Memories
Restrictions
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Curt shook his head.
"I can't do it. I forced Jubes forward a few months in her personal timestream. Something's going to happen then that repowers her… maybe a lot of mutants… but I don't dare try it with anyone other than an immortal. Anyway, a few months isn't that long. Most of us have waited so long, few more weeks won't matter."
Logan tilted his head away.
"I wish I could say that. But Curt, the mutant race could be wiped out in a day. We can't afford to wait three or four months. Also, I need to talk to you about your ridiculous endangerment of both yourself and Jubilee."
"You're being my headmaster now, aren't you, Dad?"
"And your team leader."
"Dad, you threw me off X-Force."
"For good reason. I should never had let you participate in the Apocalypse fiasco…"
"Dad, you didn't know he was a kid. Anyway, Evan's totally cool."
"That's not the point. You then followed us into the World, fought Deathlocks, insisted on entering the reality jump and going to a post-apocalyptic world, attacked that world's version of Apocalypse-"
"Who happened to be you."
"Flirted rampantly with your alternate reality half-sister-"
"I didn't know she was my sister!"
"Proceeded to moon the Horseman of War-"
"He was annoying me."
"Acted with astounding immaturity in the face of death-"
"Wade always told me you had to laugh at Death so she'd take umbrage and refuse to take you."
"Then you returned home, and against my expressed orders, you went to take on Archangel alone-"
"I knew I could take him."
"-Nearly dying in the process. Then you decide that teasing Tigress was a good idea-"
"How was I to know she wasn't at all like Maman?"
"And then when your mother grounds you, banning you from X-Men missions, you promptly move in with the Young Avengers until your period of being grounded wears out."
"Maman should have been more specific."
"Curt! This is serious! I… Do you know how scared I was when I saw you taking on Warren alone? Look… I've already lost you once. Please don't make me lose you again."
Curt gulped, stood up then hugged his dad.
"Thanks, Dad. I… I promise I'll be more careful from now on."
"How long did that last?"
"All of three minutes. For a chronokinetic, he was really very impatient."
Tora sat in a medative pose, expanding the water molecules in the air under her so she hovered off the snow. Sure, the cold didn't bother her but she couldn't be bothered to put her uniform into the wash. She concentrated on her breathing and emptied her mind. Which was easier said than done. Snippets of other realities would slip across her mind. She inhaled.
Now Eva, close your eyes. Reach out. Find the centrepoint then strike! Look, you've killed your opponent.
Exhaled.
No, Jamie. Not today. I told you I'd tell you about your father when you're ready. You aren't.
Inhaled.
You betrayed me, Jean! I considered you my friend! And I find you telepathically making my husband believe you're me, just to get back at Scott! Run, Jean. Run. Because the next time I see you, I swear on all I hold dear that I. Shall. Kill. You.
Exhaled.
I have no choice in this matter. It is my duty to kill all who threaten the reign of the Most High Lord. Free will has no place in my life.
Inhaled.
And then, blissfully, peace. Tora opened her eyes and stared at the brilliant green ones gazing steadily back at her.
"You found me."
"It wasn't too hard. You always had your favourite places."
"Did you do that, Wanda?"
"Do what?"
"Don't give me that innocent act. I can smell you lying. You just made yourself my anchor."
Wanda sat down on the snow next to Tora.
"Look… Tora, you're the only person I've ever met who… who sees me as Wanda. Not as Pietro's twin. Not as Magneto's daughter. Not as Vision's wife. Not as Tommy and Billy's mother. Just as me. And if I can repay you by helping you deal with this… well, that's only the tiniest portion of what I owe you."
Tora closed her eyes.
"Wanda, I'm not even that sure who I am anymore. Am I Marie? Am I Tora? Am I Xii? Am I Tigress or Dragon? Or am I something in between all that?"
"I'll tell you who you are. You're the one person I trust more than anyone else in the world. Because… Because you said you –or another you- caused M-Day… Can you?"
Tora smiled.
"I'll go back to the beginning, shall I?"
Wanda smiled.
"I was raised by a family of travellers. They found me when I was less than a week old, my mother lying beside me, living only long enough to tell them my name. I grew up with them. And I didn't really care about who I was… Not until I injured myself and it started healing. I left my family then. I… I needed time alone. And I was in this barn in Transia about three months later. A girl in red came flying through the ceiling. A man followed her and started threatening her. She threw red light at him but nothing happened. He was laughing, so I crept up behind him and clouted him around the head with a spade."
Wanda snickered.
