xp_logs | Haller, Hope, & Arthur | Collective Misfortune

Arthur, stable due to Warren’s blood donation, is moved up from the Medlab to his own suite to recover. Haller and Terry have temporarily relocated to aid in his recovery.

***

Arthur, Haller, and Felix receive a visit from Hope Abbott. She has brought a gift.

"Just call me if you need anything," said Jim. "Felix, come here. Three's a crowd."

The two of them had actually made it out of the medlab. Finally. Arthur had been ushered up to his (temporarily) empty suite earlier, after receiving good marks on the actually starting to heal. Thank someone for Warren’s magical juices.

Hope Abbott had shown up soon after. Jim still wasn’t giving Arthur a phone, though.

Obediently, the elder golden stopped his snuffling at the visitor's hand to follow the telepath from Arthur's room. His wagging tail brushed her as he left, leaving a few fine golden hairs on her immaculate skirt.

Casually brushing her skirt, Hope settled on the edge of the couch, a small smile on her face as she unobtrusively looked over Arthur. The bruising visible was at least clearly fading, though his arm was still in a splint. "I am relieved to see you are out of the Medlab. I hope the doctors are satisfied with your recovery?"

The other man sat much less comfortably, propped up on the couch by strategically placed pillows. Still, he was breathing in a controlled, practiced manner and seemed delighted to just be there.

"Hope, tell me, have you ever been hurt like this?" It was an honest question, and delivered by the other man with genuine curiosity.

"I have been laid up a few times, but I am not sure if it was as severe as this." Hope admitted, tilting her head curiously. "There was the Red X rescue I nearly drowned at and the Archduke was not very happy when they learned I had managed to contact Professor Xavier. How so?"

"Doctors, med staff. They never leave you alone. Is it always like this?"

"I think that is quite a common experience, yes. Quite boring, to be honest, outside the usual pains and aches." Hope stated very simple. "And it being hard to sleep because they keep coming in for check ups."

"Huh." A look of contemplation crossed Arthur's face as he stopped to do the mental math. A man who had always been lucky. "I just figured David was punking me. I may need to apologize to Dr. Voght."

"Mr. Haller was... punking... you? In what way?" Hope raised an eyebrow as her eyes narrowed. "I have to admit I am having a hard time picturing Mr. Haller punking anyone."

Arthur gave her a hard look. His eyes went to the door, and he called as loudly as could manage, "MISTER Haller?" The last part devolved into a cough as he found himself quickly out of breath. Still, he was snickering under the action like this was the best joke in the world when the affection came from Hope’s mouth. "I know you’re always overly polite, but . . . "

He stopped himself. That was Friday’s Arthur.

"Hope," the blonde man composed himself, "How can I help you? I'm only good for like twenty minutes at a time right now before the world starts to spin, and I would never want to waste your time."

"I simply came here to check upon you and see how you were doing. Is that so hard to believe?" Hope's eyes twinkled, just a little. "But if you are starting to feel unwell, I will come back to check upon you later," was her dry non-reply.

Arthur's face blanked in a stricken expression. "No! I... I'm not myself. Things have gotten a lot better since Warren helped me out. Almost normal? Seems like I'm still a little short, though, and I'm sorry."

That word again. He was getting good at it. Practice.

"I was told you helped get me to safety."

"I simply showed Ms. Summers the correct way and sent a few people to assist her. She is the one who did all the hard work," Hope quickly demurred. "Like I did for many others."

"Still. Thank you," was delivered in a small voice. Arthur couldn't hold eye contact, and his look drifted to settle on any other point in the room that wasn't this conversation. "She wasn't supposed to be there for what happened. Not from . . ."

"Unfortunately that is something that seems to come with growing up at the mansion as a teen." Hope stated, not without compassion. "She did well though. That actually reminds me . . . I was checking out one of the battle sites and I found something that belongs to you." Leaning down, she pulled a small package wrapped in brown paper from her tote and handed it to Arthur.

Arthur took the package without thinking, but his eyes had already widened as soon as it was in hand. The weight was too familiar. The heft, perfect?

“No.”

It was too late to pull back. He . . . saw.

Arthur's left eye sparked violently to life and washed his face in a pale glow. This wasn't the usual, friendly starburst of his abilities. It was sharp. Dangerous. The bundle of throwing knives cluttered to the floor as he grabbed his head with trembling hands, and the very air seemed to tense as his luck tugged on the fibers of the world and pushed.

Unseen pressures began to build.

Tech companies will assure you that there’s a zero chance their bluetooth devices will explode. A non-zero chance they’ll overheat and catch fire.

That didn’t stop the mild crackling sound that preceded a noise like a shot exploded in Hope's ear.

"Ouch... what the hell?!?!?" Hope's hand shot up, tearing her phone earpiece from her ear and throwing it away immediately. "Arthur?"

Jim looked up from where he'd been scrolling his phone at the kitchen island, blinking.

"Hope? Is everything okay?"

