Sorr taking such time (again). No futher talking, on with the story!
Giving up on the thinking part, John closed his hand to put the fire out and looked at Bobby's face. Then he climbed up in the foot-end of the bed and sat there, cross-legged, looking down at the other mutant, trying to discover if he felt anything. As usual, when he didn't concentrate on it, his power started to pick on him, and with a move that was so old that he didn't knew he'd done it, the lighter flung opened and a little flame started to form itself in his palm.
For a good 15 minutes John just sat there, looking at Bobby. He felt something, he was sure of that, but if it was the same thing as it would have been a few weeks ago he wasn't sure. John still remembered how he'd felt when they were at Alkali Lake and Stryker had started the whole "kill-every-mutant-project". When he, Bobby and Rogue waited in the jet and he almost had left, he'd stayed only because Bobby outright asked him not to. After that, when that horrid pain started, he regretted it for the first time (but not the last). Not because he thought that he could have escaped it, but because he could hear Bobby's scream. Hearing that but not being able to do anything was the worst thing with the whole process, if you asked John (and got him to tell the truth).
But now, looking at the boy he'd loved at that time, he didn't feel the same way. Sure he was worried, despite everything the professor had said about Bobby getting better. But it wasn't the same sour worry that almost felt as if he was going to throw up that he actually thought he'd feel.
With something that felt like a soft beat in his stomach John realised that the worry he felt was only the sort of worry you feel for a friend. After everything Bobby had done John still thought of him as his best friend.
But he didn't love him.
When had this happened?
Probably long ago, but the thing that started the whole reaction was when Warren just came up to John and started talking…
John smiled, and without him seeing it the flame that twisted around his fingers grew a bit and moved even faster. He almost wished that the wing-mutant were there now, it would feel a bit easier then. But at this rate, who knew what Bobby would do…
Bobby actually stirred a bit, but John was so deep into his thoughts that he didn't notice.
Instead of concentrating on what he'd been told to do; help Bobby, John started to think of his and Warrens first day; teasing Wolverine, flying, the danger-room. With the last thing in mind John let his soul take control of the flame in his hand. He tested something new, his favourite play with the fire; breaking of small peaces and let them float in the air. Making them smaller and creating more he was soon lost in his play, and never saw when Bobby opened his eyes…
A little cloud of sparks danced around John where he sat, like a swirl of stars around him. The cloud grew and rose up in the air, around two meters up. Then they fell down, each of them leaving a small trail of tiny sparks after them, so that thin threads rose from the floor, bed, boys and walls. The points where the threads touched something, wall or fabric of the blanket didn't matter, were slowly warming up, small rings growing from the tips of the threads. When the whole area was cleaned of frost John started to move the threads, letting them circle and slowly move out so that they in the end formed a ring around the bed. Then he made them wider, but not thicker, until the whole bed and its both occupants were under a thin bowl turned up side down, completely made of fire. Small sparks erupted from the edges, flew across the area in the bowl and were swallowed by the other side, not one coming out on the other side. Sometimes they took little turns and flew up, in circles, down under the bed, but not once the clothes or the bed caught on fire.
Finally John pulled down the top of the bowl and the rest slowly followed, first up towards where the top had went down, then with the flow down into the mutants hands. The "top" of it were balancing in Johns palm, then the whole form went upwards immediately, like a very thin vase. When it was only a meter of fire left John stopped his pulling and broke the upper half of his creating into threads again, like tentacles. They moved a bit before John tipped his hand over and it fell down a bit but stopped in midair. There it started to move like an octopus, and in the end it swam away. It took a turn around its master, then turned towards the other living creature in the area, taking a slowly turn right above Bobby's face. Then it swam upwards, with Bobby's eyes following its every move. Slowly the ice-mutant sat up, looking towards where he felt the weight of another person. There was John, as beautiful as ever, in a cloud of big fireballs… No, fishes! Bobby slowly looked around; it was as if the was at the bottom of a huge aquarium where everything was red, orange or yellow. Fishes of all sizes, octopuses, eels, jelly-fishes, seaweed, even bubbles… When Bobby looked up he even saw what could have been the water surface, though it was all made of fire, like watching a sunset from under the water. How long had John been able to do all this, with only his lighter, and why hadn't he told Bobby… Well, he at least knew the answer of that; because Bobby hadn't listened. Maybe John had already told him, but who had heard it? Who ever listened?
