their legs brushed and he felt the breath leave his body. They weren't skin to skin, but it felt like it. He didn't dare move lest they lose the contact.
"She said she was going to get her papa," she told him quietly after a long moment. "I'm in your mind, you think? Is she yours? Pete and I never had real children. Just the made up one Emma or Cassandra Nova stuck in my mind."
He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.
"How did you lose custody?"
"Mutant." He spat the word through clenched teeth. "And then she died of what Xavier called the Legacy Virus."
Kitty sucked in air. "Peter, I'm so sorry." She laced her fingers through his. "This must be very difficult for you."
"You have no idea." He smiled sadly.
"I know all about mind-fucks, Peter. I was forced into servitude by an evil spirit. Not once, but twice. I was forced to think that I'd gotten married and had a son." She laughed mirthlessly. "I wake up sometimes and expect to see stretch marks. And then I was forced to think that the X-men kidnapped the son that I'd never really had. All to free a witch with no true body."
"Emma Frost did this to you?"
"Cassandra Nova hid in Emma's mind," Kitty explained, leaned her head against his bare shoulder, the soft skin of her face smooth and cool. "She wanted her body back (what was left of it). She used my phasing power to get it, and when I snapped out of it, I killed her body while she was in mid-transit from Emma's mind. Emma cut her links. We think she's dead."
Piotr nodded. He wanted to gather her in his arms and hold her. He knew this was the real Kitty and not someone made up. David must have slipped them all under telepathic hypnosis and put their consciousnesses in his mind. He could think of no other explanation.
But he didn't wrap his arms around her like he wanted to. He simply set his chin on the top of her head and continued to hold her hand.
Kitty sat beside Piotr wondering why in the hell she had just told this apparition all her secrets. Her throat burned and her chest ached. What was wrong with her? This was not Piotr. This was another psychic attack. She was in Siberia? Wasn't Siberia supposed to be cold?
They sat there in silence for a while watching the workers, her head resting on his powerful shoulder, his chin leaning on hers as he massaged the back of her hand with his thumb.
"Is that," she suddenly asked as she gawked at two of the workers.
Piotr nodded. "The Thing and the Human Torch. Da. They were at the Chrysler Building with me." He gazed at her intently, enjoying the feel of her skin against his own. "I think this is some kind of psychic attack. Maybe David isn't powerful enough to control more than a few people at a time."
"David?" she repeated. She began to rethink her earlier assessment. "As in your friend David?" He nodded. Maybe she was sitting next to Piotr after all. "David grabbed me? Your friend is making you relive your daughter?" Again he nodded. Though she felt a chill race up her spine at the thought, Kitty felt some degree of comfort with him sitting close enough to envelop her in his body heat. "So why is that we aren't under some kind of hypnotic suggestion?"
He shrugged, trying to remain stoic. "We were trained to notice a psychic attack," he suggested. "Perhaps the others have not had so great a teacher." Piotr pressed his lips to her temple, quickening her pulse.
She looked at him sharply. "Why did you do that?"
He smiled. "I wanted to." His tone was anything but apologetic. His lips dipped into a frown, his brow furrowing. "He kidnapped you and Illyana and told me to choose between the two of you. He plans to kill one of you. I swear to you now, I will not let that happen."
"Where's Illyana?"
"I haven't seen her here yet, but I haven't seen Logan, David's wife, or the remaining two members of the Fantastic Four either. Illyana's appearance is a long story. She was able to escape David and brought his wife with her. He must not have deemed her that big of a threat. His wife was a captive and Illyana believes he intends to use you to retrieve her. She did him a favor and rescued Amelia for him to use as bargaining chip. Illyana had a plan to get you, but if we are stuck in my mind, I think it's safe to say that the plan has changed."
Kitty sighed. "Well, he's got me in a straightjacket dangling off a roof. I can't use my powers. I guess throwing my consciousness into your mind took care of that."
"How so?"
"Well, I'm not going to activate my powers if I can't see what I fall into. I could wake up in the center of the earth. One wrong move and Crispy Fried Kitty."
Piotr couldn't help himself. "Finger lickin' good?" he inquired, then realized the implications of the joke. He felt his face heat up, and he laughed sheepishly. A scarlet flush raced like a fever across her tanned and beautiful face, but her mouth quirked in good humor. "That came out wrong," he admitted.
She snorted unladylike and opened her mouth to speak, but Zilya yelled from inside the house. "Mama! Papa! Come and eat!"
Both sets of adult eyes focused on the door warily, their fingers entwined tightly. Kitty turned to him. "Should we play along?" she questioned, her odd-colored eyes studying his face intently.
"I-I do not know." He looked at his hands, fearing more tears.
"Mama! Papa!"
Kitty surprised him by kissing him lightly on the mouth. It was quick, so quick he didn't have time to return it, only wonder if the event had occurred at all.
"I'm here for you, Peter," she told him quietly. "I'll make you a promise. Introduce me to your daughter and if the opportunity ever presents itself, I'll introduce you to my son. I may even forgive Emma long enough to let her in my head to do it."
He nodded and stood, helping her to feet. "I think I can handle that. Provided you don't eat provocatively again."
