Chapter 7: Let Me Take Care Of You


The first coordinates that Bobby went to on Remy's list didn't show any sign that Remy had been there. In fact, there was a pristine lab, plenty of equipment, and a fully-intact clone.

And yeah, Bobby made absolutely sure that the lab came down and that nothing was left to salvage and may have accidentally started a fire but then on-purpose encouraged it until it consumed everything and then high-tailed it out of there. But the fact that Remy wasn't there and it was the first place on the list was worrying.

So it was almost comforting when Bobby arrived at the second coordinates and saw wreckage everywhere. That looked more like Remy's work. And maybe Remy had been going in a different order.

But Remy had also asked Bobby to check his work, and Bobby wanted to make sure Remy was okay, so Bobby set about a quick sweep just to be safe-

-and very quickly stopped again when he could hear someone's labored breathing nearby.

Without thinking about it, Bobby was making everything else a little bit colder, so that some of the forming puddles of water and goo and whatever else the lab had held turned into small ponds of ice as he ran toward that sound and found Remy lying among all the rubble with a knife in his back. He was still alive, at least - Bobby could hear him breathing - but he was clearly hurting, and his right leg looked … not like a leg at all.

"Crap." Bobby crouched down next to Remy and winced when he saw just how big the puddle of blood was that he had accidentally frozen into a macabre Rorschach blot there on the floor. He pulled out his phone and then hesitated, not sure who to call when so much else was going on, before he settled on Kitty. "Pick up, pick up, pick up," he said, panicking as he pressed the phone against his ear with his shoulder and made a little transport sled of ice, knowing better than to move someone that badly hurt too much if he could help it.

When Kitty picked up on the other end with a cheery "hello," Bobby let out all his breath, too.

"Oh, good, you sound like you're-" He didn't get any farther before the service dropped, and he swore at his phone and its lack of bars in the middle of nowhere. "Stupid vampire man has to live far from cell phone towers!" He shook his head as he directed his ice sled back to the small jet he'd brought and then did what he could with the emergency medical supplies to at least staunch some bleeding and give Remy some pain killers, but by that point, Remy was unconscious, so Bobby was fully panicking.

"Stupid, stupid Cajun trying to be so cool all by yourself. Ask for help, you lunatic," he muttered under his breath. "Why - why - is everyone I care about practically asking to get themselves killed?"

And, of course, Bobby knew most of the team was going to be with the Horsemen and everyone involved there, but a flight to Genosha was going to take too long. So he redirected his thoughts and called ahead to Avengers Tower. He thought about calling Johnny, but… well, Johnny had already been jealous once, and the last thing Bobby needed was to explain why he couldn't lose Remy. It was complicated, and Johnny didn't deal well with complicated emotions.

And when Captain America picked up on the other end, Bobby was almost relieved, because it gave him an in. "Hey, I'm calling in a solid 'you owe me' and I need your medical facilities. Like, now."

"Oh- kay, absolutely. What's the situation?"

"I'm headed your way right now. Um… Remy got stabbed in the back, and his knee doesn't look like a knee anymore, but mostly I'm worried about the backstabbing thing. Yeah, probably the biggest problem right there."

"I'll have the medical staff ready and waiting. You got a ride or do you need a lift, too?"

"No, no, I'm flying. I'll be there soon." Bobby cut off the communication from there, knowing he needed to focus and half convinced that something else was going to go wrong. He wasn't thrilled about going to the Avengers for help, if he was honest, but all the doctors and medics on his team were focused on Apocalypse's victims, and the Avengers had better medical care than any of Bobby's other backups.

Still, Bobby had to make a conscious effort not to put too much ice into the cabin while he was flying. And when he did land, he was purely translucent except for the edges.

"Hey, yes, um, help?" Bobby said even as a few scrubs-wearing medics rushed into the jet to get Remy. "I gave him some morphine about half an hour ago, but, well, I can't do anything about the knife… so… if you could just not let him die, thanks…?"

"That's what we're here for," one of them said as they got down to work.

"Right. Yeah. I'll just… get out of your way, then…" Bobby slid out, frowning as he watched the medics - and frowning harder still when he saw that Captain America himself had come to see what the story was. "Hey, sorry, we'll get out of your hair when he's stable, promise," he said, trying to avert an argument. He knew that everyone who hadn't been on Genosha had been singing the Avengers' praises, but to Bobby… well, the Avengers had never helped the X-Men when it counted, and they hadn't stopped Magneto when it counted either. The kids had had to deal with him after Scott had come out of retirement. So, yeah, he was a little guarded. With good reason.

