[Shadowcat] Welcome to the Year 2000
by Dora (shadowcat@kittymail.com)

DISCLAIMERS: Katherine Pryde is property of the Devil...er, Marvel (I meant
Marvel!), as is everyone else mentioned.

RATING: PG? The language is generally tame (I'm so proud of myself), but the
subject isn't, so let's just compromise.

NOTES: Y'know, I started this out as one thing, and it changed into something
else entirely... ::shakes her head:: This is what I get for reading too many
Alicia & Phil 'fics in the same day. My thanks go out to Phil Hartman for
writing everything he has.  Kudos to Dr. Evil, who kept me entertained as
always. ^_^ Also, huggles and Ewen McGregors to m'sis Sesana, who gave me
that nifty little idea for Lockheed's place in everything.  Proper feedback
forever to Mandy Lever, who helped me coin Chamber's personality a little
better. Lastly, a billion thank yous to my betas -- Zanne, Talya, Sil, Simon
and Ses. Y'all reassured me that I wasn't writing a total piece of garbage,
and helped me make my first post.

------------------------

Friday, October 12, 2001

I've never been much for writing. My creativity, what little there was,
always manifested itself in other forms. Dance, mostly. There *was* a time
when I attempted poetry, but I quickly became disgusted with my own inability
to rhyme, and wound up turning back to my personal specialty. That would be
computing, for reference. It used to be a joke between me and my closest
friends..."Pay your respects to the goddess of computing." Things like that.

So I left the major creativity to other people, like Piotr. His paintings
always astounded me... But then, my brain is too logical to really come up
with works of art. My blessing and my curse. It's part of what kept me alive.
What *should* have kept everyone else alive... Life is unpredictable that 
way, I guess. After all, I never expected that I'd have to take up the job of 
'creative-type person,' nevertheless 'last-vestige-of-sanity-in-a-world-gone-
mad.'

I'm left with no other choice, though. I'm the only one left to chronicle
what happened, to tell the tale of how our world fell apart.

God, I miss my family.

There's some sick sort of irony to that, knowing how things work -- me, the
transformed atheist, using that particular term. Kurt would tell me that it's
because deep down, I still believe. Pete would tell Kurt that he was full of
it. Somewhere between the both of them, Amanda would smile at me, and shake
her head in that way I came to interpret as "men!"

So I suppose that I should start explaining what actually happened... It
hurts, though, and I don't actually expect anyone to read this.

Well, okay, one person, but I'll get to that later.

It's doubtful that anyone other than me will actually remember this far back
("this far back"...three years ago, and I'm saying "this far back?"), but
that's where everything starts. Close to the millennium, though very few
people were actually worrying about that at the time. Or at least Excalibur
wasn't -- we were far too preoccupied with cleaning up after the British
government's mistakes. Let me elaborate: we were taking care of Black Air, 
a group of sick, twisted people that would happily bring Hell to earth. We
should've been more careful. *I* should have noticed more, should have been
able to use that logic of mine which Pete once called "Vulcan-ish," to figure
things out.

But at the time, our lives were going so well that I don't think anyone in
our position would've noticed. Or maybe I'm just trying to convince myself.

Meggan and Brian Braddock, two of our team's founding members, had finally
gotten married a year before -- August of 1998, and they left the team on a
pretty permanent basis, preferring to stay out of the spandex-clad world.
Brian's sister Elizabeth came out of her own hiatus at the wedding, and wound
up joining Excalibur immediately afterwards.

Kurt eventually got off his fuzzy blue butt after Amanda was nearly killed by
Illyana's Soulsword -- again -- and proposed to her once she came out of her
coma. I remember Rahne being horrified when I took Illyana's sword back, but
what other choice did I have? It was my burden to bear, and so once her
engagement was a set thing, I asked Amanda to begin teaching me magick. Kitty
Pryde, practitioner of the Winding Way...it still sounds as weird to me now
as it did then.

Apparently, it sounded more than weird to Rahne. Illyana's Darkchilde persona
had always terrified her, and we all knew that I was no saint... That was
proved once Belasco came to "reclaim his rightful property," as the stupid
git told me. The Soulsword was the only piece of Illyana I had left to
remember her by, and he expected me to just give it up?

Pete told me later that he would've laughed at my initial expression of
surprise, if I hadn't gone so crazy right afterwards. Belasco pissed me off,
and there was this wispy little voice sounding in my head...  Long story
short, I became the new mistress of Limbo.

