Powers Swap: The Future Is Canadian
Mar. 21st, 2023 09:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_dominion posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsKane doesn't realize he has Marie-Ange's powers. It becomes an education, and possibly, fatal.
Harry’s was used to Kane coming in early. The Canadian had an almost legendary capacity for drink, the consumption of sports on television, and bar talk. As he came in, Briar starting pouring the first pitcher, just to keep him started.
“You planning on gorging on your usual level of fried crap, Kane?” She always acted antagonistically, but it was all part of a dance.
“In a bit. Just drinks and the spring training game?”
“I’ll put it on in a sec.” She passed over the pitcher of Moosehead and a glass before looking for the remote. Kane settled into his usual spot, spacing things out with the precision of a man with a long time habit. He’d just set himself up when his phone buzzed and he checked it. Artie.
“Right, the extra passports.” Kane had asked the younger man to set him up with a couple of burner identities, just with his work with the Bureau possibly making him conflicted with his X-Men duties.
“Things good?”
“Yeah. I've got everything ready to go. Names, dates, bank accounts. John Turner is more filled out than the other two. That ID will last you a while."
“See, I thought I was the one supposed to be making all the lame Canadian jokes, eh?” Kane said. “I transferred the cash for you to MA. Just let her know how you want it. I’m told that as a law enforcement officer, I likely don’t want to know details on how it gets cleanly to you.”
"Well, I thought Sidney Crosby and Roy Halladay would sound too much like fake names. And thanks - MA will sort it out."
Kane turned off his phone and sat it on the table before taking his first sip. As he set down the pint, his vision suddenly swam in front of him. He leaned over the table for a moment, feeling like his head was suddenly three times heavier than normal and black lights exploded behind his eyes.
***
“From Mozambique to those Memphis nights
The Khyber Pass to Vancouver's lights
Knock me down and back up again”
The music came up, thin and tinny, from the speakers of a cheap car stereo. Idling at the light was a ‘76 Toyota Cressida, puke green, waiting for the red to change. The city around him was train rails, light industrial; concrete and crumbling. It looked like parts of Calgary or Regina, where the local manufacturing had moved out and only the empty shells of the buildings remained. The driver tossed a crumpled coffee cup out the window, vaguely towards an overflowing public trash can, still girt with a thick layer of sooty gray winter snow. The light changed and the car peeled out, accelerating like it was outracing something unseen behind it.
Those teenage hopes who have tears in their eyes
Too scared to own up to one little lie
Dice, tumbling down green felt in a loud, bright room. An orange haired man with a smirk as dangerous as a shark. The final strokes of ink, the rolling of a fake hologram, and sealing of a now perfect fake passport. An automatic pistol, so perfectly fit to the hand like it was an extension of the body which held it.
'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?
Pain. Blood soaking through the leg of a suit to drip on small, square, brown floor tiles. Bloodshot eyes cracking open slowly, looking at the ceiling tiles of a hospital, all with the same institutional appearance to be found in virtually any city on the planet. Not just alone, but abandoned. Left behind and utterly without anyone around him.
Can I touch you to see if you're real?
'Cause in nothing there's something I feel
Will my heart take the strain
Or will it break down again?
He worked quickly, making adjustments to a growing pile of documents; finished, finalizing, organizing. All to a single light affixed to a magnifying lens as he worked in silence. Finally, the pile was finished and carefully packed into a leather valise. He pulled on a coat, picked up the valise and a backpack and walked out. He unlocked the door of a puke green ‘76 Toyota Cressida and tossed the valise and backpack into the front seat before getting in and gunning the engine. He could see the kilometres on kilometres of lonely highway, dead fields under the scum of late winter stretching out ahead for hours and hours. Away.
***
“Ooh, Jubes, hey, just one of the people I was looking for!" Darcy slipped her arm around her teammate's waist with a light squeeze as she came down the stairs, dark sunglasses firmly over her eyes. She ignored the twinge in her head - other people had it worse, if the journals were anything to go by, and she needed to be useful. "Wanna come to Harry's with me for lunch and a pickup for our favorite Team Weird Science? I'm buying." Well, she was buying for her and Jubes. The rest of them were getting food courtesy the mansion's post-mission food budget, and it was pickup from Harry's because the trash pandas wanted The Platter. Since they were dealing with the power mishaps and Meggan’s injury, she couldn't blame them for wanting some deep-fried comfort. "And in return, you'll help me carry the pick-up order back to eXcal."
“Dude, you had me at the words food and Harrys.” Jubilee replied, leaning her head against Darcy’s shoulder in a side hug as she typed out a response to a text from Wanda and then smiled at her teammate. “Am assuming they’ll want their entire platter delivered and not just what I don’t consume?”
"Oh definitely. Have you seen Clint eat? That man packs it away. Matt too, but he's less of a gremlin. I have a short list of sweets too, so we'll swing by the store and grab those too, then order their take-out once we're almost done eating. They can wait an hour, but my stomach can't." The idea of bright lights and outside made her grimace internally, but needs must. Food must. And pick-up sounded less terrible than actively trying to cook.
Normally Harry's was a place she walked to, but not for this sort of takeout order. Still, she and Jubilee were there quickly, and Darcy's stomach grumbled as the smell of fried cheese hit her face. There were stools near the one that Garrison's ass was practically molded to, and the Canadian was there as usual. "Table, or annoy Garrison?" she asked Jubilee. "Because I'm game for either, so long as we get the big basket of fried cheese as a starter."
“Dude, how is that even a question? Of course we annoy Gar, that’s what he’s there for,” Jubilee replied with a large grin before she walked up to the tall Canadian and stood on tiptoes to stick her chin on his shoulder. “Gar, guess what?”
While Jubilee pestered Garrison, Darcy was speaking with Briar, ordering the big basket of fried cheese with a soda for herself, and instructions that whatever the other woman ate would be on her tab today too. "Oh, and we're going to be getting at least two of The Platter to go - you know how our folks are, and some of them really had a workout earlier today. So I told Clint I'd bring it to them while they dealt with a minor issue." She took the seat directly next to Garrison, handing her card over to Briar with a smile. "And well... since we're not letting this one drink in peace, I suppose his next one is on me too."
Jubilee grinned at Briar as she let Garrison go and took the seat on the other side of him. “I’ll take whatever you folks have been cooking up that’s new and a cider.”
"She'll just take the usual jalapeno poppers dipped in disappointment and bad life choices." Kane filled in, taking a sip while he watched the World Baseball Classic. It was odd but he sounded a little tipsy, something the Canadian needed a lot of time and dedication to do.
Darcy raised an eyebrow and leaned in. Garrison wasn't really one of her people, but he was a person of her people, so she was vaguely concerned about him sounding tipsy for once. "How long've you been wearing a groove into your barstool today, dude?" She kept her voice low, and when her basket of fried cheese was dropped in front of her she slid it into his reaching range. "And have you eaten yet?"
"Already a banquet burger in. Did you know it was invented in Richmond Hill? The American version is a bacon cheeseburger but the Banquet? All Canadian." Kane said, eye tracking the pitches on television.
Jubilee took the opportunity to filch a square of the fried cheese and pop it in her mouth with an innocent look at Darcy as she did so.
“You can have some of my poppers,” she noted to Darcy.
