* DISCLAIMER * This is a non-profit work of fan-fiction involving characters created and owned by Marvel Comics Group. * WRITTEN BY * Samy Merchi * ARCHIVED AT * http://mash.yok.utu.fi/~samerc/fanfic/index.html * STARRING * Elizabeth "PSYLOCKE" Braddock Generation X * CONTINUITY * This story takes place after OPERATION: ZERO TOLERANCE and before PSI-WAR. * MATURE CONTENT * This story includes: various verbal references to sexual acts a scene of explicit sex (m/f consensual) a scene with non-explicit teenage nudity * DEDICATED TO * My late mother, Seija. She went away not because she wanted, but because she didn't have a choice. I'll ever love her and ever miss her. I am just happy our love had a voice. ************* * MADONNA * * CHAPTER 2 * ************* *** The television was lying on its back on the floor, staring upwards at the ceiling, the screen shattered and smoldering smoke rising from inside the apparatus. "She did it!" Paige Guthrie shouted, pointing a finger at Jubilee. "Did not! You're the one who pushed me --!" Jubilation Lee retorted, making it a point to keep her voice louder than Paige's. "You're not supposed to be rollerblading in the house -- you've been told not to rollerblade in the house --" "I was going to take them off when YOU PUSHED ME!" "I didn't push you!" "Did too!" "Did not!" "Did too!" "Did not!" Sean Cassidy looked at the ceiling and sighed. "Lord, why me?" *** Arthur Maddicks sat in the treehouse beside the green-skinned mutant known only as Leech. He was slowly flipping thru the pages of a biology textbook and frowned a bit. "Artie all right?" Leech asked after glancing his friend. The green features turned into a look of concern as he thought he saw some moisture glistening in Artie's eyes. Artie shook his head slowly, and then used his mutant power to project a pink hologram of a man and a woman, and a child below them. Then, the woman was crossed out. Leech understood, and sat down beside Artie, placing a green hand onto the pink shoulder. "Leech understand", he said. "Leech never had a papa. Leech only had a mama, Annalee." Artie nodded quietly, and with a sigh, put the book down. The hologram changed again, this time Artie's father was crossed out, and the mother and father were faded out of the hologram, leaving Artie alone. "Leech's mama died too..." Leech said, his lower lip trembling slightly. He looked away, his eyes falling upon the textbook, and then he placed it away into a dark corner of the treehouse. He leaned back against the wall, pulling his knees tightly against his chest and curling into a little ball as he remembered the Morlock massacre. Again, Artie's hologram changed, this time to depict Artie and Leech as they were now. Then, two other images appeared a bit above the two. Sean Cassidy and Emma Frost. Then, a question mark appeared between the two adults and the two children. Artie eagerly tapped Leech on the shoulder to get the Morlock to notice the hologram. Leech looked up at the hologram, and the sadness on his face eased slightly. "Maybe Banshee and White Queen want to be Leech and Artie's parents?" he vocalized Artie's hologram. Artie nodded quickly, and the question mark changed into an arrow pointing from Artie and Leech to Sean and Emma, as he stood up and dusted himself off. "Yeah!" Leech smiled. "Leech and Artie go ask if Banshee and White Queen want to be Leech and Artie's parents!" He rushed for the door out of the tree house, and climbed down the ladder. Only when he got down, did he notice a dark-armored giant standing beside the trunk of the tree the treehouse was in. And beside the giant was a human-sized egg with eyes, arms and legs. Before he could do a thing, the giant flung some kind of dust in his face, and Leech coughed and flailed with his hands for a few brief moments. Just then Artie exited the treehouse to the top of the ladder, and saw what was happening down on the ground. He gasped, his large eyes widening, and not for the first time in his life he was frustrated that he couldn't even scream for help. "Peter, would you be a dear and get the other one down, while I deal with this one?" the white egg said, and then concentrated to use her telepathic powers on Leech, whose psionic resistance was demolished by the Pixie Dust, any psi-shields of his blown wide open, his mind made into an open book for telepaths. "Yes, Nanny", the Orphan Maker answered, and then swung his fist towards the trunk of the tree. With a crash, the