Chapter 2
Wanda has been at school for a longer while she actually intended, watching how day by day life here went back to normal a little more. Students attended classes though with minimum assignments to complete, Raven and Hank worked on their training course for youngsters and for the X-Men team, Charles and Erik were seen discussing something quite often, at times peering into some papers (as the girl assumed Xavier didn’t want his friend to dive into self-destructive mood, always coming with something “only” Lehnsherr could do).
In other news, that had a higher value for Maximoff, Peter grew more anxious with each day. According to McCoy his leg was healing much faster than it would be if he was an ordinary human, especially considering the nature of the fracture. Still, it was decided to remove the cast no sooner than the end of the week, meaning two more days of Peter whining and complaining about basically everything. At times Wanda fought the urge to slap him, reminding herself that she came here to support him and look after, in part.
Maximoff wracked her brain over the ways how she could ease this time for her brother. He had already given her a tour of the entire mansion and its surroundings, introduced her to almost all the students living here and tried to convince the girl he can do things faster even in the cast but earned a strict “no” at that. In a nutshell, he was, as Xavier once said, ‘a pain in the arse’ these days.
“Let’s make a deal,” Wanda offered to her brother after lunch. “You’ll survive these two days without trying to use your speed or puppy eyes to get rid of that piece of art on your leg, and in return I’ll make a fool of myself and entertain you.”
“I’m all ears,” Peter said, smiling like a devil.
“I’ve been thinking to participate in Raven’s training course.”
Peter remembered how much his sister hated PE at school, using every swear word in her vocabulary when talking about how many push-ups she had to do or how she almost died from a heart attack running a whole mile. Not much had changed over time. The fact, that Wanda actually decided to stretch her muscles here, at school for mutants, among people she barely knew, was a grand gesture from her. And it was all for him.
“But you hate sports,” Peter retorted.
They walked out of the mansion, squinting from bright sunlight. Silver-haired Maximoff instantly put his cool sunglasses on.
His sister gave him a shrug. “That’s the point. You’ll laugh your ass out and I’ll try to blend in, join the mutant movement and all, so to say.”
That was even grander gesture from Wanda. The speedster couldn’t miss such an opportunity. Besides, his sister never accepted a “no” as an answer without a proper reasoning and Peter had none right now.
The girl nodded up ahead where Erik and Charles stood, observing poor kids sweating from exercises Raven thought to be beneficial for their health and overall physical condition. “Looks like the stand is over there.”
When Wanda noticed Peter’s gaze at Lehnsherr (even through the sunglasses) all the while he shifted from one foot to another, she nudged him with her elbow encouragingly. “He won’t eat you if you come stand with him.”
He turned his face to her. “You’re one to talk, sis. Did you forget that awkward handshake? I thought you had a stroke or something.”
The girl slapped him on the shoulder. “You were the one so eager to find him and now you chicken out, bro.”
The speedster lifted his brow. “Like you didn’t want to find him.”
Wanda let out a heavy sight, her eyes fixed on their father’s figure. “We need to come up with something at last, decide once and for all if we are telling him the truth or leave things as they are.” She shook her head contritely. “I have no idea what to do, what is right to do, honestly.”
They stood there, two lost and confused children whose lives were so much easier when they didn’t know whom Peter actually rescued from the Pentagon. It had been a strange mixture of feelings ever since: a relief to know that their father didn’t abandon them since he simply wasn’t aware he was going to be one and anguish for that very reason, constant what ifs and how could it be that their parent was a terrorist (at least that was what the news repeated time after time throughout the years).
“One day we will tell him,” Peter promised.
A bitter laugh escaped Wanda’s lips. “One day it will be too late for that. Or we will chicken out again. I feel it’s like now or never.”
“Like now-now?” The speedster’s eyes went round.
“What?” the girl asked, furrowing in confusion. “Oh, no, not like right now. I mean…Probably not now? Right?”
At once, the twins looked up at Erik. The Maximoffs almost flinched in astonishment when they met his curious stare.
Peter and Wanda swapped a glance, mumbling “Holy crap!” in unison.
“Yeah, right,” the girl said hurriedly. “We had a plan, let’s stick to it!”
She made a move to go, but the speedster caught her arm. “Wait! What are you doing? What plan? Did we have a plan?”
“You, me, Raven’s class, entertainment,” Wanda reminded, making a stop after each word. “Keep up, bro.”