Darcy waved her off. "That's why I got the big basket. And I'll take something that reheats decently back with the pickup order. Probably nachos. Or we've got food in the house, whatever."
“I’ll like, try not to take advantage,” Jubilee replied and filched another piece of fried cheese before sitting back down to accept her drink from Briar.
***
“So, you wanna call for the bill? I think I actually managed to fill myself up,” Jubilee noted with a happy burp as she rubbed her tummy. It was a rare occurrence and worthy of note. “We can split it if you want?”
"Nope, your part of the payment is helping me schlep these to-go boxes back to everyone," Darcy said as she handed Briar both her card and the one for eXcalibur's to-go order. Two signatures later, the women and several bags of takeout had left the building, and the signed bills had been left next to Garrison.
Kane passed back the bill as Darcy and Jubilee left. The Platter had turned into something of a sensation once Kyle had tried it and then told virtually everyone at the mansion. Kane was tempted to ask for a commission, he mused, getting up and walking into the Hideaway washroom to recycle some beer. As he closed the stall door, his knees buckled and he barely avoided braining himself on the toilet as he collapsed senseless to the tile floor.
***
“Polka dot door the polka dot door, Let’s peep through the polka dot door
Through the polka dot door This is the time we always say
Get ready get set for imagination day We’ll tell sone tales
We’ll pretend and play so come on in The polka dot way”
Garrison sat on the carpet in front of the living room television, lego forgotten in front of him as he sang along to the theme song as always. What would the games and adventures be today? he wondered, intent in the way only children seemed to be able to manage.
“Today, we thought we’d take a look through the polka dot door to a different kind of door. A door that opens to new places in space and in time, and could take us anywhere and everywhere. Won’t you come with us?” The man on the screen said and Kane nodded happily.
The hole in the door opened and the camera zoomed in on an ancient classical temple, decrepit and underwater-decayed. Pools of water dotted the uneven sections of the mosaic floor, and a deep, wet smell of age permeated the cold air. In the middle of the room, on a dais, sat a carved stone cube, richly engraved with symbols he could recognize. There was something almost living about the cube, as if it was radiating energy. Around the dias were several skeletons, still wearing shreds of ancient finery, lying like they had simply stretched out on the floor around the box, waiting to die.
And then the water rushed in. Black, deep, fast water; rushing and churning and punishing as it engulfed all the senses and pulled them along the torrent. End over end, tumbling and twisting, unable to right or even determine up from down beyond the occasional impact with the side of a rough chasm and spinning out again.
The floor of the chapel was dry; cool stone that appeared at the end of the torrent, completely without seam from the moment before. Men and women stood in front of the portal, looking interested or bored or everything in between. Kurt, Molly, Doug, Darcy, Alex, Quentin, Wanda, Amanda arrayed out in front of Clint, whose mouth moved as he spoke but no sound emerged. And to one side, Namor, holding an ornate trident in front of his body, looking as if he knew something everyone else did not. Behind him, the portal flared, and the blue light rose up and took them all.
***
The frenetic piano overlaid the 70s animation as the opening went past, and opened to an old man sitting on a stool. He leaned over to look at the hand puppets of a ginger haired boy and a grey dog.
“We’re glad to see you all today.” In a voice and tone that left Kane convinced the words were for him and him alone. “Casey and Finnigan especially, aren’t you both?” Both puppets nodded back quickly. “It’s because we have a story for you. A story about a friend who has a problem. Casey, do you know what his problem is?”
“He’s not hurt, is he Mr. Dressup?” The boy puppet said as the dog bobbed around in near panic.
“No, he’s not hurt, Casey. Don’t make everyone worried. He’s just hungry.” Mr Dressup got up and walked over to a brightly coloured trunk. “How about I get some of his clothes from the Tickle Trunk and we’ll tell everyone all about it? He opened the trunk, reached in, and put a pair of ruby quartz glasses over his eyes.
He walked over to the studio kitchen and reached under the counter. He came up with a small plate with a large sandwich. The camera zoomed in on the dish as Mr. Dressup set it down. “Do you know what this is, Casey?”
“It’s a sandwich!” The boy puppet popped up enthusiastically.
“It’s a club sandwich.” He said, and lifted up the top piece of bread. It was, in a word, perfect. There were three slices of thick multigrain bread, perfectly toasted. On it was a thick swipe of mayonnaise. The leaves of lettuce were dark green and full, the tomatoes thick cut and juicy. They sat atop piles of shaved roasted turkey and slices of perfectly fried crispy bacon. The bottom was the same, making it a tall stack of food.
It was the kind of sandwich you dreamed about before lunch or headed out on the weekend to find a bite before the afternoon unfurled ahead of you. You could practically see the ice cold pint of beer that would be set down beside it. The sounds of a game of some type on the televisions overhead. The kind of meal that you just sat and slowly devoured, letting nothing hurry you along. Nothing to worry about or concern yourself with until you are done.
“Oops!” Mr. Dressup said, as he lifted the plate back up and accidentally dropped it. As it smashed into the counter, the image on the television suddenly broke up like the plate. A staccato range of images flashed in its place: a ringing phone, a crashed car, a shattered bulb and a broken pipe. Ordinary simple images but a sense of frustration, delay, and aggravation associated with each image before the channel switched.
***
A puppet of an old man in the outfit of a security guard came onto the television, his gray mustache like a muppet.
“Well, I guess that's all locked up tight now, as it should be! De-de-de-dee-dee-dee... ah, hi there, Jodie!”
“Oh, hi, Sam!” A black woman with an afro waved back at him, hoisting a mannikin from a display.
“Well, everything's all safe down here, let's go upstairs! Need a hand with him, is he too heavy?”
“No, no, I can manage fine, thank you.”
“Well, we're on our way to the children's department once again!”
“Okay, it's clear! The customers have all gone home now!”
A puppet mouse with a blonde hairdo appeared and looked at the mannikin. “Hocus pocus alimagocus!”
The theme played as Garrison put aside his latest lego spaceship creation.
“Today's Special... it's for everyone! Today's Special... come join in the fun!
With magic everywhere, A world for us to share, And friendly faces hoping that you want to meet us there, For Today's Special… It's about to appear... it's about to appear! Today's Special, shout it loud and clear!”
“TODAY'S SPECIAL!”
“So Jodie, what are we going to learn about today?” The man who had been a mannikin moments before, brought to life with the magic words from the mouse, said to the woman who walked back in on the screen.
“Butterflies, Jeff. You see, a butterfly starts life as a caterpillar and then undergoes a metamorphosis which ends its time as a caterpillar and turns it into a butterfly. It’s a little like what happens to us.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Jeff, we live our lives, and then, when our time comes, we make our own kind of metamorphosis into angels. Let me show you.”
The scene shifted as the children’s department store was replaced by a darker, more sinister scene. A darkly lit room full of half-formed men, blood running from their eyes and hands, chanting in unison. The sound of thunder, the crash of steel and the crack of stone as violence turns the room into a chaotic charnel house, filled with more blood and screams and impossible to track as, overlaid on the scene, bright fireworks pop from various points of the chaos.
And then nothing. Sanity not just restored, but made inexorable. Quiet hallway conversations in hushed voices only made outside of hospital rooms and funeral parlors replaced by frenetic and fruitless action. A butcher’s bill in magical contacts, multiple realities and the best medical specialists money could buy. The possibility of a devil’s deal too close to contemplate and yet, a tempting possibility.
