Work Text:
06/04/2018
The glaring sunlight falling into the Principal's office allowed a much sharper view of the people present and what they were up to than had been the case in Charles' quarters back then, not least thanks to the man-high windows and lighter-colored furniture.
That made it impossible even for politeness' sake to overlook how worn Angelica and Bobby looked after all these years of occasional missions for a team under the rigid, short-sighted direct command of the US government. Paling scars all over what little of skin their high-necked suits revealed ... Not only Angelica with her dangerous sickness was sporting dark circles under their eyes, or lines far too deep for their age around the pulled-down corners of their mouths instead of even the slightest playful flickering of their respective powers in a careless moment that might have relaxed the two young peoples' stiff posture a little ... This once so headstrong, careless heroic duo had obviously had earned much – bad – experience since their independent beginnings in New York, and during these terrible events, the optimistic levity of their former shared lover Peter seemed to have been missing gravely from them. Whatever events had brought them to Mutant High this day, had surely not helped dissolving their growing bitterness and mistrust of the whole world either.
Mutual comfort also didn’t seem high on the priority list of a couple who'd always remained very casual in romantic matters. Standing at a professional distance from each other, the two guests remained stubbornly silent until all seven Institute leaders had gathered in the room; even any gestures of joy at seeing former friends and teachers again were notably absent.
Even Gringo, who recognized the two people from occasional visits and happily rubbed against their legs, waited for more than an absent pat on his side in vain and retreated back between Ororo's ankles, pouting. Every now and then he let out a soft whine, unsettled by the tense atmosphere.
Hank was last to join the meeting, though he'd welcomed the part time Avengers himself earlier. He'd briefly stopped by his lab again and now appeared noticeably restless, but didn’t speak up either for the moment, hastily dropping on his favorite sofa, his paws clenching a datapad.
Angelica seemed to have an idea already what was on it, judging by how much she avoided looking at the weakly glowing Shi'ar device, demonstratively turning to Logan of all people first.
“The ‘New York II’ files have officially been reopened. S.H.I.E.L.D. likes to inform you that the security clearance now includes all currently active senior members of your team. Before we start, maybe you'd like to tell the others yourselves what really happened in Alaska.”
“Are you for real, Angelica? Is that why Rogers didn’t have the guts to come here himself because he knows damn well how I feel about you working with my own people behind my back?”
From the corner of her eyes, Ororo saw Scott's posture stiffen, a dangerously aggressive look twitching around the corners of his mouth, and sighed soundlessly, and buried her hand deeply in Gringo's fur in a gesture that after decades, she didn't even really notice anymore, until the familiar, soft touch of a cool muzzle on her wrist calmed the brief flare-up of restlessness in her soul. Keeping it together, in one of these rare moments when their leader could not, was more important than ever right now. Or in addition to this gruesome story of all things being dug up again, she would also be in for an ugly fight.
Ever since the Avengers had contacted Logan and her on the flight home in January, telling them that they had to shut up about the true outcome of that horrible mission, Ororo had dreaded this moment. It was her who spoke up anyway, because the memory had to be almost even more painful for Logan than for her. And because they wouldn't have gotten around to discussing the actual problem until late in the evening if Ororo had allowed Angelica and Scott to piss each other off now. And for that, these developments were too heavy on her heart before she'd even received any new information as it was.
“If you need someone to bitch at, Scott: Logan and I are sitting right in front of you. The two of us had personally been ordered by Fury to keep our mouths shut back then. For a matter that henceforth, S.H.I.E.L.D. was fully handling anyway, we weren't willing to risk unnecessary government interference in this house. In this case, the peace of mind and safety of our students had taken precedence.”
Scott didn't seem particularly forgiving, especially not towards the leader of the Avengers or the S.H.I.E.L.D. director, who would undoubtedly be treated to some very prosaically worded e-mail in their inbox by tonight at the latest. But luckily, Scott's sense of duty usually far exceeded his ego; his impatient gesture Ororo's way was unmistakable.
