Chapter 4

“Hey, Hank,” Scott said, entering the lab.

Hank waved one hand absently in Scott’s general direction.

“Can I talk to you?”

Hank looked up, blinking several times behind his spectacles. “How may I be of service, Oh Fearless Leader?” he asked, leaning away from his paperwork.

Scott studiously ignored the nickname, trying not to encourage him. “If you were an evil medical genius, and you had access to the X-Men, why would you take Jamie?” Scott grabbed a chair nearby and pulled it close, turning it so he could sit backward.

Hank frowned and thought for a moment. “I don‘t know. But a different way of pursuing that line of thought might be, why would an evil medical genius want Jamie?”

Scott scowled and bit at a hangnail before remembering he shouldn’t.

Both men sat in silence for a long while, broken only by the tapping of one of Hank’s claws against the desktop.

“Clones,” Hank said softly.

“What?”

“Clones,” Hank repeated, louder. “Sinister works with human subjects, clones, to try and create things. He needs bodies for that. Under normal circumstances, he makes his own human bodies and uses them; creatures that spend their lives in tubes. But that takes time. It’s possible to make a human, and for Sinister it’s possible to age one, but I would imagine that would take a great deal of time and money. So Sinister is hampered--more so every time we ruin yet another of his laboratories.”

“But Jamie makes his own fully grown clones,” Scott said, catching on. “He’d be irreplaceable as a machine.”

Hank nodded.

Scott thought about that, remembering Jamie’s powers and how they worked, trying to figure out what sort of thing they were going to walk into. “Jamie can’t make dupes unless he’s conscious,” he said after a moment, “If he’s unconscious they’ll still be there--lifeless, but there--but he can’t make more.”

“But Sinister won’t want a conscious Jamie around,” Hank pointed out, “because every time he killed off a dupe it would give Jamie a chance to make one, and possibly escape.”

“Then he would have to keep Jamie either drugged, or so confined that he couldn’t even snap his fingers.” Scott eyed Hank. “How hard would it be to keep someone at the edge of consciousness with drugs?”

“Not too hard,” Hank answered. “Not for someone like Sinister, at any rate.”

Scott nodded. “So Jamie will be helpless, in all likelihood, and his dupes useless. How do we free forty Jamies?” Scott sighed and rubbed his forehead.

“That’s your line of expertise, Fearless,” Hank said, smiling. “I just play the evil medical genius when you need me to.”

Scott chuckled. “Right, Hank. Thanks.” He stood up, swung the chair back into its spot, and walked out of the lab.

***

It was another twelve hours before they were prepared enough to assemble in the jet. Bobby had bitten his nails to the quick, and hadn’t noticed until Scott pointed it out.

“Seats, people,” Cyclops said, adjusting his visor on his face before snapping his own seatbelt into its lock.

Bobby took a deep breath and did the same, eyes flickering around the room at the others.

Wolverine sat in the far corner, his mask hanging loosely around his neck, his eyes closed and outstretched legs crossed at the ankles. Betsy sat nearby, looking preoccupied. Sam was re-checking his pouches, making sure everything was balanced right. Uneven weight could really mess with his first flight.

Rogue smiled slightly, putting a gloved hand on Bobby’s knee. “We’ll get him back,” she said softly, the words made somehow more feminine with her Southern accent.

“Oh, hey.” Bobby smiled, and could tell that it looked fake. “The X-Men always win, right?”

“Right,” Rogue said, brushing a lock of hair out of his eyes before settling down into her seat.

Bobby blew air out from between compressed lips, and leaned back against the headrest. They would be there soon.

***

They weren’t too late this time.

Betsy slunk through the shadows, her normal purple outfit traded for a less visible black cat suit. Even her hair was bound back, tied and laying quietly against her spine.

She stepped into a shadow, and out into light.

Not the room she was looking for.

She stepped back into the shadow. It closed around her, filling her eyes and nose and mouth with an inky blackness, sliding over her body like a satin lover, drowning her in loving, deathly whispers.

