Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 13, 4 years ago, San Francisco

I’m jerked awake by the sudden movement as the intercity bus comes to a stop, the lights of a Sentinel’s eyes through the window sending sharp hairs rippling across my body with the adrenalin spike as I fight to keep passing for human!

It takes me a moment to realise that no alarm is sounding, no robotic voice is announcing “Mutant Threat Detected”, none of the humans travelling with me are screaming and pointing. Rubbing the sleep from my eyes reveals that what I had thought were sentinel eyes were just unfortunately placed streetlights.

“Oi! Hoodie girl! This is my last stop. Time to get off!” The driver’s call echoes down the empty bus.

I scramble down the bus as quickly as I can, clipping my ankles a couple of times in my rush, clutching my tent bag close to my chest. “Sorry. Asleep.” My English still isn’t very good but I’ve picked up more words, like ‘sorry’ and ‘please’, on my journey. Take that mean pink haired boy!

The driver shakes his head and mutters as he shuts the door behind me before driving off. Now that I am not half asleep the bright streetlights are a comfort as I walk through the city, searching for the border and safety, unfortunately from this street level I can’t see which direction the pacific is and I was asleep when the bus was entering San Francisco.

Maybe I could climb one of the buildings and search from the high ground? But I’d need to transform to do that, supposedly San Francisco used to be a safe place for mutants before the war but the Jean Grey School was supposed to be safe as well. No. I can’t risk a human calling O.N.E. or getting spotted by patrolling Sentinels.

Everyone else walking the streets looks just as stressed as I feel, keeping their heads down, casting furtive glances at strangers and the O.N.E. vans on every other street corner. I don’t know if any of them are mutants in hiding like I am but a part of me, a cruel, angry part of me that I try not to listen to, hopes they are. It hopes that they are suffering as much as I am, having personhood held like a prize that they can only have scraps of if they conform and hide who they are.

The Jean Grey School said that I wasn’t mutant enough, part of my DNA neither human or mutant but something other. That I needed to push down and hide that part of myself to fit in, then when I failed they flunked me out and said it was my own fault. None of the human cities I’ve passed through on my way here have been any better, forcing me to pass as human just to survive, fighting off Sentinels and local superheroes long enough to run and hide again.

Hot blood pulses under my skin, my hidden arms begging to push through my sides so I can lash out and make them see me, force the world to acknowledge I exist, but I need to stay calm. Deep breaths. I don’t want to hurt people, I just want somewhere I can be myself without being attacked.

Every time I try to approach someone or call out to them they rush past me, no one wants to risk being out after curfew I suppose, especially not once it starts to rain. I’m still no closer to finding my way to the border, the unfamiliar city streets leaving me lost and often crossing my own path. I should try and find a spot to hide myself, I used the last of the cash I stole to pay for the bus fare here, I won’t be able to afford any kind of shelter.

Eventually, after an hour of getting increasingly lost and cold among the darkest alleys, I find an encampment under a freeway willing to let me set up my tent.

“I’ve not seen you around, did you just get thrown out or are you new in town.” One of the older women asks me as I join a group huddled around a wind-up flashlight under the freeway, all of us bundled up in multiple layers.

“Out of town.” Can I take the risk to say why I’m here? Well, if I made the journey to San Francisco despite the O.N.E. presence they can probably guess, most people are travelling away from the border if they can. “Going to Utopia.”

Utopia. The mutant homeland. An illegal terrorist compound according to the government. A paradise according to some of the rumours on the street, a place where everyone has food and water and beds and there are no Sentinels. The teachers at the Jean Grey School all said the opposite, that it is a dour island fortress constantly under siege and ruled by a suicidal mad man who is provoking the world to kill us all. I’m not sure the world needs an excuse.

There is a chorus of grumbling and complaints of ‘another one’ at my answer but no one tries to push me out of the freeway into the rain so that’s a good sign.

“You’re lucky you found this camp, girl.” The same woman says. “Some others have been reporting mutants that come here to the feds in exchange for a warm meal and a bed, or a fix. It's wrong, but some people are desperate.” Some people always are.

“That’s no excuse!” the only man group whispers harshly. “I heard horror stories about the old camps that O.N.E. used to run in New York ‘fore the x-men came here, and the ones they run down on the mexico border now. It’ll never be okay to give people up to those fascists!”

“Of course! I didn’t say it was justified, just that some people can’t help themselves, they aren’t in control!” The woman's defensive words seem like they might ignite a full argument for a moment before the last member of the group, another older woman, cuts in.

“Siddig, you know that Jill agrees with you really, she’s just got a soft heart for everyone. Jill, you know how quibbling over details like this upsets Siddig. We all agree that no one is turning anyone into the pigs. Sorry about that honey, we never even got around to asking your name.”

Her last sentence is addressed to me and sets the same fire running through my veins the question always does. The singular name, carved into my DNA by my creator, etched into my mind so deeply it is the only name I can think of to describe myself.

“Gwen.” I speak up, “It’s Gwen.”

“Well, nice to meet you Gwen. I’m Patty, this is my girlfriend Jill and our friend Siddig. Sorry to say that if you want to reach Utopia you’re probably out of luck. The feds have the port and the beaches locked down tight. Only a few cargo and fishing ships are let through nowadays.”

“And they are all inspected by the big purple robots first.” Jill interjects. “I’ve seen a few brave ones try to swim across or push out on small boats. The sentinels blast them from the sky every time.”

“Why try to stop us?” I ask, not for the first time. “They don’t want us here.”

“Control, they didn’t care too much when utopia was 200 refugees on the verge of extinction, they didn’t like it but they didn’t bother to stop it.” This is the first time anyone has actually answered me though, Siddig’s speech captures my attention, eager to finally have some kind of answer for why O.N.E. and their Sentinels keep hounding me. “But now there are over a hundred thousand mutants there with more on the way? The government is scared, Utopia fought the Avengers to a draw with just 200 mutants, no one knows why but we could all see it, who knows what they could do with thousands.”

Patty nods. “I remember watching with Jill when that helicarrier went down in the bay! It was so loud, like a ship collision but even bigger!”

“I don’t want to fight!” I protest, not for the first time. “I just want to live.” It’s all I’ve ever wanted. I didn’t ask to be born, all those months ago back in New York, I barely remember the first few days of my life. It was all a confusing swirl of violence, sound, lights and pain. I’m told that just by existing I was causing harm, a house sized spider sending people stampeding over each other in fear and scaring cops into shooting me as I simply tried to find a space away from all the noise and pinpricks.

Spider-Man and the Jean Grey School X-Men took me down and the School took me into their custody. They healed me and taught me simple English and math. They gave me the concept of family. Then they threw me out, said that I wasn’t good enough, wasn’t mutant enough, that I was a failure and a monster made by villains. Maybe I am a monster, maybe Scott Summers is a monster as well like they say, but if the Jean Grey School doesn’t like him then I’ll at least give him a chance.

“We know, kid. You ain’t done anything wrong.” Jill tries to comfort me, her touch on my hand making me realise I’ve let my spider hairs and my claws out. I hurriedly retract them, as much an instinct to look human and avoid trouble as to prevent any injury to the others. Jill must have been able to feel the stiff, sharp hairs of my spider-self but she doesn’t say anything.

In the morning Jill, Patty, Siddig and I go their separate ways, Jill to play music on a streetcorner while Patty apparently has a proper office job, she laughed when I said I’d never actually seen an office before, Siddig has a repair job to do and I need to find my own street to beg for money on. They wish me the best in making it to Utopia but warn me not to put myself in too much danger.

San Francisco is a bit more generous then some of the other cities I’ve begged in on my way here from Salem Center, unfortunately the food is also more expensive so I’m still hungry when I get back to the underpass camp.

Eventually I do manage to find the coastline and catch a glimpse of Utopia, it’s honestly not as impressive as I expected. The Jean Grey School made it sound like a dour fortress and the news screens made it sound like the root of all evil, I was expecting a huge castle with spikes and red light glowing beneath black stone, instead its a tiny island - not much bigger then the other island called Alcatraz I can see from the opposite shore - covered with short and round metal towers.

I can see why the others were warning me about the O.N.E. forces blocking the way though, Sentinels are everywhere - I have a couple of close calls when their scanners almost catch me - I couldn't even make it to the shore to attempt to swim, not that I could make the swim, the island is way too far out to sea.

After a week Siddig approaches me in the morning after Jill and Parry have left. “You still want to go to Utopia, kid? Even knowing the risks? Jill wasn’t wrong when she said some die in the crossing.”

“Yes.” I say as I struggle to wrestle my tent back into its bag. “I don’t want to keep hiding. It makes me sick.”

A small smile flickers across Siddig’s face. “Good answer. Mutants have been good to this city, better than the feds in O.N.E. certainly. Before H.A.M.M.E.R. forced them out onto Utopia they used to run soup kitchens and shelters for us. Even after they left the mainland they kept funding shelters and their super heroes kept cops from harassing some of us.”

Siddig leads me confidently to the docks, walking casually past O.N.E. check points with an easy smile that turns to a scowl as soon as we are out of earshot. “Its not just mutants that life has gotten harder for since O.N.E. showed up. Couples like Jill and Patty used to be able to walk together openly, now they need to be careful not to be too affectionate or agents will bust them for public indecency. People like me get picked up and shipped across the Atlantic for being ‘illegals’ just cause of our skin colour, even if we’re born here.”

I didn’t know that humans treated each other like that, like they treated mutants, the Jean Grey School had never mentioned it, they said that one day humans would accept us and treat us the same as everyone else. Wasn’t that meant to be better?

“Sorry.” I mumble, keeping my eyes low to avoid eye contact with any O.N.E. officers, the check points getting more and more frequent as we get closer to the docks. “For causing this.”

The taller man grunts and comes to a stop as we round a corner, the bay suddenly filling my view. “I wasn’t saying that for pity points, just trying to give you some perspective. No offence, but you seem a little sheltered. It’s not yours or any other mutants' fault the government is full of bigots, or any muslims’ or queers’ fault either for that matter. Don’t let them make you apologise for existing, kid.”

Siddig’s stare digs into my eyes, I do my best to not flinch or avoid his gaze as he points out one of the fishing boats. “Now, the next part’s very important so listen closely. I’ve got a friend who runs a fishing boat out of these docks. I do day labour for him, sometimes I bring some extra help that needs the coin. He doesn’t ask and I don’t say anything, neither do my new friends. Trouble is, the sea’s rough job, sometimes people fall overboard and we come back to port with less crew than we left with. It’s a tragedy but what can you do right? You still want the job?”

The thought of the sea dragging me down, the boat blasted out from under me by a Sentinel blaster, the cold sapping my strength as I struggle to breath is almost enough to dissuade me. I don’t want to die.

“What about Sentinels?”

“The lower hold is leadlined, no scans have seen through it yet.”

But the truth is, I don’t have anywhere else to go. Life for a mutant isn’t safe anywhere except maybe the Jean Grey School, and they already kicked me out. Even if I stayed on the mainland and hid as a human, I have no money, no education, no skills, not even an official identity.

“I want this.”

Like Siddig promised, there were no questions after that from the crew of the boat we boarded. I was hustled aboard quickly but calmly, everyone tense but not confused, they were used to this. I was given a quick lesson on how the crew worked while I was bundled into a heavy thermal coat and life preserver.

The plan is that the boat will drop me off on the other side of Utopia island, after it has passed the checkpoint at the big bridge and sailed out of sight. The crew will leave me with a flare gun, I’m to wait until they are a deniable distance away before shooting it. Until we get there I’m to stay in the lower hold, they apologise for the rotting fish smell but I honestly don’t mind. I've never understood why humans and other mutants don’t like the smell of partially digested food, I don’t mention this though, they might think I’m too much of a freak and reject me like everyone else.

I wait in the hold for what must be more than an hour before the boat even starts moving, the vibrations are almost deafening this close to the engines. Somehow, the journey between the docks and the big bridge feels even longer, the sounds of the crew on the deck above sounding muffled and far away through the thick metal. The ever present knot of tension in my chest grows tighter by the moment as the boat makes its agonisingly slow journey from the docks to the checkpoint.

Eventually the muted robotic voice of a Sentinel signals that we have reached the check point, I curl up in the deepest, darkest corner of the hold I can find, making myself as small as possible. Please let it work, please let it work!

It doesn’t work.

The crew start screaming, the engine suddenly roars where before it was purring and then the entire ship groans in pain as the giant hands of a Sentinel pry open the hold doors to stare at me with its scanner eyes.

“Mutant Threat Detected.”

This is my last chance, there is nowhere to run and nowhere else to hide. This time I don’t hold back the fear, instead I use it, armour myself in it. Plates of chitin slip over my skin, sharp hairs poking through them allowing me to taste the air even as my tongue curls and fuses into a feeding tube. My clothes are shredded to pieces by my armor plated body and sharp hairs.

Four additional limbs sprout from my sides, spreading my weight across the deck as I quickly grow to match the Sentinel in scale, my body tipping forward to rest on all eight limbs. My head retracts into my upper chest, my waist pinching and separating my torso into a cephelothorax and an abdomen.

My jaw separates into four parts, each larger than the Sentinel’s entire head. Before it can react I bite down, crushing its circuits and sensors between my maxillae and chelicerae! I push forward, my cephelothorax emerging through the hold opening facing towards the back of the ship along with my pedipalps and first pair of legs.

Around me the crew is rushing to and fro, yells of ‘make for Utopia’ ringing across the deck, unconscious, I hope, O.N.E. agents are pulled to one side, tied down and disarmed as I use my palps to push the Sentinel wreck off the side of the ship. The big bridge is rapidly shrinking behind us, even as O.N.E. ships and Sentinels start to give chase.

“You okay kid?” Siddig asks, wild eyed and laughing despite his bleeding scalp. “Shit, you’re a huge one aren’t you?”

I can’t speak like this but I try to simulate a laugh by grinding my maxillae together. He doesn’t react at all, accepting a gun from one of his crew mates and rushing to the railing. As the crew starts dumping barrels of fuel and boxes of food overboard I pull as much of myself out of the hold as I can, eventually getting all of my legs and my entire cephelothorax through the doors but my abdomen remains stuck. Still, now that my waist is free I can rotate my upper body to dodge or aim.

Which becomes very important as the first three Sentinels chasing us start blasting! The ship rolls to the right, the crew barely holding on, one guy even falling over for a moment before one of my legs catches him and pulls him back.

I hope this works, I’ve never tried to shoot this far before and never while I’m moving! As the ship starts to roll leftwards I try to focus my eyes on the lead Sentinel in that special way. Eight rays of crimson light cut through the sky above the bay, contrasting against the green glow of Sentinel blasts firing the other way.

Sadly none of my optic blasts hit the first time, or the second, or the third. They do force the Sentinels to dodge though and that seems to help. I really hope it helps.

“We’re almost half way!”

“Just a little further”

“Look! It’s the X-Men!”

I know that I shouldn’t do it, that I should stay focused and keep shooting the Sentinels chasing us. But I can’t resist, I turn, just enough that one of my eye pairs can see behind us in my peripheral vision and see seven lights flying through the air towards us.

My wonder is cut short when a Sentinel blast pierces through my rear left leg, severing it and blasting right through the ship's hull! Gallons of blue blood pour from the wound as I slump to the deck, my weight causing the ship to tilt dangerously.

The last thing I see before passing out is a wave of crimson light, far brighter than my own, cutting through all three Sentinels in a single swing.

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 17, Now, Krakoa

Slurp

I let the cocktail roll around in my mouth for a moment before swallowing, the tangy and minty aftertaste drawing a pleased hum from my lips, even after years of being alive the experience of tasting novel food is still one of my favourites, Krakoan fruits and nuts have given me a whole new horizon to experiment with in terms of dishes and cocktails.

“Five grams more x-berries and a finger less daiquiri I think.” I note down the flavour profile and my planned changes for the next batch as I wait for Kaine to finally pick up his damn phone. At least the organic krakoan technology of my office in the Grove is keeping me at the perfect temperature despite the summer heat, even if it does mean that the self aware island will always be listening in.

Click

“What do you want, Silver Spider? I’m.” a grunt comes over the line alongside a meaty thwack. “A little busy right now.”

“Beating up looters in the ruins of Las Vegas is hardly ‘busy’ for a hero of your caliber, Scarlet Spider. Also you must have missed the news, I go by Spider-Queen now.” Honestly it's a bit of a ridiculous name for a glorified ambassador but Mom and Dad both thought it was a good idea and I’d be lying if I said that rehabilitating Adriana Soria’s name didn’t hold some appeal.

“... the same name as the crazy supervillain I killed when she tried to turn all of New York into spiders?”

“Well it sounds bad when you put it like that!” Laughing, I lean out of the knot in the tree which serves as a window in this ridiculous treehouse the krakoans have made their seat of government. 

Maybe it's because my earliest memories are of New York, San Francisco and Utopia but I’ll always be more of a city girl then a treehugger. Give me concrete, steel and air conditioning any day over the weird organic technology that Forge has been making out of this living island.

“She was a terrible person, and she died before I was even born, but I still feel some… sentimentality towards her as one of my genetic donors I guess. Don’t worry, I’m not pulling a Jackal and trying to claim her supervillain mantle for myself. I want this title to be the name of a hero, until no one remembers the mad terrorist with delusions of grandeur." Well, there are other reasons as well but Kaine doesn’t care about mutant politics.

“If you say so.” Another grunt followed by a scream. “There, that was the last looter. What did you want to chat about? It’s pretty early to be calling me, your location data says you’re in the middle of the pacific ocean, that new Krakoa place? How many homelands do you mutants need?”

“Hah. At least one more I think. Put two of us in a room and you’ll have three superhero teams by the next day. Yeah, I’m in Krakoa, I’ve been sent as Utopia’s official representative. It’s why I’m calling you so early in the morning, I need to fit this in my schedule.” One of the spiders I brought with me from Utopia and set loose climbs from the treebark onto the extended finger of my 4th arm, its pedipalps waving over and exploring the surface of my skin. The poor guy is getting confusing signals from my hybrid biology. “I’m calling because I have a lead on Jackal. He already left the ruins of Las Vegas before you even arrived.”

“So he knows that I’m after him? We’re talking privately now by the way, Gwen.” Kaine’s tired sigh is accompanied by the sound of rubble shifting, presumably he’s taking a seat on the side of a toppled casino.

“Probably not, but Ben knows that someone is tracking him down for what he’s done as Jackal, especially the aid he gave to Hydra alongside Dok Ock. I don’t think he knows it's us though.”

“We don’t know that he actually gave aid to Hydra! Otto’s probably lying, it wouldn’t be the first time, Ben is too dangerous to be allowed to walk free but he’s not a nazi!” I have to hold my phone away from my head as Kaine’s shouts make the speaker peak and crackle.

I do know that someone called the Jackal, either Ben Riley or Miles Warren himself, worked with Hydra actually, I killed enough of his cloned Shock Troopers during the Liberation campaign to be sure of it, but Kaine is right that Ben might be innocent, no one caught Miles Warren when New U Cloning was dismantled.

“You’re right, I should be more careful with how I talk about it. That he might be innocent is why we need to find him first, before any of the less patient hunters do.” At my gentle psychic coaxing the little spider leaves my finger for a nearby leaf and starts spinning a web for himself. “You know that I’d be out there with you if I could be right, Kaine? I just… have responsibilities in Utopia, and Krakoa now.” Also the United States government considers me a wanted terrorist but that’s a much smaller obstacle.

