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ax_mainThe day after the party, Tamara comes to Tommy to complain about Yana - and then they find a much better way to pass the time.
...until Billy shows up, anyway.
Tamara had spent lunch hanging out with Bobby and keeping track of her video views and comments and such, but no matter how she tried to distract herself, she was still totally steamed.
Magik. It was always the blondes, expecting everyone else to just bow down or whatever. Getting in Tamara's face because her smuggled-in date dared to flirt with someone else... Who did she think she was?
And now she was pretty sure she'd scared Bobby, and her wings and shoulders hurt from being so tense, so she was marching down the hall of the boys dorm, laptop and all. She stopped in front of Tommy's door and knocked a few times. If he wasn't here, she'd go try and coerce Simon into giving her a back & wing massage...
Tommy hadn't exactly gotten -- or stayed -- drunk the previous night, and he'd slept okay, but he was still a little off-schedule and kind of dehydrated, so he'd spent the morning watching the comments roll in on Tamara's youtube channel and messing around on his guitar for a while. He was sprawled in his chair, guitar on his lap and Inu-yasha thankfully nowhere to be seen, when a knock sounded at the door. "Who is it?" he called, loudly enough to be heard in the hall.
"Tamara," she called through the door, not exactly amused (well, maybe a little). Superspeed, and he couldn't be bothered to open the door? She continued. Loudly. "Y'know, the girl from last night? The one you--"
She couldn't just open the door like a normal person? Tommy put the guitar down and made his way to the door, opening it halfway through her sentence. "Impressed enough to have you come knocking less than twenty-four hours later?" he finished it for her, his lip curling up in a smirk. He was relatively certain that he could get out of the way fast enough if she started to throw a fireball his way. "Come in, make yourself at home," he added, stepping out of the way and pushing the door to swing it open wider.
The room was still pretty barren; spartan, even, considering that Tommy and Inu-yasha didn't exactly have a whole lot of stuff between them. But there were places to sit, anyway.
"Oh please," Tamara replied, but she was smirking too as she pushed past him. She blinked, kind of surprised by the bare room, but whatever. She took him up on his offer to make herself at home, setting the laptop down on the desk she figured was his (the one next to the bed with the guitar), turning the desk chair around and sliding onto it, chest-to-seatback to accommodate her wings.
Well, at least she was already feeling less pissed off. "So, like the video?" she asked, knowing he'd seen it.
Tommy dropped down to sprawl on his bed, propping himself up on his elbows and his legs hanging off the side by hers. "You know how to make an entrance," he replied, his smile growing. "It was good stuff. Are you getting pushback from people here, or just the usual online mouth-breathers?"
"Ohmygod, crazy people are coming out of the woodwork online," she replied, eyes wide for a moment. "The least crazy ones think my video's a hoax, but nothing like rape and death threats to make a girl's day." She rolled her eyes. She hadn't really expected any less, of course, but still.
"Ugh, gross," Tommy made a face. "When aliens show up to bomb us into oblivion, they need to start with internet comment sections. You're not letting them get to you, are you?" He nudged her foot with his toe.
"Nah, I knew it'd happen when I posted it," she told him. Which was mostly true - she had known it would happen - but seeing things like that actually aimed at her was still... rough. "And almost everyone here has been supportive so far. But if there's one reasonable person or mutant watching for every one of those nutjobs commenting, well, that's worth it. Right?"
"Someone's got to say it. Shen would probably call it something like 'being the voice for the voiceless' or whatever, but honestly I just think it's about time to start getting our own message out. And since the Psychic Professor hasn't given you a long-distance lobotomy for it, I'm willing to bet he's at least a little bit sympathetic."
"Right?" A smile pulled one side of Tamara's lips upwards. See? It wasn't hard to make sense of all this stuff. "I didn't exactly ask permission though, so I bet there's punishment coming. Worth it, though." Without a doubt. "This one crazy chick was giving me shit for it though," she added, frowning as she got to what was really bugging her.
Tommy's glance went to his own computer parked on the desk beside Tamara's, but there wasn't any comment in particular that jumped out in his memory from that description. "What made that one different from the others?" he asked, propping himself up higher on his elbows.
"Um, she delivered her opinion in person, without any provocation?" Internet trolls were one thing, but fellow students were something else. Way more personal. Tamara's frown deepened just thinking about it.
That made him sit up, curling one leg underneath him on the bed. "Someone here?" Mind you, he could see it -- there'd been enough hot takes buzzing around after the protest, even from people who had been there and knew what they were up against for themselves, Gar. "Anyone who was there with us knows exactly why you made that vid, even if they don't want to admit it, and someone who wasn't actually there doesn't know what they're talking about."
He frowned, running through a list of girls he knew at the school who would be willing to and interested in picking a fight with Tamara. It was a short list.
"Yana? That's her name, right?" It was too small a school to not know people, honestly. With more sarcasm, she added, "Going by Magik now, brought a stranger to the party last night...?" She rolled her eyes.
Yeah, that had been one of the names that had come to mind. Tommy groaned and laughed at the same time, shaking his head. "Illyana Rasputin. Yeah, I know her." He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Ignore her," he advised sagely. "She's got a center-of-attention problem. As in, she always has to be it." Like the day they'd been at the goddamned Facility, and she'd chosen barely hours after they'd gotten away to start trying to make him be her social worker.
Tamara was smirking again, and at least partly because Tommy's face was closer to hers like this. "I think she was more upset that her date was flirting with me last night. And I guess he whined about that little shock I gave him, too." Somehow she figured Tommy would find that as amusing as she did.
"Figures he'd be a whiner. He's all talk and no follow-through." Tommy grimaced. "Don't worry about those two. You and I know you made the obviously best choice."
"You think so, huh?" Tamara asked, doing a terrible job of containing her smirk. Yeah, flirting was way more fun than worrying about Yana - and, if Tommy played his cards right, maybe they could have even more fun than flirting. Seriously, what better way to work out some tension?
"Of course I do," he played innocent. "Making that video was a well-thought out response to a difficult situation, infinitely superior to other choices, such as ignoring the media response, or spray painting a giant 'fuck you' across Central Park."
"Yeah, I'm sure that's what you were thinking," Tamara replied, wetting her lips to tell him what she thought he'd really been thinking about.
His eyes dropped to her mouth, the way her pouty lower lip glistened in the light. He couldn't see her body clearly, not with the way she was straddling the chair, but that sent him down other fantastic trains of thought. Like the way she'd felt against him the night before, those lips marking up his skin, her breathy sounds - damn. "Keep doing that and I'm not going to be able to think straight at all."
A pleased smile played at the edges of her mouth, and she bit ever so softly on her lower lip. He was so easy to tease - definitely one of his better traits. "Good - pretty sure I'm done thinking for a while... you?"
She was absolutely doing that thing with her lip on purpose, and Tommy - yeah, he was easy. He kicked out one foot and hooked it around the base of his chair, pulling her a few inches toward him. "I've always been better at reacting, myself."
Face now very close to Tommy's, Tamara leaned in, playing with the space between them for just a second, teasing. "Shut up," she told him, then closed the distance between them, pressing her lips to his eagerly. God, she'd missed kissing.
"Shutting up now." Tommy managed to get out before her lips met his. He parted them for her, teased hers with the tip of his tongue, tasting the slick of her lip gloss. The chair back pushed back against his chest when he leaned in, annoying him with its insistence on being in between them. He kissed her again, bit lightly on the fullness of her bottom lip. "The bed's a ton more comfortable," he offered, murmuring against her mouth.
Tamara grinned against his lips, more than happy with that invitation, then pulled away to stand and push the chair back toward the desk. "Lay back," she instructed, nodding her head toward his pillow as she put one knee on the bed, mischief in her eyes.
