Chapter 2
“Where is that little brat?” the leader, Cassandra, called out to her subordinates around her. Of course, it wasn’t a question meant to be answered. Her whole team was afraid of what she’d do if they actually answered her. Use her powers to torture them mentally and physically? Order for their executions? Who really knew what she would do. No one ever tried it. That was until Jade ignored her multiple messages to keep sending information to them about the Avengers and the X Men. Not only did she stop sending information, she was smart enough to corrupt their files from afar making the previous information she sent over useless. And they never had enough time to process it or even get it down in writing.
Jade had single handedly screwed them over. That’s why Cassandra was going after her head in particular. That’s why she needed that little brat to be taught a lesson. That’s why she needed to be tortured some more. Jade, or as they called her, Agent Mercury wasn’t even one of their initial recruits. Hydra allowed her to service them. Little did they know that Jade’s exposure to the outside world and these teams would hurt them in the long run. Cassandra underestimated the kindness of the X Men and the Avengers.
Cassandra herself was of an alien race. Though her people looked like humans, their eyes were unnaturally colored. The color usually showed what color their powers were as well as showing what their class was on their planet. Her eyes were bright gold. Signifying her electrifying, dangerous powers and her status as a royal. However, though she was royalty, she was at the very end of her list of eight siblings. Meaning she would never ascend to the throne and she would never have any status of her own. If she was lucky, she’d be married off to a high ranking nobleman. That’s never what she wanted, she started this brigade of bandits to lend a hand to the most despicable of a planet to gain their trust and their manpower to eventually take over the planet.
This seldom worked. The heroes of the planet usually outranked her troops leading to a dismal end for both parties. The planet would be destroyed by the time the battle was over, making it uninhabitable, and her troops would have to fall back. This was the last planet they were able to find before her father and the people urged her to come back. It made this chance her only one, and with how things were turning out, it would be another failure.
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She had her back turned to the opening of the large airship’s hangar so she didn’t see as someone softly landed in the mouth of it. However, she did hear the small, metallic clang of whatever this person was on and saw as he guards stiffened up. There was only one person who it could be.
“Agent Mercury,” Cassandra said, a snide smile already forming on her lips as she turned around. She opened her arms wide.
The same couldn’t be said for Jade as she stood stiff as a board with her arms down at her sides, hands balled into fists. Her green eyes resembled lasers as she tried to glare holes into Cassandra’s skin. Oh, how she wished she had Scott’s powers right now. Then she would blast her into oblivion for making her do such horrid things and for calling her by that wretched name.
“The name is Jade now,” she said, her voice cold. “You better respect it.” All around her little pieces of metal started to float and their hair started to stand on end due to the amount of magnetism in the room.
As fearsome as they were, Cassandra didn’t flinch as she saw the girl use her powers. The others around her started to scurry out of the way as they knew a big fight was coming. But Cassandra stood firm, her own bursts of energy coming to her hands. She grabbed her hands into fists, causing her powers to give a slight surge, and the pure amount of energy in that room was staggering. The room itself was barely big enough to hold the two power houses by themselves let alone all the guards and others who possessed some sort of powers. Both ladies waited for the other to make the first move, their chests rising and falling from panting and the amount of adrenaline being pumped through their veins.
Jade was the first to make a move. She sent two discs flying fast at Cassandra who quickly dodged them and deflected them to either side of her. Jade was about to make another move, but Cassandra was quicker. With a snap of her fingers, an inhibitor collar flew to Jade’s neck, causing all of her powers to cease to be. She struggled against the device that gave her so many tortured memories, but even she knew she was useless against it. At the same time Cassandra stopped using her powers. The flares of light stopped glowing in her fists and she put her hands behind her back as she walked closer to Jade.
A kind of panic Jade hadn’t felt before surged through her. Was this what Strange was talking about? This moment here? Was Cassandra about to capture her and use her for her own benefit? She didn’t know and she was terrified.
“What a cheap trick!” Jade screamed at her, her voice echoing off the walls of the hangar. “What kind of power dynamic do you think this is?”
“I think it’s a great power dynamic,” Cassandra said. “It’s the only way for me to get you to listen to what I have to say and what’s about to happen.”
Jade glared at the woman before her. She was crafty and manipulative, she’ll give her that, but that’s all. What was she planning? What was hiding behind the glint that shone brightly in her eyes? Why was she smirking at her like she’d already won?