“Responsibilities… yeah. I get that. So, where am I heading next?”

“You’re not going to like this but, according to the sightings I can verify, Ben’s heading towards the former State of California, probably all the way to Utopia itself.” Kaine’s hiss of displeasure is loud enough to hear through the phone. “If you hurry you might be able to get to him before he leaves the United States or catch him as he passes through one of the other breakaway countries.”

“If I ask Aracely and the other New Warriors to help I might be able to cut him off…” I leave the window and return to my desk as I listen to Kaine’s muttered strategising, starting to prepare my notes and proposals for the Quiet Council session later today. “I’ll do my best to find him before he reaches Utopia, if he does then you can’t face him alone Gwen, Ben’s much more experienced than you, he’s too dangerous for you to fight.”

I can’t help but bristle at the insult to my skills even though I know Kaine is right. I’ve never beaten either of my older brothers by Miles Warren in a fight, though I also haven’t seen Ben or Kaine in person in over a year.

“I won’t fight him alone, don't worry, we don’t even know if he’s hostile, he might be seeking asylum. I worry about how Magneto and his followers would react to Ben’s presence though. I’ll see if I can get you and the New Warriors superheroing visas, I’d rather keep this to just family and friends if I can.” 

Of course, if Dok Ock is telling the truth… I don’t know what I’ll do. I never met Ben before he went mad, not like Kaine did, and I’m not willing to shelter someone who really did work with Hydra but I don’t want to consign one of my fellow clones by the Jackal to ‘Death by Magneto’ either. Everyone deserves a proper trial at least.

“Ha! The mutant princess not wanting to involve mutants in something. Will wonders never cease, normally you can’t shut up about how we could all be doing more for ‘the mutant cause’.” Dammit Kaine. There absolutely will be a fight if you open your big mouth and demean mutant liberation once you enter Utopia, even if you don’t mean anything by it. “What will you do if things go south and we end up in a public fight?”

“I am proud of being a mutant and my mutant family but I’m also proud of being a clone and a spider, big brother. Ben is our business, not mutant business. If there is a fight… I’ll handle it.” 

“... alright, if you say so. I need to get going if I’m going to catch up to Ben. Send the exact coordinates to my phone. Stay safe Gwen.”

“You too Kaine.”

“Oh? Our little Spider-Queen scuttles in I see. With dear Emma on the island to welcome her hellions back to life I expected you to sit this meeting out, young one.” The flamboyant clone sitting directly across from me snipes as I take my seat at the Summer Table. We are the first two councillors here today, not unusual. I'm by far the most, my fellow councillors politely call it ‘overeager’, council member and Mr Sinister always loves to arrive early to get extra heckling in before the meeting starts.

Krakoa itself is always present of course, the island keeping its main avatar at the head of the council chamber in the grove while Doug Ramsey, Cypher - the essential interlocutor between the island and the rest of us - is always here before any councillors, he practically lives on its shoulder unless he’s entertaining visitors.

I meet Mr Sinister’s gaze with one set of eyes while I have the other watch the entrances for anyone else approaching, my three pairs of arms laying out my paperwork, my notebook and my latest attempt at a krakoan coffee blend down in front of me. As always the mad geneticist has only brought props along to the meeting rather than tools, a ruler, a riding crop and a novelty mug, all carefully chosen to present the appearance of not taking this seriously.

“I shouldn’t be surprised you struggle with the concept of separation of powers, Nathaniel. I am the appointed representative of all three triarchs of Utopia to the Quiet Council of Krakoa, the presence of one triarch on the island on unrelated business has no impact on my job at all.” Just because the other councillors aren’t here doesn’t mean I can afford to lose my temper though. My position is weak enough as it is due to my relative youth and inexperience, sometimes that is an advantage but I need to not overplay it, Utopia and my parents are counting on me.

“I’ll bear that in mind.~” Nathaniel Essex gives a tittering laugh as his co-founders of Krakoa, Charles Xavier and Moira MacTaggert arrive and take their seats on either side of him at the Winter Table.

Magneto explained everything he knew about the original plan for Krakoa to me when I was selected for this position but even still these two are enigmas to me. My main task is supposed to be making sure that Dr. MacTaggert’s defeatist attitude, her surety that Krakoa will fail, doesn’t drag Utopia down with it but I wonder now if the trio's plans have changed since Magneto split from them ideologically. Their actions don’t seem as short sighted as he predicted they would be when I was sent here a few weeks ago.

On the other hand, maybe they are just such practised liars and deceivers that they are leading me around by the pedipalps. After all, Xavier and MacTaggert have lied flawlessly to every child and lover they’ve ever had for the last 30 years.

“Dr. Xavier, Dr. MacTaggert. A pleasure as always.” My pleasantries just get polite nods from the pair and a sarcastic eyeroll from Mr Sinister as he grumbles about me never addressing him as ‘doctor’.

The Spring Councillors are next to arrive, entering the Council chamber as a group. The Spring and Autumn Tables are filled by the 6 Mutants who won the most votes in a world wide psychic poll of all mutants, with the exception that no existing members of other governments could be elected. It’s a sensible rule but I can’t help but be a bit sad that I don't get to work alongside the legendary Queen Ororo of Wakanda. 

There isn’t a formal seating arrangement for the elected councillors but they quickly sorted themselves into an internationalist bloc sitting at the Spring Table and an isolationist bloc sitting at the Autumn Table.

Kate Pryde, Headmistress of the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning and the current leader of the assimilationist faction of mutants that Charles Xavier founded but never believed in takes her seat at the centre of the Spring Table. When I can put aside my personal grudge against her and her school I have to admit that she is one of my more agreeable fellow councillors. The same can be said for her fellow Spring Councillor Monet St. Croix, the CEO of the krakoan state corporation X-Corp and another xavierite assimilationist.

Sadly the third Spring Councillor, Shinobi Shaw, is a complete asshole in addition to being a ruthless dilettante and businessman with a grudge. He hates me for my Mom imprisoning and mindwiping his father, Sebastian Shaw, even without the personal grudge the man looks at other humans the same way Mr Sinister does, as playthings to be used and discarded at his whim. 

An ideologue in the classical Hellfire Club mould, Mr Shaw’s only political similarity with his fellow Spring Councillors is a belief in internationalism and economic cooperation with the Sapien nations, otherwise being almost diametrically opposed to them on every issue.

Monet is one of the very few people who can unite Mr Shaw and Professor Pryde behind a unified policy, certainly she is the only person on the island who can make Shaw, Pryde and myself all get along, at least temporarily. It’s a shame that being the centre of her coalition makes her so dangerous because otherwise I think we could be real friends. She is engaging all three of us in polite small talk when my fellow Summer Councillor, Dark Beast of Clan Akkaba, arrives and interrupts us.

“Salutations fellow leaders of mutantkind!” The ridiculous man, just as annoying as Mr Sinister and his universal counterpart, says as he tumbles over the back of his chair to lean across the Summer Table and block my view of Monet. “Oh? Well this is a surprise, our little queen is dressing casual for once.”

Like most of the councillors I normally attend meetings in my superhero costume, though we don’t actually have a dress code as proven by Dr. MacTaggert and Eva always attending in civilian clothes. Today however I’m wearing civilian clothes as well, a white blouse - customised with extra sleeves for my 4 additional arms - and a conservative pencil skirt that neither hides or emphasises my prosthetic leg.

“Bold words from the man who only ever wears spandex shorts.” I retort dryly. “I have a family engagement after this meeting and didn’t feel like changing.” For all that people accuse me of being a mere mouthpiece for Mom, Dad and Magneto at least I have more independence then this variant of Hank McCoy, his devotion to Apocalypse matched only by his devotion to unethical mad science, every ‘might makes right’ mutant supremacist argument he makes coming directly from the lord of Clan Akkaba’s lips.

“I think you look quite nice, Gwen.” The last Summer Councillor says as she takes her seat, her living stone body - made of sandstone today - making distinctive grinding noises as she takes her seat on my other side.

“Thank you, Eva. Your dress is especially lovely today.” Eva of the Morlocks, who mainly seems to be their representative because no one else wanted to do the job, is my closest ally on the Quiet Council. Our nations are united in our ‘moderate’ stance of mutant-sapiens coexistence being possible but only by breaking from the old white world order and forging our own new nations built on equality from the ground up. 

While Eva and I are busy chatting, and ignoring Dark Beast’s attempts to get a rise out of us, Exodus arrives, he’s exactly the kind of mutant supremacist religious zealot that people wrongly accuse Dad of being. Utterly obsessed with Hope ever since she repowered all the depowered mutants during the battle with the Avengers on the moon, some of my first missions as an x-men trainee were fighting off his kidnapping attempts. 

Now here he is arguing childishly with Mr Sinister over who has the bigger shoulder pads. The dream of krakoa in action, a place where all mutants, regardless of personal differences, conflicting ideologies or past crimes, can live together in peace. So long as we all quietly accept parasites into our nests.

Selene and Mystique are the last councillors to arrive, deep in a whispered conversation, presumably plotting something dastardly the rest of us will have to clean up. Selene is another ex-Hellfire club member with a grudge against Mom, in her case a petty vendetta over Mom using the code name ‘Black Queen’ when she worked undercover with H.A.M.M.E.R. and Norman Osbourn.

Mystique on the other hand doesn’t hold any grudges against my family or my nation, or us against her, but she is by far the most radical mutant supremacist on the council. If she had her way humans wouldn’t even be allowed to set foot on Krakoa, she’s less bigoted against other species but she still doesn’t think that mutantkind can truly trust and work with them. 

They take their seats next to each other and Exodus on the Autumn Table as Charles Xavier stands up to call the meeting to order.

“Now that we have all arrived, our first order of business today is the latest intelligence update on Orchis’ movements...”

“Ah, Spider-Queen, a moment of your time if you would?” Exodus catches up to me as we leave the council chamber, his longer strides quickly eating up the distance.

Dammit, the meeting already ran long, a quick check of my three watches, set to Krakoan time, Utopian time and Washington D.C. time, confirms that if I take time to talk to Exodus I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to cash my favour with Bishop DeCosta in order to get Kaine his superheroing visa. The Bishop will have left his office for the day and I’ll be busy with Mom’s family dinner regardless.

“... We’ll need to walk and talk, Exodus.” I can’t justify the risk of pissing Exodus off, Kaine won’t make it to Utopia quickly enough for it to be a problem, probably. “What do you want to ask?” I can probably guess, he wants another meeting with Hope to convince them to support his cult. 

“My last conversation with the five-faced prophet was very enlightening, in particular as to the nature of the divine phoenix and the nature of mutants as her chosen people. I am working on a proposal for the Quiet Council to formally acknowledge the Phoenix’s role as mutantkind’s divine mother. I have a few other votes already, your vote, and input as family of the prophet, would be appreciated."

Well, that wasn’t quite what I expected. I’m not totally opposed, that the Phoenix is the creator and protector of mutantkind is self-evident, even if some still cling to conspiracy theories about Celestials or the fearmongering of old human religions painting us as the children of demons. But I don’t like the supremacist undertones of ‘chosen people’ or the semi-deification of my niece.

“I suppose your own Church of Hope would be preeminent? And how would that interact with non-mutants who worship the Phoenix?”

The red-skinned man grins and shrugs. “Of course not, to attempt to legitimise one religion as the official religion of all mutants would just reopen old wounds.” Surprisingly reasonable. “As for genetic inferiors that want to worship our divine mother? Let them, perhaps she will rebirth them with the gift of mutation in their next life.” And there is the supremacist rhetoric.

“Extraterrestrials and other subspecies of humans aren’t inferior to us Exodus and I won’t vote for any motion that even implies they are.” I know I’ve misstepped with my reflexive rejection of supremacist arguments even before Exodus’ grin grows larger.

“So you wouldn’t be opposed to the motion provided it flatters the flatscans enough?”

My eyes narrow as the smug zealot and I both come to a stop. “Perhaps I wouldn’t have, but I’m coming around to the idea that this isn’t an issue for the Quiet Council to rule on at all. To declare from on high a single official truth of mutant origins is an overreach and I can assure you that Utopia will not stand for it.”

“Even though your own nation has the divine mother on its flag and your own family worships her?” I want to punch his smug face so badly, he wasn’t trying to get access to Hope, he is baiting me into saying no and it's working.

“Renewalism is not a state religion, and Utopia does not officially back any theory on the origins of mutants. My answer is no Exodus.” He’ll almost certainly take that answer and try to use it to draw votes to his side, probably Shaw and Selene.

“A pity, do pass on my wishes for the prophet’s continued health. I’ll see you in the council chambers tomorrow then, Spider-Queen.” I can only glare at the infuriating man’s back as he walks away, if only I hadn’t pushed for assault to still be illegal under krakoan law when the council first formed I could just vaporise him with an optic blast and wait for him to be resurrected. 

Deep breath, the view of Arcadia rising, breathe out.

No, it is better that we have an actual detailed law code. We almost ended up with only three actual laws, one of which could be interpreted as a mandate for pregnancy. Not being free to blast my co-workers when they are annoying is a small price to pay for avoiding that disaster.

“Dammit! He’s made me late for Sharon’s welcome back to life dinner!”

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 13, 4 years ago, Utopia

“I heard she was born in a tube.”

“They say she’s programmed to hunt real mutants down.”

“I’m not! I promise! I’m normal!”

“Gwen what is this? These questions aren’t difficult, you should have caught up to the others by now. We can’t afford to give you special treatment.”

“I. I’m sorry. I’ll try harder.”

It’s the smell that hits me first, after weeks of living on the streets the lingering scent of bleach and the lack of body odor is so alien that it is the first thing I focus on.

The next sensation that returns is touch, my throat scratched raw from screaming, the scratchy texture of the polyester lying atop me making both of my legs itch and chill air currents making the hair of my arms stand on end.

Sound comes next, repeating beeps, feet shuffling across the floor, a tray filled with metal moving away from me, and the clack clack clack of someone typing nearby. Taste then, the sterile air flowing over my dry lips carrying hints of antiseptic and blood.

Finally I force open my eyes and am nearly blinded by the shining white lights of some kind of medical ward. Groans of pain fill my ears, it takes me a moment to realise they are coming from me as I blink the spots from my eyes.

“It is good to see you awake already, I am Dr. Kavita Rao, and you are safe on Utopia. How are you feeling? Small sips now.” A small plastic cup is offered to my grateful lips, the tepid liquid the most delicious I’ve ever tasted in that moment. As it withdraws my eyes follow it to an older woman with tied back black hair and a red dot on her forehead, maybe something to do with her mutant power?

“My legs itch.” It’s a silly response, there are probably much more important things to tell a doctor, but it's the most pressing thought in my head. 

Dr. Rao doesn’t laugh at me like I thought she would, instead she grimaces and takes my hand, it’s a struggle to not recoil at the sudden contact.

“Miss Gwen, could you tell me the last thing you remember?” Siddig must have told them my name, I’m glad he survived the boat sinking after that Sentinel beam pierced…

“Sentinel shot the boat. And- and my leg.” That can’t be right though, I can still feel it. My free hand reaches down, feeling for my leg but I can’t bring myself to look, instead staring over Dr Rao’s shoulder.

“Yes. I am sorry Miss Gwen but we could not save your leg, when you fell unconscious both parts of your body reverted to your humanoid form and your leg fell off the boat in the chaos. Atlantean scouts did find it a day later but it was too late and too damaged for reattachment.”

My hand should be touching my leg by now, I can feel my leg under the sheet and I can feel my hand on top of the sheet but I can’t touch my leg!

Dr. Rao is saying something but I can’t hear her, her voice sounds far away as I stare at the flat sheet where my left leg should be, spines rippling across my skin and my extra arms pressing uncomfortably against my sides.

“Where is my leg?” My free hand clenches, tearing the thin medical sheets.

“Miss Gwen you are hurting m-”

“WHAT DID YOU DO WITH MY LEG!”

Crack

Dr. Rao’s screams ring in my ears and drown out my stammered apologies as I drop her crushed hand, a giant metal man smashing through the door soon after. I’m still frantically apologising and reaching for the retreating older woman as he pins me to the floor in a chokehold.

“Is it true the Jackal cloned you to kill Spider-Man?”

“I don’t know! Leave me alone!”

“Gwen, this is the third report your roommates have made this week. This kind of behavior is unacceptable, it’s wasting our time.”

“I didn’t do anything!”

“Lying will only make things worse Gwen, I expect an, look at me when I’m talking to you young lady, an essay on what you did wrong by next week and we will be moving you to a different room, again.”

“I can’t keep up! It’s too much!”

This time I’m not in the medical centre when I wake up, instead I’m in some kind of bedroom, it looks a bit like the dorm rooms at the Jean Grey School if you replaced all of the wood panelling with metal and plastic. There is something off about the window, the light and sounds don’t feel quite right.

Regardless, the bed is the most comfortable I’ve slept in since I was kicked out of the Jean Grey School, soft but supportive with a heavy and warm blanket. I snuggle further into the warm softness, this is much more comfortable then Dr Rao’s medical bed.

“Dr. Rao!”

I’m already out of bed before my lack of a leg makes itself known as my second footfall doesn’t happen, leaving me to topple over onto my face, thankfully missing any other furniture. Actually, now that I am more awake I notice that the area around the bed has been completely cleared of anything I could hit my head on while falling.

As I drag myself up to set on the edge of the bed I study the room more intently, what I thought was a window at first is actually a video screen showing a view out to the big bridge and San Francisco, I think it might be a live recording since you can see the O.N.E. blockade, right down to the troops moving back and forth.

After two failed attempts to hop and crawl to the door I find some kind of button near the head of the bed. Pressing it doesn’t seem to do anything, even after I press it a second time. Eventually I give up, crawling back beneath the covers to stay warm despite the cold medical gown.

Not long after that I bolt upright again as a knock comes from the door. “Gwen? My name’s Xuân, can I come in?”

The headboard feels cold against my back but it and the wall behind it are stopping me from retreating any further. She’s probably here to throw me out for hurting Dr Rao, but what can I do? It’s not like there is anywhere to run. “Yes.”

A woman, who looks a few years older than me, with a metal left leg walks through the door. My own leg, my own stump, itches as I draw the covers up to my chin, unable to tear my eyes away from her missing limb.

“Do you want to ask about it?” Xuân taps her metal leg as she sits down on the foot of the bed.

I focus on my hands picking at the threads of the cover to stop myself from staring. “Is Dr. Rao okay? I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to, I panicked! I promis-”

“Hey, hey. It’s okay. Dr. Rao will make a full recovery and no one blames you for what happened. We are sorry that things got so out of hand, we’ve all been run ragged managing the refugee streams and fighting O.N.E.” Why are they sorry? I’m the one who messed up and hurt someone. “You woke up earlier than we expected and your student file didn’t say anything about superstrength. Even so, Dr Rao shouldn’t have touched you without permission.” I don’t have superstrength, not when I’m in my human shape. At least I don’t think I do?

“Student file? Jean Grey School?” I thought Utopia would be somewhere to start fresh. Where no one would know about the Jackal and Mr Sinister being my creators. Where will I even be able to go when they reject me here as well?

