The journey forward was filled with steep inclines, sudden drops, slick rocks, and jagged peaks. It felt like the mountain was fighting them every step of the way. With every turn and footfall, there was a new hazard. Snakes, spiders, and other horrible wide-eyed little monsters that could only survive in the dark seemingly began to appear in every hole and crevice.
Always within arms reach, Scott was there providing support. Helping Anna over craggy ledges and zapping away nasty little hissing creatures that threatened their path. Anna, in turn, having held on to one of the rusted shovels from the dig site - cleaved her way through thick spiderwebs and plant undergrowth presumably from fauna above.
"It's a good sign," Scott mentioned while she chopped through a particularly twisted thick brown vine with the blade of her shovel. "It must mean we're near the surface."
"God I hope."
However, before they could further ascend they had to go deeper and deeper still into the caverns. Anna could hear the howl of some roaming animal nearby and found the shadows were begging to play tricks on her mind. She could see Scott wasn't fairing much better the way his right hand was glued to his glasses, always ready to fire off a blast at anything that moved.
The way got tighter to the point they had to crawl and move single file. Anna could feel the jagged wet rocks tearing through the fabric of her clothes like they were withered cheesecloth. Her elbows and knees were taking the worst of it, but she could feel the roof of the tiny chute scratching at her back and neck like so many dull knives.
Finally free of the claustrophobic hell, it was Scott who was the first to fall to the ground on the other side. He rolled onto his back and panted, his arms laid out at his sides.
"Scott, your leg." His left leg, already damaged from his initial fall, was a near unrecognizable bloody pulp.
"We have to keep going, Anna. We just have to get to the surface. My distress signal is still live. Xavier will find us. We just need to get to the surface."
Anna fell to her hands and knees, her chest spiking with pain. "You're going to bleed out before then if we don't take care of that gash." She shed her pack, her right shoulder screaming loud enough for her to gasp with pain. She gritted her teeth as she ripped open one of the zippers to pull out a canteen and her last pair of leggings to begin dressing his wound. The blood was too caked to get off with a simple splash of water, so she instead just secured the soft dry pants around the wound as snug as she could and applied pressure.
"Scott, you still with me?"
"I'm here." He said, but his voice made him sound a half dozen miles away.
She passed him the water. "If we're near the surface, do you think you can just blast our way out?"
"I could cause a cave-in if I punch the wrong hole. I would need to know where we were and if a bunch of rocks were above us."
Anna fell back on her rear and saw what a bloody mess her knees were. She sagged her head and stared at her hands. The gloves were long gone. From the one she lost earlier, and the other that got eviscerated during their climb that was now was only a sagging black wristband around the base of her hand. "If only we had that rock-throwing guy on our team. He'd be handy right about now."
"Eh," Scott waved a hand in the air. "Fuck him. He's an ass."
Anna almost snickered. She rose her head and looked around with her flashlight. "You think this is The Brotherhood's doing?"
"Who else?"
"It just seems too, I don't know, thought through. You know? They seem like the smash-and-grab types."
"…yeah, I get what you mean."
"I just don't see fatso, toad-boy, and rocky thinking through something like this."
"There are other people who are part of The Brotherhood, you know. It's not just them."
"Magneto?"
"I was thinking Mystique."
Anna looked at him. "My Mom?"
"This whole thing… it just feels like her MO. Remember how we thought we saw each other at the beginning of this whole freaking thing? Feels like a shapeshifter would be involved."
"But what is there to gain from all this?"
"I don't know… shes' crazy."
"Hey, don't…"
"I know… sorry, I should have used my words a little more carefully."
Anna inhaled swiftly and pushed herself back to her feet. "Come-on. We need to keep pushing. Can you stand?"
"I think so. Help me up."