Then she stepped back into the light. Her earpiece crackled to life, hissing against her eardrum, air hot against her skin and the breeze--

Breeze? A vent, nearby--scraping over her flesh like sandpaper.

She had found--a control room?

Psylocke stepped forward, her cloth-clad feet making no noise on the cement floor.

Televisions covered one wall, a small computer--wires snaking like living things across the wall-length desk and floor--on another wall, lab paraphernalia on the third. The fourth, the wall in shadow, held the door and a viewing screen.

Psylocke turned, watching out the one-way mirror into the large, sprawling lab below.

Men stood or sat in cells, mostly naked, a few bodies laying filleted on tables, one living, but unconscious, under operation.

She turned away quickly. Those were all Jamie, and yet perhaps none of them were. There was one way to tell. All scientists documented everything.

Betsy turned to the computer and started typing.

***

The lab was already on fire when she flew through the wall, bringing most of it down with her. Coughing at the dust, she brushed flecks of plaster off her bomber jacket and glanced around.

Sure enough, there was Jamie, lying like a human-sized doll on a white bed, his skin ghostly pale and his cheeks sunken. His eyes stared vacantly at the ceiling, his hands resting by his sides, his chest rising and falling rhythmically.

Rogue took two long strides and made it to his cot, disconnecting wires, pulling an IV out of his arm. She put her hand on his forehead, preparing to close his lids against the dust and the smoke now pouring into the room, then noticed the horror in his eyes.

Reflexively, she turned and glanced over her shoulder. No one was there; the X-Men were keeping the Marauders busy, and Sinister had already disappeared. Not that it came as any surprise. Rogue turned back and leaned over Jamie. “Can ya hear me, hon?”

There was no response, except that his eyes moved, barely, trying to flicker toward her.

“Ya’ll’re safe, now. We have you. Just trust me,” Rogue said, and smoothed his eyelids closed.

One hand under his shoulders and the other beneath his knees, she lifted him effortlessly and hovered a few feet above the floor, turning to watch the lab through the hole in the wall.

Pandemonium reigned. Cyclops blasted Vertigo before she could do anything. Iceman froze Scalphunter’s legs to the floor. Psylocke and Arclight were caught in battle, crashing into tables and lab equipment, tangled so closely that helping them was neatly out of the question.

But that wasn’t Rogue’s job here, anyway.

Tucking Jamie as safely against her as she could, Rogue flew out the hole at her highest speeds, careening up through the roof, through the ground above, into the clean desert air where Cannonball waited. Flying past him, she released Jamie, spun at forces that would have killed any normal human, and raced back into the underground complex. Sam would catch him and take him to the jet. Her job was to save Jamie.

As many as possible.

***

Bobby saw them go with relief, a chill running up his spine as the green and red streak that was Rogue raced into the safety of the outdoors. Half a second later she was back, tearing into the metal cages for the first of the dupes.

Something exploded toward the back, and three people screamed. He was pretty sure they were all the same person.

Iceman froze the rest of the blast, stopping the fire and hot air before it could burn them alive. It took nearly all he had, and he barely dodged a blow, dropping to the ground as Scalphunter broke free and came after him.

He turned, bracing his palms together and blasting, feeling ice form from his hands, shooting upward in a blunt spike, crashing into Scalphunter’s chest and sending him flying. Wolverine was there already, keeping the man down once he landed.

“Where’s Sinister?” Cyclops’ voice rang over the headset.

“Not here,” answered Psylocke’s British tones. “He left before we ever got here.”

Bobby twisted on one knee, bracing himself up with a hand on the floor. Debris littered the ground around him, mixing with glass and blood and metal instruments.

“Acrlight’s out,” Psylocke said with a grunt. “Where’re Scrambler and Blockbuster?”

“Scrambler ran,” Bobby said, breathing through his nose to try and avoid the worst of the dust. The room was clouded with it, and more turned up every time Rogue ripped a cell wall from the cement floor.

“Found Blockbuster out here,” Sam said into the headset. “Took him out already.”