She didn't have to repeat that invitation, and Tommy pushed himself back up the bed to make room for her. "So you are always this bossy," he teased her, reaching out to take her hand and pull her after him. Anticipation coiled tight inside, his grin growing.
"Absolutely," Tamara promised with a smirk, climbing onto the bed and then straight onto Tommy without a second's pause, straddling his hips. Thank god she lived in a time when jeans could stretch so nicely... "That a problem?" she asked with faux-sweetness, hands on his chest as she started leaning down.
"Not in the slightest." Especially not when she was leaning over him, her weight on him, the pressure delicious and making his imagination run wild. He ran his hands up her thighs, and raised his head and shoulders so he could capture her mouth with his.
Tamara met him eagerly, wings settling loosely on either side of them. Tommy had good instincts, and she hummed her approval against his mouth, rocking her hips a bit, just to tease him. Encourage him. For now she kept her hands balled in his shirt, just enjoying what he was doing and kissing him thoroughly.
If he could slow time down for someone with him, Tommy would have done it right then and there. He wanted slow, and fast, and everything all at once, Tamara over and around him, her wings blocking out everything bad in the world. He sat up and tugged her tight against him, hands on her hips and his mouth moving down her throat.
Tamara didn't have a plan other than feel fucking good, and that plan was going perfectly so far. Mmm, his lips on her neck felt so good; she let her head fall back and she used a hand in his hair to guide him to the sweetest spots.
She wouldn't go all the way, and was pretty sure she'd find some boundaries when it mattered, but in the meantime? Tommy seemed happy to let her have control and eager to please, so why not enjoy? And make sure he enjoyed as well, she thought, rocking her hips against his.
*****
Inu-yasha felt like shit. He'd slept in the friggin' woods last night after being completely drunk. At a party. In front of people. Kami-sama, had someone been rubbing his ears? He could swear he remembered...
Ugh, and every time he remembered something it just got worse. He was never gonna live this down...
But remembering would basically (thankfully) have to wait until his head wasn't splitting and his stomach wasn't trying to murder him. He was pretty sure if he could just get to his room and his bed, he could sleep until he either died or felt better.
He was so out of it that it wasn't until his hand was on the doorknob that he realized what was happening inside. Ears uncovered - motherfucker, of course they were - he heard Tommy groan...
...and a girl giggle.
His hand snapped back like he'd been burned. NOPE. No fucking way-- Agh, now the smell hit him too - the dragon girl's perfume and makeup and both of their hormones and - oh god, he did not want to go in there right now....
"Chikuso," he swore, leaving the door and heading down the hall - only to gape in horror at another door as a barrage of sex smells (and feathers) hit him there too. He turned bright red and stormed out as fast as he could manage.
*****
Billy had finally gotten over that awful feeling of death with a side of headache and since he and Teddy had kind of sorta patched things up, he was on his way to boast to his brother about remembering everything from last night.
Including Tommy letting Billy hug him.
He got to the Tommy's room, only hesitating for half a second because what if Inuyasha was in there, but oh well! He gripped the door knob with an eager twist and threw the door open with excitement.
"Hey, Los-!"
His sentence lodged in his throat when he was met with a sight he never wanted to see again. Tommy was on the bed completely shirtless with his hands up some girls shirt while she was straddling him and going to town on Tommy's shoulder.
He said the first thing that came to his mind. "You're not ready to be a dad!"
Normally Tommy wouldn't have been caught off-guard enough to miss the door opening, but all his focus was on the rush of sensation, the feel of skin on skin, and he only realized Billy was there when he spoke. Tommy's head snapped up, his hands dropping away (he was going to make Billy pay for this - and pay and pay...)
"What the ever-loving fuck?" was all he managed to say in response.
Tamara didn't flinch, just turned her head to raise an eyebrow at the intruder, resting her head on Tommy's bare shoulder and glaring a bit. "Seconded. Ever tried knocking?"
But it was super weird, seeing Tommy's face on someone else... "Lemme guess - Billy?"
Billy closed his eyes and tried to think of the best response to this while Tommy was still shirtless and the girl was still straddling him. He could just run, running seemed like a fantastic idea, but the girl had asked and he weakly nodded as he opened his eyes again.
"Y-yeah....and you're...the dragon?" He had thought Tommy had been joking.
Tommy groaned, lightly tugging down on the hem of Tamara's shirt to make sure everything was covered that was supposed to be, seeing as how Billy wasn't leaving. "Tamara, meet Billy," he gestured in the general direction of his idiot supposed-brother. "The shallower side of my gene pool. Billy, Tamara."
Still catching her breath from what had been interrupted, Tamara laughed a little.
"That's the dragoness, thanks." She put one more kiss on Tommy's shoulder, then climbed off him (her only real option, since her wings got in the way of sitting back on the bed), smirking as she looked between the two of them as she stood, wings stretching out behind her. "But 'Tamara' works too. Lightning, right?"
Billy watched her move wondering if he should shut the door since Tommy was still technically shirtless, so he did without turning away from them. "Tamara. Okay, I can remember that...lightning?"
His first thought was the car Lightning McQueen, but then he remembered what exactly his powers were and gave a quick nod. "Oh, ah. Yeah. Lightning and others stuff."
Then so he wouldn't be rude. "You?"
Tommy looked back and forth between them in amazement. "We're doing this now? Seriously?" One way or another he figured funtimes were pretty much over. He reached over the side of the bed and grabbed his shirt, hauling it back on over his head.
Tamara pouted at Tommy as he pulled his shirt back on, but also rolled her eyes. "Well, unless he was gonna join us..."
Billy balked at her words and almost visibly recoiled. "Uh first off, no thanks to the Game of Thrones incest game. Also, I'm sure you're very nice, but you're just not my type."
Tommy's "no!" had come at about the same time as Billy's rejection, and Tommy glared at him. "Hard pass on the twincest. And don't take offense, even though he is offensive," he explained quickly to Tamara. If she thought Billy was negging her, Tommy was going to be the one to end up going involuntarily celibate. "When it comes to wings I think Warren floats his boat a lot more."
Tamara frowned at Tommy, smacking his arm. "Ohmygod, you don't just out people like that, what is wrong with you?"
She turned back to Billy, running a hand through her hair to straighten it some. "And both of you relax, I was kidding." Like, 95% kidding. Girl could dream, right? (Not about them together, ick twincest, but two of them and one of her…) Anyway, she held up a hand for Billy to see, letting sparks dance over it. "But nice to meet a fellow taser."
"Ow." Tommy rubbed his arm where she'd whacked it and grimaced, just because. "He's out around here already. I'm not going to pretend like it's some dark shameful secret."
Though Billy was still feeling a little weirded out, he gave a small smile towards Tommy, still unsure as to why Tommy's opinion on that mattered so much. "Ah, yeah. It's okay, I don't mind people knowing or telling. Kind of makes it easier so I don't have to keep having the same conversation every time."
He looked over at Tamara again and watched her sparks, a little envious that she had better control than he did. "Ha...taser or lightning rod, both accurate."
He tucked his hands into his pockets, worried that if he tried to show off his power he'd kill everyone in the room...or maybe just Tommy since Tamara might be shock proof.
"Oh, cool then! Anyone gives you trouble, let me know," Tamara said, smirking at Billy (and ignoring Tommy for the moment, mostly because her body really wanted to go back to what they'd been doing...). This place was gonna be safe for everyone, dammit, even if that meant she had to tase the assholes into reforming. "Do you do fire too?"
"Fire?" Billy asked, moving away from the door now that it seemed like it was more okay for him to be in the room. "I'm not exactly sure what that means?"
