Simon, Billy and Jean-Paul Backdated 9/3

[ax_wiccan]

Simon decides to help Billy figure out what is going on with him and Tommy. Unfortunately, it takes a turn he does not like.



Billy stood outside of room 105 and hoped that the kid called Simon was actually in here, otherwise he would have no clue where to find him. He knocked twice and waited for about a second for an answer before calling out. "Hello? Umm...Simon Tam wouldn't happen to be in, would he?"

Wouldn't happen to be in? What the hell?

Simon glanced up from his tablet with a slight frown. No one came to visit him in his room - let alone a voice he didn't recognize. Clearly, the teen on the other side of the door didn't know him either, judging by the use of his full name. Rising, he crossed to the door with tablet in hand, opening it with a wary, uncertain look. What he saw on the other side only made the crease on his forehead deepen. The boy looked like Tommy Shepherd. And yet he most certainly didn't, given the hair and eyes. "I'm Simon."

Billy looked up when the door was answered and tried to offer an encouraging smile, when in reality it probably came off as constipated or nervous. He held out his hand for the other to shake, hoping this guy wouldn't just turn him away. "Hey, um, my name is Billy. I'm new here. I was actually told you might be able to help me with something?"

Simon didn't take the hand. Instead, he frowned deeper. "You aren't Tommy Shepherd."

Billy held his handout a little longer, pulling it back awkwardly when it was obvious the other wasn't going to shake it. He gave a soft weird laugh at Simon's statement and rubbed at the back of his neck. "Ahhhh, yeah. I am not. That's actually kind of what I wanted to ask you about. Well, not about me not being Tommy, but about Tommy and me...looking very much alike?"

"Why would you want to ask me about that?" Simon paled slightly, glancing down the hall uncertainly.

He noticed the way Simon seemed to grow uneasy at his question and Billy was immediately confused and wanted to abort this mission.

But he had to do this. "Uhh Warren told me you were studying genetics? He thought you might be able to help me figure that out."

Simon at first breathed a sigh of relief, then mentally kicked Warren. With a slight nod, he opened the door wider to allow Billy inside. "We can talk here first, but we may need to go down to the lab."

Billy nodded quickly, willing to go anywhere if this guy could help him. He moved in past Simon and waited for the other to shut the door before taking a deep breath to get his story straight. "So...I think Tommy is my twin, but that can't be possible since we have completely different parents."

Simon eyed him thoughtfully, then brought two desk chairs out for the two of them to sit across from each other. "You do look remarkably similar. What makes you think you're twins?"

"Everything?" Billy exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air cause really all of this made no sense and he really hoped a bonafide scientist like Simon wasn't just going to laugh at him. "We look exactly alike. He told me that before his powers came to him, his hair and eyes had been brown like mine. We have the same birthday, we are both mutants and I don't know."

He paused as he thought about the last one. "I just feel like something is different with him."

"And what are your powers?" Simon asked, looking Billy over curiously. Clearly, he was new to the school, but he'd seen the post on the forums. Obviously, something strange was going on.

"Oh, well, I have electrokinesis mainly. I can fly a little, still working on that though and I guess I can use magic according to some, but I have yet to be able to really work it."

"What kind of magic?" Simon asked quietly. And god, was he really asking that now?

"It's..." Billy hated how little information he had to go on. "So, the only thing I've noticed is when I want or need something badly enough, something happens where that want is granted. It doesn't happen often, it's only happened I think a total for three times."

Simon frowned. "And your last wish brought you to me, I am guessing."

"No, I told you. Warren told me that-" Billy frowned at that. Had everything leading him to Simon been his powers? If so it took a very convoluted route compared to the other times it had worked, but maybe. "It might have? Geeze, this is so messed up."

Simon closed his eyes, then leaned forward to pinch the bridge of his nose, as he muttered, "I swear to all that is worshipped, the universe is trying to hit me over the back of the head with this message."

"What message?" Billy asked quietly, not wanting to be too loud since Simon looked not the happiest at the moment.

