DISCLAIMER: Derrick Bolris is mine. Althea Delgado/Wavedancer and Trinity belong to Red Witch. Everything else belongs to Marvel.
Chapter 3: Derrick's Philosophy
Derrick stared at his hands, both of which had small sparks emanating from them. Were they the hands…of a murderer?
"No," Derrick muttered to himself. "She can't be…Wavedancer can't be dead. I'm not a…not a murderer. I don't want to…I don't want to be like them."
"Your trauma is easily seen," a sinister voice observed, a nearby television's metal antenna wobbling with seemingly nothing moving it.
An old man in red armor floated down from the sky. Derrick instantly recognized him as Magneto, the mutant master of magnetism and head of the Acolytes. Magneto gently landed in front of Derrick, every metallic object around him vibrating from the man's sheer power.
"One does not need telepathic power to see your pain, child," Magneto said.
"I'm sixteen," Derrick growled. "And no, I don't want anything to do with your lunatic fringe."
"I have seen your anger, your hatred," Magneto said in the same eerie voice, ignoring Derrick's words. "You desire revenge, Derrick. You attacked the X-Men, you killed—"
"I'm not a murderer!" Derrick roared, standing up with a start.
"Perhaps," Magneto admitted, "but you do not know your own power."
"Maybe," Derrick reluctantly admitted, looking at his hands again. "Still doesn't mean I'm hooking up with a genocidal maniac."
"I can give you the power you need, Derrick," Magneto said, again ignoring Derrick's blunt refusal. "I can help you put it to good use, to prove mutants superior."
"Not on your life, magnet-head," Derrick snarled.
It was at this point that Magneto lost his temper. With his magnetic abilities, he pulled a ladder from a nearby building and bent it around Derrick's body, binding him.
"If you refuse to be my ally," Magneto threatened, "that makes you my enemy."
"What else is new?" Derrick spat.
The electrokinetic was lifted into the air by his bonds, Magneto pulling the proverbial strings like a puppet master with his marionette. The ladder was crushing him. Derrick could feel the pressure squeezing him, as if the ladder had become a boa constrictor snake.
A crimson beam of energy slammed into Magneto, and the four X-Men who had attempted to recruit Derrick earlier quickly arrived on the scene. Magneto's concentration broken, Derrick fell from the sky, but Rogue managed to catch him in mid-air.
"Wait, I thought your only power was taking the powers of other mutants?" Derrick said, noting the fact that Rogue was flying.
"Long story," Rogue said. "The abridged version is, I permanently got the powers of a SHIELD agent named Carol Danvers."
Rogue set Derrick down and pulled the ladder off of him.
"Back off, Magneto," Scott commanded. "Derrick's with us."
Derrick was about to object, but Rogue quickly put a gloved hand over his mouth.
"Is he, now?" Magneto said dryly. "How would that be so if he electrocuted you recently?"
"Well," Scott began, but a pipe flew from nowhere and struck him in the head.
"Scott!" Rogue cried, rushing to his aid.
Magneto floated down again, and slowly approached Derrick.
"Do you truly wish to follow Charles, or are Cyclops' words untrue?" Magneto asked.
"Doesn't mean I'm going to be an Acolyte, bucket-brain!" Derrick snapped, launching a ball of electricity at Magneto.
As when Derrick attacked the Misfits, the ball exploded on contact. As Magneto's armor was metallic, however, the electrical current rocketed through the armor, delivering a powerful shock to Magneto's body. After a long and pained scream, Magneto fell to the ground, a large metal orb coming from the sky.
"This is not over," growled Magneto as the ball sprouted tentacles and pulled its master into it. "I will return."
"What else is new?" Rogue said with a roll of her eyes.
"Okay, Derrick," Scott said, approaching the electrokinetic. "Let's go."
"I ALREADY TOLD YOU NO!" Derrick roared, hand surging with electricity again, but this time, the electricity fizzled out before he could fire a bolt of lightning. "Crap, out of juice."
"You really don't want to be an X-Man, do you?" Rogue asked.
"When did you figure that out?" Derrick spat. "I've only been yelling it to the sky for the past half-hour."
"What could you possibly have against the X-Men?" Scott asked, tone indicating he thought Derrick's dislike of the X-Men was ridiculous.
"It's not the X-Men so much as it is Xavier," Derrick answered.
"So what's your beef with Charles, then?" Logan asked, gruffly as usual.