“Yes, I used to be the librarian and french teacher there until the war with the Avengers. We still have hidden backchannels we can talk to them through. When we asked them if they knew a mutant matching your description they sent a full student file and medical history. It was a very brave thing you did, leaving the school to make your way here.”

What?

“I didn’t leave. I was kicked out.” Xuân recoils, maybe in surprise, maybe because of the specks of literal venom behind my words.

“Are you sur-”

“They said that I was a failure! That I was a dangerous monster made by villains! That I wasn’t really a mutant at all!” My vision fills with red as I yell at Xuân but I manage to keep the energy under control, barely, I want to cry but all that leaks out is wisps of red light.

“Well they were wrong.” Colour fades back into the world as I stare at the angry Xuân in shock. “You are a mutant, Cerebra and medical tests both confirm it, and you are neither a monster nor a failure for being hurt by bad men.” Her voice is firm and sure, am I still dreaming? This is everything I’ve dreamed of hearing. “I personally promise you that Utopia won’t ever reject you like that. We wouldn’t even if you weren’t a mutant.”

Tears, normal tears, are coming freely now, hiccups and snot making my babbled words almost impossible to understand. 

Once I’m calmed down a bit Xuân passes me a tissue and gives me a moment to clean myself up. “Dr. Rao is going to be okay. What about Siddig? The rest of the boat crew? They helped me.”

“They all made it as well, a few bumps and bruises but they all fully recovered while you were unconscious.”

“What will happen to them?” No sense in hiding what the Jean Grey School said about them if they already know I went there. “The Jean Grey School said that Utopia was only for mutants.”

Xuân purses her lips and grumbles about needing to talk to someone called Kitty before she answers me. “That isn’t quite true, Utopia has always had human citizens since its founding. Dr Rao is one of them.” I used my powers to hurt a human! That’s one of the worst things a mutant can do, why is Xuân so calm about it? Why aren’t I being punished? “It is a mutant sanctuary first and foremost true but it doesn’t turn away other refugees, no matter how crowded the island gets. The smuggling crew that brought you here have been working with us to get mutants to safety for over a month now, ever since the blockade started, they are all welcome to stay or to be taken to a neutral nation of their choice as soon as we can fit the trip in.”

I’m not sure what ‘neutral’ means but it sounds like a good thing from context. “I’m glad they are okay. Um. What happens now? I still hurt Dr. Rao.”

Xuân taps her metal leg again. “Now, if you accept, we can go see Madison Jefferies and get you fitted for a prosthetic leg like mine. Then pick up some new clothes for you from the quartermaster, I’m afraid most of your possessions were lost when the ship sank.” She stands and offers me her hand. “If you really want to make up for the accident with Dr. Rao then you should train your superstrength and self control so it doesn’t happen again.”

I’m not sure why my stomach flips at being told that my tent and clothes are gone, a fresh start on Utopia with a proper bed is what I want isn’t it? Pushing that down I take Xuân’s hand and let her support me across her shoulders as we head off to meet this ‘Madison Jefferies’. “I didn’t know I had superstrength. It’s never happened before. The school couldn’t have known. There's still so much I don’t know.”

“Well lucky for you, helping young mutants discover themselves is what the X-Men are all about, we’ll help you as much as we can, Gwen.” Dammit, now I’m crying again.

The next evening Xuân is helping me learn to use my new prosthetic leg by having me walk laps around one of the circular platforms on the surface of Utopia. At first I still needed her support to walk but she has just let go and is letting me take my first independent steps.

“Wah!” The sudden movement of the island almost makes me lose my balance, Xuân rushing to stop me falling before I wave her off. “I can do it! I’m okay.” I’m not as elegant and impressive as Xuân, every step is awkward and stilted - the ankle and knee of my prosthetic don’t move like my real leg - I’m more limping then I am walking, but I’m doing it!

“You’re doing great Gwen but let’s take a break, I’ve got something cool to show you.”

My stump is starting to ache… I can keep going though! I won’t fail again! “I can keep going.”

Her response is almost drowned out by the building roar coming from the sea. “You don’t have to come and sit but I don’t think you’ll want to miss this.”

“Okay. Sorry.” Turning around almost makes me fall again but I manage to waddle over to Xuân and slump roughly next to her. “Oof. Sorry. Again.”

“It’s alright, you don’t need to apologise. It took me a little bit to work out how to sit comfortably with this thing too. Look over there.” Following Xuân’s pointing finger my mouth drops open in shock at a large part of the sea seeming to boil and froth beneath a circle of flying people, mutants.

“Wow. Are they causing that? What are they doing?”

“They are, as for what they are doing, just keep watching.”

Over the next few minutes the movement of the water gets more and more violent before finally the first peaks break through the foam and I understand what I’m looking at. “They’re making a new island!”

“They are, we are, Mutants and Atlanteans working together to create a new home for our peoples. That is what Utopia is all about, Gwen. Arcadia is just the first new island of many, with this we’ll solve the overcrowding problem before it gets any worse and can start working on food security for ourselves.” Xuân is beaming as she looks at the island continuing to grow out of the raging waters.

My heart feels tight when I look back at the emerging island, Xuân says we are doing this but I’m not doing anything, I’m just distracting people with my leg and hurting Dr Rao.

“Just talk to her, Scott.” A new voice draws our attention away from the island being created. A redhaired woman in an x-man outfit and a really cool leather coat is pushing an older man with red glasses over to us and waving at Xuân.

“I will Rache, I’m not ignoring her I’m just busy with getting Arcadia raised.” The man says. He must want to talk to Xuân, I should go back to my room and stop wasting people’s time.

“The plans have been finished for days, at this point you’re just micromanaging and slowing things down. Talk to the poor girl, Dad. Hey Karma! Can I ask you something?” Oh, the woman, Rache, is the one who wants to talk to Xuân, so the man must want to talk to me? He doesn’t look like he does and he sits awkwardly on the other side of me from Xuân.

I don’t want Xuân to leave, I look at her pleadingly as she gets up and walks off with Rache but she just waves at me with a smile. “Bye Gwen! I’ll see you tomorrow, if you're okay with it, I’d like to introduce you to my little siblings and my ward.” This is all happening so fast. All I can do is wave and nod as Xuân leaves me alone, again.

For what feels like a long time the man and I sit awkwardly next to each other, mutually avoiding eye contact and focusing on the island. When it finally stops growing the man clears his throat and holds his hand out to shake.

“Hi, I’m Scott Summers, Cyclops.”

“I’m Gwen, Spider-Girl.” I say, shaking his hand, it’s what the other kids at the Jean Grey School called me at least. “You look different without the mask.” Should I? “Should I do the X salute?” I accompany my question with the crossed arms I saw the angry pink haired boy use when the teacher’s backs were turned.

“Heh. No need for saluting. After all- Well, there isn’t a gentle way to say this I suppose. I’m one of the genetic templates that was used to make you.”

My mouth is dry as I look at my, father, is that the right word? “I. It’s nice to meet you. Do you know who else was use- Who else was involved? Dr. McCoy just said it was three different people.” And that I was made by the supervillains, Jackal and Mr Sinister.

“We do, aside from myself you have two other genetic donors, a mutant woman named Adriana Soria and a human named Gwen Stacy. I’m sorry, they’re both dead.” 

“Oh.” The growing hope that I could have a family, that I could be normal and accepted retreats again. Both of my mothers are dead and none of my three fathers want anything to do with me. Jackal and Mr Sinister abandoned me on the streets and Cyclops obviously doesn’t want to be around me.

We sit in silence again for a long time, both holding our knees tight to our chests as a boat sets out from Utopia to the new island, I can just about make out the tiny forms of people getting off and starting to work, colourful blasts of energy carving caves and channels into the bare rock. Stupid. If I hadn’t lost my leg I could be over there being useful and earning my keep like them.

“Your friend Siddig is over there you know?” Scott says, smiling slightly when I shake my head. “He has some construction experience so he’s leading one of the sub-teams making the foundations for new buildings on Arcadia.”

“Oh. That’s good. I’m glad he’s okay.”

Scott looks almost proud? “He’s very thankful for you saving him, he and other members of the Ugly Bulldog’s crew visited you when you were unconscious in the infirmary, I’m sure they’d like to say thank you in person tomorrow when he comes back.”

Siddig was the guy I saved from falling over? “I didn’t know it was Siddig.” I admit. “I just saw someone falling overboard.”

“And you reacted to save his life regardless, you did good.” I’m blushing, warm blood rushing under my skin and making it itch.

“Thanks.” The memory of what came next has a chill spreading from my tummy. “I messed up though. I got distracted. They took my leg.” I’m crying again, I’m so pathetic.

“Hey. You held off four Sentinels on your own with no training, you even destroyed one.” A hesitant arm wraps around my shoulders before drawing me into a hug against his side. “You did good, it wasn’t perfect, yes, but you’ve had no training. I’m sorry our response was so slow and you got injured.”

“Not your fault.” 

“Not your fault either.” I laugh slightly at his response, still crying into my genetic donor’s shoulder. “Do you want training so you can do better next time? It would be completely fine if you want to be a civilian, but I think you have what it takes to be an X-Man one day if you join the trainees.”

Do I want to be an X-Man? I told Siddig that I don't want to fight and be angry, and it's true, but I don’t want to see people get hurt if I could save them either. I want to be useful though, to thank Utopia for finally welcoming me, and a part of me is so angry though, angry at the Jean Grey School, angry at O.N.E., angry at the people who never helped me on the streets and angry at Jackal and Mr Sinister for making me only to abandon me. Shouldn’t I use that anger to save lives like I did on the boat?

Scott even seemed proud of me for fighting the Sentinels, no one’s ever said I did good before and I want more of that, but the ache from my stump reminds me of the cost I’ve paid for that praise. “What about my leg?”

Scott looks me in the eyes for the first time, it's uncomfortable but I try to meet his gaze and not look away, I can just about make them out behind his red tinted glasses if I try. The distraction of focusing on seeing past his glasses helps me ignore the prickling feeling from being stared at.  “It will be hard, you’ll stumble, you’ll fail and sometimes it will feel hopeless but as long as you get back up and keep moving forward I know you can do it. Karma, Xuân, and I have both overcome our own disabilities to be X-Men, I think you have what it takes as well.”

My palm feels clammy against the cool metal of my false leg, I wonder what my donor’s disability is, both of his legs seem intact. Is he blind or something else? “I want to be strong. Like Xuân and you. I’ll join.”

My genetic template stands up, the sudden lack of support almost makes me lose my balance before his hand reaches out to pull me to my feet and steady me. “Excellent, we’ll introduce you to the rest of the trainees tomorrow.” That’s so quick, won’t I get any training on my own first? They are probably far ahead of me and I can barely walk- “I’m proud of you, Gwen.” Oh.

“Really?” All of my worries seem small and unimportant as the taller man, my biological father, looks down at me with a tiny smile. “Even though I’m.” A monster, a freak, a tool, a failure. “A clone?”

“Absolutely, you won’t be the first clone, or even my first clone child, on the X-Men. Some of the finest people I’ve served with have been clones. Your brother Nate is actually also a clone made by Mr Sinister.” My father’s smile grows larger as he starts to talk about this brother I’ve never met and some of the other clone’s he’s worked with like Joseph and a set of five sisters called the Cuckoos. I want him to look that proud about me one day.

“Brother? So, I have a family?” I ask him as he leads me, still limping slightly from the ache in my stump, towards Xuân and Rachel on the other side of the platform.

“Ah, sorry I shouldn’t have assumed, if you want to be a part of our family then yes we have a place for you here. I know Rachel and Nate feel the same way.”

It’s more than I dared hope for, I came to Utopia for a home and safety but if I can have a family like a normal girl as well? “Yes, please. I. I won’t let you down!”

Dad’s next words are like seeing the sun rise for the first time all over again. “I know you won’t. Welcome to the family, Gwen Summers.”

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 17, Now, Krakoa

The Utopian Embassy in Krakoa, my home for the last few weeks since Krakoa’s founding and being given this job, has never looked so intimidating. The circular tower, made of the same living krakoan biomatter as everything else on the island despite its more technological aesthetics, looms over me like a sacrificial megalith, ready to take my hard won happiness away at the slightest misstep.

I shouldn’t be so nervous, I know Mom loves me and Sharon is just another sibling to make friends with. I managed to eventually make friends with Celeste, Mindee and Phoebe, I can make friends with Mom’s first child, we even share a bestial transformation type mutation! If I do make a faux pas and hurt Sharon’s feelings Mom still won’t throw me out or disown me, I need to focus, find my safe place.

Deep breath, remember watching Arcadia rise, breathe out.

Nope. Still petrified with anxiety.

“Knight Summers?” Marshall Stone III, Random, the X-Force guard on duty has finally worked up the courage to ask me why I’m just standing in front of our own home.

“Just lost in my own thoughts, Sergeant Random. I take it Queen Frost is already in residence?”

“Her majesty arrived 20 minutes ago with the resurrected Hellions, ma’am. She said to tell you she will be in the main dining room with Miss Catseye, the other Hellions have been shown to the guest wing.”

“Thank you, Sergeant. I’ll see myself up.” I pause to whisper in his ear as I pass. “I doubt anything will happen today but be on the look out for any Church of Hope loiterers or protesters just in case.”

“Understood ma’am, I’ll pass it on to the lieutenant. Good luck with the queen.”

“Thanks Random, I’ll probably need it.”

“Ah, she finally arrives. What time do you call this young lady?” Mom, ever elegant, barely pauses in her dignified eating as I slip into the embassy dining room, the only sign acknowledging my presence being her gracefully arced brow and her sharp words.                                                                                                                                                                  

“Sorry, sorry. Councillor du Paris demanded to talk with me after today's meeting.” Sharon Stone, Catseye, is obviously making an effort to emulate mom, dressed in similarly expensive tailored clothes and sitting primly at the table. That her clothes are roughly 10 years out of fashion and she is tearing into her tuna steak with her bare fingers muddles the image somewhat admittedly. 

“Wereupon you let him bait you into an argument and making a declaration he plans to use to secure Shinobi Shaw and Selene’s votes for his ridiculous religious proclamation." Shame ripples through me at the reminder of my misstep, my exoskeleton following immediately after trying to push through my skin and pressing uncomfortably against my prosthetic. Pushing it down, I remind myself that if Mom was actually as disappointed as she sounds she wouldn’t have brought it up in front of Sharon.

“I let my temper get the best of me there.” I admit as I slide into my seat on Sharon’s right hand side, her cat tail, still kept out despite her otherwise human form, curling around my prosthetic leg’s ankle. “I have plans to ensure it doesn’t pass but let's not talk business during Sharon’s welcome back to life dinner.”

“Given that you made this mess by losing your temper like a bull in a china shop, I will be reviewing and grading those plans after dinner. Your position here is too important to be making such mistakes, you have big names to live up to Gwen.” Despite her harsh words, Mom's mental presence is as warm and caring as normal, the icy wall of anxiety my mind has been caught in finally starting to melt now that I can feel her support.

<Do stop catastrophising dear, we won’t recall you over a single mistake, or if you don’t get along with Sharon for that matter.> 

“Prettylady have metal leg, why not fix like Catseye and friends?” I’d bite the head off most people who asked me that but my still semi-feral teenaged sister looks truly confused rather than dismissive.

“I get asked that a lot, I could have a replacement organic leg and I’ve thought about it.” My fifth hand ghosts over the socket were my mechanical prosthetic nerve-links with my stump. “My metal leg isn’t a flaw to be fixed, it's as much a part of me as my flesh leg.”

“That make sense!” Catseye replies guilelessly and refocuses on her tuna steak, her tail continuing to coil around my ankle. Mom had warned me what to expect but it's still a little shocking just how feral Catseye is, her grasp of English is even worse than mine was when I arrived on Utopia.

Caress, one of the embassy kitchen staff, brings my own meal out, an identical plate of tuna steak, sauteed asparagus, salad and rice to Mom and Catseye’s. One set of arms passes my report on my cocktail and coffee experiments to Caress to file, along with the first instructions for my plans to counter Exodus’ move, while the other two start to cut into my meal. “Thank you, Caress. So Catseye, how are you and your friends finding Krakoa so far?”

She pauses in her eating to chew her lips as she thinks it over. “Catseye very glad to be alive again, not horrid machine fur like last time.” She must mean the incident when Selene resurrected mutants as technological zombies to attack Utopia before I was born, I hadn’t realised that the krakoan resurrected would remember that. “Krakoa seems happy but… false. Like Empath’s fake emotions. The people are happy but barely any real animals to hunt or real food to eat, even wind and pollen are fake.”

I blink in shock, slightly taken aback at Catseye’s insight, while Mom looks at the feline mutant with fond pride. I really should know better than to dismiss her intelligence just because of her speech from my own example but it's still incongruous to be on the other side of it.

“That’s very insightful, Catseye. It took a lot of negotiation to convince the living island to let us import some wild species, the fake animals and plants you noticed are extensions or symbiotes of Krakoa itself.”

“Not just the prey and leaves, Missy said that everyone is friends on Krakoa but Catseye can tell some people still not friends. Like War Chief and Nastyboy. Or like Missy and Firehair.” Let’s see, Mom gave me a psychic list of Catseye’s nicknames before she was resurrected: Missy is mom, short for Miss Frost; War Chief is Knight Commander James Proudstar, Warpath, one of Utopia’s top military leaders; Nastyboy is Manuel de la Rocha, Empath, a sociopath who should still be locked up in the x-brig but was freed as part of the universal amnesty demanded by Krakoa; and Firehair is Angelica Jones, Firestar, one of Mom’s victims from her supervillain days who fought bravely as a member of the resistance against hydra. The latter three are members of the original Hellions who didn’t die and need resurrecting on krakoa.

“Yes, I doubt James or Manuel will ever get along and I am afraid Angelica will probably never forgive me, with good reason." Mom admits. It's always strange when Mom talks about her life in the Hellfire Club before the Hellions died, the manipulative witch she describes sounds like a different person then the strict but caring woman who taught me so much. “When I said that all mutants were allies on Krakoa I meant something more like an alliance of convenience Sharon, like cats teaming up temporarily to hunt. It was by uniting Utopian phoenix energy studies, Akkaban celestial tech research and several independent mutants with Cerebro and Mr Sinister’s genetic caches that we were able to finally resurrect you properly.”

Ugh. I hate being reminded of those, I had enough anxiety about my purpose when I thought that Jackal and Mr. Sinister collaborated to make me, finding out that I’m a mistake twice over, the result of the Jackal discovering an abandoned prototype resurrection system cache and experimenting randomly with the x-gene, is my personal least favourite revelation from reading classified krakoan files. Finding out that Nathaliel Exxex had nothing to do with my creation besides contributing genetic material only softened the blow a little.

“Why is new happyfriend Foureyes sad?” Catseye’s words of concern draw my attention back to the present. 

“Hehe, you’re not the first to use that nickname for me.” I rapidly open and close more of my eyes, shifting between two and eight eyes on my face at a time before returning to my standard four. “Personally I don’t think it's a very good fit, my names are Gwen Summers and Spider-Queen. Sorry for not introducing myself earlier, it’s nice to finally meet you Catseye, I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Catseye initially pouts at me rejecting her nickname but her entire face lights up with joy when I mention my mutant name. “Oh! New furfriend? Spider furfriend? We play?” Her last question is accompanied by her transforming into her housecat form and pouncing across the table to lick at my face.