Finally looking up, Simon sighed. "Being open with who I am here - with my power. Because my power is probably the only thing here that could give you the answers you're looking for."

"You have powers?" He had thought Simon had just been here to study mutants since he was a geneticist, but after googling the guy maybe he was some sort of crazy prodigy due to the gene?

"Can I ask, what they are?"

"It. Singular. And yes, if I'm going to use it on you, then you should know - but I'm trying to keep it a secret, for a lot of reasons, so please, keep it to yourself once we are done here," Simon told him.

"Of course. Scouts honor and all that. I promise I won't tell a soul." Billy agreed, knowing the importance of keeping people's business to himself.

Simon sighed. Right. "Look, when I touch other people - other organisms, rather, I can scan their biological makeup. Down to the DNA. I can know a mutant if I touch one, and I can tell if you are like Tommy if I touch you, then him. I'll be able to tell how you are related, at the very least."

"Whoa. That sounds complex, but incredible. How long have you been able to do it?" Billy asked, shifting over towards one of the desk chairs to sit.

"Almost a year. And no, I didn't take shortcuts with my research results. That came before," Simon told him defensively.

Billy raised his hands to show he meant no harm. "I wasn't even thinking that, dude. Don't worry."

"Sorry," Simon shrugged slightly. "I've been keeping this secret pretty close to my chest. But you're right. You need to know."

"It's fine. No worries." Billy couldn't imagine keeping a mutant power secret for that long and he offered a small smile. "Luckily, you're in one of the best places for mutants right now, so that's a good thing. We're around others like us."

Simon gave him a wry look. "You just got here. Don't give me the tag line."

"Wow." Billy raised an eyebrow, leaning back in his chair. "Just trying to make you feel better, next time I'll just try the silent approach."

"I-I'm sorry. It's been a rough couple of weeks," Simon sighed. Then he held out a hand. "Are you ready? I'll get a read on you, then we can go talk to Shepherd."

Billy bit his lip as he looked at the hand Simon held out, now that he had come this far he was actually nervous about what they might find out. He quickly pushed those thoughts out of his head and stood up.

"Yeah. Let's do this." He placed his hand in Simon's and held his breath.

Then Simon's eyes, and world, went white.

After almost a year, he had a good handle on his power. For the most part, anyway. Usually, he touched a person, and the knowledge just, came to him. Sometimes as visions, but usually just as...input. He'd started learning how to organize that input in his mind, because sometimes it was just too much, from all of the systems, to the organs, to tissues, cells, and elements. Often, he started responding to this with anxiety or migraines or disorientation at first. So, he'd begun building what some thought of as a memory palace. Simon's, of course, was a hospital. Every room and every path within the hospital corresponded to the information he received from other individuals, a little like files on a computer. The cardiovascular system was filed in the Cardiology wing. The air was formed of a certain percentage of oxygen. DNA was located in an elaborate sculpture in the lobby.

So. He'd been ready to enter his memory palace and begin cataloguing Billy's information when he blew right past systems and organs and cells and DNA to visions and connections the arc of a family tree that wound around itself in circular glyphs, and spoke a story that shattered what little he'd begun to structure of his mental landscape. The palace just...exploded, filling his mind with more information than he thought could ever come from a single person. And indeed, it didn't. It came from half a dozen. And not just that. It came from magic, and time-travel, and souls, and everything Simon never believed in.

He gripped Billy's hand with almost bone-crushing intensity for six seconds, his eyes devoid of color, then suddenly went limp and unconscious, slumping sideways to the floor of the room.

Billy yelped at the sudden tight grip on his hand was about to tell the guy to lighten up a bit when suddenly Simon fell sideways to the floor with a dull thud. Billy's mind went immediately into panic mode as he quickly knelt beside Simon and rolled him onto his back.

"Shit!" He mentally apologized as he pressed his fingers to Simon's pulse point and could breathe again when he felt a soft pulse. He needed to get help and he had just scrambled up when he heard the door to the room start to open.

Jean-Paul took one step inside the room and stopped dead in his tracks. He was at Simon's side in the next instant, feeling for a pulse and breath.