Anna braced herself to bear Scott's weight when she heard the sound of something heavy crashing into the ground behind her. She jerked her head back and showed the light on the spot to find a stalactite had fallen and smashed. She was about to say something when a nearly identical crash happened again just out of her vision. Her eyes darted around the cave and stopped when a loud concussive slapping sound began bouncing off the cavern walls.
She stepped back, tripped over Scott, and fell onto her back. When she flashed her light she saw a long fat grotesque hand slapping the ground. "Fuck! What the fuck!" She shouted.
There was a bolt of red light but the thing swiftly dodged out of Scott's reach and disappeared.
"Mutants!" shouted a voice Anna had never heard in her life. "Mutants, they're in here! I saw the shot!" Out from the shadows sprang a pair of uniformed police officers with pistols aimed at them. "Freeze!"
Anna was back in the cemetery in Caldecott County just a few blocks away from her High School. Cold and wet, cowering behind a stone pillar, she was watching as an officer's hand wrapped around the mausoleum door.
"No!" Anna felt her scream burn her throat like a thousand hot embers as she leaped forward and plunged her hand into her pack. She didn't have to think to find the pistol she had stowed away inside, aimed the gun then fired at one of the officers. There was a spray of blood from the officer's shoulder and he shouted a curse before he fell to the ground. His partner caught him, looking back at her with sheer panic in his eyes as he drug his partner away and back into the shadows.
Anna lay there with her stinging chest pressed onto the cold wet ground. Her hands trembling hard enough the gun in her hand was a blur. She stared at the spot where the officers were. She didn't notice Scott getting up next to her, and shining his light along the walls and ceiling.
"Where did they go?" He pressed up against the solid walls around them. "Where did they go?" His roaming eyes eventually fell on Anna, then on the gun in her hand. "Where… did that come from?"
Still staring at the spot where the officers were, her eyes snapped to Scott standing above her. "What?" She breathed.
"You've had a gun? This whole time?"
"Scott, I-" She looked back where the officers had been, and struggled for breath. "I… I shot that guy, Scott. I shot that guy and didn't even think about it."
"Anna… you didn't just shoot that guy-" He crouched down and plucked the gun from her hands. "You shot that guy with Mystique's gun."
"Wha-"
"This is Mystique's pistol, Anna. What are you doing with Mystique's pistol?"
"I don't - I don't know. It was on the ground I-"
"You just found this? On the ground? Mystique's pistol? And you didn't tell me?"
"I - I - I don't know! I was tired, and angry, an - and I didn't think -"
"Do you know what this thing has done? It's shot and put holes in Logan and Ororo. It's killed people, important people, innocent people, Anna. And you're telling me you just found this fucking thing? Christ Anna, how much of an idiot do you think I am?" He chucked the weapon across the wide cave. "I never should have doubted my instincts about you! You were born Brotherhood. You were raised by a killer. Of course you're in league with your mother!"
Anna's eyes stung with tears as she watched him back away. "Scott - just listen to me -"
"No. No, I'm done listening. The problem is no one listened to me. The problem is you, Anna. We should have never let you in. Never have trusted you."
"Scott…" Tears lacquered and smothered her word. "I promise, Scott. I found that thing. I didn't know." She pushed herself to her feet, stumbling. "Scott… please just listen."
When she tried to follow him, he touched the rim of his sunglasses. "No!" He choked. His breathing was raspy. "No. Not another step." She froze, staring at him, her breath caught in her throat. He slowly backed away down a branching corridor till he was out of sight.
Anna dropped to her hands and knees. She pounded the ground with her fist till it was bloodied, and shouted as loud as her lungs were still capable of. She drooped her head, let the tears collect at the tip of her nose, and watched as they fell into a small black pool of water below her. Then, she felt something being gently draped over her back.
She threw herself forward as if an animal trying to escape a closing cage. She looked back, but it was too dark to see. She blotted to her left, running until her footfall landed on something slick, forcing her to fall. She fumbled around and found the gun Scott had thrown. She held it tight in her grip and pointed it around in random directions without the aid of her flashlight.