“Ahahaha! That tickles! After the meal, after the meal! My animal form is a very big spider, too big to fit in this room but after food I promise we can go for a run through the treetops.”

I’m not sure if it's the promise of future fun or the reminder of her unfinished food but Catseye returns to her seat and her human form, though I notice that she keeps her eyes and ears feline this time. So does mom, which causes her to throw me a dirty look.

<It took me three months to get Sharon to look mostly human at the dinner table and you are already undermining it on the day she comes back to life.>

Despite her words Mom is smirking and her psychic tone sounds amused.

<Looking human isn’t a virtue in itself Mom, just looking how you want to look. For you that is completely human, for myself, and apparently Catseye, our hybrid forms are most comfortable.>

<You both look glorious dear, the problem is that Sharon persists in the delusion that she is a cat who turns into a human rather than a mutant who transforms into a cat.>

<Ah, I’ll do my best to not encourage that.>

“How did Spiderseye meet Missy?” Catseye asks around a stalk of asparagus, judging from the way her eyes flick between us fully aware of Mom and I’s telepathic conversation even if she couldn’t hear it herself.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full, Sharon.” Mom idly responds, poorly concealing her nervousness beneath her teacher persona. For my part I determinedly don’t meet Catseye’s inquisitive gaze, instead focusing on eating my meal.

<You need to talk to her about it eventually Mom.>

<She will hate me for replacing her.>

<You didn’t replace her and no she won’t.>

Mom stays silent, uncharacteristically poking at what little remains of her food while refusing to look at Catseye or myself. Eventually, as Catseye loses patience and starts to bounce her leg with nerves, I speak up. “Emma married my father, she’s my Mom and I’m her daughter.”

“Missy found a tom! Catseye is very very happy for Missy!” Catseye turns from Mom to me with a gasp. “So Spiderseye is Catseye’s sister!” 

Mom is too controlled and graceful to do a spit take but she does pause in sipping her drink at Catseye’s deduction.

“Yes she is, Sharon. You also have six other sisters and a brother on my side of the family, along with an uncle, my husband Scott has another daughter, two sons and a granddaughter along with his brothers. I, we, didn’t want to overwhelm you by meeting everyone at once.” I am not as controlled and graceful as her and do spittake at Mom mentioning Kevin to Catseye, Mom never talks about Kevin if she can avoid it.

“When can Catseye meet them? Catseye wants to meet whole happyfamily!” My youngest sister, but paradoxically Mom’s first child, starts chattering a mile a minute, practically talking Mom’s ears off as she tries to learn everything she can about her new siblings and father. Once I’ve recovered from my coughing fit I rest my chin on one set of hands happily, watching as Mom finally relaxes and shows the gentle smile she reserves for family as we answer Catseye’s questions.

<Told you she wouldn’t be angry.>

<No one likes a braggart, Gwen.>

Later that evening, after Catseye and I had our promised race through the trees, which she won when I misjudged how sturdy a branch was and fell from the canopy, I wallcrawl onto the balcony of Mom’s guest room where she is enjoying the embassy’s best champagne and reading a book while enjoying the sunset. The near nightly parties and fireworks the nationless mutants kept throwing after the formal founding have started to calm down thankfully, so the evening is undisturbed by fireworks and music. 

“Did you girls have fun?”

“We did, Catseye chased one of Krakoa’s fake animals then I took her flying, we dropped by the Green Lagoon on the way back. Don’t worry, I didn’t let Sharon drink anything and I didn't drink and fly.” I pour myself a glass of champagne and take the lounge chair next to her. “She’s downstairs sharing the good news of her expanded family with the rest of the Hellions now.”

“I know, they are all happy for her, I can feel their emotions from up here. Roulette is asking if that means Sharon’s last name is ‘Frost’ now.”

“Is it?” Mom rolls her eyes at my grabbing motions but hands her book over to me, it’s an utterly trashy romantacy but I go through the motions of flicking through it as if I’m interested while we talk.

“I’m not sure. For a long time I thought the name would die with me and Christian, but with resurrection opening the door to my sisters returning to life I’m not sure I want them to be free to tarnish my brand if I die permanently. Phoebe, Mindee and Celeste don’t want it, they like the name Cuckoo.”

“But you’re worried they’ll get jealous and bully Catseye if you give it to her.” I love my sisters but I still remember how they bullied me at first for ‘stealing’ Dad’s attention, it's a very reasonable fear for Mom to have.

Mom tips her glass to me in agreement. “Just so, but enough about family drama, tell me about your plans to recover from your misstep with Exodus earlier today.”

“He claims to already have votes lined up in his favour, if he’s telling the truth then, given how pleased he was when he got me to confirm I’d be voting no, he most likely only has one or two votes confirmed aside from himself and is hoping to use my no vote to sway the councillors opposed to me. His existing ally is probably Mystique, she’s been going around trying to arrange quid pro quo vote exchanges to get her wife moved up the resurrection queue.”

“It is dangerous to rely on so many assumptions.” Mom is in full teacher mode and clearly enjoying it as the moonlight reflects off her reading glasses. 

“I know, I already set some of my staff on confirming things at dinner, I also had them begin spreading rumours that you are in favour of Exodus’ proposal - sorry about that - which should sway Selene to vote against it.”

“Relying on Selene to be the pettiest bitch in the universe is a safe bet but it is only one vote, how do you intend to counter Clan Akkaba reflexively voting against Utopia?”

“That, I don’t have a solid idea on how to change.” The admission leaving a sour taste in my mouth. “I’m sure I can rally Eva and the Spring table against the vote though, that would be six votes against to three votes for, the Winter Table is hard to predict but even if they unanimously voted in favour Exodus’ motion would still fail.” Ties on the Quiet Council default to the status quo, in this case no endorsement of a single theory of mutant origins.

“Pryde and St Croix will vote against it but how will you draw Shaw to your side? He’s almost as petty as Selene and has far better reasons to oppose us.” 

“He’s trying to get the council to back a state dinner on the anniversary of Krakoa’s founding with notables from around the world invited, to show off mutant culture, achievement, wealth and power. He intends to call it the ‘Hellfire Gala’. However, it is facing a lot of push back from the Winter and Summer Tables, my own vote would tip the scales in his favour.”

“Shinobi always did have an eye for politics and aesthetics, if things had been different I would have liked to set up something like that on Utopia, but how will you ensure that he keeps his end of any bargain?"

“Last week we passed a motion that codified the order of the agenda and gave it to Krakoa to set as a neutral party. Shaw’s Hellfire Gala proposal is a returning motion, so it always comes after a new motion in the day's proceedings.”

“And what will you do when Exodus brings this motion back and you no longer have that as leverage on Shaw?”

“That I don’t have an answer for, this is all just trying to stem the bleeding from letting Exodus bait me.” I admit, shame faced at failing the lesson on politicking as I pass Mom her book back with a thumb drive hidden between the pages.

<By the time that Exodus can bring his motion forward again after the mandatory wait time we will have much better leverage over Mystique, and any other councillors dissatisfied with the resurrection queue, then he ever could.>

<So your mission was a success?>

<Yes. This is all the data my agents and I could gather on the resurrection protocols along with my own scientific observations on the process. Without Akkaban celestial tech we won’t be able to automate it like Krakoa does but with the right mutant circuit and an infusion of phoenix energy from Hope or Rachel we should be able to do it ‘artisinally’.>

“Dissapointing but not the end of the world, you should have never made your first misstep at all and you need to think longer term but your emergency plan to fix your mistake is solid enough. C-.”

<Well done Gwen, you still messed up by letting Exodus bait you though, B+.>

“Well at least it’s a passing grade.” I hold my glass out for a toast.

“Barely, I expect better from you in the future.” Mom clinks her glass against mine.

I wait until she is taking her sip before springing my observation. “I’m surprised you brought up Kevin to Catseye.” 

Sadly Mom still doesn’t do a spittake, instead she sets her glass aside with a sigh and avoids my eyes. “I was hoping you wouldn’t ask about that. His boyfriend Josh reached out to me earlier today, apparently Kevin wants to reconnect, I’ve been invited to lunch tomorrow.”

Josh Foley, Elixir, is one of the main overseers for the krakoan resurrection protocols, he uses his touch biokinesis to do quality checks and fix any errors that the pod grove’s automated systems accidentally make. His boyfriend Kevin Ford, Wither, was one of the first resurrections after the initial testing stage at Josh’s request; he's only been alive again for a couple of weeks. He’s also the second child that Mom officially took as a ward after Sharon, all of the details were before my time but Mom screwed up with him somehow and he ended up being groomed by Selene and attacked Utopia with an army of techno-zombies.

I’m not very familiar with either of them honestly, Josh’s biokinesis made him too risky to use as a vector for spying on the resurrection protocols. I only know Kevin from hidden fragments of Mom’s memory picked up during psychic training sessions, knowing viscerally how ashamed she is for abandoning him is probably the only reason I can forgive her for what she did, I wouldn’t blame Kevin if he never wanted to see her again.

Lunch tomorrow will be right after Sophie and Esme’s scheduled resurrection, Phoebe, Mindee and Celeste will be arriving in the morning to be there for their quintuplet’s resurrection and to meet Catseye. Then they and Mom, along with any Hellions who accept, will be heading through the gateway network back to Utopia that evening.

“Just the two of you?”

“No, Josh will be there and he said that I could bring a plus one as well. I’m not sure if I should even go, how do I even begin to apologise to Kevin for what I did?”

“Going to the lunch he invited you to would be a good start.” I wish I could say that the angry flush is just the wine but Mom’s fear and shame is hitting close to home, the words flying from my mouth like knives. “Then saying the words ‘I’m sorry’ would be a good second step.”

“This is why I didn’t want to talk about it with you, I didn’t want to trigger you like this.” Mom says before taking a swig from her hipflask. She’s really upset if she’s hitting the hard stuff.

“Don’t make this about me!” Ugh, I’ll need to put off getting Kaine and the New Warriors a superheroing visa another day but if I rearrange things… “I’ll be your plus one.”

“A Quiet Councillor could be a bit overly intimidating…”

“Oh but the Queen of Utopia and the guardian who abandoned him on the streets won’t be intimidating? Avoidant behaviour is beneath you Mom, this isn’t about you or me, Kevin deserves this talk if he wants it. You’re acting like Pry-”

Deep breath, Arcadia, breathe out.

“I’m sorry, I’m projecting and lashing out.”

Mom takes another swig. “No you aren’t, you are right that this is about Kevin’s feelings not mine and you are right to be angry. I don’t want you to be at lunch because, well for exactly this reason, I don't want you to look at me like you look at Pryde.”

“I’d never do that! You’re nothing like her, Mom. Yes you did wrong by Kevin but you care, you care so much. You still think about him and the guilt tears you up inside, Pryde forgot about all about me and still insists that she did the right thing.” Which is bullshit because if she let Quintin Fucking Quire stay at her school there was no excuse to throw me out.

“I am worse than Kitty Pryde, much worse Gwen.” She sighs and runs her fingers through her hair. “But I’m trying to be better, and part of that is giving Kevin the apology and closure he deserves.”

“Who will you take along then? I meant what I said about this being about Kevin's feelings but you should have someone with you to look out for you as well.” Mom cares so much, so much she hurts herself giving more of herself than she can take, she needs someone to care about her as well.

“Cessily I think, she was Kevin's friend on my second Hellions, hopefully a friendly face will help keep tempers cool.” Mom tilts her head towards me, probably picking up the thoughts that Cessily Kincaid brings to mind. “Oh? I’m glad you feel safe enough to reach out to your old cohort at Pryde’s school.”

“I don’t blame the students for the teachers throwing me onto the streets, I mean I used to, but we were all just teenagers, each with our own dramas.” The flush on my cheeks as I finish my glass is only partially from embarrassment at Mom’s prying, the wine is really starting to hit. “Cessily and her wife Roxy are nice, they actually apologised for being too busy with their own issues to care what was happening to me, I think we could be good friends.”

“Good luck, dear. Even if nothing comes of this I’m proud of you for putting yourself out there. Now, if there is nothing else you should head off, I invited Sean over for some fun this evening and he just arrived.”

“I’m going! I’m going!” Laughing, I leap up and start to wallcrawl to my room above as Banshee knocks on Mom’s door. “Have a nice night with your booty call!”

Chapter Text

Past Interlude: Cyclops 1

After Past 2, Later that night.

Scott can't help the sigh of frustration at the sight that greets him when he enters Hope's room, Megan, Gabriel, Laurie and Teon all slumped asleep in chairs surrounding her bed. Ever since Hope exited the emergency operating theater after the battle on the moon her teammates have tried to spend every spare waking moment with her, talking to her, telling her about their days or new people they met, sharing how excited and thankful all of the restored mutants were towards her.

It is a slightly worrying level of co-dependency given Hope's empathic bond with them but he has been too busy and distracted to step in, he even wanted to believe it was helping both her and them. It became more than just worrying in the last few days, with the former team trying to spend every sleeping moment with their comatose leader as well.

He reaches out to jostle Megan awake. "Pixie? Miss Gwynn?"

"Mhm, wha- Oh! Mr Summers. Sorry, I must have fallen asleep."

"You all did. Pixie, you know you can't be here overnight."

"But, Hope needs us!"

"She does, but all of you need proper rest as well Pixie. You most of all, your team is relying on you right now, Megan."

The pink-haired young woman wobbles shakily to her feet as her teammates start to stir. "Why are you talking like I'm team leader? Hope is our leader."

"Megan, when Hope wakes up." 'If she wakes up', the treacherous kernel of doubt in Scott's mind insists. "And she is fully recovered, I'm sure she will want to take up her leadership role again." Scott is the furthest thing from sure about that. "But until then your teammates are still new to this life, and they are grieving with you, as the most experienced it's your responsibility to look after them and that includes making sure you all get a good night's sleep."

The welsh mutant looks conflicted as she brushes a lock of hair behind Hope's ear. "I don't feel ready, I'm not even the oldest, Laurie is two years older than me. She was in college!"

"But you've been an X-Man for two years longer than her." Scott lays a hand on Megan's shoulder to steady her. "The truth is Pixie, I didn't feel ready the first time I had to step up and be the leader my team needed either but I have faith that you are ready, and so did Hope." That is perhaps a slight exaggeration of what Hope intended when she made Pixie her second in command but it is what she needs to hear right now.

With a deep breath the young X-Man draws herself up and turns to face Scott, crossing her arms over her chest in the utopian x-salute. "Yes, sir! I won't let you down, Mr Summers."

He'd never really intended that crossed arms pose to become a formal salute, it was originally just a part of the iconography and message for the counter-propaganda he'd worked on with Erik and Emma. Then Boom Boom had taken the concept and run with it, soon everyone was using it and once the first restored mutant refugees arrived from the mainland it spread like wildfire. He could scarcely walk down a corridor nowadays without people stopping to salute him.

Smiling, Scot returns the salute as Pixie's teammates finally wake up. "I know you won't."

Once Pixie has bundled her team back to their rooms Scott slumps in one of the now vacant chairs and takes one of Hope's limp hands in his own.

"Hey, Hope. I'm sorry I haven't been able to talk the last few days, bad habits die hard I suppose, I never made enough time for you when you were awake either."

The only sound that answers him is the steady rhythmic beep of the heart monitor.

"Your fath- Nathan is still in his own coma, Emma, Rachel and our other psychics can't reach either of you, wherever you are I hope you are there together."

Scott doesn't cry, he can't allow himself to cry when a single stray tear could unleash the devastation within his eyes.

"We got the second island raised at last, once we carve out some living spaces people will finally be able to stop bunking 6 to a room, and I finally met your new aunt Gwen today. It's always hard to nail down exact ages with clones but she's about the same age as you, seventeen. Like all of us, she's had to grow up far too fast. I'm going to try to do better by her, Hope, better than I did by you or Nathan. Heh, I'm not off to the best start."

His free hand clenches with self-directed anger.

"I pushed you too hard, I knew as soon as the Phoenix entered you on the Moon, your screams, they were just like Jean's, Celeste's, Irma's and Phoebe's. I was wrong. You weren't ready." Scott can't help the grin of pride at the memory. "But you were still magnificent, even through the pain you felt, you did it. I felt it, your connection to us all as you undid Wanda's curse, you gave our people a future again Hope, you fulfilled everything that Nathan said you would be." A pause. "Then Tony Stark shot you through the heart and I thought I would have to bury another child."

Scott's gaze falls from Hope's face to the glow visible through her ribcage and medical gown.

"Are you still here Jean? I saw you, in the fire, when most of the Phoenix energy scattered across the world, not just finishing the restoration that Hope started but igniting new mutants, new lights in the darkness. Emma thinks that I'm just associating the trauma of yours, then Phoenix's, death on the Moon from the first time with Hope but I don't think she's right. I think, I think you might have always been the Phoenix. That there was no simulacrum, just a different part of you."

He claps Hope's hand in both of his, in a motion almost like a prayer.

"Phoenix, I want to believe. That you are Jean, that you saved Hope's, our granddaughter's, life because a part of you is still human enough to love her. That you are listening. That you have a plan and a purpose for all of this. If you are Jean and you are listening then I have a request and a promise. Please, don't just save Hope's life, let her wake up and [I]live[/I], so she can experience all the things she missed for your plan's sake."

The red glow from Scott's visor intensifies, casting Hope's comatose features into harsh relief.

"And I promise both of you, Phoenix and Hope, I will kill Tony Stark."

Present Interlude: Mercury 1

After Present 2, Lunch the next day.

"Miss Frost!" Cessily waves her hand, arm extended  a meter in the air to be seen clearly over the crowd of mutants of all shapes and sizes between them.

"Cessily, it's wonderful to see you again." The older woman, her former teacher and mentor, embraces Cessily powerfully once the two manage to push their way through the crowd in front of the Green Lagoon. "Almost a year since I walked you down the aisle to Mrs Washington."

Cessily smiles wistfully at her wedding band. "Thank you again for doing that, I know with the War against Hydra-"

"Nonsense, my dear! I'll always make time for my Hellions, all of them, no matter where life takes them." Miss Frost's smile falters as the pair approach the entrance to the most popular bar slash restaurant slash lounge on Krakoa.

"Hey." Cessily takes Miss Frost's hand and gives it a comforting squeeze. "We all failed Kevin and you were juggling being a headmistress and an X-Man during the worst time in mutant history, I was just a confused teenaged lesbian. If Kevin can forgive me then he can forgive you. Did you make mistakes? Yeah, tons, but so did everyone, the aftermath of M-Day was an impossible challenge."

"But still a challenge I failed, I'm not here looking for forgiveness, just to give Kevin the closure he deserves." Breathing deep to gather her courage Miss Frost steps into the green lagoon, Cessily following close behind her. Even among a sea of Mutants Josh Foley's, Elixir's, golden metallic skin sticks out, even more than Cessily's own reflective mercury form does, and the pair of women instantly spot the table Josh and Kevin are seated at.

Kevin looks just as nervous as Miss Frost does to Cessily, only mumbling a greeting as she and Cessily take their seats across from him and Josh. Miss Frost isn't much more emotive, leaving it to Cess and Josh to handle the reintroductions and ordering everyone's drinks.

"Miss Frost, can you change to your diamond form please? I want to trust you, but I need to know that my thoughts are my own." Kevin visibly calms down after Miss Frost transforms without any argument.