In the middle of it all, too small and wasted under white sheets, Jubilee. Skin tight and gaunt against her face, wasted as if consumed from inside. No more than the flickers of her eyelids to indicate life before the white sheets began to suffuse red, slowly growing around her as if they were purposefully pulling the last of her life blood from her as the clocks ticked loud and constant, slicing the last moments of her life into precise seconds.
***
“And we're on our way to the castle, I'll hurry over first and go to the back door so I can let the drawbridge down and open the big front doors for you. Are you ready? Here's my castle.” The seemingly giant man with a kindly smile and graying hair appeared. He was the Friendly Giant and young Garrison waved to his television at him.
“Here we are inside, here's one little chair for one of you, and a bigger chair for two more to curl up in, and someone who likes to rock, a rocking chair in the middle. Now, look up, wa-a-a-a-a-ay up, and I'll call Rusty... Rusty? Guess what I did today?”
“What did you do?” The Rooster puppet popped out from the sack hung by the window.
“I went to the cemetery today. Let me tell you all about it. You see, there was a woman there…”
She was dressed in mourner’s black, a long veil covering her face and the dull black dress trailing behind her as she walked between the headstones. Every so often, she reached out and caressed a stone, giving the sense that it was one of ‘hers’ in some inexplicable way. As she walked, behind her, ravens launched themselves into the sky, their cries filling up the air over the graves as they fought for altitude. The woman reached down and picked up a basket of lilies, turning back the way she came.
She placed one on a tombstone. An old man, face twisted in grief, rent his shirt. She placed one on a tombstone. A hospital monitor shifted from a reedy threaded pulse to a flat line. She placed one on a tombstone. A gunshot pierced the night, bringing a different breed of darkness with it. She placed one on a tombstone. A crisp white sheet was pulled over the face of a body in a hospital bed. She placed one on a tombstone and a terrible woman with midnight hair smiled with a mouthful of sharpened teeth as the ravens circled her in attendance.
“Quite a day, Rusty. It's late. This little chair will be waiting for one of you, and a rocking chair for another who likes to rock, and a big armchair for two more to curl up in when you come again to our castle. I'll close the big front doors and pull up the drawbridge after you're gone. Goodbye. Goodbye.”
***
Kane fumbled his phone out. He was… drunk? Was he? He’d had next to nothing compared to his usual but his eyes were floating. His phone had buzzed a bunch of times but it had seemed less important than the game. Bo had a double. That was fun. He dropped it twice before getting it open.
[From the broken coffee table, torn panty hose and crushed eggs I am guessing I got ‘blessed’ with your abilities. Oh… and the fact that I cut myself on some broken glass and it healed within the hour!]
[Any suggestions on how I can keep my suite or the rest of the mansion in one piece till this somehow passes?!?!?]
He tried to open his phone to respond, but after the fourth failed attempt as his password, he put it away again. He was just getting up to order a coke at the bar, feeling the booze hitting. But instead, he force walked past and bulled into the washroom, to throw up in the same toilet stall he’d momentarily passed out in a few hours ago.
***
A jail cell held an older man, as he quietly watched British troops bringing in a man dressed as a Quebequis patriot, screaming about liberty. He held his voice, just watching as they marched him past and returned to the paper he was writing.
“I’m a patriot, but I’m against this armed insurrection. We must reply to bureaucrats who stifle us. We can thrive through education, political economy, and industry—not armed rebellious acts. Our two races can live side by side without one enslaving the other.”
Instead, it was the inner court of the Hellfire Club, draped in the finery of the White Court, arrayed in seats facing each other. There were no words, just the flickering of eyes that was a tell for telepathic discussion about a threat. In the centre was Hope, her fingers moving in time with the eyes, obviously directing the meeting with an outward confidence.
“What is it, Mrs. Gold?”
“Aaah… burnt toast! Dr. Penfield, I can smell burnt toast!”
An FOH flag burned on the screen. Behind it, the sounds of chanting, anti-mutant slogans coming loud and well rehearsed. Certain politicians, known for their anti-mutant views waved for the camera. Told horror stories of mutants who horribly tortured and murdered humans, even though most of them had been debunked. To their audience it didn’t matter. To their supporters, it reinforced what they already believed. Mutants were the other. They were the enemy. And there was only one way to deal with an enemy, even if you had to couch it behind words that could be made an excuse as moderate, limited positions.
“Does your majesty really agree that your Governor General, the Queen’s own viceroy in Canada, should be overruled by the elected members?”
“Yes, Lord Melbourne, we assure you we do agree.”
“You mean to say that Victoria of Great Britain would give up her royal power to some obscure politician from Montreal, or Toronto?”
“Lord Melbourne, Mr. LaFontaine and Mr. Baldwin are trying to bring harmony to the colony with this… what do they call it, Lord Melbourne?”
“Responsible Government, Ma’am.”
In the end, it was told in the media. Papers covered a disgraced Senator forced to resign after calls for genocide surface and his organization crumbles around him. A ‘concerned mothers’ group is outed as a hate group front. At the centre of the crumbling web, the wolves work to devour the FOH, even as it calls for unity. On the other side, in that same sumptuous inner chamber clothed in white, the White Queen reaches into a velvet bag and withdraws a white bishop piece cast from pure platinum and holds it out before her.
“Ay, George. Today, civil war grips America. How long before they look to our borders again? Separated, the colonies are isolated and weak. But united, just imagine! To the east, the Atlantic provinces, then upper and lower Canada, across the prairies to the Rockies and beyond. A new country made one by a railway from sea to sea. Gentlemen, the time for union is now. I ask you to take the dare.”
A PART OF OUR HERITAGE
***
“Angie?” Amanda looked up from her laptop, where she was very carefully scrolling through the journals. She’d already crushed one mouse and was focussing hard on not making that two. “Has anyone talked to you about having your powers yet?”
Marie-Ange was fussing with a pumice stone and her elbow - the skin turned in towards her hands in grotesque fashion. If she was going to have easy access to places she could not usually do skincare on, she was going to take advantage, and her cousin had been so very helpful. "Not yet, no. I have been watching as people check in, but no one yet. Most of X-Force has checked in, Jubilee and Doug have picked up a hotel suite to house the strays."
“What about Gar? You haven’t heard from him?”
"No." Marie-Ange's voice went flat. "No, and…' She dropped the stone, and the little tub of skin cream, and snagged her phone, awkwardly wrapping her fingers around it before untangling them and tapping out messages with one dainty but over-long pinkie finger. "Texting medical to see if he is downstairs." She paused. "And sending Angelo to see if his car is in the garage, since he and I are texting already."
The return texts came back quickly. "Not in medical, and his car is parked here."
“Oh bollocks.” Amanda’s hand tightened unconsciously on the mouse and there was a sudden “CRACK” as the plastic splintered. “You know where he’ll be.”
Marie-Ange started to get up, even while she was typing out more texts. She shoved her feet into a pair of slippers, and grabbed a hoodie off the laundry basket. "His phone GPS says he is Harry's. No response to my text." She shuffled towards the door, already making a call to the pub, and hanging up after a brief conversation. "They have not seen him in the last fifteen minutes, but Briar says there is nothing strange happening. No stray images at least." She grabbed Amanda's phone on the way to the door, and tucked it into the pocket of the hoodie.
