Xavier's School
April, 2007
"These so-called mutants are people just like us. Their affliction is nothing more than a disease, a corruption of healthy cellular activity. But I stand here today to tell you that there's hope. And this site, once the world's most famous prison, will now be the source of freedom for all mutants who choose it. Ladies and gentlemen, I proudly present the answer to mutation. Finally, we have a cure."
The television erupted on its stand with a loud, sizzling pop. Plastic and metal melted alike as sparks exploded from the device through the screen, the glass shattering outward into shards that peppered the carpet in a spray, and Cassandra's muscles lurched. The skin of her palms burned, the television beginning to smoke. She knew what she'd done, but the unadulterated crimson coloring her vision was closer, clearer. Her stomach was a cauldron of boiling rage and it compelled her to get up.
She shot up to her feet from the bed in a jolt and teleported out, the action vindicating after the heinously offensive speech she'd just subjected herself to. The cloud washed away from her as though pushed by a strong wind and a controlled burst of energy rattled the walls. When she reappeared, she stood at the base of the main stairs, and immediately began walking. No, marching. Her steps were quick but heavy as she made her way through the mansion.
Her gaze flickered into every room and hall as she weaved through the students traveling to their next class, only stopping when her eyes landed on the closed door of Charles' office. Heels digging into the flooring to stop herself, she pivoted quickly, darting left through a sitting room. Inside the office, Charles sat in his chair as Storm and Hank McCoy sat on one of the couches, the three conversing as Logan leaned into the front of Charles' desk.
He could sense her coming, her rapid heartbeat burning against his ears as the scent of peonies and smoke, and Logan turned his head to look as the door pushed open. "Did any of you hear that shit?" Cassandra questioned, coming to a fiery stop a few feet inside the room.
Charles withheld a sigh, biting his tongue as the urge to curb her use of profanity arose, and turned to see her. "Yes, dear. We all did."
"He said we have a fucking disease!" Cassandra angrily exclaimed, thrusting her hands out at her sides in a gesture. "Do these people not get it? If they treated us like we're human fucking beings to begin with, we wouldn't need some bullshit cure!"
"While I agree with that sentiment, have you considered that some mutants may want a cure?" Hank proposed the question gently, lightheartedly.
Cassandra's head recoiled as her brows furrowed. "They want a cure because society has told them they need it to be accepted. Instead of telling mutants to be 'normal', why can't we just tell 'normal' people to put on their big boy pants and get the fuck over themselves? What is this, the sixties?"
"Well, we have no say over whether or not the cure exists, or if mutants make the choice to use it," Charles settled back into his chair. "It's up to the individual."
"You don't see how this is being used against us? Worthington has a son—a mutant son. You think he's doing this because he loves us and wants us to be happy? No, this is about anti-mutant conformity. It's an eradication tactic, Charles," Cassandra pressed. Her cheeks were flushed with the faint red of rage as her voice began to shake.
"She's right," Storm spoke up then, causing Cassandra to raise a brow skeptically. "This is a dangerous precedent to set. If they can do this to us, what's stopping them from doing it to another minority? Didn't Hitler believe Jews were a disease? Look at what that lead to."
Charles all but scoffed. "I don't believe this is at all in any way comparable. It's a cure for the mutant—it's not a death sentence."
"For all we know, there could be something deadly in it. You think they'd tell us? What happens when they decide to put it in a gun? Where's our choice then, Professor?" Cassandra challenged.
"I think that's a little far-fetched, don't you?" Hank replied, with a tilt of his head.
Cassandra huffed a humorless chuckle. "Obviously not—and don't patronize me. Are Storm and I the only ones taking this seriously?"
As she looked around at the other adults in the room, their faces all held different emotions, different answers. Storm looked to the others as well, only to be met with the same obnoxiously loud silence. Logan leaned back a fraction where he sat on the edge of the desk, perched to see all others in the room, and he waited for someone to say something. Anything, really.
