X-Men: Evolution

Blood Magics

**edited 02/25/24**

Disclaimer: I do not own X-men: Evo.

A/N: Here we go; Blood Magics has been re- written. Finished the last edits just barely after midnight, making it technically 04/24/24 that I finished it on. I poured everything I could into getting this done asap. It has a total of 38 chapters and, once I have replaced all of the 16 chapters that are already written, I will post each new chapter at least weekly if not more often- I will update this every Sunday, and I'm going to try for updating it on Wednesdays as well, since people who have been waiting for me to finish this story since I started it over ten years ago deserve the end if they've hung around this long. If you have, by the way, thank you.

Now, I should let you know; getting this finished, my brain feels a little fried. I also have some other things that I need to turn my attention to. There is a third story in this trilogy, but it will have to wait a little bit before I can get to work on it, so that I can catch up on the other things I need to get done. But at least this story finally has an ending that I can post.

I'm going to have this note on both chapter one, the first chapter, and on chapter 17, which will be the first new chapter, since I stopped at chapter 16 when this story went on hiatus. Just in case anyone gets the alert for the new chapter, although I think emails are currently broken, so people might not.

Summary: The adults are no closer to determining what kind of threat they are facing. Dragon tries her best to adjust to a life that most people would consider more normal, and Kurt disappears without warning. And the X- Men are about to receive multiple lessons about the fact that when you start playing with blood… things get messy.

1. Unique

Hank smiled. Normally, his opinion regarding a basketball left lying at random in the entrance hall after most of the students had left for school would be one of exasperation and mild annoyance. Bobby, Ray, and Sam were all notorious for leaving things in random places. Jubilee too, actually, but her left- at- random objects were almost always tubes or containers of makeup. The basketball wasn't her. Come to think of it, it wasn't Sam, either- Sam almost exclusively left food lying out. Once or twice a misplaced remote if he was called on unexpectedly. Toys, he had the good grace to put away.

No, for an object like a basketball, three out of fives times it was Ray. Bobby was the other two out of five. Jamie might have been considered a culprit if the poor boy was ever able to get his hands on the basketballs or soccer balls, but they were normally claimed by older mutants who didn't want him playing with them, so he was normally stuck with things like frisbees. And normally Rahne either got him to put them away, or did it herself. So chances were it was one of two people who had left the basketball where it could be a potential hazard.

For this particular time, though, he was more amused than annoyed. The one student left in the mansion, Dragon, had found the basketball a couple of moments before he did, and was entertaining herself rolling it around. Normally, at this time, she had a math lesson with Jean, but on this particular day, Jean was running late; a mishap with Cannonball racing down the stairs had destroyed the banister, and she, Scott, and Logan were currently repairing it. It wasn't expected to take too long, not with the practice they had- it was far from Sam's first mishap- but it was long enough that Dragon's math lesson was going to start late, and so she'd found something else to amuse herself with while she waited.

Rearing up, she draped herself overtop of the ball, and giggled when it rolled her to one side and down to the ground. Letting go of it, it rolled away from her a little as she got to her feet, and when she did, she pounced, seizing the ball with her front paws.

A loud bang split the air; the basketball exploded, a few large pieces of it flying apart. Dragon landed on the ground, suddenly confused and crestfallen. Hank winced and hurried over.

"Are you alright?"

She looked up at him, not surprised to see him- he was sure she'd known he was there- but her eyes looked watery, and she sniffed.

"I didn't mean to! What… what happened?"

Hank gave her a smile. "Don't worry. The students here have destroyed so many sports balls that I looked into making them here myself, out of a special material that I designed… one that can withstand even our students with super strength and have a greater resistance to being set on fire. The downside to that is that in order to still retain the appropriate properties of a basketball, it needs to be filled with a very high volume of air. I suspect your claws put a puncture in the ball, so the high air pressure inside blew apart the rest of the material as it escaped. The polymer I designed can withstand superstrength well… but I'll admit I did not design it with claws in mind."

The Dragon lowered her head; the water that had gathered in one of her eyes trickled down her nose.

"I'm sorry…"

"As long as you're not hurt, it's alright." Hank assured her. "The ball itself is of no importance. We have more."

Well, technically, they were a good bit more expensive to make than your standard ball… it had still been worth it to develop, given how much the students liked incorporating their powers into every single game and how many basketballs and other types the mansion had gone through before Hank had been able to develop something a little more resistant. Still, now that the mansion had a member who could not retract her claws, it looked like some adjustments were going to have to be made. Again.

Such was life at the Xavier Institute.

"You aren't hurt, right?"

"No, I'm fine. But I didn't know that would happen…"

Over the past month, the Dragon had been making progress in leaps and bounds… in some areas. In other areas, she still struggled. She still would not join the rest of them for mealtimes, eating only in her room or in the wooded area on the property, for one. For another, she sometimes became almost inconsolable over issues that were quite minor. Her fear, from what Hank could tell, was of making someone angry; exactly what she was afraid they would do, he couldn't say with complete certainty, but after what she had suffered at the hands of other people in her short life, Hank didn't really want to know what she was worried may happen. He only hoped that in time, the lingering fear would leave and the trauma she'd been through stopped forcing her to expect pain.

