Subject: [OTL]: (Age of Madelyne) Morrigan Chapter 5/5 (PG-13) Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2001 20:21:10 -0700 (PDT) From: Phil Hartman will1@earthling.net Age of Madelyne: Morrigan Chapter 5 by Phil Hartman DISCLAIMER: Everyone here is Marvel's. No money is being made off of this. Please don't sue. NOTE: " - spoken word # - personal thought ~ - telepathy * - flashback -------------------------------------------------------- 6/16/2001: X-Mansion Boathouse: 10:45 hrs EDT: -------------------------------------------------------- "Where were we - 1997 ?" Emma asked, shivering. "Not a year I'm particularly proud of ..." "Graydon Creed had been turned to ash, Charles' mind was flayed, and we were more fractured than ever," Maddie said, shaking her head. "And human opinion of mutants was ... embittered." "We were lucky the non-mutant heroes stood by us," Scott said, raising an eyebrow. "They could've hidden, or let us hang, but they stood with us." "Why wouldn't they have ?" Rachel pointed out, frowning at her father. "They're not anti-mutant bigots - excepting John Storm, of course." "Ray !" Maddie exclaimed. "The Human Torch isn't an anti-mutant bigot." "He's never comfortable when I'm around," Rachel huffed. "And I can tell Frank freaks him out." "The name," Nate said airily, mock-swooning until Rachel threw a muffin at him telekinetically. "Children, please," Scott said, fighting a smile. "We were talking about O:ZT ?" "And WHO took in all of us mutant kids and gave us shelter while you guys were out kicking Prime Sentinel hiney ? The FF did," Rachel said, crossing her arms and giving her parents a smug look of satisfaction. "Point taken," Maddie said, nodding at her daughter. "I still remember the final moments - we'd tracked down Bastion's Connecticut home, after the Avengers had freed your dad, Logan, Ororo and I from the O:ZT base in New Mexico ..." ******************************************************** 6/21/1997: Eastern coast of Connecticut: 09:23 hrs EDT: -------------------------------------------------------- "HAVE AT THEE, FIENDS !!!" #Gotta love that dialogue,# Maddie thought, ducking another Prime Sentinel as the borrowed Avengers Quinjet Scott was piloting cut through the first wave of cybernetically-altered humans surrounding Bastion's house. "I want him," Jubilee said in an icy voice. Logan patted her shoulder, but Maddie looked at the girl - #no, young woman, now, she's 17,# Maddie reminded herself, #and she's seen horrors as bad as anything we have...# ~Jubilee, don't do anything rash,~ Maddie sent, locking eyes with the young pyrokinetic. ~What Bastion did to you was unspeakable, but any time you ... kill ... there's a cost, to your soul.~ ~I don't want him dead, Madstress,~ Jubilee thought, a jolt of grief spiking inside her for an instant. The ice returned, and she half-grinned at her former teacher, as she thought, ~I want him to go to court.~ ~Justice over revenge ? Sweet,~ Maddie thought back - - before she saw the blinding green flash coming at them from the outside - -------------------------------------------------------- Bastion looked up, senses far more than human surveying the results of the muticidal energy barrage which had bathed the Quinjet carrying the remaining X-Men. "A particularly satisfying ending," Bastion purred, looking with a half-smile at his prisoners. Timmy Jones swallowed, hard, while Ruth Bastianti shook her head. "You've changed, Bastion," the old woman said, sadly. "You're not the man I helped." "I was never a man, 'Mother,'" Bastion replied, neutrally - - before the alarms went off, and he turned around in shock. "Boo," Maddie said, smiling evilly from amidst the Phoenix Effect. "This - how -" Bastion blurted, taking a step back until he felt six points digging into his back. "Freeze, bub," Logan snarled, while Scott and Jubilee helped Ruth and Timmy to find their feet. "You so much as twitch, an' I'll -" A blinding flash of dark light made everyone jump, until a whoop of joy split the air. "Salutations and proclamations, my genetic gendarmes !" Maddie heard, and she beamed as Hank McCoy bounded towards her. "Hank !" Jubilee exclaimed, waving as the Beast, Psylocke, Rogue, Angel, Gambit, Bishop, and a tall black man with white hair and two oddly-hissing objects on his shoulders approached the other X-Men. "Good to see you guys," Scott said, shaking Hank's hand. "How's Shi'ar space ?" "Better, mon ami," Gambit said, glaring at Bastion. "Dis batard tried any'thin' ?" "Logan seems to have him to rights," Ororo said, descending. She gestured at where the Avengers and SHIELD were thinning out the Prime Sentinels, and said, "Bastion's forces are