Ororo straightened up, trying her best to keep the grief and anger immediately flaring up in her heart again somewhat in check so as not to let a telltale quiver sound through her voice. “As you all know, Duncan O'Connor, also known as Jericho, has built an independent mutant sanctuary for mostly young people in the Alaskan tundra about 18 years ago. As you also know, on New Year's Eve of 2017, almost all the residents of this camp have suffered a violent death, and the project had to be abandoned.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, swallowing thickly. How she wished, all of this would only have been a fatal, stupid accident with the wrong ingredients in the tiny laboratory that Jericho had kept running on the side for his old job at the U.G.E.R. mutant research facility. Then at least she would have been spared this helpless wrath at not having been there when someone who had been very close to her had needed her, and then not even having been allowed to avenge the destruction out of the most despicable motives of everything the man had lived for.
“What you don't know is that those mutants have died of a virus that's suspected to be of artificial nature.”
“No sugarcoating, please,” Angelica murmured. "By now, it's been proven beyond doubt what we're dealing with here. A killing machine created by the hands of normal people. We call it ’Black Breath'.”
Ororo silenced the young woman with a pleading gesture. It was her job to let the others in on all this as easily as possible; that; notoriously, wasn’t exactly an Avenger specialty.
“Only one of the camp's residents survived the attack. The boy arrived at Mutant High today.”
“How many people are we talking about again?” Marie had grabbed Remy's hand in shock, in a gesture not unlike Ororo's search for purchase, a routine gesture keeping her bare fingertips away from the openings in her husband's leather gloves.
The others were far too alienated for words, and Scott was noticeably still too pissed, which, of course, had been one of the very reasons for this security clearance back then. His famous sense of responsibility would never have allowed him not to want to get to the bottom of the cause of this catastrophe himself.
And yet that exactly had been off the table the moment Ororo and Logan had informed the X-Men's competing team about everything after their arrival in Alaska, well aware that they would have had the far more government-leaning strike group on their heels not five minutes after their call to the disease control department anyway. Steve's objection that Westchester would currently never have had the capacity to for an investigation into a possible global threat, they hadn't had much to counter against.
That, even a team leader generally highly respected by almost all the hero constellations on the planet, would have to accept.
Which was why Ororo didn't even address Scott's incomprehensible side glance any further; no one had time for hurt pride and stallion manners right now.
“The number of victims is one hundred and fifty. Among them, the camp leader,” she added a tad too quietly, although at least this information was of course not new to the others.
Ororo wasn't surprised to hear unexpected heavy rain splashing against the window behind Scott's desk that in any case was not originating from her gift. Scott's wife, too, understandably was speechless after the two of them had even been at Jericho's funeral in Dublin with Ororo, at an unadorned grave that didn't hold a corpse. The camp was under strict quarantine up until today; they hadn't even been able to get the people out.
Logan, on the other hand, hadn’t come to Ireland with them. The fact that the last church ceremony Jericho had attended, had been his own wedding had been unbearable for him. His silence now, too, spoke volumes whereas he usually wouldn’t have missed a chance to get into one of these friendly arguments between old rivals with Scott.
“One hundr… This is impossible!” Remy exclaimed, upset. ”If that would really have been a terrorist attack, we would have heard about it. On TV, online, somewhere ...”
“Get real, Cajun. It was just a bunch of shunned mutant teenagers. No one missed them.” Logan's cynical tone expressed his contempt for this explanation, which they had all heard so often in their lives when catastrophes and grievances, even those committed by the authorities, had been played down. Only mutants.
“Not like the Daily Bugle could have shot a documentary anyway. Satellite reception up there's been worth shit even on a good day, and around New Year's, not even e-mails got through those snowstorms, let alone Instagram reels from the fleas. On the morning of New Year's Eve, we were called there by Jericho by what's probably been the only phone call that got through at all, but there was nothing we could do. The survivor left on horseback. We would have brought him, but back then, there might still have been the risk of infection. I wanted to go back for the boy ...” He glanced at Ororo; a just as old as unpleasant discussion was in the air once more.
“... but I had strict orders to get my ass out of there. The survivor had disappeared without a trace to this day, and S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted to avoid causing panic before we'd know more about all this.”
“Jericho had already been seriously ill when he called me. We gave the Blackbird engines all we had, but we were too late.” Ororo hastily wiped her eyes, keeping her other hand on Gringo's head when her faithful companion questioningly put his muzzle on her knee, scenting the hint of salt in the air like usually only Logan and Hank could.
“They were all already dead when we got there. The mutants' skin had turned black, all their internal organs had liquefied. By now, the snow has probably covered everything, but that doesn’t make a difference. It's very rare anyone finds their way up there."