"Come on! You want it? Come get it!"
All at once the darkness evaporated and was replaced with blinding white light. Her eyes stung, and her arms attempted to shield her contorted bloodied face and wounded senses. When her eyes eventually adjusted, she found she could see every square inch of the cave. Standing in the center was a lone woman holding a blanket.
"Hello, Anna."
Anna jerked. The woman before her was the picture-perfect representation of her mother the last she saw her. Pinned-up black hair with wavy strays ending at the nape of her neck, her pointed chin, her well-worn gray flats with the long scuff along the broad side of the left shoe.
"Mom-" The word fell like a brick of molten lead out of her mouth. All moisture in her lips evaporated and mixed with the tears stinging to the corners of her eyes. "Mom…"
"That's right, honey. It's alright, I'm here now." Her back straight and shoulders relaxed, Anna's mother began to close the gap between them - till Anna aimed her quivering gun at her mother's chest.
"Stop! Stop there!"
Her mother did as ordered, still holding the heavy-looking blanket between both of her hands. "Anna, pointing a gun at someone is a very serious thing to do."
"Sh-show me your real form. Do it!"
Her mother tilted her head to one side, exposing her long slender neck. A sad little smile turned her lips. "Baby, this is my real form."
"No! Show me Mystique! Show me who you really are under that… that skin suit."
Her mother tilted her head the other way, then with a shimmer, her skin was replaced with slight blue scales, and her pinned-up hair became bright red and was worn across her shoulders. Her neatly pressed clothes too shifted into a fitted body suit layered with strange hexagonal plates. "Is this what you wanted to see, Anna? The creature that dwells beneath?"
"Why didn't you ever tell me? Why did you hide who you really were from me?"
"Tell me, Anna, would you have thought it wise to introduce your budding daughter - who already felt the weight of the world upon her shoulders by the means of simply growing up - to the deep intricacies of Mutant politics? To show her that monsters and beasts really do exists and would seek to hurt her? That she was living with one in her own home?"
"Having blue skin and powers doesn't make you a monster." Anna felt her head shake back and forth. "Is it true? What they tell me? Do you kill people?"
She watched the muscles in her mother's jaw and neck flex. "I do what I must to protect my family and aid my kind."
"By killing innocent people?"
"Whoever has told you that anyone I've taken to task is innocent, is lying to you, Anna. The world is a complicated place. For you now, killing a single person is an ugly and unforgivable crime. What you don't see is the suffering that would have ensued should that one person had been permitted to live. What I do is dark and brutal, and it's something I never wanted you to be a part of. I can't ask you for forgiveness, but perhaps one day I'll have your understanding."
Anna renewed her grip on the gun and pointed it with rigged arms at her mother. "Why! Why did you do all this? Why did you nearly get me and Scott killed in this fucking cave?"
"I assure you, Anna. Neither of you were ever in real danger. This whole thing has been simply one grand production. Complete with a cast." She looked over her shoulder and from the corner of the room, a man with a punchy gut materialized and walked over.
"Ellow, Anna." Said a deep and well meaning voice out of a long frog like mouth dotted with boils. "How are you, love? You've grown leagues since I've seen you last." He chuckled and leveled a hand at the mid of his gut. "Up to here last I saw you."
She looked the man up and down then felt her lips part. "I've… seen you before."
"You've seen me a number of times a number of ways, love." The man then shift, his gut visibly receding into his abdomen and chest, then his back stood a little taller and a quaff of brilliant blonde hair swept across his head.
"You… You're one of Mom's coworkers from her job that came over to visit…"
"Thats right." The man's voice was a little more clear and in command. He then shifted again into a shorter man with a big mustache and a broad smile.
"Mr McCormick, you're my Mom's boss…"
"Supervisor, but close." Said a squeaky voice before the man transformed again into his first and more grotesque form. "This suit, eh - us 'transformation artist' as I like to call our kind call forms suits, this suit is my favorite. Keeps me humble it does."
