Uncanny X-Men 1943

Chapter 20

Dear Katherine,

Welcome to England. We are very glad to have you with us, and hope you enjoy your stay.

Love Emma, Scott, Rachel, Nathan, Sophie and Celeste Summers

March, 1939

...

//Emma?//

//I know.// Emma responded, before Elizabeth could even ask.

//Should we ask someone?// Elizabeth asked, skipping to what would have been her second question and ignoring the fact that Emma was likely skimming everyone's thoughts.

//Why? It would only look suspicious.//

//We have to tell the others.//

//Not yet. Let's get to Arras and make sure.//

Elizabeth nodded and looked back out the window. They'd caught the morning train from Laon to Amiens, and had been able to connect onto a train to Arras. However, from the passing thoughts of station staff and other passengers, trains were not currently running any further north or west. Betsy could feel a trap closing in on them.

The team sat in a compartment of the fairly empty train travelling to Arras. Soon their luck would run out. It had to. Emma sat opposite her, and Elizabeth prayed that she had one more trick up her sleeve.

Betsy looked out the window across the fields racing by. Thirty years ago, these fields had been a wasteland of mud and trenches and barbed wire. A veritable hell on earth. And but a few days prior, the team had been amongst man's latest incarnation of hell.

Elizabeth swallowed. "My father was killed around here somewhere." Lieutenant-Colonel Sir James Braddock been piloting a Bristol 22 Fighter Plane, and never landed. There was no official grave. Elizabeth imagined that somewhere out amongst these fields was a small cemetery with headstone reading "An Unknown British Officer" below which her father lay.

Warren wrapped his arm around her and Elizabeth allowed herself to lean into him. Logan puffed at one of the few cigarettes he had left. Remy swallowed and seemed to sink even further into the seat. He had hardly a handful of words to Emma since Rogue had left.

Emma didn't move at all.

...

While walking home from school, Rachel and Kitty had decided that that evening once everyone had gone to bed, they would sneak down and speak to Rogue. It was almost impossible to speak to her alone the rest of the time, and Rachel had picked up on Rogue's feelings of loneliness and of being overwhelmed.

Once the girls heard Scott close his bedroom door and go to bed, they donned their dressing gowns and slippers, and grabbed a half-jar of sweets. Christopher Summers, a captain in the merchant navy, may have been generally unreliable, but always sent a hamper full of goodies to his respective child or grandchild for their birthday and at Christmastime. With Christmas just around the corner, the girls decided to share the last of their lemon sherbets with Rogue.

"Rogue," Kitty whispered, knocking on the drawing room door. "Are you awake?"

Rogue opened the door, and in the dark could just make out the figures of the two girls. "What's going on?"

"We just want to talk to you," Rachel said, "If that's all right."

"We brought lemon sherbets," Kitty said, rattling the jar.

"Y'all better come sit down, then," Rogue said.

"Oh, it's lovely and warm in here," Kitty said, sitting down on the couch. There a few embers still smouldering alway in hearth. "Oh, sorry, I'm sitting on your bed," she said to Rogue.