The X-Project

After these flurry of emails, Betsy hopes for a quiet evening alone, and gets anything but that.

Time: Friday Evening: March 25th.
Subject: Fallen Pupil



Of my body and of my soul,
I will never be the person I knew.
--Elisabeth Braddock

Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale.

"Find the eye."

"Calm. Peace," Betsy's voice echoed. "Center." She sat in silence, attempting to focus her chi, yet her face was troubled, eyebrows furrowed. In the middle of her posh Upper East Side hideaway, Elisabeth Braddock could not find peace. Letting the tensions ease from her shoulders, she audibly huffed. I can do this. I have done this. Focus. Calm.

Betsy attempted the Padmasana, the lotus position, once more. Each leg was crossed and resting on the opposite knee, her back erect, her arms laid open palmed at the base of her thigh.

Her apartment was pitched into darkness by the rapidly setting sun, yet remained captivating with the splattering of candles. Betsy looked otherworldly and for a moment felt as such.

She opened her eyes and found herself far from New York City. The cool crisp breeze of autumn brushed past, invigorating her spirit. She knew where she was before her gaze caught the sight of the Five Terrace Mountains. Snow had come early this year and covered the Wu Tai Shan region, its’ peaks and underlying forest covered in a blanket of white. Betsy stood in front of a freestanding gazebo, seeing a temple in the forefront.

The structure was a school for the gifted, like Xavier’s, but this place was different. It had been home to her once. Betsy saw the tall spires reaching out from the center of the structure, smoke billowing from their points. Funeral pyres.

She brought her attention back to the gazebo; inside sat an elderly man. Walking up the few steps, she entered the structure, her eyes cat-like, shifting from each side, searching for any sign of ambush. But why did she fear him? Betsy wondered. With his deep meditative stance, the old man sitting on his haunches, his back to her, Betsy realized he couldn’t have sensed her presence.

“So you have come to finish this madness?” A gravelly voice cracked through the silence. The old man exhaled and his shoulder’s slumped. “I did not think you would show yourself.”

Betsy’s throat constricted. Her palms sweaty, and she self-consciously tightened her grip around the katana blade.

Katana? How the hell did I get this? That thought snapped Elisabeth out from within the dream and she found herself still sitting within her apartment, her right hand extended, steadying herself. “The hell?”

She still felt the wind on her face and shuddered. Taking a few quick breaths, Betsy tried to calm herself, but she was slipping into the dream again. And then with one quick tug from within, Betsy fell forward and was pitched back into her subconscious. “Then you underestimated me,” she heard her own voice say. Staring at the old man, her lips upturned into a smirk.

“No, I had prayed that you would walk away, Kwannon.” The man shook his head and continued speaking. “This path with ‘the Hand’ leads to nothing but darkness.” He turned his head imperceptibly toward her. “How could you have fallen so far without my knowing?”

“You were blind to many things, old fool.” Kwannon shot back, her smirk turning into a devilish grin. “But I have not fallen. I have only found my true path. I will be stronger with Matsuo. Your teachings, your brotherhood, were weak.” Her chin jutted out in defiance. “And I shall be weak no longer.”

Betsy felt her arms rise up, the blade catching sunlight, momentarily blinding her, but Kwannon remained unphased.

“I had also prayed for your soul,” the old man said, turning to face Kwannon as he spoke. His eyes took in every detail, until his gaze finally fell to the blade firmly entrenched in her hands. “But I see that too has been lost.”

Betsy fought against what she knew would happen next, reeling against it, but she could not stop the inevitable. She was merely an observer of the past. She felt Kwannon bring down the sword with a striking deathblow.

“No!”

Betsy was wrenched free from her trance, her hands outstretched. Her eyes were still shaking the last vestiges of sleep, flicking around her surroundings for unseen intruders. But there would be no one here in the physical plane. Betsy kicked her legs out from under her, scrambling backwards. Her chest heaved, her face slick with sweat. She sat there, in the middle of her living room, overturned candles flickering in and out, moments from extinguishing altogether.

“Do you want to be healed?” The Professor’s voice resonated in her mind.

“I don’t know, Betsy muttered into the dark, rising up from the floor, and quickly headed into her bedroom. “But, it’s about time I found out.”

She entered her sleep chamber, also lighted with white candles, and retrieved a black duffel bag from the closet. She grabbed her cordless phone from the cradle and tucked it under her arm. Betsy then went to her bureau, retrieved her clothes, and haphazardly set them inside her bag. She pulled the phone out from under her arm and began dialing. Pressing the phone between her head and shoulder, listening to the familiar mechanical ring, as she called overseas, Betsy paced back and forth.

“Come on, come on.” She looked over at the clock on her nightstand; it read 7:30p.m. Calculating the shift in time zones, she realized it was passed midnight in England. The boys should still be around. Betsy let the phone ring a few more times before, decidedly, hanging up. She let her hand fall to her side and sat unceremoniously on her bed. Hunched over, she rested her elbows on her thighs, thinking on her next move. She looked down at the phone again and began dialing.