"You run ahead, you are faster now. I will get a medical kit and meet up with you."
***
Kane was hammered. Not in a way he was used to. The Canadian had been drunk many times, but he was having problems navigating himself. Briar had said something as he left, but the road back to Xavier’s was one he’d followed so many times that he assumed he’d be fine. The snow crunched underfoot as he walked through the forest and ended up out by the stream that fed the lake. He started over the bridge but a vision hit him so hard his knees buckled and he collapsed, grabbing at his head.
***
Kane recognized the K-Rock Centre in Kingston instantly. But not from any junior hockey game. No, this was a crowd from wall to wall, every seat filled, even the Prime Minister of Canada in attendance. Every set of eyes glued to the stage as Paul Langlois began to play, and the rest of the band followed him. And then, he appeared. Grey hat, silver pants, and a retro JAWS t-shirt. You couldn’t have summed him up better if you tried. But Kane hadn’t been at the show. Like most Canadians, he’d been glued to the live feed, understanding that this was both a concert and a goodbye from Gord. He raised the microphone to his lips and sang.
“Bourbon blues on the street, loose and complete, Under skies all smoky blue green I can't forsake a dixie dead shake-”
Behind him, on a massive video screen, a video played. But it wasn’t the video for the song, which Kane had memorized as a kid. It was a swamp, rain beating down in thunderous waves as figures moved in the gloom, struggling against the weather. As he watched, the swamp turned black and threatening, darker and more ominous.
“Me debunk an American myth? And take my life in my hands? Where the great plains begin At the hundredth meridian”
A maple came down, leaves a vibrant autumn red as the trunk cracked and brought it down into the ground with a crash. As it lay there, as if in a time lapse, the leaves curled, blackened and rotted away on the ground.
“Want to be a nobody without peer, Want to be a thought that's never done, Want to shake your faith in human nature, Want to break the hearts of everyone”
Boston. The Mansion. The Ocean. New York City. Berlin. Toronto. The sounds of grief, sharp and keen. Erik the Red’s helmet, but instead of being worn, cracked and broken. A folded flag. A black band. And the white smile on the face of a dark woman as the hole was filled in with fresh dirt.
“Hope I'm a fast healer, fast as hell, Heaven is a better place today, Because of this, but the world is just not the same”
Kane staggered for a moment, finding a chair under him and sitting down as the entire stadium sang along with Gord Downie. Urging him on, helping him find the words when he struggled. The sickness hadn’t taken his energy or his passion yet. He wielded the mic like a weapon, keeping back the darkness, pausing the future for a little bubble that would only last a few hours. Dueling with fate and for an entirely too short but also impossible time, winning.
“Tell me how life's made you bad Kick me when I choke and I smoulder When I'm not what you had”
Amanda looked out from the screen, a skinny teen with badly dyed black hair. She was naked from the waist up, looking over her shoulder as the camera zoomed into the scars on her back. It pulled back to a shitty crumbling room, an equally scrawny male teen, with a shock of black hair falling over his face, mumbling to himself as a red glow flickered on and off between his hands.
“I'm just a shade shy of true wickedness I'm a shade shy of truly loving it, yeah There are other things I'd rather be doing”
A dozen sitcom fathers rolled across the screen before it jerked, swiftly, to a blow landing. And another. A fist full of rings lashed down and out of camera before coming back up. Another flicker of red energy dying and the fist returning again and again and again. Until the fist changed, became younger, tattooed instead of beringed, but just as violent. A thin scream as Marie-Ange fought against a thumb jammed into her eye.
“Stare in the morning shroud and then the day began I tilted your cloud, you tilted my hand Rain falls in real time and rain fell through the night No dress rehearsal, this is our life”
Red energy lanced through the darkness, underscored by flames. The flames rose and rose, consuming all the darkness as the energy disappeared. In a staccato burst of images, a life passed on the screen - brute and cold and violent but also in pain and sad and broken scenes tumbling across behind Gord as the entire stadium sang along with him.
“Beautiful and disaffected It was perfect till He came along and wrecked it”
Kane could recognize Amanda without recognizing her. And Sarah, but how she’d been. And LeBeau. Marie-Ange with both eyes. And a man he didn’t know, but he could recognize the magic movements of his hands. He and Amanda faced each other, his energy bright and golden while hers was dark.
“I want you to enchant my days Onward, daily, forward, away. So what's today's answer then?”
A shoot emerged from a seed, the same kind of time lapse he’d seen in dozens of nature films at school. Three women standing over a grave; Marie-Ange, Amanda and an elderly Black woman he’d never seen. A brief glow around Amanda’s hands as they spoke in words he couldn’t identify.
The two women beside him were singing while openly weeping. Most faces in the crowds had the same journey; elation, tears, admiration, and remembrance. The struggle was on Gord’s face but not in his voice. There was only determination there. This was a battle and he’d come prepared. A last stand that he was ready to make.
“Where the wild are strong, And the strong are the darkest ones, And you're the darkest one”
A beautiful dark haired woman filled the screen, one he thought he might have recognized before her hair changed to blonde. She smiled with two mouths, looking at him with four eyes, and when she waved her hand in an easy gesture, ten fingers made complex gestures as magic trailed along behind them.
“I thought you should know, it's no worse Her blood is still clear and sanguineous”
Death. The grim reaper replaced by a skull-faced man in a high black top hat and a fine suit, swinging his ebony cane. The hair flickered between black and blonde on the woman, as she sat in the centre of a spider web, waiting for attendance by her men.
“She used to like lavender pant suits And long black velvet gloves Smiles cross crowded rooms”
And suddenly it was him, in front of her. Talking, yelling. Her amused and dismissive. His red serge flashed on and off of him, in a richly appointed hall. Her court. Why did Court suddenly come into his head?
”One afternoon four thousand men died in the water here And five hundred more were thrashing madly As parasites might in your blood”
Dark water rose up in a flood. The surge rolled over the city. New Orleans. Battered by hurricanes and plundered by outsiders, now, the forces it fought against forever were looking to choke them off forever. Men and women fought the flow but were carried away by the force of the dark water.
“-But I would say you've been told, You work me against my friends and you'll get, You'll get left out in the cold”
Her beautiful face looked up and suddenly showed fury; defiance; and finally, fear. Like a woman facing death she railed, mouth open and screaming soundlessly into the camera. For all her beauty, her court melted away around her, unless the scene faded into black.
Gord stepped to the front of the stage. Like the rest of the stadium, he was fighting tears. This was the last fight. The final performance. The last American exit. He’d come out with courage and grace, too. And he’d won. Kane watched, transfixed or stupified, he couldn’t quite tell.
“Riding on horseback and keeping order restored Till the men they couldn't hang Stepped to the mic and sang”
A hand fought free from the dirt. A new bud unfurled into the familiar shape of a new maple leaf. And he saw his own hands carefully buttoning up the front of his red serge. Securing the Sam Browne belt. Placing his Stetson carefully on his head. Gord’s song came to an end, the entire stadium was captivated and lost between adulation and grief. He looked out, caught Kane’s eye and tipped his cap.
***
Kane threw up everything he’d had. His head was breaking as he staggered on the bridge. Without his powers, he toppled over the edge of the bridge into the water below. The cold water swallowed him up and he wasn’t able to catch his breath. The depths swallowed him up and as he grasped for the surface his vision went black.