"Ke- Wit- Mr For-" Kevin holds a palm up and Miss Frost shuts up.

"Let me talk first. I'm sorry for running away, and I'm sorry for attacking Utopia. I, I was very hurt and confused, Josh is helping me work through what happened with Selene but I needed to apologise for the death and destruction I caused."

"I forgive you." Miss Frost's soft words seem to lift a huge weight from Kevin's shoulders.

"Can I ask, back then I thought it was just that I was good at hiding but, why didn't you come find me? Why did you leave me on the streets after I ran away?"

Miss Frost seems to struggle to find the words, taking a sip of her cocktail which Cessily knows she can't taste or digest while in diamond form. "At the time I told myself that you needed space to find yourself, the same way I did when I ran away from home." Cessily isn't sure what surprises her more, that Miss Frost ran away from home and lived on the streets or that she is admitting it. "I hired X-Factor and Miss Sinclair to keep an eye on you and protect you from a distance, so that you would be safer than I was at least."

"She said the same thing to me back when I demanded that she bring you back to school." Cessily interjects. "It was a day or two before you called me about Stryker's attack."

A sardonic smile flickers across Miss Frost's face. "They failed to keep you out of Selene's clutches obviously, you ended up following my footsteps in more ways than just leaving home. I, I always intended that when you were ready, when you asked, that you would be welcomed back. I don't know if it was my pride or my fear that you would say no that stopped me from reaching out first."

"I never knew… Selene said that you abandoned me, that you were afraid of my power, and then when she told me about Stryker and I called Cess…" Kevin chokes up, Josh rubbing small circles on his boyfriend's back to help him calm down. "I suppose I took it as confirmation that she was telling the truth about everything else as well."

Miss Frost stares at her lap for a moment before looking Kevin in the eye. "Selene is a liar and was telling you what she knew would drive you into her clutches but she was accidentally correct on one point. The truth is that I let you walk away because I am a coward and a failure as a mutant educator. I didn't believe in you, I thought you could be a danger to the other students because of your powers and your lack of control. I am so sorry for breaking my promise Kevin, I should never have let my fear control me."

Kevin looks on the verge of tears as he leans into Josh's side, Cessily wants to reach out and hold his hand in support but she knows it would be inappropriate when she is Miss Frost's plus one.

"What does she mean by breaking a promise Kev?" Josh asks softly.

"After I killed my dad I was a ward of the state, to get me enrolled Miss Frost adopted me as her ward." Kevin's disappointed glare practically drills into Miss Frost's diamond features. "She promised me that she would never fear my power, that she would help me control it."

Miss Frost inclines her head in agreement. Cessily isn't sure how to feel about Miss Frost right now, she has always been a strict and demanding teacher, but Cessily had always felt she knew that Miss Frost cared under it all. Even after she left Utopia for the relative safety of the Jean Grey School, Cessily had always thought she could rely on Miss Frost to back her up. Knowing that isn't always true is… disconcerting. Like finding a moth eaten hole in a childhood blanket.

Kevin takes a deep breath and steadies himself. "Apology accepted, I'd like to meet again some time and talk more but, I need some space. This has been draining enough and, honestly, it's hard to look at you right now."

"Of course." When Cessily moves to get up with Miss Frost she waves her down. "I'll be okay Cessily but thank you for coming here today, if the three of you would like to catch up then don't let this old woman get between you."

Cessily looks back at Kevin and Josh. "We'd love to catch up, Cess." Kevin gestures at her wedding band. "Who's the lucky guy?"

"Heh. It's a girl, actually. Do you remember our old classmate Roxanne Washington? We got married last year, she's amazing and so smart. We're on an X-man team together in Wakanda and she just got accepted as a fellow with the University of Birnin Zana…" Cessily gets so caught up in bragging to her old friends about her wife she completely misses when Miss Frost leaves.

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 13, 4 years ago, Utopia

“Hi. I’m Gwen, Spider-Girl. Can I sit with you?”

“Hi! I’m Rico, people call me Scorpi-”

“Yo, Scorpion-Boy! She’s a Mr Sinister clone, don’t you remember what Professor Logan said in history class? ‘You can’t trust anything from Sinister.’”

Their feet as Rico is forced away by the pink haired boy sound rhythmic, like someone knocking on a door…

“I’m not like that! I’m like you! A mutant! Please don’t leave…”

“Miss Warren, you’re failing all your classes, you refuse to join any extracurricular clubs, and you have even more disciplinary reports then Mr Quire, we’ve given you every opportunity to shape up but you just won’t put in the effort from your side. I’m afraid you’ve left us no choice but to expel you."

There is an insistent knocking at the principal’s office door…

“Where will I go?” No point arguing, it just makes things worse.

“There are plenty of state schools in Salem Center, the school board will find you a place in one.”

A fist pounding on my door shocks me awake, sweat still beading on my forehead from the unpleasant memories.

“Hey, Gwen! You’ve got to come see this, your uncle is going to give a speech with Captain America on TV!” Noriko’s voice comes through the thin barrier separating my room from the new dorm corridor on Arcadia.

In the month or so since I arrived Arcadia has been totally transformed, the artificial island is now honeycombed with tunnels and covered in towers housing tens of thousands of mutants and humans, all supplied with electricity, air, water, food and communications. The trainee X-men got moved over to a new set of dorms with a connected training room, close to the main school complex which most of us still attend in addition to training, as soon as they were set up.

“Coming! Coming!” Groaning, I sit up, quickly clean my stump and pull my leg sleeve on over it. That done, I connect my prosthetic up to the nerve socket on the sleeve, the sensation sending the same jolt of phantom pains it always does, and pull on a longer set of trousers over my pajama shorts.

The mechanised door slides into the wall at the press of a button and I stumble out into the light, covering my eyes and feeling for the wall as I make my way to the common room. Noriko and Crosta’s raised voices become clearer as I get closer, I’m making much better time than I was when we first moved in, a month of physical therapy has me barely limping at all.

My eyes finally adjust to the light as I reach the common room, Noriko and Crosta are sitting together on the main couch along with Megan and David, the blue haired mutant and the blue skinned atlantean both heckling Captain America as he gives his speech, while Teon is sitting on the floor in front of Megan, leaning back into her legs while she plays with his hair. The two team leaders, the pink haired Megan and the black-skinned David, greet me with smiles. 

I don’t know if I’m just better at human interaction with an additional seven months of experience or if the people on Utopia are just nicer but most things are going a lot better then at the Jean Grey School. I like to think that I’ve made some friends, Rachel and Nate both say that teams should be friends, Dad always looks sad when I ask him though.

Martha, Sooraya, Gabriel and Laurie are sitting, well not strictly sitting in Martha’s case since she is a disembodied brain, on the left couch while the Cuckoo triplets are filling up the right couch.

“Sorry, Spider-Girl-”

“All the seats-”

“Are taken.”

The triplet hive mind says, despite all three couches being built for four people at once. It’s too early in the morning for this, I thought I’d escaped petty bullying when I came to Utopia but at least here the only people avoiding me are the Cuckoos and Miss Frost 

“Cut the crap you three, there’s clearly room for Gwen, move up so she can sit with all of us.” Noriko snaps, triplets start shouting back over the TV and Noriko just yells more, I shouldn’t be causing so much trouble.

“I’ll stand.” I cut in, leaning part of my weight on the main couch as Captain America introduces Havok as the new chairman of “The Avengers Unity Division”, this is my first time seeing my uncle outside of the picture that Dad keeps at his desk, his costume is a bit boring honestly, it’s basically just a plain black bodysuit with a few white stripes on his forehead and a glowy thing on his chest.

“No need. Gwen can have mine.” Sooraya shifts into a cloud of dust over my objections that I’m fine and reforms between Celeste and Phoebe Cuckoo, pushing them both aside with her elbows.

“Thank you, Sooraya." I sink gratefully into the soft couch, between Martha’s floating brain case and Gabriel, rubbing my prosthetic knee, I’m still getting phantom aches from standing too long with it. Dr. Rao suggested some medication for it but the side effects would force me off the team. I need to be here, to earn my place and make Dad proud, I can’t just sit around not contributing and wasting people’s time.

“I programmed the TV to pause whenever we talk loud enough. It’ll start again when we stop talking.” David announces as Havok takes his mask off, revealing blond hair a shade or two darker than mine, and starts speaking. Behind him the rest of the ‘Unity Division’ are standing in a row: Captain America, Thor, Scarlet Witch, Beast, Wolverine and Sunfyre.

We wear these things so people don't know who we are. But I want you to know exactly who I am. My name is Alex Summers. I am a student of Professor Charles Xavier. This team is an embodiment of his simple dream of all people working together. A fight more important now than ever. 

Noriko snorts, “Oh sure, ‘all people working together’, this is the whitest Avengers team in years, Sunfyre’s the only exception.”

“You’re not wrong Nori but to be a little fair five out of seven members are mutants, plus I think that Scarlet Witch is Romani." David points out.

“That still leaves five out of seven members as white men, David.” Sooraya counters.

David raises his hands in surrender, a smile on his face. I’m not really sure why he’s smiling if he lost the argument.

Half a year ago the world saw my brother Scott gamble with the lives of everyone on this planet, and lose, setting in motion a threat which was only stopped by the quick action of the Avengers. And while he tried to make a lasting change to fix what he saw as broken, no man should ever unilaterally take action or choose for so many. It is hubris. 

“Things were going fine!” Megan shouts, the pink haired girl leaping off the couch and taking flight on her iridescent insect wings, the loss of her grooming prompting a whine from Teon. “Hope had it under control, I felt it, we all did.” Laurie, Gabriel and Teon, the other three members of Hope’s former team all yell their support. “She was healing us, undoing what the Scarlet Bitch did and then bloody Iron Man shot her and put her in a coma!” Her energy is infectious, the rest of us cheering her rant on, even the otherwise reserved Sooraya.

“Hell yeah! Hope gave David and everyone else their powers back and made it so new mutants like Gwen could even be born, or, er, made or whatever… No offence Gwen, Cuckoos.” Despite her words Noriko doesn’t look very sorry.

“Yeah, none taken, Noriko.” I lie, glaring at the floor even as the Cuckoo sisters openly glare at Noriko, it's the first time those three have agreed with me on anything I think. The awkward energy from her verbal misstep brings the mood back down, the quiet making my uncle’s speech resume.

I never quite saw things as my brother did, and later our views diverged even further. I don't see myself as being born into a mutant cult or religion. Having an X-Gene doesn't bond me to anyone. It doesn't define me. 

“Argh! I wish people would stop calling us a cult” Laurie facepalms, her crystalline skin ringing from the impact. 

“Things are getting more religious here since the Avengers War.”

“We pick up a lot of the restored mutants praying to Hope.”

“Or the Phoenix Force itself, but it's still not really a cult.”

Sooraya nods along to the Cuckoo’s words. “I’ve spent a lot of my life fighting cults: the Taliban, the Purifiers, the Reavers. Utopia isn’t a cult or any kind of religion, we are just people defending ourselves." 

In fact, I see the very word "mutant" as divisive. 

The whole room boos at that, even Crosta who normally insists on being an Atlantean first and a mutant second.

Old thinking that serves to further separate us from our fellow man. We are all humans. Of one tribe. We are defined by our choices, not the makeup of our genes. 

“We’re not the ones doing the separating!” Noriko screams, sparks flaring from her containment gauntlets.

“Yeah! We tried living with the humans and they turned our school into a concentration camp! Then they drove us off the mainland with a fucking army and a team of fake ‘X-men’, then they invaded our island with the Avengers and a helicarrier!” Megan is hovering around the room now, the loud buzzing from her wings almost drowning out her rant. 

<And that’s just what the government did without including hate groups or supervillains!> Martha chimes in telepathically.

“We do live with humans, and Atlanteans.” Sooraya points out with a nod towards Crosta. “We shouldn’t fall into the trap of never trusting anyone different from us or letting our enemies set the narrative, we aren’t isolating ourselves from the world, just the bigots who try to kill us.”

Enemies, is that really what we are? Something feels wrong about the word as I stare at the unmoving image of an Uncle I’ve never met. “Sooraya’s right. Humans saved me and brought me here after mutants cast me out.” 

Martha’s floating brain case moves down to land on my shoulder, I try really hard not to shudder from the unexpected contact, I don’t want her to think I don’t like her, and reach up to pat the clear dome over her brain.

I’ve met Siddig and some of the crew he was with a couple of times since we arrived, even though we’ve all been very busy, him with construction and me with training. It was… nice, I thanked him, he waved it off as the right thing to do and congratulated me on finding my family. Apparently he is going to open a bar with a mutant called Dominikos Petrakis, or Avalanche to use his mutant name, once construction is finished on Arcadia.

Megan’s frenzied flight slows down and she eventually settles back onto her couch with a sigh, Teon nestling back into her lap as she returns to petting him. “I guess, my grandparents are pretty chill about me being a mutant, kind of supportive, even if they don’t get it. They’re the exception though.”

So please, don't call us mutants. The "M" word represents everything I hate... 

“‘M word’? The audacity of this bitch.” I’ve never seen David so angry. “Saying that about ‘Mutie’ would be one thing but just ‘Mutant’? That is not the same thing at all as ****** and it’s an insult to every goddamn black person for him to claim it is.” 

Gabriel pats my shoulder that Martha isn’t resting on. “Damn, I am sorry you have to be related to this loser Gwen.”

“We’re confused how Mr Summers could be related-”

“To such a…”

“To such a…”

“To such an Uncle Tom.” David spits out as he finishes the Cuckoo’s sentence for them. “That’s what he is, a mutant Uncle Tom.”

“What’s an Uncle Tom?” Judgmental eyes from everyone press me back into the soft couch in shame. “Sorry.”

David sighs and pinches his brow. “It’s all right, Gwen, I forgot you wouldn’t know for a moment. Celeste, could you please give her a knowledge download?”

“Well…”

“We suppose so…

“Since you asked nicely.”

At this point, even with the Cuckoos being needlessly rough, I’m familiar enough with a psychic download from Rachel’s remedial English and math lessons that I only wince slightly at the momentary headache and confusion.

“Oh. Oooohhhhh.”

The momentary quiet causes the interview to unpause, a reporter in the crowd standing up to talk.

Well… if you don’t want to be called “Mutant” what should we call you?

My uncle smiles softly as he replies. He really does seem kind on the surface but, what he’s been saying in this interview, the argument for peace and cooperation, it’s all coming from a place of privilege. How can he stand up there next to a man wearing the flag of the USA, preaching obedience, while mutants are arrested and imprisoned just for their genetics? Or humans like Siddig for the colour of their skin, who they love or what god they worship? Going along with that isn’t peace, it’s surrender, I didn’t run and fight my way across a continent to surrender to bullies.

How about Alex?

“How about bitch!” Noriko yells, Megan, Teon and Gabriel hollering in support.

“Can we not use gendered insults?” Laurie says with a sigh, as our only member of the trainees who has graduated high school she often tries to get us to be ‘less immature’.

“Well what should we call him then?” Noriko crosses her arms and nods towards David. “Uncle Tom isn’t really our word to use.”

“What about Avenger?” Mindee Cuckoo chimes in. “It’s what he is now. A member of our species who works with the government which keeps trying to kill us and that we are still technically at war with.”

It turns out that when the entire Avengers assault two sovereign nations with a S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier and the backing of both the US President and the King of Wakanda it counts as a declaration of war. I’d been shocked to learn that after I arrived, everyone in the US, even other mutants, talked about it more like a superhero fight or a riot. Atlantis, Utopia and Wakanada all signed a peace treaty only a week after the battle on the moon but the USA still refuses to recognise that Utopia and Atlantis even exist as countries, let alone sign a treaty with us.

Gabriel punches his palm. “That works, he’s happy to sit at their table and accept their cheers and their scraps of approval while leaving the rest of us to face all the hate and attacks. The other mutants up there too, Wolverine even tried to kill Hope before she could undo M-Day. They aren’t on our side, they’re part of the problem.” 

Teon, Laurie and Megan all growl angrily in sync with Gabriel’s words. It’s a bit creepy honestly… no, I shouldn’t judge other mutants like that! I don’t want to be like the bullies at the Jean Grey School. Hope’s team just share an empathic bond through her power is all, even when she is stuck in a coma. It's not creepy, even if I find it strange.

“Yeah, you hear that Alex Summers? You’re an Avenger! I hope you choke on it!”

“Avenger!” This time Noriko’s insult is echoed by all of us.

After breakfast we have our usual training, drills and danger room session in the morning, overseen by our three X-Men teachers, Dazzler, Boom Boom, and Lifeguard.

Some of us are doing better than others.

“Hey! Watch it, Spider-Girl! You almost blew my head off!”

“Sorry Nor- Surge!” I need to remember to use codenames in training to prepare for real combat, Dad and Rachel were very clear on that. I’ve only just started actually training with everyone else in the last few days, most of my training the last month has been one on one physical therapy and learning how to not shoot optic blasts or turn into a giant spider by accident, mostly with Dazzler but also with Dad, Rachel or Xuân when they could spare the time. 

My blast wouldn’t actually have taken her head off, I’ve been working really hard on controlling my output, but it would still have hurt her, I need to be better. 

“Dad makes reflecting optic blasts off surfaces to hit other things look so easy.”

Dazzler laughs at my grumbling. “Yeah, Cyke’s a show off like that, don’t feel bad though, I’ve seen the videos of some of his first danger room exercises and trust me, he found this just as hard once. Now, do it again and try not to overthink things, in combat you won’t have time to calculate the angles, you need to feel them.”

What does that even mean? “Okay.” 

I shift my gaze to the array of mirrors that Dazzler is using to teach me how to reflect shots and shift the imaginary muscles that control the change between human and spider, my human eyes can’t release optic blasts and I haven’t learned how to only change my eyes on purpose yet. The room is too small for my full spider form but a month of practice lets me stop the transformation half way.

Normally I’m not a very tall woman, about average among the other girls in the trainees, but as a half spider I shoot up to almost nine foot tall, thick exoskeletal armour plates covered in fur like setae engulfing my body. My prosthetic leg, programmed especially for this by Mr Jefferies, extends to match my natural leg’s new length when the chitin plates on my leg press into my stump sock. Two extra sets of arms sprout from my sides and my lower jaw splits into two maxillae with vestigial pedipalps dangling down over my chest, my nose sinks into my skull and vanishes making room for six extra eyes to open alongside my formally human pair, all eight glowing with red energy.

With my now red tinted vision focused on my target I carefully open the floodgates on the kinetic energy contained by my eyes, I didn’t realise how strange shooting an optic blast was until Nate showed me how to shoot normal guns, there is no ballistics or recoil though Dad says with training I’ll be able to generate recoil if I want, instead everything on a straight line from my eyes to my point of focus and beyond is near instantly assaulted by a continuous stream of pure force. Almost as soon as I let the blast loose I close the floodgates again, locking the potential destruction safely away. 

Even before I shut the blast off it already bounced between the series of mirrors to its final impact point. “Grgrgrgl.” I still missed, though my aim wasn't as far off as before, this time I hit the wall a meter or two from my target rather than sending a blast across the training room and almost hitting Surge.

“See, you’re already improving. Now, we keep at it until you can hit the target consistently. Chop chop!”

“Grgrgrgl.” I’m glad Dazzler can’t understand what I’m trying to say in my half spider form.