Tommy flopped back on the bed, propping himself up on his elbows to watch it all play out. "It means that if you piss her off, they'll be able to see the bonfire from the space station," he replied, deliberately stirring the pot.
Tamara turned to smirk at Tommy - trouble - and reached a wing over to poke him as she looked back at Billy. "Come on, you saw the protest video. Why doesn't anyone recognize me? I was the one lighting things on fire!"
"Oh, like actual fire." Billy had to bite his tongue from asking if she breathed it, but that would be too obvious right? He shook his head. "No, um unfortunately I do not have any fire power. Just electricity and magic."
He wondered if they were together, but wouldn't Tommy have mentioned something before now if they were? Maybe they were just...dating buddies like Warren and JP? Did anyone have a normal relationship here?
Ah, wait. Kitty and Bobby. Phew.
Tamara cranked her electricity up so her hand caught fire. "Yeah, like actual fire," she confirmed, raising an eyebrow at him. "Wait, magic?" She turned to look at Tommy, disbelief on her face as she let the fire go out. "Actual magic?"
Tommy shrugged eloquently. "Don't ask me, ask Harry Potter over there. Inuyasha and Illyana seem to think it's a thing." And Fatale had called it probability warping, but he wasn't about to bring her name into this conversation. "It makes as much sense as anything does in this joint."
"Ha ha. Funny." Billy rolled his eyes. "I wish I were half as competent as Harry Potter when it came to this."
He sighed when he felt his hands start to tingle, holding them against his stomach through his hoodie pockets as his own electricity sent a shock through him. He barely flinched, the numb feeling coming and going quicker than it had when he had met Teddy. "Yeah...Yana took me to Limbo where apparently I can actually function there, but over here all my powers are kind of assholes."
"She what?!" That blonde bit-- no, no she wasn't gonna use that word, even in her head, but ugh, her?! A little lightbulb snapped on in Tamara's head. Magik. She grabbed Tommy's desk chair and sank down onto it, backwards of course. "And Limbo? Limbo's real too?"
She'd taken Billy to Limbo? Tommy's insides went cold for a second and he snagged a couple of minutes for himself to think it through. After all that garbage about death and disaster and keeping it a secret, after giving Tommy rafts of shit because he'd dared to ask for her help when he really needed it, now she was basically giving guided tours. Simon for sure, Kitty obviously, he had a suspicion about Inu-Yasha, and now Tommy's... whatever.
Would Illyana be petty enough to put Billy in danger just because she was pissed at Tommy?
Probably, yeah.
"Watch what you say," Tommy drawled in Billy's direction. "You sure you're allowed to talk about that? After all her going on about how it was the deepest darkest secret ever, so bad that she's been giving me the cold shoulder for weeks for needing an extraction from a freaking torture facility, I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to be bandying that around. Unless it's common knowledge now." In which case Illyana could bite him.
Billy frowned a little when he got the impression that Yana wasn't exactly everyone in this rooms favorite person. He looked over at Tommy with a confused, worried look. "I mean, I asked if I could see it, but she never really said anything about keeping it a secret I don't think."
Billy bit his lip. "What do you mean giving you the cold shoulder for an extraction?"
"Seconded," Tamara said, turning to Tommy again. Her head was spinning - what was even happening right now?? “No, wait— torture facility?!"
Oh, for... Tommy sighed, raking his hand back through his hair. "You remember about a month ago," he directed that at Tamara- "before you got here," he advised Billy in an aside. "There was a whole thing where Xavier, in his infinite wisdom, sent a bunch of us in to a lab facility to do recon. And he said that there had been a student here who'd been held prisoner there."
Tommy turned his arms over to show the inside of his forearms and his elbows, the white and fading pink scars from the picc lines and iv ports still visible, in the right light. "I assumed the gossip network in this place would have made sure everyone knew who that was by now, but I guess not." He shrugged, then held his head high. "Three months, I was a lab rat, Xavier found me after I busted out. And then asked me to go back in. Which is where we ran into Pyro and his friends for the first time.
"It's a long story, or maybe a bunch of short ones, but the point is. We got attacked, I got flash-fried by some girl throwing EM pulses around, and Yana was there as a teleporter to be our extraction. I asked to pull out to get back to the rest of our team, Illyana flung us into Limbo as some kind of halfway point, and then when we got back, proceeded to yell at me for 'ordering' her to do it in the first place. Because apparently even one person knowing about Limbo was the end of the world as we knew it. And she hasn't spoken to me since."
Billy had known about Tommy being in the facility for some time now, but that didn't make it any easier when Tommy brought it up and he thought of his brother in a lab. He didn't even care that Tamara was in the room as he quickly moved over to his brother's bed, leaned over and wrapped his arms around Tommy.
He didn't even care that Tommy's white hair made his nose itch, he just held him tighter and wished that every asshole who had ever touched Tommy would pay.
Tamara was gaping, barely able to process. She'd seen bits and pieces of things, but hadn't heard anything firsthand, so she hadn't really thought... Jesus, but those scars were real enough. "...holy shit."
Tommy was getting hugged. Again. By Billy. Again. He shoved his arm against Billy's shoulder in a halfhearted attempt to get rid of him. "Get off," he grumbled.
"No." Billy muttered and held on to his brother tighter, making sure Tommy couldn't get away. "You're my brother, so you're going to have to deal with comforting hugs and words. Just let me do this."
Tamara was still processing. Apparently Yana was way more powerful than she'd realized, and involved with really dark shit... and Tommy had been part of it too. Experimented on. Christ.
And Limbo - did that mean Hell was real? God, and the devil?
She watched the world's most awkward hug happening on the bed, wings completely deflated and brushing the floor. Usually she'd be making fun of them, but she was too distracted by the way her own head was spinning.
"Seriously." Tommy let it go on a few moments more, then elbowed Billy lightly in the gut. "Enough already. Leggo. There is way too much family togetherness happening here."
Billy finally let go, feeling like he had hugged his brother sufficiently well enough and took a step back. "Okay. So, let me just ask this... she took you to Limbo and then got mad, what happened while you were there?"
He turned to Tamara quickly. "Limbo is like...kind of other dimension? For some reason my magic works better there than it ever has here."
Also he learned his lightning was magic, which was weird.
Tommy frowned at Billy. "Nothing happened. Like I said - she used it as a waystation of some kind. Teleport in, turn around, teleport out. I saw a room, and that's all."
Billy frowned at that, not quite sure why Yana would get so upset at Tommy for just being there when she had taken him to Limbo and they were getting along great.
"Maybe I should ask her..." He wondered aloud. "I mean there has to be a reason. People don't get mad for no reason, even if it's really weird or dumb."
"Leave it alone," Tommy warned him. "She told me exactly why she was mad at me -- because she didn't want anyone knowing about Limbo in the first place. So if she's dropped that line of bullshit and is offering guided tours of the place now, then she can come talk to me when she's ready. Don't get involved."
"Ohmygod, I think she threatened to send me there this morning," Tamara said, realization dawning. She scowled. Threatening to send her to hell over a lousy boy? Her wings bristled angrily behind her as she glared. "That fucking-- Seriously, stay away from her, she's nuts."
"She what?" Billy asked, looking at Tamara in disbelief. Why would Yana threaten that? Specially since she knew it could be a dangerous place based on what she has told him about the place. "Maybe she was just saying it in a way like, 'oh I'm so mad I could kill you' even though you never would?"
"Yeah, her glowing red eyes really said 'don't worry, I'm exaggerating' to me," Tamara replied sarcastically, though her anger was directed at Yana, not Billy. For now. "She came at me out of nowhere, all pissed off because her date flirted with me last night. Which, seriously, what kind of idiot brings an outsider here?!"