"Hey, why don't you come on over and take a seat," Steve said as he approached the scene. "You can get cleaned up and changed if you need to - we can find some food for you, too."

"I'm actually okay. None of this is mine," Bobby promised quickly, glancing down at himself where the blood was the only thing that wasn't see-through.

"Offer still stands," Steve said.

"Yeah, just… give me a minute." Bobby watched the medics load up and leave with Remy and then bit his lip. "I feel like I should… he was working on something, and I told him I'd see it through. But if he got caught-"

"How close was he to being done?" Steve asked.

"I don't know," Bobby admitted. "He had a list of places… I wrecked the first one, but when I got to the second, he was like that." He hedged. "But if Sinister caught him, I don't know if - I mean, maybe if I'm fast-"

"You're not going alone," Steve said. "Give me five minutes."

"Oh. Um. Okay." Bobby blinked a few times but couldn't think of a comeback, so he just kind of sat there and let Steve go. But that also meant that he had five minutes to think of something to say, so when Steve got back, he said, "Any way we could, I don't know, send out some drones or something… not living?"

"Absolutely," Steve agreed. "It'll take a detour to inform Tony's he's giving up some tech, but yeah."

"Okay, yeah, that's probably smarter than what I was planning to do, because I kind of remembered that Sinister could take out my whole team, so…" He gestured between himself and Cap.

"Yeah, we still don't have the full picture on what happened," Steve said. "And I doubt we will until everyone manages to get back."

"Sounds right, honestly." Bobby took a deep breath and gestured for Steve to lead the way. "I've got Remy's list, by the way. He managed to find where Sinister stores his backup bodies, which is huge-"

"How'd he pull that off?" Steve asked.

"I have no idea," Bobby admitted. "But he's been gone a lot lately, so I'm sure that's what he was working on."

Steve nodded at that and called Tony - though he really didn't have to twist Tony's arm that hard, not when Tony was finding out a lot about Sinister's influence in the life of the kid he considered his own son.

But that just left Steve with Bobby, who looked like he was still struggling to come down from a panic attack. "How you holding up?" Steve asked, even though he knew that wasn't anywhere near an adequate question.

Bobby let out a laugh that sounded almost distant. "Oh, you know," he said carelessly, "about as well as can be expected when we're dealing with who we're dealing with."

Steve nodded quietly. "Yeah, we had our hands full dealing with Hydra, but from what I could see…"

"Yeah." Bobby pressed his mouth into a thin line. "First time seeing it that close, huh?"

Steve nodded.

"Yeah, that tracks." Bobby hadn't taken his gaze from the direction he knew Remy was. "Don't get me wrong," he said, forgetting to censor himself when he was that worried, "it's been good to have the Avengers telling the press to cut it out with the anti-mutant stuff. Really helpful stuff. But you're just doing the PR, huh? First time really dealing with what the X-Men dealt with now that you're actually involved with the team?"

Steve frowned, but he didn't say anything - not when he could see that Bobby was upset. And not when he was right; the Avengers hadn't dealt with the same stuff the X-Men had, and now, they were being exposed to a lot of it for the first time as the new generation took up the patch.

"Been surface-level this whole time. Didn't deal with Magneto, did you? And you just drove the anti-mutant groups underground so they could organize," Bobby said. "Wasn't until the kids resurrected the team that anything got done." He glared, still looking down the hall. "Least we have good medical. I do appreciate that, don't get me wrong. This would have been so much worse back when it was mostly Hank doing the patching up."

"Yeah," Steve said in a breath, thinking of the many missions years ago where he'd either see Logan or Hank after something like this. Thinking of how Hank was only silent and would only ever say that they'd been lucky to do the good that they'd done - and how Logan refused to elaborate on that. Or worse still, when Logan would blow him off with an irritated tone by telling him that he and Tony couldn't handle it … even though there were teenagers on the X-Men that were going through hell that shouldn't have had to handle it. Whatever the Avengers had been doing over the years wasn't enough, and he wasn't sure how to fix that now any more than he thought he knew how to fix it when the X-Men were gutted. .

Bobby glanced at Steve at last and then seemed to realize that he was unloading in anger on Captain America. He cleared his throat and shook his head. "Yeah," he said, though he couldn't bring himself to apologize because, well, he was right. He cleared his throat again, awkwardly. "I, um… I need to call Kitty. I told her I'd check in. And then I think she and I would like to see what Stark finds out about what Remy was doing, if that's okay."

"Yeah, sure," Steve said almost belatedly. "Anything you need."

