Christmas time again. Who knew last year we would have gone through hell and back before the next one, ah know ah didn't. Still have some missing people. Sam and Tabitha finally showed up two weeks ago with their other four kids; they looked so relieved when they saw their youngest here.
Jamie, and Kayley were playing on the front porch when a very tired looking group of people came walking up the driveway. The three girls jumped up and ran into the house yelling at Tara about the people. Tara went out and was able to recognize Sam. Tabitha's hair had grown out and turned its true light brown color, combined with their tiredness, Tara hadn't been sure it was she until they had almost reached the house. Tara wondered why they hadn't gone to the X-mansion first, all the camps were south of Westchester County, much more so Delaware County, where this house was. She knew they hadn't stopped in Westchester, or someone there would have called them, and they could have brought Jamie there.
"Tara, is Jamie here?" both Sam and Tabitha asked at the same time.
"Yes she is, now y'all come in an' collapse, ah'll get Jamie, and bring her to you."
"Thank whatever she's here. I didn't know if I was gonna make it here, if she wasn't here I don't what Sam and I would have done." Tabitha says as they tiredly climb the front steps to the porch.
"Just sit down in the front room, ah'll go get Jamie."
Tara watched them sit down in the room and then she got Jamie. She wondered if Jamie would recognize her parents, it had been almost six months since she had last seen them, she had her fifth birthday while they were in the camps. Somehow her siblings were in another camp and her parents in another. Jamie was in the same camp most of Tara's kids, Jubilee and two of her three kids, and Kitty and her kids.
She had heard their stories about the camps. The relocation camps, work camps, and the now infamous camp eighteen, the torture camp, where they had taken Remy and Louis. Maybe some of the others that were still missing, like Professor Xavier had been taken there too. If he had been, lord knows where he is now, without his hoverchair, if he's even... No ah won't think about it, ah can't believe he could be dead. He's just having a hard time getting to us, Tara thought.
Luckily Jamie had recognized her parents, she screamed "Daddy, Mommy!" as soon as Tara brought her into the room. Sam and Tabitha looked as happy as ah probably did when ah got mah kids back, Tara thought.
Theresa, James and their kids finally showed up a week ago, they had been separated too, and it had taken that long to find each other. Lorna and Alex showed up at the X-mansion yesterday. Now almost everybody has been found, except Galen's husband and Professor Xavier, Tara thought.
As far as the "bad guys" go, the government caught a couple of them besides Rusty and Skids, but most of them are still on the loose. They called me and the other X-Men to testify, briefly, at Rusty and Skid's trial. Rusty and Skids didn't get sentences as harsh as I thought they would. They only were sentenced to five years, with a chance of parole in eighteen months. They are also getting therapy, which could increase the likelihood of early parole.
The government also got Sabretooth, he got life, with no chance of parole, but ah doubt that prison will hold him long. For now ah feel better that he's in there, ah know everyone else here feels the same.
As for mah foster mother, ah know the government doesn't have her, but no one knows where she is, ah'm one of the last people who saw her, and that was last spring. She disappeared shortly after that, and no one has seen her since.
Magnus is dead.
On the good news front Kitty has a baby son, born just a week ago, she named him Illyann, after Peter's sister Illyanna, who died of the Legacy virus so many years ago. Now the nursery has lots of babies again. There's Analise, Gwen, Rhiannon, Rhiann, Allen, Curtis, and now Illyann. Allen and Curtis, Galen's two boys, miss their father. Allen is eighteen months and Curtis will be three in January.
January came, and Luna announced that she was going to have a baby. Renee said that she hoped Luna could still be in her wedding as matron of honor. Luna laughed and said it wouldn't be a problem, she'd only be four months pregnant in March, when Renee's and Lotan Lee's wedding would take place.
Still no Professor Xavier. Galen's husband was still missing too and nothing had been heard about Mystique either. Tara tried to not let her worries and sadness over Magnus' death, dampen her daughter's happiness on her upcoming wedding.
