xp_logs | Keep The Faith: Memory and Realization

The other X-Men begin to realize the gravity of their situation

THEN

"Looks like a nice smooth flight back," Terry told Forge, settling back in her chair after verifying their flight path. In her head, she was already composing the mission report, a fairly short one as it had been an uneventful pick up. Better than the last one, thank God. Terry wasn't going to complain about not having to pull another student out of the middle of a mob scene even if part of her considered this a milk run and really wanted to command something a little less routine.

Her superstitious Irish side would later point at that feeling and mutter darkly.

She unfastened her harness and stood. "I'm going to check on the kid. Be right back," she said right before everything exploded in blackness.

***

NOW

Her head was splitting and when she dared to crack an eyelid, the bright light made her whimper and cringe back into the pillow. Everything seemed to be spinning, even with her eyes closed. What the hell had happened? Trying to come up with anything beyond a vague memory of blue sky and clear instrumentation just made her head hurt worse.

There was someone moving in the room and Terry shifted carefully toward the sound, easing open one eye and taking the resulting stabbing pain. "Hello?" she said, her voice raspy.

"Terry!" Someone rushed over to her side, a hand landing on her arm in a protective, comforting manner. "Don't move. Just lie still."

"Bobby?" Just hearing his voice made her relax even as her thoughts skittered about in utter confusion. Where was she? At the Keep? Why would they take her to the Keep? Had Bobby come back to the mansion? Her head hurt too much for these thoughts. "I...what happened? Where am I?"

The young man bent over her, stroking her hair back from her forehead gently. "You've been in an accident, love. Don't worry - you're going to be fine." Bobby's smile was warm, reassuring.

"We were...in the jet?" She didn't mean to make it a question. The pounding in her head was slowly subsiding and she could actually focus on his face now, her mouth curving in to a smile in response. "And there was...everything went black. I don't remember an explosion. How long have I been here?"

"Not long. Something went wrong on the mission, but we got you here quickly."

"And you flew over? Why'd you come over?" She struggled to sit up, grateful that he was here but knowing that there was something he wasn't telling her. Bobby wouldn't have come back from the Keep for something that wasn't serious. He knew the risks she faced and accepted them. "Bobby, what's really wrong?"

"It's... the rest of the team..." The young man's face struggled to stay neutral, but there was a definite wash of sadness across his features.

Terry sat up with alarm, one thought instantly lodging in her head and on her face, I was leading them. She grabbed at his arms, fingers digging in for support, "What happened, Bobby? Just tell me straight out."

It seemed that despite her plea, Bobby couldn't bring himself to utter the words. "I'm sorry, love, but..." He shook his head, looking away sadly.

Terry stared at him aghast then pushed him away, climbing off the bed to pace restlessly. "But how? The plane... but I'm not..." Hurt. She wasn't hurt at all. Even her headache was subsiding. Her custom tailored black leathers with their kelly green piping didn't have a scuff on them. She whirled back around to face her husband, "I have to talk to Mr. Summers."

"I don't think you can do that." It was now that Terry noticed something amiss about Bobby's tone - it was an almost infinitesimal difference, but she knew better than anyone the nuances of her husband's voice.

Terry gave him a startled look and then started muttering in Irish, her hands fisting her in hair--wrecking its carefully woven braid and that should have been her first clue. Finally she turned and snapped at question out in that same language, not really expecting an answer then switched back to English, livid. "Sure you'd have done a better job if you'd considered how long he's been in Ireland. Bit too much Boston in your voice."

Bobby's eyes flashed yellow, and as he looked calmly at Terry a smirk grew on his face. "The charade is only useful for so long, anyway," Mystique replied. "You would've figured out you weren't at that mansion soon enough, and I have better things to do with my time than let you cry on my shoulder."

"We're just lucky my head hurt too much for me to greet you the way I'd normally have him." Terry was managing to control the anger in her voice but power vibrated the edges of it, her hands going to fists. She took stock of the room she was in, short little glances that never strayed long from the woman in her husband's body. There were several glass balls scattered around the room that puzzled Terry. She wouldn't have expected interior decorating in her prison. "What the hell do you want?"

"Information. Every one of your 'team' is here, and under our control. If you don't tell us what we want to know, they suffer for it." Bobby nodded, his posture relaxed and nonchalant. "And if you're thinking about making noise, you may want to reconsider." He gestured to the globes. "Wouldn't want to risk shattering those and releasing the nerve gas inside."