"Not the 'I'm a man, you're a woman' thing again," she mock-complained, a wry grin twisting her lips.
He chuckled as they walked into their temporary home. "It's only because it's you, Katya," he admitted, and leaned down and touched his lips briefly to hers, imitating her kiss from moments before.
"Ew," Zilya lamented around a mouthful of sandwich.
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Why do I keep doing hero work in skirts? Illyana wondered as she concentrated and made sure that she and Spiderman emerged in different spots. You'd think after ten years, I'd make sure to have pants handy. She would have been very embarrassed if she didn't have as much control of her powers and had to emerge from the 'port sitting on his shoulders with her skirt over his head. It hadn't been her fault the skirt got caught. She was supposed to appear so she could grab his shoulders. Illyana thought it could have been worse: She could have emerged in front of him and landed in his lap with her skirt over his head. Now that would have been mortifying. Spiderman did not need to see her girly goodies.
When the 'port ended, they stood less than three feet apart, she behind him, in an abandoned warehouse. She was about to say something when he kicked back, his heel catching her in the stomach, unexpectedly.
"Oomph!" The sorceress doubled over. Blessed Mother, don't let him kick me in the face, she prayed as she tried to inhale the air that had been kicked out of her. Spiderman spun around to face his opponent, was taken aback that he had kicked a woman. Aunt May had instilled some high moral values. One was never to hit a girl. Since he had to break that rule (in self-defense!) occasionally, he had modified it slightly: One was never to hit an innocent girl. It was all he could do to keep from apologizing.
"Who are you?" Mother, he sounded angry under that mask. Illyana, still clutching her throbbing belly, took a few seconds to catch her breath, and then held up a finger to stall for time. She looked at the whites of his large insect eyes, a little unnerved that she couldn't make out any facial expressions.
"Hang on a minute," she wheezed. "I'm a good guy. You could have died."
His retort was quick and lethal. "Yeah, cuz you fell on me." He wanted to believe her, but the pentagram that dangled from one of many chains around her pale neck warned him to be wary of her. Never a good sign. Pentagrams were almost always trouble.
"I did not fall on you," she informed him as she inhaled the stale air, a little angry that he would accuse her of falling on him, like she was some fat cow or something. Yeah, whatever. Jerk. She did what she had to do. He was getting too close to David. One more block and David would have sensed him. "I grabbed you and saved you."
He put his hands on his hips belligerently. "My spider sense didn't go off." And it hadn't. Though afterwards his skin itched so badly he wanted to scratch his skin off. Now there were only mild tremors, but he couldn't understand why. It put him on edge.
"Well, you can get off however you want, but I still saved your life. I've already been through this a few times."
She could not see him mouth, "Get off?" but she did hear, "Okay. I'm now officially confused."
Illyana summoned the others. They had been in an old office, but she brought them down, imagining the people as she had left them, a tricky feat considering it was difficult for her to teleport an object she could not see. She was lucky to be blessed with an excellent memory and a great sense of direction. Spiderman literally jumped when the Fantastic Four, Piotr, Logan, and Amelia appeared. Illyana felt like laughing when he let an explicative slip.
Her powers don't really set of my Spider Sense. Which was odd. The golden auras looked familiar. They kind of reminded him of Colossus' kid-sister's teleportation powers from last night. He studied the woman openly. With a mask, he could do that and get away with it. She was as tall as him, her clothing baggy and rain-dampened with the suggestion of nubile curves beneath her attire. The white peasant shirt laced low in the front with large sleeves. The skirt was reminiscent of the multi-colored patchwork quilt Aunt May had made him as a moving gift when he'd gone off to college. She was dressed like a gypsy, he decided, with those chains and baubles draped around her neck, the crystal studs piercings in her earlobes. Her blonde spiked hair and black tattoo heightened the translucence of her face in the dim light of the warehouse. Something flickered far back in those icy blue eyes of hers, eyes that had seen too much. A thousand wounds faced him from those eyes and he had to look away.
She stood, swearing slightly. Spiderman dropped into a defensive stance, but she ignored him and walked over to her brother, kneeling beside him. She lightly tapped his face with her fingers.
"Come on, Piotr, snap out of it," she insisted, her voice echoing in the building. She continued to speak, but it was more to herself than to the only other conscious person in the room, "I was hoping this was far away enough."
Spiderman followed her example and checked the others, going first to Johnny Storm. He toyed briefly with the notion of punching the blonde man's face, but thought better of it. He really didn't know what he was up against.
Suddenly Logan sat up and wiped the drool from his mouth with the back of his hand. "Damned telepath," he spat. He looked around, his eyes silver slits in the semi-darkness. "Spiderman. Yana. What the hell happened?"
"Unexpected telepathic attack."
"I thought you'd seen the future?" He eyed her angrily. Lightning lit the sky, illuminating the warehouse casting eerie shadows. Illyana shuddered.
"Apparently I was looking at the wrong one." Illyana quickly brought both men up to speed.
"Well, shit."
"Motto," Spiderman agreed. "I'm still confused," he admitted after a moment.
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(Thanks for reading. Input welcomed.)