Renee celebrated her nineteenth birthday. Despite the happiness of the day it took on a melancholy tinge when they looked at old videotapes of other birthdays. Especially when Magnus or Professor Xavier were on the tape. Or Richard, who they had finally found out had become a member of the combined thieves guild under Belladonna's tutelage. They found letters after they had returned from the camps. Belladonna had sent the letters to Richard after she became his godmother; letters that had been written to draw him away from his family, and to her. Tara and especially Remy felt the bitter betrayal of these letters.
They had found the letters when they were cleaning up the mess they found the house to be in when they returned. Neither Remy nor Tara had the nerve to move things out of that room until they were confronted with the mess upon their return. Remy had found the first letter. He recognized Belladonna's handwriting, and saw it was a letter she had written seven years ago, when Richard was about eleven years old. At first he thought nothing of it, after all she was the boy's godmother, but curiosity got the better of him, and he had to read it. What he read angered him; some of the very things Richard had said to him and Tara, in that last argument was in this letter, word for word! "Dat salope!"
Tara jerked and turned around, "Who? Who's a bitch?" She was shocked to hear that word, even in French, coming from Remy's mouth, the only woman he had ever called that, in front of Tara, at least, had been Candra. "Is it Candra, did she do something?" Tara asks.
"Non, not dis time, look at dis letter Belladonna sent!" Remy angrily told Tara that some of the very things Richard had told them, just before he ran off, were in this letter, exactly how he had said it! Remy asked Tara to find all the letters Belladonna had written that were in the room, with him and read them. It was quite a substantial stack once they found them all. The earliest letters seemed harmless, and Tara remembered helping Richard read them, since he was only about five when she started to write him. She wrote about funny little incidents that happened when she and Remy were growing up together. Tara had teased Remy about a few of the childhood incidents after she read the letters. After about three years the tone started to change, and by that time Richard was reading the letters himself. Tara hadn't thought anything of Richard still receiving letters from Belladonna back then, she just thought Belle's letters had continued in the same vein as before. She knew when Belle visited that time, when Renard was a baby, that Belladonna wasn't that interested in seeing the other children or her or even Remy, it seemed. She only wanted to see Richard, her godson. She had accepted that, it had hurt a little, but she let it slide. Tara hadn't realized how obsessed Belle was with Richard. The letters written by that time were shocking. Belle was telling Richard that he should have been her son, if he were he would have been her only child, he wouldn't have had to share her with other brothers and sisters. Belle had even made remarks about Renard that were as bad as what Mystique had said to her face when Renard was a baby. Several years later Mystique had actually apologized for her harsh words, but Belle's letters just got worse and worse. Till finally Richard left them to join her. After they read all the letters, Remy, seething with rage, took them upstairs to their room, and after kinetically charging them, threw them in the fireplace. He watched the little fireburst, but felt little relief at his release of anger and energy. The letters had already done their damage. All this time, Tara especially, and he had been thinking that they had somehow done something to drive Richard from home, something they hadn't said or done with their other kids, they had racked their brains trying to think what it could have been. Now it turned out it had been Belladonna's plan, maybe all along, certainly since Richard was eight, to draw him to herself, by causing a rift between their oldest son and Tara and himself! He knew he'd have to swim lots of laps in their indoor swimming pool; which they had just finished cleaning out and filling back up yesterday. He'd ask Tara to join him, she was always up to a swim, and right now he knew he really needed her company; to keep him from brooding on how the thieves/assassins guild were drawing the boy even further away from them.
Somehow the thieves/assassins guild had kept their mutant and mutates members hidden, and they weren't taken to the camps. Apparently he was happy there, and had already married a girl that Belladonna had adopted. This news about Richard they heard from Helene, who had some contact with Belladonna, but not as much as she used to. She had heard this news in August, but hadn't been able to contact them until they returned to the farmhouse in December. They decided against going down to New Orleans for now. Things were in such a state of flux with everyone right now no one could be spared for any length of time. And the fact that, in spite of the way he got there, he was apparently happy there and was now married to. They reluctantly agreed that for now he was best off where he was. In spite of the evidence in the letters though, Tara still saw it as somehow her fault in some way that he left.
