Blueshift

Blueshift Chapter Sixty Four (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… *sends energy * InterNutter, TC, and Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and wondermous for archivng/hosting. :) ProPhile: By the time you read this I’ll be done with the story. ;) Morgan: * glomp * Readers/Reviewers: *kicks computer gnomes * And next week I’m going to a weekend long festival. I’m going to set up at least one chapter to be out for y’all while I’m gone. Wheeeee. Thanks for reading/reviewing as you can!

Mystique hated having a headache. It made it damned hard to concentrate. As it was, she was having a hard enough time dealing with the small, dark haired woman before her without the pounding of tension behind her eyes and at her temples. “Look,” Mystique ground out between clenched teeth, “I’m sure this is absolutely fascinating but I really don’t have the time or inclination to listen to you right now.”
“You should…” the woman replied quickly, moving to block Mystique’s exit. “Your companions will wait. Their time is coming soon enough.”
Mystique barely kept herself from rolling her eyes. _Damn my luck… _ She had been ordered at the last moment to stay at Magneto’s home, waiting for she was not told what, just that she would know when it happened. She wondered idly if this was it, if Magneto were testing her loyalty or ability. She did not smile but instead folded her arms sternly. She found her near-nudity often unsettled people and crossing her arms, pushing her breasts up intentionally, would break the most determined applicant for her or Magneto’s attention. This woman, however, did not show so much as a flicker of discomfort or interest at the sight. “If you have some business with the Brotherhood, I suggest you schedule in advance next time. Now, you must excuse me…” Mystique started to sidestep the dark haired, olive skinned woman only to be stopped with a hard, almost iron-like grip on her shoulder. Hissing in surprise and a hint of pain, she glared down at the woman. “Release me or regret this.”
“You have the understanding of a child,” the woman spat. “I am Minerva, goddess of war and wisdom, daughter of Janus himself! What part of this are you not grasping?”
Mystique narrowed her eyes. “The part where you think you have the right to touch me.” She shoved Minerva away and drew herself up straight. “Touch me again and it will be the last thing you do.”
“Do not speak to me in clichés,” Minerva said flatly. “You are going to join your…master?...in attempting to suborn the others like yourself. Others which, by rights, me and mine should destroy. But we like you. You’re chosen from among them, you and few others… You can help us.” Minerva tugged at her chiton, frowning when it did not fall as she would have liked it to. “You’re a warrior, Raven. You’ve fought hard your entire life, giving up more than most people could imagine just for the right to grow, to become the strong person you are today.”
Mystique felt an odd pull somewhere in her chest. _No one calls me Raven but Eric. How does she know my name? _ “You are out of line. Leave.”
“The longer we argue here, the more irate that man becomes and the further you are diminished in the eyes of his new companion… Essex? Yes, Essex. Listen to me now and do as I say and you can leave. You will go to them and do as I tell you to and it will end well. Stay here and strut and puff at me or ignore my commands and it will end poorly. People—more people—will die and the gods will have to clean up in your wake. As it is, we are depending on someone who is practically a child…” She sighed and trailed off, smiling as if in apology.
Mystique was acutely aware of each passing second, seeming to feel Magneto’s irritation reaching across the short distance to rake across her nerves. She took Minerva’s pause as a cue to speak, which further rankled her, this seeming attempt to command her. “I am not your minion or servant or cohort… Your commands are nothing to me.”
Minerva let her pass this time, not even turning to follow her. Instead, she sighed loudly and said “Fine. Whether you live or die is no matter to me. It’s one less body for my brother to add to the walls.”
The blue mutant cringed at that mental image. After the most brief of hesitations, she continued out the door. “Stay or go, at this point I don’t care. Incubus will deal with you.”
“Incubus is not here,” Minerva called back, standing in the doorway as Mystique gained the walkway to the car. “He hasn’t been here in a few hours… I saw him leave. I saw him follow the shadowy man from the grounds…”
Mystique stopped then, dead in her tracks. She turned smoothly and crossed back to Minerva with a speed that was both astonishing and graceful. “How long have you been watching us?” she demanded, pushing the tall woman against the doorframe. “How did you get on the grounds?”
“Long enough and I have my ways,” Minerva rejoined. “Your charges are in trouble, Raven. The witch is with those who are about to be seriously… let’s just say hurt and keep it polite. And the fair one, the mother… She is about to do something very foolish.”
“If you hurt them,” Mystique began, only to be surprisingly cut off by Minerva’s hand over her mouth.
“Shut up and listen to me and heed my words well. Go to your master, go to Eric or Magneto or whatever you want to call him today. Do as he says until you are close to the alien woman, the one called Lilandra. Her companion is the one you want to deal with, the dark one. She calls herself Deathbird. It is by her hand that this race will be destroyed if you do not act.”
“She means to destroy mutants?” Mystique asked as Minerva released her hold. “Threats like this are nothing new.”
“Not mutants… the entire race. All humans.”
A silence both tense and deep stretched between them for what felt like an eternity but was truly only a few seconds. “All humans? Impossible.”
“So are gods and aliens, aren’t they?” Minerva winked audaciously and disappeared from Mystique’s sight, a fine dusting of white-gray powder marking where she had been standing.
Letting her eyes rest on the site, Mystique felt anger and annoyance warring with a tinge of fear in her breast. _I thought they had been destroyed… I was *assured * that they had been destroyed… _ She left the powder alone, ignoring the urge to kick it like a petulant child, and ran to the car.