Remy shook his head slowly, hatred for the faceless attackers darkening his red pupils. An almost inaudible buzz somewhere in one of the pockets of his trench coat revealed that an unwanted discharge of energy was surrounding one of his cards. “Causing panic ... Merde. Whatever. Then why are you guys suddenly getting candid?”
“Isn't that obvious?” Katja said quietly, nestled closely to her husband's strong chest, as usual during such burdening meetings. "It's started again, hasn't it?”
“Yes," Hank replied surprisingly. "I received an e-mail a few minutes ago, from an Italian colleague reporting a mysterious mutant death in Rome yesterday. The same symptoms.”
“McCoy, that's top secret!” Angelica shouted sharply. "Delete the data from all network-connected devices immediately.”
“Already did. I may look like it, but I didn't grow up in the jungle," Hank grumbled.
“So is it the same virus?”
“Most likely,” Angelica nodded, again without even a word of apology. Only her fingertips had started restlessly toying with one of her strands of red hair, which the young woman had been wearing only at chin-length ever since she had to seek treatment at U.G.E.R. again and again for her recurring cancer relapses, caused by her own powers, yet was still entirely unwilling to give up on the use of them entirely in favor for her crime-fighting career. In the wake of this new tragedy, too, there would doubtlessly once more have to be even more of this dangerous radiation in her cells than was good for her. And that was a wall Ororo had long given up on, talking it down.
”We're flying to Italy right after this meeting to investigate the case. And the X-Men have to research the New York II massacre. It's time to join forces in this matter.”
“Is it?” Logan asked dismissively, ignoring Scott's withering glance in his direction. He was clearly as reluctant as ever about dealing with this catastrophe again. "After you guys couldn’t wait to get sole custody of the case back then?”
“Back then, it hadn't spread to multiple crime scenes either,” Angelica replied in irritation. "The other Avengers are all busy. We need your help, especially now that the survivor is living in your house. Besides …" She paused, suddenly looking everywhere but at Logan.
“There's something else. So far, this has all been speculation, which is why we didn't say anything right away. But if you're back in now, you should know. The people who have engineered Black Breath ... They're probably the same ones who killed Jean at Lake Ontario at the time.”
In the stunned silence following this crucial revelation, the snikt of Logan's claws was resounding far too loud, followed by the almost inaudible vibration of the orange-colored radiation field around Angelica's body answering the unmistakable threat.
“Hey, hey.” With two steps Scott, was between the high armchairs before Katja or Ororo had to jump up, neither of whom would allow the young woman to use her powers in this building entirely unnecessarily, with regard to Angelica's health alone, no matter how quickly their own anger on the young woman threatened to rise. ”You two can sort that out in the Danger Room later if you're feeling bored.”
Scott only released his firm grip on Logan's shoulder when the latter sheathed his claws, growling his way.
Then he turned to Angelica, no less angered than his favorite rival, but with a control trained from an early age that helped him to fold his trembling hands behind his back instead of giving his aggression free rein as well. “So, what's your security clearance excuse this time? Angelica, by all the ... You, of all people? Jean was your friend, too! Don't you think we're the ones concerned by this the most?”
“That's exactly why. We wanted to be a hundred percent sure before someone overreacts and possibly sabotages all investigations just because they're not in control of their instincts.”
While the exhausted way Angelica was rubbing her temple, with tight lips, now revealed she at least felt a little bad about leaving her allies in the dark after all, it was also plain to see where she was coming from, with Logan, by now, visibly shaking all over, who had come to stand behind Ororo at the largest window, leaning heavily on the windowsill with both hands.
That Logan had never gotten over what had happened wasn't a secret even among the X-Men's close partners. He fulfilled his duties at the school and on the X-Men's team with all the strength they could wish for, but if you knew what he'd been like in his time with Jean, you didn't need to be able to read his thoughts to know that part of him had died with her. He was still mourning. And he was still seeking revenge after all this time. Especially because the X-Men had never found even the slightest clue as to who had ordered the attack on Jean.
A little of this almost painfully stiff tension only left his shoulders when Gringo ducked away under Ororo's caressing hand and tugged at Logan's jeans playfully, just like in the beginning as a half-grown pup, until one of his favorite playmates absently ruffled his neck fur.
“Are you sure now?” Hank asked uneasily. “We haven't heard from these people ever since. We'd hoped this had been a one-time thing. Someone who just lost it because of Dark Phoenix.”