After Belasco's death, Rahne left Excalibur, taking Douglock and Colossus
with her. It was something of a guilt trip, but from what Moira told me, they
were all quite happy helping with Generation X, and Emma Frost even gave
Piotr's career as a renowned artist a kick start. It stills bothers me,
though, that one of my own friends was frightened by me... I suppose that's
how Illyana used to feel.

The others...they reassured me that I was still the same person no matter
what, and so as always, life continued on. For a while, anyway.

Kurt and Amanda's wedding rolled by a little more than a year after Brian
and Meggan's, and they left Muir for a couple of months on one of those world
tours. By early December of 1999, Psylocke went to the mainland to spend
Christmas with her family. That left Muir with Moira, Pete, Lockheed and
myself. The quiet, while unnerving at first, became a welcome change, and I
wound up spending most of the time alternating between practicing my kata and
my spells.

Christmas and Hanukkah went by almost unnoticed, with everyone "too busy" to
come by, and us too preoccupied to visit them. But the new year...the new
year was a blast. And I mean that literally.

Pete complained about it, but I persuaded him to save the 'festivities' until
later, and we spent the last hours of 1999 with Moira, who'd been pried out
of her lab. She died not soon after.

That's actually an understatement -- we didn't know until later on, but her
death came at the moment certain superstitious types had been fearing. Y2K
was nothing, compared to that. While I've had little direct experience with
certain enemies of my friends, I loathe them nonetheless. Sinister is one.
Stryfe is another, if not because of the threat he's posed to my best
friend's brother, then because of the threat he released on our world. His
legacy is everyone's now, and was just starting to be then.

Stryfe killed Illyana, who was like the sister I never had. Stryfe killed
Jamie Madrox, who was one of Rahne's closest friends. Stryfe killed Moira,
who was everyone's confidante. Stryfe planted a bomb within our society, and
from the grave he has taken my family from me. He is very lucky that my reach
does not extend into the hell where he is, hopefully, burning. I say that for
Kurt, who would be reassured by his religion, if he were still alive.

I have my reassurances...but it's very difficult to cover a wound to the
heart with a Band-Aid.

The Legacy mutated immediately. It had to, since it killed all its hosts at
once, like flicking off a light switch. I remember Moira telling Meggan about
the Ebola virus once, several years ago. About the different strains, from
Marburg to Sudan. At the time, I believe there were four. One, Zaire, had a
ninety percent fatality rate, but was relatively difficult to catch. The
other, Reston, was even more dangerous -- it was airborne, could be
contracted just by breathing normally, but it only infected monkeys...for
the time being. The Legacy took on the worst characteristics of both, was
designed to do so.

Pete and I made sure that the others got to Muir immediately, and Moira had
a decent ceremony. We didn't know anything then. I should have paid closer
attention.

Pete started coughing four days after the funeral. Smatterings of people
across New York and New Jersey were seemingly down with the flu. I took his
cigarettes away from him.

He was on a respirator within a week and a half. We all tried to keep in
touch, especially when it seemed that Rahne and Hank McCoy had developed the
flu, also. The next call came from X-Force -- Terry Rourke was coughing up
blood.

The more I think about it (and believe me, I think about this quite often),
the more I realize that Stryfe seemed to target us first. Not just mutants,
but the people who fought on Xavier's side, for his infamous Dream, capital
'd.' It makes me wonder how much he knew, to take us the way he did...were we
carrying dormant virii for several years? I still have trouble understanding
the how of things, more often than not, but I do realize that his scheme had
layers upon layers.

He wanted us to hurt, to know the hurt he felt. That bastard didn't know the
meaning of pain, and I'm positive he realized that, too.

What little time I was away from Pete was spent in Limbo. My kingdom. I
understand why 'Yana did the same. It may be a little slice of hell, but 
it's mine. My sanctuary. My savior. And Illyana understood that, still does.
Limbo's rulers don't really die, you know... Belasco may rent space in my
brain, but Magik is there too. I'm not quite so alone as it seems, and it
had its perks, I suppose. Illyana often lent her own two cents, if not her
powers. I'm swerving off track, though, aren't I? Right.

By February, everyone in Generation X but Chamber and M were down. I don't
know how I knew, but I did...so I left for Massachusetts. It was worse than
I'd expected. The entire population -- human and mutant -- were on their last
legs. That's not entirely a figure of speech, either. I closed up the school
best I could without being too obvious, and took Jonothon and Monet back to
the X-Men's base with hopes of retrieving help. Stupid of me.

