"So, you want the x-men to just run off to some little island and live in paradise?" Peter asks, folding his arms and sitting back in his chair. "After everything they've done!" I glance around the conference room; I didn't think everyone would be happy with Charles's request, I'm not even sure how I feel about it myself. It kind of feels like the x-men are getting to walk off into the sunset after all they've done.
"It's not the solution we wanted, but maybe there has been enough bloodshed" Natasha says, glancing over at Steve and then at Tony. Tony's hand is resting under his chin, and he looks back at Natasha. "What is our plan, anyway? To execute them or to lock them up for the rest of their lives? We don't exactly have a plan in place."
"How do we explain to the public and the government that the avengers decided the x-men didn't have to suffer? They've been ruling and terrorising the country for years, I know Charles is our best chance at stopping them, but it's not up to us to decide their fates" Tony says, Peter nods in agreement. I glance over at Henry, wondering what his thoughts are.
"Are all the x-men going? Some of those kids think the x-men are being hunted and are just protecting themselves" Henry reminds everyone. I sigh, this is a difficult decision. We don't have the right to decide which x-men should be banished and which can stay in America, but who gets to decide that? I can't imagine getting a jury to debate about mutants and which can stay, and which need to go.
"Obviously the ones under eighteen would stay, they can be humanised" Steve says uncertainly after a few seconds of silence. Can they? Scarlett was heavily against the avengers, even if she was alive, I'm not sure if she would have agreed to come here, just because she wasn't with the x-men didn't make her a friend of the avengers.
"As opposed to a nineteen-year-old mutant who can't be humanised" I say, I understand eighteen is when you're classified as an adult, but there isn't much difference between an eighteen-year-old and a twenty-year-old, how do we decide that the twenty-year-old mutant is too brainwashed to be saved?
"I agree this isn't perfect, but it gets at least some of the x-men out of here" Clover says, glancing over at me. "If we lock the x-men up, are they going to be locked up for the rest of their lives? Send the kids to the island but allow them to come back once they realise it was all lies."
I consider Clover's statement, the issue is if some of the x-men continue to push their narrative that humans hate mutants and want them all dead, they could even turn it around and say humans hated them so much that they sent them to some random island.
"Should we send the kids out of the room?" Clint asks, glancing over at me and Peter. Seriously? I'm mature enough to go help Steve and Natasha find Charles, but not mature enough to partake in this discussion? Whatever. I roll my eyes.
"Yep, they should go" Bruce agrees.
"Alright, the four of you off" Rhodey says, I stand up and walk out of the room without protesting. The scraping of chairs on the floor tells me that Henry, Clover, and Peter are coming with me, the door shuts as soon as we're out of the room.
Peter heads into Tony's lab and we follow him, I sit next down to Henry and Clover sits across from me, next to Peter.
"There's no way we're just shipping Magneto off to some island" Henry comments, glancing at me. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, thinking of Magneto not really being punished for everything he's done, so many people have been killed because of him, and kids have been ripped from their families and brainwashed.
"I agree" Peter says. "They've killed so many people, they need to face justice." I think Peter would perhaps agree with the idea if May hadn't just been killed, but who am I to judge? I also don't want to see Magneto walking free after he killed Scarlett. I wonder if he was responsible for Ashton's death.
"Do we even have prisons strong enough to hold mutants?" I say, a thought occurring to me. The x-men institute could probably hold some, but that place is not big enough to hold the amount of the x-men that will end up arrested if we're successful.
The light turns off and I frown, glancing out the door, the lights to Bruce's lab have also turned off, we must be having power issues.
"Tony will get the power back on in minutes" Peter shrugs, Tony and Bruce can probably solve any problem, I doubt a minor power failure will give them much of a headache.
"Storm, can we talk?" Clover asks randomly, a shiver runs down my spine as I guess at what she wants to talk about. I nod and stand up, I follow Clover out of the lab and down a flight of stairs, unsure where she wants to talk.
I follow Clover into one of the training rooms downstairs, I think this is where Clover trains. She trains every day; I've seen her train with Clint a few times. She also runs on the treadmill; she does a lot of running. Clover sits down on one of the benches, I stay standing, leaning against a rack of weights.
"Storm, do you think we can try again? I know I screwed up majorly, but I do love you" Clover says sincerely. Even with the lights off, I can see the guilt of what Clover did on her face, I know it's heavy for her. I close my eyes, I want nothing more than to go back to how things used to be, but Clover wanted to pin Steve's death on me.
A door opens, saving me from answering. My eyes narrow as a boy comes in, he looks maybe twenty-three or twenty-four. I've never seen him before, Clover gets to her feet, glancing at him suspiciously.
"Do you remember me, Storm?" he asks, his eyes full of hurt and anger.
"No" I answer, I don't think I've seen him before, but he knows who I am.
"You killed everyone I love and you're going to pay" he says, I sigh as I realise, I could've very well killed his family, over a hundred people died when I placed down that bomb.
"Did your loved ones die in the bombing?" I ask, my voice quiet, I don't want to meet people who were affected by my actions, I don't want to see the damage I've inflicted on people who didn't deserve it.
"Yes" he answers, clenching his fists as he glares at me. A wave of hotness flashes through my body, what am I supposed to say?
"She didn't know, the x-men lied to her, she had no idea there was a bomb" Clover says, walking over to me and standing in front of me, turning her body to face the boy.
*Author's Note* ... Poor Storm, having the bombing thrown in her face all the time :(
YOU ARE READING
Beautiful Ruins
Action"Maybe there was a fleeting moment where I wanted to be a hero and believed I could be one, but the truth is I'm not, I won't ever be. My past does define me, it made me a villain" - Storm. Fifteen-year-old Storm is the daughter of Black Widow and I...