For once, it was Bobby answering; Angelica probably knew she'd already said a bit too much. And in the slightly too rough voice of the X-Men's former pupil, too, you could still hear the grief for his former teacher. “That's how what it looked like at first, because Dr. Grey had fried their best warriors before she died, yes. It seems, those bastards haven't recovered from that for a long time. And then they must have gotten a new leader at some point, because their goal is no longer the destruction of individual, potentially dangerous mutants, but of all of them. And they start with our children.” He clenched his fist in an uncontrolled gesture, ice crystals glistening on his skin. Though Bobby and Angelica had never seemed interested in having children of their own, the well-being of young mutants had always been very important to them. One of the few major similarities between their teams.
“In retrospect, we have detected parts of a radio message on a top-secret frequency that's been sent from Rome to Alaska before the massacre in New York II, which unfortunately also leads us to fear that someone in the camp was an accomplice of the attackers. This communication happened on exactly the same frequency as one, more than 17 years ago between Rome and Toronto, with someone in a building near the hospital where Jean gave birth on the line. We are still busy, analyzing the scrambled fragments of conversation; and that will take some time. But one thing is for sure: There's been talk about mutants dying both times.”
“Rome, of all places ...” Ororo shook her head bitterly. Even decades after the public had become aware of mutations, the Catholic Church was still very reserved in its attitude towards mutants. It wouldn't have surprised Ororo at all if this cruel group would have been made of some fanatical believers. She was almost glad that Jericho wouldn't have to learn that his beloved deep faith, of all things, might have had something to do with the attack on his children.
“They probably had a teenager infiltrate the group. We finally have to find these people.”
“I'm afraid you will, whether you want to or not,” Angelica spoke up again. "Alaska could have been them stirring up the hornet's nest to get you back in the field. They must be aware that you knew Jericho. And Noemi is old enough now to become a danger. The timing can't be a coincidence.”
“That's ridiculous,” Ororo blurted out – more out of shock than the conviction that what Angelica was suggesting there was absolutely impossible, although that had been one of Logan's and her biggest concerns after Noemi's birth and the immediate appearance of her fire powers. Unfounded, fortunately, at least that was what they had thought after there'd never been another attack ... "No one's ever showed interest in Noemi ...”
“No?” Angelica interrupted her, impatiently rolling her eyes. "How would you know, Ororo? How often did the girl leave this mansion alone?”
Now it was ice-cold shock spreading in the room at the realization that none of them might not have been as safe and undisturbed as they'd thought in the last few years. That they might only have been lucky. And that Logan had been wise to never leave his daughter unattended, as inconspicuously as possible as he'd been able to, so as not to make her feel like she was living in a prison.
Katja, in particular, visibly shuddered at the thought that Noemi's best friend, too, might have been in great danger at the girls' regular trips downtown. “We're lucky that she's so close to Sassy. The two are inseparable. Besides, if you guys are right about your assumptions, then these bastards until recently didn't want to target anyone innocent in their eyes anyway.”
“Very likely.” Angelica tried to soothe her, which, after the revelations of the last few minutes, did not help much though. “But now we can no longer be sure of anything, I'm afraid. And sooner or later, we would have faced this problem in one form or another anyway. At some point, Noemi has to start living. Just be careful. If she's attacked, her hidden cosmic genes could be activated.” Completely unfazed, Angelica addressed this threat, although everyone present had hoped so badly so far that this danger did not exist, simply couldn’t exist.
“Hold your tongue, Miss Jones.” Such impertinence drew a hiss from the lips of even a usually very polite and diplomatic character like Hank. ”Noemi has never shown any signs of being a carrier for Phoenix.”
Angelica grunted all but disparagingly as if she didn't care a bit how painful this subject was for others. “Except or being telekinetic, telepathic, and breathing fire? Just like Jean no longer showed any signs after her resurrection until she almost burned down the Mutant Department? Noemi has her mother's powers and is not subject to the mental restrictions that Charles had forced on Jean back then. If she loses control ... Then the whole universe is in danger. Again. We would all appreciate it if this time, you guys stopped living in denial land in time.”
Katja and Ororo looked at Logan almost simultaneously, saw how his muscles bulged under his plaid shirt, how the tips of deadly claws emerged inch by inch between his knuckles, scraping over wood, leaving deep marks in it, and this time, some charming animal distraction in the shape of a warning nip at his knee didn’t help either.
