Memories

Born of Shadows

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Logan sat alone in his office with his thoughts. The other Tora had given him far too much to think about. Then he reached into his desk and pulled out the medallion Hank had given him. He picked up some paper and carefully ran it over his pinky in such a way as to create a paper cut. Then he pressed down and the blood well up and he ran it over the winged sword impaling the crown. He'd seen Etana's official coat of arms, the red and black shield that she never carried. She had once described the proper name, the…what was it… the blazon! That was it. Parted per fess gules and sable, chief wings sable, sword argent, base crown gules. He'd just said he had no time for fancy language and she'd laughed.

The blood ran around the raised sigil and the whole thing glowed bright, then burst into white flames that didn't hurt him to touch.

You called me?

Etana stood in front of him, her hair a flickering corona of flames but otherwise appearing as human as she ever had.

"Is Tora dead?"

What? That's it? No, hello, how are you? How are things in Dead-Land? Just right to business?

Logan slumped backwards. She didn't look happy with him. He'd not even had her in the room five seconds and he'd insulted her. Bad move. But then she moved and sat gracefully on the chair opposite.

No, she isn't dead. Well… She's not in any of Death's Realms. Honestly, Logan… I don't think she can die anymore. You can't kill something like that…

"Like what?"

Etana shrugged.

Something that…primal. She's nearly one with the Dragon. Mistress Death summoned her a… Time doesn't work the same when you're dead… Mistress Death summoned her to the Afterlife. Logan, she was lost. I think she'd forgotten Tora ever existed. But then she remembered. She's out there.

He felt pain stab into his chest, didn't know what to think.

"Then… Why doesn't she come home?"

Etana looked away, almost ashamed.

She wishes to die. She stays away because she is trying to protect you. Because she wants to die. She wants to be allowed to leave the pain. She doesn't want to hurt you anymore.

He felt a lump rise up in his throat.

"Why would she want to leave?"

The look Etana gave him was far more tender and understanding than any she had given him in life.

Because she loves you enough to let you go.

He felt the lump harden and move.

"But… Why…?"

Because she's an idiot? I don't know, Logan! I've always been awful with emotions. I just lock them up and ignore them. You're asking me to psychoanalyse her. I can't do that. I chop off people's heads with swords.

"But…"

Time's up, I'm afraid. Don't call me again unless it's urgent. I've only one of those and you've already used up one life of three.

"Tana!"

She smiled sadly, then her wings ignited in black fire, swung around her and she was gone. Logan just moved forward and thumped his head off the desk a few times.

Phoenix rolled her eyes.

"Can I say, Etana is a wonderful person, but I still want to thump her at times."

"She was trying to be comforting. She just always sucked at it."

Phoenix shrugged.

"She did get a cool coat of arms though…"

Evan sat looking at the file. Mrs Logan had given it to him and he'd only read part of it before… Before all the bad stuff happened and he was taken and was told who and what Apocalypse was and the scary version of Mrs Logan –unscarred yet harder and colder- had helped rescue him but still pulled him aside and quietly told him that if he ever became like Apocalypse, she would hunt him down and kill him. He had looked into the cold eyes and whispered "I'd thank you" and she pulled away and given a little half-smile that made her look less scary.

But now he opened the second part of the file, the one sealed tight with wrappings upon wrappings of duct tape. There was a single name on it. Etana.

There were pages upon pages of neatly handwritten notes. The script wasn't anyones' that Evan recognised, but it was beautiful in its grace. It was almost like calligraphy. And also every now and then, the writing would descend into an alphabet he didn't recognise, written from right to left in the same clear script. He touched it and realised whoever had written this had used a fountain pen. The paper was beautiful as well, thick and handmade, with a small embossing at the top. Giving up on trying to puzzle out the mystery of who would make a report on an enemy on such high-quality material, Evan began to read.

I have known the mutant known as En Sabah Nur for almost all of my life. For a significant portion of our aquaintence, we were friends. We first met when we were fighting off a Brood invasion together. My first impression was of a shy young man struggling to make his way in the world. I liked him, truth be told. He seemed very sincere.

I dropped in every now and then, about every decade as his power grew. He was, not to put too fine a point on it, infatuated with me. He proposed twice during our first few years of friendship. Eventually he gave up asking but still asked without words. I later discovered his intentions were a part of his 'survival of the fittest' laws. He perceived me as genetically a highly compatible mate, believing any offspring would be some of the most powerful mutants ever born.

I regret to say it took me a number of centuries to perceive his true self. It took a rather violent confrontation atop the tomb of an old friend for me to see him for what he was.

While I have devoted large portions of my life to thwarting the schemes of En Sabah Nur and his Clan Akabba, I understand these files are meant to be utilised for psychoanalysis. Therefore the details of various plots will be of no use –En Sabah Nur is too canny to reuse the same plan twice, especially when I had previously prevented its inception. I realise what is of value to you is my personal experiences with him. I will happily divulge some of our interactions –but others I seal in the enclosed envelope to only be read in event of my death; and some I will never tell, for the pain they caused me.

You must understand, that for one such as me, a year is of little consequence. Therefore my centuries-long friendship with En Sabah Nur was one of the most important relationships of my life. He was my friend and in another world, his words may have had another outcome. In that world, I weep for you, but you must know this –for all his cruelty, insanity and twisted laws; En Sabah Nur is at heart an honourable man –and there is no man more dangerous than one with honour.

I write this on the 28th of Sh'vat 5767 (in your calendar, the 15th of February, after sundown.)

