feathers ↣ w. worthington iii

(23) Debt, Star Wars, and Gloom, Oh My!

Lilli smiled weakly and pulled away from Ororo. "Yeah, sure. Come on, I'm gonna be late."

Ororo stared at Lilli for a long second before shaking her head and following Lilli to the assembly room.

-

An hour later, Lilli and Peter had snuck out of the Institute and were well on their way to Kezing's hideout. Peter had been cracking jokes and lightening Lilli's mood, for which she was thankful. She didn't want to feel all doom-and-gloom.

"Just imagine the look on their faces," Peter said, "when we open that cell door. We're gonna be holding this over their head for years."

"'Hey, Lilli, can you do the dishes tonight?' Uh, remember that time I saved your life?" Lilli mimicked Kurt's voice with a laugh.

"'Peter, I'm not doing your chores anymore.' Okay, I can call Kezing and make him take you back," Peter said in a deep voice, pretending to be Warren.

Lilli turned to Peter with wide eyes. "You're right! We won't have to ever do chores again!"

Peter grinned at Lilli. "Just imagine everything we can make them do for us. All cause we have to come save their asses."

Lilli smiled, thinking of all the ways she would hold this over Warren's head if they actually survived. She'd been very pessimistic this morning, but Peter was making her feel more hopeful. Maybe, just maybe, she would actually live.

Hah. What a thought.

"Should we turn invisible now?" Peter asked a few moments later, his cheery voice gone and replaced with a solemn one. Lilli looked up; they were just cresting a hill and coming into view of Rochester. Peter was right— they needed to be on their guard. Lilli nodded, taking hold of his hand, the familiar sensation washing over her. She felt a twang of nostalgia hit her— this may be the last time she ever turns invisible. This mutation of hers had once been a source of self-hatred and isolation— but it had brought her to her best friends and second family. It had put her through hell and made her feel the worst she'd ever felt, but it was simultaneously the best thing that had ever happened to her.

"You alright?" Peter asked, pulling Lilli from her thoughts. She turned to his shimmering body and smiled weakly, nodding her head.

"Yeah. You?"

"Yeah. Tell you what— since you're being so pessimistic, you owe me ten bucks when we get back," Peter said with a grin. Lilli rolled her eyes.

"Bring it on," she replied. Peter laughed, and the two headed into Rochester to their certain doom.

-

"This is it," Peter whispered. They were stood on the sidewalk across from the dark alley that led to Kezing's hideout.

"Yeah. Shit, I hope Cas isn't here," Lilli said, suddenly remembering how he'd told her that he'd known she was there the second she'd crossed through those doors.

Peter turned to her, a questioning look on his face. "He shouldn't be. Why do you think he is?"

Lilli shook her head, staring intently at the alley. "I don't know. We didn't check to see if he was still at the school. I've just got a bad feeling about this."

Peter looked back across the street. He tilted his head, thinking for a second, then shrugged. "Nah. It's twenty bucks now. You pay me an extra five bucks with every ominous comment. And Star Wars reference."

Lilli nodded. She looked over at Peter with a grim look on her face. "Pete. I've been meaning to tell you."

Peter looked over. "What?"

Lilli took a deep breath, closing her eyes. "I've wanted to tell you for a while. But now, since we're about to die—"

"Twenty five."

"—Since we're about to die, I feel like I need to say this. Consider it my deathbed confession." Lilli opened up her eyes and smiled a sad smile. "Peter... I am your father."

Peter smiled sarcastically. "Yeah. Nice one. Very funny. If you wanted me to start calling you Magneto, you could've just asked," he looked back at the alley and then down the street. "That's thirty, now."

"I'll make sure my corpse pays yours," Lilli replied, rolling her eyes as she looked back down the street, waiting for a Kezing truck to arrive.

"Thirty five. Oh, look, our taxi to doom is here!"

Lilli turned to Peter with a look of incredulity. "That's five for you! I'm back down to thirty now."

"Shut up. I was only saying it because it's all black," Peter retorted. Lilli looked back down the street at the shiny black pickup heading their way.

"Yeah, for the aesthetic. Hey— shouldn't Jean have like, mind connected us now?" Lilli asked, remembered suddenly that they'd planned to communicate with Jean.

"Guess we're on our own," Peter said as the pickup drew closer. Lilli frowned.

"They're all dead, I bet."

"Aaaaand we're back up to thirty five. Come on, let's go." Peter started heading across the street. Lilli quickly followed, and they reached the alley at the same time as the pickup. It slowed down for a second, allowing Peter and Lilli to soundlessly pull themselves up and into the bed of it.

Lilli laid down on her back, just like she'd done all those months ago with Warren. Except this time, Warren wasn't laying beside her. He wasn't there to make her feel safe and protected. He wasn't there to hold her, to steady her nerves, to tell her that it would be alright. Instead, he was down in a cellar somewhere, struggling to survive, and in desperate need of her. And even though they had some weird, complicated history, Lilli would be damned if she didn't give her life to try and save his.

Lilli settled into the bed of the truck and watched as the sky disappeared, giving way to a low, dirty ceiling. She felt queasy as the pickup drove further and further into Kezing's stupid underground lair.

Unbeknownst to both Peter and Lilli, Cas was there. He'd left before they had to come do some business for his father, who'd stayed at the Institute. Cas was busy at work when he felt Lilli breach his half-mile barrier. He stepped aside from the other Kezing agents for a moment to tune into Lilli's emotions, to try to dissuade her from coming down. But he couldn't. There was a block.

Cas tried even harder— why couldn't he influence her emotions? He still had that mutation: it was his friend Paul's, and he'd just shook hands with Paul the day before. So he had the mutation, but why wasn't it working?

Cas tried a different tactic. He tried calming her nerves, like he'd done a million times before. He turned the mental dial in his head, and could almost feel her muscles relax as she calmed down. Cas felt confusion wash over him. Why could he only change some of her emotions? He went back to the first one, trying to change her mind and make her too scared to come further down. But he couldn't.

It suddenly hit him why.

She was so fixated on coming down to do Lord knows what that her emotions were impossible to manipulate. She literally couldn't be swayed. Cas internally growled— what the hell was she coming down here for?

Cas shoved it to the back of his mind and returned to the other agents. "Where were we?" He asked, trying to forget about Lilli for the moment. He couldn't arouse any suspicion in the other agents— he didn't want to make them think something was up.

"The prisoners," one of the agents replied. Cas looked at him, frowning. His father hadn't mentioned that.

"What prisoners?"

—————

Wow I'm so so so sorry this update is so late! Online school started for me and I have been completely overwhelmed and so it was hard for me to find time to write:( pls forgive me

Butttttttt I'm back!! What do you think is going to happen next? Is Lilli being too pessimistic? Are the X-Men going to save the school? Is Lilli going to go into debt with Peter? Keep reading to find out!

Once again I'm so sorry this update was so late!! I'll try to make the others quicker :(

serbisa