Disclaimer: I own none of the characters within.
Author's Notes: Another chapter for my lovelies. This chapter could be subtitled: "The One With The Pseudo-Scientific-Medical Babble." Enjoy.
- - -
- - -
- - -
- - -
- - -
- - -
Stand still and listen; the doctor is speaking. Everyone give your eyes and ears to the man with the clipboard, because he could be the one that saves the day. Hank explained his plan with rapid intensity to those gathered; Charles, Ororo, Logan, and the brooding Erik.
"As near as I can figure, the problem is all in Pietro's blood. That's where Mr. Lensherr injected his speed cocktail, and that's probably where the danger still is. His blood is pumped full of all these drugs that triggered his mutant gene but are now keeping him trapped in it."
"So what you're saying is," Logan drawled. "Is not only do we have to catch Speedy in the first place, but we gotta bleed him out?"
"We could try hemapheresis, where we remove blood to purify it, but his blood might be too tainted to salvage. A transfusion could be his only hope." Hank explained. "If we could get rid of enough of the tainted blood and replace it with clean, it could purge his system enough to keep him stable in real time."
"What do you suggest we do, Hank?" Charles asked quietly.
"Yesterday the problem was how to keep Pietro with us once we slowed him down. I had the plan all along to use some sort of powerful tranquilizer to stop him for a little while, but I had no idea how to keep it that way. Now that I've connected the two, I need to prepare the tranquilizer and then the transfusion."
Ororo asked the question on all their minds: "Whose blood?"
"Mine." said Erik firmly. "It will be my blood."
Everyone gave him a simultaneous glance. Hank's was furious, a silent "how dare you?" that spoke louder than words. Logan's was skeptical and Ororo's was aloof. Only Charles seemed sympathetic, and Erik begrudged that look the most of all.
"Do you know your son's blood type?" Hank snapped. "Or were you too busy filling it with drugs?"
"That information can be obtained from a driver's license," Xavier said sternly. "This cannot turn into a battle. A young man's life is at stake; we have to remember that. The cause is not important, only the fact that he needs our help."
- - -
They drifted to her side like they had never been separated.
When Wanda entered the dining room for breakfast, the first person to join her was Todd, loyally falling into step beside her and sitting down next to her at the table. She felt her hair ruffled from behind and turned to see Lance giving her a weary welcome smile. He sat on the other side of her. Fred sat across from them as though trying to keep all three in his sights to prevent anything from happening to them.
Even after breakfast the three boys stayed in sort of protective ring around her; if anyone wished to speak with Wanda, they would have to get past her trio of satellites. The first person to actually approach, however, was someone that the satellites scattered before; it was Logan.
"Hey, kid," he said to Wanda in that disconcertingly nonchalant way of his. "The Professor needs to speak with you."
- - -
It all came down to blood.
Of course they were a match; Wanda had no doubt in her mind that the exact same flowed through her veins as her brother's. Hank explained the whole procedure in careful detail, which she supposed was a comfort, even though his detached scientific way of speaking was sort of creeping her out. It all felt like an out of body experience because she could hardly believe that there was a chance of saving Pietro. In fact, when Hank finished his talking, he had to wave his hand carefully in front of her face to get a reaction from her.
"Are you all right?" he asked gently.
"I don't know how to answer that." she shrugged.
"All right, then. I'll need to take a sample from you to begin screening tests."
"What do you mean, screening tests?" she was suddenly very alert.
"Just because you have the same blood type doesn't guarantee a safe transfusion. I have to screen the blood for health reasons, safety reasons—"
"That would mean waiting!" she jumped from her chair, furious. "You expect me to just wait around for you to perform a bunch of stupid tests? You expect Pietro to wait?"
"Wanda, it's procedure—"
"No!" Arms crossed, chin lifted, she took a stand. "No tests. We are going to start as soon as possible."
"Wanda, you have to think about the ramifications of this decision."
"What, are you implying that it could be dangerous? You don't understand. There is not a single thing in my body that could harm Pietro. Nothing. There's no danger at all."
- - -
It all came down to blood.
Erik's heart smoldered with envy at the gift Wanda was able to give to her brother, the gift that he should be giving. Why couldn't it be him? This would have been the perfect redemption, the ultimate penance for his sins. But perhaps this was the true punishment, this denial of his only chance.