Billy bit his lip as he tried to think of a way to explain that. He still didn't really know what had happened at the party between Yana and well...everyone, but he had known that everyone was upset with her choice of date. "Are you talking about Pyro? And what did he do to make everyone so mad?"
The guy who was in the same group as Tommy and his spirit mom, right? Or was that a different thing? Ugh. His head hurt.
"He was one of the guys who attacked us at the Right's facility," Tommy explained, everything about the conversation making him tired to a level he hadn't really thought possible. "It's another group of mutant kids, after the same information we were going for. They torched the place, destroyed everything we might have been able to get our hands on, and bailed." And he really, really didn't want to get into Wanda and Pietro's involvement with Tamara sitting right there. "They're not bad guys, I don't think, just jerks."
"Jerks who now know way more about all of us than they have any right to," Tamara pointed out, a knot forming in her stomach. That was worse than she'd realized. "This is supposed to be a safe place - there are people here who can't be outed, for their own safety. Think that matters to Pyro?" Nevermind that she'd been flirting with him last night. He'd turned out to be a dick, so no benefit of the doubt for him - especially since it turned out he was with some whole other group of mutants who were into arson. "They don't even need to spy if someone's stupid enough to invite them in."
Billy frowned at that, feeling bad for Yana cause he remembered he saying that she actually kind of liked the guy she had brought. "Why would they be interested in outing other mutants? I thought they were pro-mutant or whatever as well...just a little more umm...intense about it?"
He wanted to lean more towards Tommy's view on the brotherhood, that they were okay and just kind of jerks. Jerks he could deal with.
"We don't know, that's the point," Tommy replied, though the answers to that might be a whole lot closer than they were before, assuming Kitty's tracker did what it was supposed to. "But I can think of a few good reasons -- guys like Worthington or Jean-Paul have a lot to lose if they're exposed as mutants, and Warren at least has a shit-load of money to bleed if someone wanted to blackmail him. With photos from a cell phone brought to a party, say.
"Anyway, you asked why people were mad about Pyro being here, and that's why."
Tamara was frowning, agreeing with what Tommy was saying (and glad to hear him saying it). It was just... everything that had felt so safe about this place yesterday was kind of crashing down around her, in about eight different ways, and she was starting to feel shaky even though she was sitting down...
Which she wouldn't have noticed, except her wings freaking trembled.
Fuck. Fear was useless. She channeled it into something angrier. "If that asshole puts any of us in danger, I swear to Christ that the next shock he gets will definitely leave a mark..."
Billy noticed Tamara's wings starting to shake and he felt bad, not because he had done anything, but because people deserved to feel safe where they lived. He swallowed and tugged on his shirt a little. He needed to talk to Yana about all of this since it was apparently a big deal.
He just wondered how he was going to bring it up. So hey, you know that guy you like, yeah, no everyone is afraid of what he's going to do. So maybe not see him? Yeah right.
"I'll talk to her. And Tamara, you're right, this should be a place that everyone can feel safe being so...we should make that happen."
"There's no such thing as a safe place, Billy. Only some that are safer than others for a while." Tommy turned on the bed and dropped his feet down to the floor again, facing Tamara in his chair. Acting purely on impulse, he ran his hand gently down the leading edge of the wing closest to him, feeling the shakes she was trying to keep in check. "But I don't think he's going to be back here any time soon. You saw the kind of reception he was getting. Even Kitty got on his case, and she's not exactly hot-tempered."
Tamara actually blushed a little. Both brothers trying to make her feel better? Man, she must look so dumb right now...
Still, the stroke of her wing felt nice, and she smiled back at Tommy through her flush, wing leaning into the touch of its own volition. "Really? Sorry I missed that." She bit her lip, then said, "But this can be a safe place, if we protect it." She glanced at Billy, since his powers could definitely help with that. "I mean, we've got some serious firepower just in this room, right?"
Billy stared at her for a second before flushing scarlet red. "Oh, no. I'm just- not-no-I can't do much."
All Billy could do was zap people or almost kill them with out meaning to and his stupid magic that never worked when he actually needed it. "Tommy can at least blow things up."
"Shallow end," Tommy reminded her, cocking an eyebrow at Billy with a wry grin. Given the jolt he'd gotten from Billy on day one and the little (tiny) bit he knew about magic and what Pam had described as probability control... Eh. Billy would get tougher. "But you're right, in that we have some crazy talent building up here."
Her wing was responding to his touch and he was faintly weirded out by the reminder that it was as much a part of her as her arm or her shoulder, not just some cosplay-like piece to be worked around. He traced his thumb down the ridge along the edge and wondered what his touch there felt like from the other side. "It shouldn't be a surprise that someone else is trying to get in on that action."
The touch wasn't so different from a caress of her arm, though it still felt nice (very nice). She was still getting used to people touching her wings in non-medical ways, but so far she really liked it.
"Yeah, but there's a difference between wanting a safe place to exist and wanting to turn us into some kind of army," she said, frowning. The idea of being used to fight someone else's battles turned her stomach. "I'm just talking about protecting this place."
Billy thought about that, using their powers to keep the school safe and not just from that Brother hood club, but from anyone who would want to hurt them. "That sounds like it could be a good idea, but it would have to be students who actually knew their powers or someone could get hurt."
Or killed.
"And that would he where all these power-training courses come in, wouldn't it?" Tommy arched an eyebrow at Billy. "You didn't think Xavier had us running exercises three days a week for our own benefit, did you? We're his protection."
"Who cares about him?" Tamara pointed out. "He set this place up and brought us here, but now it's ours too." Usually she would've said something about Tommy's cynicism, but after what she'd just learned, Christ, who could blame him?
"Ugh. All of this is making my head hurt." Billy muttered as he pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. He really would love for Xavier to not be using them as a meat shield, but in some ways, no matter how negative it was, Tommy's ideas could have some grain of truth. Why did everything have to be so convoluted. "I think I'm going to go back to my room and lay on the floor for a bit."
"That," Tommy said firmly, "sounds like an excellent plan. You go do that." And on the other side, he traced his fingers down Tamara's wing, then along the outside seam of her jeans, a caress along the firm strength of her thigh. Fifteen minutes ago the world had made sense, even if only for a little while. Getting back to that place seemed like the best possible way to rescue the rest of the afternoon.
God, Tamara was glad she and Tommy were on the same page. Right now she wanted to go back to the exact 'not thinking' they'd been doing before...
"Nice to meet you, Billy," she said, eyes never leaving Tommy's face. One hand snaked forward to tug at the hem of the shirt he'd put back on. Never one for subtlety, she added, "Do me a favor, lock the door on your way out..."
"Oh my god!" Billy rolled his eyes and threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. "You people."
But he left without further dramatics, not sure how to lock the door from the outside, but slammed it closed hard enough so maybe it would stick and they would be stuck in there.
Tommy rolled his eyes at the closed door, zipping over to lock it before hauling ass back to the bed. "I'd apologize, but I refuse to take responsibility for that just because he's borrowing my face." He held his hand out to Tamara, an offer to get her out of the chair and back to having fun. "Where were we?"
Tamara took his hand, readily getting up from the chair and wrapping her arms around his neck, wings easily mimicking to wrap around them both.
"Reacting instead of thinking, I believe?" she said playfully, angling her head just so, wetting her lips the way he'd noticed before.
"My favourite plan." And he was not too proud to admit that the sound she pulled out of him with that little gesture was embarrassingly close to a whimper. Tommy sank his fingers into her hair and his mouth down on hers again, teasing at her lips with his tongue.
Tamara hummed happily, opening her mouth to his and getting lost in it again. After all the crap she'd just learned, and especially what she'd learned about Tommy, now she felt like they both deserved this. They deserved to feel really, really good.
So she kissed him back up against the bed, already tugging his shirt up his body.
