Lines in the Sand: Chapter 1

Part 1 of the Twilight Force series

An X-Men Evolution Fanfic

Lance slammed the Jeep’s door and stomped up to the door of the boardinghouse, cursing Summers, the professor, those dumb kids who thought flying a jet would be fun, and himself, for actually thinking he could just show up at the mansion, join the X-Men, and everything would just work out.

He should have known it didn’t work like that.

Tabby was already up and doing homework in the living room when he walked in. Nightmares again, probably. At least everyone else seemed to be asleep.

She smirked up at him. “Well, you actually made it longer than I thought you would.”

He ignored her and went up to his room, tossed his duffle bag on the floor, and dug out some clothes. His X-Men uniform stared up at him, mocking him. He hadn’t meant to pack it, he’d just stuffed everything in his bag without thinking.

He threw it aside, then went to take a shower. He chose not to think about the fact that his room was left untouched, despite the fact that any of the other boys could have claimed it after he left.

There was no shampoo, of course, but he managed with soap. The water was cold already, and mold gathered around the tiles. He did his best not to touch it when he put the bar of soap back on the edge of the tub. The shower curtain hung crooked now, but he stepped over the corner out of habit. If any of those X-kids tried to live here, they’d never survive, he thought bitterly.

Everyone else was still asleep when he came downstairs. He found a (probably) clean glass in the kitchen cabinet and filled it with water, then searched the fridge and cabinets for something to eat.

“Tabby, where’s all the food?”

“What food?” she called back. Her tone made it sound like a joke, but the empty cabinets told a different story.

Guilt churned in his stomach along with hunger, but he pushed it away. He had left them with plenty of food for the next few days, but they weren’t his responsibility just because Mystique happened to shove them all in the same house. There was no reason why he couldn’t leave to find something better.

“I can’t believe I used to look up to you!" Lance shoved the memory of Fred’s hurt expression from his mind.

No reason at all.

He found a single serving bag of chips and sighed. Better than nothing, he supposed. He grabbed it and his water, then joined Tabby in the living room. For once, she wasn’t listening to music, but she still ignored him, staring down at her textbook with an intensity he had never seen her show towards homework.

He wanted to scream.

He wanted to remind her that she had done the exact same thing as him, so why was she so mad?

Except . . . it wasn’t really the same thing, was it? When Tabitha left the X-Men, it didn’t matter. Sure, she had friends who missed her, but they didn’t need her. The students at the institute had plenty of people looking out for them, protecting them. The Brotherhood . . . they only had each other.

And he’d left. Just like her dad. Just like Mystique.

He dug his fingers into the couch and stared down at the holes in his jeans. “You mad at me?”

“Nope.”

Oh sure. That was convincing. He looked up and stared at her until she gave a huff and closed her book. “I’m not. You think I’d live in this dump if I had a better choice? It’s filthy, we only have running water most of the time, and we’re constantly running out of food. I’d leave too.”

“So why don’t you? You were an X-Men. You could go back.”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, sure. And they’d all be happy for the first few days, saying they knew I’d come around, and then as soon as something goes missing, which is going to happen in a house that big with that many people, suddenly everyone remembers that time Tabby tried to help her dad steal some money. No, thank you.”

He couldn’t really argue with that. “That uniform they gave me . . . I’ve got it upstairs.” She leaned her chin on the heel of her hand and raised an eyebrow. “It’s supposed to be fireproof. Bet that’d make a pretty good challenge, huh?”

A sly smile spread across her face. “Well, my afternoon’s free.”

Something splashed upstairs, and then footsteps thundered down the stairs. Lance winced. That couldn’t be good.

“Save me!” Todd hopped into the room, then hid behind Tabitha’s chair. She held up two fingers and watched a small bomb grow between them. Todd grew even paler than usual. “No, wait, not you.” He jumped up and landed behind Lance. “Save me,” he moaned.

Lance rolled his eyes and was about to say he probably deserved whatever fate Fred had planned for him, when Fred spoke. “What are you doing here?”