There was a white flash.
And nothing.
Harry’s was used to Kane coming in early. The Canadian had an almost legendary capacity for drink, the consumption of sports on television, and bar talk. As he came in, Briar starting pouring the first pitcher, just to keep him started.
“You planning on gorging on your usual level of fried crap, Kane?” She always acted antagonistically, but it was all part of a dance.
“In a bit. Just drinks and the spring training game?”
“I’ll put it on in a sec.” She passed over the pitcher of Moosehead and a glass before looking for the remote. Kane settled into his usual spot, spacing things out with the precision of a man with a long time habit. He’d just set himself up when his phone buzzed and he checked it. Artie.
“Right, the extra passports.” Kane had asked the younger man to set him up with a couple of burner identities, just with his work with the Bureau possibly making him conflicted with his X-Men duties.
“Things good?”
“Yeah. I've got everything ready to go. Names, dates, bank accounts. John Turner is more filled out than the other two. That ID will last you a while."
“See, I thought I was the one supposed to be making all the lame Canadian jokes, eh?” Kane said. “I transferred the cash for you to MA. Just let her know how you want it. I’m told that as a law enforcement officer, I likely don’t want to know details on how it gets cleanly to you.”
"Well, I thought Sidney Crosby and Roy Halladay would sound too much like fake names. And thanks - MA will sort it out."
Kane turned off his phone and sat it on the table before taking his first sip. As he set down the pint, his vision suddenly swam in front of him. He leaned over the table for a moment, feeling like his head was suddenly three times heavier than normal and black lights exploded behind his eyes.
***
“From Mozambique to those Memphis nights
The Khyber Pass to Vancouver's lights
Knock me down and back up again”
The music came up, thin and tinny, from the speakers of a cheap car stereo. Idling at the light was a ‘76 Toyota Cressida, puke green, waiting for the red to change. The city around him was train rails, light industrial; concrete and crumbling. It looked like parts of Calgary or Regina, where the local manufacturing had moved out and only the empty shells of the buildings remained. The driver tossed a crumpled coffee cup out the window, vaguely towards an overflowing public trash can, still girt with a thick layer of sooty gray winter snow. The light changed and the car peeled out, accelerating like it was outracing something unseen behind it.
Those teenage hopes who have tears in their eyes
Too scared to own up to one little lie
Dice, tumbling down green felt in a loud, bright room. An orange haired man with a smirk as dangerous as a shark. The final strokes of ink, the rolling of a fake hologram, and sealing of a now perfect fake passport. An automatic pistol, so perfectly fit to the hand like it was an extension of the body which held it.
'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?
Pain. Blood soaking through the leg of a suit to drip on small, square, brown floor tiles. Bloodshot eyes cracking open slowly, looking at the ceiling tiles of a hospital, all with the same institutional appearance to be found in virtually any city on the planet. Not just alone, but abandoned. Left behind and utterly without anyone around him.
Can I touch you to see if you're real?
'Cause in nothing there's something I feel
Will my heart take the strain
Or will it break down again?
He worked quickly, making adjustments to a growing pile of documents; finished, finalizing, organizing. All to a single light affixed to a magnifying lens as he worked in silence. Finally, the pile was finished and carefully packed into a leather valise. He pulled on a coat, picked up the valise and a backpack and walked out. He unlocked the door of a puke green ‘76 Toyota Cressida and tossed the valise and backpack into the front seat before getting in and gunning the engine. He could see the kilometres on kilometres of lonely highway, dead fields under the scum of late winter stretching out ahead for hours and hours. Away.
***
“Ooh, Jubes, hey, just one of the people I was looking for!" Darcy slipped her arm around her teammate's waist with a light squeeze as she came down the stairs, dark sunglasses firmly over her eyes. She ignored the twinge in her head - other people had it worse, if the journals were anything to go by, and she needed to be useful. "Wanna come to Harry's with me for lunch and a pickup for our favorite Team Weird Science? I'm buying." Well, she was buying for her and Jubes. The rest of them were getting food courtesy the mansion's post-mission food budget, and it was pickup from Harry's because the trash pandas wanted The Platter. Since they were dealing with the power mishaps and Meggan’s injury, she couldn't blame them for wanting some deep-fried comfort. "And in return, you'll help me carry the pick-up order back to eXcal."
“Dude, you had me at the words food and Harrys.” Jubilee replied, leaning her head against Darcy’s shoulder in a side hug as she typed out a response to a text from Wanda and then smiled at her teammate. “Am assuming they’ll want their entire platter delivered and not just what I don’t consume?”
"Oh definitely. Have you seen Clint eat? That man packs it away. Matt too, but he's less of a gremlin. I have a short list of sweets too, so we'll swing by the store and grab those too, then order their take-out once we're almost done eating. They can wait an hour, but my stomach can't." The idea of bright lights and outside made her grimace internally, but needs must. Food must. And pick-up sounded less terrible than actively trying to cook.
Normally Harry's was a place she walked to, but not for this sort of takeout order. Still, she and Jubilee were there quickly, and Darcy's stomach grumbled as the smell of fried cheese hit her face. There were stools near the one that Garrison's ass was practically molded to, and the Canadian was there as usual. "Table, or annoy Garrison?" she asked Jubilee. "Because I'm game for either, so long as we get the big basket of fried cheese as a starter."
“Dude, how is that even a question? Of course we annoy Gar, that’s what he’s there for,” Jubilee replied with a large grin before she walked up to the tall Canadian and stood on tiptoes to stick her chin on his shoulder. “Gar, guess what?”
While Jubilee pestered Garrison, Darcy was speaking with Briar, ordering the big basket of fried cheese with a soda for herself, and instructions that whatever the other woman ate would be on her tab today too. "Oh, and we're going to be getting at least two of The Platter to go - you know how our folks are, and some of them really had a workout earlier today. So I told Clint I'd bring it to them while they dealt with a minor issue." She took the seat directly next to Garrison, handing her card over to Briar with a smile. "And well... since we're not letting this one drink in peace, I suppose his next one is on me too."
Jubilee grinned at Briar as she let Garrison go and took the seat on the other side of him. “I’ll take whatever you folks have been cooking up that’s new and a cider.”
"She'll just take the usual jalapeno poppers dipped in disappointment and bad life choices." Kane filled in, taking a sip while he watched the World Baseball Classic. It was odd but he sounded a little tipsy, something the Canadian needed a lot of time and dedication to do.
Darcy raised an eyebrow and leaned in. Garrison wasn't really one of her people, but he was a person of her people, so she was vaguely concerned about him sounding tipsy for once. "How long've you been wearing a groove into your barstool today, dude?" She kept her voice low, and when her basket of fried cheese was dropped in front of her she slid it into his reaching range. "And have you eaten yet?"
"Already a banquet burger in. Did you know it was invented in Richmond Hill? The American version is a bacon cheeseburger but the Banquet? All Canadian." Kane said, eye tracking the pitches on television.
Jubilee took the opportunity to filch a square of the fried cheese and pop it in her mouth with an innocent look at Darcy as she did so.
“You can have some of my poppers,” she noted to Darcy.
Darcy waved her off. "That's why I got the big basket. And I'll take something that reheats decently back with the pickup order. Probably nachos. Or we've got food in the house, whatever."