Oh yeah. They were definitely going to have some fun.
...until Billy shows up, anyway.
Tamara had spent lunch hanging out with Bobby and keeping track of her video views and comments and such, but no matter how she tried to distract herself, she was still totally steamed.
Magik. It was always the blondes, expecting everyone else to just bow down or whatever. Getting in Tamara's face because her smuggled-in date dared to flirt with someone else... Who did she think she was?
And now she was pretty sure she'd scared Bobby, and her wings and shoulders hurt from being so tense, so she was marching down the hall of the boys dorm, laptop and all. She stopped in front of Tommy's door and knocked a few times. If he wasn't here, she'd go try and coerce Simon into giving her a back & wing massage...
Tommy hadn't exactly gotten -- or stayed -- drunk the previous night, and he'd slept okay, but he was still a little off-schedule and kind of dehydrated, so he'd spent the morning watching the comments roll in on Tamara's youtube channel and messing around on his guitar for a while. He was sprawled in his chair, guitar on his lap and Inu-yasha thankfully nowhere to be seen, when a knock sounded at the door. "Who is it?" he called, loudly enough to be heard in the hall.
"Tamara," she called through the door, not exactly amused (well, maybe a little). Superspeed, and he couldn't be bothered to open the door? She continued. Loudly. "Y'know, the girl from last night? The one you--"
She couldn't just open the door like a normal person? Tommy put the guitar down and made his way to the door, opening it halfway through her sentence. "Impressed enough to have you come knocking less than twenty-four hours later?" he finished it for her, his lip curling up in a smirk. He was relatively certain that he could get out of the way fast enough if she started to throw a fireball his way. "Come in, make yourself at home," he added, stepping out of the way and pushing the door to swing it open wider.
The room was still pretty barren; spartan, even, considering that Tommy and Inu-yasha didn't exactly have a whole lot of stuff between them. But there were places to sit, anyway.
"Oh please," Tamara replied, but she was smirking too as she pushed past him. She blinked, kind of surprised by the bare room, but whatever. She took him up on his offer to make herself at home, setting the laptop down on the desk she figured was his (the one next to the bed with the guitar), turning the desk chair around and sliding onto it, chest-to-seatback to accommodate her wings.
Well, at least she was already feeling less pissed off. "So, like the video?" she asked, knowing he'd seen it.
Tommy dropped down to sprawl on his bed, propping himself up on his elbows and his legs hanging off the side by hers. "You know how to make an entrance," he replied, his smile growing. "It was good stuff. Are you getting pushback from people here, or just the usual online mouth-breathers?"
"Ohmygod, crazy people are coming out of the woodwork online," she replied, eyes wide for a moment. "The least crazy ones think my video's a hoax, but nothing like rape and death threats to make a girl's day." She rolled her eyes. She hadn't really expected any less, of course, but still.
"Ugh, gross," Tommy made a face. "When aliens show up to bomb us into oblivion, they need to start with internet comment sections. You're not letting them get to you, are you?" He nudged her foot with his toe.
"Nah, I knew it'd happen when I posted it," she told him. Which was mostly true - she had known it would happen - but seeing things like that actually aimed at her was still... rough. "And almost everyone here has been supportive so far. But if there's one reasonable person or mutant watching for every one of those nutjobs commenting, well, that's worth it. Right?"
"Someone's got to say it. Shen would probably call it something like 'being the voice for the voiceless' or whatever, but honestly I just think it's about time to start getting our own message out. And since the Psychic Professor hasn't given you a long-distance lobotomy for it, I'm willing to bet he's at least a little bit sympathetic."
"Right?" A smile pulled one side of Tamara's lips upwards. See? It wasn't hard to make sense of all this stuff. "I didn't exactly ask permission though, so I bet there's punishment coming. Worth it, though." Without a doubt. "This one crazy chick was giving me shit for it though," she added, frowning as she got to what was really bugging her.
Tommy's glance went to his own computer parked on the desk beside Tamara's, but there wasn't any comment in particular that jumped out in his memory from that description. "What made that one different from the others?" he asked, propping himself up higher on his elbows.
"Um, she delivered her opinion in person, without any provocation?" Internet trolls were one thing, but fellow students were something else. Way more personal. Tamara's frown deepened just thinking about it.
That made him sit up, curling one leg underneath him on the bed. "Someone here?" Mind you, he could see it -- there'd been enough hot takes buzzing around after the protest, even from people who had been there and knew what they were up against for themselves, Gar. "Anyone who was there with us knows exactly why you made that vid, even if they don't want to admit it, and someone who wasn't actually there doesn't know what they're talking about."
He frowned, running through a list of girls he knew at the school who would be willing to and interested in picking a fight with Tamara. It was a short list.
"Yana? That's her name, right?" It was too small a school to not know people, honestly. With more sarcasm, she added, "Going by Magik now, brought a stranger to the party last night...?" She rolled her eyes.
Yeah, that had been one of the names that had come to mind. Tommy groaned and laughed at the same time, shaking his head. "Illyana Rasputin. Yeah, I know her." He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Ignore her," he advised sagely. "She's got a center-of-attention problem. As in, she always has to be it." Like the day they'd been at the goddamned Facility, and she'd chosen barely hours after they'd gotten away to start trying to make him be her social worker.
Tamara was smirking again, and at least partly because Tommy's face was closer to hers like this. "I think she was more upset that her date was flirting with me last night. And I guess he whined about that little shock I gave him, too." Somehow she figured Tommy would find that as amusing as she did.
"Figures he'd be a whiner. He's all talk and no follow-through." Tommy grimaced. "Don't worry about those two. You and I know you made the obviously best choice."
"You think so, huh?" Tamara asked, doing a terrible job of containing her smirk. Yeah, flirting was way more fun than worrying about Yana - and, if Tommy played his cards right, maybe they could have even more fun than flirting. Seriously, what better way to work out some tension?
"Of course I do," he played innocent. "Making that video was a well-thought out response to a difficult situation, infinitely superior to other choices, such as ignoring the media response, or spray painting a giant 'fuck you' across Central Park."
"Yeah, I'm sure that's what you were thinking," Tamara replied, wetting her lips to tell him what she thought he'd really been thinking about.
His eyes dropped to her mouth, the way her pouty lower lip glistened in the light. He couldn't see her body clearly, not with the way she was straddling the chair, but that sent him down other fantastic trains of thought. Like the way she'd felt against him the night before, those lips marking up his skin, her breathy sounds - damn. "Keep doing that and I'm not going to be able to think straight at all."
A pleased smile played at the edges of her mouth, and she bit ever so softly on her lower lip. He was so easy to tease - definitely one of his better traits. "Good - pretty sure I'm done thinking for a while... you?"
She was absolutely doing that thing with her lip on purpose, and Tommy - yeah, he was easy. He kicked out one foot and hooked it around the base of his chair, pulling her a few inches toward him. "I've always been better at reacting, myself."
Face now very close to Tommy's, Tamara leaned in, playing with the space between them for just a second, teasing. "Shut up," she told him, then closed the distance between them, pressing her lips to his eagerly. God, she'd missed kissing.
"Shutting up now." Tommy managed to get out before her lips met his. He parted them for her, teased hers with the tip of his tongue, tasting the slick of her lip gloss. The chair back pushed back against his chest when he leaned in, annoying him with its insistence on being in between them. He kissed her again, bit lightly on the fullness of her bottom lip. "The bed's a ton more comfortable," he offered, murmuring against her mouth.
Tamara grinned against his lips, more than happy with that invitation, then pulled away to stand and push the chair back toward the desk. "Lay back," she instructed, nodding her head toward his pillow as she put one knee on the bed, mischief in her eyes.