“Great,” Cyclops said, twisting and, with one hand to his temple, let a wide-range blast fly at the control room. “Everyone out.”

The dust that erupted was unbelievable, and the next thing Bobby knew Sam had grabbed him and was hauling him out at superspeeds.

“There were Jamies in there!” Iceman screamed, panic flooding his body. Those were living, breathing--

“They were dead, Iceman,” Rogue said softly, her voice not quite carrying the tones it would have in person. “Ah checked.”

He stopped struggling. “All of them?” There had been so many . . .

“All. Most have been dead for hours,” Rogue said, settling on the ground outside the jet, Wolverine in one arm. He grunted as she set him down, then brushed off his nose, sneezing.

“Let’s go, people,” Cyclops said, peering out from inside the ‘bird. Psylocke was already buckling in, looking coolly professional. “I don’t know long this compound is going to remain stable. We could go under pretty quick.”

They got inside, the engines already started, and were in the air before anyone quite had time to strap in.

Bobby didn’t bother settling down at all, but clung to the side of the stainless steel lab table Jamie was strapped to, other Jamies littering the floor and locked into seats.

“Gonna be okay,” he breathed, grabbing hold of Jamie’s hand with one of his own.

The jet rocked as the blast from an explosion hit it, and the engines wound up with a scream. Wolverine grunted and covered his ears, sneezing again.

Bobby rocked with the jet, tightening his grip both on the side of the bed and Jamie’s hand, feeling the other man’s skin cold against his own. “Gonna be fine...”

***

“Sit down, Mr. Drake,” Hank snapped, a hand on Bobby’s shoulder sending him crashing back to the examination table.

Bobby could see Jamie’s legs behind a curtain, and every so often Cecilia would walk into his line of sight. He couldn’t be too bad--they didn’t have him in emergency . . .

Bobby stood again, and again was forced back down. Dimly he realized Hank was calling him by his last name, and knew that he must be far beyond the ends of Beast’s patience, but he didn’t care. He bit a nail and had his hand slapped by a furry blue paw.

“Is he--”

“He’s fine. Now stay seated.”

Cecilia came from behind the curtain, flipping through a file with a preoccupied expression, and Bobby jumped to his feet and lunged for her. “Ce!”

She leapt sideways, startled, then continued on her path.

“Ce!”

Hank leapt up, snatching him around his waist and dropping him back onto the table. “Stay. Seated.”

“I need to see--” Bobby twisted, sliding off the other side, heading toward Jamie’s legs.

“Stay!”

Bobby stopped dead at the roar, turning in stunned shock to look at Hank.

“Bobby. The faster you’re through this, the faster you can see Jamie. Making my life harder will not get you there, I promise. I will put you back in the Arctic if I need to.”

Bobby stopped and eyed Hank. Surely he wouldn't do that. He wouldn’t put him back in that awful little white room, meant for nothing more than cleaning out your lungs. Shi’ar technology was amazing, but boring as hell when you were on the receiving end.

“I would.” And Hank crossed his arms over his chest, glaring.

Bobby sat down slowly. “Fine. But I’m going to see him as soon as this is over.”

“Fine. But it’s not over yet. Now give me your arm.”

Bobby scowled at the needle that held the Shi‘ar bugs, as they had been lovingly dubbed. “Ah, man. I don’t care if it does help my lungs. That alien shit always makes me pee green for days.”

***

Jamie was home when he opened his eyes. He knew it. And not just because Hank sat by his bed, hands folded in front of his mouth, a pensive look on his face.

“Do I look that bad?” Jamie managed, and realized that he sounded that bad.

Hank smiled. “Sleeping Beauty awakens.”

“You better not have kissed me, Hank,” he muttered, resting his eyes and smiling through dry, cracked lips.

Hank chuckled. “Jamie,” Hank paused. “How do you feel?”

Jamie opened his eyes. “What’s wrong?” he asked, eyeing Hank.

Beast hesitated, the claws of his thumb and forefinger ticking against each other rhythmically. “We rescued eight dupes,” he said softly.

