Memories
Safety
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Thor disagreed with her ruthlessly killing any guards in their way. But then he found his brother and it was all he could do to stop himself going back and killing the rest. Loki was twitching, covered in blood, stripped of his armour and his skin ice-white. Trickles of sweat slid down his face. Tigress leant down and with surprising tenderness cleaned the worst of the blood away.
"Come on, sweetie. We need to get you to safety."
Loki looked up, confused. Then angry.
"You shouldn't be here! Not in your… your…" He had noticed Thor and dropped his voice low. "…condition."
"Loki, shut up. Right, we'll get you out of here. And then I'm coming back to kill every last one of them."
Thor marvelled at the woman capable of getting his brother to shut up and listen to her but still refused to let them slip away when they managed to bust out.
"You shall come with us. Mine brother is injured and I wish to speak with you, Tigress, about your 'relationship'."
Tora rolled her eyes in disgust but let him call up the Quinjet. The awkward silence filled the whole plane on the flight back. It was only when Loki was given the all-clear that she finally relaxed. Thor didn't look like he was going to give any mercy.
"What was mine brother referring to with your 'condition'?"
Tigress promptly boxed Loki's ears.
"Told you not to mention it, you idiot."
Everyone stared at her.
"Did she just call Loki an idiot?"
"She did…"
"My respect for her awesomeness has just increased a hundred-fold…"
She sighed, rolled her eyes and stood up.
"I am only going to say this once. I do not want to have to repeat myself. Any stupid comments will result in extreme agony. Understand?"
They all nodded. She closed her eyes.
"I am going to retire from the whole costumed super-villain thing because for the next twenty years or so I will be raising a mutant demigod. There, I said it!"
The silence that followed was incredibly awkward.
xXx
"Maman?"
"Jamie?"
"Can… Can we speak…? Alone?"
"Of course. The garage?"
"Okay…"
"So…?"
"We were doing the Fall of Apocalypse in Modern History."
Tora stiffened.
"Yes…?"
"Why didn't you tell me? That I'm not… I'm not Kurt's son…"
"You are. He has always been your father. Legally and emotionally, he is your father."
"But not genetically! I find out from my History teacher that I'm the son of a genocidal maniac who abused you for three years!"
"What did the teacher say?"
"Read out of the textbook. I still have it."
He threw the book over to Tora who opened it.
"Page thirty-three."
Her eyes skimmed across the paper.
The leaders of the Resistance were the original Captain America, Steve Rogers; and a mutant with a long and chequered history dealing with En Sabah Nur, Etana Bat Aleka, or the Shadow. They were joined in the High Council by Kurt Wagner, a former X-Man who was one of the few who survived the turning of Wolverine and Archangel; Reed Richards, the only free member of the Fantastic Four after the capture of his wife and children, the assassination of Johnny Storm, the Human Torch and the conversion of Benjamin Grimm to the Horseman of War; Max Eisenhardt, formerly the mutant terrorist Magneto; and Marie Circen, more commonly known as Tora and a trusted member of the Inner Circle of Clan Akkaba due to her marriage to Apocalypse's Hand, formerly the X-Man Wolverine.. However, Circen had been spying for the Resistance since the very beginning, assassinating Archangel, the Horseman of Death and providing the details that allowed Ohio to be evacuated before Victor Creed, the second Horseman of Death razed it to the ground. One of Circen's major coups however was to smuggled Etana Bat Aleka into the Clan Akkaba and use her considerable power as the wife of the Hand of Apocalypse to divert guards from En Sabah Nur's chambers when the Shadow assassinated him. However, Circen was unable to prevent Logan from capturing and torturing the Shadow. At the public execution however, Circen threw herself between the Shadow and the blade, revealing herself to be the long-suspected spy in the very heart of Apocalypse's regime. Wagner rescued both Shadow and Circen, but the sword had shattered on Circen's adamantium spine, a relic from the Weapon Plus program she had been a forced participant of. Circen appeared to have recovered, but later collapsed at the Resistance's victory parade. She was rushed to Eisenhardt in an attempt to remove the shards of enchanted metal, but he was unable to prevent her major organs from being ruptured. Circen died before ever seeing the final return of democracy to the world. Out of respect for her, Wagner had her marriage posthumously annulled and took her infant child who had been removed from her shortly after his birth, in concordance to her last request. Since the fall of Apocalypse's regime, Wagner's whereabouts have been unknown. It has been suggested that he lives in seclusion, raising the son of Apocalypse's Hand and Archangel's Bane.