"Thanks." Bobby ran a hand down his face, the exhaustion of an adrenaline comedown obvious as soon as he stood up. But before he could go anywhere, his phone chimed, and he quickly pulled it out, hoping for good news.

Saw all the chaos in Australia on the news. You okay?

The text was from Johnny - which, Bobby had to admit, was more than he'd expected when they weren't seeing each other anymore. But he supposed the Four had meant it when they'd said he was part of the group.

But the text was so laughably after-the-fact and lacking any initiative to help that Bobby almost wanted to take back everything he'd just said about the Avengers. At least they were trying.

He rolled his eyes and shot off a quick response: Fine. Totally crazy right now, though. Gonna be busy picking up for a while. Don't worry about it. We won.

That was all Johnny wanted to know anyway, right? They won, and Bobby was alive. So… there it was.


Annie didn't think everyone realized how much they were projecting, especially when they were all still in so much shock.

It wasn't just the ones who had been fighting Apocalypse themselves, either. Wanda was projecting all of the things she needed to do on Genosha after she and the island's defenders had held off Apocalypse's minions. Ororo was projecting worry for Mia even as she coordinated with Kitty to get the students back to the school. Tyler, just before he lay down and passed out, had been projecting pure horror simply from what he knew from the injuries he had healed.

And then, there was Scott's family.

Rachel was still in a constant state of anxiety. She'd never lost that much control to the Phoenix, and Annie knew that she could still hear it knocking on her defenses - and reminding her of her mother's failure while it was at it. At the moment, she was talking to Craig, who heartily agreed with America's suggestion of a vacation somewhere entirely new, though Rachel was too worried about the rest of her family to actually agree to it.

Scott was, of course, as tightly wound as she had ever seen him. He wasn't projecting quite as badly as everyone else, because he didn't want his kids to hear him, even if Nate seemed to be entirely tapped out at the moment. But she could hear his anxiety… as well as the guilt that was waiting to rush in after the anxiety was done.

And then, there was Nate, who was sitting with Kate and David. Physically, there wasn't much wrong with him, according to Hank, but he'd been through the ringer psychically, and now that the fight was over, he was trying to act like he was fine. Just like his father.

But he was a mess mentally. Annie could hear it from a mile away. Even if it hadn't seemed like a long time to the others, he had been trapped with Apocalypse in his mind for a long time - and until the others had been able to distract Apocalypse's attention, it had been nothing but pain the whole time.

But there was also the simple fact that Nate felt just as responsible for what had happened with Noh as James did, somehow. He knew that James wouldn't have had to bargain with Noh for anything if he hadn't been controlled. If he hadn't hijacked everyone else's minds. And it didn't matter to him that he'd been controlled himself, because he hadn't ever been controlled before.

They were all spiraling. Badly. And on top of all that, Kate was barely holding herself together for Nate's sake, because she had been beyond panicked while they were waiting for news of how the fight had gone. Annie had seen it herself: Kate had been half convinced that she had married into a family cursed to be broken again and again. She was terrified of losing Nate, of being a mother on her own. And she was still terrified, because she could see for herself that Nate was losing himself to his own memories.

It was a lot. And while Annie wanted to be there for them, she simply needed a break.


In the medical suite, Hank had been easing back the sedation and painkillers he'd kept James on - with the dampener in effect. There were a few reasons he wasn't willing to let the kid hit the ground running again, and a large part of that had to do with how guilty he knew James must have felt carrying the weight of everything that Hank had torn into him about as well as feeling responsible for Noh's death. In the short time that Apocalypse had started to transform him, all of that had been used and ramped up. But outwardly, James was just quiet and mostly still. On one hand, he wanted to try and help those around him … but on the other hand, his outlook of how much 'help' he'd given everyone had him half afraid to even touch any of them.

Mia was with her family - properly supported. His siblings were with their chosen support systems - also properly supported. The twins were so clearly being cared for, too, that James just … didn't want to interject himself. And the old team … his dad? They were rallying around each other so clearly, it was incredibly easy to distance himself from all of that. Especially when he started to watch the younger members of the Avengers diving in to help, too.

He was caught in his thoughts when he noticed Annie slip into the suite and look around, holding onto her elbows. Her eyes were red from crying, and she was biting her lower lip. And when she saw James, her shoulders dropped, and she slipped over to him, sitting down on the end of his bed.

"Can I stay with you?" she asked softly.

"Need a break?" James asked quietly.

Annie nodded, wiping her eyes with the palm of one hand. "I've been practicing for a year, but it's still so hard to block everyone out when they're projecting," she admitted.