Pietro was his son. Half of his blood was in that boy, but it wasn't enough. It was never enough! No matter what Erik seemed to do, it could never repair the damage he had inflicted with his own hands. There was no guidelines for him, no set of rules for a father struggling to reconnect with his abused child. The gap between them had grown too wide to cross, and his last effort to build a bridge had been thwarted.
What about the blood? Would it alone be enough to save them, the very fact that they shared at least a portion of the same? Maybe, maybe not. He had no way of knowing. His mind was filled with images of blood, buckets of it, swirls of it, stains of it. It was making his stomach turn, and for a wild moment he was quite certain he was going to throw up.
A sudden touch on his arm made him jump; it burned. It was Johnny, looking a little better than he did this morning when Erik saw him rising weakly from the library couch, but still with the appearance of a very sick young man. Erik considered how his appearance had been gradually declining with his health as the disease seemed to move onto the next stage. It was stressful for Erik to have one more reminder of his failures paraded in front of him.
"What is it?" he snapped tersely.
"Hello to you, too," Johnny retreated a few steps, wounded. "Geez, no need to be so friendly. I'm only your minion, after all."
Erik sighed, composed himself, and repeated in a much gentler tone, "What is it?"
"Just keeping you updated, that's all."
Johnny held out his right hand palm down, and Erik almost physically recoiled in horror when he saw the new lesion on the back of it. As it was his stomach lurched again and his guilt threatened to strangle him.
"John..." he said feebly.
"No worries, mate." Johnny shook his fiery head sadly. "A fella comes to terms with a lot of things when he finally just accepts that what will be, will be."
"Que sera, sera." Erik echoed.
They stood silently facing each other, eyes averted in respect of the other's pain. The quiet that descended was the quiet that fell on hospital rooms when the plug has been pulled and there's nothing to do but wait.
"You know," Johnny said with a heavy sigh. "I always thought of you as a father."
Erik didn't answer. He couldn't.
"We sort of are related," the boy continued. "If you think about it."
With a slow, tentative gesture, Johnny reached out and took Erik's hand, turning it palm up so that the concentration camp numbers were laid naked and bare for all the world to see. He held his own scarred hand up next to it for comparison.
The effect was striking and suffocating. Both of these marks were cruelties inflicted by other men because of difference in race or powers. Both of these marks did not just scar their owner on the outside, but had been carved deep into their wounded spirits, crippling them both in one fashion or another. Both of these marks were made as punishment for something beyond their recipient's control.
"We've been through the fire, you and me," Johnny murmured thoughtfully. "We've been struck with the hammers and pounded into shape, shoved into the coals and dragged out again, dunked underwater and drawn out in a cloud of steam and sparks. But here we are, eh? Still breathing."
He looked up and their eyes met. Erik was daunted in the face of such deep, immovable sadness. It was like a physical weight on his shoulders and he fought to remain on his feet. He was granted relief when the sadness was veiled by a strange smile.
"Funny old world." Johnny said, almost fondly, the keeper of some great mysterious secret. "Que sera, sera."
And he walked away quite calmly as though he hadn't just shattered Erik's heart.
- - -
It all came down to blood.
Think how much of it there will be! Pietro giggled excitedly. At the speed he was going, with his heart purring like the engine of a race car, well, all it would take was one neat slice across the wrist and there'd be a fountain of the stuff! A scarlet cascade of life force splashing all over the floors, the walls, the ceiling if he waved his arm enthusiastically enough! What a sight it would be.
He wondered if he could paint a self-portrait before it killed him. A stick figure, vanished from the waist down after the attack of the Eraser, arms flung out in supplication and mouth yawning open in a great big silent scream. He could even draw a picture of his heart, crisscrossed with jagged breaks and tears. That would be quite the little mural. Maybe they would hang it in a museum. Or a mausoleum. Didn't really matter.
In a fit of theatrics, he decided to seek out Wanda one last time and say goodbye to her. It seemed only fair, after all, since she was pretty much the only one who would miss him anyway. He walked all over the house, waving the knife in front of him and making lightsaber noises, until he saw her sitting on the couch next to Lance. Lance, Lance, Ants-in-his-Pants. That rhymed. It made Pietro laugh.
Standing before Wanda, he held the knife over his wrist with the same grace and care of a violinist about to draw his bow across the strings, a painter about to add the final stroke to his masterpiece. He smiled at her adoringly and said, "TTFN! Ta-ta for now!"
- - -