Jamie sat for a moment, staring. “The others . . . ?”

Hank shook his head wordlessly. “Betsy said most were dead when they got there.”

Jamie took a deep breath, held it, and slowly let it out again. “Eight?” Thirty-one dupes; dead. He breathed, but it was forced.

“I’m sorry.”

Jamie looked at him for a moment, then nodded. “I should . . .” he stopped, looked around for them. They needed to come home. “Where’s Bobby?” he asked.

Hank smiled ruefully. “I sent him to bed. He’s been down here for two days.”

Jamie smiled. “Can I see my dupes? And then, him?”

Hank nodded, eyes downcast. “You can leave any time you’d like, as long as you come back in the morning.” Then he looked up, eyes twinkling. “I’m not done with you, yet.”

Jamie smiled tiredly. “All right. Thanks, Hank.”

***

Bobby murmured something unintelligible, and rolled over to throw an arm over Jamie. Then he woke up.

He lay still for a moment, trying to figure out what was wrong with the picture. Then he realized Jamie was in his bed. Smiling, he sat up slightly, bending over Jamie’s prone form. “Hey,” he whispered, but the younger man was sound asleep. Bobby let him sleep, brushing a kiss across his cheek. Jamie murmured and turned over, snorting before settling back down, his mouth slightly open.

Carefully, so as not to disturb his bed-mate, Bobby slid an arm under Jamie’s pillow, fitting it between the younger man’s head and shoulders, in the nook his neck made. Happily, his boyfriend back in bed where he belonged, rather than in the medbay, Bobby fell asleep.

***

And woke to screaming.

He thrashed, feeling something attacking him, clawing at his chest, and realized it was Jamie.

With an effort he was able to defend himself and still wrap the younger man up, using both the coverlet and his arms, until Jamie stopped struggling.

The door burst open, and a sleep-addled Remy stood, staring with frightening red eyes into the dark room. He didn’t look like he quite knew what he was doing there, himself.

“It’s all right,” Bobby said. “I’ve got it.”

Remy nodded once and left, closing the door behind him.

Jamie was shaking.

“It’s okay,” Bobby murmured, rubbing the covers where Jamie’s arm lay.

“No,” Jamie said, struggling up and away and staggering into the bathroom. “It’s not.”

Bobby sat up on one elbow, watched the light come on through the open bathroom door. After a moment he got up and shuffled across the carpet, peering inside. “Jamie?”

Jamie sat on the toilet lid, his head in his hands.

“Are you okay?” Cautiously, not sure if he should be there or not, Bobby reached out and put a hand on Jamie’s head.

Jamie sat up. “I reabsorbed them, Bobby,” he said softly, his eyes red and dry. “I reabsorbed the ones that were still alive. I reabsorbed them, and I have all their memories, and I know exactly what he did. I see it, and I hear it, and I feel it. Fifty times over. Over and over and over again. No matter how many times I feel myself pass out from it, it’s still there.” He looked up at Bobby, lifting his hands and dropping them in defeat. “And since I absorbed them, what happened to them happened to me.” He shook his head, buried it back into his hands. “I can’t sleep for the nightmares,” he whispered.

Bobby stepped closer, reaching out to touch Jamie’s shoulder. Jamie shrugged away, standing abruptly. For a moment he looked at Bobby, brown eyes nothing but black pools in the darkness. “I’ll be back later,” he said gently.

“Want me to go with you?” Bobby asked, hurt, as his hand fell back to his side.

“No. I’ll--I’ll be back later,” Jamie said again, and brushed past Bobby, escaping out the door.

***

Early mornings were Hank’s favorite part of the day. Very early. Earlier than anyone else got up--even Scott who, though few people knew it, despised early mornings.

The sun hadn’t even woken yet when Hank started the pot of coffee in the kitchen, reading the paper as he listened to the pot burble and sing cheerfully. The bitter scent of ground beans slowly eased through the room, soaking into the corners. When it finished, he grabbed his “Property of an Evil Scientist” mug, a gift from Bobby upon graduating with his PhD, filled it with thick, dark coffee, and headed down to his lab.

