Backdated: Matt and Rachel

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Matt wasn't sure entirely what to make of Rachel's text messages to him about his shirt on New Years. Nothing had happened! Well, they had kissed, but most people did that on New Years, he didn't think she was madly in love with him or whatever. Especially not after those texts. She'd ended up crashing in his room drunk and he had slept on the couch, which kinda reminded him of his childhood actually. Regardless, it wasn't all that awkward, at least not to him. Apparently, Rachel felt differently.

That all said, he had been tutoring her for her GED test in the spring and as far as he knew that hadn't changed. Therefore, he sat waiting for her in one of the study areas since the library was still under construction from being attacked. Flipping his watch face up, he checked the time again, wondering if she was going to show.

She entered, about seven minutes late, expression deliberately blank as she finally slid into her seat across from him, thumping her thick textbook onto the table. “Sorry I’m late. Got held up.” Which was a flat out lie, of course, considering that she had spent those seven minutes rolling about on her bed and tossing her phone in the air, contemplating the session altogether.

But that was too cowardly, even for her. And she really needed to take her GEDs this year.

"Traffic in the halls can be brutal this time of night," he agreed, knowing any number of things could have held her up, including simply not wanting to show. Matt wasn't going to call her out, "You do your reading and look at the questions at the end of the chapter?" he asked. She was doing well in her studies over all, awkward New Years aside. He wasn't going to mention it if she didn't, at least not yet.

“Yes,” she said. Then beckpedalled. “Looked at them without actually doing them, that is.” Because she’d been distracted, obviously.

"Did you actually read them and think about them?" It would have been better if she had done them, but Matt wasn't exactly a teacher assigning grades. "Let's go over them then and discuss it."

She tried, she really did. But Rachel could not focus with the thoughts churning in her head. And it wasn’t like when they were at war and such sentimentalities could be pushed aside in favour of more life-threatening issues at hand. Where there were more important things to deal with. Where people as individuals weren’t as important than the goals of each side.

So she was distracted, and a pretty cruddy student even by her own lousy standards. Which was why halfway through the lesson, Rachel threw down her pen on her notepad and let out a gusty sigh.

“I’m sorry, I can’t concentrate.”

And never in her life had she felt like the teenager that she was. She’d always been the straightforward sort. Put things out there, deal with the problems and move the fuck on with life.

Because needs must.

But needs must wasn’t a pressing factor here. And everyone that cared about her here had made it a point to make sure that it wasn’t a pressing factor in her life anymore. It was making her weak and… well, like a useless sissy. That thought made her uncomfortable.

“And I’m sorry. For being a bitch to you on New Year’s.”

Matt shrugged, "It's forgotten," he replied, "Anyways, you're not the first drunk I've handled over the years. So long as it was worth it," he'd had plenty of fun while still staying sober. He did not drink, it was too easy to fall into that trap. "But...thanks. You want to talk about it?"

“No,” she sighed, slouching across the table with her cheek propped up against her palm, left hand idly tracing random patterns on the paper. “Not really. But I guess I kinda owe you an explanation. At least for why I freaked out on you for… no reason. Regardless of what you might say,” she added hastily when it looked like he may disagree out of the goodness of his heart or something. “You’re a friend. I don’t promise the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but it’s better than letting stuff stew between us, right?”

Protesting that she didn't owe him was exactly what Matt had been prepared to do. That said, he was curious. "Alright," he agreed. "Good thing this isn't a court of law," and he wasn't a judge. "What happened?"

“Well, how much do you know about my past and why I’m here?”

She hadn’t told him anything, but news went around the mansion pretty fast as far as she could tell.

"I've heard things..." Matt had no idea what was true and what wasn't though, "I hear a lot. Not everything's the truth though," yay enhanced senses. "I tend not to pay attention unless it's important."

Rachel’s mouth twisted into a sardonic smile, picking up her pen to start doodling for real. “I guess they didn’t tell ye kidlets who aren’t officially part of the X-Men. But you should know enough to piece the overall picture together by now. Or at least enough to know that I’m not building up a tall tale here.

“My parents are Nate and Moira. Which means that I’m their little baby girl who got pulverized when pretty much everyone here got kidnapped to Genosha.”

Matt didn't bother to point out that he was a X-Men trainee. "You're older. And unpulverized," he remarked, trying not to shudder involuntarily at the mention of Genosha. Those were not good memories, even now. "How'd you manage that?"


“*I* didn’t manage shit. But there was this jackass by the name of Nathaniel Essex who brought my consciousness down the Spiral and into this sick, made up fantasy world of his,” she said, verdant eyes flashing dangerously as she dug her pen into the paper mid-doodle, mind recalling images of her betrayer with frightening ease. Rachel called on her training to regulate her breathing before her powers could escape her, and for the most part looked outwardly calm after the first few moments.

