The Vault - REVIEW THIS STORY

Written by NicoPony
Last updated: 08/15/2007 08:57:57 AM

Epilog

When Remy turned again, he caught a glimpse of fiery red hair just behind one of the large oak trees. He walked a little faster, his bookbag decorated with little buttons banged against his hip. He was grinning a particularly obnoxious grin by the time he’d reached Jean’s side. She was leaning back against the tree trunk, gnawing on the nail of her pinkie finger. In her lap was one of those ubiquitous blue-covered notebooks used for University exams.

“Hot off the presses,” Remy called, and dropped one of the two newspapers he carried into her lap.

Jean glowered up at him.

“Still upset about that B, hunh?” he smirked. “Oh, the end is nigh! Jean Grey’s gotta B on her test!”

“B-plus,” she snapped. “Go ahead and mock me. You might not take this class seriously, but I want to be a psychologist. And I can’t even get an A in Psych one-oh-one.”

Remy shrugged and looked skyward. “There’s plenty o’ time t’make it up.”

“What did you get on the exam?” Jean asked, feigning disinterest.

Remy flopped into grass, sticking his narrow rear end into a space between the tree’s roots. He shook out his newspaper and hid behind it. Jean sat up straight, recognizing her own face on the front page of the newspaper.

She made a disgusted sound and grabbed the newspaper Remy had dropped in her lap. She held it up in front of her, looking at the headline of the school newspaper, The Bayville Beacon: “Local Teen Unjustly Imprisoned.”

“’One girl’s journey into a personal Heart of Darkness...’” Remy read dramatically.

Jean reached out and crumpled Remy’s newspaper as he exploded into laughter.

“You wouldn’t be laughing if that was you on the front page!” Jean snarled.

Remy pulled a horrible face and strangled out: “The horror...the horror...!”

Jean rolled up her newspaper and began to beat him with it.

“Mais, this is funny!” He pulled the newspaper free from Jean’s grasp. “’Jean Grey, a long-time Bayville resident and University honors student’---ha! I guess they didn’t find out about the B yet!”

“Oh, you’re so annoying! I don’t know how Rogue can tolerate you for a single moment!”

“She tolerated me pretty good last night,” Remy said lowly, his eyes danced mischievously.

“Incorrigible!” Jean cried. Her voice echoed out across the quad. Several people turned to look in their direction.

“Oh, c’mon Jean! You’re famous! I mean, who else gets front page of th’newspaper and gets elected Keg Queen in th’same week? What would Kappa Tappa Kegga do wit’out you?”

“That is not a real fraternity, Remy,” Jean said in a deadpan tone.

“Keg Queen! Keg Queen!” Remy chanted, fist in the air.

Jean deliberately held the newspaper up in front of her face. She continued to read the front page article with growing embarrassment.

Two weeks have passed since nearly thirty mutants mysteriously appeared on the Mall in Washington, D.C. The mutants, ranging between the ages of fourteen and twenty-five, were noticed in the early morning by D.C. authorities. The mutants claimed to have been held captive on a remote island somewhere in the Indian Ocean. Fearing the young mutants’ public demonstration would soon turn into a full-scale riot of anti-mutant prejudice, police detained the mutants for several hours at the D.C. Police Department.

“We were robbed of our individuality and pitted against one another,” Grey told reporters. “It was terrifying.”

Jean didn’t want to read any more. She all ready knew what she’d told the reporters. Jean didn’t want to be the one to put on a brave face and stand in front of reporters and their microphones. But Xavier had insisted it be done, and she was the right person to do it. Jean was growing weary of her role as mutant goodwill ambassador. Hers was the face that was presented to the new recruits. She was the one who acted as role model. Frankly, she was sick of being Miss Nice-Mutant. Now that it was over, she hoped to never think about what happened on Krakoa ever again. It was bad enough she dreamt about it every night. Bodies floating in green liquid, hot mud pouring into her nose and mouth, and always the horrid pale face of Milbury, grinning at her.

Jean probably couldn’t have swayed public opinion in her favor alone. She was all ready publicly known, having fought against Apocalypse and his Horsemen in front of international news crews. But Guido Carosella’s tiny grandmother took the bus down from Brooklyn, New York to Washington D.C. and showed up on the front steps of the police department demanding to see her grandson. The news stations were fascinated with the small Italian immigrant grandmother and her gargantuan but gentle grandson.

Then the British government discovered that one of their citizens, Betsy Braddock, had been detained, allegedly, by the U.S. Government. It was an international public relations disaster. When the investigations continued, it was revealed that Lorna Dane had been removed from a Southern California psychiatric hospital. This discovery led to the medical community uproariously decrying the imprisonment and mistreatment of those suffering from mental disorders.