Charles held his tongue once again, the only sentences available to him the ones he already voiced. Hank had made it clear where he stood, naturally in favor of a mutant cure, if anything for the sake of his own insecurity. Perhaps it was that insecurity that prevented him from truly seeing the opposing perspective? After all, it was exactly as Cassandra said. Society made him feel inadequate. Unworthy. Inhuman. Beastly.
It caused him to resent his mutation, his thick hair and blue skin, and birthed a longing for societal normalcy no talking point or proof could ever quell. Charles could not allow himself to give up on the hope of basic morality even for the sake of discussion. He couldn't allow the thought of forced curing being a reality. If he abandoned that hope, that trust that humans would make the choice to be good, he would abandon himself.
However, those things did not truly go hand in hand. It was a fact that people did not often do the right thing when offered the choice. The majority of humanity had continued to fail mutants at every turn throughout history, just as they'd failed anyone the least bit different from them, either due to appearance, religion, language, or genetics. Ethnic cleansings, genocides, enslavement—it was in every textbook Cassandra had ever been given, entire semesters in class dedicated to such historical events.
Now, there was a genuine threat to mutant rights. The cure should not exist. Instead, humans should simply be kinder. But with the existence of a cure came the lack of civil rights. If you commit a crime? Cured. If you anger a police officer for existing in your own skin? Cured. You're not only punished for a crime you may or may not have actually committed, but you're subjected to the loss of who you are as a person.
It was cruel, abhorrent, and unfair. It was something she'd assumed—trusted—that the people she looked up to would view the same way. But the silence when challenged spoke louder than their paper thing arguments. It felt like a heel to her stomach, threatening to knock the wind from her lungs as the implication settled in, and she found her jaw slacking. "That's it?" she questioned, more quiet than before. Hurt. "After everything you people have taught me, you're going to side with them? Just like that?"
"Cassandra, there are no sides. We have no evidence of wrongdoing. If mutants want to give up their mutation, who are we to stop them?" Charles finally spoke up, his voice a little softer at the sight of her features paling, but it fell on mostly deaf ears.
"Fuck you."
Cassandra turned and hastily exited the office, leaving the door open in a further show of her disdain for their views, and Charles finally sighed. "I guess I've been gone a little too long," Hank commented, adjusting his position in an attempt to escape the guilt threatening to crawl into his throat. "I don't remember her being this belligerent."
"That happens to teenagers when their mentor dies," Logan dryly quipped, sending a light glare at the mutant on the couch.
Hank returned the stern stare, brow lowered in contempt at the insinuation. It was a slap in the face. He hadn't been here when Jean died. And although it wasn't likely that him being a part of the team at that time would've changed the outcome, it was far too easy to direct hostility toward him, if anything for the simple fact that he wasn't there afterward either. He wasn't there for Scott, or Storm, or Charles.
He was in Washington, working with some of the very people trying to keep Stryker in business. It was a blemish on his conscience Logan found all too satisfying to rub into his face. Before there was a reply to be given, Logan stood from the desk and strode across the room to the open door, and he left the office. Although he'd left to find Cassandra, he would not find her in any hiding place he knew of.
She sat in the somewhat-attic of the mansion, tucked into the window sill, her knees to her chest as her face rested in the palms of her hands atop them. Her body trembled with anger and confusion and hurt. The person she wanted to run to for guidance was dead. The second option was held up in his room and not taking visitors. Not that she would want to talk to Scott anyway. Not truly.
He'd become a different person after Jean's death—in some ways, they all had—and he was no longer the Scott Summers she knew. So she sat alone in the silent dimness of the room, trying desperately to calm herself as she collected her thoughts. Then, after a moment, an unmistakable sound preceded a brief rush of air. Cassandra's head shot up, eyes searching the space. But she didn't need to look for more than a second to find Kurt.
