Scott stopped when he noticed the young man had fallen a couple of steps behind. Legion was staring at his watch, where the dial spun with a constant sickly yellow glow.
"Everything okay?" Scott asked.
Legion lowered his arm naturally and resumed walking at his side.
"Yeah," he replied calmly. "I was just checking some data that finished loading."
They entered the infirmary, where the atmosphere was calm and cool.
Hank McCoy was standing beside one of the gurneys and, upon seeing them, approached with a friendly smile.
"Hello, Scott. And you must be Legion," Hank said, extending his hand. "I'm Dr. Hank McCoy. It's a pleasure to meet you. What you did today for those young people was excellent work."
Legion shook his hand politely.
"Thank you, Doctor. The pleasure is mine," he replied. "Scott mentioned you had them here, but I wanted to know the condition of the ones we rescued."
Hank checked a tablet before gesturing toward the gurneys at the back.
"Their vitals are stabilizing. We're administering fluids to flush any trace of the substance from their systems. They're stable, but they'll remain sedated for a few more hours so their nervous systems can rest."
Legion nodded, then added another question.
"And the other two boys I brought? The ones with the collars."
Hank nodded as he began walking, motioning for them to follow him down a side hallway.
"We placed them in two special rooms. Mostly because the young man who calls himself Hellion, who seems to be close to Emma Frost, became quite aggressive once he regained consciousness. As for the other boy, Speed, he simply asked for a similar room, so we decided to give them their space."
As they walked, Hank glanced sideways at Legion, curiosity in his eyes.
"By the way, I noticed those collars seem to inhibit their powers very effectively. Would you mind sharing how they work, exactly?"
Legion fell silent for a moment.
He suddenly felt the suit tighten around his shoulders more than usual, a physical discomfort that forced him to adjust his posture. He looked at Hank through the visor of his helmet.
"For now, I can't tell you that, Doctor," he replied calmly. "But we could discuss it later if you're interested."
Hank nodded with an understanding smile, not pressing the issue.
"I understand perfectly. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss it in the future."
They stopped in front of the doors to the special rooms. Hank paused and politely excused himself.
"They're in here. If you need anything, I'll be in my lab," he said before walking away.
Legion watched the doctor leave, then loosened the strap on one of his gloves slightly, feeling his skin warm.
"Hank seems like a good guy," Legion commented.
I hope he's not the same one who decapitated and cloned Logan on Krakoa, he thought to himself, keeping the comment internal.
Scott let out a small laugh.
"He's been here with the Professor forever. If you ever have a problem and the Professor isn't available, you can always go to him. He's very wise."
"I see," Legion replied calmly. "That's good to know."
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Scott stopped in front of the doors to the special rooms and looked at the hero.
"Do you want me to go in with you?"
Legion shook his head gently.
"That won't be necessary, thanks," he said. "I just want to talk to one of them. It'll be brief."
Scott nodded, leaning against the hallway wall.
"Alright. I'll wait out here, then. Take your time."
Legion gave him a brief nod of thanks and headed toward the door of the room where Speed was staying.
=================================================
He entered the room and found the boy sitting on the edge of the bed. He was touching the metal collar with curiosity, running his fingers over its cold surface.
When he saw Legion enter, he stopped, clearly uneasy.
"Hey," Legion said by way of greeting.
"Hi," Speed replied, lowering his hands. "Sorry… it's just… it's a really strange feeling. I feel heavy, like something's missing. It's weird not being able to feel my powers."
Legion walked over to a chair in the corner, dragged it closer, and sat down in front of him, meeting his gaze.
"It was necessary," Legion explained calmly. "Given the situation, I didn't have many options. You put me in a tough spot out there."
Speed looked down for a moment and let out a long sigh, nodding heavily.
"I'm sorry. Really. I was conscious the whole time… that's the worst part. I couldn't do anything. It was like my body wasn't responding, and I could only watch as everything happened. I tried to stop myself, but my legs just kept running."
Legion listened in silence, maintaining a firm posture in the chair.
He noticed the warmth in his chest rising again, a mild sensation that distracted him for a second, but he kept his focus on the boy.
"It wasn't your fault. That technology is designed specifically for that. No one could have resisted it on their own."
Speed looked at him, seeming a little more relieved by the words, though he still fidgeted nervously with the edge of the sheet.