The underground halls were lit, as they always were, and the glow bounced off the white walls and whiter floor. He opened the door to his lab, letting the light sneak in before him, and flicked the switch.

The desolation in the room was overwhelming.

Jamie sat in Hank’s computer chair in striped green pajama bottoms and a white t-shirt, a rubber ducky bathrobe stolen from Bobby’s closet draped around his shoulders. He held a bottle in his hand, the label made out in Hank’s writing, familiar orange-yellow plastic marking it as from a pharmacy.

“They’re not working, Hank,” Jamie said softly, still looking at the bottle. Then he stood in one fluid motion, the bathrobe whispering around his ankles, and he threw the bottle at Hank’s chest.

It hit and bounced off, empty and impotent.

“They’re not fucking working!” Jamie dug his fingers into his scalp, dragging his hair away until all that was left was a sharp-angled face, made sharper by the harsh laboratory light.

Hank entered the room slowly, stopping to pick the bottle up. He glanced at the label; it was what he had thought. Anti-depressants that Jamie had been taking for several months now. Carefully, he set it on the counter. He set his coffee down as well, then turned away to close the door. Silently, he looked back at Jamie.

“You’ve just been through a very traumatic experience--” he started, and was interrupted.

“Fuck it, Hank. Before that. They weren’t working before that! They haven’t since--”

“This takes time, Jamie.” Hank cut through his tirade expertly, without raising his voice.

“No!” Jamie roared back, grabbing the chair and sending it skittering across the floor. “God damn it, Hank, it’s not that! There’s something wrong--more than my fucking hormones! There’s something wrong with me and there’s something wrong with my dupes and--Hank, they hate me! Something’s not right. Even when my parents died--Hank, when I was alone, and scared, even then it wasn’t like this! Something’s wrong, and you know it.” He looked up, shaking all over, and the energy drained from him, leaving only the urgency behind. “Hank, what’s wrong with me?”

Hank wished for his lab coat. For the wall between himself and his patients. For that thin costume that made him believe he could say horrible things, and it would all be okay, because he was The Doctor, and they were His Patients.

Instead, he had to look at Jamie as his friend. And it made it all the harder.

“It may,” he said slowly, “have something to do with the Legacy Virus.”

Tension left Jamie’s body, and he stood like a ragdoll, propped up through some child’s magic. “We tested me for that,” he said quietly. “Months ago. I was negative.”

Hank breathed deeply, through his nose, trying to find some sort of balance. “Yes,” he said, finally. “Our conclusions may have been premature.”

Jamie stared at him, unmoving.

“Sit down, Jamie,” Hank said softly.

Jamie’s knees buckled, and he dropped straight down onto the floor. His robe pooled around him.

Hank walked quietly to the counter, picked a file out of the many arrayed there, and sat down on the floor in front of Jamie. “Do you want me to get Bobby?” he asked, ducking his head until he could meet Jamie’s lowered eyes.

“No,” Jamie whispered. “Just tell me.”

Hank hesitated. Then, finally, he nodded once and opened the file on his lap. “Betsy retrieved this from Sinister’s lab,” he said, laying out papers carefully. There were sheets and sheets of numbers and symbols, some of them scrawled on in a spidery hand.

Jamie picked up the nearest paper, staring at it blankly.

Hank took one look at his eyes and could see that he wasn’t comprehending, though he had read charts just like this in his lab work. “Sinister started using your dupes for his own purposes,” Hank said, softly, taking the sheet of paper away. Jamie looked up, meeting his eyes. “When he noticed the odd hormone levels in dupes who did not act depressed, he grew curious. He started testing and discovered--” Hank paused, gathering his thoughts. “He discovered that some of the dupes that were depressed also had Legacy. Others with high hormone levels who were not depressed later became depressed, and developed Legacy.”

Jamie just stared, hand outstretched as if he still held the paper.

“Not all of the dupes had any sign of the Legacy virus,” Hank said slowly. “But as time wore on, more and more started to develop it.”