Well, that explained the suburban house-wife look. Terry modulated her tone, her eyes narrowing as she considered how precisely she could take out Mystique if need be. She had a feeling that she was being severely underestimated. It was almost insulting. "And how will I know that you're not going to make them suffer anyway? I'm not telling you anything, they're all trained for this." God, it sounded so callous but it was true. Every last one of them would say the same. "Get out of my husband's skin. You're a bloody poor twin..."

Terry blinked, "Actually hold on, I need a moment with that mental image."

"Please, spare me." Skin rippling, Mystique resumed her own form, looking slightly less patient now. "There's no point in torturing anybody unless you force us to - so don't. You're their leader, you're supposed to be keeping them safe," she reminded Terry. "Refusing to talk wouldn't be doing a very good job of that, would it?"

"Giving you information wouldn't be doing my job either," Terry responded, though she acknowledged that she was in fact failing her team. "You've offered me no assurance that my cooperation would make them safe, ergo, I've no reason to even consider it." It was easier to defy Mystique when she was in her own form. "You can go now." She leaned back against the wall, folded her arms and mostly closed her eyes, watching Mystique through her lashes.

"Some leader you make," came the derisive response as Mystique made no move to leave. "Perhaps I should have them open the vents so you can hear their screams? Or bring you severed digits? I'm sure they're all distinctive enough for you to tell whose is whose. If you tell us what we want to know, they won't suffer. If you don't, they do. Simple."

That would be useful. If she could hear them, she could find them. Terry was careful not to react. "Or you can try giving me a better deal than offering not to torture them, probably with those creepy fingers of yours crossed behind your back. Because I'm not going to stop telling you no."

"You're not in a position to bargain, here." Mystique stalked nearer, eyes narrowed dangerously. "I will give you one more chance. Tell us the access codes, or your teammates will die knowing you were the cause for their pain and suffering."

"All right, all right." Terry held up her hands, projecting something like resigned fear in her expression, "The access code is," she paused, a flair for drama ingrained in her through generations of Irish men and women. "One. Two. Three. Four. Five."

THEN

The darkness was total, only the sounds of shouting could be heard inside the jet. Yet even still, Forge could feel the plane going into a rapid descent. Gripping the yoke, he blindly pulled back, trusting his senses to tell him when the plane was level. Speed was too high, altitude still dropping - and then the feeling of intense cold and pressure that signaled a tear in the hull, and as he hit the emergency alert systems, something grabbed him and yanked him into a deeper darkness, and he knew no more.

***

NOW

The first thing that Forge was aware of was the humidity. Humid, but not hot. Concrete under his feet - that meant some sort of indoor location.

The second sensation was the pecular lack of 'ping' from his prosthetics' real-time chronometers. That meant one of two things -either he'd been teleported into someplace that couldn't receive a GPS signal, or something even more bizarre had occurred.

His first attempt to stand up was met with resistance from his wrists, and he looked down to see both his hands encased in full-covering restraints, linked to a short chain set into a ring in the floor. He was seated on a folding chair, leaning forward at the waist uncomfortably. A second attempt at testing the durability of the chain immediately revealed the futility of a brute-force attempt at escape.

Gathering his thoughts, Forge exhaled slowly, trying to calm himself. His flight suit had been stripped of every remotely technological device, from his communicator to his multitool to a non-working pocketwatch he'd picked up at a pawnshop. So now he found himself chained in a bare concrete room, with only the light from a bare bulb above him giving any sort of illumination, but no clue as to the time or how long he'd been unconscious.

By the sound of movement behind him, he gathered that he wasn't alone.

"Apologies for the restraints," said a deep, accented voice out of the shadows. "Call it... convention. The others were most insistent that the formalities be observed. Myself, I see no point. There is nothing technological in this room, and besides-" The voice came closer, until its owner was standing beside Forge's chair, a towering figure dressed in black. Joszef Veres was wearing an odd smile as he gazed down at the younger mutant. "I hardly think you will have much luck getting past me."

"Oh, son of a bitch," Forge moaned, lowering his eyes. "Veres. Nimrod. I take it then that I'm a guest of the Brotherhood once more? Where are my friends? Where's Erik? If you've got me alive, that means you want something. Fine. But I want to deal with the organ grinder, not the monkey." Although trying for bravado, a waver in Forge's voice belied his internal terror. Nimrod wasn't kidding when he said Forge wouldn't have much luck with escaping. Veres was easily one of the strongest mutants ever recorded, with physical capabilities on par with the Juggernaut. Forge, no stranger to impartial comparison, knew that he himself reflected the exact opposite end of the spectrum physically.