"Still… thanks for getting me out of there," the young man added. "When… when can I take this off?"
"As soon as you answer a few questions," Legion replied calmly. "I'm not going to leave you wearing that, don't worry."
Speed nodded, though impatience was evident.
He adjusted himself on the bed, sitting up straight to face Legion, waiting for the questions.
The hero remained silent for a few seconds, observing him through the visor of his helmet, before asking the first one.
"What are you doing here?"
Speed blinked, confused by the simplicity of the question. He let out a nervous laugh and spread his arms.
"Well… I got captured, you saved me, and now I'm in this room. What do you mean?"
Legion slowly shook his head, not moving from the chair.
"No. I'm asking what you're doing HERE," he said, placing sharp emphasis on the last word.
Speed narrowed his eyes, losing some of his lighthearted demeanor.
"You're not supposed to be born until much later in the future," Legion said. "So either you're an impostor, which I doubt, because I compared your biological signature with Magneto's and they match… which confirms you're Wanda's son."
As Legion spoke, the color drained from Speed's face. The boy opened his mouth to say something, but no words came out.
Legion leaned forward slightly, closing the distance between them, his voice dropping a register, becoming more direct and demanding.
"I'll ask again… what the hell are you doing here, Speed?"
Speed fell silent, his gaze fixed on an empty spot on the bed sheet.
The silence stretched long enough for the hum of the medical equipment to feel deafening.
"I… I don't know what you're talking about," he finally stammered, trying to catch his breath. "Magneto? I don't even know him. I've never met him in my life. You must be mistaken, I swear, I just—"
Before he could finish the sentence, Legion moved fast. He grabbed the metal collar firmly and yanked him forward in a rough pull, forcing him just inches away from the helmet.
"Somehow they captured you, and you're from the future," Legion snapped, his tone no longer patient, but sharply aggressive. "Who knows what you know or how long they've been holding you prisoner?"
Speed's breathing sped up, but Legion didn't release him.
The warmth in his chest seemed to have traveled into his hands, and his voice, even through the helmet's modulator, vibrated with a new intensity.
"Upgraded Sentinels shouldn't exist yet, but I had to fight one not long ago," Legion continued, tightening his grip. "There are mind-control devices everywhere, Killgrave is nowhere to be found, and now you show up."
Speed tried to lean back, but the grip on his neck was ironclad. Legion leaned in closer, completely invading his personal space.
"Let me tell you something, Tommy Shepherd," he said, pronouncing the name with aggression. "Son of the Scarlet Witch, better known as Wanda Maximoff. How long have you been under their control, and what the hell did you tell them?"
The last bit of color drained from Tommy's face. His eyes widened in pure terror as his real name and his mother's name came out of that stranger's mouth.
The pressure on the collar made it hard for him to swallow, and the way Legion looked at him, even through the helmet, was that of someone who would not accept another lie.
He ran out of air for a moment, eyes wide, voice breaking.
"I… I—I…" he stammered, unable to form a single coherent word under the pressure.
Legion froze for a second, as if suddenly hearing himself.
His fingers, gripping the metal with unnecessary force, slowly relaxed. He released the collar abruptly, causing Speed to fall back onto the bed.
The hero took a step back, shaking his head slightly beneath the helmet.
"I'm sorry," Legion said, and this time his voice recovered its former calm tone, though a trace of exhaustion was evident. "I didn't mean to do that. But… you're the piece I was missing in this whole puzzle. I need to know the truth."
Speed took a few seconds to pull himself together. He pushed himself up on his elbows, looking at the figure in front of him with a mix of fear and curiosity.
"It's been… it's been a long time," Speed managed to say, trying to keep his voice from trembling. "I don't know exactly how long, but they kept me in that capsule. They asked me things… things about my family, about what would happen. I didn't want to say anything, but they… they had someone who knew ways to make me talk."
The boy stared fixedly at the visor of Legion's helmet. Suddenly, a thought seemed to cross his mind, and his eyes widened in surprise.
"You… you're from the future too," Speed blurted out, his voice barely audible. "That's why you know who I am. That's why you know about my mother."
"No," Legion denied immediately, with dry firmness. "I'm not from the future."
"Then how…?"
"I have my own ways of knowing things," Legion interrupted, regaining his composure as he sat back down. "The problem is that there are too many things out of place. The Purifiers have technology they shouldn't have, and it seems you're the key to how this whole disaster started. So I need you to remember, Tommy."
