Chicago is Burning: Conclusions

[xp_madin]

Safely away from Ben's grandma's burning house, they regroup. Ben is offered a place to stay - Chicago isn't a viable option. Madin, who had tagged along until now reluctantly asks to come along too.


"Everyone okay?" Sooraya flicked a bit of ash from her coat as she quickly scanned each member of the group, her eyes resting on Ben and his grandmother the longest. "You're looking pretty done in..." Accepting a backpack from one of the others in the group, she dug out an energy bar, offering it silently to the teen.

"Yeah..." Match's eyes flicked around the group of people the woman had led them to, brows furrowing though he was too tired to glower. On cue, his stomach growled, and, with a mumbled thanks, he took the offered food. "Ya guys just show up to find mutant kids in need, or just ones that start fires?"

“Kids in need”, Angelo assured him immediately. “We were looking for you before this, your grandma asked us to.”

"Mutant kids in need," Quentin amended, glaring at Angelo for omitting the keyword. "We can find a new place for you to stay, too. This city probably isn't safe anymore. Fuck, this state may not be."

Jackie let out a snort. "This ain't my first rodeo, kid. I've got contacts that'll keep me safe until they find the next unfortunate to target. But Ben..." she put her hand on her grandson's shoulder, giving it a squeeze. "You're right, the city's not going to be safe for him, and he needs training in what he can do." She didn't have to crouch to look Ben in the eye anymore, and wasn't that a wonder? It was like she blinked, and the child he'd been was the young adult he was becoming. Still, she looked him firmly in the eye as she talked. "I love you, and that hasn't changed just because you have these powers. But you do need to train them, and you won't be the first or last young person I've directed to them. For training or for a safe stop until they can get out of the country."

She turned to the rest of the group. "I'll probably need to get a new phone, and Ben will definitely need one. Still, leave me with a good phone number and e-mail to contact you with, and promise me you'll take care of my boy. I'll be in touch as soon as I can be, because I'm not letting him lose contact with me again. Not if I can help it."

"We'll leave all of our contact info," Alex assured her. "And we can get Ben set up with a new phone basically the minute we get back to New York." He looked at Ben, tilting his head slightly. "If that's what you want?"

Ben's face fell, mouth opening as he tried frantically to come up with something that would let him stay with his grandma, or bring her with, or get them sent somewhere together. He'd only just gotten her back, and now that it was obvious he wouldn't be returning to the others, it wasn't fair that they had to leave each other. Instead of whining like he wanted to, he nodded sullenly. "Yeah, sounds good."

Madin shuffled their feet, kicking at a clump of dead grass sticking out of the snow. "I... Look, can I at least get a ride? This was um. The cops are going to fucking murder me if I'm still here in a few hours." The cops, the Brotherhood. This was going to be on the news. People were going to find out. "I know you did your thing --" Madin mimed energy coming out of their head at Quentin "-- but this was visible, you know?"

"We can set you up, too," Quentin offered, waving his hand as if it were nothing. Like relocating people across the country and giving them a new life was just a day job. "But we might want to avoid flying back in case either of you got put on the no-fly list. How long's the train to New York? Or just get whatsherface to pick us up."

"Blink?" Angelo nodded. "Yeah, she might be the best bet. She can get here and get us there before anybody starts putting your faces on the news."

"Already on it." Sooraya held up her phone. "I'll also get in touch with Cypher or one of the other computer folks and see what they can do to contain the news and the identities of everyone involved. Footage sometimes has a habit of getting corrupted unfortunately, especially once things went digital..." She stepped a little to the side to start making her calls. "We probably need to get our own stuff together though."

"Split up, then. Sooraya handles phone calls, Q handles setting up transport," Alex looked at Madin. "Do you have anything you need to pick up? One of us can drive you back around to get it before we leave. Anything else we need to worry about?"

Madin kicked at the grass again. How far away was Texas? Could you drive there? Pay someone to get you over the border? Or even drive to Mexico? "Yeah, I need to get my stuff. But Jesus fuck, I. I get trusting Q but seriously, I don't even fucking know the rest of you. Why should I trust you instead of - of going to Miami or something?”

Quentin did not look up as he composed a text message to Clarice. "Look, you know me. Sort of. I vouch for them. Well, at least for Alex, but he'd vouch for Qadir and Espinosa, so by the transitive property . . ." He shrugged. "You can come with us for a time or we can get you to where you want to go, whatever. So if you want to go to fucking Miami—which, why the fuck there?—then you got it."

"If you're gonna go to Florida, at least do Orlando," Alex said. "I get it, you don't know us, you don't trust us. Nothing I say is going to earn your trust in five minutes. But if you're willing to take a chance, we can give you a roof over your head and a chance to breathe without constantly looking over your shoulder, if you want."

"Yeah, sure." Madin nodded. It wasn't like staying here was going to be an option. "Sure. I'll come. I just need to get my shit together, okay?"