This story features the X-Men and other related characters, which are copyrighted by Marvel Entertainment/Marvel Comics Group and are used without permission. The use of these characters in this story is not intended to infringe on that copyright. No profit is being made on this work, it's written solely for entertainment purposes. This work is copyright of me and may not be used for commercial purposes.
It's All In Your Head: Part Twenty One
by sevenall
She saw, alright.
"What have you done to him?!" she cried.
Warren hunched on the edge of his bed. His face had become gaunt, the hawk's nose more beaklike than ever. A blindfold covered his eyes and his wings had been secured and lay flattened against his back. The blond hair was straggly, unkempt, like his fingernails. Warren, the compulsive dandy, who couldn't bear a crooked button or a loose thread. Warren of the exquisite taste, who rather went without than settled for a lesser year, an inferior quality or a love imperfect.
"Betsy...," Hank pleaded with her.
Elizabeth was already at Warren's side, untying the silk blindfold with utmost care, but the wing harness was locked too tight for her to open.
"It's for his own protection, Betsy. "
"You goddamn insensitive morons...why?" she raged at him.
"Look at him, Betsy," Hank begged. "Just look at him."
Although the blindfold had been removed, Warren's eyes remained closed. His facial muscles were slack and devoid of muscle tone. Elizabeth noticed, for the first time, the bars outside the windows.
"Warren," she said, speaking slowly and pronouncing every syllable carefully. "It's me. You're safe."
"He came back a month ago, more bird than human," Hank said softly. "He cannot speak and appears not to understand what we're saying. No one knows where he has been or what it was that pushed him over the edge. We think he has been flying with the big birds for some time now, because he gets agitated by flights of birds. At first we kept him in the attic, but he would try to fly out through the windows as the birds called, and so we put him here. At least he can't hurt himself here."
"Hank?"
"Yes?"
"Get the hell out of here."
He did, with a last sorrowful glance at her, as he departed. Elizabeth sank down on the bed, as her blood pressure threatened to abandon her completely. Two righteous rages in less than two hours were at least one too many for her.
"Come on, Warren," she said, cuffing his cheek lightly. "Don't fool around with me. You know I won't have it."
Not even a twitch. She changed track.
"I hope you're in there somewhere, Warren. Hell, I know you are, so I'm not letting you get away with this...act. You need a good, solid whack on the head and the minute you're back to your human self, I'll give you one. Or maybe not."
Humour died. She sighed. She had played this conversation in her head a million times, picturing Warren as either penitent or fiercely angry or anything in between, but never as catatonic. The lines and inflections she had prepared were useless. She turned his face to hers with gentle force.
"What a friend would do," she mused, "is to stay with you. Talk to you. Crack the shell of this illusion you live in. And although we didn't part as friends, I always hoped we could be, one day. We have so much in common, Warren. We know each other so well. If anyone could help you, odds are that I'd be the one."
She tried to interpret the flicker in the wild animal eyes as recognition. Nope. Just a trick of the light.
"I suppose you can see where this is going."
Her fingers traced his cheekbone, a familiar gesture of affection, before she remembered that she had no right to touch him that way anymore. She removed her hand.
"I'm leaving the X-Men, Warren. I'm going home. Well, to Muir. Moira doesn't mind me staying there, sassenach lassie that I am, and I think it will help Brian a lot to have me close. From what I understand, he hasn't been taking my medical news well. No more than I did."
Hank and Bishop had taken turns to update her on all things X, to distract her from the tests Hank was running, and though their accounts were restrained to the point of censure, it was clear that Brian had started drinking again, that Meggan was quite literally beside herself and that Kitty was furious with them both as well as with Logan, Elizabeth herself and anyone unlucky enough to cross her in the slightest way. There were a lot of things to set right. Better start now.
"So you see, I can't be the kind of friend you need. I'm sorry, Warren, I really am. But since the diagnosis, my world has grown so very small, and I with it. What strength I have I must use for myself. I can't take up another burden, even when it's yours."
She hadn't known the truth could hurt so much. Each word felt like a stab into her own heart. Months ago she would have justified her actions by Warren's responses and counteraccusations. Not now.
"Goodbye, Warren," she said, running her hand lightly over the wings, cold and metallic to the touch. "I'll see you otherside."
And then there was truly nothing more to say.