Tommy grew thoughtful, staring up at the ceiling as he tried to put his memories in order.
"I don't know exactly when it was," Speed began quietly, "but I arrived in this era about… two years ago."
Hearing that, Legion leaned back in his chair. He ran a hand across the front of his helmet and let out a long, heavy sigh.
Two years was far more time than he had imagined; it was enough time to change the course of many things.
"How did they catch you?" Legion asked.
Speed let out a bitter laugh, filled with regret.
"I was excited about everything," he confessed, looking at his hands. "The people, the food… everything was so different, so full of life compared to what I knew. One day, a girl approached me while I was eating something. She asked my name, what I was doing there… you know. She had a pretty name, Sofía."
Legion said nothing, but the tension in his shoulders increased.
"We talked a lot, until it got dark," Tommy continued, his gaze unfocused. "She offered me a place to spend the night."
"Oh, no…" Legion murmured under his breath, rubbing his temple against the metal of his helmet.
Speed shrugged, as if trying to downplay his own mistake.
"She was very kind and pretty. In my time there aren't many young people… and everyone is so focused on surviving that they're usually not very… pleasant. I let myself go and accepted. The last thing I remember is drinking a hot chocolate she gave me. After that, I got very sleepy."
An uncomfortable silence settled over the room. Speed touched his collar again, now realizing how stupid he had been.
"When I woke up, I was already in one of those capsules. And the rest… well, you already know."
Legion nodded slowly, processing the magnitude of Speed's mistake. He sighed again, but this time the sound was more strained, as if it was hard for him to catch his breath.
At that moment, Sid's voice echoed inside his helmet.
"Sir, your body temperature has spiked suddenly and your hormonal levels are behaving erratically. I recommend that—"
Legion didn't pay him any attention.
He felt as if the suit was burning his skin and the space inside the helmet was shrinking by the second.
With a quick motion, he pressed a button on the side of his neck. A soft hiss was heard, and the suit loosened slightly, allowing him to breathe a bit better, though the heat persisted.
"How did you get here?" he asked, fixing his gaze on Speed.
The boy fell silent, staring into a corner of the room, unsure whether he should take the next step in his confession.
Seconds passed, and the silence began to gnaw at Legion's patience. He felt pressure in his jaw, and his fingers drummed forcefully against the chair.
"Let me tell you—" he started, his tone rising sharply, but he cut himself off abruptly.
Legion clenched his fist tightly and forced himself to exhale through his nose, struggling to regain control of his own voice.
After a moment, he rephrased the question, trying to sound calm, though the effort was obvious.
"Kid… this is important. I need to know. How did you get here?"
Tommy lowered his gaze to his hands, fiddling with the sheets again.
The attitude he had shown at first had shifted into a kind of childish resentment.
"I had a fight with my brother and with my aunt Lorna," Speed confessed, his voice heavy with bitterness. "They always give me the simple missions, the boring ones. Everyone else puts their lives on the line out there, and I was only given messenger tasks. 'Run here, bring this, take that.'"
Speed let out a dry laugh, with no trace of joy.
"I wanted to prove my worth, prove that I could fight too. But Aunt Lorna got stubborn. She said it was too dangerous, that it was her duty to take care of everyone, especially us. And to top it all off, my brother took her side. He said I was 'too young' for that. What an idiot… we're twins! We're exactly the same age."
Legion listened, but the heat at the back of his neck was turning into a rhythmic pulse, and at times it was hard for him to even stay focused.
"So I got angry," Speed continued, clenching his teeth. "I got tired of being treated like a child. I took Cable's device and opened a portal to the past. I just wanted to leave, to prove to them that I could take care of myself somewhere else."
"What happened to Cable's device?" the hero asked, trying to keep his voice steady.
Speed shrugged, avoiding the gaze of the man in the helmet.
"I erased the date and jumped through the portal," the boy admitted. "I left the device behind, in my time. I didn't want them to track me back."
Legion let out a long sigh, feeling the sweat run down his forehead. He brought a hand up to his head, pressing against the sides of the helmet, trying to ease the crushing sensation that wouldn't let him think clearly.
"So you took the portal, didn't take the device, and you were captured for two years," Legion summarized, speaking with deliberate slowness to keep his composure. "I need you to make one last effort, Tommy. Do you remember anything else? Faces? Names? Any specific place they took you before ending up in that lab? Anything that could serve as a lead."
