Fractals

Fractals Chapter Seventy Three (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse, Hamster Witch and Uberbeta… sugar free kind of sucks, lol. InterNutter, TC, Maxwell Pink and Dracena are loverly and wondermous for archiving/hosting. :) ProPhile: Next chapter, sweaty sticky smut. ;) Morgan: *glomp * Readers/Reviewers: Almost done. And again, like I say every story, lol, there *will* be some loose ends that I’m carrying into the next fic. Viva la continuity.


Amara closed her eyes and inhaled slowly, holding the breath as long as she could before exhaling on a slow count of twenty. She repeated the action four more times until she began to feel slightly lightheaded. Finally, she opened her eyes and stared back at herself in the mirror. She was ashen, she thought bitterly, finding irony in the phrase. She did not like thinking in English so much… She nodded slightly, taking the displeasure as a further sign from her gods that her timing was right. Lance’s knock on the door startled her, making her jump and gasp slightly before deciding to become irritated. She wrenched the door open and glowered up at him. “I was *busy*” she snarled, stalking past him. Or trying to. He grabbed her by the elbow and spun her to face him, not letting go even when she let her skin grow uncomfortably warm under his touch.
“You’ve been in there almost an hour,” he said tensely. “I was worried.” He glanced past her down the hall towards the foyer and lowered his voice to a near whisper. “They’re going back for Kurt’s mom and Jono and Forge,” he said quickly. “If you’re going to leave, now’s the time to do it. They’re too distracted to notice.”
“What?” She felt as if the entire world shifted and turned onto it’s side and she was rapidly sliding off the edge. She stared up at him, her voice suddenly very small. “Leave now?” It was so sudden. She had expected to have several days to plan, to plot and gather supplies she would need and most importantly of all, figure out how the Hell to get there without divine intervention. It felt as if her stomach were shaking inside and her knees were threatening to give way. She clutched at Lance’s shirt and lowered her eyes, verging on panic.
“Kurt and Kitty and Paige are going with some guy from the Daily Planet back to Magneto’s… They’ll be gone for a while, I’m sure of it. Everyone else is busy playing spin doctor with the media assholes.” He paused. He could not believe he was doing this much less saying it. He took Amara by her upper arms and pulled her into the small bathroom she had just emerged from. “Amara, you might not want to believe it but I love you. I want you to be happy…” He swallowed hard and rushed onward, “If you want to go back to Nova Roma, if you really think it’ll be better than here, that you’ll be better off, despite what your father did… Then I want you to do it.” He closed his eyes and leaned to press his forehead against hers, his voice barely audible then. “I just wish you wouldn’t.” He was bone weary and felt more than a little sick. He wished that he had never left the Boardinghouse, that he had never met any of the Institute residents… He sighed wearily and opened his eyes to find Amara staring up at him with wide, luminous eyes on the verge of tears. “I really wish you wouldn’t.”
“I want you to come with me,” she breathed. “I want you to come with me to Nova Roma…” She could feel the heat rising through her body, not her powers or even nervousness. It was the heat of the stone floor of the baths, warmed by a clever map of pipes pumping hot spring water through the building, the heat of the grass and soil of the island on a summer day, the heat of the temple near the lava flow… Voices were growing near, Bayville was intruding on her thoughts again. She muttered under her breath, cursing whoever was coming towards them, and stepped away from Lance. “I’m not asking as Princess Amara Aquilah,” she said in a smooth but hurried tone, “I’m asking as Amara.”
Lance did not have a chance to respond. Scott swung around the corner like a man on a mission, his face set in lines of aggravation and anger. “I can’t believe she told me to shut up in front of reporters!” he said to them, lighting on their presence as a chance to vent. “Alex is going to see that! Her folks will see that!” He shook his head, pressing his hand to his forehead and sighed harshly. “I don’t need this!”
Amara shifted almost imperceptibly, becoming Princess Amara before Lance’s eyes. “Why is it always about you, Scott?” She raised a brow. “Maybe you need to pay more attention to her instead of moping.” She turned sharply on her heel and strode down the hall towards the foyer where the media members were gathering, the dull roar of voices building to an annoying level.
Scott stared after her for a long moment before turning to Lance, looking almost accusing. Lance shrugged. “She’s got a point,” he shrugged, starting after her. “You are kinda selfish.”
“You’re fucking whipped, you know that?” Scott muttered, striding to keep up.
“Yeah, but at least my woman didn’t tell me to shut up in front of a reporter,” Lance pointed out, smiling as they reached the group and Scott was unable to reply without being overheard.
Professor Xavier, looking very tired and markedly older, separated himself from the crowd and motioned to his students. He waited until the handful of reporters had quieted down and were paying attention. “Thank you for coming out and I do apologize for the…incident…earlier. Have your offices contact me by Friday and I will arrange for compensation for your efforts.” He paused significantly. “I trust that you have all seen for yourself how badly the attempted outing turned out and I trust that you will keep in mind your own pain and suffering when you return to your offices to write your articles…”
Jubilee leaned over to Jean. “He’s just letting them go? No mind wipe? But…”
“Shhh,” Jean hissed, pinching her arm. “Wait for it.”
Professor Xavier smiled slightly, Emma coming to stand by his side. “We thank you for coming out this evening and look forward to your articles on the Institute and our current open enrollment for special students. Feel free to include our contact information.”
“What the fuck?” Jubilee hissed loudly, finding herself shoved into the study by Jean and the door shut behind them as the party broke up. “What the fuck was he fucking doing? I did not just sweat blood for him to do that!” She was gesturing wildly, her temper rising fast, making her vision blur in anger.
Jean narrowed her eyes and sent the sofa sliding up behind her friend, forcing the slight girl to sit. “There is no way to catch everything,” she said quietly. “The best we can do is spin. Make reality seem like something else… sort of like those weird pictures at the mall that are supposed to look like dolphins if you squint and cock your head to the side but really just look like a test pattern.” She sighed and pushed a lock of red hair out of her face. “Jubilee, we’re out. Whether we like it or not, people out there know about us and a lot of them hate us. The best we can do now, the best the Professor can do now, is to make it safe. So long as this handful of reporters now think they came out for some sort of open house, we’re safe here, or safer than before. But there will always be someone who wants us dead and dissected.”
Jubilee closed her eyes. “I hate being a mutant today. I want to go back to last week and be a mutant then.” She sighed heavily and opened her eyes again. “I don’t care what you say,” she continued, standing and looking both stricken and angry at once, “there’s always a way to hide.”
Jean stood aside as the Asian girl removed herself from the room. “I wish that were true,” she sighed.

A/N Next up, the return of the prodigal mutants, some smut, and possibly a short epilogue after that.