Jean closed her eyes and tried to steady her breath. The silence had become almost a sound in and of itself, humming in her ears and filling her mind with nothingness. It caused her physical discomfort to keep her shields so strong for such an extended period of time but if she did not… She dreaded to think of what would happen. A wave of heat washed over her and she opened her eyes, looking around frantically for fire or some sign if impending doom. Jono was safe, she could see him, moving and dusty and shaking off flecks of debris as he stood out of sight of the Professor, hesitant and scared.
“What is it?” Scott asked, kneeling by her side. “Are you going to be sick, baby?”
“Baby?” she said softly. “I thought I asked you not to call me that…” She felt like she was burning up from the inside out. “I need a drink,” she muttered. “Damn it… how did it get so warm out? What’re they doing to us?”
Scott frowned. Everyone was shivering, most of them ill-prepared to be out in the cold. “Jean…” He paused then shook his head. “I’ll see about the water.”
She nodded and closed her eyes again. Her shields were slipping a little; she could feel the anger of the Shi’ar and the tiny whispers of awareness begin. “So hot,” she muttered, moving to lay on the frosty ground.
Scott glanced back at her as he neared the Professor. “There’s something wrong with Jean,” he said roughly, trying to keep his voice down. “I don’t know what it is… I think she has a fever or something…”
Professor Xavier frowned, holding up a hand to pause the conversation with Logan and Mark. “Tell Beast. She might need to be moved into the cellar. I don’t want anyone in above ground structures until we know what D’ken’s demands are. In fact, get some of the stronger students and start clearing a path to the old cellar. Hurry and make sure the passage between the cellar and the main basement subsystem is clear as well.”
Scott nodded, hiding his disappointment and concern. He wanted to snap that he didn’t give a damn about the cellar or everyone else, his wife was sick and in pain! Instead, he trotted back to the clusters of students milling around Storm and Beast. “Where’s Todd?”
“No idea,” someone called back from the thick. “He and Rogue are both gone…”
“Damn it,” Scott muttered, wishing them performance problems for choosing that moment to disappear. “Okay. I need people to help clear the debris from the cellar door. You, you, and you… and the rest of you, get into lines of five and sit down and be quiet!”
“Fearless Leader strikes again,” Storm muttered,raising her brow as Scott led a small cadre of students towards the cellar, turning back himself to check on Jean again.
Beast sighed. “He’s eighteen going on fifty. Keep an eye on the younger ones. I’m going to see what’s going on with Miss Grey over there.”
Storm nodded, turning her attention to the remaining students. She hoped and prayed the missing ones were unharmed and alive, or at least alive. She did not experience true fear often, not since childhood really, but she felt the old nausea and icy chills returning, creeping through her body, and she knew this day would not end easily.

A/N Next chapter, WTF is up with Rogue?