Rogers later…
She raised her head, eyes so sad.
"You aren't him…"
"Couldn't you have told me? I don't know, mentioned at one point that I'm the son of the most reviled man in the world!?"
"We thought it was better-"
"That I didn't know? You honestly thought it was better I didn't know!"
"Yes… Because I wouldn't wish that burden on you, not until you were much older…"
"Maman, you've lied to me! You've lied my whole life!"
"I have never lied! Kurt Wagner is your father, no other man!"
"I think you're just trying to hide the fact you made a mistake and you're so ashamed that you've been hiding the truth! I think you've made yourself believe that I'm actually Kurt's biological son!"
She recoiled as if hit. Then she looked up.
"I bled for you. When Apocalypse took over, I had a choice. I could stay with Logan and keep the child I was carrying, or leave for the Resistance and almost certainly lose you. I chose you over my freedom and self-respect. I chose to be beaten and humiliated and treated like a whore for you. I let that… that… monster hurt me and turn me into little more than an outlet for his most violent emotions, all so you could remain safe. He didn't care for you. He threatened me. I could stay with him, or he would kill you. So I remained. I would never let him hurt you, because you aren't his son. You are the son of Wolverine and not the man he became."
Jamie faltered.
"You… That's the reason you stayed? Me? You stayed with him all those years because of me?"
She nodded slightly.
"It was worth it. I would willing go through a thousand years of that torment if it meant you were safe."
"So… Why risk the Resistance? You still cared about the world…?"
"The world can go to the dogs for all I care. I wasn't going to let you grow up in that environment."
"So…everything was for me…?"
She nodded softly and then he was crying on her shoulder as he tried to realise what she'd gone through for him.
xXx
She stood there, choking on the lump in her throat.
"James and I… We've known each other since… well, forever… We grew up in the house next door, were best friends all through school, dated briefly in high school before deciding that we were better at being friends and kept in touch all through college. And… Lots of people talk about how our marriage was full of love. It was, so very full… But… I think I have to say, we were never in love…"
She looked up.
"We both came back from college with broken hearts. His fiancée had cheated on him; I'd had some…bad experiences with guys. And there was the one person who would never hurt us, who we trusted more than anyone else. When we got married, we knew we weren't in love but that we were choosing to spend the rest of our lives with our best friend."
She coughed, trying to clear out the feeling she was being suffocated by the tight ball of grief in her windpipe.
"We just…slotted into a life together… To be honest, we'd been best friends for so long, the only difference was that we happened to live together. When… When we found out about the cancer… We came even closer. We found ways of comforting each other, just by being there. And… And two days before… When the pain was at its worst… James just looked at me and quietly said 'I think I've fallen in love'."
She looked down, unable to meet their eyes.
"And that was the weirdest thing. That in twenty-two years of marriage, we did fall in love. Just very, very slowly and so gradually we never even noticed. And I think, that in a way… If we'd been in love at the start of our marriage, rather than simply loving each other, then… I hate to say this, but I doubt it would work out…"
She smiled sadly.
"So I just wanted to say, to James, today of all days. Thank you. Thank you for being the best friend I could ever have. And thank you for being the best husband."
She stepped down and Kurt, moving up to the coffin, pressed one hand on her shoulder.
"Marie…"
She touched his hand.
"Thanks, Kurt… For everything…"
"How sweet…"
"How sad."
"You always focus on the negative, don't you?"
A.N. I'll be away over the weekend, so I'll post this now -I'm aiming to publish 250 on the 1st of July, Memories' second anniversary.