Bobby realised with a sickening feeling that he'd done much more that taking away Johns current lover when he left him for Rogue; he'd taken John's best friend, his one ant truly love, his safety, his trust, his reasons to stay, his everything. Bobby had actually done this to someone, and that someone wasn't just a faceless person in a grey mass, it was the one Bobby loved himself!
And instead of being completely destroyed like any other person would, that very someone was sitting there, playing with his mutant power like a child that just discovered it and just was a little curious. Just like an innocent child, not knowing anything about the dangers and evils in the world, not knowing that it were things like true hurt and unhappiness, things like hate, misery or death out there waiting to put its black claws in you and pull you into the darkness. Not knowing that just because you were yourself you could be hated, yelled at, tortured and even killed.
When Bobby looked at Johns face, glowing in the light of his under-water-creatures, smiling at his own fishes, his own world, he couldn't see one trail of all the pain he'd gone through. John had told Bobby his whole story, bit by bit, and Bobby knew what sort of life he had behind. John was the sort of kid that no doubt would end up in jail and the judgers would all blame it on his family for it, at least if you looked at how the world worked. But there he was, hiding all the shame, beats of his fathers, evil hisses of his mother, all the bruises from his life on the streets, all the tears that no one cared if he'd cried, all the blood that had been dripping from his wounds when people discovered what he was; everything was hidden. Nothing in his face showed that he'd been drugged and raped at the age of ten, that his own brother threw stones at him and called him freak when he ran away from home, that he'd been half dead when Xavier by pure chance send out Cyclops and Storm to drag him out from under a bridge, away from the rotting and stinking body of a dog that had been dead for at least a week and bring him to the mansion, where he'd be even more alone before Bobby moved into his room because it was too many students to give him a room of his own. Nothing there showed that he had to spend a whole month in a normal hospital before they could nurse him in the mansion by themselves, no sign was there to show the world that he knew that people whispered and pointed after him in the corridors, that he'd tried to run away from the mansion six times in a half year because he thought that they tried to trick him and was going to hand him over to some mutant-experimenting-lab. He'd told Bobby that he rather kill himself than going back to a place like that; he'd spend a week there before he was able to melt the opening to the ventilation in his cell and escape, and he had scars on his arms to prove that he'd tried to do the same thing for other reasons…
But there was no sign of it now; there was just a happy boy who'd learned to have fun on his own and was doing just that.
Bobby knew what he'd done, the full weight of it was finally upon his soul and heart, and there was no thought in his mind of what he could do to erase the pain. For he knew that he deserved it, that it was just equal. Bobby realised in that moment that all the people who said that life was unfair lied, it was the thing that it was fairer than they wanted it to be that was the problem. For everything that you did really did rewarded itself, and it did that in a meaning that was more than humanity wanted it to be. Life was more fair than any human or mutant ever could understand, not even the professor would see that far into the truth.
Life was fair, but the ones who lived it weren't…
Without realising it Bobby had started to cry, and the tears didn't frees on his cheeks. Then suddenly something soft touched his face and he was pulled out of the world in his mind; John wasn't at the foot-end of the bed anymore, he stood next to Bobby and dried away his tears with a napkin. When Bobby looked up, he smiled and gave the napkin to Bobby so that he could do it himself. John knew that even so small things like someone touching your face with a peace of paper could be embarrassing, even if no one saw you. Bobby took it, dried the last of his tears, blew his nose and threw the napkin in the basket next to his bed.
All the jelly-fishes and seaweed; the whole aquarium-world was gone, and Johns lighter was back in its owners pocket, laying still and silent until next time.
John sat down next to his friend and waited until he sat up and looked him in his eyes.
Without any sort of nice beginning, like one of them touching the cheek of the other or some sweet words, they simply fell into and embrace of each other, clinging to the thing that for at least some point in their short lives had meant the most to them in the entire world. No words was spoken, no whispers or soothing playing with the others hair was done. For they both knew that this was the last, this was it. When they let go it would all belong to the past, all words, touches and feelings would be forgotten, or as close to forgotten as they could get. For they wouldn't turn back this time, a silent agreement said that both of them would let go of the other. In that hug there were no words, but two grasps let go of a chain that belonged to the heart of the other, an opening of the hand that meant that they would never pick it up again.
A final end to it…
Now I'll warn you all right from the start that it might take a while before I get back my inspiration again, I lost it halfway through this as well...