trunk was smashed into so much toothpicks, and the tree toppled awaywards, crashing onto the ground. Artie winced as he hit the ground together with the branches of the tree, half buried by them. Held down by the branches, and somewhat immobilized by the pain in his side from the rough landing, he knew he didn't have a hope of escaping. "Peter, you dummy!" Nanny said scoldingly, making sure to keep her distance from Leech so she wouldn't be affected by the boy's powers. "We are here to save them, not to hurt them! Go and make sure he is all right!" Then, she turned her attention back to Leech who had already been mesmerized by her telepathy, and who was standing quietly in a listless trance. The sounds of sharp, quick breaths filled the air as Artie watched in terror the armored giant walk slowly, deliberately towards him. The Orphan Maker pulled out another dosage of the Pixie Dust, and Artie swallowed, his heart racing. From the darkness of the shadows, a pair of scared eyes watched everything happen. *** "Brandy?" "Yes, please", Elizabeth answered as she sat down in a plush recliner in the living room, and took a look around, her eyes brushing over the clock on the wall. She sighed a bit. It was getting late. And the roads would no doubt get clogged up by snow -- or icy, at the very least. Even if she drove home, she wouldn't get there until very late at night. Maybe she could use her shadow-teleporting powers to go home, and then return in the day and drive her car back to New York. Maybe she could try to teleport the entire car to New York? She had never tried to teleport anything so big... She flinched a bit as she noticed Emma standing beside her recliner, offering the drink. Elizabeth took the drink with a polite nod of gratitude, and mentally scolded herself for sinking so deep into her thoughts. Then, she chuckled slightly, amused that such a little detail had gotten a hold of her thoughts, considering the much bigger matter she had been unable to get out of her mind for the whole drive here. "What's so funny?" Emma asked as she also seated herself, and sipped from her drink. "Oh, nothing", Elizabeth said, and mimicked Emma's gesture, sipping from her brandy. "Just thinking of why I'm here..." The last few words trembled a bit, and she cursed in her thoughts. "Really", Emma answered. "Why don't you enlighten me?" "I'd really prefer to wait until Sean gets here before getting into all of that", Elizabeth said. "In the meantime, maybe you can tell me what's been happening around here. Any unruly boys, girls having crushes on them?" She put on a fake smile of levity and rolled the brandy around in her glass, unable to watch Emma in the eyes as she asked the question. Emma didn't miss the aversion of eyes, and her eyes narrowed in intelligent curiosity. But, she decided not to approach the subject just yet. "Oh, the usual. Angelo and Jonothon are imitating Lone Ranger and Tonto and enjoying playing the antisocial game away from everyone else, it seems -- which, considering they both are attracted to Paige, strikes me as odd. Sometimes I wonder if they might be gay..." *** Angelo Espinosa sighed and struck his forehead with the heel of his palm. "Jono, mi amigo -- you are hopeless!" he proclaimed with certainty in his tone. (( Hey, I have reason! )) Jonothon Evan Starsmore stated in a psionic broadcast, in a bit of a huff, as he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned his back against the wall of the basement. "She's just a girl!" Angelo replied as he hit fast forward on the remote control and the picture on the television screen went blurry as it went ahead at high speed. "And we both know she likes you! Get with the program, dude -- make your move when you have a shot!" (( I don't have a shot! )) Jono broadcasted in frustration, tearing off the bandages covering the lower half of his face and upper chest, revealing the seething psionic energy underneath which was the poor replacement for his lost body parts. (( I'm only half a man! She couldn't ever want a cripple like me! She can't even --)) "Can't even what?" Angelo snapped, hitting pause and turning around in his chair to look over its back towards Jono. "Hm? There's just one thing that matters to a chica, and that's in here." He stood up from the chair and patted his crotch. "As long as you got that, you're a whole man!" (( You're --)) Jono started, and then glanced at the television screen, which broke his train of thought