“If you plan to survive this meeting, this is a great time to shut up,” Katja warned her old friend, surprisingly calm despite the fact that tears were glistening in her eyes and that lightning and thunder had joined the rain over the mansion. This time it wasn't just the ones that her powers created.
Angelica's lips tightened, but she was wise enough to raise her hands in defeat.
Scott soothingly put his arm around Katja's shoulders, although Ororo could see that there was a suspicious red flash behind his glasses, also, whereupon the storm dissolved.
His eyes were on their guests, though, his head tilted in mistrust. “Exactly on the day after there's been another Black Breath victim, the Alaska survivor arrives here, who just happens to have been beaten up pretty badly. Why do I have a funny feeling it's not an accident you've shown up today?”
“We finally found Bastian a few weeks ago after a long search,” Angelica admitted. “But we couldn't persuade him to come either with us or here. Just hearing the word X-Men had him furious. That he seems to have changed his mind is probably mainly because he no longer has a home.” She shifted her weight uneasily in her chair, once again wrapping a suspiciously thinned strand of hair around two fingertips. ”His pimp's been delivered a subpoena this morning.”
“You set this up?“ Remy asked in disbelief, the suspicious pink glowing there in his pocket only intensifying, and if there would be any more revelations coming up, about how much people had really been toying with far too young souls in the last few days, in a way Remy knew best what deep traces it could leave behind, sooner or later this excess energy might actually discharge. "The boy's had an inhibitor implanted months ago! That asshole could have beaten him to death!"
“We had no idea of knowing the guy would lose it so badly. We just wanted to get Murray away from him. We had to move when we heard about Rome," Angelica tried to defend herself.
“And that justifies ...?” Hank just stared at her, open-mouthed, and Ororo felt the same.
Where the hell was little Angelica? One of Katja's closest former college friends, who had almost snapped Emma Frost's neck when she had suspected Katja was in danger in Emma's estate? Who had never been able to stand seeing a normal human or mutant suffer? Who was hiding under that broad red mask today? It certainly didn’t look like a real sense of guilt. Those green eyes under the deep red hard rubber mainly radiated distance these days. This willingness to sacrifice with regard to her powers at any cost, just so she wouldn't have to give up the dream of making this world a little better ... That was something that Steve had once inevitably instilled in Angelica during his recruitment. And apparently, over the years, this constant life with the enemy in her own body had become an expectation that everyone around Angelica had to be prepared to put their own well-being and safety in the background at all times, too.
“... a few cuts and bruises? When the lives of tens of thousands of mutants are at stake? Let me think.”
Bobby tried to mediate, as so often. “That doesn't matter now, does it? Kid will be fine soon, right? It was maybe a little radical a cut, but at least he's safe here now. What's your first impression, Hank?”
“Emotional, impulsive,” Hank replied hesitantly. "As far as I can see, Bastian is suppressing his grief over Alaska as much as his time as a lab rat for normal humans, just like the last six months, which have been filled with physical and emotional violence.”
“It's as I feared." Angelica sighed. ”What a mess ... There's no way we can spare him, sadly. You have to fly to Alaska with him. He's the only one who knows his way around New York II.”
“This is madness!” Marie blurted out before anyone else could object, worried about a boy she hadn't even met, just as naturally as she and Remy had been taking care of the young people at Mutant High for all these past years. “That boy's been through hell!”
“And probably through even more rooms of it than we know yet,” Angelica agreed. ”If he looks familiar to you, imagine him even paler but as a girl with golden hair and silver pupils. Rebellion, ring a bell? Bastian's secondary mutation has early manifested as an entirely different shape that he can morph into, and his parents took advantage of that by drilling him mercilessly into a teenage singer under the alleged protection of anonymity, and making quite a buck with him. Rebellion has won an American Juniors season and had two relatively successful hits. After Bastian accidentally showed his powers on stage once, his parents kicked him out and he ended up in that lab in Helsinki until he moved to Alaska. And now right back to prostitution ... Do you think I'm not aware of the burden? But do you want to know what's really insane? There are a bunch of maniacs out there randomly turning mutant children into black corpses. That's insane, and right now Bastian is the only one who can help us stop this madness.”
