D'Ancanto

Chapter 1

Your flesh moves under my fingers

and I remember flesh and fingers, as a child holding
the head of a flashlight cupped in my fist
in a dark room, seeing with such delight
the outlines of my own hand's
lucent skeleton, swathed in the red glow
of the blood clouded within

and this is how I hold
you: not as body
as in planetary,
as in thing, bulk, object
but as a quickening

a disturbance of the various
darknesses within my arms
like an eddy in the moonlit
lake where a fish moves unseen.

We rot inside, the doctor
said. To put a hand on another
is to touch death,
no doubt. The there is also

this nebulous mist of interstellar
dust snagged by the gravity
of a few bones, mine,
but luminous;

even in the deep subarctic
of space beyond meaning, even among
the never alive, to approach
is to shine.

I hold you as I hold
water, swimming.

~ "The skeleton, not as an image of death" by Margaret Atwood

Fires from Chelsea blew windows off buildings in Greenwich Village. Charlotte grabbed the door handle as Marie ripped the squad car through traffic.

"Girl, I am fucking writing you up for-- we were up on two wheels!" Charlotte bellowed.

"We got here faster than the firefighters," said Marie.

"Fat lot that's going to do when I left my stomach up in Carnegie, good night, woman, watch the goddamn--argh!" Charlotte covered her eyes. "Just let me know when we're in hell."

"Thought you told me Hell was Times Square."

Flames licked around the corner of the intersection. Windows warped, some falling out of their frames. Marie slammed both feet on the brakes, shoved the door open and crouched behind it for cover. "We're here. I'm taking point."

Charlotte glared at her as she took the same position. "I'm not kidding, D'Ancanto. As the senior partner, I have a duty to report insanity. Where'd you learn to drive?"

"With good ol' boys in back country roads."

"You still in touch with them?"

"Not really."

"Good. 'Cause I'm calling the Marshals on them. Dispatch, this is MacTac-2, did you copy the 10-70? 'Cause it's a big, damn seventy."

"10-4, MacTac, emergency logged," said the frustratingly calm voice on the radio.

Marie glared at it. "Well, is there anything being done? Y'know, before Manhattan gets burned to the ground?"

"All units are occupied. Please wait for back-up."

"We are the back-up." Marie groaned, "Dispatch, please at least tell me the New York's Bravest are on the case."

"The fire department is en route, ma'am."

"They're driving around just as crazy as you taking those fires out," said Charlotte.

Marie leaned forward only far enough to say, "You are so jealous of my skills, Jones."

"A likely story. Hey, looks like the leather cavalry's here."

"They've been here a while." Marie pointed to the evidence. Ice pillars held buildings upright. A pile of bent cars formed a barrier in an alley. Triple claw-marks gouged the asphalt beside bubbling heaps of the same material.

"Keep waiting for back-up, D'Ancanto. Something this big, we gotta go by the book."

"Shouldn't we at least go for the bystanders?"

Charlotte shook her head. "I see you step out of this car, I'm suspending you for a week. The landscape is don't get dead."

Marie pressed her lips into a thin line but nodded. Heavy, dark rain clouds crept east to the worst of the fires. Storm. Although the rain did little to stop the fires, it at least prevented them from spreading. Fortunately, September in New York City meant lots of humidity for Storm and Iceman's powers to draw from. Marie counted at least five other uniformed X-Men surrounding the area which likely meant another five were out of sight. There were a lot of them these days, the mutant community's open secret. She knew less than half by name. One of the new ones dropped in front of her, all gangly legs and eagerness.

"Hi, I'm Cannonball. Wolverine told me to tell you to leave Pyro to us and worry about the bystanders."

"You hear that, Detective Jones?" Marie called out.

"Loud and," said Charlotte. "Back-up's en route but he's making the trip hard. Any way you can clear the road for the EMTs and FDs?"