"Well, dampener's big enough for both of us," James said.

"I actually didn't know there was a dampener," Annie admitted. "I was looking for your quiet mind."

James gestured to his face, which had some fairly wicked bruises from the work Hank had done in surgery. "Yeah, well … I may have locked down pretty tight, too."

"If you're dealing with anything like your brother and sister are mentally…"

"I'm fine."

"God, you are your father's son," Annie said, though she couldn't hide her affection, either, as she lightly hit his arm.

"I'm sure they have it worse. Him, too."

"He hasn't had the time yet to process his eyes, let alone the rest of it."

"I know. I'm waiting for that shoe to drop," James agreed with a deep sigh.

"His old team has been asking him about them, but he's just giving them the basic overview and facts. I know he hasn't found his emotions yet," Annie admitted.

James frowned as he looked down to his hands. "You two should probably take a vacation so he can clear his head."

"America keeps saying the same thing to Rachel," Annie agreed. She sighed, keeping her hand on his arm where she had teasingly hit him. "I wish I knew what to say."

"Honestly? With him? Less is more, I think. At least right now."

"That's true." Annie bit her lip as she glanced at James. "Does this dampener affect your senses too?"

James didn't bother looking up as he simply nodded, determined not to point out that he had already caught a few scents that he didn't want to think about too much before he went into surgery.

"But you still know how complicated things are right now. It makes it hard to know how to help when I know I'm also a source of anxiety for him." She paused. "We don't know where Sinister disappeared to."

James's frown deepened slightly. "He'll turn up."

"I know." Annie looked down at herself and sighed a shaky breath. "I wish I could feel relieved, but I only feel like this is a pause."

James quietly considered her as he tried to find the right path to avoid. He didn't know how long Annie had been pregnant, but he knew that by the concentration of the scent … he should have known a lot sooner. "Don't dwell on it. Hank wants to kill him. He doesn't usually do that."

"Neither does your father," Annie agreed. "But as soon as he knew…" She trailed off, and before she could find new words, the door opened again, letting Kate and Nate into the room.

Nate immediately handed David off to James without even asking, focusing on holding onto Kate, who had the same stress lines around her eyes that Annie did.

"I still have a broken arm, Nate," James said, though he shifted as much as he could to accommodate David, who was making shocked little gasps and patting James's face where he was bruised up. It didn't take long, though, for David to snuggle in under James's chin - though he still reached up to pat him as he snuggled in. "Everyone just after the dampener zone?"

"Can't access my powers right now anyway," Nate said. "I'm burned out." He didn't say aloud that he was worried killing Apocalypse had done him permanent damage, but James could see it in his face.

"So, kiss your Hawkeye. She's the real victim here: she didn't get to cover your back."

"It's true. I got the breakable china doll treatment," Kate said, tipping her head back to glare at the ceiling.

"We both did," Annie said, smirking for only a few seconds.

"Nate's the china doll now," James said. "And he definitely needs protecting from himself."

"Oh, always," Kate agreed without hesitation, though she was lightly smiling as she watched David snuggle James. "He missed you," she said softly.

"I wasn't gone that long," James argued. "And he had you, so …"

"Yeah, but he loves his family," Kate said. "And they were all gone except me and Annie."

"And you're his favorite teddy bear, and you were gone a lot longer than just the fight," Nate added.

"Yeah, last minute prepwork," James muttered. "But … hey. It worked."

"It did, yeah," Nate said. He raised his gaze to James's and muttered at the low end of James's hearing for how close he was sitting to him, "Just barely. It was too close; I'm sorry."

"You did everything you could," James said. "Big fat-headed hero."

"Yeah, yeah, throw me a parade."

"Don't tempt me."

Nate smirked at that. "It'd be insane."

"We can open it with Dad letting loose," James said. "He can do better. I'm sure of it."

"Yeah, it's still wild seeing him with those glasses. I don't even remember him in those outside of pictures."

"It feels weirdly familiar, but I can't put my finger on it," James agreed.

"Wish I could peek at how he's doing, but Annie's face kinda says it all," Nate added in a whisper.

"He's awake, so he's freaking out," James said thickly. "I don't think I helped him out there."

"Yeah, me neither. He keeps staring at me…" Nate ran a hand down his face, and James heard him take in a breath that was almost a choked sound; he was barely keeping it together still.

"Are you sure?" James asked. "He could literally be looking anywhere."

"Yeah." He removed his hand so he could look at James. "I'm not… can I just… I don't know what to do, and I need your help."

"Who am I killing?" James asked with no note of teasing.

"My memories?" Nate offered tiredly.