“I’ll like, try not to take advantage,” Jubilee replied and filched another piece of fried cheese before sitting back down to accept her drink from Briar.
***
“So, you wanna call for the bill? I think I actually managed to fill myself up,” Jubilee noted with a happy burp as she rubbed her tummy. It was a rare occurrence and worthy of note. “We can split it if you want?”
"Nope, your part of the payment is helping me schlep these to-go boxes back to everyone," Darcy said as she handed Briar both her card and the one for eXcalibur's to-go order. Two signatures later, the women and several bags of takeout had left the building, and the signed bills had been left next to Garrison.
Kane passed back the bill as Darcy and Jubilee left. The Platter had turned into something of a sensation once Kyle had tried it and then told virtually everyone at the mansion. Kane was tempted to ask for a commission, he mused, getting up and walking into the Hideaway washroom to recycle some beer. As he closed the stall door, his knees buckled and he barely avoided braining himself on the toilet as he collapsed senseless to the tile floor.
***
“Polka dot door the polka dot door, Let’s peep through the polka dot door
Through the polka dot door This is the time we always say
Get ready get set for imagination day We’ll tell sone tales
We’ll pretend and play so come on in The polka dot way”
Garrison sat on the carpet in front of the living room television, lego forgotten in front of him as he sang along to the theme song as always. What would the games and adventures be today? he wondered, intent in the way only children seemed to be able to manage.
“Today, we thought we’d take a look through the polka dot door to a different kind of door. A door that opens to new places in space and in time, and could take us anywhere and everywhere. Won’t you come with us?” The man on the screen said and Kane nodded happily.
The hole in the door opened and the camera zoomed in on an ancient classical temple, decrepit and underwater-decayed. Pools of water dotted the uneven sections of the mosaic floor, and a deep, wet smell of age permeated the cold air. In the middle of the room, on a dais, sat a carved stone cube, richly engraved with symbols he could recognize. There was something almost living about the cube, as if it was radiating energy. Around the dias were several skeletons, still wearing shreds of ancient finery, lying like they had simply stretched out on the floor around the box, waiting to die.
And then the water rushed in. Black, deep, fast water; rushing and churning and punishing as it engulfed all the senses and pulled them along the torrent. End over end, tumbling and twisting, unable to right or even determine up from down beyond the occasional impact with the side of a rough chasm and spinning out again.
The floor of the chapel was dry; cool stone that appeared at the end of the torrent, completely without seam from the moment before. Men and women stood in front of the portal, looking interested or bored or everything in between. Kurt, Molly, Doug, Darcy, Alex, Quentin, Wanda, Amanda arrayed out in front of Clint, whose mouth moved as he spoke but no sound emerged. And to one side, Namor, holding an ornate trident in front of his body, looking as if he knew something everyone else did not. Behind him, the portal flared, and the blue light rose up and took them all.
***
The frenetic piano overlaid the 70s animation as the opening went past, and opened to an old man sitting on a stool. He leaned over to look at the hand puppets of a ginger haired boy and a grey dog.
“We’re glad to see you all today.” In a voice and tone that left Kane convinced the words were for him and him alone. “Casey and Finnigan especially, aren’t you both?” Both puppets nodded back quickly. “It’s because we have a story for you. A story about a friend who has a problem. Casey, do you know what his problem is?”
“He’s not hurt, is he Mr. Dressup?” The boy puppet said as the dog bobbed around in near panic.
“No, he’s not hurt, Casey. Don’t make everyone worried. He’s just hungry.” Mr Dressup got up and walked over to a brightly coloured trunk. “How about I get some of his clothes from the Tickle Trunk and we’ll tell everyone all about it? He opened the trunk, reached in, and put a pair of ruby quartz glasses over his eyes.
He walked over to the studio kitchen and reached under the counter. He came up with a small plate with a large sandwich. The camera zoomed in on the dish as Mr. Dressup set it down. “Do you know what this is, Casey?”
“It’s a sandwich!” The boy puppet popped up enthusiastically.
“It’s a club sandwich.” He said, and lifted up the top piece of bread. It was, in a word, perfect. There were three slices of thick multigrain bread, perfectly toasted. On it was a thick swipe of mayonnaise. The leaves of lettuce were dark green and full, the tomatoes thick cut and juicy. They sat atop piles of shaved roasted turkey and slices of perfectly fried crispy bacon. The bottom was the same, making it a tall stack of food.
It was the kind of sandwich you dreamed about before lunch or headed out on the weekend to find a bite before the afternoon unfurled ahead of you. You could practically see the ice cold pint of beer that would be set down beside it. The sounds of a game of some type on the televisions overhead. The kind of meal that you just sat and slowly devoured, letting nothing hurry you along. Nothing to worry about or concern yourself with until you are done.
“Oops!” Mr. Dressup said, as he lifted the plate back up and accidentally dropped it. As it smashed into the counter, the image on the television suddenly broke up like the plate. A staccato range of images flashed in its place: a ringing phone, a crashed car, a shattered bulb and a broken pipe. Ordinary simple images but a sense of frustration, delay, and aggravation associated with each image before the channel switched.
***
A puppet of an old man in the outfit of a security guard came onto the television, his gray mustache like a muppet.
“Well, I guess that's all locked up tight now, as it should be! De-de-de-dee-dee-dee... ah, hi there, Jodie!”
“Oh, hi, Sam!” A black woman with an afro waved back at him, hoisting a mannikin from a display.
“Well, everything's all safe down here, let's go upstairs! Need a hand with him, is he too heavy?”
“No, no, I can manage fine, thank you.”
“Well, we're on our way to the children's department once again!”
“Okay, it's clear! The customers have all gone home now!”
A puppet mouse with a blonde hairdo appeared and looked at the mannikin. “Hocus pocus alimagocus!”
The theme played as Garrison put aside his latest lego spaceship creation.
“Today's Special... it's for everyone! Today's Special... come join in the fun!
With magic everywhere, A world for us to share, And friendly faces hoping that you want to meet us there, For Today's Special… It's about to appear... it's about to appear! Today's Special, shout it loud and clear!”
“TODAY'S SPECIAL!”
“So Jodie, what are we going to learn about today?” The man who had been a mannikin moments before, brought to life with the magic words from the mouse, said to the woman who walked back in on the screen.
“Butterflies, Jeff. You see, a butterfly starts life as a caterpillar and then undergoes a metamorphosis which ends its time as a caterpillar and turns it into a butterfly. It’s a little like what happens to us.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Jeff, we live our lives, and then, when our time comes, we make our own kind of metamorphosis into angels. Let me show you.”
The scene shifted as the children’s department store was replaced by a darker, more sinister scene. A darkly lit room full of half-formed men, blood running from their eyes and hands, chanting in unison. The sound of thunder, the crash of steel and the crack of stone as violence turns the room into a chaotic charnel house, filled with more blood and screams and impossible to track as, overlaid on the scene, bright fireworks pop from various points of the chaos.
And then nothing. Sanity not just restored, but made inexorable. Quiet hallway conversations in hushed voices only made outside of hospital rooms and funeral parlors replaced by frenetic and fruitless action. A butcher’s bill in magical contacts, multiple realities and the best medical specialists money could buy. The possibility of a devil’s deal too close to contemplate and yet, a tempting possibility.