The glare the man on the couch gave her didn't belong to Arthur at all. His accent shifted toward a posh Australian drawl. "Stop it. I don't want to remember. Quelqu'un . . . aidez-moi."

On the floor, the discarded earpiece continued to swell and overheated right next to the papered package. It exploded in almost a merry “pop!”, bringing up a small pillar of smoke. The smell of burnt plastic filled the air.

"Uhm, not quite. We have a fire starting and Arthurs just begged for help in French. And I know for a fact th . . . " Suddenly, at the same time, Hope's world went dark and lit up at the same. Yes, everything became black, but Arthur's aura blazed to the front. Excrement brown disgust, terror yellow and the deepest blue of sadness swam closest to Arthur's skin, almost getting choked down by strangely muted orange, threaded with red.

Hope almost froze . . . those colors were scarily familiar.

The fire continued to escalate joyfully. The paper had been an excellent kindling, and now the area rug was fair game. There was a slight creaking as the very floor began to warp under the weight of the building lucksnap, and the hardwood began to bow in around the couch. Arthur simply sat in the middle of all, muttering to himself: "S'il vous plaît . . . arrêtez . . ."

It was the lamp next to the couch that next decided to join the party, and it began flickering from on to off in a crackling series of warnings before its lightbulb exploded.

The muted orange started to pulse, the red cracks sparkling, almost blinding Hope. "Death . . ." She hissed out in a low voice.

"Fuck!" It wasn't Jim who responded, but Cyndi. She dove to the kitchen sink and wrenched open the tap. The stream of water emerged only to flow snake-like in the direction of the fire — unsuccessfully. The paltry supply from the sink wasn't enough for how fast the fire was spreading. Still maintaining her concentration on the water, the telekinetic wrenched open the cabinet beneath the sink, grabbing for her natural enemy: the emergency fire extinguisher.

"Get back," she said, shouldering Hope out of the way and engaging the extinguisher.

"Ouch." Sharp pain suddenly blazed in her shoulder, followed by equally sharp fire blazing across her vision as the crazy aura sight vanished and Mr. Haller's tall body came into focus as he wielded a fire extinguisher. "What in the blazes was that?!? Is that?!?"

The fire alarms were ringing now, and the chaos continued to swirl in a vortex around Arthur. Yet despite all of the flame and confusion, a yellow-coated figure blurred past the two humans attempting to contain the situation. Felix.

The golden retriever fearlessly leapt across the flames to hand right next to his master. A wet nose was promptly nuzzled against Arthur's shielded face, and emergency kisses were deployed.

The effect? Immediate.

Soothed by his longtime friend, the sparking glow lessened. The fire immediately dimmed, and the creaking stopped. The building pressure that Cyndi hadn't realized would soon crack the nozzle of the fire extinguisher she held was snuffed out. The laws of regular probability seem to reconsider their return. Arthur, however, still sobbed.

Jim lowered the extinguisher, wiping the sweat from his face with the back of one arm. Characteristically, Cyndi had left as soon as things were no longer on fire.

"Arthur, are you okay?" he asked, and instantly realized the stupidity of the question. No man sobbing into a dog was 'okay'. Jim winced. "Look, just . . . hold on. I'm going to call the Medlab."

Hope groaned, pulling herself up from the ground as she gingerly rotated her shoulder. "This is not what I expected when I handed him those blades. I will call the Medlab if you check on him and the damage a little more?" For now she rather keep a little more distance . . .

The telepath, finally noticing she was on the ground, grimaced and moved to offer her his hand. "I'm not sure it's a good idea to get close to him right now," he admitted. "His powers have been gone for a few days, and I'm guessing this is them coming back. He — " he stopped, then frowned at her. "Sorry, did you say you gave him something?"

"Yes, I returned some of his knives I found at one of the battle sites . . . " Hope dropped her head once she realized what had happened. "Oh hell, it set off his psychometry, didn't it? The aura looked really similar to when we did our experiment. Wait . . . " Her head shot up, eyes widening: "How did I . . . ?"

The frown deepened. "Aura?"

"Yes!" Hope replied, eyes still wide. "After the earbud my vision went dark, but suddenly his aura was visible, just like when I am ghost out. I have never been able to do that..." She glanced over to Arthur. "We should first call and arrange for help . . . before we talk about this."

"Um, right." Jim retrieved his phone from where he'd dropped it in the kitchen and dialed medical. To his relief, it was Jean who picked up. After a few minutes he ended the call and slipped the phone back in his pocket.

"Since he's stable they're going to discuss what to do about the luck snaps first," he explained, glancing back at Arthur. He seemed to have quieted now; Felix was now laying across his lap like a weighted blanket. Jim lowered his voice. "And it's not a bad idea to give Arthur time to calm down, either. Stress makes it worse. Now . . . back up. Tell me exactly what happened."

