Pixie, Perv, Protector

By Mice

Chapter 12: Jean, Jean, Jean

But every morning, I wake up and worry,

What's gonna happen today?

You see it your way, I see it mine,

But we both see is slipping away.

Eagles, "Best of My Love"

You will never understand me.

You will never understand the fountainous empathy I contain by opening my mind and shutting my mouth.

The joy of being a woman, the first woman, the only woman. Knowing clearly, and before rediscovering your telepathy, what it was like to be treated as a person second. To be the first exposure, intimately, of womankind to those you were told were your brothers. To have their respect for you hovering in the back of their minds until you chose one of them.

And you can never change your mind on that decision. Even if you wanted. Because you would no longer have their respect. They would no longer believe your judgment.

If they had just accepted you.

Why wouldn't it have been you? You are the combination of all their best traits. Warren's confidence. Hank's intelligence. Bobby's focus. And Scott's attendance.

The others often made fun of Bobby's short sidedness and youth. They could have learned from it. His powers came from empathy and become stuck in "fright or freeze". And his ability to deconstruct and reconstruct moisture in the air came from ADHD. Without further focus, Bobby just would have been a cold man all his life without knowing his potential. From a whisper of empathic power, he could freeze earth. Because he took time to think about it.

What's the word for being an all-around reliable person? Scott. It's like he imprinted on the first pop love song he heard. What scares you is that you know what that song is. And you don't get the Eagles. You are a U2 person.

Only one of her brothers ever had the time to stop and encourage her to have dumb fun. Not because of what she could give him, but that he refused to look at a rainbow alone and would often chase down a chipmunk on the grounds to see it with if everyone refused his invitation.

Dumb fun. Even after several deaths, catastrophes, changes, Bobby would always find the dumb fun.

Now, he wouldn't. He can't find where had looked for it before. His mind is a torn up house in a police procedural.

You are a confident, intelligent, punctual leader. And you know how to make pancakes. Pancakes are fun. Everyone agrees with you that they are.

You are the obvious leader. If not in name, in service.

Your only regret is having them make you choose one of them.

And they will never choose only you.

They will say what you meant to them. They will cry.

But they will move on.

Someone not as confident as you. Someone carnival trick intelligent. Someone tardy.

And someone who brings out dumb fun from each of them.

Someone's name will not be as loud as yours, but it will hurt because they all agreed that you are the one who dies, not someone else.

You are what they never wanted to be.

You didn't get a choice in being victim.

And when you piloted that ship to certain death, they let you.

Two of Scott's ex-girlfriends and his mother? Pilots.

The bravest act you performed that led to your death is the most arousing of his.

The moment when he knew you were the leader.

If he looks kindly at someone, it's because you taught him how to see.

All of them.

And if they see someone before I die, you'll take care of it.

You're a powerful telepath.

You get into the mind. Provide a voice of doubt. Someone so naïve, you don't have to put your back into it.

You don't approve.

That simple, that small, that powerful. Because that's what you think.

And you're not dead again yet.

She will never be you. You will never let her.

I'm the one.