Stumbling Along the Path
"Does it ever wake you in the middle of the night?" Erik asked, "The feeling that one day, they'll come for you? And your children?"
Xavier wheeled around, "I feel a great swell of pity for the poor soul who comes to my school looking for trouble."
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or universe. They belong to Marvel and FOX Studio.
A/N: Back from Vacation now. So more updates will be made regularly again.
A week had gone by with nearly no incidents. Jean and Scott were sitting adjacent to one another in the common room. Ororo and Kurt were off taking their citizenship test. And Peter was off with Wanda having an incredibly awkward lunch with Magneto.
"You all are welcome to join me. Genosha will be the perfect home for all mutants, away from the prejudice and persecution of humans. Together we can make a better world, my children." Magneto said, as he brought in the mutants that Peter recognized to be Toad, Blob, and Lorelei.
"You will no longer be forced to use the names they gave you." He continued, referring to what the names their mother had given them.
"You can make a name for yourself. Just as I have. And the other members of the Brotherhood. We can be like a real family. Please just think about it. I would love for you both to come with Polaris and I." He looked to Lorna, then back to Peter and Wanda.
Peter agreed he would think on it, but ultimately wondered how Dad-neto had managed to afford his own island and boats to and from… He pushed the thoughts away from his mind as his eyes glanced upward to the clock. It was time for danger room practice. Scott was supposed to prove he had learned how to fix the Blackbird, but Peter knew he had been too busy making googly eyes at Jean to memorize jack squat, it would be the perfect time for him to crack a joke at four eyes, and he couldn't miss that.
"Where are you guys staying in the meantime? My home is always open to you, Wanda, Pietro." Magneto nodded towards his children.
Wanda smiled and hugged her father before Peter nudged her reminding her of the time.
"We have been staying at our own place." Peter lied, he wasn't a good liar, and he wondered if his father noticed.
"Well the offer still stands, my children. I hope you two will think long about my offer." He opened his arms to hug Peter who awkwardly began to rub the back of his neck before quickly embracing his father and taking off with Wanda.
"Now remember, today's mission will be a rescue mission from the MRD. You all did decent the last time, but this time we are applying Cyclop's knowledge. The blackbird will malfunction, Scott. You will need to be able to fix it, to get you and the escaped mutants out of the area safe." Hank said, as he began programming into the system.
Peter and Wanda quickly ran into the room, Wanda still in her street clothes but Peter had somehow managed to change without anyone noticing.
"Sorry I'm late. Had a good old meeting with dadneto." He jested as he adjusted his goggles and ran his fingers through his hair to fix the windblown look.
"What'd I miss?" He joked, as Wanda elbowed him in the ribs.
"Let's just do this. You know I hate these practices." She murmured under her breath.
"Yeah yeah. Okay. Let's see if Cyke can memorize something other than Jean's face." Peter teased, as he was met with Scott's ruby red glare.
"Oh boy…" Hank muttered as he began the countdown on his hands to start the simulation. Three, two, one…
The panels flipped around and soon they were in a small town, lots of buildings, carrier crates and a long dock with the Blackbird resting on the edge, docked like a boat. The MRD building had alarms going off as dozens of armed military men came out with guns ablaze.
"Who has the mutants?" Scott shouted.
"We do!" Ororo and Jubilee said in unison, with the virtual children mutants behind them.
"I can block the gun shots. Storm, can you create a distraction?" Jean said as she put her arms up to create a telekinetic shield between them and the MRD.
"I think I can do that…" She gave a bit of a cocky smirk, she flew up into the air and her eyes turned white as the water around them on the dock began to swirl up in a tornado like fashion. She sent it hurling at the MRD.
"Nightcrawler, take the children onto the jet with me. I can start working on the jet. Wanda, help Jean with the shield, maybe take their guns. Peter, do whatever. Jubilee, come with me you can keep the children calm." Scott commanded as Kurt wrapped his arms around everyone and bamfed into the jet.
"Okay… let's do this…" Scott muttered to himself as he began to press buttons, remembering what Hank had taught him the other day about overriding the system.
Jean and Wanda side by side had managed to fend off the entire MRD, Wanda using her magic to take their guns from their hands while Jean made sure none of them could advance towards them. Peter and Ororo braced themselves in case they were needed. Ororo threw down bolts of lightning to throw off the guards and blind them temporarily. It was not long before Jean heard Scott in her head.
"We're ready to go." He said.
"Let's go!" Jean shouted to the group.
Thanks to Wanda most of them had already been disarmed so Jean felt better about letting her shield drop for them to all run to the ship. Alas, they must have missed one because as she ran to the ship she felt a sting on her leg as one of the plastic pellets hit her. She quickly turned around and with a swipe of her hand, she flung the man across the dock into the water. She continued to run towards the jet as they all got in, the engine began to roar, it felt so real. They heard a whistle and soon the panels flipped back around and it all began to go back to a flat room.