Guido had gone home with his grandmother. Betsy was deported, or rather, returned home to the UK, despite her protests. And Lorna was put back on her medication and readmitted to the hospital. The rest of the mutants were released, as the authorities could find no criminal record on any of them. Not even St. John Allerdyce, who had in fact, set a warehouse on fire. Magneto had benevolently erased any record of their arrest. He hadn’t won any favor with Remy however, who was giving both Magneto and Xavier the cold shoulder for the last two weeks. Both Remy and Jean had been welcomed back to Bayville University. The president himself had publicly apologized for what he called a: “Regrettable incident involving the Spirit Rock.” Jean was looking forward to things getting back to normal. As far as normal went in Bayville.

Remy was riffling through his backpack, shoving the folded newspaper inside. Jean yanked it from his grip and crumpled it with her copy of the paper.

“Hey!” he cried. “And I was gonna have you sign my copy.”

“Fat chance,” Jean snapped. She had spilled several papers and Remy’s psychology book from his bag when she’d grabbed the newspaper. The book was laying open in the grass. The margins of the pages were covered with notes, the text heavily highlighted. Remy snapped the book shut and shoved it into his bag.

“Really, Remy,” Jean said. “The professor gave you enough money to buy new books. I don’t know how you can manage with those used texts. Look, the spine’s falling off!”

“I’ll stick with the used, thank you very much. B’sides, the answers are in them all ready.”

“Yes, that’s generally where you find answers. Books. Glad you finally managed to learn something.”

She picked up his fallen notebooks. A blue exam book fell out of the clutch of papers she was holding. They both dove for it at the same time. She wrestled it from his grip.

“Gimme back that book, Jean,” Remy said dangerously.

“In a minute,” she replied coolly. She had to hold him at bay with her telekinesis while she opened up the book and flipped to the back. She stared at the grade in growing horror.

“YOU GOT AN A!?”

“A-plus, Know-It-All. So, wanna borrow my notes?”

~*~

Author’s Notes:

First, I’d like to thank my beta, Neko, for proof-reading this and making sure it all made sense. Without her, this probably would have never been “published.”

Hope you enjoyed my story. For those of your who are more familiar with the show than the X-Books, I will clarify a few things. For those of you who are fans of the books, you might’ve noticed mention of things familiar to X-Men canon.

Krakoa, the “Island that walked like a man,” was featured famously in Giant Sized X-Men #1. Krakoa was a living island that devoured mutants. The original X-team was held captive there, prompting Xavier to form a new team comprising new X-Men such as Wolverine and Storm. Polaris was mostly responsible for the ultimate defeat of the island.

Milbury’s Genosha project was named for the island of Genosha, located in the Indian Ocean. In the X-Books, mutants/mutates were used as slaves to hold up Genosha’s successful economy.

Doctor Milbury, of course, is referencing one of Mister Sinister’s numerous aliases. His real name is Nathaniel Essex, but has also gone by Nathan Milbury. In the books, Milbury is the name of his deceased wife’s estate. Here Essex uses the name of the school he graduated from, Milbury University.

Destiny (Irene Adler), as well as Sinister, Amanda Mueller, Kurt Marko and Alexander Ryking were all involved in a research project called The Black Womb. The intent of the project was to study mutant children. Toad was originally one of the Black Womb children. Destiny served as archivist on the project.

Doctor Valerie Cooper (briefly mentioned in Chapter: “Because America Can”) works for the Commission on Superhuman Affairs. She’s most notable for her work as mutant liaison in the United States government. She was also responsible for holding the remaining 198 mutants captive at the Xavier Institute after the events of M-Day...for their own protection of course. Gyrich was the government liaison for the Avengers before working with the CSA. He was most closely affiliated with the Black Panther, who rules Wakanda.

Carl Denti became the X-cutioner after his partner, Fred Duncan was killed. So, in my mind, Duncan was doomed from the start. :-)

Betsy Braddock is Psylocke, of X-Men fame. Guido Carosella is Strong Guy from X-Factor. Lorna Dane is Polaris. And Joanna Cargill is Frenzy, one of Magneto’s former Acolytes in the books.

Moxie is my nod to the character Foxx, an alias established by Mystique to infiltrate the X-Men. Moxie is about a million times cooler than Foxx, though, who was completely lame.

Sugar Bombs are the drug---er, breakfast of choice for the former members of Generation X. Chris Bachalo, artist for the book in the early days, snuck Sugar Bombs into his drawings.

On a personal note, our University has a Spirit Rock, which was defiled last year after the Black United Students had decorated it. There weren’t any riots on campus though, and the three boys who had written the racist message apologized.