Todd stood up and stared at Lance. “Oh yeah. Why are you here?”

Lance crossed his arms and looked away. “You guys . . . might’ve had a point. I don’t fit in there.”

Pietro snorted, skidding into the room. “Of course we were right. Well, of course I was right. How these knuckleheads actually managed it for once, I’ll never know.”

Lance looked up at Fred. He refused to think about why he was so worried about his response.

Fred grinned. “I guess we can let you come back. At least we won’t have to walk to school anymore.”

Lance laughed. Weird as it seemed, it felt nice to be back.

Sharing a house with around twenty people did not leave much room for secrets. When two of those people were telepaths, one could teleport, one had super senses, and another could steal memories with a touch, it became even harder to keep anything private.

As an only child, this had been very hard for Kitty to get used to, but she had managed. Now, however, it was proving to be a problem. She had managed to change into normal clothes without disturbing her sleeping roommate, but she decided to carry her shoes instead of putting them on. She didn’t want to risk Mr. Logan hearing her leave.

She tiptoed to the bedroom door and was just about to open it, when a voice said, “you’d never survive my house.”

Well. She thought Rogue was asleep.

She turned back, and Rogue propped herself up on one elbow. “Irene always knew when I was trying to sneak out, and I was much quieter than you.”

Kitty bit her lip. “Are you going to tell?”

Rogue sighed. “As long as you’re back before we have to leave for school, I won’t say anything, but if they start freaking out cause they can’t find you, I’m not lying.”

Kitty grinned. “You’re the best! Thank you!”

Rogue laid back down, grumbling something about stupid girls and stupid boys and always waking her up. Kitty ignored her and left the room, turning the knob before shutting it to muffle the sound.

Kitty had never been one for breaking rules. Usually she didn’t see a point, and when she did . . . well, she was very good at talking adults around to seeing her perspective. As a result, she had expected this late-night excursion to be exciting. She had not expected just how exhausting it would be to creep silently all the way down the hallway, or how hard it would be to make it all the way down the stairs without stepping on any creaky spot.

She huffed. Bobby, Jubilee, and Sam had made sneaking out seem so easy. If it was this hard to break the rules once, she couldn’t imagine why anyone would try it again.

Finally, she made it outside and slipped on her shoes. She kept carefully to the path, hoping the lasers were only set to go off if someone broke in to the mansion, not out.

No lasers appeared, no booby traps, and then she was past the gate. She smiled to herself as she broke into a run. She had actually made it!

Her endurance had gotten a lot better since she moved into the mansion and Logan had started dragging her into Danger Room sessions, so she was actually able to run all the way to the Brotherhood’s boarding house.

She stopped on the doorstep and stared at the door, considering. She could knock, but he might be asleep, or someone else might hear her. She could throw rocks at his window like people did in books, but what if she broke it?

Hesitantly, she put her head through the door. She didn’t see anyone up. She stepped the rest of the way through the door and slowly climbed the stairs, wincing at every creak.

She found Lance’s room easily (the large sign that read “Keep Out” in his handwriting gave it away) and knocked.

She had to knock two more times, but eventually he opened the door, having clearly just woken up. He blinked several times, his brows drawing together like he was confused.

“Hi.”

His eyes widened, he grabbed her arm, and dragged her into his room. He shut the door. “What are you doing here?”

She put her hands on her hips and tried to force back her smile. He was even cuter when he had just woken up, in his pajamas and with his hair falling in his face. “Oh, so you can break into my home in the middle of the night, but I can’t do the same to yours? Talk about double standards.”

“No, no, that’s not what I said. Why–why are you here?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“You can talk to me at school.”

Her amusement fell away. “Right, cause you definitely weren’t, like, avoiding me in school today, or anything.” He eyes darted away, and she knew she hadn’t just been imagining it.

She stepped closer and put her hand on his arm. “I didn’t do anything to make you think I didn’t want to talk to you, right?”

He shook his head. “No, no nothing like that. It’s just–” He didn’t continue.

“Lance?”

