xp_logs | Forge, in Miami - Tuesday at lunchtime

On a particular anniversary, Forge finds himself returning to the scene of the crime to find things have changed in two years.

Forge got off the bus and winced at the Miami humidity. Even in mid-October, the Florida weather was a sharp shock from the cool air of New York. Forge had told Clarice that he'd meet her for lunch in fifteen minutes, figuring that this one stop wouldn't take long. Just a few moments of his time, more symbolic than anything else.

He stopped at an intersection, puzzled as he checked the address on the printout. He was certain he'd written it down correctly. All the other buildings looked familiar - he'd only seen them through windows, of course, but there was the beach and the sub shop with the horribly-painted sign. Behind him should have been a retirement home, although to be more specific, a building claiming to be a "senior living complex" that had really been a base of operations for Magneto and the Brotherhood, where Forge had been an unwilling guest for an extended period of time.

Now instead of the light-pink stucco of the expected retirement home, there stood the familiar brown-and-green glass-fronted facade of a Starbucks' Coffee.

Simultaneously amused and disappointed, Forge shook his head and walked inside. Even at this time of day, the line stretched half a dozen customers to the door, and the lone barista on duty was jumping back and forth trying to fill orders. Idly, Forge peered around. Just past where the espresso machine stood would have been the kitchen where he'd tried to bluff Malice into believing that he was helping the Brotherhood willingly, and beneath in the basement (likely now collapsed in and buried under the new foundation, he figured) he'd spent weeks creating what had been intended to be Magneto's ultimate weapon, the Neutralizer.

He glanced over at a group of older gentlemen on the patio, dealing out cards between them. Their game was rummy, but he remembered nights in a dimly-lit kitchen, sitting across from the world's pre-eminent mutant terrorist learning the finer points of canasta. In those weeks, he'd seen beyond the facade that the media presented of Magneto to the man that was Erik Lehnsherr. A man who believed passionately in his cause, and would take any means necessary to further it - but only a man nonetheless, with habits and quirks and perhaps, Forge still allowed himself to think, the possibility of redemption.

He had trouble reconciling that knowledge of Erik Lehnsherr with the actions of 2006, the near-total destruction of a coastal city by earthquake and tsunami. The fact that once more, Magneto had used a young mutant as a tool to simply further his agenda. Two sides of a coin, Forge thought. How long had it taken to subsume the humanity of Erik under the madness of Magneto? What led a man to walk that road, and did he really want to think too hard on it?

"What can I get you?" the beleaguered young man said from behind the counter, looking up at Forge, who had reached the front of the line.

"Closure," Forge replied automatically. Upon seeing the barista's confused expression, Forge just waved a hand and glanced up at the menu. "You know, I think I'm in the wrong place. There's nothing for me here."

Forge turned to go, hearing the barista murmur something about "crazy rude customers" under his breath as he headed out into the sunlight. A few blocks away, Clarice was probably waiting by the sandwich shop for that Cuban sub he'd promised her for her time in teleporting him down here. A quick lunch, and then he could be hundreds of miles away from this place and those memories.

When he got back to Westchester, Forge decided, it was time to take a look at moving forward.