Subject: [OTL]: (Timewind Arc, Aidan Richards) Pyrotic Lament, 3/3 (PG-15; imagery) Date: Sat, 3 Aug 2002 17:22:54 -0700 (PDT) From: Phil Hartman will1@earthling.net Timewind Arc: Pyrotic Lament Conclusion by Phil Hartman DISCLAIMER: The kids are mine. Their parents are Marvel's. No money is being made off of this. WARNING: Slightly nasty imagery at one point ... -------------------------------------------------------- 6/2/2020: -------------------------------------------------------- Ninaeve almost bit her tongue at the sight of Aidan slumping over, unconsious on the sand. The spear jutting out of his left side was what had provoked her scream. #But I can't use my power - Mum and Da warned me about the consequences,# the Scots girl thought as she tried to back away from the Marauders surrounding Aidan. "Get her quickly," Sinister ordered. He glared at Harpoon and snarled, "Use less force. The boy's lung was punctured when you attacked him." "I don't understand what happened. It was a charged harpoon. There shouldn't have been any piercing, just a stun discharge," the Inuit hunter stammered - - before he was sent flying by a focused shriek. "I'LL SHOW YE ALL PIERCIN', SCUM !" Ninaeve shouted. She released another sonic blast, shattering Prism and staggering the remaining Marauders as she flew directly at Sinister. Who promptly caught her out of midair and threw her at his feet. "Surrender, Miss Cassidy, and we can be done with this ... unpleasantness. As powerful as the Richards boy is, you are the main focus of this little outing," Sinister said icily. "Ye - ken what m' real power is ?" Ninaeve whispered. "Indeed," Sinister said, smiling thinly. "Moira Kinross possesses a most potent mutant sub-latency. It is regrettable that your deceased half-brother Kevin was afflicted with an unstable physical form, but you are both physically stable and sane. I -" He howled, as Aidan's body flickered with white fire, and the Marauders vanished. "LEAVE- her - alone -" Aidan moaned, trying to get to his feet. He screamed as he pulled the spear from his side, and slumped back again onto the sand. "AIDAN !?" Ninaeve sobbed, shrieking once when a pain shot through her. Her hand came away bloody from where she felt her back. "Suffer - and know that - despite his heroics - this is NOT over -" Sinister wheezed, fading out. #It HURTS - but I'll live, what 'bout Aidan -# Ninaeve thought, checking his wound. It was still bleeding, and he shuddered. #No choice,# the girl thought. And she began to sing. -------------------------------------------------------- The words were Gaelic, he realized, as warmth filled his mind. He felt the edges of the wound closing as he struggled to regain consciousness. "Ninaeve ... ?" Aidan asked, sitting up shakily and looking at the now very-pale red-headed girl beside him. She fell into his arms, smiling weakly, as shouts began to fill the air. "M' real power - c'n change reality by singin' - couldnae lose ye -" Ninaeve laughed. She patted Aidan's cheek and added, "Ye mean so much t'me -" ~Ninaeve !?~ Aidan begged telepathically. ~ANYBODY !?~ ~Aidan !?~ his father replied, fear and worry in his mind. ~Keep the link open -~ ~I'm coming to you - GET A HEALER ON-SCENE NOW !~ Aidan demanded, trying to teleport - - and yelling, when he and Ninaeve landed in the surf. -------------------------------------------------------- ESU Hospital, Neohattan: 14:00 hrs EDT: -------------------------------------------------------- "If I'd waited -" "Aid, your teleportation only manifested - what, last week ?" Frank tried to reassure his son. Aidan turned from where he'd been pacing, dressed in a robe and hospital gown, before the ICU entrance and gulped. "Dad, I thought I could save her," the boy mumbled. "I should've tried to heal HER, not the other way around - my healing factor -" "Couldn't have healed around that spear in your side," another voice - young, mocking - called. Aidan snarled soundlessly, and Frank scowled, as they looked at the figure walking towards them. "Not that her healing effort would have mattered anyway, if the spear had remained. But then, thinking things through has never been your strong point, has it, little brother ?" Aidan's brother Arawn sneered. "Arawn, NOT NOW," Frank warned - - before flinching, when Aidan telekinetically knocked Arawn to the floor and leapt atop him. "WHAT THE FLONQ DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THINKING THINGS THROUGH !?" Aidan howled. "You leather-wearing, death-worshipping DROPOUT ! Go back to the streets and sell yourself, you jerk !" Arawn's face flickered with an indecipherable emotion, as Aidan stood and walked a few feet away from him. "What I do with myself is my business - I'm a legal adult under the Mutagenetics Laws," Arawn said in a quiet tone. He stood, dusting off his leather bodysuit, and tried not to wince when Frank stared at him in incredulity. "You - you're not actually -" Frank muttered. "As I said, Father, I'm a legal adult," Arawn spat. "Save your compassion for the baby there. His broken heart needs tending." He vanished through a teleportal, as Rachel and Aidan's twin sister Aislinn walked up with a haggard-looking Sean and Moira Cassidy. "Arawn again ?" Rachel sighed. Frank looked at her with a stunned expression, and Aidan dimly caught some kind of telepathic exchange between them. Aislinn walked over to him and hugged him, thinking over their twin psi-link, ~Ignore Arawn. He's a freak.