In the middle of it all, too small and wasted under white sheets, Jubilee. Skin tight and gaunt against her face, wasted as if consumed from inside. No more than the flickers of her eyelids to indicate life before the white sheets began to suffuse red, slowly growing around her as if they were purposefully pulling the last of her life blood from her as the clocks ticked loud and constant, slicing the last moments of her life into precise seconds.
***
“And we're on our way to the castle, I'll hurry over first and go to the back door so I can let the drawbridge down and open the big front doors for you. Are you ready? Here's my castle.” The seemingly giant man with a kindly smile and graying hair appeared. He was the Friendly Giant and young Garrison waved to his television at him.
“Here we are inside, here's one little chair for one of you, and a bigger chair for two more to curl up in, and someone who likes to rock, a rocking chair in the middle. Now, look up, wa-a-a-a-a-ay up, and I'll call Rusty... Rusty? Guess what I did today?”
“What did you do?” The Rooster puppet popped out from the sack hung by the window.
“I went to the cemetery today. Let me tell you all about it. You see, there was a woman there…”
She was dressed in mourner’s black, a long veil covering her face and the dull black dress trailing behind her as she walked between the headstones. Every so often, she reached out and caressed a stone, giving the sense that it was one of ‘hers’ in some inexplicable way. As she walked, behind her, ravens launched themselves into the sky, their cries filling up the air over the graves as they fought for altitude. The woman reached down and picked up a basket of lilies, turning back the way she came.
She placed one on a tombstone. An old man, face twisted in grief, rent his shirt. She placed one on a tombstone. A hospital monitor shifted from a reedy threaded pulse to a flat line. She placed one on a tombstone. A gunshot pierced the night, bringing a different breed of darkness with it. She placed one on a tombstone. A crisp white sheet was pulled over the face of a body in a hospital bed. She placed one on a tombstone and a terrible woman with midnight hair smiled with a mouthful of sharpened teeth as the ravens circled her in attendance.
“Quite a day, Rusty. It's late. This little chair will be waiting for one of you, and a rocking chair for another who likes to rock, and a big armchair for two more to curl up in when you come again to our castle. I'll close the big front doors and pull up the drawbridge after you're gone. Goodbye. Goodbye.”
***
Kane fumbled his phone out. He was… drunk? Was he? He’d had next to nothing compared to his usual but his eyes were floating. His phone had buzzed a bunch of times but it had seemed less important than the game. Bo had a double. That was fun. He dropped it twice before getting it open.
[From the broken coffee table, torn panty hose and crushed eggs I am guessing I got ‘blessed’ with your abilities. Oh… and the fact that I cut myself on some broken glass and it healed within the hour!]
[Any suggestions on how I can keep my suite or the rest of the mansion in one piece till this somehow passes?!?!?]
He tried to open his phone to respond, but after the fourth failed attempt as his password, he put it away again. He was just getting up to order a coke at the bar, feeling the booze hitting. But instead, he force walked past and bulled into the washroom, to throw up in the same toilet stall he’d momentarily passed out in a few hours ago.
***
A jail cell held an older man, as he quietly watched British troops bringing in a man dressed as a Quebequis patriot, screaming about liberty. He held his voice, just watching as they marched him past and returned to the paper he was writing.
“I’m a patriot, but I’m against this armed insurrection. We must reply to bureaucrats who stifle us. We can thrive through education, political economy, and industry—not armed rebellious acts. Our two races can live side by side without one enslaving the other.”
Instead, it was the inner court of the Hellfire Club, draped in the finery of the White Court, arrayed in seats facing each other. There were no words, just the flickering of eyes that was a tell for telepathic discussion about a threat. In the centre was Hope, her fingers moving in time with the eyes, obviously directing the meeting with an outward confidence.
“What is it, Mrs. Gold?”
“Aaah… burnt toast! Dr. Penfield, I can smell burnt toast!”
An FOH flag burned on the screen. Behind it, the sounds of chanting, anti-mutant slogans coming loud and well rehearsed. Certain politicians, known for their anti-mutant views waved for the camera. Told horror stories of mutants who horribly tortured and murdered humans, even though most of them had been debunked. To their audience it didn’t matter. To their supporters, it reinforced what they already believed. Mutants were the other. They were the enemy. And there was only one way to deal with an enemy, even if you had to couch it behind words that could be made an excuse as moderate, limited positions.
“Does your majesty really agree that your Governor General, the Queen’s own viceroy in Canada, should be overruled by the elected members?”
“Yes, Lord Melbourne, we assure you we do agree.”
“You mean to say that Victoria of Great Britain would give up her royal power to some obscure politician from Montreal, or Toronto?”
“Lord Melbourne, Mr. LaFontaine and Mr. Baldwin are trying to bring harmony to the colony with this… what do they call it, Lord Melbourne?”
“Responsible Government, Ma’am.”
In the end, it was told in the media. Papers covered a disgraced Senator forced to resign after calls for genocide surface and his organization crumbles around him. A ‘concerned mothers’ group is outed as a hate group front. At the centre of the crumbling web, the wolves work to devour the FOH, even as it calls for unity. On the other side, in that same sumptuous inner chamber clothed in white, the White Queen reaches into a velvet bag and withdraws a white bishop piece cast from pure platinum and holds it out before her.
“Ay, George. Today, civil war grips America. How long before they look to our borders again? Separated, the colonies are isolated and weak. But united, just imagine! To the east, the Atlantic provinces, then upper and lower Canada, across the prairies to the Rockies and beyond. A new country made one by a railway from sea to sea. Gentlemen, the time for union is now. I ask you to take the dare.”
A PART OF OUR HERITAGE
***
“Angie?” Amanda looked up from her laptop, where she was very carefully scrolling through the journals. She’d already crushed one mouse and was focussing hard on not making that two. “Has anyone talked to you about having your powers yet?”
Marie-Ange was fussing with a pumice stone and her elbow - the skin turned in towards her hands in grotesque fashion. If she was going to have easy access to places she could not usually do skincare on, she was going to take advantage, and her cousin had been so very helpful. "Not yet, no. I have been watching as people check in, but no one yet. Most of X-Force has checked in, Jubilee and Doug have picked up a hotel suite to house the strays."
“What about Gar? You haven’t heard from him?”
"No." Marie-Ange's voice went flat. "No, and…' She dropped the stone, and the little tub of skin cream, and snagged her phone, awkwardly wrapping her fingers around it before untangling them and tapping out messages with one dainty but over-long pinkie finger. "Texting medical to see if he is downstairs." She paused. "And sending Angelo to see if his car is in the garage, since he and I are texting already."
The return texts came back quickly. "Not in medical, and his car is parked here."
“Oh bollocks.” Amanda’s hand tightened unconsciously on the mouse and there was a sudden “CRACK” as the plastic splintered. “You know where he’ll be.”
Marie-Ange started to get up, even while she was typing out more texts. She shoved her feet into a pair of slippers, and grabbed a hoodie off the laundry basket. "His phone GPS says he is Harry's. No response to my text." She shuffled towards the door, already making a call to the pub, and hanging up after a brief conversation. "They have not seen him in the last fifteen minutes, but Briar says there is nothing strange happening. No stray images at least." She grabbed Amanda's phone on the way to the door, and tucked it into the pocket of the hoodie.
"You run ahead, you are faster now. I will get a medical kit and meet up with you."