“But it was only weeks ago that I didn’t have it,” Jamie said softly. “And my dupes were already acting odd then.”

Hank nodded. “I know. Jamie, you never were without it.”

Jamie flinched.

“Because of the way you create your dupes, the Legacy virus, once you develop it, is encoded into their DNA. When you died, your mind jumped into a dupe that already had it. It doesn‘t take long to develop from nothing to a full-blown virus, because your immune system doesn‘t recognize it as a virus anymore. In the time Sinister had you, one in four of your dupes went from being created with the virus, to four out of five.”

Jamie sat back, eyes dropping. His hands placed themselves in his lap. There was only a slight tremble. “Then no matter what, I get it, and die?”

Hank looked back down at his data for support. “Maybe not,” he said slowly. Jamie looked up, but Hank didn’t look back; he didn’t want to see the desperate hope. “There is a very small chance,” he said quietly, “that as the disease progresses, you’ll create a dupe without it built into the DNA.”

“But they’re all me,” Jamie said, confused.

“Not quite. When your dupes start having psychological differences, they also start having slight biological differences.”

There was a moment of silence, then, “So the disease makes me create dupes that aren’t actually dupes. They’re real people, and biologically different.”

Hank nodded slowly.

“Since they’d biologically different, they might not have Legacy in their biology?”

Again, Hank nodded. Finally, he looked up and met Jamie’s gaze. There was too much hope there. “But then it reverts,” he said at last. “Your body is too full of the virus to create a dupe, even a biologically dissimilar one, without it woven into their DNA.”

Jamie thought for a long time. “How do I not die, Hank?” he asked at last.

Hank looked back down at the file. “Sinister had a theory. He was trying to implement it when we broke in.”

A twisted smile graced Jamie’s features. “He was trying to do good?”

Hank grinned wryly. “Well, he was planning on keeping your sick dupes for more testing. But he is also trying to cure the virus.”

Jamie’s smile faded. “That’s good.”

“Yes,” Hank agreed.

“What was his theory pertaining to me?”

Hank took a deep breath. “That if he could find a dupe without any hint of the virus, and then kill you and all your dupes, you would transfer into that healthy body.”

Jamie waited. “Why didn’t he do that?” he asked.

“Because he never found a dupe without any hint of it. That there might be one is only a theory.”

Jamie cringed. “Oh.”

Hank looked up, reached out and put one of his big furry paws on Jamie’s smaller hands. “Jamie--there’s no way to know that you would survive the transfer, anyway.”

“I did once,” he said quietly.

“Yes. Once.”

Jamie didn’t respond.

After a long time, Jamie reached out and pulled the file closer. He turned a few of the pages, eyes glancing over figures in a practiced gaze. “Hank?”

“Yes?”

“Mind if I just sat here for a while?”

“Not at all,” Hank said, pulling a sheet out from under the others. He glanced over it one more time, then folded it and put it in his pocket.

Then he settled back.

Jamie looked up. “By myselves?”

Hank smiled slightly, nodded once. “Don’t do anything drastic.”

The corners of Jamie’s mouth lifted. “I won’t.”

Hank stood, turned, walked quietly toward the door. He put his hand on the knob and stopped, turning back. “Do you want me to get Bobby?”

Jamie shook his head without looking up. “Don’t say anything to him, Hank,” he said suddenly. “Please?”

Hank hesitated, then nodded unhappily. “All right.”

Jamie looked back at the papers spread around him.

Hank stepped outside, heard a ‘pop’ as he started to close the door, and two voices that were the same drifted back. “So what do you think?” “I don’t know. It is Sinister, after all.” “Yeah. Hand me that chart, would you?”

The door closed with a click, locking out the noise, and Hank pulled the sheet of paper from his pocket. It was scrawled on in the same spidery hand that adorned the charts and printouts. “Good luck with him, McCoy,” it read. “Essex.”

Hank looked back at the door, then turned and walked toward the stairs.

**

Back to the living room
Back to Water Lines

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