X-Men Evolution: Rogue Evolution

Snow Fall 11.3

The library was quiet, as a library typically should be, but never had the library in the Xavier mansion been so still.

The X-Men gathered had yet to change out of their uniforms following their mad dash to the jet post-battle. Ash and dirt clung to exposed portions of their faces and arms while the lengths of the fabric stretched over panels in their uniforms were missing patches, revealing padding and thin plating beneath.

Kitty looked relatively untouched, but you wouldn't be able to tell that by the thousand-yard stare she had fixed on the overlapping flames in the fireplace.

Eventually, Kurt and Jean joined them following an examination by the Auto-Doc downstairs. Kurt's sallow skin and ruddy eyes nearly matched the stained bandages fixed around his left wrist. Jean, on the other hand and had arms laced with lacerations and a tissue in one nostril to staunch her nose bleed. The idea that these were the best possible versions of her friends, newly released from the robot doctor made her question the validity of the machine's capabitlitys, or perhaps that they were lucky to even be alive.

Even with the team whole again, the silence remained unbroken. Someone, Anna wasn't paying attention to who, continued to maintain and stoke the fire. The heat slowly allowed her to feel the pinpricks in her fingers and shoulders again. If that was a blessing, she wasn't sure, but at least she was now fully aware this all hadn't just been some sort of dream.

"What happens from here?" Kitty asked in a whisper that a mouse would struggle to hear. Her glazed eyes continued to reflect the dancing flames, and their subsequent soft yellow illumination made her sockets look hollow.

"I'm not sure." Scott leaned forward in his chair and rubbed his hands together. With how stiff the maneuver looked, Anna could feel pain in her midsection just by watching him. "We wait for marching orders from the adults, I guess."

Evan put his hand on Kurt's knee, and Kurt held it in place with his hand. He stroked the back of Evan's calloused knuckles with his thumb.

"We did good out there." Jean crossed her legs on the couch. Her voice sounded strange, like she'd inhaled a pillar of smoke. "We saved a lot of lives stopping Jugernaught. The cops, hell, even Ororo and Logan, none of them could have stopped him without us." She paused to clear her throat. "We saved the day today. The X-Men."

"There were so many cameras," Kitty whispered to the point that it sounded like a whimper.

Scott tousled his hair, "I think it's why the professor gave us the helmets."

"Wish I had thought of that before I took mine off." Anna rubbed her forehead with her hand. She could feel grit grinding against the flesh of her face.

"That's why we had the watch cloak as a backup. You had yours on, right?"

She checked her watch, and the pulsing icon on the face indicated it was still on. She tapped the button to deactivate it. "Still witnesses."

"Nutoriously unreliable. I wouldn't worry about it."

Jean pulled the wad of bloodied tissue out of her nose. "What's done is done." She sniffed. "There's no use worrying about it now."

"Oh my god." All eyes turned to Kitty.

Jean rubbed her nose. "What?"

The phone in Kitty's hands was trembling. "We're all over the news... CNN, ABC, FOX-" She turned her phone around to show the others a video of a bird's eye perspective of the fight they just had. It was at the point Logan pounced on Jugernaught, and Jugernaught in turn grabbed him by the leg, twisted it, and cast him aside at fastball speed.