Fractals

Fractals Chapter Fifty Eight (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… *sends extra Scottish* InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and wondermous for archiving/hosting. :) ProPhile: Smut soon! Morgan: Check your inbox this afternoon… ;) Readers/Reviewers: It’ll all make sense in the end, lol. Mille grazie for reading/reviewing!

“Run that by me again…”
“Do I have to?” Jean rubbed her forehead and frowned when her fingers came away sticky. The sight of blood did not bother her as much as the lack of noise. No voices or emotions teased the corners of her mind, no tiny nibbles of mouse-like need and fear and desperation gnawing at her own thoughts… It scared her.
“It would help,” Storm replied from somewhere down the row. “Tell me again how you came to be here.”
Jean groaned softly and stood, shuffling against the wave of dizziness washing over her and making it to the mesh gate of the pen, pressing her forehead against the cool metal. “We left the Institute a little before eight this morning. We made it as far as the outskirts of Bayville and then…” she sighed and closed her eyes tightly. “I just don’t remember.”
Scott stirred on the concrete floor but did not awaken. Sam sighed. “None of us do, Storm. One minute, we were fine, the next…” He sighed again. “God, I hurt all over.”
“Right,” Storm said briskly, trying to sound sure of herself. “We’re missing the Professor, Emma, Logan, Kitty, Kurt, Wanda, Tabby, Jono, Todd, Remy, Jubilee and Rahne.” She padded softly to the bucket of water and stack of towels Mystique had left. “Your cell is unlocked,” she added, refusing to refer to it as the kennel it once was, “I suggest we wash up. Not to satisfy the captors but for our own peace of mind. No use becoming the animals they will expect to see.”
There was a soft rustle of creaking knees and aching backs, murmured sounds of pain and yawns they felt were out of place as feet shuffled towards the middle of the narrow room, the bucket of icy water and the stack of rough towels that Amara suspected were bought special for the occasion. She accepted the one that Storm handed her, soaked in the bucket first, and said carefully, her usual venom gone, “How do you think we came to be here?”
Storm sighed. “I can only answer for Sean, Forge and myself but we were waylaid in the woods near here. Sabretooth came on us too fast to fight off…” She sounded ashamed almost, not meeting the eyes of any of her students. It had not occurred to her that she had committed the greatest sin a mutant could commit—believing they were invincible simply because they were different.
Sean winced as the rough, cold towel came into contact with a particularly sore spot on the back of his neck. “We should worry more about getting out of here than how we got in. We know where we are, at least I suppose we do, and we know the direction we came from.”
Lance squeezed his towel out over the bucket and frowned. “This fucking sucks. You know… when I was in the Brotherhood, this shit never happened to us.”
Rogue elbowed him. “Shut up.” Her head throbbed painfully and she had the fleeting thought that she would rather have her powers back three times as strong than feel this bad ever again. She licked her lips to relieve the cracked dryness and said softly, “Storm… I still have the memories. That’s not blocked off by this thing,” she indicated the collars they all wore. “I know what was in Jimmy’s head, what he was told… I still have Empath’s memories and…” She bit back the urge to babble. “I think I can figure a way out of here.”
“That would be interesting to see,” Mystique said lightly as the door slid openly on silent tracks. She held both Kitty and Emma by the back of their necks as if they were no more than puppies. She shoved the women into the room, sending Kitty sprawling with an aborted yelp as her palms and knees struck the concrete floor. Emma managed to keep her footing but lurched and staggered to do so. “If you can get out of this house before the event this evening, you’ll only make it worse for yourselves. I suggest you play nice and clean up. No one likes messy guests.” The door slid closed on the blue woman’s smiling face.
Kitty stood slowly, hissing at the pain in her palms as beads of blood welled through roughened, broken skin. “I told you to listen to me,” she said sharply to Emma, tears plain in her voice. “We would have made it out just fine and could have come back with…” She paused and seemed to notice for the first time all of the other people in the room. “Oh. Never mind.”
Emma raised a blonde brow at Sean but did not go to him. “Hello,” she said calmly, her nudity overwhelmed by her demeanor. She seemed unashamed of it and did not even glance at the others in the room. “Give me your shirt.”
Sean did not hesitate and pulled his shirt off, handing it to her. He glanced at the teenagers and was relatively relieved to see that they had all busied themselves cleaning their faces and hands, ignoring Emma until she was clothed. The t-shirt did not cover much but it gave a sense of modesty that had been lacking before. “Are you alright?” he asked softly. “You look…shaken.”
She smiled tightly. Her hand was swollen and a disturbing bluish purple color, but she did not offer it for his inspection. “We’re just fine,” she purred. “Kitty, I think it’s safe now.”
Kitty stood, her air of accusing panic gone. She smiled giddily, obviously excited about some secret. “You sure?”
Emma’s smile became genuine. She tapped her temple idly and nodded. “Very.”
“What’s going on?” Storm asked, standing from helping Jean clean a wound on her knee. “Kitty, this is not a situation for mirth…”
Kitty’s grin broke across Emma, too. “Yes, it is,” the younger woman said. “We’re getting out of here.” She tugged at the collar around her neck and it pulled free. “She never checked to make sure it was working.”


Kurt groaned. He was not sure what time it was or even what day it was. He just knew that he was not in his bed and he hurt. “Don’t move,” a familiar voice said quietly somewhere over his head. “You’ll give yourself a migraine.” He felt compelled to obey and laid very still. The smell of food was strong, making his stomach lurch partially in protest and partially in need. There was rustling around him and something cool against his forehead. “Okay, the lights are off. You can try to open your eyes now.”
He opened one eye and winced. Even the tiny amount of light in the room seemed to shoot through him in pure pain. “Ach,” he muttered. “Too much…”
Wanda sighed. She moved the wet cloth over his eyes. “Tabby, see if you can’t make it darker.”
Kurt could not help the bubble of incredulous mirth that broke across his chest. “They’ll never believe this at home,” he muttered. “Wanda, the Scarlet Witch, taking care of the fuzzy blue elf.”
“Don’t get too excited,” she retorted. “We need you to get us out of here.”
“Out of where?” he asked, slowly coming more awake.
Tabby knelt beside him and sighed. “We’re in a bedroom in Magneto’s house. WITH locks on the door, thank you very much,” she snapped at Wanda.
“I said,” Wanda growled, “I was sorry. I didn’t know he’d bent that far towards nutcase!” She stood and paced, leaving Kurt on the floor with Tabby.
“What’s going on?” Kurt asked thickly, almost afraid to have his suspicions confirmed.
Tabby made a noise of frustration before responding. “We tried to escape, It didn’t work. Looks like we’re going to be part of Magneto’s little zoo later.”
“His… what?” Kurt was on his feet, the world spinning around him. He leapt at the door and fairly ripped it off it’s hinges before Wanda managed to pull him back. “Let me go!”
“It won’t work!” she yelled. “You can’t use your powers and we’re locked in!”
Kurt followed her gaze with his fingers, finding the collar around his throat. He wanted to vomit. “Caged like an animal,” he muttered, sinking to his knees. He repeated the words over and over in every language he knew, starting to rock slowly back and forth.
“Great,” Tabby said. “You broke him.”
Wanda growled. “Fanfuckingtastic. Just what we need. Another problem.”