He walked toward her from near the center of the room and her muscles shuddered as a wave of relief washed over her. "I heard what happened and wanted to see if you're alright," Kurt explained his arrival as he approached.
Cassandra turned in her position to allow her feet to touch the floor, hanging off the edge of the sill, and she outstretched her arms. Kurt didn't hesitate to crouch before the sill between her knees and wrap his arms around her torso. An action too natural, too comforting not to repeat. With her arms around his neck and shoulders, Cassandra exhaled a heavy breath. "I don't know what to do," she admitted, her cheek against the top of his shoulder.
"Must you do something?" he asked the question genuinely.
"Someone has to. We both know damn well what this government is like. It's not a question of 'if' they make weapons—it's 'when'."
Kurt gave a small nod. "Yes. I know. What could you do?"
Cassandra pulled away enough to sit up, her hands coming to rest on his forearms as his held her waist, and she shook her head. "That's what I don't know," she answered. "If I know anything about Magneto, he's probably already doing something himself. I don't want to join him...but if he's the only one trying to stop this, what choice do I have?"
"You have to do what you believe is right. Still, it couldn't hurt to find out his plan before doing anything you might regret," Kurt gently advised her.
She nodded slowly, thinking. It wouldn't be hard to find Magneto and simply ask for his terms and conditions before committing to the cause—even just temporarily. Rage and purpose swirled within her, and she felt compelled to take action. However, at the same time, her veins flowed with pure terror at the thought of doing something that could distance her from the X-Men.
There were things she absolutely hated about living at the mansion, and she'd had her fair share of abuse from nearly all the founding members—but they were the only thing that ever truly resembled a family in her life. The attachment she felt to them cut deep into her bones. If she sided with Magneto now, who was to say they would take her back later? Would she be stuck with Magneto? Or, worse, left without a home? She couldn't risk it. Could she?
Though, she didn't have to just yet. All she had to do was find Magneto and hear him out. Then, she could think it over and decide what to do, preferably with some clarity after the initial anger subsides. Cassandra exhaled and, this time, felt a change. "Thank you," her eyes lifted to meet Kurt's, and the corners of her mouth lifted into a small smile. "I was losing my mind there for a minute."
Kurt gave a toothy smile in return. "You have a big heart, Cassie. That's a very good thing."
His voice, his presence, the feeling of his hands against her waist—it all contributed to the calming warmth beginning to ebb within her chest. It was like a campfire on a cold night, a cold drink beneath the summer sun. Something about him was always enough to soothe her restless emotions. Cassandra leaned forward, tilting her head to better capture his lips between hers as she lifted her hands to cup his face, thumbs gentle as they slid over his cheekbones.
Kurt melted beneath her touch. His hands slid up her back to wrap his arms around her once more, to pull her closer as he kissed her back. She moved a hand to the window sill and pushed, helping ease herself off the wood the rest of the way in favor of lowering herself to him instead, the change causing him to place his knees on the floor as she now straddled his lap. But it wasn't an inconvenience. It was more than welcome, his abdominal muscles contracting involuntarily as a shiver ran through his body.
Her fingers slipped his hair, nails sharp but gentle against the skin of his scalp. It was then he pulled away, summoning every ounce of will, and gave her a cautious look as they both found it harder to breathe. "Here?" he questioned, voice quiet so close, their noses brushing in the space between them.
"No one comes up here," she answered, moving her lips to the line of his jaw. As she placed slow kisses toward his neck, she continued, "I don't think anyone remembers it exists. Besides, it's not like we can't make a quick getaway."
Kurt's eyes fluttered closed, her warmth reaching his ear, and a small sound of pleasure escaped him. "It was too close last time."
The statement brought Cassandra's mind back to only a few days prior. They'd been in a situation similar, only they'd become trapped in intimacy inside the greenhouse in the South garden. One thing had lead to another, a simple kiss snowballed until they were making love against the workbench, and they were too lost in each other to hear someone outside. Thankfully for both of them, they hadn't actually been caught. However, Cassandra did have to explain how a lone sandal of hers wound up in the greenhouse to Storm that evening.