She didn't have to repeat that invitation, and Tommy pushed himself back up the bed to make room for her. "So you are always this bossy," he teased her, reaching out to take her hand and pull her after him. Anticipation coiled tight inside, his grin growing.
"Absolutely," Tamara promised with a smirk, climbing onto the bed and then straight onto Tommy without a second's pause, straddling his hips. Thank god she lived in a time when jeans could stretch so nicely... "That a problem?" she asked with faux-sweetness, hands on his chest as she started leaning down.
"Not in the slightest." Especially not when she was leaning over him, her weight on him, the pressure delicious and making his imagination run wild. He ran his hands up her thighs, and raised his head and shoulders so he could capture her mouth with his.
Tamara met him eagerly, wings settling loosely on either side of them. Tommy had good instincts, and she hummed her approval against his mouth, rocking her hips a bit, just to tease him. Encourage him. For now she kept her hands balled in his shirt, just enjoying what he was doing and kissing him thoroughly.
If he could slow time down for someone with him, Tommy would have done it right then and there. He wanted slow, and fast, and everything all at once, Tamara over and around him, her wings blocking out everything bad in the world. He sat up and tugged her tight against him, hands on her hips and his mouth moving down her throat.
Tamara didn't have a plan other than feel fucking good, and that plan was going perfectly so far. Mmm, his lips on her neck felt so good; she let her head fall back and she used a hand in his hair to guide him to the sweetest spots.
She wouldn't go all the way, and was pretty sure she'd find some boundaries when it mattered, but in the meantime? Tommy seemed happy to let her have control and eager to please, so why not enjoy? And make sure he enjoyed as well, she thought, rocking her hips against his.
*****
Inu-yasha felt like shit. He'd slept in the friggin' woods last night after being completely drunk. At a party. In front of people. Kami-sama, had someone been rubbing his ears? He could swear he remembered...
Ugh, and every time he remembered something it just got worse. He was never gonna live this down...
But remembering would basically (thankfully) have to wait until his head wasn't splitting and his stomach wasn't trying to murder him. He was pretty sure if he could just get to his room and his bed, he could sleep until he either died or felt better.
He was so out of it that it wasn't until his hand was on the doorknob that he realized what was happening inside. Ears uncovered - motherfucker, of course they were - he heard Tommy groan...
...and a girl giggle.
His hand snapped back like he'd been burned. NOPE. No fucking way-- Agh, now the smell hit him too - the dragon girl's perfume and makeup and both of their hormones and - oh god, he did not want to go in there right now....
"Chikuso," he swore, leaving the door and heading down the hall - only to gape in horror at another door as a barrage of sex smells (and feathers) hit him there too. He turned bright red and stormed out as fast as he could manage.
*****
Billy had finally gotten over that awful feeling of death with a side of headache and since he and Teddy had kind of sorta patched things up, he was on his way to boast to his brother about remembering everything from last night.
Including Tommy letting Billy hug him.
He got to the Tommy's room, only hesitating for half a second because what if Inuyasha was in there, but oh well! He gripped the door knob with an eager twist and threw the door open with excitement.
"Hey, Los-!"
His sentence lodged in his throat when he was met with a sight he never wanted to see again. Tommy was on the bed completely shirtless with his hands up some girls shirt while she was straddling him and going to town on Tommy's shoulder.
He said the first thing that came to his mind. "You're not ready to be a dad!"
Normally Tommy wouldn't have been caught off-guard enough to miss the door opening, but all his focus was on the rush of sensation, the feel of skin on skin, and he only realized Billy was there when he spoke. Tommy's head snapped up, his hands dropping away (he was going to make Billy pay for this - and pay and pay...)
"What the ever-loving fuck?" was all he managed to say in response.
Tamara didn't flinch, just turned her head to raise an eyebrow at the intruder, resting her head on Tommy's bare shoulder and glaring a bit. "Seconded. Ever tried knocking?"
But it was super weird, seeing Tommy's face on someone else... "Lemme guess - Billy?"
Billy closed his eyes and tried to think of the best response to this while Tommy was still shirtless and the girl was still straddling him. He could just run, running seemed like a fantastic idea, but the girl had asked and he weakly nodded as he opened his eyes again.
"Y-yeah....and you're...the dragon?" He had thought Tommy had been joking.
Tommy groaned, lightly tugging down on the hem of Tamara's shirt to make sure everything was covered that was supposed to be, seeing as how Billy wasn't leaving. "Tamara, meet Billy," he gestured in the general direction of his idiot supposed-brother. "The shallower side of my gene pool. Billy, Tamara."
Still catching her breath from what had been interrupted, Tamara laughed a little.
"That's the dragoness, thanks." She put one more kiss on Tommy's shoulder, then climbed off him (her only real option, since her wings got in the way of sitting back on the bed), smirking as she looked between the two of them as she stood, wings stretching out behind her. "But 'Tamara' works too. Lightning, right?"
Billy watched her move wondering if he should shut the door since Tommy was still technically shirtless, so he did without turning away from them. "Tamara. Okay, I can remember that...lightning?"
His first thought was the car Lightning McQueen, but then he remembered what exactly his powers were and gave a quick nod. "Oh, ah. Yeah. Lightning and others stuff."
Then so he wouldn't be rude. "You?"
Tommy looked back and forth between them in amazement. "We're doing this now? Seriously?" One way or another he figured funtimes were pretty much over. He reached over the side of the bed and grabbed his shirt, hauling it back on over his head.
Tamara pouted at Tommy as he pulled his shirt back on, but also rolled her eyes. "Well, unless he was gonna join us..."
Billy balked at her words and almost visibly recoiled. "Uh first off, no thanks to the Game of Thrones incest game. Also, I'm sure you're very nice, but you're just not my type."
Tommy's "no!" had come at about the same time as Billy's rejection, and Tommy glared at him. "Hard pass on the twincest. And don't take offense, even though he is offensive," he explained quickly to Tamara. If she thought Billy was negging her, Tommy was going to be the one to end up going involuntarily celibate. "When it comes to wings I think Warren floats his boat a lot more."
Tamara frowned at Tommy, smacking his arm. "Ohmygod, you don't just out people like that, what is wrong with you?"
She turned back to Billy, running a hand through her hair to straighten it some. "And both of you relax, I was kidding." Like, 95% kidding. Girl could dream, right? (Not about them together, ick twincest, but two of them and one of her…) Anyway, she held up a hand for Billy to see, letting sparks dance over it. "But nice to meet a fellow taser."
"Ow." Tommy rubbed his arm where she'd whacked it and grimaced, just because. "He's out around here already. I'm not going to pretend like it's some dark shameful secret."
Though Billy was still feeling a little weirded out, he gave a small smile towards Tommy, still unsure as to why Tommy's opinion on that mattered so much. "Ah, yeah. It's okay, I don't mind people knowing or telling. Kind of makes it easier so I don't have to keep having the same conversation every time."
He looked over at Tamara again and watched her sparks, a little envious that she had better control than he did. "Ha...taser or lightning rod, both accurate."
He tucked his hands into his pockets, worried that if he tried to show off his power he'd kill everyone in the room...or maybe just Tommy since Tamara might be shock proof.
"Oh, cool then! Anyone gives you trouble, let me know," Tamara said, smirking at Billy (and ignoring Tommy for the moment, mostly because her body really wanted to go back to what they'd been doing...). This place was gonna be safe for everyone, dammit, even if that meant she had to tase the assholes into reforming. "Do you do fire too?"
"Fire?" Billy asked, moving away from the door now that it seemed like it was more okay for him to be in the room. "I'm not exactly sure what that means?"
Tommy flopped back on the bed, propping himself up on his elbows to watch it all play out. "It means that if you piss her off, they'll be able to see the bonfire from the space station," he replied, deliberately stirring the pot.