A bat Anna hadn't previously noticed, fluttered down from the cave ceiling and an instant later became a wiry man with thick wild black hair. "Hey, kid." He spoke with the voice of a man who was half cigarette. "We never actually talked, well - I never talked back - but you've seen me plenty of times."
Anna felt her eyes narrow.
"Maybe this will jog your memory." In an instant, the man was a bright red cardinal bird.
"You… the bird… out my window the first day I was at Xavier's…"
A flash later the bird was a man again. "That's right. Eh, don't worry - I didn't hang around for anything I wasn't supposed to. You're Mom just wanted to keep an eye on you, was all. I was always the red bird, nothin' else. Well, at least at Xavier's. I've been a seeing-eye-dog that you pet as a kid without asking the owner first. A gray cat that played with you outside your Kindergarten class. A few others."
Anna stared at the man wide-eyed.
"Anna, I'd like you to meet your uncles Fester-" She offered a hand in the direction of the man with the gut, "And Finch," than a hand to the man opposite. "You haven't known them exactly, but they have been with you your whole life. They also volunteered to help me in this little production we've set up for you."
She pointed the gun between the men. "You - and - y-you. My whole… whole life you've just been there?"
"It's like you're Mum said, love." Started the large man, Fester. "We wanted to tell you from the beginning, but where could we even start with," he snickered, "with the world of the Gifted? You were just a babe, you had so much riding on your shoulders already. But we still wanted to be there for you and help you and your mums however we could. To know a kid was going to be a Gifted… it was a first. We wanted to be sure it was done right."
"You were so scrawny when they got you." Started Finch and he put his gnarly-looking hands together. "I remember holding you, just like this. Then as a toddler, you were a real spitfire. Only thing that would get you to take a nap was if I let your ride around on my back as a giant cat a while."
All the blood drained from Anna's face and hands. The muscles in her arms buckled and she slowly lowered the gun. "Oh, my god." Tears softened her vision. "I remember that. It… just feels like some sort of dream."
"Nope." Finch rubbed his sides. "I can still feel where your tinny heels kicked me to get me to go faster."
"Everyone that is here, is here because they love you, Anna." Her mother spoke softly. "We're here because we needed to show you the truth."
"Truth?"
"Let me ask you, during all of these trials you've been forced to face, where have your X-Men been? They know where you were hiking. They know you're lost. Why haven't they come down to save you? Then there is the teammate who you've been given, Scott Summers. What has he been to you?"
Anna looked down at the pocked-marked floor. "He's…"
"A burden a best and an outright danger at worst. All he's done since you've fallen is ask and take, Anna. Justify as you see fit, but these are the facts. He's taken your recourses, insulted you, and humiliated you. He condemned you before even knowing you. He then left you to fend for yourself after the first miscommunication. The boy is fickle, self-obsessed and his loyalty and 'friendship' are worth less than the scum beneath your boot."
She walked closer to Anna. "What of the others, hmm? Where are they? Better yet, what if they were here - would they be better in his stead? Would they be more capable of defending you, aiding you?" She was close enough now to walk behind Anna who could feel her words tickling the back of her neck. "Children, Anna, you - your friends - you're children. What you experienced here was a curated glimpse into the real world. Its cruelties, its cold unforgiving nature, and how it can take away from you whenever it wants. You have to ask yourself, who is it that you want in your corner when the time comes? Because a storm is coming, Anna. A storm the likes the world and our kind have yet to see. And when it hits, is it Xavier and his child soldiers who you want at your shoulder?"
Anna felt like a toy with its batteries taken out. Hunched over, her chest faced the ground and her knees knocked together. Eventually, her mother, who had now circled around and stood before her, merely had to pluck the gun out of Anna's hands. Then wrapped the blanket she was holding around Anna's shoulders.