"And then I dropped the spade because I was staring into my own face, only… It was like someone had taken my face and recoloured it. Green eyes instead of amber; auburn hair instead of red. And then all these other people turn up… Cap, Pietro, Clint…"
Wanda smiled softly.
"The Kooky Quartet."
"Quintet by the end of it. You insisted I returned to the States with the Avengers as a member. I did and a series of blood tests revealed we were half-siblings. I trained hard, and soon discovered I did more than heal."
"Claws and senses?"
"Yeah. We got on well… Cap trained me to be the best I could, and I started dating Bobby Drake. That didn't work out."
"Go on."
"Well, we were too young and then there was Pietro, being all protective…"
"He does that."
They shared a slight smile.
"I left. The Avengers… They weren't working out for me. I'd left my family to find out who I was. The Avengers weren't helping. And then Professor X approached me. The original team had been captured. Would I be interested in helping form a new team to rescue the old? I agreed. Maybe the X-Men could give me the answers the Avengers couldn't. We saved the old team. Thunderbird died. Jean became Phoenix. Magneto captured us and Hank –Beast. We escaped but the base, underneath a volcano –was destroyed. Jean and I escaped one way, the other X-Men another. We both thought the others had died. I… I didn't know what to do. I'd found a new life but without the X-Men it was worthless. I contemplated returning the Avengers but that would feel like failure. Instead I went to work with Dr MacTaggert on Muir Island. Jean arrived shortly but something was wrong. She… She was different. I confronted her on it but… The X-Men suddenly arrived, alive and well and er… Logan proceeds to kiss me senseless, telling me that he really should get better at displaying his emotions. And before I can kiss him back or slap him –I'm still not sure what I wanted to do- Proteus attacked. We were so busy. Running around, saving the world. I couldn't speak to either Jean or Logan. And… The Hellfire Club. I was the first to confront them. Emma tried to turn my mind inside out. I fought back. Jean was just standing there as the Black Queen. I begged her to help me. And somehow, I reached a part of her. I brought Dark Phoenix to life with my pleas. And when we were on the Moon fighting for her… Wanda, she killed me. She became Dark Phoenix again and burnt right through me. The… The X-Men were horrified. And then… Then it came. Like a miracle…"
"What did?"
Tora turned to Wanda, her eyes unreadable.
"Life Itself. I was reborn. As Dragon, I fought Jean. As Dragon I made her confront what she was. And in the knowledge that our fight could only end with both our deaths, Jean committed suicide. Scott was distraught, the war with the Shi'ar was averted and I lost my power –or so I thought."
"You thought?"
"I never really lost it. I just supressed it, fearing that I'd turn out like Jean. I left the X-Men –I felt I was the one responsible for Jean's death- wandering for so long. Logan found me. I tried to push him away. I still wanted to know who I was. He asked me to either return or let him come with me. I went back with him –the X-Men needed me, he said. Then he corrected himself. He needed me. I stayed with the X-Men. We got married shortly after Jean returned. She became Phoenix again and I… Suddenly I got all the Dragon powers back. You needed Dragon in case Phoenix got out of control. And then I had my twins. I was told they died before I even got to hold them…"
"Tora…"
"And I couldn't cope… I manipulated the Shi'ar into attacking Earth. Bobby was killed. The Brotherhood attacked as well… Two students were killed. And finally I lost it. I reanimated Jean's body, forced her to walk right into the school, right to her memorial statue and then I made her explode."
Tora's head dropped in shame.
"It killed twenty-three students, the Professor, Emma, Logan and Scott Lang; who had come to talk about setting up a school for other powered children in partnership with Charles. The X-Men realised I was unstable, packed me off to stay with Father and then… then… Whiteness. And everything is different."
Wanda tilted her head.
"We're sisters there… Are we…?"
"No. Not here. It's been known to happen, so don't worry."
Wanda suddenly sighed.
"You've always shown at least some resistance to reality warps… Immutability… Either through Dragon, or your alternates or just your sheer bloody-mindedness. So what was different about my warp?"
Tora was staring upwards in silence. Wanda pressed her point.
"You're immune to all reality warps, bar mine. What does that say?"
Tora got up and glanced over her shoulder.
"It means that, deep down, I wanted what you created."
And then she walked away, feet crunching in the snow, leaving her friend to stare after her in amazement.
"Whoa! Hold it right there, sister! She wanted House of M? Seriously?"
The masked woman shook her head slowly.
"Not exactly. What she wanted was a world where her kind could live in peace."