Cannonball looked pleased to be of service. "Um. Sure, I guess. Which way are they coming?"

Charlotte took a few seconds to confer with dispatch. "Broadway's insane right now but it's Dyer that's shut right down. Anything you can free up from the business district's great, too."

"Passing that on. Thanks ma'am, Miz Rogue." He ran a few yards then turned into some sort of jet-propulsion system from the waist down, rocketing up into the clouds presumably to pass the message on.

"Huh," said Charlotte. "I guess that's one way to avoid traffic."

"Gotta be hell on his uniform though," said Marie.

"You ever gonna tell me why they call you Rogue?"

"It'd take a whole flat of Jack Daniels and a Joseph Gordon-Levitt marathon to tell you all about my misspent youth." She peeked over around the door and just about singed her eyelashes off. Pyro's fires were intensifying; she felt the heat through the car door. A glance to her left showed Charlotte crouching forward. "It's getting unfriendly here, bosslady."

Charlotte pointed to a van turned on its side a dozen yards to their west. Marie nodded and dove across the front seats to Charlotte's side. At the count of three, Charlotte sprinted to the van while Marie provided cover. A scraggly crowd seemed to have the same idea, running in panicked zig-zags to the nearest cover. The movement must have attracted Pyro's attention because Marie heard the growl of fire on the move echoed by a very human scream. Her jaw clenched.

Johnny

A fiery rope darted forward to cut her off from the van. Marie leapt back in time to keep from roasting but her pant leg caught a spark. She slapped at the smouldering cloth.

"Dammit, Johnny!" Pyro was only a year older than her, still shy of thirty, but wild acts like this were way too immature. She was pissed off at him, pissed off that she knew him, and pissed off that nothing anyone said changed his fool mind about the Brotherhood. Now her pants were scorched and she'd have to patch it up because the next three paycheques would have to go to the exploded plumbing in her apartment instead of food and clothes. "Goddamnit, Johnny!"

"Die! Die! Die!" Pyro's voice rose over Storm's thunder and the wails of the sirens, over the screaming victims and the fire itself. "Die!"

Oily tracks along the gutters created low barriers of fire. People inside buildings hesitated to cross the streets; people leaving their cars didn't want to jump into the sidewalks. Everyone headed for the closest avenue of escape which meant the emergency personnel couldn't get through the same way. On the other side of Marie's squad car, a man tried to crawl to from the worst of the pandemonium. The panicked mob didn't stop for him. Marie flicked the safety back on her piece and went around the car.

Up in the air, Storm pleaded with her former student. "John, you must stop this!"

"That's not my real name."

"Pyro," she said gently. "Pyro, please you're hurting yourself. These fires are too hot even for you to control."

"I don't care." Louder, more brokenly, he repeated, "I don't care! I'm already dead."

The crawling man was now reduced to covering his head. The mob trampled on. Marie breathed deep and ran into the melee. Arms and legs buffeted her on all sides, and she reminded herself that they had every right to be this afraid but dammit, they were making things worse. All it would take for a death count was one person to trip over that man.

Then, because she jinxed the world, someone did trip. The centre of the mob collapsed like a madman's domino maze. The movement caught Pyro's attention. From this distance, she couldn't see his face but Marie somehow knew his expression had changed.

"Iceman!" she yelled. Instead Kitty dropped beside her which only showed the desperation of the situation: she lived a civilian life, too. Kitty solidified just long enough to grab one of the people in the dogpile then phased again. Because everyone in the piled touched, the whole bunch of them also went insubstantial. Kitty then plucked out one person at a time and handed them to Marie who helped them get to safer ground.

"I'm keeping the injured phased," said Kitty.

Marie nodded. That would keep them from getting hurt more. "Why isn't anyone taking Pyro down?"

"We're trying" Kitty said. "Everything we throw at him melts. The temperature around him is ridiculous."

"What about Wolverine?"

Kitty pursed her lips. "You smell barbeque?"

