Chapter 232: Relief
23rd March 2012, New York City
(Jasmine Sayre POV)
Selene looked down, “I’m sorry for your loss.”
I nodded. There were very few people who knew how close Erebus and I were, and Selene was one of them. She understands that the moment we’re alone, I’m probably going to break down in tears and that I was holding on for the sake of the kids.
Speaking of the kids, I looked down to Wanda and Rose, “So, did you spend the whole day worrying about me?”
The two young women shared an odd look before Rose spoke out, “Jasmine, you’ve been gone for six months.”
Ah, fuck, this was going to be problematic.
I forced a smile on my face. The two girls didn’t seem to notice anything, but Selene obviously noticed what I was doing. Truthfully, I didn’t feel like talking too much. I just wanted to go to sleep and mourn my friend in peace. However, the girls haven’t seen me in months, meaning that I have to catch up with them. I’ll try to get out of this conversation when I can to go to bed, “So, what’s new?”
Wanda glared at me, “This is the second time you disappeared without a trace. Is this going to be a recurring thing?”
Oh, she was mad. Well, it was understandable. She already has abandonment issues stemming back to her birth father, who had just given up on her and put her in a psychiatric facility who resembled a prison more than a hospital.
It was better to calm her down. I was already exhausted emotionally from what happened, and I seriously needed to rest. Answering her question, I shook my head, “No, I will do my best that it won’t happen again, but sometimes accident happen. No matter how powerful I appear to be, I cannot expect anything. But believe me, I will do my best for them not to happen again. Still, I knew the risks when I performed the ritual, and without Erebus, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Selene interjected, “I used my bracelet to know if you were alive and reassured them, so that wasn’t that big of a deal. Although, there was a slight glitch on the day it happened, but the connection came back immediately.”
I nodded. She must be talking about the time I was pretty much dead, and Erebus was able to pull me back, “Like I said, it was a near thing. But it’s not like you didn’t know what was happening or the risks involved. I had told you all.”
“And the losing your humanity thing?” Rose asked.
“With Erebus’ intervention, it became a gradual thing instead of an instant one. I am different, believe me, I can feel it in my bones. I can feel the Earth moving. The ground beneath our feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour and the entire planet is hurtling around the sun at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour, and I can feel it. We're falling through space, right now, clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go...,” I stop my rambling. I really need to get a grip on my powers. I righted myself and continued, “Let’s just say that I’m different, very different, but it’s still me, deep down. I have lost a shard of my humanity, yet I am still mortal, a being of flesh. But slowly, it could take months, years, centuries or even millennia, but my humanity will erode, and my ascension will be complete.”
And what a sad day it will be. The day I stop struggling and accept that my humanity is gone, the day I stop even trying to pretend to be human, because I wouldn’t even be able to pretend, even if I tried fooling myself, because I would be too aware of everything.
Seeing the sad faces of my sister and daughter, I chose to change the subject, “So, what’s been going on while I was gone?”
Rose seemingly understood my attempt at brightening the mood and answered, “Nothing much. We’ve been staying in the mansion for the time being since SHIELD is still after us.”
I gave her an incredulous look, “They’re still a thing?”
“Barely, the final UN vote is in a few days and it’s not looking good for them. Your leaks started a worldwide challenge to hack their servers and while their security is impeccable, eventually someone was able to get a few classified files and post them online. They got the details of the research on World War two Hydra weapons, some human experimentation while trying to recreate the super soldier serum, a couple of assassinations of high profile targets that got a lot of people outraged. Let’s just say that a lot of people are out for their blood. The Avengers, even if it was formed by SHIELD, ended up renouncing them. Yeah, Captain America pretty much claiming that he didn’t trust SHIELD on national television was the last nail in the coffin. Add in the fact that the world security council was fired and are now being tried for ten million counts of manslaughter, the organization is in chaos, and Nick Fury was the only one who is keeping things going so far, and even then, he’s waiting on a miracle to come out of nowhere to fix things for him.”
Well, isn’t that interesting? I will admit that it is impressive that Fury has somehow kept his ship afloat while the entirety of the world is against him. But things are happening near what I planned. Honestly, I didn’t give a shit about SHIELD, what I did care about was the fact that it was a Hydra asset, and considering how they might target my family, and could technically assassinate them, I needed to take them out. That was the point of it all. Although, a part of me is really petty, and wanted to see a control freak like Fury try to deal with the chaos that I caused. Serves that guy for trying to confront me during a school day.
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But now, I didn’t care one bit, about Hydra, about SHIELD. It all seems so small, so pointless. I knew that I didn’t feel this was before the ritual. Is this still something that changed in me? Or is it the fact that now that I pretty much destroyed the two organizations, I stopped caring about them? How much have I changed really?
Still, something bothered me slightly about what Rose said, “Wait, why is SHIELD after you? As far as I know you haven’t done anything really illegal.”