The next day Renee and Lotan took the old horse sleigh out and harnessed the two horses and went for a ride in the deep snow.
"Leta, how do you think your father really thinks about us getting married so young?" Lotan called Renee by her nickname, Leta, which was short for her middle name, Arlette.
"Actually, I think he is really happy for us, just like he said. It's your dad that's griping."
"Not really, he just likes to do that. He'll do that again when Louis and Scotia get married, whenever that is!"
"Uncle Scott is not happy about them even being engaged!"
"Louis told me Uncle Scott screamed at him till he was hoarse, when Louis said he and Scotia were planning on getting married. Aunt Jean finally got Uncle Scott to go for a walk while she talked to Scotia and Louis. Aunt Jean advised them to wait for a few years to get married, until Uncle Scott gets used to the idea."
Renee laughed, "That'll happen when my mother's hair turns all black!"
Lotan laughed, "Or my dad loses all his hair!"
They both gently pulled the reigns of the old sleigh, turning back towards home as more snow began to fall thickly from the sky.
Renee thought, as she smiled at Lotan, that was one of the most carefully worded way she had ever heard her unusual looks referred to. Her mother told her she looked `striking'. Aunt Jean had told Renee that she was a "handsome young woman' back when Renee was unhappy that she wasn't pretty like her mother or her sisters. She told Renee that back in the 1980's and 1990's her looks were really in, and she could have been a model. As Renee got more into her teens she noticed when she was out with her friends in New York guys would look at her too. Not the same way they would look at Hana, Luna, Mary, or Deborah, but they'd still look. She noticed the men would pass right over Scotia, or after a quick look at her face they keep their focus on her body. Scotia was quite tall. At 185 centimeters, taller than even Renee who was 178 centimeters. In spite of her height, Scotia had her mother's shape.
Before he left Renee thought Richard might have been mildly interested in Scotia. Scotia was his only friend besides Louis. The three of them would hang out together all the time. Scotia told Renee that she had feelings for both Louis and Richard, she couldn't figure out if she liked one more than the other. Also she and Roger had a brief relationship, but that ended up being nothing but teenage lust and burnt out pretty quick.
Louis though, really liked Scotia. After Richard left, Scotia's feelings for Louis were free to develop. While they were separated from each other in the camps Scotia realized she really loved Louis, the attraction to Richard had just been more of an infatuation. An infatuation not much different than the crush she, and most of the female students had at the LeBeau school when they were around 10 or 11 for Remy LeBeau.
These crushes were sort of annoying to the LeBeau kids, all who, so far, had skipped that stage and gone straight to interest in kids of their approximate age. Remy thought it was funny and it amused Tara too, especially since some of the boys around the same age had crushes on her! A few of the kids had a crush on Peter. Poor Peter was very uncomfortable about it.
"What are you thinking of Leta?"
"Oh, just growing up here...with the school and all...Funny, I always liked it when you called me Leta, but I still dislike Letty- Roger will tease me every once in a while, and say something like: `Hey Letty, when you and Tan getting married?"
"He's teasing me too there, you know I hate being called Tan as much as you hated Letty. Maybe I should, as my mother says, `paff' him one?" Lotan had inherited his mother's plasmoid power.
Renee laughed. "Won't do any good, we'll just have to call him Rog, or something stupid like that back."
"Hey, just call him by his middle name, you notice he never uses it. He must be embarrassed by it."
"Etienne. Yeah it does sound kind of snobby and affective. You know we should have thought of this when we were kids. Guess we didn't because he never got mad about something someone said about him. He didn't have a nickname, most of us had nicknames, but he was always Roger, even Louis had one, Uncle Logan called him, Junior, because-"
"He acts just like I'm sure I did at his age.' Yeah I remember him saying that." Lotan sounded a bit wistful. It had never been a really overt thing, but Logan had been closer to Louis because of personality similarities.