Tamara turned to smirk at Tommy - trouble - and reached a wing over to poke him as she looked back at Billy. "Come on, you saw the protest video. Why doesn't anyone recognize me? I was the one lighting things on fire!"
"Oh, like actual fire." Billy had to bite his tongue from asking if she breathed it, but that would be too obvious right? He shook his head. "No, um unfortunately I do not have any fire power. Just electricity and magic."
He wondered if they were together, but wouldn't Tommy have mentioned something before now if they were? Maybe they were just...dating buddies like Warren and JP? Did anyone have a normal relationship here?
Ah, wait. Kitty and Bobby. Phew.
Tamara cranked her electricity up so her hand caught fire. "Yeah, like actual fire," she confirmed, raising an eyebrow at him. "Wait, magic?" She turned to look at Tommy, disbelief on her face as she let the fire go out. "Actual magic?"
Tommy shrugged eloquently. "Don't ask me, ask Harry Potter over there. Inuyasha and Illyana seem to think it's a thing." And Fatale had called it probability warping, but he wasn't about to bring her name into this conversation. "It makes as much sense as anything does in this joint."
"Ha ha. Funny." Billy rolled his eyes. "I wish I were half as competent as Harry Potter when it came to this."
He sighed when he felt his hands start to tingle, holding them against his stomach through his hoodie pockets as his own electricity sent a shock through him. He barely flinched, the numb feeling coming and going quicker than it had when he had met Teddy. "Yeah...Yana took me to Limbo where apparently I can actually function there, but over here all my powers are kind of assholes."
"She what?!" That blonde bit-- no, no she wasn't gonna use that word, even in her head, but ugh, her?! A little lightbulb snapped on in Tamara's head. Magik. She grabbed Tommy's desk chair and sank down onto it, backwards of course. "And Limbo? Limbo's real too?"
She'd taken Billy to Limbo? Tommy's insides went cold for a second and he snagged a couple of minutes for himself to think it through. After all that garbage about death and disaster and keeping it a secret, after giving Tommy rafts of shit because he'd dared to ask for her help when he really needed it, now she was basically giving guided tours. Simon for sure, Kitty obviously, he had a suspicion about Inu-Yasha, and now Tommy's... whatever.
Would Illyana be petty enough to put Billy in danger just because she was pissed at Tommy?
Probably, yeah.
"Watch what you say," Tommy drawled in Billy's direction. "You sure you're allowed to talk about that? After all her going on about how it was the deepest darkest secret ever, so bad that she's been giving me the cold shoulder for weeks for needing an extraction from a freaking torture facility, I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to be bandying that around. Unless it's common knowledge now." In which case Illyana could bite him.
Billy frowned a little when he got the impression that Yana wasn't exactly everyone in this rooms favorite person. He looked over at Tommy with a confused, worried look. "I mean, I asked if I could see it, but she never really said anything about keeping it a secret I don't think."
Billy bit his lip. "What do you mean giving you the cold shoulder for an extraction?"
"Seconded," Tamara said, turning to Tommy again. Her head was spinning - what was even happening right now?? “No, wait— torture facility?!"
Oh, for... Tommy sighed, raking his hand back through his hair. "You remember about a month ago," he directed that at Tamara- "before you got here," he advised Billy in an aside. "There was a whole thing where Xavier, in his infinite wisdom, sent a bunch of us in to a lab facility to do recon. And he said that there had been a student here who'd been held prisoner there."
Tommy turned his arms over to show the inside of his forearms and his elbows, the white and fading pink scars from the picc lines and iv ports still visible, in the right light. "I assumed the gossip network in this place would have made sure everyone knew who that was by now, but I guess not." He shrugged, then held his head high. "Three months, I was a lab rat, Xavier found me after I busted out. And then asked me to go back in. Which is where we ran into Pyro and his friends for the first time.
"It's a long story, or maybe a bunch of short ones, but the point is. We got attacked, I got flash-fried by some girl throwing EM pulses around, and Yana was there as a teleporter to be our extraction. I asked to pull out to get back to the rest of our team, Illyana flung us into Limbo as some kind of halfway point, and then when we got back, proceeded to yell at me for 'ordering' her to do it in the first place. Because apparently even one person knowing about Limbo was the end of the world as we knew it. And she hasn't spoken to me since."
Billy had known about Tommy being in the facility for some time now, but that didn't make it any easier when Tommy brought it up and he thought of his brother in a lab. He didn't even care that Tamara was in the room as he quickly moved over to his brother's bed, leaned over and wrapped his arms around Tommy.
He didn't even care that Tommy's white hair made his nose itch, he just held him tighter and wished that every asshole who had ever touched Tommy would pay.
Tamara was gaping, barely able to process. She'd seen bits and pieces of things, but hadn't heard anything firsthand, so she hadn't really thought... Jesus, but those scars were real enough. "...holy shit."
Tommy was getting hugged. Again. By Billy. Again. He shoved his arm against Billy's shoulder in a halfhearted attempt to get rid of him. "Get off," he grumbled.
"No." Billy muttered and held on to his brother tighter, making sure Tommy couldn't get away. "You're my brother, so you're going to have to deal with comforting hugs and words. Just let me do this."
Tamara was still processing. Apparently Yana was way more powerful than she'd realized, and involved with really dark shit... and Tommy had been part of it too. Experimented on. Christ.
And Limbo - did that mean Hell was real? God, and the devil?
She watched the world's most awkward hug happening on the bed, wings completely deflated and brushing the floor. Usually she'd be making fun of them, but she was too distracted by the way her own head was spinning.
"Seriously." Tommy let it go on a few moments more, then elbowed Billy lightly in the gut. "Enough already. Leggo. There is way too much family togetherness happening here."
Billy finally let go, feeling like he had hugged his brother sufficiently well enough and took a step back. "Okay. So, let me just ask this... she took you to Limbo and then got mad, what happened while you were there?"
He turned to Tamara quickly. "Limbo is like...kind of other dimension? For some reason my magic works better there than it ever has here."
Also he learned his lightning was magic, which was weird.
Tommy frowned at Billy. "Nothing happened. Like I said - she used it as a waystation of some kind. Teleport in, turn around, teleport out. I saw a room, and that's all."
Billy frowned at that, not quite sure why Yana would get so upset at Tommy for just being there when she had taken him to Limbo and they were getting along great.
"Maybe I should ask her..." He wondered aloud. "I mean there has to be a reason. People don't get mad for no reason, even if it's really weird or dumb."
"Leave it alone," Tommy warned him. "She told me exactly why she was mad at me -- because she didn't want anyone knowing about Limbo in the first place. So if she's dropped that line of bullshit and is offering guided tours of the place now, then she can come talk to me when she's ready. Don't get involved."
"Ohmygod, I think she threatened to send me there this morning," Tamara said, realization dawning. She scowled. Threatening to send her to hell over a lousy boy? Her wings bristled angrily behind her as she glared. "That fucking-- Seriously, stay away from her, she's nuts."
"She what?" Billy asked, looking at Tamara in disbelief. Why would Yana threaten that? Specially since she knew it could be a dangerous place based on what she has told him about the place. "Maybe she was just saying it in a way like, 'oh I'm so mad I could kill you' even though you never would?"
"Yeah, her glowing red eyes really said 'don't worry, I'm exaggerating' to me," Tamara replied sarcastically, though her anger was directed at Yana, not Billy. For now. "She came at me out of nowhere, all pissed off because her date flirted with me last night. Which, seriously, what kind of idiot brings an outsider here?!"
Billy bit his lip as he tried to think of a way to explain that. He still didn't really know what had happened at the party between Yana and well...everyone, but he had known that everyone was upset with her choice of date. "Are you talking about Pyro? And what did he do to make everyone so mad?"