"You heard me," he repeated, looking up to try and meet Veres' eyes. "I want to talk to Magneto."

The smile was turning downright sardonic. "Yes, I imagine you do. And I want to be somewhere else, perhaps with Magneto, attending to matters of import. Rather than playing at interrogator with you." Veres laid a heavy hand on Forge's shoulder, shaking his head. "Unfortunately, I fear you are stuck with this... monkey, John Henry Forge. But if you provide the remote access codes for Cerebro, I may indeed be able to arrange a conversation with Magneto. He is, after all, most appreciative of cooperation."

"The what?" Forge blurted out before he could catch himself. Of course the Brotherhood was aware of Cerebro - Magneto had helped Xavier design it, Mystique had broken into it once, and from what he'd heard, Magneto had reconfigured a replica of it to try and wipe out all humanity. But part of Cerebro's security was that it was a closed system - there literally was no remote access, the massive computer didn't function without a telepath's mind to drive it.

"Remote access codes. And you think I have them? And what would you do with remote access to Cerebro? Erik knows it doesn't work without a telepath." Forge hoped that keeping Nimrod talking would give away at least something about the situation. Namely the status of his teammates.

"And there are so very many ways one could acquire a telepath." Nimrod straightened, moving around the chair. "Would Jean Grey refuse to operate Cerebro if we had her husband? Dayspring, if we had his daughter? Braddock or Frost, if we found similar leverage? Everyone has their limits, John Henry Forge." Nimrod looked back at him, and the look in his eyes had gone wintry. "And if you truly expect me to believe that the X-Men's technological genius does not have the codes to one of his team's key pieces of equipment, I think you are making a very unfortunate mistake."

"Quid pro quo," Forge replied, placing his feet firmly on the floor to try and stop his muscles from twitching. "If you want something, you're going to have to reciprocate. Tell me where my friends are, or you're getting nothing out of me."

"Why are you so concerned about your teammates?" Nimrod asked curiously. "None of them have asked about you..."

That means they're alive, Forge immediately deduced. "Because they're my teammates," he answered aloud as if it was explanation enough. "You remember what that was like, don't you? You were military, Hungarian special forces, right? You knew what it was like to have to trust the people in uniform next to you with your life. Maybe you've forgotten that, spending time with folks like Toad and Mystique."

He shook his head, looking away. Of course Nimrod was bluffing. They were his team, his friends. None of them would sell him out, especially not to the Brotherhood.

"Oh, I remember my comrades," Nimrod murmured, looking away. There was a strange, distant look on his face for a moment. He seemed to shake it off, whatever it was, and looked back at Forge, a glint of something close to pity in his eyes. "It speaks well of you that you want that, of your teammates," he said, and sounded rather shockingly sincere about it. "But these ones with you, they are not worthy of that trust. I have watched them being questioned."

"You're lying," Forge snapped back, standing up only to find himself yanked back down by the chains around his hands. "You've got nothing, and you know it. It's only a matter of time before the rest of the X-Men come kicking your heads in to get us. You weren't around the last time, in Florida. They brought the whole place down to get me and Polaris out of there. And that was with Erik around. What chance do you think you've got, you crazy son of a bitch?"

"When they come looking for you," Nimrod mused. "Of course, they would. If they had any reason to believe that you were still alive." He tilted his head slightly, regarding Forge steadily. "You do remember being in the air, before you came here? Aloft, in that marvelous stealth jet. Do you remember landing?"

Forge closed his eyes, the memories of a pressure headache setting in. "We were banking over that river valley... when everything went dark I tried to level out. You... you crashed my plane?" This time Forge actually came out of the chair, straining forward at Nimrod, teeth bared in a feral grimace. "They're going to come for us, you schizophrenic idiot! Erik would know that, and he'd tell you to cut your losses and run. You've got nothing and you know it!"

Nimrod stepped towards him as he lunged, one large hand closing almost delicately around Forge's throat. Not squeezing, not even a little. Just emphasizing how easy it would be. "They have wreckage," he said simply. "Plane wreckage, scattered over an impressive area indeed. How long to search that area and find no human remains? And surely, you don't think that we took you somewhere that Xavier could find easily. Magneto has been hiding from his telepathy for a very long time, and he teaches us well."

"Go to hell," Forge squeaked out, fear constricting his throat despite Nimrod's restraint. "They'll come for me."

But the doubt evident in his mind leaked through in his words all the same.