Renee looked contrite, "I'm sorry Lotan, I didn't mean to-"
"Hey, it's okay. Mom likes me better!" Lotan laughed.
Renee laughed with him. She had been her daddy's girl. Again nothing overt, just something she somehow knew. Richard had been the same with their mother. Mom and Dad loved all of us equally, but Richard and I were the first born. There's almost three years between Richard and Roger, but only 15 months between Richard and I. Mama and Daddy were both still fairly young when we born and they hadn't been married that long.
Mama told me recently, as a joking way of explaining this, which is why she and daddy made the big mistakes while they were learning to be parents with us. I think it was her way of saying too that she still feels responsible somehow for Richard leaving." Renee sighed, that was mama, sometimes. Renee had seen her mother and father struggle with their self-esteem since she could remember. Dad usually hid it well, but mom generally was more obvious. Mom was much better though than use to be.
She had talked to her father about how her mother was. He had told her that, "Your mama, she used to really have problems about dat. Before we got married, dere were times she was emotionally paralyzed by it." That was one of the great things about parents, if she asked about something, they would generally tell her about it.
About the only thing her father had difficulty taking about was the bad things he did in his youth. Mama said, when I commented on that to her, "You think he's bad about that now... Before we were married...!"
I was about 10 when I had those conversations. I was just getting interested in boys. Actually, just one boy in particular, she smiled at Lotan again and said, "We were so silly when we first started getting interested in each other this way, weren't we!"
"Yeah." Lotan laughed. "Both of us trying to act cool, as if nothing was any different! Our parents must have got some laughs out of that!"
"More than they did later when they were wondering just what we were doing when we were at the Academy. First big secret I kept from mom was when you and I-"
"Yeah, but your dad knew! He didn't say anything to us that night we got here, but the next day he called me into the office and asked, in that real quiet, but scary voice, `You use protection, pup?' How'd he know? He couldn't smell it on us like my dad could, and since we weren't taking classes there anymore, we could avoid our moms. Your dad's not telepathic, not even really empathic, just slightly."
"Apparently enough to figure us out!"
"Yeah, no kidding! It wasn't like we were little kids though, I was 15 and you were 16."
"I know, I think dad was mainly concerned we were both using protection, he didn't want any `accidents', especially not with us still being kids. Mama and Daddy knew enough about being our age that they had let me get on birth control as soon as I asked, with no questions asked. Although I could tell mom was dying to question me!"
"You know it was almost better when your mom caught us doing stuff. That scary look your dad got when he got mad frightened the hell out of me when I was a kid!"
"Not just you! Daddy was usually pretty lax about some things, much more than mom. Like all the fighting Louis and I did. Mom would be furious. She knew that Louis would instigate it, just because he likes to fight. It made for a bit of tension between your mom and my mom, nothing that caused any real hostility, just some exasperation on my mom's part.
"My mom couldn't do anything to stop him. She even talked to me about it. Well more like she muttered out loud in front of me- `It must be in his genes, he acts just like Logan!"
"Yeah she said it in front of me of me too! My daddy though, wasn't that worried about it. He told mama right in front of me- `Either the boy's in love with her or she'll beat the holy hell out of him one of these days.' This was when I was 13, about the time the strength gene was activating. Never got as strong as mom, but even with just a tenth of her strength..."
"You never got the chance to teach him that lesson, though. He got interested in Scotia and stopped doing that stupid rhyme."
"I'm glad, really. Him falling in love was a benefit to all of us, it matured him-"
"Slightly!" They both said and laughed.
In February Tara had her forty- fourth birthday. Her father, Senator Kelly, came, but this time with only his limo driver. Remy had made a sarcastic joke about it, "Don't need no escorts dis time, neh ?"
The Senator winced, "I'll regret that the rest of my life. What happened shouldn't have happened to anyone. I am going to do my best, for the rest of my years in the Senate to see that it doesn't happen to anyone else. I managed to finally get that law that imprisoned first the Japanese-Americans during World War Two, and then any parahumans last year, declared unconstitutional."