They were almost as bad off as Gen X, and I remember seeing Trish Tilby, that
CNBC reporter, on one of the mansion's televisions, doing some story about
what was happening throughout the states. Everyone had gone into a panic, 
and when I saw how Bobby Drake had burnt up until he was nothing more than 
a puddle, then the reports that X-Force was dead and Sam Guthrie was on his
way back...it was too much. Taking Jonothon and Monet with me, I went back 
to Muir. Pete was dead by the end of the month, and God knows it wasn't
pleasant...he was hurting so much at the end, and he nearly begged to die
with dignity... I couldn't let that disease take him. I didn't.

He had been kept under quarantine thanks to precaution, and I sterilized
before and after visiting the medlab, but it wasn't enough.

Kurt started to lose his fur, and the New England and Southwestern states
started to crash and burn. Amanda locked herself up with her husband, but it
was useless. Meggan had decided to visit, and within two months, most of
Scotland and quite a bit of England had gone mad. Logan called on what
remained of Canada's comm systems with more reports, and while Jono informed
me that I couldn't stop crying for two days after being told that he and
Rogue were the only ones left, I seemed glad that someone was out there.

I remember feeling a small sense of relief amidst my remorse. There were
survivors, despite the fact that this plague was still going strong. People
were genuinely terrified, though, and countless mutants -- even suspected
mutants, people with birth defects -- were murdered. I thought of the Salem
witch trials. We were caving in upon ourselves, and by July, bodies had begun
to pile up.

The survivors who knew the proper people came to Muir, and while Jonothon
listened to reports on deaths and riots, Monet and Amanda hid in their own
little worlds. That left me with answering the door.

Shatterstar showed up with Sam, both looking more haggard than I'd ever
thought possible. Next came Meggan Braddock, who was as depressed as Amanda,
but seemed well enough. Less than a week later, we got another call from
Logan. He had found Domino and Cable, and they were on their way to Muir. I
should have known. We all should have known.

Once everyone had some time to recuperate, we all sat down with hopes of
understanding. Monet surprised me when she finally came out of her daze, if
only long enough to point out that the twelve of us all seemed to have our
own defenses, more or less. She and Rogue were generally immune to disease.
Shatterstar and Lockheed, who hadn't left my side in months, were alien.
Logan had his healing factor, Domino her luck. Jono was little more than a
walking corpse in the first place, Sam couldn't die, Meggan wasn't really
human, and Amanda and I had our magicks for protection. That left Cable, who
"*was* supposed to be a savior in the first place," as I think she might have
put it. My memory is no longer entirely trustworthy.

Domino yelled at him for nearly twenty minutes before he cracked, eventually
telling us about the Twelve. I remember Jono saying it was just a bunch of
bullocks he wanted nothing to do with. Jono, in his own strange way, reminded
me of Pete on occasion. I miss them both so much that it has become a physical 
pain.

By the beginning of September, I think we were all just waiting. For
something, anything. We had all discovered that waits were short, more often
than not, though Logan and Shatterstar became impatient after just a few
days. They went to the mainland despite Cable's commands to do otherwise,
checking for signs of life, I suppose. Scotland no longer had much of a
pulse, nor did England, Africa or Japan.

I spent hours upon hours sitting before Muir's computers -- machines that 
I had programmed and reprogrammed over the years -- only to find that the
States were in ruins, along with the rest of the world. We continued our wait
while the Legacy raged on, and lives blinked out in vast numbers on a daily
basis. Frustrated, I turned to Limbo. And then to Jonothon, who I had become
much too attached to.

We got what we were waiting for, late September of 2000. Apocalypse came out
of wherever he'd been hiding, and made his presence known. We went to face
him, and we were foolish. Before the fight had even begun, Amanda was snuffed
out. Her death empowered me, in more ways than one. He fueled our rage, but
he killed the woman who had eventually become a sister to me.

Lockheed fell next, and the Soulsword screamed for me. My little dragon...
a year later, and I still keep expecting to wake up each morning to garbled
trills and threats of flame.

Cable was shrieking in all our minds, demanding that we fall into place. It
was useless, though. The Twelve had hardly begun to exist before it was
crushed. I've seen more death than I've cared to during my short life, and
what happened that day still makes me sick to my stomach. It was chaos
embodied, and one of the things I can recall most clearly is the red film
which covered everything, gruesome. While I want everything written in order
so that no one forgets (too little, too late, I would think), the way the
remainders of my friends and family died should not need to be chronicled. I
will take that to my own grave, thank you.