"Yeah but what--"

"That's eau de Fighting Wolvie."

"Nice."

Storm's rain turned torrential. The fires still raged but by now several fire trucks and squad cars blocked the intersections. Two or three blocks past them, ambulances lined up to care for the injured. One of the EMTs had paired up with another new kid who seemed to have healing powers. Every once in a while, the EMT pointed out a person for the kid to touch.

"What's the plan?" Marie asked.

"We're in the process of putting together a Plan D," admitted Kitty.

"Dammit."

"Pretty much."

Her walkie crackled. "D'Ancanto, tell me you're standing," said Charlotte.

"I'm good, Jones. You?"

"Peachy. There's five of us behind this van and I need eyes before we make a run for it."

"I've got this under control, Rogue," said Kitty, gesturing to the mob.

"Marie," Marie corrected. As she ran for the van, she opened up the scanner for info. "This is D'Ancanto, MacTac-2. My partner's hunkered down with five people on East Twenty-Third between Madison and Park Avenue. Suspect is in visual range, repeat, suspect is in visual range. Requesting further orders, over."

The radio replied, "MacTac-2, this is Captain Chu. I need you to clear the area. We have a plan in place and you may get caught in the crossfire."

"What about my partner?"

"Is she in a safe position?"

Marie chuckled. "Sir, nowhere's a safe position right now except maybe Niagara County."

"Fair enough. Just get your ass out of there in under seven minutes. No heroics, y'hear?"

"Loud and, sir."

Marie stole across the length of the squad car, keeping Pyro's wavering silhouette in sight. The locked cage in the trunk held her Remington 700, her baby on the range but a weapon she'd hoped to never use on the field. She popped half a box of cartridges in her belt pouch. As she did so, her fingers brushed a pair of adamantium jacket hollow points hidden in her slacks. Storm and Iceman were throwing everything they could at Pyro but he burned too hard. Wolverine must be in there, too; the sour-sulphur-sweet-metal smell drifted towards her hiding place. She'd never smelled burning human flesh until today but it couldn't be anything else. Battered by the heat convection winds, helicopters uselessly bobbed overhead. A couple of them looked like helitacks; sure enough one dumped flame retardant several blocks over. None of them could get anywhere near Pyro. Marie moved the hollow points to her belt.

With Pyro distracted, she made a run for the Charlotte's van and slid beside the group in a classic base-stealing move. "Hey there, partner."

Charlotte glared but Marie knew she didn't totally mean it. "All right people, we're going to evacuate in an orderly manner. If you don't do like we do, we can't protect you properly. D'Ancanto over there is a crackshot; she'll be providing back cover. I'll lead the way. Remember: do like I do exactly and we'll be fine."

"What if we get burned?" a man cried out.

"That won't happen." Charlotte sent Marie a look that said, "Don't make a liar out of me," as she pulled her piece out of her holster.

Marie did the same. "On your three, bosslady."

Charlotte's "three" followed a staccato of gunfire. With abandoned cars parked in a semi-straight line, they had plenty of cover. Even so, Marie had to push two of the people out from behind the van to get them to move even as she looked frantically around for falling debris and ricocheting bullets. In the rooftop across the street, she spotted a sniper taking position. SWAT was out, which was kind of expected but it didn't seem enough.

She pressed on her radio. "D'Ancanto, MacTac-2 again, sir. Just out of curiosity, what exactly is the plan?"

"SWAT, snipers, and the National Guard," said Captain Chu.

"With all due respect, sir, he's melting rebar by farting in its general direction. I don't think the snipers are going to do much damage."

"When you've got a better idea, let me know. Until then get the hell out of there."