"Well dat's a start."
Senator Kelly sat in on the classes, and was amazed at how normal everything was. He watched his daughter teach a French language and culture class, with some help from her husband.
Then he watched his son-in-law teach the older students how to make survival stew, in the woods in back of the house, over a campfire he started without his mutant powers.
He showed the kids how
to start a campfire several ways without using mutant powers, two methods were rather primitive: the stick friction method, and a method was using a piece of glass, foil, and a piece of paper. Then lastly with matches.
When he asked the kids to try it, his eleven year son Roman got a smirk on his face and pulled out an old butane lighter, and said "Like this dad?" in a mocking response. Remy took the lighter away, and told his son that he'd have to try to light it by the stick friction method. He let the boy saw away for a good couple of minutes, then helped his Roman light it.
Remy told them the purpose of this was to show the ones that didn't have an ability to start a fire with their powers, ways they could if they needed to, even without a lighter or matches; and the ones of them who had the mutant ability, other ways to light a fire, because sometime they might have depleted their energy for their power,
"It's not infinite, y' see, y' only can go so long before you get tired." Then he had them set a large pot on top of the wood and fill it with the water they had brought with them. Then he brought out the ingredients and showed them how to make the survival stew, which ended up being their lunch that day.
This was in preparation for the 13-year-olds "final exam". They would have to survive a week in the wildness alone with just their classmates' help. Remy would take them there, and watch them to make sure if they got in trouble someone would be there to "rescue" them.
Sometimes Logan would come along too. Logan would always pull some sort of stunt that would scare the hell out the kids. Sometimes the kids needed it, though, they were too cocky about their own abilities. In a couple years Roman would need a scare, if he didn't wise up. Remy thought about doing that himself, if Logan wasn't available.
It wasn't until the PE/ Self defense class that Senator Kelly saw the teachers or students use any mutant powers. He watched the co-teachers of that class interact with the students and each other, he watched them with special interest because those two teachers were his, soon to be, grandson-in-law's parents. Jubilee and Logan showed the kids how to use their individual powers and abilities to defend themselves and each other. Jubilee explained to the Senator that this was just the start of their training in using those powers, just basics to more help them control their powers, the real training in defensive use of their powers would come in their teens at the Academy.
When they sat down for supper, and Tara's birthday party, everyone sat around the big dinning room table, even the babies: whose high chairs were pulled up next to their respective parents. All of Tara and Remy's kids, except for the missing Richard was there. In fact the table was quite crowded with almost everyone associated with Tara in the years since she had joined the X-Men, friends and family.
Tara did miss her foster mother too even though almost no one else did. Of course Professor Xavier is missing too, Tara thought, ah know that's still on everyone's mind. And Magnus not being here too. Renee told me today that she still misses her godfather. She had told Magnus last June, that she and Lotan were thinking about getting married. He seemed happy, and congratulated her, and told her he definitely would be there for her wedding. He gave her a necklace that had two interlocking rings hanging from it, he dismissed it as hopelessly sentimental, but hoped she liked it. Renee had loved it, and now it was even more precious to her, since it was the last gift he had given her. She told me she was going to wear it with her wedding dress. Ah told her that ah thought was an appropriate gesture. Ah just hope it doesn't make her sad when she puts it on.
March came, and with it Renee's and Lotan's wedding. Professor Xavier was still missing as the wedding day approached. So the plans went on without him. Renee and Lotan did not plan as dramatically large a wedding as her parents had. Just a fairly typical wedding from the region of the country her parents had come from, but a still a big one for the area of the United States that she had grown up in. She would have a matron of honor, four bridesmaids, and a flower girl. Like her mother though, she decided to have a traditional ceremony, but in the day rather the than evening. She also chose a reproduction of an old style for her wedding dress, but chose a different time period. The dress style was worn, roughly, one hundred years before she was born.