James sighed. "Okay … what part of what memories? Actual stuff or projected manipulations and lies?"

"He found out about David," Nate said simply.

"And now he's dead."

"Doesn't erase what I saw," Nate said.

"Okay, well … I wasn't in that telepathic loop, so …"

"Yeah, I know. Just…"

James nodded slowly, then paused when he heard David let out a hitched sigh as he had clearly fallen asleep. "Alright. Facts. He could see paths and potential almost to the same level that Essex could," James started out, then made a point to wait for Nate to meet his gaze. "That's why he kept the guy around. To look deeper for him. But he only ever used his own powers to show you whatever would make you more vulnerable to him - or that's what they say. Take that big fat grain of salt and work around it."

Nate nodded, looking almost exactly like James in that moment as he considered what he was saying.

"He poked at your deepest fears, and you still had him on the ropes," James pointed out. "Helluva lot better than I could ever do."

"Hate to say it, but I had a lot of training," Nate admitted.

"And you're just better."

"Okay, sure."

"Why the hell won't you just accept the truth when I tell it to you?" James asked with a growl in his tone.

"Because I'm your brother, and it's my job?" Nate offered.

"Maybe in every other subject," James said.

"What, you want me to carve out exceptions to the Little Brother Handbook?" Nate asked, smiling a bit more.

"No, I just want you to take the damn compliment already."

"I will when you will."

"When I'll what?" James said with his nose scrunched up.

"Exactly." Nate smirked and picked David up now that he was sleeping.

"Just for that, I take it back," James said, still grumbling. "I'm not giving any more compliments to anyone. Ever."

"That's a shame, since you're giving a speech at our wedding," Annie said with a soft smile as she watched the boys teasing each other.

"Nate's the talker," James said.

"I'm asking all three of you," Annie clarified. "And we should do that soon… or I'll get a billowing dress, I suppose."

James paused at that but didn't say anything further, since he was still trying to work out how that had gone on for so long without him knowing it.

"Okay, if it's alright with you both," Annie said, "I'd like to sit here in this telepathic silence…"

"Oh, right," Kate said, grabbing Nate's arm. "Enjoy the quiet. I know you need it."

"Surprised you don't," James called after her.

"You've met me, haven't you?" Kate called over her shoulder.

"Sadist."

"Birds of a feather."

"So I've noticed. You two are sick," James said.

"Love you too!" she called back, leaving James and Annie alone again - and Annie simply resettled herself and got comfortable, drinking in the silence and hoping that she could keep a bit of an eye on James in the process, to ease Scott's mind.

But after a long moment, James seemed determined to blow that. "You know, if you really hate it that much, I can see if there's a way to get rid of it in those files. I don't know what he told you, but I'm sure it was a lie."

"I … don't hate it," Annie admitted softly. "I actually like having this connection with your dad. He doesn't say as much as he thinks, you know?"

"Yeah, that's pretty easy to see. He and Nate have the same tells."

Annie smiled warmly. "They do," she agreed. She closed her eyes again and let out her breath. "I'll be alright. There won't be daily Apocalypse fights in my future."

"Thought I'd offer," James said. "Everyone wants to act like the latest mess is going to be the norm for operations. Every time."

"I know that's not the case, or Scott would have died of a stroke at age twenty-one," Annie pointed out.

"He acts like it's the standard just as much as everyone else does," James said. "It's exhausting." He paused. "Well, that's not entirely right. Rachel is the worst."

"I can hear the terror when he thinks he's losing one of you; she's got the same problem."

"Throw a marshmallow at her," he advised.

"I may just."

"She gets all …" He drew his shoulders up to his ears. "... insulted and flustered. Shocked."

"Sounds like my big sister when I throw her a good insult," Annie laughed.

"It's just a reminder that I like to give her," he said. "Even the Phoenix gets a rise out of being threatened with s'mores. Off her forehead."

Annie laughed and readjusted the way she was sitting to be more comfortably close with him. "I'll take any advice you're willing to give. I want to be a good stepmother, even if you're all grown."

"Most of my advice is crap."

"I'll take it anyway," Annie said. "Anything helps; I know I'm marrying into an already-complete family."

James shook his head. "No, that's not true. If it was, he wouldn't want to marry you."

Annie blushed with pleasure and whispered a quiet, "Thank you."


While Nate and his family were talking with James, Scott turned his attention to his daughter. He had eaten far more than he'd meant to in trying to recoup what his body had used up to fuel his healing. But eating and letting his concerned friends know that he was trying to help his healing - when so many people were doing the same after Tyler had helped them - was a good way of fending off questions.