Yours,

Etana Bat Aleka, Shadow of Justice

Evan reached out and touched the graceful signature. It flowed and was alive. The woman had died shortly after writing this. He didn't need to have heard Zillah announce her full name to recognise the woman from her first few sentences. He had seen her alive before Zillah had ever arrived and she had tilted her head quizzically at him before flashing him a broad smile and a wink. She'd slipped him a bit of paper with the same graceful handwriting and the note You're Okay, Kid on it. She'd partly been the reason he'd stared at Zillah so hard. Because she may have only been around the school for a few hours before she vanished, but she was one of the most interesting people he'd ever seen. He'd later read up on her in the X-Men files and been astonished by how short her autobiography had been –at least the autobiography on offer to students. Hacking into the X-Men high-security files had been like discovering a gold mine. A woman who was also an angel. A warrior who was also a mother. An ancient who sometimes displayed a child's sense of humour.

Then he began reading her notes and he felt such sorrow. Because nothing hurt so much as seeing respect and care turn to fear and eventually all-consuming hatred. A man who she wanted to make excuses for but could find none. It hurt like nothing he could imagine. He was the same genetically as a man who forced a loyal woman to denounce him. He had the same capacity for evil as Apocalypse.

After a few pages, he pushed it away and pulled out the little note, and held it close. Because it was the only thing anyone had ever given him that said that he wasn't Apocalypse which made him feel as if he wasn't. Because she knew En Sabah Nur and if she said he wasn't that man, then he wasn't. He couldn't be.

And if he ever became that, then there would always be Zillah. Cycles within cycles, returning and reborn.

"But didn't they…?"

"Life works in funny ways, my dear Phoenix. You should have lived long enough to know that."

Beast sat down.

"What is it, Henry?"

Hank Pym pinched the bridge of his nose.

"We were taking a tissue sample from Zillah –part of the standard Avengers health tests; and something odd came up. I did so extra testing –I wanted to compare her cloning procedure to Laura's and… And Henry, her DNA shows the aging signs of a sixteen year old. I compared it to some samples from Etana –they're identical except… Etana's is that of a woman in her mid-to-late thirties. Zillah's is that of a teen. Even Laura's displays the aging signs of a forty-year-old, and that's with a healing factor!"

Hank leant forward, suddenly interested.

"Even Evan's DNA shows signs of aging. No one has ever managed to create a clone without the tell-tale wear-and-tear discrepencies! Not even the Shi'ar, although they've worked out how to ensure the life-span of the clone isn't affected by the age of the donor."

"If it wasn't for the readings being exactly the same, I'd swear she was Etana's daughter, not her clone. But their DNA is identical… It just doesn't make sense! Was there anything on what method Etana used to clone Zillah?"

Hank shook his head.

"There was nothing at the house. The thing that was slightly confusing was the photos that clearly weren't taken on a timer. No pose, nothing. But Etana and Zillah, caught by surprise. Someone else was there, someone who took photos of them. There was someone else there, but Zillah won't tell us who. Well, she did, but Doda isn't that helpful."

"That means Aunt, doesn't it? So a female?"

"Questionable. Further questioning implied a gender-neutral being. It's possible Doda was used simply to imply a sibling-like relationship with Etana."

"You think they could have something to do with Zillah's creation? What if it were an alien being that reproduces by absorbing another's genes? A being that somehow carried Zillah, hence making her a child of Etana's…"

"It still wouldn't explain the lack of aging in the DNA. And you'd expect at least some variations."

"It's not possibly Etana could have been a series of mutants with asexual reproduction as part of her mutation? The Decimation could have disrupted the transfer of personality to Zillah."

"No. Her memories were too complete. Zillah is a completely different person."

"We should try asking Zillah again?"

"Call her in, Henry. You won't get anything out of her."

"Ooh, I want to see this…"

"Sure thing, Jean."

Zillah sat down and smiled awkwardly.

"Whatever Ava said I did, I didn't do it! She's just annoyed I did better than her in the Principles of Tribal Magics than her."

Pym blinked.

"Zillah, you're not in trouble. We just want to talk to you about your aunt."

"My aunt…?"

"The one you refer to as Doda?"

Zillah stiffened.

"I… I'm not allowed to talk about her. She said you'd get angry."

"Who did? Your mother or your aunt?"

"Doda. She said that when I met you, you would get angry if you knew who she was. She says sorry though. She's so very sorry and she didn't mean it and she's trying to make everything right!"

There was a long pause. Pym leant forward.

"Can you describe what your aunt looked like?"

Zillah shrugged.

"She had lots of faces. Sometimes I could touch her, sometimes I went right through. It depended on what she came to do. She dropped in a few times after… after Ima died, but never for too long. She said there was a danger of being noticed and she couldn't afford to be noticed, least of all by herself."

Zillah fell silent.

"I miss her… She came just before Uncle Logan. She said I wouldn't be alone much longer but then she had to go because otherwise people would come and they'd be angry instead of happy."

"Did she say why?"

"That was when she said she was sorry. Also, she said she just had to do a few things before she'd be out of your hair forever. That she had a date with an old friend and would finally get some rest. That's when the alarm sounded because Uncle Logan had landed."

Her wings had curled around her defensively.

"She said she couldn't come back. She was sorry."

Beast looked startled.

"If… If I were to show you a photo, could you identify her?"

Zillah's eyes widened in shock

"You know her?"

"I suspect I may…"

He leant over, tapped a few times on Pym's screen then turned it round. Zillah said nothing, but there was a twitch in her face that Etana would have never displayed that told Hank everything he didn't want to know.

"I… I don't recognise that woman."

"Thank you, Zillah. You can go now."

She vanished in a flash of light and the two Henrys stared at each other with barely supressed fear.

Soft golden eyes stared out of the screen.

"She needed to work on her inscrutability."

"Oh Jean, give her five years and she will be as much a master of hiding her true feelings as Etana ever was."