"What the hell happened?"

"He-" Billy froze as he tried to think of how to explain that, he had promised not to tell Simon's secret, but if he lied then something awful could happen to him.

Fuck, Simon. I'm sorry.

"He touched me. I-It's his power, he read my DNA."

"I know his power... it's never done anything like this before." Fuck, questions later. Simon did not look good right now. "I'm taking him down to the medlab, all right? Meet us down there."

A moment later, they were gone.

Billy took in a shaky breath and on unsteady legs took off after them at a dead sprint. When he arrived at medical he was gasping, able to get the words 'Simon' and 'unconscious' out before he was pointed towards the room.

He quickly moved towards the instructed room and opened the door, scared of what he would find.

Inside the room, Sharon had just finished having Jean-Paul get Simon situated in a bed and was administering something from a syringe. "He's showing similar symptoms to a concussion, but this isn't something they tell you how to do in nursing school," she told the boys tightly.

But Simon's other hand moved a second later, flailing the vital signs monitor on his finger uncertainly. "Oh god," he coughed softly, keeping his eyes closed. "Turn off the lights."

Not even a second later, Jean-Paul blurred, the lights clicked off, then Jean-Paul was at Simon's bedside again.

"You still with us, Tam? You're not going to get out of fencing lessons that easy, just so you know."

"Oh god. He's awake." Billy thought he might puke from relief, but he kept it together enough to move towards the foot of the bed. He was too scared to even touch the bed they had Simon on and just stared at the boy. "Simon...I'm so sorry."

Sharon frowned. "I'm going to get some migraine medication. Boys, you should-"

"No, I need to say this," Simon breathed out, managing to peel his eyes open again - which were thankfully back to their normal coloration. "Before I forget. Billy - do you want Beaubier to hear?"

Billy quickly glanced over at Jean-Paul before gulping and nodding. "It's fine. Whatever is up with me, I don't care if he knows."

Simon pulled a hand over his eyes. "This is going to sound crazy, because it is, but whatever you just did to me - whatever I just saw - it's the truth. You imprinted your magic on me - wished me to see the answers you needed. So, I saw a lot more than DNA and hormones, and I might pass out again after this and just sleep for four days, so someone warn my professors."

He took a slow breath. "Right now, there exist a pair of teenage twin mutants, named Wanda and Pietro. One who's a speedster, with hair like Shepherd's."

Jean-Paul jolted slightly.

"Wait... you saw those two jerks because you touched Billy? I thought you just read DNA and molecules and stuff."

"T-Tommy mentioned them! He said the guy looked like him, looks and powers both." He shifted closer, next to Jean-Paul. "Okay. Yes, I know of them."

Simon waved at Jean-Paul like 'I don't even know', but nodded slightly to Billy, then closed his eyes again. "They're both the children of a very powerful mutant. In the future, Wanda...will become pregnant with twin boys." He reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Billy...and Tommy."

Billy jerked back away from the bed, his entire body felt numb and he tried hard to process this. He would almost ask what story Simon was trying to weave, but he knew the guy was telling the truth. He had seen it in Billy's DNA so it had to be true in some weird way.

"I-I-What?" He ran his hand through his hair and tried to figure out exactly what to do with that information. He needed to tell Tommy...but how without letting Simon's secret out. "Damn it."

"Simon." Jean-Paul was frowning, but somehow not incredulous. "You're telling us that Billy and Tommy are time travelers? I just want to be sure I'm hearing this right."

"No." Simon cringed, both in pain, and at the thought of the words that were leaving his lips. "I'm saying that their souls were reincarnated in the past, through some...sinister magic." He took one breath then growled. "I know! I know how it sounds. I would be the last one to ever believe any of this - but it's the truth, I've seen it, and I wish I hadn't."

"Reincarnated time traveling?" Billy struggled to really grasp all of that, trying to place someone else as his parents besides the ones that raised him and it just didn't fit. He moved over to the small plastic chair that was left at the side of the bed and sat down heavily in it, putting his head in his hands for a long moment.