For the moment.

They all knew Sinister had been deeply involved - and they knew how much he liked to fiddle with mutations - but no one was willing to ask if this new accelerated healing Scott was dealing with was permanent.

Scott knew, then, that Rachel was probably dreading people coming to check on her as much as he dreaded it. But this was different. She had been terrified of losing control since the day she heard the Phoenix in her mind, and he wasn't coming to grill her. He just wanted to make sure she knew that he was there.

After all, isolation and the Phoenix was a bad combination.

He found Rachel in the room that Wanda had set aside for her - literally in one of the towers. It was a good thought, putting her up there where she could get some distance from all the misery that was so obviously threatening to pull her down, but it was also a clear sign to Rachel that she was a danger to others. Not that she needed the reminder.

Once Scott got up to the room, he wasn't at all surprised to see that America was passed out asleep - or that Rachel was sitting up in their bed and running her hands through America's hair while her own still floated in the air with occasional flickers of flame. She was so much like him that it was almost painful: America had given Rachel someone to help, something to focus on, and she was putting her all into being there for her exhausted girlfriend.

He and Rachel were good at that. Good at taking care of everyone but themselves.

"Knock knock," he said, knocking on the edge of the doorframe to announce himself.

Rachel didn't even look up from the way she was raking her fingers through America's hair. "Heard you coming," she said, her tone faraway.

"I thought you might," Scott said, coming to sit on the end of the bed. He tried not to move the bed too much, but as soon as he sat down, America woke up - instantly ready to defend Rachel or talk her down if need be.

He was glad to see it - though he also hated to see it. He recognized that same worry and anxiety from when he had been dating the Phoenix host. As cool as America played it, she was facing the possibility that her girlfriend might give in to the Phoenix. No one could shrug that off easily.

But when America saw who was at the door, she relaxed and slid into a sitting position, smiling easily. "I'll go grab a midnight snack," she said, knowing that the two of them needed to talk and that she would be in the way otherwise.

"Thanks," Scott said softly as she passed him.

"Look out for her," she whispered back, and he nodded, barely stowing his smile in the face of her fierce protectiveness.

He waited until the door was closed behind America before he moved closer to Rachel and reached out to rest his hand on her arm. She looked so much like Jean in that moment - scared and surrounded by fire in her hair. She was so much like him, but when she panicked, she was her mother. And that was what he was worried about.

"Hey," he said gently. "What's it saying to you right now?"

Rachel pressed her mouth into a thin line as she tried to keep her composure, but after a few minutes, she shook her head and then gestured him over so she could lean into him in a deep hug as she let terrified tears escape. "That it could bring Noh back for James and Mia," she admitted. "That it could erase Sinister from existence…."

As Rachel trailed off, Scott tried to cheer her up. "Well, I'm not terribly opposed to erasing him, mind you," he teased her, and she let out a sad chuckle.

"I'm not either. But I don't…" She took a deep breath. "When I was a kid, Betsy helped me get a handle on this. On how scared I was of the Phoenix. And I've been getting better at not just keeping it locked away but letting it out sometimes, like Logan and K suggested when they were here. But…" She shifted, and he moved with her so that he was leaning against the backboard of the bed and she was hugging him, holding on like she did when she was a kid. "I've never been a passenger before."

"Oh." Scott felt his heart drop as he suddenly understood. "Oh, god. Rachel. I'm so sorry."

Rachel nodded and then simply wrapped herself into a hug, hanging onto him for all she was worth - as tightly as she could without burning him, anyway. Though her hair was more like cinders than fire now that she had admitted what had happened.

"You'll be alright," Scott said after a long moment, quiet but firm. "I'm proud of you, Rach."

She didn't say anything in response, simply holding on tighter - though he thought he could see a faint smile hiding underneath all that fear all the same.


Kate woke up, bleary-eyed, after having only just fallen asleep about an hour ago, according to the time on her phone. She usually zonked hard after a good fight, and playing Defenders of Genosha with Wanda had definitely been fun.

But she heard David crying, and so, with a sigh, she tried to get her body to engage with her brain so she could get out of bed and feed him.

Before she could quite get there, though, she felt the bed move beside her, and Nate said in a whisper, "I'll get him."

And Kate honestly wouldn't have thought anything of that; they traded off all the time. But she knew how tired he was, and she knew he'd been through much worse than she had, and she'd been planning to handle the nighttime shift for him. David was starting to sleep for most of the night anyway; she'd only have to wake up once or twice.

"I've got it," she said.