Tara told her daughter not to get a veil, that she and Remy would take care of it; they wanted to do something special for her with that. Now, it was the wedding day. Tara was helping her daughter with last minute adjustments on the wedding dress, and Remy still hadn't given her the veil.
"Where is he with that veil, he said he have it ready this morning, so ah could give it to yah, it's only five minutes before he has tah walk you down the aisle, and we don't have it yet." Tara says with worried irritation.
"Here it is, chere. Mon fille, dis is the type of cap dat my female ancestors way back, when they were still in Brittany, wore on special occasions." The cap was white lace and cloth and looked something like a yarmulke, the caps that Jewish men wore. But this cap was embroidered on the front, and had two ribbons, that when worn would fall over the ears, in the back a lace veil was sewn to it, which Renee recognized as the veil from her mother's wedding hat. "Since your mama didn't know the way to embroidery dis, I did dat, and made the cap too, but your mama, she sew dis veil onto it."
Renee felt herself start to cry, "Maman, Papa, thank you it's beautiful!" Then she hugged both her parents tight.
"So are you ma petite." Renee could tell even her father was close to crying.
Tara puts the cap carefully on her daughter's head. Remy insisted on staying to help too, but he does more talking than helping. While there, he tells her a little more about the cap, how he had sewn it and embroidered it, and offered to teach her how to do it. Renee told her father that she'd really like to learn how to do it, so she could pass on the tradition to the next generation of the family.
Finally in April Professor Xavier returns, alone. Someone had found him a wheel chair, in the camp, and he had wheeled himself all the way from California, near the Mexican border, nearly back to Westchester County. He had no money with him, but people had given him food and shelter sometimes. He had luckily got a ride over most of the desert. After traveling over most of the rest of the country in the wheel chair, he got a ride in Philadelphia to just north of New York City. For some reason no one would give him money, so that he could call the school, even when he assured them that he would reimburse them. So after a few times he decided to stop asking until he got to New York State. He had tried telepathic calls too, but apparently his exhaustion made the calls too weak for anyone to pick up, until he was just twenty miles from the X- mansion. Jean picked up that telepathic call, and immediately jumped in a car and picked him up. He told them of his harrowing trip back, and told them he had not seen anyone he knew at that camp, except early on he had seen Carol Danvers, but apparently, they soon sent her elsewhere, because he could tell she was no longer in that camp, after the first two weeks.
"Wonder if she got sent t' eighteen?" Remy speculates. "They kept us all separated dere, Louis, he only know I'm dere because one time, they hurting him in the same room at same time as me." This was the most Remy had ever said about what was done to him in eighteen. Up till now most of the details they had about eighteen had come from Louis, who had been more willing to talk about it.
Remy had so far refused to talk about it, even to Tara. Even though he still had nightmares almost every night, and Tara would be awakened by his thrashing and hoarse yells.
She would hold him, until he woke up gasping, sitting bolt upright. She would gently speak to him, until he'd calm down, then she'd kiss him and ask him to talk about it, he would always refuse though; all he'd say is that they hurt him bad. So when Remy spontaneously revealed a little of what he went through, she took his arm and walked outside and demanded he tell her everything. She reminded him that one of the things he promised when they were married is that he'd keep nothing from her.
This finally worked and haltingly he told her of his ordeal, at least what he wasn't in too much pain to remember. "First dey take all of us t' Riker's Island. Renee told you 'bout dat. She saw me dere, I was able to talk to her for a few minutes, I told her t' take care of de other kids, and find the way back to you when she could, I knew dey'd be doin' somet'ing to me, an' so I said my goodbye t' her dat way, cause I t'ought I'd not be makin' it back.
Den they separate us for different camps. Me, dey take away by myself, rough me up some on de way t' the camp. Den when I get there dey t'row me into a isolation cell. Every day dey get me out and torture me, 'lectric shock, chemical burns, broken bones... evert'ing. They don' even ask me anyt'ing most de time, just torture, and laugh at me screamin'..." Remy is shaking as he tells her this, then they cry together and she holds him tight.