“Miss Dazzler, Spider-Girl said a bad word!” Phoebe Cuckoo calls from across the room where she and her sisters are sparring in their diamond forms with Laurie, Transsonic.

That bitch.

“And she just called me the b-word in her head!”

“Grgrgrgl.”

Dazzler shakes her head, her expression impassive. “Don’t swear at me or at any of your teammates Spider-Girl. That’s a demerit for you. Now, repeat the exercise.”

By the time we break for lunch, and then on to the normal classes with the civilian kids, I’m still not hitting the target consistently, but I am hitting it. It helps to imagine it as Phoebe Cuckoo’s smug face.

At the end of my last class, introductory french with Xuân, Lifeguard arrives to pick me up.

“Miss Cameron? Has Gwen been accused of something?” Xuân must have seen my guilty slump when Lifeguard arrived, this is probably about me calling Phoebe a bitch in my head, I thought I got away from all this!

“Nah, there are some new arrivals from the mainland who want to thank her is all.”

Wait what? I’m not in trouble? And why would anyone want to thank me?

Lifeguard escorts me to the teleport station, only installed last week and intended to be part of a closed network between all of the planned islands, across to Utopia and then to the main airfield on the island’s barren rocky surface where the rest of the trainees are waiting along with the crew of the Ugly Bulldog.

“Hello, Gwen. Have they told you anything about why we’re here?” Sooraya asks as I step into line at parade rest between her and Martha. A few camera drones are floating nearby but out of the way of the runway.

“Lifeguard said that someone wanted to thank me, I can’t think of why though.”

We are interrupted by the roar of an X-Jet coming in for landing, I’m surprised that it seems to come from the direction of the blockade, did the O.N.E. patrols let it through for some reason?

Once it’s set down and taxied over to us the boarding ramp lowers to reveal Dad, Cyclops this is official business so I should use his code name, and three teenagers roughly the same age as us. A girl with long brown hair worn in a high ponytail, a tall boy with the same colour skin as David and another girl with shoulder length brown hair, really cool tattoos and an odd breathing tube around her neck.

“Sofia!” Noriko and David cry as they run forward to embrace the girl with long brown hair as she steps off the ramp.

Sooraya, Megan, Martha and the Cuckoo sisters are close behind them, the entire group crowding around ‘Sofia’ and the tall boy in a tearful group hug, I don't think I’ve ever seen the Cuckoos actually cry or seem so happy to see anyone, not even Dad or Miss Frost. Everyone seems to be avoiding the girl with the tattoos though, even the other trainees not invited to the group hug like Crosta, Laurie, Gabriel and Teon.

After a second or two Dad, Cyclops, corrals the group hug and the tattooed girl over to the rest of us. “Everyone, allow me to make introductions. These three fine young mutants are Sofia Mantega, Lazaro Kotikash and Alani Ryan. Sofia and Lazaro were among our students depowered on M-Day and recently restored to their full selves by Hope, while Alani is returning to us after a period of captivity as a PoW.”

“That’s one way to put it.” Noriko mutters while glaring daggers at Alani along with Crosta.

Cyclops ignores and talks right over Noriko’s interruption. “Sofia, Lazaro and Alani, I’d like to introduce you to the crew of the Ugly Bulldog and Gwen Summers. They are the people who, with great personal risk and sacrifice, captured the three O.N.E. agents we negotiated your prisoner exchange with.”

All three sets of eyes dip down to look at my stump, my prosthetic leg rather, I wish I’d worn an outfit that covered it for afternoon classes. I smile and wave to the trio, hoping to draw attention away from my leg. I think I manage to smile the right amount, the Cuckoos never fail to tell me that my smiles are ‘too wide and creepy’.

It’s Alani who gets over my prosthetic first, stepping forward she does an Atlantean bow to me and the crew, like the kind I’ve seen Crosta doing. This close I can see that her breathing tube is filled with water and when she speaks the words come out slightly garbled. “Thank you for saving us, O.N.E. detention centres are not a pleasant place to stay.” That’s putting it mildly. Sofia and Lazaro approach once Alani has broken the ice, they both hug me in thanks - which is incredibly awkward and unwanted - and shake the hands of the crew.

After the handshakes are done the crew, who seemed much less surprised by all of this than us trainees did, and the camera drones all leave. A part of me is angry at Cyclops - and this was definitely Cyclops leader of Utopia not Dad right now - for stage managing all of this, including showing off my leg, without asking first or warning us but looking at how happy my teammates are to see Sofia and Lazaro again, it’s hard to stay angry. Though not everyone is forgiven so easily, all of the trainees, even Crosta, Laurie, Gabriel and Teon who - like me - didn’t attend the Xavier Institute, are avoiding Alani like she is infected with something.

So am I.

I know that I shouldn’t just be following the crowd in ostracising someone like this but, I’m scared. I don’t want to go back to being the girl no one likes.

Cyclops clearing his throat distracts me from my thoughts, and pulls all the attention back to him. My fellow trainees and I rush into a parade ground line again, Alani slotting in naturally while Sofia and Lazaro fumble and hesitate, clearly not expecting it.

“I am sure you are all itching to catch up and show your friends the grand tour, I know I would be in your shoes, but first I would like to offer Sofia and Lazaro a chance to visit Hope and say thank you.” He can barely finish talking before the two restored mutants are agreeing, practically begging, to be allowed to see her.

When I asked David what it was like losing his powers and regaining them, and if he thought it was like how I lost my limb, he’d compared it more to having a piece of your soul stripped away. Not just losing the mental, or sometimes physical, muscles that governed the power but also a piece of your identity and personality being forcibly denied to you, not just by society but by a malevolent and active hidden force, even in the privacy of your own thoughts it was hard to think of yourself as a mutant. You knew your power and your identity was there still, but kept just out of reach, taunting you as if it was all your own fault for being too weak to reclaim it. 

When he put it like that, I started to understand why so many of the restored mutants have begun to worship Hope and the Phoenix. 

Listening to their excited chatter as Dad leads them away, I don’t think Sofia and Lazaro will be an exception to that trend.

“Um. Hi everyone?” Everyone ignores Alani. “Look I know I made a huge mis-”

“Mistake!” Megan suddenly blows up, spinning around and getting right in Alani’s face! “You joined the Avengers! In the middle of the war! You left us, you abandoned us when we needed you and- and Hope-” She breaks down crying before she can finish her tirade, quickly drawn into a group hug and bundled away back inside by Laurie, Gabriel and Teon.

“We don’t want-

“To hear anymore excuses-”

“From an Avenger”

The Cuckoos say before flipping their hair in sync and stalking off, Noriko, David, Sooraya and Martha following without a word, leaving just myself and Crosta with Alani and even Crosta refuses to look at her.

Alani is crying now as well but she doesn’t back down, calling out to her retreating former friend’s backs. “I deserved that, I’m just glad to see you all safe.” She turns to look at Crosta. “Crosta, can you escort me to Namor please?”

“Hmph. And why should I bother the Emperor of the Seas with the words of a traitor?” Crosta finally turns to look at her, his lips pulled back in a snarl.

“Because this traitor needs to answer for her crimes, and her emperor is the only one who can pass judgement on her.”

Crosta stares at her for a moment, his face inscrutable to me, before turning without a word and gesturing for Alani to follow him. As the pair dive off one of Utopia’s cliff faces I’m left alone with a hollow feeling in my stomach, like when I fail a test but even worse.

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 17, Now, Krakoa

Another airstrike impact illuminates the smog blackened streets of Modesto.

“I’m picking up a Punisher on our right!”

“Silver Spider, take him out!”

“On it Surge!”

I stay low and evasive as I split off to hunt the cloned fascist down, the Punisher clone series might not have any superpowers but they are damn good shots.

A near miss from the Punisher sends me gliding behind cover, feel the angles… there! My optic blast ricochets between buildings, around the corner and destroys his sniper’s nest.

It takes me a moment of questing through the dust and rubble to confirm the kill, the familiar broken body of Frank Castle lying limp beneath a chunk of masonry.

“Silver Spider to Surge, the Punisher is dealt with, I’m on m-”

The corpse’s arm sweeps my legs out from under me and I land roughly in the bay waters, the rocks of the Alcatraz camp looming above me like silent judges.

“Foolish Spider-Clone, you thought you could defeat me, the Superior Octopus? I killed the real Spider-Man, a pale copy like you is nothing. Now I’ll finish the job I should have the day you were born.”

His tentacles envelop me, crush me, as water fills my lungs, his stinging ink forcing my eyes closed, preventing me from blasting free.

I can’t breathe!

I can’t breathe!

I can’t br-

The rag is torn away from my face, leaving me gasping for air as moisture drips from my lips.

“Tell us where the rest of your squad is mutie, we’ll make it quick if you do.”

The Mad-Dog clones have me strapped down spread eagle, an inhibitor collar preventing me from shedding my fragile human form and fighting back.

Red triangle, it’s the strongest shape.

R

ES

IST

The rag and the water come back 

“Tell us why you killed so many of us. Aren’t we your sibling clones just like Ben and Kaine? Why didn’t we deserve mercy as well?”

Red triangle, it’s the strongest shape.

R

ES

IST

The rag and the water come back again, and again, and again, and again, and again.

“You fucking successionist genefreaks, it makes us sick how ungrateful you are. We gave everything for this country and then you dare try and leave? Hydra will show you your place.”

Red triangle, it’s the strongest shape.

“Please save me, Daddy.”

“Daddy? Normally I prefer my creations call me father but I like how it sounds from your lips Gwen.~”

Jackal stalks around the room, matching me step for step as we circle each other, both tense for the fight to start.

“You are not my father.”

“How so? I designed you and birthed you from my own test tubes, well Mr Sinister’s test tubes but I stole them which makes them mine.”

“You never raised me or loved me. I owe you nothing.”

“Really you're very impressive for a first prototype, all of your production models disappointed me and died. I wonder what is different about you.”

“You’ll never know.” My optic blast atomizes Miles Warren and continues through the building, tearing the entire New U lab down around us.

“You know you will never be free of us.” Nathaniel Essex steps out from behind me, his ghostly pale face practically shining in the pitch darkness of the collapsed building.

“I’m already free of you both.”

“Never. Jackal may be a plagiarist but he and I are alike in one way, we are eternal. I would never have crossed spider with mutant myself but the results have been fascinating. I wonder… What will the next generation look like?”

I try to scream, my throat and body locking up as the specter of Nathanial Essex floats above me, the spider within me struggling to burst free. After a moment the sleep paralysis fades and I bolt upright, falling out of my bed as my body shifts and spasms uncontrollably between spider and human until I lie panting on the floor, fully human for the first time since I came to Krakoa. 

Crawling along with a single hand and knee my other hand quests blindly in the dark for my phone to call Alani. It takes her what feels like an eternity to pick up. “Hi darling, sorry I was prepar-”

“Is Nita okay? Is she with you? Are you both safe?” The red lines on Alani’s face distort cutely as she frowns, now my eyes are adjusting to the light I can see she is in her room in the New Atlantis embassy, Nita floating behind her on a baby tether, babbling and playing with her stuffed whale.

Alani draws Namorita close and hugs her, angling the camera to show them both clearly. “We’re both safe in the embassy, I was just preparing to drop Nita off with the daycare. Did something happen?”

Finally, my heart beat starts to slow again, I lean back against the edge of my bed and run my free hand through my sweat soaked hair, working out the tangles from my tossing and turning. “Just another nightmare.”

“About the Liberation Campaign?”

Little Nita reaches out to the camera, as if she could comfort her mother despite the half an ocean and two timezones between New Atlantis and Krakoa. I grow an additional two arms and wiggle their digits at her in response. Our child giggles and kicks her legs in Alani’s arms.

“Among other things, Jackal, Sinister, the humanity of clones etc. Most of the old classics. How has your morning been?”

Alani gives me a knowing look but allows the deflection. “I actually slept well last night, no memories of internment camps for a change. Probably because this little shark kept waking me up! Yes you did! Yes you did! You kept Mommy awake!” 

Nita’s giggles transition into high pitched shrieks of joy as Alani bounces her up and down. “Work will be slow today, at this point it’s a game of hurry up and wait for the US to reply to our treaty demands. The main sticking point is still California, they won’t accept that the people left alive don’t want them back.”

Climbing back onto my bed, and shifting my grip on my phone from my hands to my telekinesis, I let out a chuff of amusement. “Gee, I wonder why people don’t want the government that was running concentration camps before it got taken over by Hydra to come back in and retake control.”

Alani rocks Nita as we talk. “You’d think that, but our psychic and traditional polling suggests that the real driver of public opinion is the actions under Hydra: the nuclear bombing of major cities, the firing squads, and the execution of the state government for ‘disloyalty’. Most sapiens were able to just put ONE’s crimes against humanity out of their minds during the Blockade Years.”

“I wish I could say that surprised me or that it was a uniquely sapien affliction, far too many people on Krakoa are all too happy to ignore the treatment of other minorities now that it is out of sight.” I admit with a grimace. “It’s not that I don’t understand where the anger and isolationism comes from but if Essex is going to insist on us using the Homo superior name on all the official documentation then we should live up to the title and be the better people.”

Nita yawns in Alani’s arms, bored now that her mommies are talking about something that isn’t her. “Something tells me that Mr Sinister doesn’t consider empathy for our fellow beings to be a superior trait, but enough about politics, your morning has obviously been awful but how was your day yesterday?”

Slipping out of my pajamas I grab my cane and limp over to the manikin holding my X-Men uniform. “Mostly just more politics, I did manage to finally make a blend of krakoan coffee that doesn’t taste awful though. Burning feathers but most of the new residents of Krakoa seem insistent that psychedelics are an acceptable substitute for flavour.”

“Mmh, I don’t suppose you could get any sent over to New Atlantis could you? Namor is building up an immunity to normal coffee.”

“Alani!” I have to pause getting dressed so my laughter doesn’t make me lose my balance. “I’ll see what I can do, it shouldn’t be too hard, export laws are pretty loose, our wonder drugs are the alliance’s main leverage after all. Sharon’s resurrection went off without a hitch by the way. She’s a good kid, I’m sure you’ll love her, she might even be your new favourite sister-in-law.”

“She’s coming back to Utopia with Emma then? What about the rest of the original Hellions?”

Humming in thought I finish getting my uniform’s lower half on, the black leggings with yellow stripes on the thighs mimicking the abdomen patterns of my spider form. “Well Empath will stay on Krakoa obviously, he might have the same universal amnesty as everyone else but he knows that if he uses his power like he does here in Utopia he’d end up back in the X-Brig. As for the others, Beef and Brevaton might stay, neither of them were Hellions long before Fitzroy killed them. Roulette, Jetstream and Tarot will all join Mom and her entourage when they come home I think.”

I take my prosthetic leg from its charging station and attach it to my costume’s nerve socket as Alani chuckles. “Heh, if you’d told me back when I went to school with her I’d never have believed that I’d be looking forward to seeing Esme Cuckoo again.”

My telekinesis makes zipping the top half of my uniform a breeze, I shudder to think how awkward doing up a back zipper would be with six arms getting in each other’s way without it. “The horror stories everyone has told me about her do make her sound like a piece of work. Hopefully her living sisters are a good influence on her.”

Like my legs the coloured parts of my uniform top mimic the natural fur and skin patterns of my spider form, in this case a silver back and shoulders and a moment's concentration shifts my skin and human hairs to the same shade of pearlescent silver. Spinning for the camera I ask Alani how I look.

“You look great, like you always do in uniform, and you don’t have any loose zips or clasps.” A cry from Nita pulls Alani away from her appreciation of my silver skin. “It’s all right, little shark. I really do need to get her to the daycare before work, sorry to cut the call short.” A pause. “I won’t press you to talk to me but please talk to someone about your nightmare. I love you, Tiny.” 

“No need to be sorry, I’m the one who called and interrupted your morning out of the blue and… yeah, I’ll schedule a meeting with the embassy doctor for this evening. Love you too, Red.”

We blow each other kisses as Alani closes the call.

Sliding my ruby-quartz lensed mask over my eyes and checking its HUD tells me I still have two hours before I would normally get up, lead the embassy’s morning prayers and get ready for work. “Might as well call Bishop DeCosta and sort out Kaine’s visa situation now.” 

Getting Kaine and his team a visa to perform superhero work in Utopia ends up being disappointingly simple, I don’t even end up needing to call in any favours with Roberto DeCosta, he is overjoyed at a multi-ethnic American superhero team wanting to visit. Apparently it is, ‘just the kind of diplomatic outreach we need right now’ and the fact that their leader, Justice, is a mutant just makes it an even more attractive idea.

Xuân’s friend would probably have been even more in favour if I had admitted they’d be working with me to hunt down a possible hydra deserter but I still want to keep Ben’s presence as quiet as possible, he’s my responsibility, it’s bad enough that I have to involve Kaine and his friends.

Now, even after breakfast and leading morning prayers for the faithful on Krakoa, waking up so early has left me with almost two hours of free time before my actual work day at The Grove of Governance starts. Still listless from my nightmare, I find myself levitating around the clearings and copses that surround the centre of Krakoan government, enjoying the sights, smells and sounds of mutants making the most of a safe space, many of them for the first time in their lives.

I haven’t seen such a chaotic and vital energy in a crowd of mutants before, not even when Utopia celebrates the construction of a new island. For all that our nation has been a safe haven for mutants for five years, we have also been a nation under siege for just as long. Utopia’s own open markets and street parties always have an edge of tension to them, how can they not when armies of sentinels waited on the edge of the horizon? 

Even if Moira is right and Krakoa is doomed to fail, I think it is worth it to see mutant children run and play between the stalls and treehouses without fear or shame while their parents mingle and laugh with almost as much carefree energy as their children. If it does fall I hope they can keep the happy memories of freedom and safety alive, carry them with pride, and pass them onto the next generation of mutants. 

Krakoa has united our people in a way that Utopia and Clan Akkaba, dominated by the singular and alienating visions of Cyclops and Apocalypse as they are, never could. Not just with a universal identity that can encompass all of mutantdom but also a new mutant wide government, language, script and set of numerals, whatever differences we have in creed, origins or loyalties, now all mutants can find common ground in something aside from our suffering at sapiens hands.

A part of me finds their attitudes naive, the Krakoan promise of peace without strict hierarchy or armed force to defend it only possible because of the sacrifices that Utopia and Atlantis have already made to force the sapiens to treat us with fear if not respect, but I do my best to push it down. I’ve seen how that poisonous thinking can lead to depersonalisation and atrocity first hand.

Even my own presence doesn’t gather the same sort of attention it would in Utopia, no salutes or bows for the middle Princess Summers on Krakoa, even the adults who recognise me give a respectful nod at most. A rare few instead glare with venom, the enemies my parents and their difficult decisions made displacing their anger onto me. 

Some hate Utopia for radicalising the USA against mutants, scaring them into further crackdowns, others have more personal grievances about the use of child soldiers or bioweapons and the bad name they feel Cyclops, the White Queen and Magneto gave to mutants everywhere as terrorists and troublemakers.

It’s been an adjustment over the last few weeks, adapting to a place where “Scott Summers” is not a universally beloved name. It gives me a new appreciation for the accusations that Utopia is a dangerous cult of personality, though I still disagree. 