Irritated, Marie slapped her radio off. More SWAT had come out of the woodworks and were waving them over. She kept her eyes and hand gun trained back at Pyro. A few feet from the SWAT van barricade, a shout cut short. Seconds later, Iceman flew, limp-limbed, out of the inferno. A pink girl-- Marie thought her call-sign was Blink--threw a pink blob up in the air which swallowed Iceman up. The blob reappeared near the ground, bringing Iceman with it. He crumpled on the street, breathing hard, his fleshform showing in bits and water dripping off his shoulders.

"D'Ancanto, come on!" shouted Charlotte.

Marie looked over her shoulder. There was her partner, looking worried as always, like moms always tended to be. There was Iceman, his woefully young-looking pink sidekick, and Storm doing not much of anything. And there were the adamantium jackets in her pocket along with her one hundred forty-six hours clocked on the range.

She reholstered her piece and ran for Bobby to the sound of Charlotte hollering her lungs out. She was so going to get suspended for this and right on the month when her bike needed some good loving. Plus the whole exploded plumbing thing.

"You know what Wolvie would do to you if he found you sleeping on the job, Popsicle?"

Iceman moaned. Water pooled at his knees and elbows. "Don't even joke about that. I get him?"

"Well, you might've given him the flu."

"Fuck. I was hoping to kill the temp around him. Drain the heat."

"Like his fireballs back in school."

He almost smiled. "Gimme a minute to catch my breath."

"Let's see if me and my baby can buy you more." Marie patted the Remington.

"He's turned half of Midtown into ash, Marie. You can't go there."

"I didn't say I could stop him; just stall him a bit. I'm gonna need one of these." She pulled the commlink out of his ear.

"Marie!"

But she was already up and running. She didn't want or need to get up high; by her estimates, there'd be too much wind to get a good shot in. A second or third floor window would do just as well as anywhere higher. There was one to her right that didn't look too scorched and most of the windows had tiny balconies where she could get a good shot in. Marie took a running start and leapt for the fire escape, easily catching hold of the rungs. With a good swing, she was up and over, climbing up the rest of the way. She wrenched a half-open window nearly out of its sash and made her way around the apartment until she found one of those half-balconies.

"This is D'Ancanto, MacTac-2, speaking to the X-Men, over."

"Rogue?" Storm said, "What on Earth are you doing?"

"Helping out a bit. You think you can herd Pyro past Madison Square Park, closer to central Chelsea?"

Wolverine's voice came over the waves next. "What's going on in your head, Marie?"

"I'm a sniper," she lied.

"I most certainly will not--" Storm began but Wolverine interrupted.

"Are you any good?"

"Come on, Wolvie. Like you'd associate with sucky snipers."

"Wolverine." That was all Storm had to say. She could put whole wikis into one word.

With a sigh, Wolverine said, "Storm, do you even want to estimate the casualties and the property damage Johnny's done? He's not your student any more. I'm sorry."

Silence held the commlink for the longest five seconds Marie had experienced since she waited for that Novomane shot ten years ago. "Very well. But I cannot be complicit in this."

"Fine. You head the safety crew. Blink?"

"Sir?" came the girl's voice.

"Grab my commlink and give it to Iceman. He's going to need it. Then report to Storm."

"Yessir."

Marie popped the standard cartridges out of the rifle, replacing them with the adamantium ones. She MacGyvered a mount using an up-ended flowerpot then trained the muzzle towards the tallest of the flames. Then she lay flat on the grilled floor for an experimental look down the barrel through the iron sights. It wasn't ideal but it would have to do. "I'm in position."

"What position? MacTac, is that you?" her police radio crackled out. Whoops. Captain Chu was still on.

"Sorry, sir. Didn't know my key was open." She locked the radio and pulled it off her collar. "As we were, X-Men."

"We're driving him your way," said Iceman. "Gonna try to cool down the periphery, too. Hope you've got a coat."

"I'll handle it." Marie peered down the sights. She immediately teared up. The centre was white hot, almost like looking at the sun. Multicoloured spots danced in her vision when she glanced away. Fuck. That was unexpected. "I'm going to be a bother again and ask if anyone there has a good pair of shades I can borrow."