"I appreciate you bringing my pistol back. It's like a second child, I'm not sure what I would have done without it." She turned her back to Anna and ejected the clip. "I know you were bothered about shooting at Finch earlier in his cop suit. Don't worry, it was filled with blanks. I was never going to put you in that position with a loaded gun."
A red pulse on Anna's watch drew her attention. The words 'DISTRESS CYCLOPS' read in big bold letters along with a set of coordinates. She covered the watch under her blanket. "What happens now?"
"We go home."
"What home? It's all gone." Anna closed her eyes. "And it's all my fault."
"No, Anna." Her mother turned and knelt in front of her. "This isn't your fault. None of this has ever been your fault. It's the fault of the fools around you. The fault of the world you've… been born into." She took Anna's hands into her own gloved hands and held them tight. "My baby. I wanted nothing more than to spare you all this pain. Since I laid eyes on you as a little girl… all I've ever wanted was to shield you from the evils of this world." She closed Anna's hands together and brought them close to her chest. "You saw me at my worst when you were taken away from me. I'm sorry I hurt you. I just couldn't stand someone ripping you away from me… my baby." Her mother wrapped Anna up in her arms and Anna didn't resist. She found her own arms raising and matching her embrace.
"Oh, Mom." Her breath caught in her throat. Her watch blinked red near her face 'DISTRESS CYCLOPS' with the same coordinates till finally, the screen flashed a symbol of a battery, before going completely black.
"I love you, baby. When we get you home, you will finally be safe." Her mother released her and Anna looked between her mother's yellow eyes.
"Where is home?"
Her mother brushed Anna's hair out of her face. "The Brotherhood. We have a base in Bayville but I'm going to put in a request out of state. I want to be done with this horrible place and I think you do too."
"What about Mah?"
A sliver of life seemed to fade away from her mother's face before she answered. "She'll be there too."
"But - I thought she went off the grid. Went dark."
"She came home, just like you have."
Anna looked deep into her mother's eyes and what she found made every muscle and fiber of her being tremble with a depth of sorrow she had yet to feel. Her lips parted and she looked down at her bare hands.
"What -" She cleared her throat and squeezed the tears out of her eyes. "What should we do with, Scott?"
"He's not someone you need to worry about anymore, honey."
"You're not going to kill him, are you?"
Mystique paused and drew a breath. "No, I'm not in the business of killing children. He's been given a sedative and will rest till I'm sure someone will find him."
"What if no one does?"
Mystique raised a well-manicured brow. "Something you will find in life, Anna, is the world is filled with cockroaches. Cockroaches are hearty little things that are awfully hard to kill. Somehow, I'm sure that boy will be just fine."
Anna nodded, her tears slipping down her cheeks. She felt Mystique's finger slip under her chin and raise her face to meet her own. "You are one of the bravest women I have ever had the privilege of knowing, Anna Marie Adler. I saw in these caves that you were made out of stuff that could cut diamond. I could not be a prouder mother."
Anna's lip quivered, and her eyes felt hot. "Oh, Mom… I wish I could say the same." With that, Anna launched her hands for Mystique's face and clamped down on anything she could get purchase on.
The other woman screamed and grabbed at Anna's wrists in an attempt to push her away, but Anna's fingers only bit down harder. What felt like white-hot fire coursed through Anna's hands and bolts of electricity through her veins. She felt as if she was burning in a volcano while simultaneously being plunged into arctic water. Senses wailing, she watched with wild eyes as the fight drain out of her mother's face. Both bodies fell in a struggle to the ground. Emotions whipped Anna's soul in every direction, but the draw of blood and the taste of iron in her mouth kept her focused.
She could finally hear Finch and Fester shouting her name as they descended upon her. She rolled pathetically to the side, just out of their reach, and found they chase after her. Instead, they were still looking around Mystique's prone form and hadn't even glanced in her direction. Anna brought her hand in front of her eyes and found she was perfectly in visual sync with her surroundings.