Getting caught, or the thrill of being threatened with it, wasn't all that appealing to Cassandra. Of course, she felt the rush from the idea that she was rebelling against the rules—or, at least, the heavily implied rules. But it didn't affect her in moments like this. Though, remembering what they'd done in the greenhouse only spurred her on in the attic. "Then we'll be faster this time," she spoke between kisses, nearly at his shoulder now, and she ground her hips down against his lap.
Another shiver ran through him, this time sharp, and it pulled a growl from his throat, the actions causing his erection to throb within his sweatpants. He adjusted his hands then—one flat against her back and the other cupping the underside of her thigh—and lifted her up against him as he stood on his knees, before turning to lower them both to the wooden floorboards.
There was an urge within him, a primal desire to touch her, please her, claim her as his own right there on the floor, and there was nothing stopping him from giving in and doing just that. He pulled away from her only to grab at her sweater and pull, tugging it over her head with the help of her adjustments and wiggles, before moving swiftly to the buttons of her jeans. Blue swirling drunkenly with lust in her eyes, Cassandra lifted her lower half as Kurt pulled the denim down her legs.
With only her cotton panties remaining, she was quick to right herself as she reached for his clothes, pushing the fabric of his shirt up his muscled torso. He made short work of the task, pulling his shirt over his head and beating her to the waistband of his sweatpants. Cassandra's fingers pulled off her last article of clothing as he maneuvered out of his pants. The sight of his erection, freed from the removal, swirled something light in her gut—a kind of nauseating brought on by anxious butterflies, a rush of anticipation.
"Fuck me," the words were a breathy exhale as she leaned back on her palms, nudging her heels over the wood to part her legs for him.
It was an invitation that fed his lust far too completely. Kurt surged forward, their lips meeting with equal parts lust and passion, and Cassandra laid back as he positioned himself over her. Her heart beat violently against her rib cage, throat ablaze already as she felt him at her core. Heat enveloped him as he eased inside, and she swallowed him to the hilt, a sensation that elicited loud moans from them both.
Skin erupted in bumps, arms and legs snaked to hold on, hands grasping at each other as the feeling settled in. Though, the stillness was short-lived. Neither could stand it. With a palm braced against the wood, Kurt began to move his hips. Every change in position sparked heat in the pit of his gut. The warmth was like a drug with an overwhelming rush that faded too soon, forcing him to give chase, thrusting deeply into Cassandra with an ever quickening pace.
It wasn't just difficult to breathe anymore—it was impossible. Gasping in what oxygen she could between the involuntary sounds that ripped their way up her throat, her nails dug into the skin of his shoulder blades, teeth nipping at his neck. The result was a glorious mixture of gruff moans, grunts, and whines from him that did nothing but plead, begging for her to continue.
She bucked her hips to meet his thrusts and the sounds only got louder, tension building in the core of their abdomens like a highwire they couldn't help but cross. The climax meant the end of the rush, but that thought was buried too deep, both stuck in the chase to the point of detriment. Kurt's hand slid along the skin of her torso, slick with sweat, until his fingers reached her folds, and he began rubbing at the sensitive bundle of nerves.
"Kurt!"
Her back instinctively arched as her muscles suddenly tensed, gliding her nails downward parallel his spine, and he swallowed her lips in a searing kiss as his chest rumbled with a groan. It was all so much. The heat, the friction, the pressure. They were so close to the end of the rope that Kurt could feel himself slipping, his thrusts becoming more sloppy, shallow as it swelled within him. Cassandra wasn't far behind, seconds away from the freefall of release.
"Cassie...I'm about to- scheisse," he gritted his teeth, dropping his forehead to the front of her shoulder, as he swore in his mother tongue.