There was no strategy, no rhyme nor reason to what happened, or how we fell.
But at the end of it, when Cable and Apocalypse seemed to be having a
staredown, and I was standing, horrified, intangible, watching Chamber's
true form take to the astral plane... I'm incapable of describing it. This 
from the woman who uses her logic to a fault...I'd laugh, but I'm afraid 
I might wind up crying again, and tears are a waste.

At the point when the flash came, we weren't entirely defeated. Cable and
Rogue, while hurt, weren't completely broken. Shatterstar was taking his last
breaths, but still on his feet. Ben's tenacity always amazed me... I couldn't
say where I was, though. Again, my memory is anything but 100% reliable -- 
I remember the worst of the fight, how my friends were cut down, but little
more than that.

It was, of course, a warzone. Despite the small numbers on the field, I had
never seen a place that felt so crowded. And it was, believe me. Maybe not on
a physical plane, but the Soulsword saw it all...Cable saw it all, and he
drew upon what remained of the Twelve. He took us all in, inside of him, and
it was beautiful. It was the most terrible beauty I'd ever seen, and what
came to mind then -- what I still think of when I remember what it was like
-- is Elizabeth Braddock. Betsy, the woman I owe my life to, is gone.

Most everyone is gone.

I remember hearing Apocalypse scream, and Nathan scream, and they were
intermingled. At the end, I think they became one. There was...a light, of
sorts, so blinding and difficult to explain, and then they were gone. It was
so frightening... I think I ran to Limbo. No...I *know* I ran to Limbo, my
home away from home, my place of technology, and logic, and things that can't
feel or hurt...

I was too afraid to go back. For all I knew, Rogue and anyone else who could
have possibly survived might have been wandering in the wastelands. It didn't
matter. I couldn't go back. It was just too much, too overwhelming. Instead,
I stayed huddled in my little corner of Limbo, a place where even my
'subjects' couldn't get to me. Illyana and all the others who spoke to me so
often were quiet, and it was maddening. All alone, where to go?

Back to the warzone, where we had all died and had our souls taken for the
sake of good. There was nothing left, which really didn't surprise me at all.
But I cried anyway. For Moira, for Kurt, for Pete and Lockheed and Rahne and
Jono and my family, adopted and by blood, and for the millions of innocent
people who didn't deserve to die in such a way.

I cried for me.

Because the virus *still* wasn't over... People were *still* dying... And I
was too tired to fight off death.

For a few months, I scoured what felt like the whole world for people,
wanting to help them, and figuring that if I caught the virus, I would die.
End of story.

It didn't happen, and, eventually, there didn't seem to be anymore people to
help. So I retired to Limbo for a few months, living in a state that wasn't
living at all. I nearly went insane, for the second time. And then it
happened.

One of the voices came back. Except it wasn't one I could immediately
recognize. It was familiar, but weak...dying. It demanded that I leave Limbo,
if only for a little while.

Sinister never was one to say 'please.'

When I found him, he explained that Stryfe's Legacy was finally taking its
toll on him, too, despite the immortality En Sabah Nur had promised. I would
have left then, if he hadn't explained that I was as close to a 'like mind'
as he could get, and he was bequeathing his final masterpiece to me. That,
however, wasn't what stopped me. It was an achingly familiar touch at the
back of my mind, and the little redheaded source which I recognized
immediately.

I took the child before Sinister could even say another word, and we left
for Limbo. That was last month. He was right -- you, Rachel, are his final
masterpiece. You are perfect, and I know that you'll live up to your name --
both of them, Phoenix. You are my last hope, everyone's last hope, though
you don't know it yet. You'll rule Limbo when I'm gone, and you will be this
world's salvation. You'll be something that both Nathan and Apocalypse could
be proud of.

You're everything we've fought for, Rachel, and everything I've wrote is for
you to understand one day. You are the Twelve.

Meggan Braddock
the innocence

Monet St. Croix
the knowledge

Domino
the luck

Samuel Guthrie
the immortal heart

Lockheed
the loyalty

Logan
the beast and man

Katherine Pryde
the spirit

Rogue
the strength

Benjamin Russell
the warrior

Amanda Sefton
the love lost and gained

Nathan Christopher Charles Dayspring Summers
the leader

Jonothon Starsmore
the light

---
FIN