"Right." Gently stretching her shoulder again, Hope carefully organized her thoughts as if to make a report for her work at XFI. "We were chatting a little and I offered the package with the knives. He started to unwrap it and suddenly he froze, his eye sparking. He dropped the knives and suddenly my earbud made a very loud sound, as well as heating up. I removed it and tossed it away. Only a moment later my vision went black and Arthur's aura flared up."

"Without ghosting out first?" Jim's forehead creased. "I wonder if it was the pain, or some kind of cross-reaction with his psychometry. He's been — " Jim stopped himself, realizing he didn't know how much Arthur had shared about his condition with his teammates. He wound things back to what he knew was general information.

"His psychometry has been sensitive lately," continued the telepath. "And it's being complicated by the concussion. On top of that, he read something during the fight with Death. I'm not really sure what, but he seems to keep dipping in and out of it. Jean and I have been talking, but we're not sure how to handle it — there's a combination of psychic and organic factors at play, and until the latter is resolved it's potentially dangerous to start messing with the former."

"His aura . . ." Hope quietly admitted. "It was like Death's aura was choking Arthur's. I recognized it from the fight . . . it was very distinctive."

Jim went still for a moment.

"He does tend to experience the emotions associated with his readings," the telepath said slowly. Hope could see it happening, he thought. It would make sense that her ability to perceive emotional states would be able to detect artificial alterations in them as well. He wondered if her ability to see it without leaving her body was an evolution of her power or a consequence of Arthur projecting his own memories, as he'd been doing lately. It was difficult to say, but one conclusion did seem obvious.

"He must have been exposed to something from Death during the fight. That . . . oh." Another puzzle piece fell into place. Jim raised his hands to rub at his temples, stomach dropping. "Damn it, Arthur."

"What is it?" Hope's voice held an undertone of steel. "There is something more going on here."

"He intentionally put himself in harm's way," Jim said, bitterly. "I mean, he told me so, but I wasn't sure what made him do it. It must have been whatever he read on the battlefield. It was the only way he saw forward."

"It had to be a choice. There was a man inside of that thing, and he was trapped."

"Wait . . ." Glancing over at Arthur, Hope carefully lowered her voice as her eyebrows almost met in a frown. "Are you trying to imply Arthur knew what would happen in some way?"

"I think he suspected. Or suspected it could happen under the right circumstances." Jim rubbed the back of his head uncomfortably. "After Radha healed me, he offered to read to me so we might be able to get a better idea of what happened. Instead of a memory he saw two potential paths: immediate action versus delay. Nothing concrete about what event would provoke the choice, just a vague projection about the consequences. At the time I thought it was related to something I might do in the field if I deployed. When you guys figured out what Radha was really up to, though, I realized it must have been about that. Deploy with the X-Men for the demonstration in District X, or hang back and be available to help X-Factor address the cause."

"And neither of you two chuckleheads thought it might just be a good idea to discuss this? Or to even mention this?" Hope's gaze and tone hardened, though her voice remained low.

Jim spread his hands. "At the time we only had a theory, and I had already agreed to help Quentin. It wasn't relevant. And afterwards I was . . . not really in a place to discuss it." He very much was not going to admit to Hope that his prediction, too, had warned of a personal price to be paid. If Hope's stare became any more withering it was going to set him on fire. "Anyway, we think it has something to do with intent. It's like he reads the odds of an action, almost, and can extrapolate potential consequences."

"This is not just you." Hope informed him sharply, a small hand gesture indicating Arthur. "For someone who appears so genial, he keeps his cards very close to the vest. Now, I can respect a secret, but here there were nearly a hundred lives at stake. And as if his powers were not already unsettling enough."

"That's going to have to wait until he's not dealing with a traumatic brain injury," Jim replied with uncharacteristic sharpness. He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Sorry. But right now our priority is getting him through the luck snaps long enough for him to recover. Once we're past that, then you can talk about his readings."

Hope raised her eyebrow, unimpressed, and added an eye roll for good measure. "It is not if I am about to march up to him and have that conversation now. But it is going to be had at some point." Her voice gentled quite a bit when she added: "I do wish for him to be well and his secrecy has not helped that."

"It is a problem," the telepath admitted, turning to look at his friend. Arthur was still sitting quietly beneath Felix's comforting presence, eyes closed. Jim hoped he had drifted off.

"But . . . for later."

***

It wasn’t over.

A traumatized man sat curled on a couch, but the world bent around him in a twisting confusion of logic that sent the regular quantum nature of reality into a tizzy. Logic was out for the day. Now, it tipped toward the worst.

The sphere of bad luck spread in a perimeter out from the space normally occupied by Kyle Gibney and Arthur Centino. Pictures that once hung straight were suddenly knocked askew, and the ones that feel did so at the worst angle possible. There was a squeal as a nearby toilet began to overflow. Technology nearby green screened, soft rebooted, or suddenly logged out of all accounts simultaneously.

The immediate effect stopped just outside the edges of the suite, but the sphere was hungry for balance. A thousand cases of bad luck. It pulsed.

Arthur’s luck had returned, and the universe wasn’t happy.