"Nah," he said, already at the door. "I was awake anyway."

Kate frowned as Nate closed the door behind him to go get David the next room over and give him a bottle, leaving her in complete darkness that should have been a nice, inviting blanket to go back to sleep. But instead, she was more awake - because she recognized the tone Nate had used.

She sat up in the bed, her arms crossed as she chewed on her lower lip and waited for Nate to get back. She almost smiled when she saw him open the door and tiptoe inside, trying to be quiet even though he was completely exhausted and couldn't float. "Not that I don't appreciate you feeding David, but … if you'd told me you couldn't sleep-"

"What, and make you stay up too?" Nate asked. "I'm fine. You need to rest, and I can't right now, so I might as well be useful."

Kate let out a long, tired sigh. "C'mere," she said, and he crawled back into the bed so she could wrap herself around him, snuggling in deeply as she rested her cheek against his back. "What can I do?"

"Not much, sorry," Nate said in a sigh. "You know how it is."

"Yeah, I know," she said. She paused for a long time. "You can see it when you close your eyes, huh?"

Nate let all of the air out of his lungs. "Yeah."

"I get that."

The two of them sat there like that, wrapped in each other, for a long time, in silence, knowing there wasn't much either of them could say. But Kate was determined to be there for him like he'd been there for her, so even as she started to drift off, she made sure to kiss him and then fall asleep tightly curled into him, grounding him as best she could.


Both Nate and David were asleep still as Kate crept her way down the hall. She'd eventually just made Nate take the sleeping aid Hank had given him after she'd woken up with David just after sunrise - or when it would have been sunrise back home - and saw that he was still awake. And now that they were both sleeping, she wasn't going to disturb them for the world.

But that also meant that she could turn her attention toward the other people she cared about. Her parents were with the Avengers cleaning up the mess Hydra made in Australia; her siblings were here on Genosha but were hanging out with Leslie Ann and a few others. But her in-laws… they needed some cheer, she was sure.

And the best target, she had found, was usually James. Besides, she wanted to ask his advice for how to help Nate anyway. She was overthinking everything, despite the anxiety meds Hank had given her after she'd finally admitted she might have had some postpartum issues.

Of course, no one actually knew where James was since Hank had finally let him out of the dampener zone, and that just meant Kate got to stretch her training from her mom.

Knowing the way the fight had gone, Kate was sure that James was trying to isolate, possibly looking at the best routes to slip away from the island entirely without being noticed. But with everyone on high alert, the transportation available to him was severely limited. He had to be in the planning stages - and that meant he was avoiding people.

So, all she had to do was search the hiding places she'd found the last time she was there - and expand the search from there.

It took her until the better part of the day, with occasional breaks to go feed David, but she did, eventually, find James tucked away in an alcove on the royals' private beach. Not close to the water but higher up, where he could see the palace and the waves as well as the sky. She couldn't have seen him from any other angle but from being practically directly below him, either, so she was glad she had a habit of looking up as well as around.

The next thing James knew, he heard the thunk of a grappling arrow, and she climbed up to his hiding spot, plopping down next to him with an exaggerated sigh.

He watched her without comment - only sure to shift over to give her space before he went back to trying to be smaller than was physically possible for him to be.

"So, I'm not going to ask how you're doing, because that's stupid," Kate said. "But I did want to check on you. Be the obnoxious little sister I am."

"I'm alive; that's the base requirement, right?"

"Seems to be, yeah." Kate looked out at the stars and pulled her grappling hook free, rolling up the rope to use later.

"Well, there you go." He rested his chin on his crossed arms and then turned his head toward her. "So, what's bothering you?"

"All of it," she said without missing a beat. "Same for you, I'll bet."

"Me? No. Can't complain too loudly."

"I'll be loud for you." She leaned back again. "I'm trying to be for Nate what he was for me. He's not sleeping. At all."

"What's keeping him up?" James asked. "The panic attacks over the control thing, what he saw, or …"

"He hasn't said," Kate admitted. "And he…" She paused. "I think the fact that he can't access his powers at all is terrifying him. He'd usually have just let me in to show me at least some of it."

James thought it over for a long moment. "I'll talk to him."

"You don't have to," she clarified. "I'm sure he'll talk to me eventually. I just needed a shoulder while I'm his shoulder."

"He's not going to whine at you about not having powers, Katie," James said thickly. "He'll have to process everything and find a much cooler way to handle it than freak out like he is. Probably part of why he can't access it much or at all right now. He's stressing himself out of it on top of the burnout."