He sighed. “Come on, Kitty, you know exactly how all your friends feel about me. I just figured it was probably better if . . . well . . .”

She frowned. “And you think I care? Look, I–I’m really sorry about what happened and that you felt like you had to leave, but that doesn’t mean I suddenly don’t want to talk to you anymore! I–I missed you.”

His eyebrows shot up, then he smirked. “I’ve only been gone for a day.”

She could feel her face burning. “I know. I still missed you, though.” How many times had she turned around to share a joke with him just to remember he was gone? She pushed her hair behind her ear and looked up at him. “Did you miss me?”

He shrugged his shoulders and glanced away. “I guess I missed you a little.”

She bit her lip to keep her smile back. “Just a little?”

He looked back over at her and grinned. “Okay, maybe more than a little.”

They stood there for a moment, just smiling at each other, then he asked, “so is that all you came for?'

She twirled one of her curls around her finger. “Well, yes, but . . . I can stay a little longer if you want me to.”

She regretted the words as soon as they came out of her mouth. He was supposed to be sleeping. It wouldn’t be long before they were supposed to get up for school. She had woken him and barged into his room, he was in his pajamas, and why hadn’t she thought this through?

“We could watch tv,” he said.

“What?”

“I mean, if you wanted to stay a little longer. We could see what’s on tv.”

“Oh,” she said. “Oh, yeah, that sounds . . . nice.”

A grin flashed across his face, and he turned around and opened the door, checking the hallway. Then he gestured for her to follow him out.

Kitty had to stifle a giggle as they tiptoed down the staircase, but no one seemed to notice as they made their way into the living room. She sat on the couch as Lance picked up the remote and turned on the tv, muting it before it could wake anyone else up. Then he turned the volume down and unmuted it as he sat down. With way too much room between them.

As he flipped through channels, trying to find something that wasn’t the news or just a music station, she slipped her shoes off and pulled her feet up onto the couch, using the movement as an excuse to slide closer to him.

She felt him tense up when her shoulder brushed his, and she glanced over, wondering if he wanted her to stop. He was very pointedly not looking in her direction. She shifted again, and her knees brushed the side of his leg. His eyes darted over to her, then away.

“Do you want me to move?” she asked.

He kept his eyes firmly on the tv. “No, um, that’s okay.”

She leaned closer until her arm was pressed against his. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

She smiled and leaned her head on his shoulder. He found some sitcom she wasn’t familiar with and put the remote down, then stretched his arm along the back of the couch behind her, but not actually touching.

She didn’t know what the show was about, and she didn’t particularly care. He wasn’t laughing, so she didn’t think he was paying attention either. Finally, his arm slid off the back of the couch and settled around her shoulders. But it only too a few seconds to realize that wasn’t going to work.

She sat up slightly, and he immediately pulled his arm away. “No, wait! I’m just a little hot,” she said. She shrugged out of her sweater then grabbed his hand and pulled it back to her. He grinned and wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close, and she settled against his side. They stayed like that through a couple more episodes of the sitcom.

She sat up. “I should probably head back now.”

“Want me to drive you?”

She shook her head. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

“Yeah . . .” he rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, I’ll see you at school.”

She smiled. “See you then.”

The one nice thing about being up so early was getting the first shower. Usually Pietro or Tabby got there first, but for once Lance actually had warm water and a little bit of quiet.

Of course, that didn’t last long. As soon as he made his way downstairs, he could hear Pietro and Todd arguing about something.

“Fits me nicely, don’t you think?”

“Nah, I’m telling you, Speedy, it’s my color. Besides, you’re too tall.”

“Yeah, it looks good on you, Todd,” Fred said. “You wear too much green anyway.”

“‘Zactly. Balances it all out.”

“No, it just makes your skin look even greener,” Pietro said.

“What do you think, Lance?” Tabby asked.

He spun around and saw both her and Fred looking at him with matching mischievous grins. “Huh?”

“Do you think the sweater looks better on Todd or Pietro?” Tabby stepped out of the way to reveal both boys holding one sleeve of a pink sweater.