Jean-Paul glanced from one to the other. His roommate's sense of the universe was crumbling around him, and the new kid, who seemed nice enough, was having an understandable identity crisis. But at least Billy could stand to be touched.

Jean-Paul gave Simon's shoulder a brief squeeze, then went to go sit beside Billy.

"So, I guess the question is, are you guys going to tell Tommy?"

"If you think he should know," Simon looked over at Billy, starting to slide down into the pillows, "Then you should tell him." God, his secret was starting to unravel so fast. "But he needs to understand that the knowledge of my power can't leave this school."

"Tommy should know. It's his life here too, not just mine." Billy paused there to rub at his face a little tiredly. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to let your secret spread like wildfire. I'll tell him, but I'm going to make sure he doesn't tell anyone."

Billy gave Simon a serious look. "He might be my brother, but that doesn't mean I won't electrocute him if he breathes a word of it to someone."

Simon nodded, sighing a little in relief. But he still looked Billy in the eye when he asked, "What about the rest of your family?"

"Which rest?" Billy muttered, honestly not sure which ones Simon was talking about now. "If you mean my actual parents, in the here and now, then I don't really want to tell them right now. Maybe someday, but not now. No."

"Let them get used to the idea of his being a mutant first," Jean-Paul agreed.

"I meant...your other family. The scarlet woman," Simon told him wearily. "Wanda."

Billy frowned and shrugged. "I don't know, I mean you said she's only a teenager like us, how's she going to feel when she hears that there are these two twin boys who are, surprise, her reincarnated children from the future."

He sighed, shoulders slumping. "Also, what do you even say to your spirit mom from the future?"

"Not much, in this case," Jean-Paul suggested. "Her and her brother weren't exactly approachable. Keeping them at a distance might be the safest option."

"Probably correct in this instance," Simon agreed, rubbing at a temple. "It is going to be difficult enough telling your...brother."

Billy nodded and decided that this information was only going to be told to Tommy, at least for now. He licked his lips and glanced over at Jean-Paul, offering a weak smile. "Thanks for coming in when you did and thanks for thinking I didn't attack or kill him."

He stood up and moved so that he was closer to the side of Simon's bed. "And thank you, Simon. Again, I'm sorry my DNA knocked you off your block, but I really appreciated it and I'll do everything I can to keep your secret safe."

He made sure when he squeezed Simon's shoulder that it was over the fabric of his shirt.

"It's not something I would like to repeat," Simon agreed. "But at least you have the answers you needed."

"Yeah. Now, just gotta decide what to do with them." He took a deep breath and let it out, shuffling a bit towards the door. "I'm going to go so you can rest. I hope to see you again and this didn't make you want nothing to do with me or Tommy."

He gave a small wave towards Jean-Paul as well and made his way out of the room.

Jean-Paul waved back, then went to sit at the foot of Simon's bed as Billy closed the door behind him. "Not going to die on me, right? I don't want to move that glorified bunk bed of yours out on my own."

"Why are you even here?" Simon grumbled, closing his eyes. "No, I'm not going to die. But you can have the room to yourself tonight."

"I'm here because I found my roommate unconscious on the floor, you ungrateful shit." Jean-Paul shrugged. "And because you have, by your own admission, had your world view twisted into a pretzel."

Simon shuddered softly at the thought, but pushed it aside, looking up at him. "And I need some time alone with that. But...thank you. For being here."

"De rein." Jean-Paul rose to his feet. "You know where to find me if you have nightmares."

And he would, Simon knew, shifting onto his side, his back to the door. He hadn't wanted to say so to Billy, but he was, by far, the most fucked up thing that Simon had ever experienced in his life.

Comments

[ax_magik]

Yana is sulking that she's no longer the most fucked up thing Simon's ever experienced. She'll have to try harder.

(though she kind of wants to high five Billy for knocking Simon on his butt. With magic. :) )

[ax_angel]

Hahaha just when you thought your lives couldn't get weirder, welcome to the Lensherr-Maximoff clan, boyos....