Fester cradled Mystique's head and looked back at Finch. "The girl is using her powers. She must be blending in somewhere. I'll look after our lady here -" he pointed for one of the gaping cave mouths in the cavern. "She's probably going after the boy. Guard his body. Go!"
Finch nodded and in a flash, transformed into a bat and flew off in the direction Fester pointed in. Anna followed Finch till the darkness of the cave became too much for her to spot the little bat any longer. Slowly she crept forward till she could just spot something the size and shape of a man lying prone against the wall.
"Scott! Scott!"Anna scrambled on hands and knees till she was within arm's reach of the figure. She felt along the body till she located a head and untied the gag.
"Anna…" Scott mumbled finally. "Some guy… jumped me. Injected me with something… can't move."
"Scott, I got your transmission, which means Xavier did, right?"
"…yeah…"
"Okay… shit, Scott I can't carry you. You need to stand!"
"Anna-"
"Wha-"
"Duck."
Anna turned just in time to see Finch standing over her, then a fraction of a second later he was blasted away with a bright red bolt of light.
"Fuck!" She looked down at her arm which was now a strange cheetah print. It seemed her mother's borrowed powers only wanted to cooperate for so long. She looked back at Scott whose sunglasses were resting on his chin and his eyes closed. She put the glasses back over his eyes. "We have to get out of here now!"
When she looked up she saw little roots digging through thick clumps of dirt. She grabbed Scott's head to angle his eyes upward when she felt the same stinging sensation she had with Mystique. She heard him groan, and she felt as if she were about to puke from another skin-to-skin contact. Then she felt that familiar power behind her eyes she had from touching Scott before. A moment later it was gone.
"Damn it." She looked back the way she came, then down at Scott. "I'm sorry." She then gripped his bare arm in her hand. He gritted his teeth and tried to suck back in the scream vibrating in his throat. Anna had to hold on to the wall to stop herself from falling over as waves of energy burned every nerve ending in her hands, arms, and face. When she finally let go, a strange feeling of vitality pushed through her veins and warmed her blood. Then there was a pressure - no - a power building behind her eyes she had only felt for the briefest of moments before were now in full force. She looked up and let the full extent of the near-intoxicating energy fly free.
In a wild burst of ruby-colored light, the dirt above them cleared away with explosive force. Rocks flew every which way like shrapnel and small trees and grass began to cave in around them. At her whim, the beam of energy seized, and she was able to see clearly once more - though what she saw was far from clear.
Gnarled bushes, limbs from trees, and mounds of dirt surrounded them. Freezing cold water and mud slapped against her scalp and shoulders.
'Anna. This is Xavier.'
Anna darted her head back and forth, ready to fire another shot. "Xavier?"
'Anna, I'm communicating to you telepathically. Are you near Scott?'
'Yes!' She screamed in her head. 'He's here. He's half-conscious. Mystique gave him something to paralyze him. He can't move!'
'Anna, listen to me. We've been looking for you both and caught Scott's signal for a moment but it stopped transmitting. Can you transmit on your watch?'
'No. It's dead'
'We need a visual on you then. Last transmission we got we saw you were on the top of the mountain but we don't see you. We need to you send up some sort of flare or signal.'
Anna looked directly into the rain-heavy sky and let the surge of power run through her eyes once again. A bolt of red light fired from her vision and near overwhelmed her senses. She maintained the beam as long as she could until her body gave way under her and she fell to her knees.
'Good! We're close. We just need a little more, Anna, we're coming!'
A pair of arms grabbed Anna from behind and restrained her arms. "Anna, please!" She could smell the waft of cigarettes. "Stop this. You're only hurting yourself!"
She threw her head back and felt the satisfying thwack of her skull meeting nose. Finch shouted and reflectively let her go. Anna spun on the spot, blasted him, and launched him across the cavern. He sored, smashed his back into the opposing rock wall, and fell into a heap on the ground. Leaking blood from his lip, he looked up at her and smiled. "A real badass you've become, little girl." He spat a wad of phlegm and crimson onto the ground and breathed. "Just like your Mah and Mom. Wouldn't have expected no less."