Lahnsherr watched the twins part their ways, Wanda walked to Raven, gesticulating something with a smile, and Peter was approaching him and Charles with a look of a person who had been sent to hard labor.
“Wassup?” the speedster said as a way of greeting.
The kid has no manners, Erik noted again to himself.
Charles glanced up at Maximoff. “Peter! How do you do?”
A pathetic attempt to re-educate him, Lehnsherr thought. Quite amusing though.
Shut up! the telepath’s voice flashed across his mind a second later.
“Did your sister decide to participate in the classes?” Xavier went on as if he didn’t say a word into his friend’s mind.
Peter smirked. “That’s her part of the deal.”
The men stared at Maximoff uncomprehendingly.
“Wanda loves to lose herself in a book like for forever, whereas I usually do many things at once. She decided an escapade such as this would entertain me,” the young man explained. He turned his face in time to see his sister’s intense gaze at the jump rope. “And she wasn’t wrong.”
Wanda hated every minute of it. She felt a drop of sweat forming over her brow, but she had got her hands full and couldn’t even wipe it off. Jumping rope seemed to be an extremely ridiculous exercise to her at that moment. Who the hell even got an idea to jump repeatedly in one place over a rope?!
When she approached Mystique asking if it was possible to participate in her training course, deep down she hoped to hear “I don’t have time to babysit Magneto’s kid” or something along the lines, but Raven agreed (too willingly for Wanda’s liking) and even gave her a sweatsuit. So, Maximoff had no choice but to follow her own plan. Besides, Kurt and Jean were among the lucky students and it had a soothing effect of a sort.
One torturous exercise was followed by another, and if it wasn’t for Peter, she would have left a long time ago. But the jackass watched her as a hawk, waiting for her to give up. Erik and Charles were watching her now too. Bloody fiends! She gave them the thumbs-up smiling from ear to ear, then turned around and swore under her breath so filthily a kid beside her chocked on his water.
“Do you like sports?” Kurt asked, hoping to start a conversation.
“Totally in love,” Wanda deadpanned in between push-ups.
When nothing else seemed forthcoming, Kurt tried again. “Sprichst du Deutsch? Your Schönen Abend noch* sounded pretty confident.”
“Sprichst is too big of a word to describe my skills,” the girl got out. “But Ich learne and as far as I can see it’s going nicht schlecht*.”
“Du bist gut darin*,” Wagner said with a sheepish smile.
“Danke,” Wanda replied, rubbing her hands together to brush the dirt off. “Das ist so schön zu hören*. You are good at English too, by the way.”
The young man beamed. A moment of happiness passed quickly though. Raven shouted that after a break they are going to run ten times around the mansion. The statement was followed by exasperated “ugh” from the group of students, but mainly from Kurt and Wanda. Jean was doing just fine.
Traitor, Maximoff thought looking at the red-haired girl.
As if reading her mind, Grey turned to Peter’s sister. “Never saw anyone do push-ups with such determination.”
“I’m very passionate student,” Wanda crooned.
“Are you going to stay here?” Jean asked, re-braiding her hair.
“I’m a bit old to study at school, don’t you think?” Maximoff smirked. “Besides, I have Oxford to graduate, so no, I won’t stay there and never intended to, actually.”
The telepath watched Wanda astutely for a moment. “And what about…you know? Your family situation?”
The girl looked around, checking if anyone was listening. Apparently satisfied, she finally said, “It’s a complex question I still don’t have the answer to, unfortunately. But I would ask you to, please, keep our family’s secret to yourself. The last thing I want is for this to spread all over the school.”
“Oh, I would never.” Jean shook her head enthusiastically.
Maximoff flashed her a closed-mouth smile.
“All right, everyone come here,” Raven ordered. “Take your positions.”
“As if we are in an army,” Wanda muttered.
Jean coughed into her fist to hide the giggle.
Students lined up near the mansion and run when Mystique waved her hand in a signal.
“All good?” she asked Maximoff on the second round, catching up with her.
The girl schooled her features into something she believed looked like “I can do it forever, let’s go” and let Raven outrun her. As soon as the mutant disappeared from Maximoff’s line of vision, the mask of confidence and ease slipped out and the girl turned another way abruptly, to where she believed was a bench.
She trudged to her little piece of paradise only to find it occupied by Peter and Erik, Xavier nearby them.
“Move,” she huffed out, before collapsing onto the bench.