The speedster frowned, squeezing his eyes shut as he tried to search his memory, but ended up shaking his head in frustration.
"Everything is… blurry," he admitted softly. "I know I talked. I know I talked a lot, but I don't remember with whom. There were many questions, one after another… and they ran tests on me somewhere closed off, dark. But after that, I only remember being in the capsule. Time just stopped making sense in there."
"And what do you know about Killgrave?" Legion asked, his voice growing a bit deeper without him even realizing it.
Speed hesitated for a second, lowering his gaze and nervously fidgeting with his fingers, avoiding eye contact with Legion's helmet. The silence stretched on a moment too long.
"Tommy," Legion said, using his name to force him to focus.
The boy squeezed his eyes shut, as if it hurt to admit what came next.
"In the future… there aren't many resistance groups left," he began, his voice barely audible. "There's the one my aunt leads, and some smaller ones scattered around. One of them, the most famous, is the one led by Killgrave."
Speed took a breath, curling in slightly on the bed.
"And I might have told them about him… his name, his… his powers. I couldn't help it, they kept asking and I just couldn't keep my mouth shut."
Legion couldn't take it anymore.
He felt the heat inside the suit become unbearable. He stood up abruptly, walking toward the wall in front of Speed, visually cornering the boy.
"Sir, listen," Sid's voice sounded in his ear again, more urgent. "Your physiology is—"
"Shut up," he growled under his breath, cutting her off cold.
Suddenly, a violent impulse surged through his arm.
Without thinking, he turned and slammed his fist into the wall behind him with devastating force. The sound was like a cannon blast, and the structure cracked visibly, fragments of plaster flying through the air.
On the other side of the wall, in the adjacent room, a shout full of rage could be heard.
"What the hell?! What the fuck is wrong with you lunatics?!" It was Hellion's voice, yelling furiously from his "room."
Speed jumped on the bed, shrinking back at the outburst.
Almost at the same time, the door flew open and Scott rushed in, his visor glowing.
"What happened?!" he asked, stopping short when he saw the destroyed wall and Legion with his fist still buried in it.
The young man froze for a moment, staring at the damage he had just caused. He slowly pulled his hand back and turned to Scott.
"Damn it… I'm sorry, Scott… really, again," he said hoarsely, bringing his other hand to his head. "I'm making a mess of everything."
He looked at Speed, who was still pale.
"It's just that… this thing is squeezing me too tight. It's killing me."
Sid tried to say something else, but Legion ignored her completely.
With trembling fingers, he input a command sequence on the panel on his arm.
Instantly, a metallic hiss echoed through the room, and the upper part of the helmet—the section covering his hair and the sides where his ears should be—retracted mechanically, folding back over the nape of his neck.
Legion let out a deep sigh of relief, feeling the cool air of the room against his skin.
"Ah… much better. Now I can actually think," he murmured, running a hand across his forehead.
However, when he looked up, he noticed the silence in the room.
Scott and Speed were staring at him, their expressions filled with confusion.
"What?" Legion asked, not understanding the reaction. "What's wrong?"
"You… you mentioned you were human, didn't you?" Scott asked, not taking his eyes off him.
Legion nodded, confused.
"Yes, I am. Why…?"
Speed raised a finger, pointing at Legion.
"Because last time I checked," the boy said, his voice shaky, "humans don't have animal ears."
"What are you talking about?" Legion frowned.
At that moment, Sid finally intervened.
She deployed a holographic screen right in front of his face so he could see himself.
Legion froze when he saw his reflection. His hair was no longer the same. It was now a vibrant orange with black stripes, and right where his human ears should have been, two tiger ears poked out, furry and alert, twitching slightly at the sound of the ventilation.
"Fuck…"
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Hey, how's it going? Yes, I know. A chapter now? At this time of year? At this hour of the day? With this economy?… Yes.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it.
Now our protagonist will have to deal with certain physical and emotional changes that our beloved favorite feline comes with. Also, it seems Speed has been a very naughty boy, and because of his antics, some very bad people now have sensitive information. We discovered why Killgrave hasn't been able to be located. Interesting stuff.
I wonder what will happen in the future?
As always, thank you very much for your support and your comments.
See you in the next one.
A little kiss :)