Trying to think of what might calm the trembling in her limbs that was making her claws click on the floor, Hank remembered a certain treat he'd gotten for himself that he planned to snack on while he worked in a few upgrades to the Danger Room's coding. Well, he did have plenty; he could spare a few. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the little bag of candy tucked in there.

"It's quite alright. Say, mind helping me eat a few of these before Jean comes to start your math lesson? I think I brought too many."

She blinked at him. "What?"

Opening the bag, Hank poured a small handful of jelly beans out and placed them on the floor for her. "These are called jelly beans. Each colour is a different flavour."

She regarded them carefully, almost squinting at them. "They're each one colour to you?" She mumbled, and he remembered the… "problem" she had with seeing colours.

"Ah, that's right, you see colours everywhere, don't you? Well, you should still be able to tell them apart by smell."

"Yeah, that I can get. Some smell the same, but not all… I think I see what you mean by their colours? The colours I see do move out of the way sometimes. But they're all over the place."

She pushed a few of the jelly beans around with her nose.

"Yes, energy waves are like that. It's fascinating that you can truly see them all as moving colours… but I can also see how it would be rather inconvenient."

"I don't consider it inconvenient… other people do, though. Jamie was trying to tell me about a flower that his mother grows in their garden at home that doesn't grow here, and he was getting himself confused trying to tell me what it looked like other than colour." The Dragon shook her head. "People seem to use colour as something very important in a description… I guess, for most, it is. But it's not like it's the only thing… you can describe with petal shape, and arrangement, and what the leaves look like, and if it grows flowers in clusters or single, and if it has seeds or not, and the smell of it, and if the leaves grow in clusters or pairs or staggered down the stem or all at the ground… there are lots of ways to describe things without colours, and that's just for flowers."

Hank gave a hum of agreement as she ate a couple of the jelly beans, picking out first a green one, and then a yellow one. He could see her point, though for the jelly beans, he could only think of three things one might use to describe them that would differentiate; colour, smell, and flavour, and colour was easily the most convenient choice. And yet…

"I would imagine if we all saw energy waves the way you do, then we might all be able to describe things using details that we would normally never notice at all." Hank mused. "The things that you see… the possibilities are astounding. What sorts of things might we all come to understand about the way the world works?"

"Don't know. I see them, but they do things I don't understand at all, like when they- bleah!"

The Dragon reeled back, spitting out the jelly bean she had just eaten. Bringing one paw up, she licked the bottom of it, as if wiping her tongue off. "Ugh, tastes worse than a butterfly!"

Hank glanced at the one she had spat out; a black jelly bean. An amused smile tugged at his lips.

"Ah, not a fan of the bl- ah, the licorice ones? Some people like them, and many people don't. Here." Reaching down, he swiftly removed the other black jelly beans from the pile he'd put on the ground for her.

"Now, what were you saying? What don't you understand that they do?"

"Blargh." The Dragon muttered, clearly still not quite over the taste of the black jelly bean. She ate an orange one, then a white, then a red before she answered.

"When people touch each other. They do this… thing. Before I came here, and I mostly saw things happening in the pictures that the colours were showing me. I've seen it a few times in person after they get here. But when people touch each other, the colours that kind of always move around each person kind of seem to tap on each other and then go back to their person, like the colours greet each other and then leave. But for most of the people here, they don't just tap each other- they kind of mingle for a moment, swirl around each other, then go back, but they keep a piece of the other person's colours until the contact stops. That's how most people's colours are."

"Hm… very interesting. You said they seem to greet each other and then go back? But the people here mingle more and keep traces until it's over? There are a lot of possibilities there… it could be to do with our mutant status… or, it could perhaps be something as simple as familiarity. Perhaps if two strangers touch, their energies greet each other and separate. Everyone here at the mansion, though, knows each other. So perhaps the familiar energies blend more."

"You think? That's not how it works for everyone, though. I've been keeping track, because it's really weird, but certain people have a different thing happen, and only certain people."

"Really? Maybe it's a result of their mutant power or something, that causes their touch to another person to be different?"

"I- no. I don't think so. I mean, it happens between two specific people, not one person and everyone else. Like, Kitty and Kurt. If they touch each other, then it happens. But it doesn't happen if either of them touch someone else- only if they touch each other."

"Oh? Really? What happens?"

"The colours flare up and swirl around each other and they don't go back to their original person until the contact stops. They just mix and dance around. It's really pretty, but I don't get why it happens. It's not just the two of them, either- it happens between a few other people. Ooh, this one is really good."

Her last comment was directed at a pink jelly bean, and Hank smiled.

"Who are the others that it happens for?"

"Umm… Rahne and Jamie have it happen when they touch, and when Scott and Jean touch each other, and Mr. Logan and Mrs. O, too. Oh, and I think I saw it with Bobby and Jubilee once, but I wasn't paying attention fast enough. By the time I looked back at them, they weren't touching anymore."