A very familiar pink sweater.

“It looks bad on both of you,” he said, trying to keep his expression neutral. “It that yours, Tabby?” It definitely wasn’t Tabby’s.

Tabby smirked. “What, you trying to keep secrets from us, now? Come on, we all know Kitty was here last night.”

He shoved his hands in his pockets. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Come on, Lance, you can tell us.” Todd dropped the sweater and hopped over to him.

“Yeah, Lance.” Pietro leaned on his shoulder and raised an eyebrow. “What were you two doing all night that you want to keep so secret, huh?”

“Fine! She was here, okay? We just . . . watched tv for a little while and talked. That’s it.”

Pietro waved the sweater in his face. “So it wouldn’t be a problem for us to return this to her, right?”

“Yeah,” Todd said. “We’d be helping.”

“No!” Lance snatched the sweater. “Her friends would freak if you did that. You know that.”

Tabby sighed loudly and rolled her eyes. She held out her hand. “I’ll give it to her and tell her I must have accidentally packed it in my stuff.”

Lance hesitated, and she smirked. “What, don’t trust me? I may make fun of you a lot, but I don’t actually want Wolverine to come in here and kill you or anything.” Lance grimaced and handed it over.

For once, Tabitha was actually looking forward to school.

She found Kitty at her locker, and leaned back against the once beside it. “Hey, Kitty! What’re you up to?”

Kitty turned when she said her name, then went back to shuffling through the books in her locker. “Oh, hi, Tabby. Not much.”

“Have a good night last night?” Tabby gave a wide, innocent smile. “Sleep well?”

Kitty’s eyebrows drew together and she tilted her head. “Uh, I guess. Why?”

Tabby shrugged one shoulder. “No reason. Hey, I’ve got something for you.” She pulled the pink sweater out of her backpack and held it toward Kitty.

Time almost seemed to stop when Kitty saw what she was holding, except for the various shades of red her face turned. Tabby said nothing, just waited.

Kitty glanced down the hallway, then snatched the sweater up, stuffing it down into her bag as far as it would go.

“I must have accidentally packed it in my stuff,” Tabby said, shrugging. “Whoopsy. Don’t know how that happened. Well, gotta head to class. Bye!”

Kitty slipped through the front door of the mansion and glanced down the hall to make sure it was clear before running back to her room.

So far she hadn’t been caught, even with Tabby returning her sweater at school. She still couldn’t believe she had left it at the boarding house, but she was grateful Tabby had returned it without letting everyone know where she had been the night before.

Still, if there was one person who would know she snuck out, it would be Mr. Logan.

“Hey, Half-pint.”

Uh oh.

She slowly turned around in the kitchen door. He was standing at the counter, chopping vegetables with a particularly large, scary-looking knife. “Oh, hi, Mr. Logan!”

“We have a curfew for a reason, kid.”

Okay, she expected him to be mad, but that disappointed look was somehow so much worse. She ducked her head and stared at her shoes. “I know.”

“You’d best remember that, or you’ll be cleaning the jet with the others.”

She nodded and waited for him to continue. He hadn’t like Lance joining the X-Men, and had liked him leaving even less. It seemed everyone at the Institute thought the Brotherhood was a bad influence, and sure, she didn’t agree with everything they did. The girl’s soccer championship had been a nightmare, and people could have been hurt, but she knew that hadn’t been the intention. She was sure Mr. Logan was especially upset that she had gone to the boardinghouse.

What if he told her not to see Lance again?

“Wait,” Bobby skidded into the room and grabbed onto the counter to stop himself. “Kitty broke curfew? Seriously? What was she doing?”

Mr. Logan pointed that long, scary knife in Bobby’s direction. “That’s none of your business.” He turned back to Kitty. “Don’t you have homework or something to do?”

She stared at him. “What?’

He frowned. “Homework?”

“Oh! Oh, right. Yes. Um, thank you, Mr. Logan.”

“For what?”

She smiled. “Oh, nothing I guess.”

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