“In this fantasy, Apocalypse had succeeded in his attack against humanity, and mutants and humans alike were dwindling in numbers. I was part of the resistance… In the thick of things. My parents had died and Essex was my mentor in most things – a dear uncle, for all intents. It was like…” Like he had deliberately been setting Rachel up for the greatest betrayal of all time.

Her voice wavered, but did not crack. And she focused intently on Matt’s features so that she would not sink completely into the abyss of her memories. Some things were still too raw for her to be unaffected by. So she wasn’t too keen to go into the details.

“Long story short, big git needed my powers to bring his son back. So he had me grow up in another plane to find his son’s consciousness for him. He sent me back with an elaborate story, letting me believe that this was an alternate universe where Apocalypse hadn’t succeeded in his nefarious plans. So I manifested as an adult in physical form here. Unpulverised. Ta-dah.”

Rachel might've looked outwardly normal, but that wasn't what Matt could see with his powers. He could hear the hitch in her voice, the intentional and deliberate change in her breathing as she became emotional and then controlled herself, he could hear her respiration. Reaching out silently, he took her hand, lending her his support. "I've read of Essex," Matt finally offered. He was in the X-Men records, "he sounds like a psychopath. Glad you're not pulverized...." what was he supposed to say to that. It was clear that Rachel didn't want to offer details about things and who could blame her?

"So, when you got drunk on New Years? It brought back those memories?" Matt asked, making sure he understood it all in the context they were discussing. He wanted to know more about this Age of Apocalypse thing, but he kept quiet. It clearly bothered her.

"Those memories are never very far from my mind,"Rachel admitted, squeezing his hand with a quiet sigh. She was glad for his comfort, though it didn't do much for the persistent ache in her chest. It was easier speaking to someone who didn't have a vested interest in her from before Genosha. "Those memories were my whole life starting from when I was 6. It's not something I can suddenly not think about. Not right now. But. It's also because...

"Just before my first trip here, we conducted a last ditch attempt at dealing with Apocalypse. I say 'we', but Remy forbade me to go because I had to lead the retreat in the event that they failed." Rachel laughed, a quiet, damning knell. Head bowed, she stared at her history textbook, willing the words to remain in focus. "They failed so spectacularly, Kurt and I had to watch them publicly execute the poor fools on TV. Not just Rems died. But Korvus as well."

A stabbing pain in the heart forced another deep inhale. She hadn't put voice to these particular thoughts to anyone before. "Matt. Matt, I loved Korvus. Loved him with everything I had. I never would've survived the war without him. Not without going crazy. But now I don't even have that left of him because it wasn't real. And David can say what he likes about only needing me to believe for it to have been real. At the end of the day, it just... it wasn't real. Because a relationship is a two person thing.

"So when I kissed you, I felt like I had betrayed my Korvus. And even if he hadn't been real, I had betrayed myself because clearly if I was there kissing you a few months after he'd died, then my love for him wasn't real either, right?"

She withdrew her hand from his grasp and waved away what he was about to say before carding her fingers roughly through her hair. Rachel wasn't crying yet, but it wasn't from a lack of desire to.

"I know it's stupid. And whatever. It's fucked up and I reacted without thinking. I'm sorry for lashing out at you when it really wasn't your fault. Or a big deal, I suppose."

That explained a lot and Matt had no idea here. He had nothing to draw on really and while it sucked that yeah, she was drunk and clearly not into him, this was one hell of a good explanation. Not even an excuse, but a really, really good reason. "You were drunk," Matt replied with a shrug, "and you're supposed to kiss on New Years. You wanted someone to want you or like you or whatever because you don't have the one you love. 'Cause I'm guessing that not only is this Korvus dating someone else, he's not really the same as the one you knew," thought she knew? Whatever. Semantics. "Doesn't mean your feelings aren't valid and stuff. I've been to enough counseling to know that. I don't think you betrayed your Korvus though. It was a kiss, that's all. I ain't gonna replace him magically."

She withdrew her hand from his grasp before carding her fingers roughly through her hair. Rachel wasn't crying yet, but it wasn't from a lack of desire to.

The tension right now was thick enough to cut with a knife. "I'm your friend," Matt reiterated softly, "if you want to talk or whatever, then I'll listen. If you want...I dunno. Something else, just tell me. But I'm still your friend, that isn't changing, okay?" Studying was definitely over, not that they'd gotten very far.

She blinked at him, as though realising something for the first time. But then a corner of her lips quirked up in a small, wonky kinda smile as Rachel reached out over the corner of the table and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. It was a heartfelt kinda hug for words she couldn't quite express, except for a quiet: "Thanks, Matt."