"He's delusional, that's what," Derrick said harshly. "All of you have been X-Men for years. Years. And said X-Men haven't exactly made any progress in making humans and mutants a little friendlier to each other. Humanity still behaves like the same bunch of ungrateful five-year-olds that they were when you were first drafted into the X-Men."
"Like we haven't noticed that?" Rogue said, rolling her eyes. "I can't even count how many times people protested against the Institute."
"And I can't count the number of times that people have thrown rocks at me just to find something to do," Derrick said. "Face it, Cyclops…I'm not meant to be an X-Man. No matter what you or anyone else does, how you do it, the human race won't change their views of mutants. They just won't."
"Xavier doesn't seem to think so!" Scott countered angrily.
"Like I said," Derrick replied, shaking his head, "delusional. He can tell someone's behind him without even looking but he can't see that there's no point to what he's doing. There's no point in protecting people who'll only see you as a mad dog that needs to be put out of its misery."
"Look, Derrick," Rogue began, "when the X-Men first came after me, I didn't exactly jump at the chance, either. Of course, Mystique was messing with my head at the time, so by making herself look like some of the X-Men, she convinced me that they were trying to kill me, not help me. Xavier's probably the most compassionate guy I've ever known. It's like I told you before, he helped me cope with my powers. He helped Scott cope with the fact that he can't open his eyes without destroying something, and he helped Kurt come to grips with how he looks."
"They're different," Derrick said. "Cyclops and Nightcrawler probably needed a little push, but that was before that Sentinel ended up revealing mutants to the world. I don't need a push, Rogue. I don't need anyone."
He looked away from them.
"I just want to be left alone," he continued. "I just want to go somewhere that won't have any prejudice. I don't want people trying to get me into their personal clubs just so they can have my powers. I just want to find somewhere nice and quiet…the only place I'll be able to escape the racism."
"Kid," Logan said, "you really remind me of X-23."
"Your clone?" Derrick asked.
"Yeah," Logan nodded. "And I'm gonna tell you the same thing I told her. We might be the only people in the world who can understand you, and maybe the closest thing you could possibly have to a loving family."
"You just don't get it, do you?" snarled Derrick. "I don't want a family, and I don't need to be 'understood'."
He turned and walked away.
"I just want everyone to leave me alone," he finished.
"Derrick, wait!" Scott cried, reaching out to the electrokinetic, but Logan stopped him.
"You can't control the will of others," he said. "Thought you'd learned that when we first took on Juggernaut. Forget the kid, Slim. We're pullin' out."
Logan, Rogue, and Kurt left the scene, but Scott looked in the direction he had last seen Derrick.
"Even if you won't admit it, Derrick," Scott said to himself, "the Institute might be the best place for you."
****
"She'll be okay," G.I. Joe medic Lifeline reported. "Luckily, Derrick didn't hit Althea with a fatal blast. She still shorted out, though, so she'll be out for a few hours."
"That's good to hear," Roadblock nodded as Todd sighed in relief. "Derrick most likely attacked her out of fear."
"I don't care!" bellowed Shipwreck, Althea's father. "That kid's gonna pay for this!"
"Whoa, Shipwreck, cool it!" Todd said. "I got a look at Derrick's eyes. Remember how scared I was when I first got here?"
"How could I forget?" Roadblock sighed.
"Yeah," Shipwreck nodded. "So?"
"Derrick had that same look when he fried Althea," Todd explained. "He was scared out of his mind, yo. Something happened then that made him go from 'jerk' to 'scared kid'."
An explosion in the distance caught their attention.
"That was either Trinity or Pyro," Lifeline guessed.
A teenage male with red hair styled in a bowl cut ran by, three girls with hair colored the same way as Althea in hot pursuit.
"WAIT FOR ME, GIRLS!" Shipwreck cried, chasing after his triplet daughters.
"Must be drinking again," muttered Lance.
"How is she?" asked a snake-like creature with blonde hair that had just entered the room.
"Hey, Xi," Todd said. "Al's gonna be fine, just needs a few hours to rest up."
"Derrick will pay for this," Xi growled.
"Slow down, Xi," Lance said. "Todd explained it earlier, Derrick was afraid when he shocked Al. Pretty much makes it self-defense."
"Hang on, what about Shipwreck?" Roadblock asked. "I think there are places you guys will need to—"
"LEAVE ME ALONE YOU PERVERTED SAILOR!" a woman shrieked.
"…check," Roadblock finished with a sigh. "Never mind. Cover Girl found him."
****
Yes, I know that Magneto went down with relative ease, but if you can send an electrical current through that armor, the shock will probably be enough to take down just about anyone. Just to clear that up for if anyone starts wondering.