The Lost Sheep

Posted on Fri Jul 12th, 2024 @ 4:58pm by Jean Grey & Pietro Maximoff
Edited on on Sat Sep 7th, 2024 @ 8:06pm

1,099 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Episode 5: Days of Fortune Past
Location: Baxter Building
Timeline: October 6, 1990

“Most of the condos are still available, you can take your pick.” Jean remained hospitable as she guided Quicksilver away from the conference room and down the hallway to the living spaces, but her telepathy was subversively busy reaching out and collecting whatever information she could gather. Pietro’s sudden departure from the Brotherhood created pause and concern in both her and Scott. The idea that his turncoat behavior was disingenuous had crossed both their minds. Not that Quicksilver wasn’t prone to random acts of kindness, his empathy occasionally went against Magneto’s wishes.

But Jean found nothing but honesty inside of Pietro. He had a disgust for Magneto and his lack of motivation for finding their family. Quicksilver was at his wits end with the Brotherhood and he couldn’t deny how successful the X-Men had been. Iceman, Beast, and now Jean—all of them gone and then returned.

“Yeah, thanks, let me take a look,” Pietro awkwardly replied. To suddenly be living with former X-Men, it was a surreal and uncomfortable situation. He had been conditioned to think less of them, and yet they had accomplished so much more, at least in some areas.

A blur of blue and silver moved past Jean as each door to the available condos was opened and then shut again in the blink of an eye.

“I’ll, ah, I‘ll take the one on the end.” Pietro had already known that was the best location for him. It had access to the most exits, making it easier to run when needed.

“Great. Let’s head into my office and I’ll give you the keys.” Jean directed him to follow her back to the office space. She crouched down in front of a floor safe and began to enter in a combination. “You want to ask me something, don’t you?”

“Yeah… I do.” He became uneasy from her question. Pietro had been told that telepaths were untrustworthy and manipulative, that they would steal and exploit your thoughts for their personal gain. To have one just come out and address what was milling in his mind, it was unnerving.

“Go ahead,” Jean said, encouraging him to continue. “You can ask me anything, and I’ll do my best to answer.”

“How did you do it?” Pietro found himself asking without thinking. That gnawing need to know taking over. “We were told all of you were gone and now you’re back. How?”

“By doing what the X-Men do best,” Jean answered simply as she sorted through the key cards of the available condos. “We defended and protected people. We investigate all leads and avenues where people and mutants are being exploited. When called to action, we step up and do the right thing.”

Jean found the keys and shut the safe before standing up and handing them to Pietro. “At least that’s the answer from my head. The answer from my heart says it’s love. Our love for humanity and our love for one another guides us home, back to what matters most, our family.”

Pietro’s eyes narrowed at her response, it sounded like a lot of flowery bullshit. But the way Jean looked at him when she spoke, he couldn’t help but feel her sincerity. He wanted to scoff at her remarks, to roll his eyes and sneer at how stupid it sounded but there was a part of Pietro that also wanted to believe that what she said was true. Deep inside, he too wanted to believe that love wasn't a weakness, that it mattered.

“Wanda isn’t just my twin, she’s my best friend and my biggest advocate.” He knew he shouldn't talk like this but he so desperately wanted to. Something about Jean made it easy to open up to her. “When we were kids, our life was pretty rough. We were constantly on the move and we faced a lot of insecurities. Sometimes we went days without food, or nights without a place to sleep. The only thing that remained constant in our lives was each other. When I wanted to give up, she was my reason to keep going.”

Pietro let out a long tension-filled sigh. Despite his cynicism, it felt good to say these things out loud and to not be shamed for it. “I miss her. I miss her smile and her laugh, I miss her supportive words and our long conversations. I miss having someone in my corner who will always fight for me.”

Jean reached out and placed a comforting hand on Pietro’s shoulder. “We’ll find Wanda and Lorna too. Not just because it’s the right thing to do but also because I owe you.”

Quicksilver looked at her with renewed skepticism. Favors and indebtedness were weapons for the Brotherhood.

“In Santo Marco, when you diffused that bomb. You saved all of us. Surviving that event, it pushed me forward towards taking the next big step in my life. So for more reasons than you know, I’m grateful to you.”

“So this is all some sort of kind gesture butterfly effect?” Pietro said in mocking irreverence.

“Maybe?” Jean said with a shrug and a smirk. “Lorna was banished to a dimension known as Limbo. Alternate dimensions are unknown to us but we’re still trying. There seems to be few leads for Wanda. So I think we should go back to basics. Sometimes personal leads are the most fruitful. Is there anyone Wanda was conversing with or visiting before she disappeared?”

Pietro huffed at that question and Jean immediately picked up on the mental image of a blue skinned mutant with glowing yellow eyes, three-fingered, and a tail. “No, no one that matters.”

“Quicksilver...” Jean chided him and Pietro mentally cursed her telepathy.

“He wasn’t anyone in particular. Someone Wanda was seeing before we left for the Brotherhood. They called it off just before we departed, but after all those years, they never stopped writing to one another.” Pietro tried to downplay the whole situation, trying to make it seem like it hadn’t been that big of a deal, but Jean’s telepathy told her otherwise. Wanda had been in love with this man and then she had been forced to make a choice between her family and him.

“Anything helps.” Jean encouraged him to continue even though the name was already in his mind. “Sometimes little things can turn into big things, let us try for Wanda’s sake.”

“Fine,” Pietro conceded. “His name is Kurt Wagner.”

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