~ ~I know. But if I'd gotten some help - why'd Ninaeve have to risk her life for me ?~ Aidan sent, trying not to break down. The ICU door opened, and Hank and Cecilia McCoy walked out with exhausted expressions. "Moira, Sean - Ninaeve's in stasis," Hank began, the blue-white fur around his face somewhat dimmed somehow. "Her life-force was what she used to fuel the song that healed Aidan," Cecilia continued. "She's alive, and there's no indication of remaining physical damange ... but it may take months before she comes out of her coma." "Or never," Moira said, dully. "Accushla - !" Sean pleaded. The red-beared Irish sonic projector looked at Hank, but the felinoid mutant shook his head. "Sean ... the possibility exists," Hank said, sorrow in his words. "I -" Aidan turned, shaking, and walked away. #SINISTER ...# The rest of the day was a blur. -------------------------------------------------------- He awoke in his own bed at Richtech Tower, in boxer shorts. "I thought you might feel better here," Rachel said, sitting at Aidan's bedside. "One of the HERBIE models changed you after we teleported back from the hospital." "Thanks," Aidan said, blushing slightly. "Mom - Ninaeve -" Rachel squeezed his hand where it rested on top of the sheet covering Aidan, and her expression shifted to one of sadness. "She's in a stasis pod," the inheritor of the Phoenix said. "Aidan - she's been taken to the Pool. They're worried that Sinister might try for her again." "'They' ?" Aidan asked, his eyes widening. He threw back the sheet, and Rachel slipped into the hallway as he changed into a black skinsuit. ~The XSE. They're worried about Ninaeve's reality-warping power,~ Rachel sent. "THE XSE !?" Aidan yelled, teking his door open. "But she saved my life -" His eyebrows dropped, and Aidan teleported. -------------------------------------------------------- To the guards' credit, they didn't fire when Aidan appeared out of thin air. His lip twitched as he sank to his knees in front of the service entrance to the Pool, and the anti-grav sled came to a stop. "Excuse me, but you're not allowed here," one of the XSE guards said as he nudged Aidan's shoulder with a boot. "Let him be, trooper," a familiar voice called. A strong hand helped Aidan to his feet, and the boy looked up into blue eyes beneath a blond crewcut. "Uncle Alex," Aidan said absently as they walked towards the stasis level of the superhuman prison facility. "I'm not thrilled about keeping an innocent girl here, either. But with tesseract technology, Sinister could penetrate most medical facilities," Alex Summers said, gently. They stopped before the crypt where Ninaeve's stasis pod was being hooked up to support equipment, and Aidan looked at her with watering eyes. "Why YOU !?" Aidan snarled, turning to glare at Alex. "You could share your anti-teleport tech with hospitals !" "Aidan, we can't just go handing out advanced security technology -" Alex began. "YOU CAN'T EVEN CATCH ONE LOUSY TWEN-CEN MAD SCIENTIST !" Aidan howled. The floor - the entire building - began to shake, and the boy's eyes flickered white as he spat, "You're supposed to protect mutants like her from freaks like Sinister ! But that - scum - is still out there, and she's locked up like she's the criminal, and - and I -" He ran past Alex, and took off telekinetically into the Uptown sky. #The XSE can't protect us. Arawn loves taking cheap shots. I failed her -# Aidan thought, the immense spires of the Uptown portion of Neohattan blurring as he flew past them. After the Rebuilding from the Manhattan Catastrophe of Christmas Day, 2006, most of the city buildings' elevators didn't descend past the 10th floor. The actual streets of Manhattan were abandoned by all but the most desperate, and new mag-lev tracks and hover-car roads had been constructed above the Downtown level. Aidan flew, finding his wanted location, and landed there shakily. "Your Majesty," he said, nodding to the magenta-haired middle-aged woman who greeted him at the business's entrance. "Aidan Richards," Meduseld Amaquelith-Boltagon, former Queen of the Inhumans, said. She returned the boy's bow and ushered him into the salon as she asked, "What can the Hair-agen do for you ?" "I'd like a crew cut, please. Something to make me look ... like I feel," Aidan said, gloomily. Medusa's eyebrows raised, but she just nodded. The buzz of the razor was the only thing Aidan let himself hear for a time. -------------------------------------------------------- 9/5/2020: -------------------------------------------------------- The hum of Ninaeve's stasis tank jarred Aidan from his reverie. "I've kept it short since then - I'll keep it short until ... well, I don't know how long," Aidan said, forcing a smile. "I ... I miss you." He kissed the transparent cover of the tank, and walked away. The EEG monitor blipped once, higher than the REM-sleep pattern Ninaeve had been in for months, and fell back to the regular rhythm. -------------------------------------------------------- finis ... ? --------------------------------------------------------