"That and from what little he did tell me, it sounds like there was some really bad psychic feedback. I don't think he's looking forward to dealing with the reverb when he does turn it back on."

"We all burn ourselves out sometimes," James said. "He never really pushed that hard. Dad wouldn't let him. He'd get a nosebleed and Dad would lose it, so he never pushed until he needed to recharge it. He'll be okay. He's just gotta freak out a little bit. If you can get him to talk to someone professional, though, maybe he'll get something for the anxiety."

"Yeah, I'll make him talk to my therapist," Kate said. "He definitely can't complain to me about not having powers or not wanting to get help for anxiety, right?"

"That's what I was thinking."

"Okay. I figured I should start there, but I'm overthinking again."

"Not sure if that's from Nate exposure or Annie exposure."

"Oh, god, Annie is having the worst time," Kate said, pulling a face. "Everyone is projecting trauma all around her, and she's trying to keep a lid on it because she actually wants to be a mom, you know?"

"I noticed," James said. "She was coming to sit with me for a while, but I think she thinks she has to chat."

"Culture clash," Kate said, smirking.

"Sure seems like it."

Kate nodded, letting the conversation drift off for a moment as they watched the stars. "I meant to ask, because you didn't freak out like you did the first time you figured out she was pregnant - did the scent unlock that memory?"

"No."

"Huh." Kate pressed her mouth into a thin line as she watched him before, surprising him, she leaned over and kissed his cheek. "That's too bad. You were in total badass hero mode, and you should get to remember that."

"You're so full of crap."

"Um, you know when I'm lying, so you can't even go there," Kate pointed out.

He tipped his head back and forth a couple times. "Maybe it doesn't count if you believe your own bullshit."

"No, really." Kate broke into a smile. "I thought Billy was going to need to take a cold shower. You clocked the pregnancy, marched over to Rachel, and demanded she erase that knowledge so Sinister couldn't have it, and Billy looked like seeing you go all protective was going to put him on the floor he was so … you know how he is when you get heroic."

James raised an eyebrow as he looked at her. "No …"

"James, you gotta pay attention to your boyfriend more, because if you don't know how much he gets the hots for you when you go into hero mode like that…"

"I pay attention. You're just exaggerating, Katie."

"Not even a little bit," Kate said, grinning with relish. "But, hey, now your dad's going to be in Westchester with Annie behind that nifty gadget of yours, so hopefully, they'll get to be new parents all over again in safety, or your dad will die of a stroke."

"I'm sure they'll handle it fine," James said as he settled in, looking forward again.

"I hope so. Because I'm telling you right now: I got a taste of what it was like for your dad, and I thought I was going to fall apart. I'm just lucky Wanda had a mission for me, because…" She paused and twisted her hands together as she tried to find the right words. "He said goodbye, you know, just in case."

James nodded after a while. "I think we all did."

"I don't know if I could have done what your dad did, James."

"You wouldn't have to," he said, shifting his tone to one that was fake but still more like the joking tone he preferred. "Billy would have swooped in to be your roomie and steal your baby."

Kate couldn't help but smile at that. "Yeah, um, you're aware that he's got ideas for the future, right? You've seen that face he's been making lately?"

"He turns bright red talking about taking about even thinking about it, so yeah. Hard to miss."

"You ready for that? I mean, you've got a year-ish before you can get married, but…"

"Provided I'm still alive then, I'm sure we'll figure it out."

"I'll be the favorite aunt, obviously."

"Rachel would fight you for it."

"Rachel can try, but I will not be stopped," Kate said with a sniff. "Besides, any kid raised by you and Billy? I've totally got that kid's number."

"Okay," James agreed with a shrug.

Kate smiled, victorious, before she went back to sitting with him in silence - until she realized how long it had been. "Okay, it's been fun hanging out with you, but if I don't go feed David…"

"Yeah, yeah. Go do your thing," James said as he got to his feet and started toward the treeline.

"Hey, come find Nate?" Kate asked as she started to head toward the beach. "You're right. He can't talk to me about the lack of powers."

"He could try Dad, too," James pointed out.

"Your dad has literally his entire old team trying to check on him about his eyes," Kate said.

"His eyes are perfect."

"Which is why they're fussing."

"Pointless. He'll be better than he remembers if he takes the time to try it out."

"I'm sure. But still." Kate let out all her breath from her cheeks. "Anyway. Love you, James. I'm glad you're here."

"Love you too," he said in a sigh as he stopped. "Text me when Nate needs the treatment."

"Thank you," Kate said, breaking into a genuine smile before she hurried off, this time feeling a little better about James, anyway. Even as he took off into the dark jungle.