The harmonious flow of people is suddenly disrupted, an unseen social force causing the river to part around a pair of intruders. The first, a red skinned synthezoid with long green hair floating next to her companion, has her body contorted into the kind of casually odd yet relaxed position that I’ve only seen from autistic fliers like myself, her body parallel to the ground, knees up like a doggy paddle and her arms folded atop her head. 

There are only so many synthezoids in the world, less than 30 by my last count, and the young woman, only a year or two younger than I am, is easily the second most famous of them all. Viv Vision of the Champions is second only to her father, the Avenger Vision, in being a worldwide icon for synthetic people’s personhood and potential heroism.

And now she’s here, on the most syntheticphobic island in the pacific ocean. With only her fellow Champion for protection, who likely has his own problems to worry about if any of the mutants staring at Viv Vision get over their fear and disgust long enough to recognise him.

Fuck.

I fly a little higher, just enough that I won’t bump into anyone’s heads as I increase my speed and try to reach the pair before the worst happens.

Time seems to pause between one heart beat and the next as one of the playing children, too distracted in her game to notice how the adults have all avoided the companions, runs into the leg of Viv’s walking companion and falls down, where she looks directly up at the glowing yellow eyes of Viv Vision.

“Aaaarrrrhhhhhh! Mommy! Daddy! Sentinel! Sentinel! Help!”

Double fuck.

The girl's parents rush over from a nearby bar stall to scoop the fin-eared young girl into their arms and glare at Viv Vision, energy gathering around the woman’s hand as she holds it out towards the synthezoid like a crucifix before a vampire. “How did a robot get on the island!” The man shouts, from both his human mouth and the one on his stomach granted by his mutation, his panicked query quickly spreading like wildfire.

“No need to panic! No need to panic! Everyone please remain calm!” I project as loudly as I can while touching down between the family and Viv Vision. Whispers quickly break out amongst the crowd, adults who had previously just been staring or avoiding Viv Vision recoiling with fear and shielding their children with their bodies. “As a Quiet Councillor I can assure you that this woman is not a Sentinel. She is Viv Vision, a hero on the Champions with a long history of defending mutants!” 

The emphasis I place on the last two words is a slight exaggeration, while the Champions did liberate some camps while operating as part of the anti-hydra resistance they have never, as a team, focused much on mutant issues specifically. Still, the Champions are one of the most universally beloved superhero teams and their work against human trafficking has saved several mutants from criminal and government experimentation.

“I am not a Sentinel.” Viv Vision agrees, in surprisingly passable krakoan for someone who must be still learning as she speaks, shifting her position to be better seen by the still frightened but no longer panicking crowd. “I have no programming to harm or hate mutants. Indeed, my stepmother is a mutant and I love her very much.” It’s a struggle to contain my full body flinch, and the accompanying urge to transform, at her allusion to the Scarlet Witch but years of practice win out. 

Thankfully none of the crowd seem to realise who Viv Vision is referring too, if they did then a riot would almost certainly break out. Most of the adults will have lost someone during M-Day and the children will have been raised on stories of the evil witch who comes to steal your powers, or your life, if you misbehave, if they realised the synthezoid daughter of Wanda Maximoff was in front of them I’d be worried about a lynch mob.

Grabbing Viv Vision and her companion’s hands I whisper furiously. “We need to leave, I promise you aren’t in trouble so please don’t resist.” Thankfully neither of them does as I pick all of us up in my telekinesis and fly us away from the crowd, which quickly calms down and resumes its harmonious flow without the proverbial rock in its path. 

However, even as we disappear over the treeline I can’t help but notice a tension that wasn’t there before, people looking over their shoulders and holding each other tighter as a tiny part of the illusion of krakoan safety has been stripped away. Afterall, if one synthetic person can make it through the gateway network and into the heart of Krakoa itself, what is to stop another, less friendly, one?

Letting go of Viv Vision and her mutant companion once we are a few clearings away from the main thoroughfares I slump onto the grass with a sigh. “Well that could have gone better, word of advice Miss Vision, don’t mention your stepmother here if you can, she’s…” 

Near-universally reviled? Widely hated? Blamed for the second worst event in mutant history? The story that mutant parents tell their children to keep them up at night? The adversary figure in Exodus’ false religion? “Not well liked.”

“I see you inherited your father’s preference for sarcasm and understatement.” Viv observes her delivery just as dry as my own, rather than take a seat she crosses her legs and floats in the air.

“Please don’t call me that, Viv. We’re the same age.” Her companion says, crossing his arms petulantly and taking a seat opposite myself. Reluctantly I force myself to look at and acknowledge the elephant in the clearing I’ve been avoiding. He really looks nothing like dad, from the saber at his cocked hip to the long flowing hair and the flamboyant uniform with its flared collar and garish colours. 

Even his face is different, dueling scars and blaster burns marring his cheeks where Dad has a broken nose and bullet grazes, to say nothing of the contrast between his cocky smirk and Dad’s perpetual frown. Honestly the only similarity between them is the visor made of ruby-quartz that keeps their powers in check.

The ruby-quartz that only three people in the universe need to act as a safety for their powers, me, my Dad, and my dad’s time-displaced younger alternate timeline variant. When did I become so jaded that time travel lost all sense of wonder and just became a pain?

Should I unclip my mask? Or would he take me flaunting that I can control my optic blasts as a taunt? “You’re a year younger than me actually but yeah, I’d rather not call you father either, Scott Summers.”

Chapter Text

Past Interlude: Loa 1

After Past 3, minutes later.

Alani swims into Namor's throne room, empty except for the Emperor of the Seas himself slouched in his fancy chair, with her head hung as if she is going to her execution.

She might well be, she's seen how Namor handles traitors before, even if he does have a soft spot for her family dating back to the 30s Alani's doubts he will spare her.

It's fine, she made peace with her death weeks ago, never even thought she would leave the ONE internment camp they spirited her away too when Avengers Academy closed down.

So she is understandably shocked when Namor, rather than angrily shouting or glaring with disapproval, sweeps her into an almost crushing hug.

"Alani! You are safe! I am sorry that matters of court prevented me from greeting you above on Utopi-"

Alani wriggles free and swims away, Namor could easily have kept her in his grip but lets her go rather than risk any injury.

"W-why aren't you angry with me? Um, your highness." Alani hugs herself as her tears leak out into the ocean water. "I betrayed you! And the X-Men! During wartime at that! I-I am so sor-"

"Alani." Namor reaches out slowly, as if Alani is an easily spooked animal, and when she doesn't back up again gently cups her cheek. "You were taken as a prisoner of war, you betrayed no one."

"But I did! I- I stayed at Avengers Academy, in their gilded prison for me, when everyone else escaped."

"I know, your friends told us everything." Alani knows they aren't friends anymore after her reception on the island above. "You made the choice to not escape when it was offered to you, yes, but that is not a crime or a betrayal, Alani."

"I made friends there, I trusted them." She grips her arms so tight that blood leaks from under her fingernails. "When Arcade kidnapped them and the school was shut down… Headmistress Tigra and the teachers all stood up for me but- but they didn't stop ONE from taking me into custody. I- I thought they would, the X-Men would have. They said they'd argue my case but they still let them take me!"

This time it is Alani who rushes forth and hugs Namor, burying her sobbing face into his chest as Namor gently holds her and it finally sinks in that she is free and safe again.

"Alani!"

"Alani, you're bleeding!"

Shock races up Alani's spine as her parent's voices echo across the throne room, two familiar sets of arms embarrassing her as Namor lets her go and gives the Ryan family some space.

"Mom? Dad? B-but they told me you were dead!"

"What! No darling, your friend Megan and her teacher came to pick us up as soon as the war was over."

"Oh Alani! We've been so worried! Namor kept us up to date on the prisoner exchange negotiations, but the stories we heard from some of the other parents…"

Alani stares in wonder at the atlantean amulets on her parents' necks, the same kind that she used to wear that let you breathe underwater, as all three Ryans pull back from their close embrace to look at each other.

"I, I'm fine really, they didn't- didn't mistreat me or anything. It was rougher than being held at the Academy but- Mom, Dad why are you here? Why aren't you back home? Or on Utopia?"

"You can't breathe air anymore thanks to your accident, of course we would come down here to live with you, darling."

"After the war the government started rounding up the families of mutants who lived on Utopia, the X-Men got to most of us first and brought us to safety. Heh, we've even started a support group!"

Alani can't help the giggle that escapes at the idea of her parents, her utterly normal parents, doing something so mundane as a support group about her and her friends.

Her laugh is quickly swallowed by choking sobs when she remembers the day that ONE told her that her parents were killed by a hate mob, how they kept asking her for safehouses and locations so they could protect people like her parents and her friends from angry bigots.

She didn't think she told them anything but it is so hard to remember what happened when they questioned her. She followed all of her anti-interrogation and anti-telepathy training: red, the colour of danger, a triangle, the strongest shape, resist, she had to remember to resist.

R

ES

IST

"Alani?"

"Oh, sorry Mom, force of habit I guess."

She tries to laugh it off but her parents won't let it go.

"No, it wasn't nothing. Please, talk to us honey. We can't imagine what you went through but you can alwa-"

"That's just it! You don't get it! You can't get it! And the only people who do all hate me for betraying them! And they're right!"

"They don't hate you honey and you haven't betrayed anyone."

"Your father is right, Alani." Namor drifts closer and places a steadying hand on her shoulder. "Both Cyclops and I know that you are not a traitor and have proclaimed it to all our subjects. If any have called you traitor then they will be swiftly punished."

"No! Enough punishment! They didn't- I don't- I'm not worth it."

Her parents draw her close again.

"You're our daughter, you are worth everything Alani."

"King Namor, does new Atlantis have any therapists?"

Alani shakes her head and struggles against her parent's grip.

"No! I'm not broken and, and I need to make up for what I-"

"We do, I am sure that Miss Frost will also volunteer her services."

Namor bows to Alani's parents, something so unexpected that it shocks Alani from her  protests.

"We may not be bound by blood but I consider all of you to be family, I will do all in Atlantis' power to help Alani heal."

Present Interlude: Viv 1

During Present 3, before Gwen meets Viv.

As Viv passes through the Krakoan Gateway alongside Slim she saves the novel spacefolding experience for later analysis. Once they are through she releases his hand, the 'greencard' that allowed her to pass through the gateways as a non-mutant, and lowers her density to float into a more comfortable position alongside him.

"Are you all right Viv? No problems with the gateway?" Slim does not fidget but Viv can see the worry and anxiety in her best guy friend from the way his brow subtly creases.

"My internal diagnostics show no errors, Slim."

[Mine either!] Viv 2.0 chimes in her head.

[Thank you for double checking sister.]

[No probs, Ooo! Look at that guy! I think his hair is made of grapes!]

Viv very deliberately does not stare at any of the mutants passing in and out of the main gateway nexus on Krakoa, it would be rude.

A small portion of the tension escapes Slim's shoulders. "Phew, I'm glad. They've never been used by a synthezoid before I'm pretty sure."

Viv bumps Slim's shoulder with her own, mostly as an expression of comradery, partly to move him out of the way of the people exiting the gateway behind them. "Then I'm honored to be the first. What should our first stop be? I have heard rumours of something called Carousel?"

Slim grins as he starts to lead Viv across the island. "The Carousel is a sort of combination main street, open plan night club and city hall. This early in the day it's pretty empty but during mid day it is where the lucky artisans and street performers who won yesterday's sortition set up. Then in the afternoon after the Quiet Council meets any mutant can appeal to one of the Tables, it rotates depending on the day, for arbitration or to propose motions for the next day's council meeting. Then in the evening once all the kids are cleared out it becomes the main party space."

Slim coughs and blushes. "We haven't had anything as wild as founding week recently but there are DJs every night and live music once a week."

Viv hums in thought and switches to a more comfortable position as they walk past a stall advertising fresh burritos to departures and new arrivals alike. "I was under the impression that Krakoa was post-scarcity? That is how the posters and fliers made it seem, I am surprised that craftspeople and markets exist, as well as cooks."

"It is, sort of. All water, food, electricity, housing and healthcare is provided for free but it's pretty basic. If you want any decorations, a cocktail or a fancy meal you either have to make them yourself or get someone else to do it for you. The QC introduced a currency system in the second week." Slim laughs, he looks much more comfortable talking about economic minutiae than street parties, Viv can relate. "Over the professor's strenuous objections apparently."

"It's pretty simple." Slim picks a seed from a tall bush as he walks, and Viv floats, past. "The Krakoan Seed, the island grows more of them all the time and they decay about a month after being plucked so the currency stays in constant circulation and no one can hoard wealth. You can't use them outside of Krakoa for anything but since they are edible they make a basic unit of labour value." He pops the seed into his mouth to demonstrate.

"Fascinating, if the Carousel would be a poor choice for the first visit, what do you recommend instead?" Viv switches to a more comfortable position again.

"Honestly all of the 'event' venues only really open later in the day, there is the amphitheatre for local plays and movies from the outside world but it doesn't really open until lunch. I thought I'd show you where Laura, Gabby and I are living." Slim blushes again. "If that's okay with you I mean, we live in a sort of village-commune thing with a lot of other mutants our age, things sort of settled into age and politics based tribes if that makes sense? Kids accepted obviously, they are all staying with their parents or guardians unless they don't have any in which case they live in orphanages conn-"

Viv floats in front of Slim, maintaining her relative velocity so they don't crash into each other, to pull him out of his mutterspiral without touching him without consent. "I'd love to see you and Laura's new house, Slim."

"Great! We'll need to cut through one of the smaller side markets off the Carousel to get there, they open earlier in the day so we can still buy some knicknacks if any catch your eye. The habitat, that's what we're calling places made from living krakoan biomatter, is great, it has this amazing spot for sunbathing to recharge, maybe we can make a meal of it at midday?"

"I would like that, I have missed our regular solar lunches together since you emigrated." As a synthezoid patterned after her father Viv relies on synthesising sunlight into energy for most of her energy needs, she can eat for sustenance but does not need too. Slim's own mutant power synthesises solar radiation in a similar way to power his optic blasts.

The pair are silent for a moment as they walk before Slim reaches out and, after receiving a nod of consent from Viv, brushes a loose lock of green hair behind her ear. "You know I'm not leaving the Champions, or giving up on co-existence right Viv? Even if the professor never actually believed in it I still do. You, Ms Marvel, Brawn, Spider-man, Nova, you all proved to me that isolationism and setting ourselves up as better than other people isn't the answer, that the mutant struggle isn't the only struggle like I was taught."

Viv reaches up to take Slim's hand in hers, her other hand copying her friend's motion by tucking some of his brown hair behind his ear. "I do Slim, you don't have to justify choosing to live somewhere you and your family feel safe and normal to me. Safe spaces aren't separatism or supremism. And I know you will not leave the team or stop being our friend. I miss your company but I am happy you are here." A teasing smirk crosses her lips. "I only regret that the one visitor at a time rule prevents me from bringing CJ here on a double date."

The friends allow their hands to part as they turn off the Carousel and onto one of the side streets. "Heh, she'd either love it here or hate how green it is. I do wish I could bring more than one of you at a time, the QC is really cagey about visitors. Personally I blame the Utopians, they get really paranoid about things like that. Their embassy is practically a fortress; they even stationed an entire platoon of X-Force to guard it."

"I take it neither the Morlocks or Clan Akkaba did likewise?"

"Mhm. The Morlocks' tunnel connection to Krakoa is just guarded by a couple of volunteers and the Akkaban embassy building is creepy but it only has a few civil guards for security, less than ten in total, whereas Utopia stationed 25 actual soldiers here."

"Regardless, I am glad that I won the straw draw to visit with you first. You have found a beautiful new home Slim, and I'm excited to explore it. Perhaps after we meet Laura and Gabby but before the nightly street party we could explore the deep jungle? I have already catalogued many novel fauna and flora species as we have walked."

"Sure, some areas are off limits for Marauder or government business but they're clearly marked and everywhere else on the island is free for eve-oof!"

A small fin-eared child falls back from where she impacted Slim's leg at a run, Viv floats a little lower to offer her hand with a smile.

"Are you all right little one?"

Something is wrong, perhaps she failed to use the right expression, Slim and her both often struggle with that, because the small girl's eyes widen in fear before she screams.

"Aaaarrrrhhhhhh! Mommy! Daddy! Sentinel! Sentinel! Help!"

Chapter Text

Heroic Age Year 13, 4 years ago, Utopia

“Heads, team sisters breaks, tails, team boys breaks, deal?” Rachel holds the dollar coin out, completely useless on Utopia with almost everything either being organised by the quartermasters or using Atlantean currency, her thumb primed to flip it into the air.

“Deal.” Dad, Nate and I agree. The coin goes flying and flips once, twice, three times… and then keeps flipping in place as Rachel and Nate stare each other down.

“Cheating already are we, little brother?”

“Just keeping you honest Rache.” Nate smirks despite the sweat beading down his forehead, supposedly he used to be just as powerful a telekinetic as Rachel but some kind of mad science experiment by a supervillain ‘burned his powers out’ so now he’s having to build them back up slowly, like a muscle, Dad says.

Eventually Nate can’t contest the coin anymore and it drops into Rachel’s waiting palm, slapping it onto her forearm she lifts her hand to reveal heads. Which is good because even with his eyes closed as a handicap Dad can, and has, won a round of the weekly family pool game by getting a full suit and the eight-ball in the pockets during the break shot.

“Team sisters it is. You want to break first today Gwen?”

“Mm? Sure.” I withdraw my hand from the peanut bowl, slipping a few into my pocket for later, and step up to the table.

Pick a ball… Feel the angles and don’t overthink it. There, that striped eleven-ball on the corner of the triangle.

Clack

ClackClackClack

For a second I worry I’ve undershot before the eleven-ball slides into the pocket with a satisfying whisper.

“Yes!” I can’t contain the wiggle of happiness that passes up my body in a wave, accompanied by thick setae fur bursting out of my skin before I force it back down, at finally getting a ball in the pocket on the break shot.

“Good job, Tiny.” Rache’s hand ruffles my hair while Nate punches me in the shoulder, but in a nice way.

I lean into the touch, Rache’s fingers digging into my scalp grounding me, helping me know this is real. “I’m not tiny, I’m on the higher side of average. You and Nate just got Dad’s tall genes.”

Rachel takes our team’s next shot, another striped ball in a pocket, then me again, another pocket. On Rachel’s next shot her angle is slightly off though, the ball bounces off the bumpers and almost pushes a solid colour ball in. 

“Dammit. Your shot Nate, please miss so Scott doesn’t win in one shot again.”

“I promise nothing!” Laughing, Nate takes his shot and sends two solid colour balls into two corner pockets.

I step back to the peanut bowl for a snack, slipping a few more into my pockets on autopilot. The four of us are in Siddig and Dominikos’ new bar ‘Sid & Dom’s’ on Arcadia, we had been having these family gatherings/training sessions in the teacher’s breakroom on Utopia but Dad insisted that all three of us would get ‘a more authentic experience’ if we held the family game in an actual bar now that it was open.

Honestly I don’t like it as much as the breakroom but I don’t want to risk Dad deciding to stop inviting me or calling off the bonding time altogether. Sid & Dom’s smells of cheap beer and toilet still spirits plus its loud, though the pool room at least has a wall between it and the rest of the bar, so the noise is just irritating rather than driving a screwdriver between my temples.