“What are you trying to do?” Jade asked.
Cassandra laughed before answering. “I want to see if they’ll come to get you,” Cassandra said. “I’ll give them thirty minutes to save your sorry ass and then we’ll take off with you. Never to be seen again.”
Jade gave a laugh that caused her to grab onto her stomach and bend over for a minute. The idea of the Avengers or the X Men coming to get her seemed so absurd. None of them would ever want to see her face again after what she did to them. They didn’t know the part about her corrupting the files, but still. A betrayal is a betrayal no matter which way you spin it. She might as well be dead to them. So anyone coming to get her was indeed laughable.
“What type of weed are you smoking?” Jade said. At first her face was still stretched out in a laugh, but soon became a deadly glare and frown that would scare off the most fearsome of foes and heroes. But not Cassandra. She was more confused than anyone. What was she talking about? “The Avengers and the X Men would never in a million years come to get me,” Jade spat at her. “I am no more than a pawn in their eyes. A piece, a plaything for them to use and discard when they are done.”
Cassandra raised an eyebrow. The person in front of her didn’t seem to be the person she heard over those messages. The way she talked about the people she supposedly cared for was so cold and so cruel it was hard to believe that she even lived with them for a year. Where was the person from four months ago who disobeyed her orders, who ignored her for countless days, and who caused this mess in the first place? Where was the girl who would have done anything for the people she called friends?
“I’m not sure I’m following,” Cassandra said, pacing back and forth on the platform she was on. “Why do you speak so coldly about people you say you care about? Who care about you?”
Jade let out another laugh. “Of course, I care about them,” Jade said. “Who said they care about me? Who said they would come to get me when the time came to it? Why my life over the rest of the people on that planet?” Jade was waving her arms around, her shoulders slightly slumped and her hair ragged. She was sweating profusely from the nerves. In all honesty, she was stalling. For what, she didn’t know. She was hoping that a miracle occurred and the people who will never look at her the same way would come to get her. For them to give her one last measly chance. To believe in her once more how they used to. However, this hope was almost nonexistent. It was almost a passing thought. No one was coming to save her. The prophecy Strange had would most likely come true and the world would be destroyed.
And it was all her fault.
“How are you so sure?” Cassandra asked. “Why would they not come to get you?”
“Do you not understand what happened?” Jade asked, her anger increasing by the second. “Do you not see what you made me do? I betrayed them out of cold blood and malice! Who would want to come get someone who gave away their secrets and put their very families in danger?!”
Cassandra sighed. This girl had zero life experience. How could she be making a judgment call so soon? Then again, why was Cassandra about to tell her that people were coming? Why was she trying to instill hope in the enemy?
“Friendships don’t get thrown away that quickly,” she tried to retort. “Besides, you have corrupted all of my files, so it’s useless to me. All the information you sent, I can’t use. Or did you not tell them that? They will come to get you, and when that happens I will destroy them. The people who care-.”
“There is no one here on this planet or in this universe who gives a damn about me!” Jade screamed at her. Her voice echoed off the walls as she yelled at the thick headed woman before her. Now she was becoming desperate in her words, in her need for the earth to survive, and for someone, anyone, to show up. “I will die alone without anyone to come see my grave!” she continued. “I will be driven so mad by the likes of you and others and I will self-destruct like you’ve always wanted! Is this what you wanted in the first place?! To see me start to care about something other than the mission for the first time and then take it all away from me?”
As Jade continued to speak, the more her words seemed to set in. She was alone in the world. No one cared. No one would ever care. And she would die alone with nothing but a number to remember her by if she was lucky. It was a sudden and painful realization that she came to. It set in so quickly, her body started to shake
Cassandra smiled. The time was almost up. But she had one more question to ask. “And what about the blue one?” she asked.
Jade looked at her, her eyes sunken in and anger fueling her body. However, this anger was more of a tired anger instead one fueled by fire. “What about the blue one?” Jade asked, feigning ignorance. “Do you mean Beast?”
“No, the other blue one,” Cassandra said. “What was his name again? Nightcrawler, right? You love him, don’t you?”
Jade hesitated for a moment, her breath getting caught in her throat. She swallowed the lump in her throat and heaved a great sigh before she spoke. “Yes, but-,” Jade started.
“And he loves you back?” Cassandra asked.