retreating." "But now would be a perfect time for him to try something," Scott said, glaring at Bastion. The X-Man walked directly in front of the leader of O:ZT and demanded, "Well ?" "If I told you, it'd ruin the surprise," Bastion sneered - - until something silvery started to run out of his ears, eyes, nose and mouth. "SPILL IT," Maddie snarled, clutching Bastion's head in a Phoenix-talon. "The cosmic avatar I currently house isn't terribly amused by smart-assery, and I'm even less a fan of that crap. TALK." "i-if - GRK - you wish -" Bastion choked. His shape shifted, and the X-Men took a step back, horror-struck. [MUTANT-DESIGNATES: X-MEN: WILL BE TERMINATED,] Nimrod replied, its' chest-cannon starting to glow green. "Goddess - the nanotechnology used by these fiends - came from Nimrod !" Ororo gasped. "You violated humans ?!" [NANOCYBERNETIC ENHANCEMENT WAS REQUIRED FOR THE CONVERSION PROCESS,] Nimrod said, turning to Maddie. [MUTANT DESIGNATE: GOBLYN QUEEN: WILL BE TERMINATED FIRST.] "RIIIIIIGHT," Jubilee sniffed. "You're not gonna let this overgrown can opener get away with this crap, are ya, Mads ?" "Not before I get a shot in !" a familiar voice yelled, and Maddie grinned as Nimrod was encased in ice. "Bobby !" the X-Men cheered, seeing Iceman approach with a dark-skinned woman holding onto him from behind. "Drake, I could kiss you - if I wasn't married," Maddie chuckled, lifting Nimrod telekinetically. "Later, scrap-boy." ******************************************************** "YES !" Nate and Rachel cheered, high-fiving their mother. "Well, I do have my moments," Maddie purred, grinning wickedly. "Flambe'd Sentinel, and this time, he didn't come back." "The fallout from O:ZT was no less harsh to anti-mutant forces," Emma said, a wistful smile on her lips. "I still remember talking with Robert Kelly about the Mutant Rights Act - as it was called before it became the Kelly Act." "So do I," Maddie said, rolling her eyes. ******************************************************** 7/3/1997: Senatorial Offices, Capitol Building, Washington, D.C.: 09:34 hrs EDT: -------------------------------------------------------- "Senator, let me ask you: Do you have any children ?" "Not yet," Robert Kelly said, glancing at the photo of his wife, Sharon, on his desk. "Thanks to the X-Men, Sharon and I do still have a chance at having kids someday. But I don't see -" "Bear with me," Maddie replied, digging in her purse. She pulled out a small book, then opened it and handed Kelly a photo. "Those are my children - Rachel is 10, and Nathan is 7. I've tried, God knows, to keep them from the line of fire, but they've both seen things no child should see, all because of one extra gene in their DNA." "Your boy's scars - and that hand, is it a prosthetic ?" Kelly asked, looking at Maddie with a shocked expression. "It's real," Maddie said, taking a deep breath. "My son was targeted by a 5,000-year-old Egyptian megalomaniac with a Darwinism fetish, simply because Nate is a mutant. For the rest of his life, my little boy will have to use a good share of his telekinetic power just to keep that damnable virus at bay. I can blame myself, or Apocalypse, but it doesn't matter - the reason Nate was kidnapped and infected was because he is a mutant." Kelly went ashen. "I, myself, am a clone of Charles Xavier's deceased first student, Jean Grey. I was created by one of Apocalypse's ex-flunkies, a monster named Nathaniel Essex, to serve as a brood mare to produce my children by Scott Summers," Maddie continued, acid entering her voice. "Again, I exist, born a slave, a disposable 'product,' all because of the whims of genetics and madmen. I never asked to exist, Senator. But I do, because my genetic donor was a mutant." She leaned forward, and said, softly, her eyes locked with Kelly's, "I've killed in self-defense, Senator. I've killed to protect my children. I may very well have to kill again. But I'm an exception among the X-Men." Maddie stood, starting to pace, as she said, "And the crimes I've committed were in the service of what I pray is a greater good. I've had to live with the memories of the people I've killed - the memories of the six BILLION extraterrestrials Jean Grey killed, when she lost control after being victimized because of her power. We're not saints, Senator, but we're not sinners, either. We're people." She locked eyes with Kelly again, and said, "Give us a chance to be people, Senator. The amnesty clause, the equal protection clause, the protective clause against misuse of the gene-test - they're no less important to us than the Civil Rights Act is to African-Americans. This bill is our future, and possibly the