Dad already won the round for himself and Nate while I was getting a snack, Nate and Rache are busy resetting the table but Dad comes over to stand next to me and grabs some peanuts for himself. I ignore him, I’m still a little mad about him not asking me before using my leg as a propaganda tool earlier today.

“I’m not saying to stop, all of us here have done it in the past, but you know you don’t need to hoard food anymore right? You’ll always have enough food here, I won’t let any mutant, especially any of my children, starve.” Dad’s voice is a gentle whisper, Rache and Nate must be able to hear, with their telepathy if not their ears, but the bar patrons next door won’t be able to.

“I know.” I fiddle with the peanuts in my pockets with a guilty hunch to my shoulders. “Just, habit I guess. I know that this, all of this, the food, the bed, the family, the friends will still be here tomorrow but it… It doesn’t feel real yet.”

“I know.” Dad doesn’t reach out with physical affection as often or easily as Rache and Nate so the firm but gentle pat on my shoulder sends warmth shooting through me. Dad does care, I know it really, it's my fault for not telling him how I really feel about my leg. “It took me a while to believe it too.”

Rache and Nate’s heads snap to look at Dad at the same time as mine, the pool table forgotten. “You were homeless?” All three of us ask in stereo.

“Did I really never tell you two? Huh.” Dad frowns as he leans back against the wall and applies chalk to his cue tip. “I ran away from the orphanage I was in when my powers fully manifested for the first time. I hid in the forest for a few days avoiding all human contact, I didn’t have any control of my optic blasts and I didn’t have my glasses, until I was found and adopted by a mutant named Jack Winters.”

“I never knew that.” Rache frowns. “Do you think that Nate and I’s biological fathers had the same history?”

“You, almost certainly Rache but from what Nate’s told me about his world I doubt my variant met Jack Winters there. I stayed with Jack for a few years, we were thieves but Jack refused to pay guild dues so we had to keep on the move, that’s when I picked up my own food hoarding habit, and eventually made our way from Nebraska to Washington D.C.”

“You’re an ex-thief too?” Nate looks excited by Dad’s story while Rache looks constipated.

“Is that why you, your variant, taught me to pick locks as a six year old? He told me it was a part of the standard x-men curriculum!”

“It is part of the standard curriculum, because I put it there, it’s a very useful skill for a superhero.” After taking a sip from his beer Dad shrugs, I think he’s embarrassed? “Ororo and Remy are much better at it than me though, they really improved the course materials when they joined.”

“Oh my god.” Rache slumps into a chair and holds her head in her hands. “I had no idea, all these years.”

My awkwardly shuffling feet are all I can look at. “Is this a bad time to admit that I stole stuff when I was making my journey here? I never figured out how to pick locks though, at least not without my optic blasts.”

“Don’t worry, like I said, it’s on the curriculum.” Dad’s hand on my shoulder is gentle but solid and reassuring. “You aren’t a bad person for stealing to survive, Gwen.”

Peaking through my bangs shows all of my family smiling at me, Nate most of all.

“I am going to teach you everything I learned about carjacking from Forge, I was running out of gun tips anyway. I had no idea the X-Men were cool with thievery, I’d have been teaching you tricks from the start.”

Dad chuckles. “It’s about the motive and the victim, hurting an innocent person when you don’t need to? That’s wrong. Taking what you need to survive from bigots and assholes? Well that just serves them right.”

“Yeah. All three of us have been freedom fighters against oppressive regimes even before Utopia was founded, Gwen. None of us would judge you for a little bit of petty theft.” Rache turns to Dad. “So what happened to Jack Winters? How did you end up with Xavier?” 

Dad’s smile fades and he avoids our eyes. “Well, for all that I’ve moved past it now… Jack wasn’t exactly the best foster father. He was abusive and his mutant powers, teleportation and telepathy, made it impossible for me to escape him. We were doing a big job as part of a crew, stealing data from a nuclear physics lab, when the FBI and Xavier caught up to us.”

“Xavier is an avenger?” I blurt out, shrinking in on myself from everyone’s bewildered stares. “I-It’s what we, the trainees that is, have taken to calling mutant collaborators.”

Rache looks like she eat something sour but Nate and Dad look thoughtful. “It’s not a terrible insult but a bit of a mouthful, and as long as people realise they were wrong we shouldn’t hold mistakes like that against them. It’s hard to break the social programming to trust the government, the original X-Men actually had an FBI liaison until an election happened and working with mutants became politically unacceptible.”

“I am definitely telling Dani about this. She’ll think it’s a riot.”

“So the professor had Jack arrested and brought you to the institute?" Rache prompts, rolling her eyes as Nate chuckles to himself.

Dad tenses up. “Not quite. Jack used the lab’s cyclotron to power himself up somehow, enough to match Xavier on the astral battlefield, and transformed his body into living diamond, like Emma’s, that was immune to my optic blasts. Charles guided me through how to overload the cyclotron and… Kill Jack with his own out of control powers. It was the first time I ever took a life.”

Before I’ve even really processed what I’m doing I close the distance between us and hug Dad, gently and mindful of the strength that accidentally crushed Dr Rao’s hand. Dad tenses even more at the sudden contact. “I’m fine Gwen, really. I talked through all of this with Emma years ago.”

“Stop being so macho and let Tiny hug you, Dad.” I hear Rache say before Rache and Nate’s arms wrap around me and Dad. “You don’t have to be the fearless leader with us.” Eventually Dad relaxes into the group hug and wraps his arms around us in return.

It’s been three days since Alani Ryan, codename: Loa, returned when I finally work up the courage to knock on Xuân’s office door.

“Come in! Oh, Hello Gwen, what do you need?”

“Hello Xuân, um, Ms Mạnh. Can I talk to you about something? It’s important.”

“Of course, Gwen! My door is always open, come sit.” Xuân stands from behind her desk and leads me over to the couch opposite.

Normally Xuân’s office and her apartment are some of the few places where I can forget my false leg but today the phantom pains are worse than usual, my hand can’t stop fidgeting with the servos near my knee.

I shouldn’t even be doing this, I’m only a beginner at friendships but even I know that snitching is bad, why does it matter that Alani is being ghosted by everyone anyway? She did something wrong so she's being punished! That, that’s what being an X-Man is all about isn’t it? Punishing bigots and evil mutants? It’s not like what happened to me at the Jean Grey School at all, I never did anything wrong!

“I think I made a- That is, I’m worried about Alani.” I can’t meet Xuân’s eyes, though she’s almost as understanding as Dad about not forcing me to look directly at her, instead staring at her mechanical leg. 

Our prosthetics are almost identical, it makes sense since the same person designed them I suppose, a bare stainless steel casing with cut outs showing dozens of micro-hydraulics, biometal fiber bundles and hydrocarbon ligaments inside surrounding metal bones. Dr Jeffries and Dr Nemesis both insist that the open design is important for self-maintenance, and that it is more aesthetically pleasing, but I hate it. It just reminds me that my real leg is some stupid fish’s poop somewhere.

“Ms Ryan has had a very difficult time as a prisoner of war, she’s seeing a therapist but if you have any concerns I’ll pass them along of course.”

“It’s not anything Alani has done, its that the oth- we have all been, sort of, excluding her. Since she got back, the others who were held prisoner at Avengers Academy say that she betrayed us and sided with the Avengers, so no one is talking to her and no one sits with her at meals and we don’t tell her about movie nights or-”

“Gwen. It’s okay.” Xuân’s hand hovers over mine. “May I?” After I nod she takes my hand in hers and gives it a gentle squeeze. “We know, Sofia told us yesterday when she noticed what was going on.”

I’m such a coward. I can’t look at Xuân right now, instead my eyes rest on the picture of her younger siblings, Leong and Nga, and her ward, Face. It just makes me feel worse. Xuân invited me into her family, she said that if Dad had rejected me she’d have taken me as a ward like Face, and I’ve let her down. 

“I’m so sorry! I. I should have told you sooner, I shouldn’t have joined in at all! I just, I didn’t want it to happen to me again.” I trip and fumble with my words as they pour from my mouth, tears and snot joining them as Xuân pulls me into a hug.

“It’s okay, Gwen. You’re right that you should have said something earlier but it’s good that you came forward now.” 

“Wh-what’s going to happen now?”

“Scott and Emma are going to be talking to the ring leaders, the Cuckoos, Noriko and Megan, later today. It will depend a bit on how that goes but at minimum all of them will be getting detention and assignments on why bullying is wrong. After that, tomorrow all the trainees will be briefed on why what Alani did was not a betrayal; of Utopia, Atlantis or the rules governing prisoners of war.”

“What happens if it doesn’t stop?”

“Are you going to continue to ostracise Alani, Gwen?” I shake my head, burrowing further into the crook of Xuân’s neck. “So at least one person is going to stop. As for anyone who doesn't, they will be off the team until we think they have learned better. There is no room for people who bully the vulnerable on the X-Men, I know that some candidates for graduating from the trainees to full members have been set back by this.”

We sit silently for a few moments, Xuân rubbing small circles on my back as I calm down. Eventually I pull myself together enough to leave her embrace. “So, Dad knows as well. I. I’m sorry I let you both down.”

“You did, but I’m proud of you for doing the right thing in the end and I’m sure Scott will be as well. You’re only seventeen Gwen, we aren’t expecting perfection from you, just that you try to be the best person you can be and you’ve proved today that you are.”

Dammit my eyes are getting misty again. “I should. I should go and apologise to Alani. Start being better to her now.”

Xuân pats my shoulder and helps me stand up. “I think that is a wonderful idea.”

Despite my promise to Xuân I can’t actually find Alani to apologise to her until the evening meal. Supposedly meal times used to be more free form in the days when Utopia was less than two hundred mutants and their handful of allies but since the Restoration brought a mass influx of desperate restored mutants, strict rationing and planned meal times to coincide with work shifts had to be enforced.

Even after the raising of Arcadia, and the work that is being done on New Genosha, Utopia still doesn’t have food security. We import most of our food from New Atlantis and China, the only nations willing and able to run the US blockades, but with so few exports we can’t exactly afford premium ingredients.

All of that to say that the evening meal I carry on my way to sit with Alani is the same barely seasoned fish soup and rice it has been for every Tuesday for the last month, at least the seafood dish which is used for the main course is rotated every day and we have plenty of salt. I can’t bring myself to bitch about it like some of the adults though, Noriko and I both agree that having 3 certain meals a day is much better than starving on the streets. 

Supposedly the scientists in X-Club and Frost International are working on high performance hydroponics to grow herbs and spices for local use and export. I do miss takeout chinese, even if I don’t miss fishing it out of the trash first, so I hope they complete them soon.

“Hi Alani, is it okay if I sit with you?”

The Hawaiian mutant looks up from her book in shock, she must have been really absorbed because I wasn't walking quietly at all, and looks around her empty table. Normally every cafeteria, there are several on each sub-level and within each tower, is so packed that you need to squeeze in but after the trainees started ghosting Alani, along with Noriko and Megan’s whisper campaign, people have been actively sitting on each other’s laps to avoid Alani. Even now I can feel the glares the rest of the room is shooting at my back.

“Uh, hello? I don’t think we’ve been introduced properly, and I don’t want you to get into trouble with everyone.”

Well that was basically a yes right? Before my nerves override my morals again I sit down across from Alani and try to smile with courage I don't really feel. “My name’s Gwen Summers, it’s nice to meet you, Alani Ryan. And as for everyone else…” 

I try to be cool and look around the room as if I’m not bothered but the betrayed anger on Noriko’s face makes me flinch and turn back, hunching over the table and trying to contain a stress transformation. Spindly spider legs erupting from my shoulders before being forced back in.

Deep breaths. Remember your lessons. Deep breaths.

“Look I appreciate the gesture but every bad thing you’ve heard about me? It’s true and you shouldn’t get yourself in trouble on my account.”

“W-wwell, I’ve not heard much about you at all actually. A little bit of bad stuff yeah but, even if it's all true, I know it can’t be the whole story.” My fork is a twisted mess from my fists clenching but at least my spoon is still usable. “At my old school people heard a few out of context bad things about me, some of them true, some not, and ostracised me so bad I got kicked out. I don’t want to be that person towards you.”

Deep breaths, look her in the eye, be sincere. You can do this Gwen.

“I want to get to know the real Alani Ryan and if after that I think you're a bad person? Then I’ll tell you that to your face rather than just turning my back and ignoring you.”

Alani holds herself together for a second before laughing gently. 

Well okay fuck you too then I guess, bitch. 

Before I can get up and stomp away Alani speaks up. “No, no sorry. It wasn’t a bad speech, you were just so serious about it, did you practice that in the mirror?”

“A little bit.” I grumble before taking a big spoonful of rice to chew and hide my blush.

“Well… thanks. That means a lot actually and I’d give your speech a six out of ten for what it’s worth.”

Well that’s better than a five I guess. We eat in silence for a bit, the cafeteria around us gradually going back to normal chatter as people get tired of glaring at me for sitting with Alani. Why is talking to people so hard? 

“So, what do you do for fun around here Gwen? We used to play volleyball and basketball mostly when I was… Well, before the war.”

“We still do that a bit, but with so many more people it's hard to find the free space, David and some of the adults are talking about setting up leagues to organise it better. We’ve got a few games consoles in the dorms, you’ve probably seen those, and Sid & Dom’s has some arcade machines. Oh! And a Pool table, Dad, Rachel, Nate and I have family pool games there.”

“Heh, well I was asking what you do for fun not everyone else.” 

“Family pool night is fun! But if you need something I do alone then Siddig has been teaching me how to bar flare, that’s fun too.” 

“Fair, fair. Though now I’m curious, I assumed the last name was coincidence but are you Mr Summers and Ms Frost's futurepast kid or something?”

Futurepast, one of several mutant slang terms that I’ve had to pick up the old fashioned way after Rachel’s remedial English download didn’t cover them. It means someone coming from a dystopic future to alter the past and avert their own timeline. My older siblings Rachel and Nathan are both futurepasts, Rachel is even the inspiration for the term. Nate isn’t a futurepast, he’s just an alternate timeline refugee.

“Or something. I was made in a lab using Dad’s DNA and two other people, not Ms Frost’s.” I don’t say who made me, it's not a secret and everyone has been much kinder and less scared then at the Jean Grey School but I still don’t want to risk Alani looking at me like I’m a timebomb. “What about you, what do you do for fun?”

Alani smirks and waves her book at me. “I like long walks on the beach, swimming, surfing and reading books of dark magic.”

This time I’m the one who giggles but Alani doesn’t laugh with me. “You’re serious?”

“Yep” Alani pops the ‘p’ at the end. “The Necronomicon, the Tome of Zhered-Na, the Book of Eibon, the Celeano Fragment, the Pnakotic Manuscripts, the Vermis Mysteriis, Il Libro di Cagliostro and more.”

Those sure were a lot of book titles she just said. Alani giggles at my unimpressed look, it does really cute things to her red tattoos… wait, no now that I’m looking at them closely those aren’t tattoos. Those are a part of her skin, they must be part of her mutation, like breathing water, but then why?

“When you arrived you were wearing some kind of water breathing tube to help with your mutation, are you okay without it?”

Alani winces but also smiles, it's confusing, I’m not sure what she’s actually feeling. “Wow, you really don’t know much about me. Water breathing isn’t my mutant power, that was the result of a magical accident with an atlantean amulet, I take special potions to let me breathe air again temporarily.” 

She grabs my bent fork and holds it flat on her palm, with a flash of light it falls right through her hand! As it falls it breaks apart into chunks and then keeps breaking down until all that is left is a pile of metal dust. “My mutant gift is that I can phase through and disintegrate any solid matter I touch. Plus these red markings.”

“Wow.” I try to follow Dad’s advice and break down the tactical uses of Alani’s power as I poke at the small pile of metal dust on the table but it's hard when I’m distracted by how pretty it was in action. “That’s really cool.”

“Thanks, what about your gift? Can you turn all the way into a spider or is it just partial?”

“Hehe, both, plus I’ve got Dad’s eyes too.” At some point we both finish our food, but keep talking, I barely notice the time passing.

“Hey, Spider-Girl!”

I’m only half way through turning to look at the Cuckoo when her punch almost knocks me off my feet.

As I stumble she grabs my t-shirt, slams me against the metal corridor wall and looms over me. “How dare you snitch on us. Who the hell do you think you are to get me benched huh?"

It’s only the next day after my talk with Xuân, Dad’s talk with everyone must have gone badly.

“No answer? I’m not surprised, your so fucking dim. I don’t see what Mr Summers likes so much about you, we’ve been much more useful. The Three-in-One have been essential to Utopia from the beginning, we coordinate the teams and do most of the work on Cerebra, what do you bring?”

What is she even talking about?  I am so fucking sick of being people’s punching bag for imagined slights. I snap an open palm into her solar plexus, not a hard one, just enough to knock her back and force her to let go.

“Stop calling me stupid! Just because I’m a clone doesn’t make me stupid! And I wouldn’t have needed to snitch if you all just didn’t bully Alani!”

She transforms to her diamond form and lunges at me again, this time I’m not surprised and try to put up a fight, but in this form she is just as strong as I am and has much more training then I do. Soon she has me pinned against the wall again, this time hard enough to dent the metal sheets covering the rock.

“We’re clones too, stupid! I only call you stupid because you’re stupid! You just waltz in here with your sob story and wrap Mr Summers around your little finger! Even Mom likes you for some reason!”

“Miss Frost likes me? She has a weird way of showing it, she avoids me almost as much as you!” Shifting to my hybrid form breaks the diamond girl’s hold on me, and gives me enough strength to slam her into a wall hard enough to dent it this time! “Grgrgrgl.” <Why do you hate me so much if you're all clones too?>

“Oh please! You arrive with your doe-eyed ingénue act, charming everyone and monopolising their attention. Getting special treatment from Mr Summers.” Her superior training tells again as she breaks my hold and sweeps my prosthetic leg, shattering its ankle joint and sending me sprawling to the floor. “You’re just like Hope! Trying to take Mr Summers away from us and turn my sisters against me!”

My sixth arm grabs her ankle and I swing her one, twice, three times into the floor. “Grgrgrgl!” <What are you talking about? I can’t take Dad away from you, it's not like he’s your father!>

The triplet twists out of my grip with a feral scream as she tries to claw my eyes out. It's only thanks to my spare arms and extra bulk from my transformation that she doesn’t get any of them, instead just leaving shallow cuts from her diamond nails. “Yes! He! Is! You ugly freak!”

“Grgrgrgl!” <I’m not a freak! I’m a mutant! Just! Like! You!> I flip us over and slam the horrible girl into the floor with every word.

“Celeste! Gwen what are you doing!” Dad’s furious shout shocks me out of my rage and I drop the Cuckoo, Celeste apparently, as I shift back to human form and collapse beside her, blue blood mixing with red as the cuts on my face keep bleeding. 

Not again. Not again.

Dad carefully helps Celeste up from the floor, she seems disoriented as she shifts back to human as well, holding her head and groaning.

Did I do that? I thought she was invulnerable in diamond form!

Dad looks back and forth between us, he must be so angry, his shoulders are tense and he’s frowning he hates me he hatesmehehatesme!

“I- I’m sorry!”

“Gwen wa-”

Before I can try to crawl away despite my shattered prosthetic, or Dad can finish his condemnation, a green portal opens beneath the three of us, quickly sucking us down into itself before closing. Leaving no trace in the corridor except for the marks of Celeste and I’s fight.