After this Remy's nightmares decreased in number and intensity, but Tara had a few herself. Remy tells her that this was the reason he had not told her about what happened, he didn't want her to have nightmares about it too.
July came, by now most feel that Galen's husband must have died; even Senator Kelly's contacts in government information agencies are not able to locate him.
Luna had her baby in mid August. A boy named Magnus, for the great grandfather who'd never see him. The baby is a mutant.
Carol Danvers shows up at the baby shower held at the X-mansion. Tara feels uncomfortable and doesn't know what to say, so she says nothing, and leaves early. Carol, however, seems to be forgiving, and curious. After Tara leaves Carol asks about her.
Tara returned home still agitated. Remy noticed this and that night as they were getting ready for bed, asked what happened at the baby shower to get her stirred up.
"Oh Remy, Carol Danvers was there, what could ah say, ah felt so bad ah had tah leave." She says with obvious upset in her voice.
"Chere, dat was what, around twenty five or more years ago, an' she got everyt'ing back didn't she?"
"Well not her powers from me, but she didn't need them, when she went out in space with the X-Men, before ah joined, somebody messed around with her genes and she turned even more powerful and she took the new codename Binary."
"Uh huh, she's probably forgotten you."
"But has she forgiven me? How could she when ah still feel shame about it? Ah almost killed her..."
They hear a knock at the front door. Jubilee answers it, then calls upstairs, "Somebody wants to talk to you, Rogue."
When Jubilee uses the old codename, Tara knows who it is,"Remy, it's Carol, she's here."
"I'll go down wit' you, chere." He said as Tara put on a robe over her nightgown, and Remy put on some clothes.
Tara clutched Remy's hand as they walked into the living room.
"Hello Rogue, or it's what now..."
"Tara LeBeau, this is mah husband Remy."
"Hello."
Remy just nods and sits down on the sofa, pulling Tara down beside him, and putting his arm around her protectively.
"Tara, I've had more than twenty years to think about that incident, and I'm sure you have too..." Carol starts.
"Carol ah'm so sorry for what ah did, it was the most horrible thing a person could do, ah know that's not enough, no apology would be enough, for you tah be able tah forgive me..." Tara interrupts, letting the words all spill out in a rush.
"But Tara, I did forgive you, can you believe I had actually forgotten about you, until I was in the camps. When I saw Charles, I remembered you. I realized I had no deep anger towards you anymore; you were probably just a confused kid who got caught up by a terrible role model. A shame for both of us Charles didn't find you first, I wonder why he didn't, what with having that Cerebro. You ever found out why?"
"No, ah never asked him. Sometimes, ah don't know why, he doesn't follow the lead right away, ah guess that's what happened with Remy too."
"I wouldn't have left back then chere, if he had come back then; I had a family and friends that I cared about, and I believed they cared about me."
"Not me, ah would have left with the X-Men gladly, anybody who was a mutant too, and seemed tah care for me, that's what happened with Mystique."
"That woman used you." Carol said with a quiet venom, stating without actually saying it, there was no forgiveness for Mystique in her heart. Tara couldn't really blame Carol, she was surprised that Carol had been able to forgive her. "Yeah she did, but in some strange way she loved me too." Tara said. "This is not to excuse her, ah still feel some bitterness about her using me, but what ah did to you was, at least partly, my own decision, even though it was the decision of a messed up sixteen-year old."
Just one more question, I heard you had a bunch of kids, just how many did you have?"
"Yeah, actually we have ten counting mah stepson Andrew, Remy's son from an earlier partnership." When Tara says, "partnership" she smirks and looks at Remy. She had deliberately used the word Remy had used, years ago, to describe his relationship with Helene. Remy's mouth twitches into a smile at her teasing.
"Better you than me," Carol laughs, then tells them good night.
In September Tara received a mysterious gift in the mail. It was postmarked Bavaria. Inside the box was tiny sapphire raven. Tara knew, this was a message from her foster mother, Mystique, to tell Tara she was alive.