future of every American yet to be. Please - help us." Kelly removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "You realize," he said, replacing his glasses and looking at Maddie with a hard, long stare, "there are people who will tear you apart, in the media, because of what you've testified to." "I'm sure," Maddie said, allowing herself a small smile. "But the NOW and the Christian Coalition both support my actions in the defense of my children. For the first time in a very long time, Senator, mutants are a cause celebre'." She sat back down, and leaned across the desk as she purred, "Think of it, Senator - the liberals and the conservatives are actually coming together to support mutant rights. This is your chance to not only leave a legacy, but to look towards the White House. People remember the horror stories about the Prime Sentinel conversion process - anti-mutant bigotry is at an all-time low, because of what the big, bad international New World Order did to decent Americans." "Mutants, baseball, and apple pie," Kelly said, smiling faintly. Maddie sat back, then shrugged. "It's a catchy campaign slogan, 'Mr. President,'" she said, grinning. "Better make it yours while you can." ******************************************************** "HA !" Rachel giggled. "That's brilliant !" "And damned if Kelly didn't ride that one all the way to the White House last year," Scott said, shaking his head with a chuckle. "And as an independent !" "The Republicans and Democrats were torn apart over allegations of participation in O:ZT," Emma said, sipping her orange juice. "Mutants rode a wave of public support all the way to the front page of every newspaper. We're not the freaks in the sewers any more. We're stars." "And none more so than ..." Maddie began, giving Rachel a wink. Rachel blushed bright red, but said, "He's ... done pretty good, I guess ..." ******************************************************** 9/25/2000: Sydney, Australia: 09:23 hrs local: -------------------------------------------------------- "HE'S DONE IT ! A NEW WORLD RECORD IN THE 50-METER MEN'S FREESTYLE ! AMERICA TAKES THE GOLD !" "GO, girl !" Maddie whooped, helping Rachel to the stairs amidst the thousands of screaming fans sitting in the Olympic natatorium. "Your Prince Charming awaits !" Rachel darted, leaving a grinning Maddie, a smiling Nate, and a shocked Scott behind her. Maddie looked at Scott and sent, ~Close the jaw, dear. Why'd you think Ray was running up those long-distance charges ?~ "B-but - him ? I just never thought - I mean -" Scott stammered. He felt something tear inside as Rachel broke through the throngs of U.S. Olympic swimmers, press people and IOC officials to come face to face with the still-damp, swimsuit-clad boy catching his breath beside the pool. The crowd roared as one, regardless of nationality, cheering as Frank Richards took Rachel in his arms and kissed her deeply. ******************************************************** "A BILLION people saw that," Rachel groaned, despite the dreamy expression on her face. "If you two do so much as -" Scott began, until Maddie looked at him. ~I've already threatened Frank with a far more horrific fate than you could ever perform, darling. Leave safeguarding our daughter's chastity before marriage to moi,~ Maddie sent, giving Scott a wink. Scott smiled weakly, but Rachel glared at her parents and said, "Hell-O. How many screwed-up alternate timelines do you HAVE to throw at me before I get the picture ? Only kissing before marriage. I got it, already." "You're 14 !" Scott blurted. "What if Franklin isn't the one ?" Maddie face-palmed, and Rachel's eyebrows dropped. "First of all, Father, Frank and I have been psionically linked ever since our first kiss. You'd be surprised how many fights, stupid misunderstandings, and moments of blithering embarassment we've managed to avoid," Rachel started. Nate, Emma and Maddie slipped away from the table and headed for the lake, leaving a mortified-looking Scott to his fate. "D'you think we're being a little harsh to Dad ?" Nate asked, removing his towel before stepping towards the water in his bathing suit. "Ray doesn't kill, sweetie," Maddie said gently, diving in. She surfaced, giving her son a daring look, and sent, ~You got what it takes to beat your old mom at chicken ?~ ~You're not a chicken, you're a phoenix !~ Nate psi-laughed, splashing after Maddie. Emma watched as Rachel ended her tirade, and raced Scott into the cove, and the Summerses squared off at splashing each other. -------------------------------------------------------- finis The Age of Madelyne is tbc ... --------------------------------------------------------