Wanda scowled, “We didn’t. It’s just with the way the UN has been pressuring them, they want a win desperately and recruiting mutants and super powered people in their organization was a good way to do that. They’ve been hunting mutants left right and center, from all over the world. Jean was over herself trying to rescue them.”
Selene nodded in agreement, “I put her in touch with my representative in Genosha to help out. She was growing restless in here and wanted to get involved. It was the safest way I could see of her helping out without getting herself killed. They’re a team of professionals that have been doing this for years.”
I raised an eyebrow. Seriously, has Fury been doubling down with this. I didn’t really understand why he was collecting mutants all over the world, and honestly, I didn’t care. It was probably some plot to pressure the UN to keep him going. So, that by disbanding SHIELD, all these mutants with powers will be free to do what they wished, and that wouldn’t bode well for the stability of the countries involved.
Still, it was curious that Genosha was finally getting involved in this, even if the rest of the world didn’t know it. This was a nation of mutants, one that was previously under Selene’s control, before the got bored and chose a successor in Emma Frost, one of the main pharmaceutical manufacturers in the world and currently the white queen of the hellfire club.
She was a mutant capable to turning her skin to diamonds but her most impressive power was her very precise telepathy. It didn’t rival mine in any way, considering how much time I’ve been training that particular ability, but she was impressive for someone her age, nonetheless.
Selene had chosen to give up control over the country and hand it over to her fellow Queen so that it would remain a safe haven for mutants. Honestly, Selene didn’t care about it. She could probably take over the country is a weekend if she was bored, but she gave it to Emma Frost of all people because while she tried to hide it, she was a good person deep down. She was manipulative, very power hungry, and had a very skewed moral compass thanks to her father, but she wouldn’t hurt the mutants under her supervision, and would make sure that they would have happy lives if she could. Even then, if she went mad and started to do some weird shit, Selene was just going to set her straight. For now, Emma was the temporary leader of Genosha until Jean steps into the role.
Still, what Emma had done was impressive. She had created a very sophisticated spy network all over the world, and in conjunction to a very powerful mutant called the Doormaker, who could make a portal to anywhere on Earth he could visualize, she was able to keep a visual on known mutants and would send a team to save them if they’re attacked by bigots or power hungry groups. Then, they would be offered a place in Genosha where they would be safe from such dangers. It was a very efficient system and the main reason why the mutant population all over the world was plummeting. They didn’t stop appearing, they just moved somewhere safer.
Honestly, Jean ‘interning’ with Emma was a good choice. It gave the redhead a good idea what she would have to deal with when she takes over eventually, and it allowed her to make bonds inside the place, meaning that she was more likely to accept a position there if I offer it for her.
Mutants didn’t have the protection the wizards usually had, also known as the mist, meaning that their safety was far more difficult to secure if they’re not in a single location. It was why I took over Genosha after I defeated Nathaniel Essex, after all.
Still, I will admit that the situation with SHIELD was very curious, “I never imagined Fury being this heavy handed with the recruitment of mutants.” I commented out loud.
Rose chuckled, “It’s actually our fault, a bit. Bucky has been trying to take down the remaining Hydra cell while you were gone, and he needed help with the mutants, since he didn’t know if they were brainwashed or voluntarily joined the organization. Either way, we used the doormaker network to put them in cells in Genosha. Emma and Jean then looked in their heads for signs of tampering and fixed it if there was any. If there wasn’t they remained imprisoned, but if there were, after they fix it, they would offer them a position in Genosha, and removed their memories of the place if they refused. We did this to the mutants in SHIELD as well. Unfortunately, SHIELD was a lot more compromised than we thought, which means that Fury lost most of his super powered assets. It’s why he’s been so heavy handed with the recruitment right now.”
I nodded. It made sense, after all. One of the main arguments in keeping SHIELD as an organization is the fact that it made dealt with super powered criminals and presented as a safe alternative for mutants to be useful for their administration. It was a good way of getting rid of troublesome teenagers with too much power by convincing them of playing superhero.
But with half their mutant roster gone, and the decrease in mutant criminals due to the mass migration to Genosha, it proved that SHIELD wasn’t needed for things to remain stable. Fury was doing his best in proving the contrary by trying to either recruit or arrest as many mutants as he could.
It was a very dangerous policy to take, not to mention incredibly risky. But, for now, Fury was a man with nothing to lose, and that was a scary thought to have.
If anything, the next few days will prove to be interesting at the very least. I ended up spending hours with Selene, Wanda and Rose, chatting up, making jokes. It was nice to see that the ritual didn’t seem to have affected the way I felt about them. I chose not to overthink things, as the day concluded, and I went to sleep. I’ll worry about it tomorrow. For now, I will sleep and mourn my friend’s death in peace.
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