For a few seconds, it was unpleasantly quiet in the room once more, but this time it was reluctant hesitation instead of dark emotions weighing down on everyone. Ororo looked at Scott questioningly, not enthusiastic about the idea of putting the boy in such a position either, but if there was no other way ...
Their leader nodded at her, barely noticeable, glad that they had come to the same conclusion. Scott rarely made a decision without including Logan's and her advice; that responsibility for the team, the three of them had always shared since Ontario Lake at the latest. And since Logan understandably couldn't be objective in this matter, it was up to Scott and Ororo to be the asshole.
“We're leaving tomorrow morning,” Scott explained through gritted teeth.
“Thank you. We'll send you our latest research data right away. We'll be in touch as soon as we hear anything new from Rome. Good luck.”
The two Avengers were suddenly in a great hurry to get to the door. Angelica only had a brief handshake for Katja to spare. No hug.
In the first moment alone, the X-Men felt completely at a loss for words, knowing how close Logan must be to taking out his aggression over the news on someone or something. It had been a long time since they had been confronted with such a stressful situation.
“Who's going?” Marie finally asked.
Scott arduously swallowed his annoyance at the behavior of both the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. and moved away from Katja a little, leaning forward, crossing his arms over his knees, gathering his focus to deal with the first planning of a major mission in a while.
“Hank, you have access to Bastian already. He'll probably feel safer if you go with him. Logan, you've been there before.” He paused just for a moment to check on his teammate in his back.
This wasn’t an easy choice, given how emotionally compromised Logan was regarding this matter. But everyone knew that there was no way, Logan would allow them to leave him out of the hunt for Jean's killers. It was still better to support him as a team and, if necessary, to slow him down, as far as that would be possible. No one was surprised when Logan nodded gruffly without even turning around.
Scott returned the gesture and stopped again, only noticeably if one knew that after a good 20 years, it was still not easy for him to have his own wife on his team. “Katja, you need to melt the snow so that we can actually see anything. I need Ororo here for research, especially if we need to continue to cooperate with the Avengers because of Rome. Rogers hates her guts at least slightly less than mine.”
“Not happening with my powers,” Katja immediately objected. ‘Not to that extent and not in the short time.”
“Noemi could," Remy threw in from the side, exactly the suggestion that Ororo had more or less already feared. It was not surprising that it came from one of the teenagers' trainers.
She herself wasn’t comfortable with the prospect that the greenhorns were to be seriously involved in the X-Men's job all of a sudden. If Angelica was right, that wasn't a good idea for Noemi in particular. “She's only sixteen ...”
“This is only about investigations, not battle. And this won't be the last crime scene she sees,” Logan surprisingly cut her off. ”If that takes her down a notch, fine with me.”
That, Ororo believed him immediately. Angelica's warning had hit him hard. From now on, he would keep an even closer eye on his daughter, even more than before. Especially if Noemi might indeed make the decision for the dangerous life at the front once she was old enough for it.
There was all he could do anyway; Noemi rarely let anyone keep her from anything. And after all, it had been Logan himself who had trained Noemi in all kinds of martial arts, regardless of her already powerful mutation, ever since she'd been a child. Together with Saskia; Katja had been very supportive of that. As in so many matters, she and Logan had been in complete agreement on this issue as well.
But the worry remained, and so Logan understandably preferred to be there at least for Noemi's first mission.
“Let her have a taste of blood,” Scott nodded at Ororo's resigned glance.
After that decision, what he had to tell them next was no longer a surprise. Scott couldn't stop his own daughter on her path to becoming a hero any more than Logan could stop his. ”I still want you there, Katja, and bring Saskia, too. The weather in Alaska is no picnic.”
Ororo saw the shock followed by anger on Katja's face and sighed, rubbing her temples in a vain attempt to fight the beginning of a headache. Especially because of such discussions to be expected, the others had been only moderately enthusiastic about Noemi and Saskia basically wanting their own X-Men uniforms as soon as they'd been able to walk.
“Sassy has to have her first experiences at some point too, Flashwind.” Scott's very firm tone of voice and the fact that he addressed his wife by her code name before she'd even said a word, made it clear that this decision was already set in stone.
Katja gritted her teeth. “And here I thought we wanted to take a different approach than Charles did with some of you guys. Then again, in some states the girls are already legal, right?”