"Go to hell!" She gave him another blast, burring further into the rock wall behind him. She only stopped when he ceased moving. Panting for breath, she glanced all around them and saw only shadows. "Scott, we have to move." She grabbed both of his arms and dragged him over the recently fallen dirt and deeper into the cave.
"Anna!" She recognized the voice of Fester. "Sweet girl, stop this!"
"Screw you!" She pulled Scott as hard as she could, trying to summon the strength for another blast.
"Anna-" Her mother's voice was curt. "There isn't anywhere to go. You're only wasting your time and energy."
"Says you!" Anna turned and blasted into the wall behind her. Rocks scattered and splintered till they formed a near-perfect hole to view a mountain-dotted landscape beyond. High winds whipped her face and stung her cheeks. A mixture of rain and snow near froze her fingers and bare flesh on contact. She looked down and saw a long platform where a massive rock she had just knocked down was now spanning a wide gap between jagged rock formations. Without giving herself time to think about it, she lowered Scott and then herself onto it.
"Anna!" Both adults shouted then she saw them both appear in the hole she had just created.
"Anna Marie!" Shouted Mystique over the roaring winds. He was holding onto Fester and clasping her abdomen. "Get back here, now! That rock isn't stable!"
Anna felt the precarious rock shift under her, but she moved out further still. She dared a look down and saw saw-toothed rocks and snow-tipped peaks beneath her. "Oh, man." She mumbled.
'Anna, I feel you and Scott nearby but we still can't see you!' Shouted Xavier in her head. 'We saw an explosion somewhere nearby. Please fire another beam and we will find you!'
Unable to drag Scott any further, she laid him down at the midpoint of the long flat rock, then collapsed to her hands and knees near his head. She felt bile build in her throat and swallowed it down.
Mystique made a move for her but Fester bared her with her arm. "I'll get the pup. You're too weak." The big man then got on all fours and transformed into a dire wolf with a long mangy tail. He eased himself onto the rock and made careful steps toward her.
Anna looked up. "Stay away!" The wolf only got lower, its eyes fixed on hers. Closer and closer the wolf inched towards her. "I told you - stay away!" With a shout, she let loose one last bolt of light fueled with every last ounce of energy left in her muscles and breath in her lungs. The light struck the wolf in the chest and sent it sailing off the rock. Anna's limp neck arched backward sending the lance of red stabbing into the clouded skies above.
With the last of the scarlet energy went the last of Anna's ability to keep herself upright. She only saw a little greasy pigeon fluttering away before falling forward. With her face inches away from Scott's and the sun behind him, for the first time, she could just see Scott's eyes. They were blue. "I tried." She wheezed. "I really tried."
"I… know." She saw tears leaking out from behind his glasses. "You… could have… left me to die."
"We made up." She coughed and smiled. "Remember, dickbag?"
"Thank…you."
A hissing sound like Anna had never heard overwhelmed her hearing and senses. All around the rain and snow were displaced and just behind Scott's matted hair, she could see the Blackbird levitating in mid-air with its hatch door open. Soon strong hands were grabbing at her arms and lifting her off the rock.
"Wolverine!" She heard Ororo shouting. "Mystique in nearby! Watch for her!"
"I got Scott!" She heard Evan declare somewhere nearby while she was being dragged by the underarms.
"She's not alone, there are others." Xavier too was somewhere on the ship behind her. "Nightcrawler, can you teleport her inside?"
"She's too weak, Prof." Anna heard Kurt say in her ear. "I think she might do worse than lose her lunch if I do."
Anna saw Logan walk down the ramp while Kurt drug her up it. He looked around the rock and sniffed the air. Not too far away she saw Scott getting drug up by Evan.