"Excellent Job, X-Men!" Hank called out over the intercom, "I will have the Professor meet with you later to go over some of the notes I have taken but I have to be off."
The X-Men stood around taking deep breaths. Jean sat down on the ground and inched up the leg of her suit, she rubbed at the small welt the pellet had left. She missed the beginning when Hank allowed them to do virtual bullets instead of these little airsoft pellets.
"You okay, Jean?" Scott knelt down.
"Oh yeah. It's fine. Just caught me off guard. Thought Wanda had disarmed everyone; it was my fault for not being more vigilant." Jean shrugged and hopped back up on her feet.
Scott nodded and helped her up before turning to the rest of the group. He tried to think of something inspirational or leader-y to say, but he drew a blank and turned around and just left to go take off the suit.
Jubilee turned to Ororo and Kurt, "So how did your test go? I'm a citizen and even I don't know all the presidents."
"It went alright. It was difficult. Everyone kept staring at Kurt like he was going to set off a bomb at any moment." Ororo sighed.
"Ja. People vere very rude." Kurt nodded, pulling at the collar of her black and red suit.
"Yeah, that's not uncommon. People still give my mom and dad weird looks when I'm with them. They act like they've never seen an adopted Asian before." Jubilee griped.
Peter and Wanda looked at each other and decided to leave the conversation. Peter wanted to talk to Xavier about what Magneto had mentioned to him. He knew Wanda would not appreciate him relaying the information back to Xavier so he took off without her.
He was about to run into his office when he realized he had passed the professor and turned around.
"PROFESSOR!" He shouted as he slowed his pace as to not startle Xavier.
"Peter, what can I help you with?" Xavier turned to face Peter in the hallway.
"Can we go to your office…? It's kind of personal." He whispered.
"Of course, Peter." Xavier began to wheel back towards his office, he had a feeling he knew what Peter had wanted to talk about, he knew the X-Men could wait for their notes.
Peter opened the door and held it for the Professor as he wheeled behind his desk.
"So what is it you wanted to talk about?" Xavier said, looking up to Peter who was playing with various books on the shelves.
"Magneto. He had Wanda and I come out to see him today. And somehow he's managed to buy ships and a whole island and build an entire city. I don't know where he got the money for that, probably all that child support he owes my mom, but that's not the biggest part. He is making basically just an island city for mutants. Some magical fantasy land free from humans and the MRD and it just sounds too good to be true. I want to believe him, I do… I just can't. Wanda… I think she is starting to side with him. And I get it, he's not a bad guy, he's just… he's not all in the right either, ya know? Of course you know…" Peter made a bunch of hand motions and thought back to Apocalypse.
"This might be worth looking into. Thank you, Peter, for mentioning this to me. I can use Cerebro to look into this more. In the meantime, try not to worry about it. If it is worth looking deeper into, I will send you guys to Genosha to see if it really is all Erik says it is… but I'm afraid you are right. That is an awful lot to acquire in a short period of time. Thank you." Xavier looked concerned and rubbed his chin while he thought.
Peter nodded and got up. Outside the door was Wanda waiting on him.
Jean had finally changed out of her suit and was getting ready to go out with Jubilee and Ororo to celebrate the passing of her citizen ship test.
"I have never had my nails done before…" Ororo said.
"Me either but it sounds fun right. I've never had long nails before." Jean said, running her fingers over his bitten nails.
"Oh! It's so much fun! I know the perfect place. My mom and I used to get ours done together." Jubilee chimed in, throwing on her yellow jacket and grabbing her sun glasses.
"It is worth a try." Ororo shrugged, with an indifferent look on her face.
"Fair enough!" Jean agreed, she grabbed her purse and a cardigan and began to look for her keys.
Scott saw the girls leaving and was going to ask where they were going but didn't want to seem too clingy. After all he wasn't Jean's boyfriend, they had just gone out on one date. He had been wanting to ask her out again, but he didn't know what to say, or how to say it. They had had so much fun the week before. He couldn't imagine that she would say no, but at the same time all he could think is that she would say no.
He saw Peter dart out of the institute without any notice. Wanda slowly snuck out behind him. He was tempted to follow but knew it would be impossible to keep up with them. Instead he sat down and turned on the News… a quiet week disturbed by a mutant rally with Magneto in the front.
"No wonder Peter and Wanda took off…" He thought to himself.
They had had their moment of peace, but the moment was over. And Scott knew it wouldn't be long before their Danger Room sessions would have to be applied, and he wasn't looking forward to that.