"I'm on it, ma'am." Cannonball appeared quickly after his drawl snapped through the commlinks. He pulled his goggles off and gave them to her. "These'll do?"

"They're great, thanks. I'll give them back when this is over, 'kay, sugar?"

He blushed, nodded and zoomed away.

She still teared up looking straight at Pyro but at least she could keep him in sight longer. Marie shut her eyes. She had to save it for go-time and trust the X-Men to do their job. "Let me know when he's within two hundred feet, repeat, two hundred feet."

"I heard you the first time," Wolverine grunted. "Give us a couple more minutes."

The air chilled. To the north, the buildings took on a lighter shade. Frost, Marie realised. Bobby was doing his job. Further back, more to the east, Storm's clouds poured rain over the city, quenching the fires best she could. She smelled sulphur; that was either Nightcrawler 'porting people away or just plain old industrial waste. She preferred to believe the former. The column of flame loped closer.

"Fuck you!" she heard Pyro yell. "I'll get you. I'll fucking get you! You left us, you fucking-- you left! I believed you!"

"Close enough?" Bobby asked, audibly panting.

Marie checked. "Another seventy-five feet if we're going to make it count."

A pained, bellowed "No!" erupted out of the column at the same time a cone of fire did. Marie rolled back, gasping as the iron grates of the balcony went red with heat.

"What the heck was that?!" she yelled.

"We're losing control," said Bobby. "Take your shot!"

"I can't yet! He's too far!"

"We can't--" Bobby seemed to choke then Wolverine dove out of the conflagration, more skeleton than human. "Marie, take the shot!"

"Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck." She reassembled her mount, hands shaking. This was a bad idea. This was one of the worst ideas she'd ever had, and Lord help her, the list went a mile long. She took a moment to wipe the sweat out from her goggles then shifted into position.

There, between her sights, the glowing white centre of Pyro's main fire. And then there, in the middle, shifting through the heat waves, was Pyro's silhouette.

"Marie!"

"Just a second."

"Marie, we don't have--" Bobby's swallowed groan of pain was more chilling than any scream.

He was getting closer. His silhouette wavered in the heat waves. Marie didn't dare blink.

"Take the damn shot, Marie," Kitty shouted, sobbed.

"Hold on."

"Marie!"

The waves parted. Marie pulled the trigger.

NYPD's Mutant Crimes Task Force-- MacTac for cute-- just barely operated out of the 28th Precinct but, much to the Deputy Inspector's chagrin, didn't actually answer to the 28th. No one exactly held a bidding war to house the country's first mutant crimes unit but after the president's vociferous backing of mutants after the Alcatraz Attack, the mayor of New York had a sycophantic spasm and offered a burned-out shell of a brownstone at the border of the Mount Morris Historic District and Spanish Harlem as a site for this "ground-breaking" police force. She didn't bother to ask the residents of the neighbourhoods about it; they reminded the task force of this at least once a week. But at least they did it teasingly now. Mostly.

Still soot-stained eighteen hours later, Marie took a healthy chug of her coffee and wished for the meeting to end. She didn't need to look at more pictures of Johnny's chest blown off. She already knew she'd never forget the smell.

"The link between the drug, ziff, and what the media is calling Alcatraz Legacy Disease or ALD, is obvious" said Captain Harper. "As such, the joint bureau chiefs have agreed that concentrating on removing ziff from our streets is priority number one for--"

Marie raised her hand. Charlotte kicked her leg but she ignored her. "Sorry, I must still be smoke woozy but I don't get what ALD and ziff have to do with each other."

"He showed it five slides ago," said Zeigler, his nictitating membranes half-drawn in boredom.

"And another two slides before that," said Ziegler's partner, Henshaw. "It was colour-coded and animated. I was on the edge of my seat."

The captain cleared his throat. "Considering you should be at home on sick leave, D'Ancanto, I'll let this one pass. Don't let me catch you snoozing again."

