I.
He dreamed of the crash. He could feel it in his bones, in his muscles, all the weight of the metal falling on top of him, the violence of the crash of his body against the floor at the speed, the explosion of the gas, the rubble falling on him. He could still feel the pain, he remembered the pain so vividly, it was all he could feel for so long... And he thought it was the last thing he would ever feel. The agony of dying, forgotten, forsaken.
There was no one in the warehouse, just him. When Warren woke, it felt even colder than the metal.
II.
Jean looked at him with hatred, with susupicion. She couldn't forget that because of him and his purple friend they had to pull off that dangerous rescue I which they almost lost Kurt. She didn't forget how viciously he went after their blue friend, either, even if now they seemed to be on friendly terms. Jean didn't forget anything and wasn't all that sure that this boy deserved a second chance.
But the thing was, if she thought he was dangerous she could (and she did) go into his head, to look around, see his intentions. She saw many things, saw the anger, the anger that overwhelmed everything, the disgust in his family's eyes, the hurt, the hiding, the running away, the cage with those horrible snipers, gun at the ready, so that he'd know he could only fight and fight and fight... The pain from his wing, the hollowness, she felt Apocalypse's manipulation in her own flesh, Jean felt everything.
And she decided that maybe, just maybe, she would let him stay.
III.
It was been three months, one week, five days and seventeen hours since Charles Xavier let him in the school and offered Warren a room when he heard his father's voice in one of the offices and absolutely panicked. He was supposed to be stronger than this, he knew, but the shock of hearing that voice again, it knocked the air out of him, he couldn't think, couldn't properly function.
“Are you all right?” An accented voice said in front of him.
The blue boy. Kurt. That gave him an idea.
“I need to get away, can you take me someplace far?”
Kurt nodded, asked no further questions and just took Warren's shaky hands and teleported them both out of there. They reappeared in what looked like an old church, someplace he didn't know.
“An abandoned church?”
“It's a chapel, I think. I come here sometimes, when I want to be alone. No one will find you here.”
Warren released a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.
“Thank you.”
He sat in one of the benches and breathed again. His father wouldn't be able to get him back to that mansion, to that life. The Warren Worthington that was could never be again. He didn't just have his wings and his skills now, he had people, a support system.
“Do you want to talk?” Kurt said looking with those big innocent eyes of his.
Warren had used to hate him so much, but now... All of it, Apocalypse, Berlin, it was a distant memory now. And all of it (except for the crash, the crash was oh so very present, it still hurt him some nights) made a little less sense now. And he did kind of want to talk about it.
“Are you ever afraid that your past is going to catch up with you?” He asked and Kurt nodded.
Sometimes he remembered the box, the electrified box they had shoved him in, and imagined those men finding him and capturing him again.
“Yes.” Kurt looked down and muttered a prayer, but when he looked back up, he seemed more cheerful. “It will not happen. We protect each other now.”
Warren smiled, looking at the old church and how far his father's voice seemed to be.
“Yes. We protect each other.”
IV.
He did meet with Betsy occasionally, and didn't tell the others. They were incompatible. Betsy hated that he was Charles and the others, and the X-Men would hate him as well if they found out (well probably Jean already knew because she knew everything). There was a lot of things in which he still agreed with her and thought of leaving the school - it was a bit too peaceful for him anyways and joining her and other antis.
But the hatred had decreased somehow, and the reasons of the Professor and his companions resonated in his head. Maybe there was another way, maybe they could choose something that didn't leave them empty when it ended like the fight did. But still, he couldn't let go of Betsy, of the last remainders of his adventures in glorious battle.
Eventually, they would stop seeing each other, go their separate ways once and for all. But for now...
V.
Warren was at a Metallica concert with Jubilation, Kurt and Peter.
And nothing else mattered.
VI.
Warren was using his wings to protect Scott and Kurt's unconscious forms while enduring the attack of some anti human mutants that had attacked the school. Jean and Ororo where handling the attackers quite decently, but their team mates had been knocked out in the beginning of the fight and it was up to Warren to keep them safe.
It felt weird, he had always been the offense while the others defended and it was strange not to strike, but he didn't mind. These people had tasked him with protecting those boys, those boys he'd managed to befriend, with their ideals, with their jokes, with their smiles.
Maybe there was something beyond anger, a better life. Maybe the next time he woke up with that plane crash in his eyes, he wouldn't have to be alone.
VII.
The next time somebody came for Warren, they found a barrier of mutants who didn't let them pass.
Warren could fight his own battles, but he didn't have to do it alone anymore.