"Hm… how curious. I wonder if it is a matter of not just how familiar the energies are with each other, but also how compatible they are with one another, in some sort of way." Hank mused. "That's the only theory I can come up with, as of right now. Ah, if only I had your vision."

"It would make things easier if someone who knew what the colours meant could tell me about it." Dragon sighed.

"Alright, we're finished. I'm sorry for the wait."

Hank looked up as Jean entered.

"Ah, I take it the banister is fixed?"

"It is." Jean smiled. "We're ready to go. Coming, Dragon?"

Dragon quickly snapped up the last couple of jelly beans. "Yes. Um. No. Wait. Most of those were good. And I'm… supposed to say something. When someone does something nice for me. Mrs. O said… I need to remember my manners. But I… can't remember what it is that I'm supposed to say." Her eyes narrowed in thought. "It's not "please…" that's what I say when I ask for something. Um…"

"I think the phrase you're looking for is, "thank you."" Jean informed her, smile widening as her eyes softened.

"That's it!" The Dragon looked at Hank. "Thank you!"

Hank chuckled. "You're very welcome."

"I'm coming now!"

Hank watched the Dragon scamper over to Jean, and the older girl took the lead as they went to a small room that had been set up as the Dragon's "classroom." After they left his sight, he gave his head a small shake, and bent down to pick up the pieces of the burst basketball and the spat- out black jelly bean.

"Unique children come with both unique problems and unique rewards." He mused, moving to dispose of them. Once he had, he headed towards the Danger Room; he still had upgrades to add.

School was more difficult than it had ever been. Kurt had been hoping it would go back to the "status quo" of difficulty with time, but that hadn't happened; the press of people in the hallways had him constantly on edge. His mind kept trying to drag him back into a surrounding mob wielding pitchforks and torches and other weapons, and of gunshots and bloodstained ground.

In a reversal, Kitty was now the one walking him between classes, the bruising on her face long since healed. Other students tried accompanying them, as well, and while part of Kurt felt rubbed raw at the thought of the hovering, the other part was mature enough to realize that it was honestly helping. Faces of teammates nearby was keeping him more grounded, more present.

He was also using one of the breathing techniques they had been taught by Wolverine and Storm during some of the lessons that Kurt had never seen much of a point in holding before and was now extremely grateful for. In particular, he was using the one meant to force the heart rate to slow down; they had been taught it in case of sustaining a bad injury and needing to wait for help. A slower heart rate meant slower bleeding. In this case, it was helping with the roaring in his ears and keeping him here and now rather than being dragged into past terror whenever he felt surrounded. Which, in the hallway, was always. The lunch line, too. But at least now, sitting at the cafeteria table and sliding his tray onto it, the press of people eased up; all of the faces nearby were both familiar and friendly.

He sighed with relief. Kitty, sliding into her usual spot next to him, set a hand on one of his and gave a small, reassuring squeeze.

Rogue sat on his other side a couple moments later; Bobby was directly across from him, and Amanda sat directly across from Rogue and leaned in.

"Hey, guys! So, I think I found the perfect place! For, you know that outing we were planning to bring the Dragon on. Our girl's outing!" She beamed.

Amanda had been very disappointed a month ago when she'd found out that Dragon had visited the school, and she had completely missed the entire thing, though Kurt privately thought that it was probably a good thing; he had no doubt Amanda would be nothing but friendly to her, but trying to meet her while groups of students around them screamed would not have gone well.

"Oh, yeah? Someplace not too big, right?" Kitty asked.

"Right! So there's a little café that opened maybe… maybe two months back? Maybe a little less? Anyway, I've checked it out, and the owners don't seem to care much about mutants one way or another, from what I've overheard. And they've got lots of soups and sandwiches and deserts on their menu, so it shouldn't be too hard for everyone to find something they like. It's about six blocks northeast of the amphitheatre. It's called Sue's."

"Oh, I've heard of that place." Rogue mused. "Not normally my type of scene, but I'll go if it's with everyone."

"Yeah? I've heard of it too, I was wondering about giving it a try. We've got to be so careful nowadays, though… but if the owners don't mind, it might be a good place to go. How about this weekend? Was that the plan for you?"

Amanda nodded at Kitty. "That's what I was hoping. Do you know who all might be coming?"

"I'm always down for a girl's day." Tabitha cut in; she was sitting a few people down the table, but promptly got up to sit on the table to lean further in. Amara immediately began tugging her arm.

"Let's have some fun!"

"Tabitha, get down before you get in trouble!"

"Oh, boy." Rogue muttered under her breath.

Kurt couldn't agree more; having Tabitha along might not be for the best. Dragon had gotten used to and was getting along with most of them at the mansion now, no longer terrified at the sight of them. Tabitha, however, was one student that Kurt had noticed she did not seem to like as much. And Kurt could kind of get it; Tabitha was overbearing at times. She said whatever came to her mind and took whatever she wanted, and for someone as skittish as Dragon, he could see her finding such a person overwhelming. He was a little worried about the two of them going out together, but… then again, it wasn't like they would be alone with each other. Hopefully it would go just fine.

As a few other people chimed in, girls confirming they were coming, Kurt couldn't help but remember that saying about famous last words.