As a result, Peter with his crutches was sandwiched between his sister and father.
“I thought training wasn’t over yet,” the young man teased, trying to find a comfortable position.
“Shut up,” Wanda parried, resting her head on the back of the bench and closing her eyes. “I bet you can hear my heartbeat right now.”
“Here we go,” the speedster announced, grinning.
Charles ducked his head to hide a smile. Now he realized how much Peter must have missed his sister. Though he still was noisy and over energized, Wanda somehow balanced it out, creating an image of an inseparable whole. They were twins, after all, a connection so strong and deep, made by mother nature itself, so that nothing could compare to it, least replace it, as the Professor believed.
“How do you even do it, Peter? Running around at supersonic speed, live at supersonic speed?” the girl groaned. “Why my legs feel like a jelly and my back hurts? Should my back hurt?”
Silver-haired Maximoff stood from the bench at last, observing his sister. A couple of unruly locks of her dark hair slipped out of her ponytail and plastered to her temples and forehead, which was glistening with sweat. Overall, she looked really worn out, her lips were slightly pale and chapped, and the shadows under her eyes now stood out clearly against her rosy skin.
“Are you alright?” Peter asked worriedly, drawing a dismissive “Pff” out of the girl.
Erik looked sympathetically at Wanda. Her brother wasn’t lying when he said that his sister loves to dive into books “for forever”, it seemed like her physical condition was at the lowest level. But the exhaustion from sleepless nights didn’t escape Lehnsherr’s notice either. It was too familiar with him. For the first time he thought that maybe a little assistance from Charles would really do no harm.
“Are you sure you don’t need help?” Erik asked somewhat gently, much to Xavier’s and Peter’s surprise.
If Wanda heard the question, she either didn’t notice this note of concern in Lehnsherr’s voice or didn’t notice his question entirely, because all they got to hear from her was a whimpered “How many muscles does a human body even has?”.
“About six hundred,” a voice somewhere nearby said. Hank was approaching Wanda’s group support dressed in his white lab coat.
The girl half-opened her eyes and gave him a once-over. “It was a rhetorical question, but thanks, doc.”
Things got rough, Peter thought because Wanda never addressed anyone in a way that was disrespectful. Even when she was pissed off. Especially when she was pissed off. Meaning right now not only her legs became a jelly but her sharp mind probably did, too.
McCoy smiled sheepishly. “I have made a few observations which seem to be rather interesting from a scientific point of view. Peter has this amazing superhuman speed –”
“Supersonic speed,” the girl amended, her eyes became more focused, wary.
“Yes, yes, exactly, supersonic,” Hank chattered, perking up. “But you seem to be lacking the basic physical development in that matter –”
Wanda smirked. “You certainly know how to get a girl.”
“I meant…I didn’t want to…I didn’t mean it as an insult,” poor McCoy begun apologizing hastily.
Xavier rubbed the bridge of his nose, ashamed of Hank’s communication skills.
“Also, were you hiding in the bush with some devices to make your observations scientifically correct?” the girl went on with dangerously growing portion of sarcasm in her voice.
Uh-ho, flashed in the speedster’s mind.
Better language, same manners, Erik thought though his own sardonic nature gave the girl a point.
“No, not, of course not! I’m not some pervert,” Hank tried to justify himself, making Charles seriously consider stopping his friend from talking using his telepathic powers. “What I’m trying to say that it would be great to run a few tests –”
Peter, who didn’t like doctors or needles or anything remotely connected to medicine, winced.
“Thanks, but no,” Wanda cut out, her face still retained a mask of amicability, however indignation and annoyance were already waking up in her core.
Xavier prayed for this conversation to end now. Wanda made it clear that she didn’t want any interference in her personal space, understandably so.
But not for McCoy, obviously, as he persisted, “But such research would be of great value, Wanda. It would show how the mutated gene develops in twins, what Peter’s body and yours are capable of, maybe –”
“Hank,” the Professor said warningly.
“Do we look like lab rats to you, Mr. McCoy?” Wanda snapped.
The temperature around them seemed to drop below zero. Hank paused abruptly, puzzled. Magneto and Professor X watched Maximoff as if she was a predator ready to seize her pray.
An essence of unease slowly moved through Peter’s body. He had never been on the receiving end of his sister’s rage, still every time some poor thing who had been foolish enough to piss her off prepared to taste it, he involuntarily held his breath.