***
Kane was hammered. Not in a way he was used to. The Canadian had been drunk many times, but he was having problems navigating himself. Briar had said something as he left, but the road back to Xavier’s was one he’d followed so many times that he assumed he’d be fine. The snow crunched underfoot as he walked through the forest and ended up out by the stream that fed the lake. He started over the bridge but a vision hit him so hard his knees buckled and he collapsed, grabbing at his head.
***
Kane recognized the K-Rock Centre in Kingston instantly. But not from any junior hockey game. No, this was a crowd from wall to wall, every seat filled, even the Prime Minister of Canada in attendance. Every set of eyes glued to the stage as Paul Langlois began to play, and the rest of the band followed him. And then, he appeared. Grey hat, silver pants, and a retro JAWS t-shirt. You couldn’t have summed him up better if you tried. But Kane hadn’t been at the show. Like most Canadians, he’d been glued to the live feed, understanding that this was both a concert and a goodbye from Gord. He raised the microphone to his lips and sang.
“Bourbon blues on the street, loose and complete, Under skies all smoky blue green I can't forsake a dixie dead shake-”
Behind him, on a massive video screen, a video played. But it wasn’t the video for the song, which Kane had memorized as a kid. It was a swamp, rain beating down in thunderous waves as figures moved in the gloom, struggling against the weather. As he watched, the swamp turned black and threatening, darker and more ominous.
“Me debunk an American myth? And take my life in my hands? Where the great plains begin At the hundredth meridian”
A maple came down, leaves a vibrant autumn red as the trunk cracked and brought it down into the ground with a crash. As it lay there, as if in a time lapse, the leaves curled, blackened and rotted away on the ground.
“Want to be a nobody without peer, Want to be a thought that's never done, Want to shake your faith in human nature, Want to break the hearts of everyone”
Boston. The Mansion. The Ocean. New York City. Berlin. Toronto. The sounds of grief, sharp and keen. Erik the Red’s helmet, but instead of being worn, cracked and broken. A folded flag. A black band. And the white smile on the face of a dark woman as the hole was filled in with fresh dirt.
“Hope I'm a fast healer, fast as hell, Heaven is a better place today, Because of this, but the world is just not the same”
Kane staggered for a moment, finding a chair under him and sitting down as the entire stadium sang along with Gord Downie. Urging him on, helping him find the words when he struggled. The sickness hadn’t taken his energy or his passion yet. He wielded the mic like a weapon, keeping back the darkness, pausing the future for a little bubble that would only last a few hours. Dueling with fate and for an entirely too short but also impossible time, winning.
“Tell me how life's made you bad Kick me when I choke and I smoulder When I'm not what you had”
Amanda looked out from the screen, a skinny teen with badly dyed black hair. She was naked from the waist up, looking over her shoulder as the camera zoomed into the scars on her back. It pulled back to a shitty crumbling room, an equally scrawny male teen, with a shock of black hair falling over his face, mumbling to himself as a red glow flickered on and off between his hands.
“I'm just a shade shy of true wickedness I'm a shade shy of truly loving it, yeah There are other things I'd rather be doing”
A dozen sitcom fathers rolled across the screen before it jerked, swiftly, to a blow landing. And another. A fist full of rings lashed down and out of camera before coming back up. Another flicker of red energy dying and the fist returning again and again and again. Until the fist changed, became younger, tattooed instead of beringed, but just as violent. A thin scream as Marie-Ange fought against a thumb jammed into her eye.
“Stare in the morning shroud and then the day began I tilted your cloud, you tilted my hand Rain falls in real time and rain fell through the night No dress rehearsal, this is our life”
Red energy lanced through the darkness, underscored by flames. The flames rose and rose, consuming all the darkness as the energy disappeared. In a staccato burst of images, a life passed on the screen - brute and cold and violent but also in pain and sad and broken scenes tumbling across behind Gord as the entire stadium sang along with him.
“Beautiful and disaffected It was perfect till He came along and wrecked it”
Kane could recognize Amanda without recognizing her. And Sarah, but how she’d been. And LeBeau. Marie-Ange with both eyes. And a man he didn’t know, but he could recognize the magic movements of his hands. He and Amanda faced each other, his energy bright and golden while hers was dark.
“I want you to enchant my days Onward, daily, forward, away. So what's today's answer then?”
A shoot emerged from a seed, the same kind of time lapse he’d seen in dozens of nature films at school. Three women standing over a grave; Marie-Ange, Amanda and an elderly Black woman he’d never seen. A brief glow around Amanda’s hands as they spoke in words he couldn’t identify.
The two women beside him were singing while openly weeping. Most faces in the crowds had the same journey; elation, tears, admiration, and remembrance. The struggle was on Gord’s face but not in his voice. There was only determination there. This was a battle and he’d come prepared. A last stand that he was ready to make.
“Where the wild are strong, And the strong are the darkest ones, And you're the darkest one”
A beautiful dark haired woman filled the screen, one he thought he might have recognized before her hair changed to blonde. She smiled with two mouths, looking at him with four eyes, and when she waved her hand in an easy gesture, ten fingers made complex gestures as magic trailed along behind them.
“I thought you should know, it's no worse Her blood is still clear and sanguineous”
Death. The grim reaper replaced by a skull-faced man in a high black top hat and a fine suit, swinging his ebony cane. The hair flickered between black and blonde on the woman, as she sat in the centre of a spider web, waiting for attendance by her men.
“She used to like lavender pant suits And long black velvet gloves Smiles cross crowded rooms”
And suddenly it was him, in front of her. Talking, yelling. Her amused and dismissive. His red serge flashed on and off of him, in a richly appointed hall. Her court. Why did Court suddenly come into his head?
”One afternoon four thousand men died in the water here And five hundred more were thrashing madly As parasites might in your blood”
Dark water rose up in a flood. The surge rolled over the city. New Orleans. Battered by hurricanes and plundered by outsiders, now, the forces it fought against forever were looking to choke them off forever. Men and women fought the flow but were carried away by the force of the dark water.
“-But I would say you've been told, You work me against my friends and you'll get, You'll get left out in the cold”
Her beautiful face looked up and suddenly showed fury; defiance; and finally, fear. Like a woman facing death she railed, mouth open and screaming soundlessly into the camera. For all her beauty, her court melted away around her, unless the scene faded into black.
Gord stepped to the front of the stage. Like the rest of the stadium, he was fighting tears. This was the last fight. The final performance. The last American exit. He’d come out with courage and grace, too. And he’d won. Kane watched, transfixed or stupified, he couldn’t quite tell.
“Riding on horseback and keeping order restored Till the men they couldn't hang Stepped to the mic and sang”
A hand fought free from the dirt. A new bud unfurled into the familiar shape of a new maple leaf. And he saw his own hands carefully buttoning up the front of his red serge. Securing the Sam Browne belt. Placing his Stetson carefully on his head. Gord’s song came to an end, the entire stadium was captivated and lost between adulation and grief. He looked out, caught Kane’s eye and tipped his cap.
***
Kane threw up everything he’d had. His head was breaking as he staggered on the bridge. Without his powers, he toppled over the edge of the bridge into the water below. The cold water swallowed him up and he wasn’t able to catch his breath. The depths swallowed him up and as he grasped for the surface his vision went black.
There was a white flash.
And nothing.