“Wanna take a breath, Cat?” Marie chimed in, confused. As Saskia's godmother, she was very close to the girl both emotionally and as a trainer, and Katja's sudden resistance visibly confused her. “Wasn’t it you who wanted her to become a fighting machine before she'd even finished preschool?”
“Certainly not so that she can risk her life together with us,” her friend replied monotonously. ”I just don't want my daughter to become a victim. But that's not my decision.”
“No, it's not,” Scott replied softly, taking Katja's hand firmly in his. "It's hers.”
"Decision." Katja wiped her eyes with her free hand in agitation. ”All they've heard from us day and night were stories about saving the world. Did we really expect them not to follow suit? This is my own fault.”
She hung her shoulders wearily when Scott lovingly took her in his arms again. “And I don't want to lock her up. Sassy could handle that just as little as I could. But you guys gotta understand me, please. Saskia isn't even a level 4 mutant. Her mutation radius is even smaller than my own.”
Now, after far too long a silence, it was apparently time to clarify something that had somehow always been smoldering in the background. Therefore, Hank intervened as so often did with sometimes unpleasantly honest words. “Because her mutation just like yours was never sufficiently advanced. You're both capable of much more than you know. I don't know how you classify mutants, Cat, but I'd say someone who might one day be able to freeze or dry out the whole world deserves a place on our team.”
“That's exactly why we're both keeping our hands off things that are working just fine,” Katja retorted harshly. ”I'm sick of this discussion, Hank. I'm not going to risk messing around with emotion-based mutations and accidentally destroy half the country with PMS-generated storms or plunge it into a new ice age just to stroke some egos.”
“That's not the point right now,” Scott interrupted before even more bickering could start. "What Saskia can do so far has already been very useful in many simulations. Not to mention she's one of the best close combat fighters we have. If you unexpectedly run into trouble in Alaska, she'll be prepared. She wants it so badly, let her see what she can expect. Maybe that will change her mind.”
Katja grinned weakly. "How well do you know your daughter, Scott Summers?”
That settled that, and bit by bit, Logan seemed to have recovered from his shock, too. “What about you?” he asked Scott, a familiar spark in his hazel eyes. Tragedy or not, Logan enjoyed every mission that he was in charge of.
“I'll sit down with Ororo and check the security systems,” Scott declared stiffly, trying in vain to hide his annoyance at his own decision. ”If there's a deadly virus out there, I want to be sure we're protected. Air conditioning, sensors, the whole lot. Hank, hook Bastian to a needle while he's still asleep. We need initial tests. Marie, Remy, see what you can find out about Rome. You got twelve hours to become experts. Ororo, help them if they need you. Logan, talk to Noemi. And do your homework; this is serious.” Certain little digs toward his favorite rival, Scott just couldn't help making every now and then even after all this time.
“Katja, check what kind of weather expects you in New York II, and then tell Sassy what's up. Move, guys. Let's at least pretend we still know how to do our job.”
The briefing dissolved, now that everyone knew what they had to do, until only Ororo and Scott were left in the room. And only now, Scott showed how much all of this was getting to him, too. He buried his head in his hands and rubbed his eyes under his glasses, probably tormented by the headaches that his optic blasts triggered conspicuously often lately, despite Hank's regular attempts at treatment. Not even Gringo jumping on his lap as if he'd still been weighing three and not sixty pounds, couldn't elicit so much as a brief grin.
“Here I thought this whole crap was over,” he murmured when Ororo sat down next to him and gently took his arm.
“It never will be, as long as Logan doesn't know who had his wife murdered. He can't lose Noemi, too, Scott. We have to do everything to protect her. For him and for Jean.”
Her voice sounded a bit too hoarse, though she hadn't been crying in years. She had always had to be strong for Noemi. That had always been her job; she had made that silent promise to Jean when her friend had put her baby in Ororo's arms on her deathbed. And even 17 years afterward, Ororo couldn't think of that cruel moment without her eyes burning.
Scott was discreet enough to overlook it, just squeezing her hand. “You've always taken care of her as if she were your own child. Now it's time for her to start going her own way, and that will be hard enough. Let's see that we finally take these bastards out so that we can release her on it with a clear conscience.”
Ororo's nod was more hesitative than planned. A mission that had already begun with over 100 dead children would not be easy, not even for the seniors among them. “May the Gods be with us, Scott. I don't think we have the slightest idea what we're getting ourselves into.”