Mastering the remaining strength, Wanda straightened and slowly but confidently stood up, ignoring already aching muscles. She approached McCoy, her every move smooth and gracious, though Lehnsherr could see the effort she made to maintain such an impression.
When Maximoff stopped, there were bare inches left between her and Hank, she could see her own reflection in his glasses. Despite all that beastly power hiding under the guise of a socially awkward scientist, the man had to steel himself not to flinch under her piercing gaze. Even considering the fact, that he was actually much taller than her.
“I don’t need your little experiments to know what my body can do. Neither does Peter. And if it’s so difficult for you to comprehend a “no” in such private matters, I’ll explain something to you,” Wanda rebuked, her eyes blazed with flaring rage. “My family has a history with people who loved running tests for “scientific purposes” during the war.
Erik tensed.
“Forgive me for the comparison, Mr. McCoy, but you, driven by your ambitions and perseverance, remind me of them right now. Of those fanatics who destroyed the lives of innocent people, my people, my relatives. By offering to “run a few tests” on us, you belittle their sufferings, their sacrifices and losses. You may be a genius behind a microscope but it doesn’t give you the right to study every breathing thing you don’t understand under its lenses.
Charles eyes became glossy as his sensitive nature felt girl’s pain and resentment for her family, her fear of losing her brother and people dear to her heart.
“Do not speak of something that may trigger one’s old wounds, Mr. McCoy. And don’t you dare to come to my brother ever again with your “offers”,” Wanda warned Hank, who stood silently in front of her, not daring to even breath.
Once Maximoff was done, she cast a softer glance at Peter, a silent invitation to come with her, and paced away from McCoy, heading to the mansion.
The speedster seized the scientist, pursing his lips in a silent “you’ve got yourself into one hell of a rabbit hole” and turned around to join his sister, who was already several feet away.
“Did anyone see Wanda?” Raven asked, running up to the silent men a moment later. “I think I’ve lost the kid.”
She noticed the grim look on Lehnsherr’s face, Charles’ gleaming eyes and Hank’s half puzzled half frightened expression.
The woman narrowed her eyes. “What? What happened? Why are you…” the mutant stumbled, trying to find the right word.
“Hank, you can’t just ask our students to participate in your projects based on their own biochemical material,” Xavier said at last, his voice a bit shaky.
“They are not your students,” Erik corrected. “Not Wanda, at least.”
He gave McCoy a stern look, then stood up from the bench and walked away. The weight of memories of his own family and destroyed childhood drove him forward. He could understand Wanda like no one else, her mixed feelings and fears that Beast stirred up. Little did he know that Maximoff’s passionate monologue about family included him, too.
“Is someone going to explain what happened here?” Raven tried again, watching the receding figure of her old friend.
....
As soon as Wanda was within the walls of the mansion, she allowed herself to take a deep breath and relax her posture. While she was in the shower, Peter took two tin cans of chocolate pudding and several boxes of cereal from the kitchen. He also made a cup of hot green tea for his sister and poured an icy cold Tab for himself.
When the girl returned to her room, dressed in her pajamas, with a towel turban on her head, her brother had already arranged some kind of a dinner for the two of them.
“Quite fun of a day, huh?” the speedster teased with his usual grin.
Wanda’s mouth curved into an apologetic smile. She plopped down on the empty part of the bed, shouldering her brother. “I’m sorry I had a cow. I came here to take care of you, but it somehow turned into me frightening away your new…friends.”
Peter grimaced. “That’s why I didn’t say I have an evil twin sister.”
The girl rolled her eyes good-humoredly. “Say no more, or I’ll tell mom the truth behind the mystical disappearance of the Maximoffs’ porcelain service.”
It was their childhood joke. When Peter was just mastering his mutant powers, he and Wanda made a bet that he could throw chewing gum exactly at the flower painted on one of the plates so that it would stick to it. The speedster, of course, won, only he accidentally used his supersonic speed (which made the impact of his touch rather destructive) and it led to a catastrophe (one of many that followed later). The gum landed right on target, splitting the plate in half and since he still didn’t know how to control his superhuman speed, he didn’t manage to catch the rest of the plates, which, by the domino effect, began to fall from the shelf one after another. Like very well-mannered children, Peter and Wanda buried the broken plates under a tree in their yard and refused to confess the truth to their mom. Wanda, like the best sister in the world she was, didn’t betray her brother and was subjected to punishment along with him. Ms. Maximoff still didn’t know what they have done with her favorite set of plates, and every time Peter started to annoy his sister, the girl jokingly threatened to reveal the secret.