"Much appreciated, Captain," Marie drawled.

Captain Harper flicked back to the animated, colour-coded slide to a chorus of groans. Charlotte leaned over and whispered, "Why didn't you keep your mouth shut? I have to pick Tim up from my mom's."

"I just wanted to know," said Marie.

"He'll put it up on the intranet anyway."

"Ziff, also known as Mutant Growth Hormone, Sweet Maggie, and banshees. As you can see," Captain Harper pointed to a chart, "there's a direct correlation between the rise in ziff use and the cases of ALD--"

"Correlation ain't causation," Marie pointed out.

"Yeah, what about that study saying it's only mutants who took the Novomane that're getting ALD?" someone in the back called out. Marie felt the combined effort of the entire room as they tried not to stare at her. She kept her back straight and her attention on the Captain.

"What about the one that says it also affects mutants who don't?" Charlotte shot back.

"Hey, I'm just saying it can't be healthy to mess with your genes like that. Who knows what kind of shit they put in the Novomane to cripple us." Marie recognized the speaker now. A mutant named Everett Thomas whose aura could duplicate powers and track mutants by sensing those powers. He didn't have to touch anyone to do that; his aura did it for him. Lucky dick.

Charlotte and a couple others started to stand but the Captain waved them down. "There's time for that later. Right now this meeting is about ziff, it's about a war of drugs and it's about stopping the spread of a disease that we all have a stake in whether you're pro-Novomane or not. Got it?"

Everett leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, and said nothing more.

"Now, to get back to D'Ancanto's point, I'm not saying ziff causes ALD," he said. "I'm saying there's a relationship. Considering ziff is already an illegal drug and the media panic machine's already working on the rise of baseline ziff usage, cracking down on it will probably kill ten birds with one stone. The whys can't be our headache right now; let's focus on the hows."

{{Betcha that's the new catchphrase from PR,}} Charlotte texted.

Marie repressed a grin. {{You're 12.}}

She snickered then coughed to hide it. The act wasn't difficult; her throat still hurt from the fires. Fortunately, the captain took that as a sign to wind things down. "Let's continue this meeting in a couple days. It's been a long damn shift and we all deserve to get some rest."

Henshaw let out an exuberant "Amen!" amidst the cheers and everyone began to shuffle out of their chairs. Then the captain raised his hands.

"I forgot one more thing!"

Marie joined the chorus of groans.

"D'Ancanto, get over here."

Puzzled, Marie made her way to the front just as the doors opened. Ziegler re-entered carrying a brightly coloured box from the Cuban restaurant across the street. He made a beeline for her while the rest of the officers clapped.

"What's this?" Marie demanded. "Jones, what the hell?"

Charlotte held her hands up. "Don't look at me, partner. My only contribution was telling them you'd give up your sainted grandma for a slice of tres leches."

Captain Harper patted her shoulder. "You did good, D'Ancanto. Your shot turned the tide yesterday, so much so that I'm going out on a limb pissing off PR to keep your part in it a secret. But, dammit, we all know what you did and we want to congratulate you not because--" the cheers become more raucous and Harper put his hands up to beg for a bit more attention-- "not because you had to take a life. We all know any idiot can pull a trigger. We congratulate you because you made that hard decision and, in doing so, you saved countless lives. For that, you deserve cake."

The last thing Marie thought she deserved was cake but the captain's cheesy speech actually made everyone happy so she stretched her mouth out into a smile and cut the damn tres leches. Sensing something off, Charlotte chased people away with as much good humour as possible, allowing Marie to escape that much sooner. Not that she escaped alone. Charlotte was at her heels as soon as she left the locker rooms.

"Hey! Come with me to Momma's. She's going to want to tear into me for leaving Timmy there so long and I need to manipulate her sense of propriety."