“Hello?” Betsy spoke into the receiver. She shook her head at the person on the other end, as they drabbled on. Her face relaxed visibly, relieved and amused all at once. “Yes, it’s me.” Another few moments. “Yes, I know what time it is, and yes, it has been a long time.” Betsy self-consciously chomped on her thumb as she spoke. “Well, how’s tomorrow for notice?” Nothing. “Hello?” Betsy waited another languorously minute, before she began smiling. “I’ll be there. See you.”

She rose from the bed, zipped up her duffel bag, and blew out the candles in her bedroom.

“Time to make sense out of the last two years,” Betsy whispered to herself, just as she caught sight of her haunted reflection in the window. “Even if it’s the last thing I do.”




****

Time: Saturday Morning: March 26th.
Subject: Friction.



Change means movement
Movement means friction
--Saul Alinsky

Harsh clicks against the linoleum, errant voices filling the space with painful noise, and the slow-numbing feeling of psychic drowning. These were all the signs of over-stimulation and it was no wonder, standing at the check-in stand at J.F.K airport. Thousands of minds, all crowded within this confine space, Betsy did all she could. She pinched the bridge of her nose, like a child trying to prevent a nosebleed, but failed to keep the flood from flowing. It’s like trying to keep her head from popping off, she thought. But at least she felt something, even if it was pain.

“Headache, dear?” A warm voice asked from behind.

The telepath turned around and looked down. There stood a short, plump elderly woman with a duffel bag planted firmly on her back. Betsy blinked. “Just a little,” she added, taking her eyes off the enormous satchel.

“Traveling often gives me grief, child. But ya look like you’re already done in.” She stood next to a suitcase that was almost the size of the five-foot tall woman. The woman tucked her chin toward the front of the line, to a man arguing with one of the ticket agents. The blustering businessman was a saturated shade of purple, while violently slamming his hand unto the counter. “Trick is not to let them git to ya like that fool.”

Betsy managed a small smile. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Believe me, it’ll do ya good in the end.” Feeling satisfied, the older woman smiled up at the statuesque Braddock. “So, where are you off to?”

Betsy thought on it for a moment, but the grandmother didn’t wait for her reply. “Not that I’m nosey and all, but I’m heading’ to see my daughter and her two babies in the Far East. She expecting another one this week, forty years old and having a newborn. I told her she was crazy, but she doesn’t listen like she should. Never did.”

“Right.” Betsy hesitated. “I’m sure it will all work out in the end.”

“If I learned something over the years, dearie. That it never works out…in the end.” The older woman smiled, the lines on her face deepened.

There was warmness in her eyes and it struck Betsy to her core.

“Life never hands you what you want outright. Ya got to earn it. And sometimes, ya have to start over to be worthy of the second chance in the first place.”

“Thanks, but I never asked for your advice.” Betsy stated sardonically

“Don’t scoff at the elderly.” The old woman warned. “It’ll come back on you ten-fold.”

“Ten-fold?” Betsy turned away, trying to stifle the sensations she felt. Was it amusement?

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you, Elisabeth.”

Betsy started. “Hold on a minute….” She turned back to face the older woman, but there was no sign of her.

Betsy’s dark set eyes darted about the check-in area. There was nothing. She scanned the area for every life form within the airport’s confines. And still nothing hinted to the old woman presence, physically and/or telepathically. “Bugger!”

“Miss.” A small hand tugged at her coat sleeve. “Miss, it’s your turn.” Betsy lifted her eyes to find a young girl standing with her mother; both were curiously watching the telepath. Betsy looked up at the line and found that it had moved drastically forward. Betsy lifted the handle to her suitcase, and went to the next available ticket agent.

“Identification, please.” Betsy handed over her passport to the ticket agent. The young woman at the counter gave the passport a once over before continuing. “Welcome to Trans-Atlantic, Ms Braddock?”

Betsy thumbed the communicator in her jacket pocket. It burned white hot. Her mind flared outwards. Gritting her teeth, Westchester flashed brightly in her thoughts. If the force within her psyche could manifest in the physical world it would have left trails of fire in the sky. No, she shook her head. This was for the best. She needed to be as far from Westchester as she could manage.

“Are you alright, Ms. Braddock?” The ticket agent asked. After a brief moment, she placed a concern hand on Betsy’s shoulder, shaking her. “Ms. Braddock?”

White-hot memories so blinding with irrepressible light, that it burned her from the inside out. But she could not cry out in pain, or out of fear. Robbed of the basest of emotions, Betsy’s subconscious mourned. Curled up in a corner within her psyche, a pale form sobbed into the darkness.

****



Spoiler: This is not fluff, but it isn't angst. It just is. ****Thanks to Sil for the lookover. Enjoy!****