The guy who was in the same group as Tommy and his spirit mom, right? Or was that a different thing? Ugh. His head hurt.
"He was one of the guys who attacked us at the Right's facility," Tommy explained, everything about the conversation making him tired to a level he hadn't really thought possible. "It's another group of mutant kids, after the same information we were going for. They torched the place, destroyed everything we might have been able to get our hands on, and bailed." And he really, really didn't want to get into Wanda and Pietro's involvement with Tamara sitting right there. "They're not bad guys, I don't think, just jerks."
"Jerks who now know way more about all of us than they have any right to," Tamara pointed out, a knot forming in her stomach. That was worse than she'd realized. "This is supposed to be a safe place - there are people here who can't be outed, for their own safety. Think that matters to Pyro?" Nevermind that she'd been flirting with him last night. He'd turned out to be a dick, so no benefit of the doubt for him - especially since it turned out he was with some whole other group of mutants who were into arson. "They don't even need to spy if someone's stupid enough to invite them in."
Billy frowned at that, feeling bad for Yana cause he remembered he saying that she actually kind of liked the guy she had brought. "Why would they be interested in outing other mutants? I thought they were pro-mutant or whatever as well...just a little more umm...intense about it?"
He wanted to lean more towards Tommy's view on the brotherhood, that they were okay and just kind of jerks. Jerks he could deal with.
"We don't know, that's the point," Tommy replied, though the answers to that might be a whole lot closer than they were before, assuming Kitty's tracker did what it was supposed to. "But I can think of a few good reasons -- guys like Worthington or Jean-Paul have a lot to lose if they're exposed as mutants, and Warren at least has a shit-load of money to bleed if someone wanted to blackmail him. With photos from a cell phone brought to a party, say.
"Anyway, you asked why people were mad about Pyro being here, and that's why."
Tamara was frowning, agreeing with what Tommy was saying (and glad to hear him saying it). It was just... everything that had felt so safe about this place yesterday was kind of crashing down around her, in about eight different ways, and she was starting to feel shaky even though she was sitting down...
Which she wouldn't have noticed, except her wings freaking trembled.
Fuck. Fear was useless. She channeled it into something angrier. "If that asshole puts any of us in danger, I swear to Christ that the next shock he gets will definitely leave a mark..."
Billy noticed Tamara's wings starting to shake and he felt bad, not because he had done anything, but because people deserved to feel safe where they lived. He swallowed and tugged on his shirt a little. He needed to talk to Yana about all of this since it was apparently a big deal.
He just wondered how he was going to bring it up. So hey, you know that guy you like, yeah, no everyone is afraid of what he's going to do. So maybe not see him? Yeah right.
"I'll talk to her. And Tamara, you're right, this should be a place that everyone can feel safe being so...we should make that happen."
"There's no such thing as a safe place, Billy. Only some that are safer than others for a while." Tommy turned on the bed and dropped his feet down to the floor again, facing Tamara in his chair. Acting purely on impulse, he ran his hand gently down the leading edge of the wing closest to him, feeling the shakes she was trying to keep in check. "But I don't think he's going to be back here any time soon. You saw the kind of reception he was getting. Even Kitty got on his case, and she's not exactly hot-tempered."
Tamara actually blushed a little. Both brothers trying to make her feel better? Man, she must look so dumb right now...
Still, the stroke of her wing felt nice, and she smiled back at Tommy through her flush, wing leaning into the touch of its own volition. "Really? Sorry I missed that." She bit her lip, then said, "But this can be a safe place, if we protect it." She glanced at Billy, since his powers could definitely help with that. "I mean, we've got some serious firepower just in this room, right?"
Billy stared at her for a second before flushing scarlet red. "Oh, no. I'm just- not-no-I can't do much."
All Billy could do was zap people or almost kill them with out meaning to and his stupid magic that never worked when he actually needed it. "Tommy can at least blow things up."
"Shallow end," Tommy reminded her, cocking an eyebrow at Billy with a wry grin. Given the jolt he'd gotten from Billy on day one and the little (tiny) bit he knew about magic and what Pam had described as probability control... Eh. Billy would get tougher. "But you're right, in that we have some crazy talent building up here."
Her wing was responding to his touch and he was faintly weirded out by the reminder that it was as much a part of her as her arm or her shoulder, not just some cosplay-like piece to be worked around. He traced his thumb down the ridge along the edge and wondered what his touch there felt like from the other side. "It shouldn't be a surprise that someone else is trying to get in on that action."
The touch wasn't so different from a caress of her arm, though it still felt nice (very nice). She was still getting used to people touching her wings in non-medical ways, but so far she really liked it.
"Yeah, but there's a difference between wanting a safe place to exist and wanting to turn us into some kind of army," she said, frowning. The idea of being used to fight someone else's battles turned her stomach. "I'm just talking about protecting this place."
Billy thought about that, using their powers to keep the school safe and not just from that Brother hood club, but from anyone who would want to hurt them. "That sounds like it could be a good idea, but it would have to be students who actually knew their powers or someone could get hurt."
Or killed.
"And that would he where all these power-training courses come in, wouldn't it?" Tommy arched an eyebrow at Billy. "You didn't think Xavier had us running exercises three days a week for our own benefit, did you? We're his protection."
"Who cares about him?" Tamara pointed out. "He set this place up and brought us here, but now it's ours too." Usually she would've said something about Tommy's cynicism, but after what she'd just learned, Christ, who could blame him?
"Ugh. All of this is making my head hurt." Billy muttered as he pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. He really would love for Xavier to not be using them as a meat shield, but in some ways, no matter how negative it was, Tommy's ideas could have some grain of truth. Why did everything have to be so convoluted. "I think I'm going to go back to my room and lay on the floor for a bit."
"That," Tommy said firmly, "sounds like an excellent plan. You go do that." And on the other side, he traced his fingers down Tamara's wing, then along the outside seam of her jeans, a caress along the firm strength of her thigh. Fifteen minutes ago the world had made sense, even if only for a little while. Getting back to that place seemed like the best possible way to rescue the rest of the afternoon.
God, Tamara was glad she and Tommy were on the same page. Right now she wanted to go back to the exact 'not thinking' they'd been doing before...
"Nice to meet you, Billy," she said, eyes never leaving Tommy's face. One hand snaked forward to tug at the hem of the shirt he'd put back on. Never one for subtlety, she added, "Do me a favor, lock the door on your way out..."
"Oh my god!" Billy rolled his eyes and threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. "You people."
But he left without further dramatics, not sure how to lock the door from the outside, but slammed it closed hard enough so maybe it would stick and they would be stuck in there.
Tommy rolled his eyes at the closed door, zipping over to lock it before hauling ass back to the bed. "I'd apologize, but I refuse to take responsibility for that just because he's borrowing my face." He held his hand out to Tamara, an offer to get her out of the chair and back to having fun. "Where were we?"
Tamara took his hand, readily getting up from the chair and wrapping her arms around his neck, wings easily mimicking to wrap around them both.
"Reacting instead of thinking, I believe?" she said playfully, angling her head just so, wetting her lips the way he'd noticed before.
"My favourite plan." And he was not too proud to admit that the sound she pulled out of him with that little gesture was embarrassingly close to a whimper. Tommy sank his fingers into her hair and his mouth down on hers again, teasing at her lips with his tongue.
Tamara hummed happily, opening her mouth to his and getting lost in it again. After all the crap she'd just learned, and especially what she'd learned about Tommy, now she felt like they both deserved this. They deserved to feel really, really good.
So she kissed him back up against the bed, already tugging his shirt up his body.
Oh yeah. They were definitely going to have some fun.