Jade shook her head in anger and disbelief. More tears streamed from her eyes as she tried to wrap her head around what she was hearing right now. Was this woman stupid? Was she even hearing what she was saying?
“No!” Jade screamed. Her voice was shaken by a laugh. “Were you even listening?” Jade asked. “No one loves me! Certainly not Nightcrawler!” She was careful not to say his real name for fear of her using it to find out where he lived. It might be fruitless to hide something that may already be known, but Jade had to try.
“But you described him as the best person you met and someone you care deeply for and are desperately in love with,” Cassandra said. She mocked Jade with little movements and flourishes as if she were fainting. It was all followed by a laugh.
Jade pressed a hand into her chest and felt her heart drumming beneath it. “Of course, I love him!” she screamed. “I love him so much that it would kill me to see anything happen to him! That doesn’t mean he loves me back! He’s not so stupid to come here and give you what you want…t-to bow to your will! He’s not here!”
Cassandra laughed an evil laugh. “Oh, but he will come if he knows what’s good for you,” she said.
“He’s not coming!” Jade said. “And he doesn’t love me! He doesn’t care enough about me to come and save me!” Jade was now reduced to soft little sniffles. It was yet another truth she had to come to today. The fact that whatever love Jade had for Kurt had to fade away like the day fading to night. Quick and precise. She had to forget. To move on and act as if nothing ever happened between them if they were to ever meet again. There was no way Kurt could love someone like her after all that she did. The betrayals, the lies.
How could he ever be sure again that she loved him after all of that?
However, Jade was not so foolish as to think that this love she had would fade overnight. In some parts of the world, during the right season, the sun remains forever in the sky. Never turning to night. Never setting. Jade wondered if her love would be like that. Never forgetting the softness or the kindness. Forever wondering what could have been if she didn’t betray them, if she could just live like a normal person, or if she never met him in the first place. What would her life be like?
As soon as a silence set in that hangar, a loud, distinct popping sound echoed behind her. “I’m sorry, darling,” an accented voice called out. “You aren’t getting rid of me that easily.”
Jade’s eyes grew wide, Cassandra let out a loud fit of laughter, and the guards stiffened once more behind both of them. Jade stayed in her spot, her arms rigid and shaking and her whole entire body frozen in fear and dread. No, she thought, this can’t be happening, he can’t be here. Slowly, she turned around, her eyes cast to the ground at first for fear of what she might see. When she finally looked up, she saw not only Kurt but Cyclops, Jean, and Doctor Strange. The last three spread out immediately trying to dismantle the ship and disarm the guards.
Cassandra stopped laughing as she realized what was happening and quickly motioned for her guards to get going and to get fighting. She ran around trying to use her powers to hinder the three super powered people in that room.
“K-Kurt,” Jade whispered. “What…what are you doing here? How…how did you?”
“What, you aren’t happy to see me?” Kurt said with a laugh. “In all seriousness, Tony managed to sneak a tracking device into your pocket before we left. It had a microphone and we heard everything.”
“E-everything?” Jade asked.
“Yes, everything,” Kurt said. “We know about the corrupted files. Granted it doesn’t absolve you from everything. There’s still a bit of trust building to be done.”
Jade looked to the ground. She wanted to be glad she really did, but something was stopping her. She didn’t know what. Before she could say anything else, Kurt lifted her chin to look him in the eyes.
“We heard everything else as well,” he said. “You’re limited self-worth, your fear of dying alone. I promise you I will not let that happen so long as I live. Because you got one crucial piece of information wrong.”
Jade blinked. “What is that?” she asked.
“I do love you,” Kurt said. “With all my heart.” Hearing that from Kurt made Jade melt into his arms. She fell into him and gave him a deep, loving kiss which Kurt gladly accepted. He held her close and ran his fingers through her hair. When they broke apart, they both smiled. “Now, let’s get you out of here,” Kurt said.
Before they could do anything, Jade felt the uneasy sensation of energy charging through the air. When she looked behind Kurt, she saw as Cassandra’s arm was outstretched in their direction. “You’re not getting away that easy!” she screamed. She then sent an energy blast their way. One that looked charged and dangerous. Without so much as a second thought, Jade pushed Kurt out of the way with all her might. The blast of energy hit her squarely in the chest. She felt it affect her body and singed her skin before she blacked out from the blow and fell to the ground.