and halted him mid-sentence. He blushed slightly and looked away from the screen as if his eyeballs had been burned. (( Look, Angelo -- not everyone thinks about sex as much as yer do. )) "And you're afraid *she* doesn't?" Angelo asked, quirking an eyebrow. "Look, hombre -- she's a girl. She's what, fifteen? You just make the right moves, she'll go wild." (( You've got 'em all figured out, eh? )) Jono sighed and shook his head. (( Why don't you have a girl if they're so easy? )) "Monet's stuck up, Jubes is annoying, Emma's old, Penance'd present serious hazards to my well-being when I got her going -- and as for Paige -- well, I'm leaving her to you." (( She's always liked you. )) "She's liked you more." (( ...I dunno. )) "I do." (( And Emma'd kill you if she heard you say she was old. )) "Hey, I can do her if she wants me to." (( You wish. )) Angelo shrugged, and got out of his chair. "Let's get out of this place", he said as he walked over to the VCR, popped the X-rated tape out and put it into its covers. "I need to return this to the video store. I think I'll pop into a bar in the Valley on my way. You wanna tag along?" (( A bar? )) Jono asked, pausing and his expression brightening a bit. (( It's been ages since I've been in one... )) He started slowly rewrapping the bandages around his destroyed upper chest and lower face. (( Cassidy and Frost won't like the idea though --)) Angelo laughed. "You think I'm gonna tell them?" *** WHACK! THUMP! "UNGH!" CLUNK! "OOFF!" Jubilee kicked Paige in the stomach, catapulting the Kentucky girl backwards and crashing her onto a table which gave way underneath her, the table legs buckling and breaking. "OW! That hurt!" Paige shouted, and forced herself back up, and tackled Jubilee like a pro football player. The two girls smashed into a couch, and toppled it backwards. As the back of the couch hit the floor, the girls were knocked out of the piece of furniture by the impact and rolled onto the floor. "You fight like a girl!" Jubilee screamed. "Stop pulling my hair!" "WHOULFF!!" Paige reflexively let go of Jubilee's hair as she doubled over in pain from the knee hitting her stomach. "Not...fair..." she wheezed while clutching her abdomen. SPLASH!! Both of the girls' eyes widened and they let out a horrible scream. Sean Cassidy put the bucket away after emptying a good two gallons of cold water and ice cubes onto the two girls. Then, he crossed his arms over his chest and tapped his foot against the floor. "Which one o' y' would like t' explain all this to me?" *** Everett Thomas looked down into his lap and sighed. The medlab was silent around him, only the quiet breathing of two sleeping children echoing off the walls and bringing a sense of serenity to the air that was not paralleled by Synch's soul. (( They're what, six years old or something? And I've...kissed them. Isn't that a crime?? But how was I supposed to know?? 'Ignorance of the law isn't an excuse, Everett'. Sure, dad, but how about ignorance of the circumstances? I didn't know! I just --)) He concealed his face in his hands and his shoulders shuddered a bit. After long moments, he stood up and looked at the twin girls, Nicole and Claudette St Croix. He leaned closer to Nicole's bed and pulled the covers a bit higher on her, tucking her teddy bear tightly under her arm. Then, he hesitated, and swallowed. Slowly, he leaned over and put a light kiss onto Nicole's forehead. "Sleep tight, okay?" he whispered. He glanced over to Claudette's sleeping form and blew her a kiss. "You too, Claudette. I'll be back soon." He headed for the door, which slid open in front of him. He paused in the doorway, looking back into the medlab, letting his eyes linger on the St Croix twins for a few moments, before he stepped out, and let the metal doors close behind him. "Damn you, Everett", he muttered under his breath, and hit the wall of the corridor half-heartedly. (( Now you're turning into a pedophile. What's that they say -- 'it's always the quiet ones'?? )) He closed his eyes and shivered a bit. (( I can't help it -- I miss Monet, even if she was two kids... Does that make me sick? God, I wish I could talk to someone about this... )) He clenched his hands into frustrated fists, shook his head, and strode off down the corridor, his head hung in shame as doubt and fear kept tearing at his soul. Then he was gone. The corridor echoed with silence. "This way, Peter. The children are down this corridor." "Yes, Nanny."