All Logan said was that I had to come to Utopia right away, now, immediately. I thought it was about the Sentinel that had attacked Utopia. And in a way it was. It was about Etana and what she lost fighting it. Stepping into the infirmary with Logan, I feel both horrified and amazed at the same time.
Amazement because Etana, who pretends she is so separate, is surrounded by people who obviously care about her. Nightcrawler, pacing backwards and forwards, biting his lips; Magneto, back to the wall and fidgeting, rolling his helmet back and forth in his hands; Tora, sitting beside the bed and then all the Logan children; Curtis clinging to the ceiling, Jamie sitting on the big chair with both Eva and Stevie resting on either side of him. A dysfunctional family unit, but a loving one all the same.
Horror, because Etana is lying in a bed, eyes closed, oxygen mask on her face, left hand clasped in between Tora's, right arm resting at her side, down to the bandages about halfway down her bicep and that wrap around the stump of her arm, which is severed just above the elbow…
"Tan…"
Nightcrawler looks up.
"She single-handedly stopped the Sentinel. Teleported her arm right through the CPU. It destroyed the Sentinel but also…"
"Meant her arm was beyond being saved."
I turn to see Tora.
"Can you…explain?"
"When Etana teleports, she has to force the matter that's already there out of the way. With something like air, there isn't much of a problem as the molecules are so far apart. But something solid, like the Sentinel… You suddenly have twice the amount of matter in one space. Therefore, some parts of Etana's arm remained in the dimension she travels through, whilst some parts of the Sentinel were transported there. She… She managed to teleport back to Utopia before she blacked out… It wasn't pretty."
Curtis nods.
"Yeah! There were bits of flesh everywhere and-"
"CURTIS STEVEN LOGAN!"
"Sorry, Dad…"
Etana isn't moving except to breathe and I can't help but stare at the white bandages.
"Why isn't there any blood?"
Tora glances up, looking exhausted.
"I managed to stop the bleeding but I couldn't heal her. I'm sorry, Steve."
"I should have been here…"
"This is a mutant problem, Steve. It's understandable that you weren't here."
"Where's Quire?"
"We're holding him here. Trying him in front of his own peers… And then I'm reinstating the school in Westchester. Scott and I have it all worked out. The kids, those we've agreed are too young to fight, are coming with me, as is anyone who wants to. We'll still be X-Men, just slightly off the front lines, busy looking after the next generation of mutants, keeping them safe and as far away from danger as possible."
"Etana?"
"Don't know. Probably school. She keeps going on about how she doesn't want these kids to be like her, fighting for survival from a young age."
I stare down at her, at the stump where her arm should be and I don't know what to feel. She needs two arms. She's a fighter, needs to be able to balance, use a weapon. She'll never be able to use her bow again… Never be able to reach out with the effortless ease. She'll have a new centre of gravity to adjust to, a new fighting style to work out. A new job to get. I'm not letting her fight, not now.
And a little, selfish part of me hates the fact she sacrificed that arm without a second thought.