"Let go, baby," she was breathless, quiet so near to his ear. "I'm so close- just let go."
There weren't many thrusts left in him before the rope ran out. It snapped like a thinning rubber band and his hips shuddered to a halt against hers, diving deep one final time, thick heat filling her entirely. The sensation was enough stimulation to push her over the edge, a rush of ecstasy pulsating through her at a speed quick enough to sprinkle stars throughout her vision, and her limbs tightened around Kurt's frame to anchor herself.
He whispered words that spilled from his mouth like rain, fighting to catch his breath as the endorphins struggled to level out. It wasn't until she regained her wits, muscles relaxing without the strength to hold them any longer, that Cassandra realized he was praying. She'd heard it too many times not to recognize the words, the speech pattern—even with limited knowledge of German, it was obvious.
Despite the protest of muscle, she lifted her arm, sliding her fingers into his hair to gently massage at his scalp as she leaned her cheekbone against his temple. Her chest heaved beneath his weight, colliding with his as his lungs worked just as hard, their breathing echoing in the emptiness of the room. "Are you alright?" he suddenly asked, voice sounding a little raw.
"Extremely," Cassandra sighed as she allowed her eyes to fall closed. "And you?"
He found it within himself despite the blissful weakness to push against the floor, lifting up far enough to see her face, and she opened her eyes to find softly golden halos gazing into her soul. "I'm in love with you."
She swallowed thickly, words caught in her throat as she felt the oxygen in her lungs forced back out of them too soon, but she couldn't force her eyes away. It was true. He was deeply, completely, stupidly in love. He was in love with just about every part of her, from her personality to her body. In her heart, Cassandra knew she felt the same—the way she felt when he entered the room proof enough as it was. But the intimacy she shared with Kurt wasn't there with John.
Sex was so simple, a means to an end. When she shared her bed with Kurt, it was like the act held an entirely new meaning, something so strong and rich that heightened the experience as a whole. It made her feel close to him in a way she'd never felt with anyone else. As though, somehow, it were possible to share your soul, even just for a moment. Even though all of this was true, her lips held deathly still. She didn't dare say all the words that came to mind, the sentiment expressed behind them.
Wasn't it too soon? Did time matter so much when the love was real? If she was to speak at all, she wanted deeply for the words to echo his. She could risk it, couldn't she? After all, how could she be willing to risk her life for someone but not her heart? He deserved to know she loved him, too—that he was appreciated and adored and desired.
Forcing herself to inhale, she swallowed once more, her hand following the side of his face before settling just above the jawline. "I'm in love with you, too," her voice wavered, threatening to tremble, but the words took shape. "I love you, Kurt Wagner."
Warmth swelled in his chest and Kurt leaned down, pressing a kiss to her forehead, her temple, her cheek, every inch of her face. Her lips parted in anticipation, openly accepting him when he finally reached them, and their mouths melded together deeply. It was slow, comfortable, free of any expectation but love already shared. A part of her felt as though she were simply falling back into old habits.
It was easier to be in a relationship than to commit to being alone when it was right in front of her face. But the way her head, heart, and body felt at peace in his arms spoke volumes—it was a state of being thought unachievable. In truth, she didn't know what to do with love once she had it in her hands. She was too heavy-handed with such a delicate thing. More often than not, all it took was one clamp of her fingers, and the feeling cracked like an egg bleeding through the cracks in her hand.
Being late in the day already was the perfect excuse to stay out of the social areas of the school for the night. Instead, they gathered their clothes and escaped to her room, put on more comfortable clothing, and settled into bed. Her television unplugged, the device looked like it'd been shot with a small missile across the room, dark as they opted for a book. Shoulder blades against his abdomen, Cassandra read the lines aloud as his fingers gently combed through the warm mahogany of her hair.
She didn't know how she would tell Charles what she'd done to the television, or where this new level of relationship would lead, or how she was going to find Magneto. But she would handle it all in the morning.