"Too much wind!" Logan shouted. "I can't get a good read. Weather-witch, turn down the hailstorms out here!"
"This is turned down! It's not getting quieter!"
"It doesn't matter now, Logan. We have the children." Xavier called out from somewhere behind her. "We leave. Now!"
Anna tilted her head back and saw Kurt straining to pull her. When he caught her eye, he smiled. "Enjoy your trip?" She jerked herself out of his arms and hugged him, he hugged her back just as tight. "It's okay. It's okay, dude. We're gonna get you home."
She wrapped her fingers in his hair. "Kurt," fresh tears streaked her cheeks.
"You're okay, you're -"
An alarm went off and the Blackbird's bay was flooded with flashing red lights. All eyes looked toward the hatch which was refusing to close. Suddenly Mystique appeared in its gap, one muscular hand braced against a massive latch to secure the door, and her two legs baring the bay door from going any further. In her free hand, she held her pistol aimed at what Anna then realized was Xavier.
"Xavier!" Mystique roared like a threatened beast. Anna saw Logan was about to make a move but Xavier put and hand on his shoulder. "Xavier!" Mystique's body buckled against the strain of keeping the door open. Her bared teeth chattered behind stretched bloodied lips, her wide manic eyes were stitched with red veins, and her cheeks were slick with tears. However, the gun trained for Xavier's head remained eerily still.
"Xavier…" Her voice creaked. "Should anything - anything - ever happen to my daughter, I will find you, Xavier. And when I do I will feel each one of your bones break in my hands before I broil your flesh and fed it to those you hold most dear. As for your precious toys, their blood will stain the streets red before mixing with the fecal matter in the sewers below produced by those humans you are so damned determined to protect. Do you understand me, Xavier!" With one final withering glare, she let go of the hatch door and fell backward outside. Anna tried angling her vision to catch one last glimpse of her mother but saw nothing as the hatch door closed firmly shut.
-
The air in McCoy's classroom was stale and now warm thanks to the midday sun blasting through the windows. The stack of papers to grade resting on his desk had hardy lowered an inch since that morning despite being on his third cup of coffee. He leaned back in his chair, pulled off his reading glasses, and stared at the desk closest to the door. Anna's desk. He eventually pivoted his chair till he was looking out of one of the windows to his right. The courtyard below was buzzing with students on their lunch. From his vantage, he could easily spot her little group sharing a meal together in their usual spot.
He heard the door to his classroom swing open and slammed into its door stop mounted into the base of the wall. McCoy lowered his head. "Morgan, please. I'm not in the mood right now too -" he turned and found Anna standing before his desk, her eyes wild and hair unkempt.
"Anna!" He stood. "I was told you and the boy you were with were to stay home for the next two weeks."
She slammed her hands on his desk, dislodging a few nick-knacks and dispersing a small could of dust from the computer tower resting horizontally beneath his monitor. "Why!" She shouted. "Why are you working with Mystique? I thought I could trust you!"
"Mystique?"
She slammed her hands on the desk again. "You got in my face and made me go on that goddamn trip! You forced me! This is your fault!"
McCoy held up his hands. "Anna, I assure you I had no idea this trip was even being organized! I didn't know you were even interested in archeology till Principal Darkholme informed me you would be absent from my class in favor of the trip!"
Anna's eyes drilled into McCoy's. "You told me to go. You did. You said I had to do it to save my grade."
"I've offered an assignment in the form of an essay for you to do, yes. However, I have nothing to do with the archeology club."
Anna's shoulders and muscles suddenly dropped as if the strings holding her up had become slack. She stared at his desk. "Principal Darkholme." She looked back up at McCoy. "She told Xavier that you okay-ed the trip… she set us up." She pushed herself off his desk and then stood before a window. She peered against the sun till she spotted her, her principal, talking with a teacher in the middle of the courtyard. The conversation between the two broke, then Darkholme looked back up at Anna and their eyes met.