Marie shook her head. "Char, I'm beat, girl--"

"So take a load off at my mom's. C'mon, what're you going to do once you get home anyway? Grab take-out and wallow? At least at my place, you're guaranteed homemade lasagne or maybe even zhaliang 'cause it's Timmy's favourite and Momma denies him nothing."

Despite having eaten cake, Marie's stomach rumbled. Charlotte's mom specialised in all noodley dishes and she really was just going to grab take-out. "Nah, I mean to wallow good and hard tonight," she said finally. "Just bring me leftovers tomorrow."

"Leftovers, ha! You remember how much fourteen year old boys eat?" Now caught up to her, Charlotte bumped Marie's hip with her bag. "What's bothering you, partner?"

"Aside from the fact that we've been on duty for fifty-two hours straight, half of Manhattan got burned down, news polls are on the down-swing for mutants, I've got to patch up my uniform again, and we're on District X duty indefinitely?"

"Aside from those very minor details."

Marie ran a hand through her hair. "I went to high school with him," she said, her voice pitched low.

Charlotte's expression didn't change but she did blink five times real quick. "Huh."

"Not just... he was my friend. Mainly my boyfriend's friend but mine, too. We were the three amigos, y'know? Me, Johnny and Bobby. I haven't seen him face-to-face since... gawd, probably since I was seventeen and even though I knew he'd gone down the wrong track, I never expected to..." She ended her tirade on a frustrated sigh. "I shot him. Ten years not seeing one of the best friends I ever had and I shot him. And I was so damn proud that I shot him. Isn't that fucking sick?"

"No one should do that. Why didn't you tell me?"

"I don't know. I just... I was hoping I wouldn't have to I guess. I mean, the X-Men were there."

"Doing rescue duty," said Charlotte.

"They train to maintain life. That's what it says in the brochure, right?"

"Girl, they wear light armour and drive a decommissioned military jet. Whatever they might say about maintaining life, they're suited up to beat it nearly out of your body." Charlotte hitched her bag higher on her shoulder. "It's not supposed to be easy. Frankly, if you don't feel like utter shit after shooting someone, I'll arrest you myself. But to have to do that to someone you know, that is the ultimate shitfuck. I'm sorry you had to do that."

Marie shrugged.

"You talk to psych about it?"

"Like I've had time in the back-to-back-to-back-to-back shifts."

"Right. More like this is one of those mutants-only things," said Charlotte.

"What are you talking about?"

Charlotte shrugged this time. "It's not a bad thing. Everyone-- every culture's got something. Kind of like what Chinese people order in restaurants isn't on the menu and how the way black folk talk about white folk when they're by themselves is different. There's just stuff you know because you're a mutant and you know the rules about the community."

"Like what?"

"Like the identities of the X-Men."

Marie barely stopped from twitching.

"Don't worry," said Charlotte. "You've never given anything away. But they don't cover their faces and still no one knows who they are. Say what you will about baseline-mutant co-operation but at least half the guys over the MacTac talk about them like they know them--"

"They wish they knew them," Marie corrected.

"They know something. Which is a heckuvalot more than what the rest of us basies have. It's cool; I know why you do it."

Marie felt the inexplicable urge to apologize but she didn't know what for. "It's not a mutant-only thing," she said instead but before she could elaborate, someone walked into her, making her trip forward. It was Everett and four other mutant police officers. Marie didn't know many of them too well.

"Excuse me," she said sarcastically. "I didn't mean to take up the whole width of the sidewalk."

Everett snorted. "Whatever, flattie."

Marie gritted her teeth. She dropped her bag, ignoring Charlotte's warnings. "Look me in the face and call me that again."

Everett and friends did a slow turn. "What're you gonna do about it? Oh right. Nothing. You can't. You 'cured' yourself."

Charlotte grabbed her arm. "Marie, let it go."

"Oooh, the flattie's angry!" said one of Everett's cronies. Another one piped up, "Maybe she'll shoot us, too! She's good at killing mutants."