Silver-haired Maximoff put his hands up in surrender, however, he couldn’t resist poking at the turban on his sister’s head, thereby destroying the entire thing. A small fight with slaps, pinches and pillows thrown in the face ensued right after, resulting in Peter falling off the bed with a loud yelp.
The twins ate their puddings and cereal while watching “The Dukes of Hazzard” as if they were at home. When they were together any place felt like home.
....
Once Charles entered the cafeteria, he realized neither Peter nor Wanda was present.
“You block the passageway,” Erik grumbled and with a slight wave of his hand moved Xavier’s wheelchair further into the room.
The telepath shook his head, marveling at the impatience of the Master of Magnetism. He only stood there for a couple of minutes and no one had any complaints.
“Did you see the twins?” he asked instead, settling down at the table.
“As I said they are not your students, Charles,” Erik hedged. “Don’t fuss about them.”
But by the way the man looked around, peering into the faces of the youngsters, Charles could tell that he, too, was guessing where the Maximoffs had gone. In fact, Xavier was a little surprised by the attention his old friend paid to these two kids. Erik never sought to find someone’s company, or to be involved in other’s lives, least of all students’, but ever since they returned from the buttle with En Sabah Nur he kind of kept an eye on Peter, and now on Wanda, too. Perhaps it was because the speedster got him out of the Pentagon and Erik was curious about his powers that temporally were out of use. Or because the Maximoffs were among those rare students who didn’t try to stay out of Magneto’s sight, on the contrary, they were always somewhere around. The twins seemed to liven him up a bit on days when the loss of Magda and Nina pressed too hard on him.
And now it looked like today’s incident touched Erik’s wounded soul, because he called Ororo to their table. “Did you see the twins?”
Munroe’s brows went up ever so slightly. “Peter said they are having a family night.”
“Did they leave the school?” Xavier asked taken aback.
He knew, of course, that Hank had messed up and wanted to talk to the Maximoffs, but several urgent matters kept him in the office until the evening. Did they just leave for Washington without saying anything?
Charles could have sworn that something sparked in Ororo’s mind, but it passed quickly as Jean literally ran up to them. “They’re upstairs, Professor. Wanda was tired after Raven’s class and Peter decided to cheer her up.”
Storm nodded energetically in confirmation to her friend’s words. “Exactly.”
Xavier’s eyes darted between the two of them, waiting, because there was clearly something else they knew, but when nothing else came out, he said, “Alright then, thank you.”
Jean cast a glance at Lehnsherr, as if scanning him for some answers. Munroe elbowed her, bringing Grey back to reality and the girls turned around, heading to their table, where Kurt, Scott and Jubilee were already waiting for them.
The taut atmosphere at X-Men’s table didn’t relent even when Raven talked about her first day as a teacher, gushing over how determined her students were (but also openly laughing at one boy that gaped at a girl who accidentally made the grass grow under her palms in between push-ups). Charles was only half-listening, tired from yet another busy day, though Raven’s enthusiastic tone made him gladden. He was happy that his sworn sister finally agreed to return home even if she didn’t think of this place as such. Hank was even more awkward that evening, avoiding Lehnsherr’s attention at all costs, who in turn sat with a sullen expression, pushing the vegetables around his plate.
On that note, they all parted their ways.
....
After the dinner Raven went upstairs to check the Maximoffs out. Through the half-opened door to Wanda’s room, she saw an adorable scene that filled her heart with contentment.
The twins were already asleep, the speedster leaned the back of his head against the headboard, his lips were slightly parted, reminding Mystique how young he actually was. Wanda’s head rested on her brother’s shoulder, her damp hair was covering half of her face like a curtain. Empty cupboard boxes were scuttered around, a couple of cereal lay on the speedster’s chest as if he had fallen asleep before he had time to put them in his mouth.
Raven slipped into the room, trying to avoid making any noise and turned off the TV since the channel they have been watching had already went off.
Before she closed the door, she cast a glance over her shoulder smiling at peacefully sleeping twins.
....
*Do you speak German? Your “Have a good evening” sounded pretty confident.
*”Speak” is too big of a word to describe my skills. But I’m learning and as far as I can see it’s going pretty well.
*You’re good at it.
*Thank you. That's so nice to hear.