Her vision went red. She could feel her whole body shaking but couldn't move. If she had Scott Summers' powers Everett Thomas would be in a thousand different pieces all over the Hudson River.

"I'm reporting your ass, Thomas," said Charlotte.

"I have nothing against you, Detective," Everett said. "You're a sister and you're true to yourself. Her, she killed her gift then has the gall to still call herself a mutant. I don't respect that. I can't."

"And I suppose you were never an idiot as a teenager?"

Everett and his friends rolled their eyes. A couple muttered about a mother's lecture.

"Do you know what my gift was?" Marie blurted out. "Any time I touched people, I'd suck up their life and their powers. If I touched anyone for longer than five minutes, chances are they'd be in a coma. Longer than ten, they were dead. But that's not the funnest part. The funnest part was that they'd go on living inside my head. All of them. Forty-seven last count, all talking at me in my head, half of them pissed off 'cause I had no business robbing their souls. So yeah, I took Novomane. I killed my gift. But I fucking dare you to tell me you wouldn't do the same."

Although his expression softened, Everett said, "Our gifts are what makes us mutants."

"Okay, people, it's way too late in the day to get into philosophical arguments," said Charlotte. "Guys, good-bye. D'Ancanto, we have a train to catch. You are definitely coming over for dinner," she added for Marie's sake.

Marie shook her head. "It's all right, Jones. I'm going home."

"You're not going to do something stupid about this like kill yourself? Because if you are, I can stay over and watch the movie with you." Charlotte's tone was light but the concern was sincere.

Marie bumped her with her own bulky sports bag. "And out myself as a John Hughes fan to the woman writing my evals? Hell no! It's my not-so-distant emo-goth thing. I want to work it out for myself over a nice gewürztraminer and a movie."

"Whatever you say," said Charlotte. "Just remember, Mayor Hot-as-Heaven is coming over tomorrow and I need you to be my wingman."

"Mayor Hot-- oh, you mean Warren Worthington?"

"The Third. Don't you laugh. His dad might be an unethical douchebag but he's damn easy on the eyes. And those wings..." Charlotte pressed her lips together. "Mmm-hmmm."

"Normal people crush on rock stars or actors. You like politicians," Marie teased.

"Not all politicians, just the mayor of the fine city of Boston with the pretty, pretty wings."

"You are so Stifler's mom." They found themselves at the closes subway station, their usual point of departure. Rogue would take the 7th Avenue down to Brooklyn while Charlotte went up the 7th then switched over to the Lexington into Queens. "I'll be over tomorrow if only to protect Warren Worthington III's virtue."

"You do that." Without warning, Charlotte reached over to give Marie a quick, tight embrace. "Watch yourself, 'kay?"

Marie nodded stiffly and tried to return the embrace. Even after ten years of living without her powers, she felt uncomfortable with touching. Funny how one year could change your entire life. She went down one platform, Charlotte, another and they lost sight of each other in the surging mass of commuters. The air down here blew muggier than aboveground; the fans installed a couple years ago just swirled the humidity around. Marie hunched over, pulling her body in as small a package as possible. Again with the touch-phobia.

The mind-numbing subway commute back to her apartment almost took an hour which wasn't bad considering the debris still littering the roads of Manhattan. Not many people trusted the subway's integrity either, she guessed. She passed by her usual pizza place to put in an order then went down the road to the liquor store to buy wine while her dinner baked. Thus laden, she all but pulled herself up five flights to stairs to her apartment. Her exhaustion slammed into her like a Hummer. Her eyelids wanted to weld shut. Even the idea of spinach pizza and nice, cold wine wouldn't keep her out of bed now. As soon as she entered her place, Marie dropped dinner on the kitchen counter and made for her bedroom.

A flint-click and spark caught from her left caught her attention. Marie drew her handgun out and pointed. "Freeze and drop, asshole. I've had a long day."