Family Ties

Family Ties Chapter Thirty Two (NC-17)

Disclaimers Apply

 

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST
WOMAN ALIVE ™, Prophetic Muse and Hamster Witch, it’s not just the bees in
Germany. The ones here are stalking me, too!
InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink make me giddy because they
archive. J ProPhile gets more dancing muses for his
smuttiness and Jubilee, Tex and Ramsey get muse kibble. J Readers/Reviewers: The armadillos are back in Texas now and angry as all get out…
The Killer Kitties ™ are on guard…

 

 

 



Banshee let
out a long breath and rolled his head from side to side, popping his neck. “What do you think? About ten more minutes?”

“According
to the chrono, yeah.” Forge raised a
brow at the Irishman and asked, “What’re you so anxious for? You’ve been to the city tons of times.”

“Yeah,
but…” He trailed off. They were sent to look for Jubilee, the
Professor not angry but rather worried at her non appearance the night before. Lilly had called and assured him they were
safe and sound, just had been delayed while visiting the city and would be home
in the morning. Professor Xavier waited
until seven in the morning before sending Banshee and Forge out to the last
location Jubilee’s powers had been detectedneglneglected store in
Chinatown.

“But what?”

“But
nothing.” Banshee returned his
attention to the readouts in front of him and frowned. “You have any kids, Forge?”

“Not that I
know of.” Forge banked gently eastward
and gave Banshee another curious glance.
“What brought that up?”

“Nothing. Just being nosy.” His laugh sounded forced, even to his own ears. “Got a plan of action yet?”

Forge
blinked with conversational whiplash.
“Well, I was thinking we go in, see if she’s there, and if she’s not, we
find her.”

“Ah. Not one for frills are you?” Banshee eyed
the monitors again. “Five minutes to
go. Where’s the landing site?”

“You’ll
see…”

Something about the way Forge
grinned made Banshee distinctly uneasy.
“I’d rather not, I think.”

“You’re such a pessimist.”

“Only when you’re flying. My head’s still sore from that last landing
of yours.”

“I was trying to miss the duck.”

“There was no duck.”

“Duck.”

“There wasn’t…”

“No, duck!” Forge reached over and
forced Banshee’s head down as bumped to a rough landing, skidding down a
deserted road, the only thing keeping either of them from bodily harm being the
seat restraints and the fact both had their heads down.

When the last ping sounded, Banshee
grated out, “Pilot’s license or no, I’m flying home.”

“I was trying to miss a goose.”

“I will kick your ass back to
Bayville…”

 

“Well. This is certainly discouraging.”

“Looks like all Hell broke loose in
here,” Forge muttered as they searched the abandoned storefront for signs of Jubilee,
aside from the lady who owned the shop next door claiming someone set off
fireworks in the old store the night before.
“Jubes did some damage.”

“She weren’t alone,” Banshee
muttered, squatting to pick up a card, the Ace of Spades. “Remy was with her.”

“Maybe not,” Forge chanced. “Maybe someone had a poker game in here or
something. Nah, that sounds dumb even
to me…” He pld thd the card from Banshee’s fingers and frowned at it. “I don’t know what I’m looking for.”

“This,” Banshee replied, picking up
a rather disreputable looking gag from the floor.

“Someone is into some serious
S&M here…”

“I don’t think that’s what it was
used for. What was Jamie wearing last
time you saw him?”

“No idea…jeans and a t-shirt?”

“They all wear jeans and a
t-shirt,” Banshee sighed. “Luvaduck
this isn’t going well.” He tossed a
tennis shoe to Forge, who caught it readily and tucked the card inside it. “That looks like it belongs to a small man
or a teenager. I’m willing to bet it’s
Jamie’s.”

“Fuck.”

“Exactly.” The two men sighed and looked around the
storefront once more. “Well, we start
canvassing the neighborhood.”

“Unless the neighborhood comes to
us…” Forge pointed past his companion
towards the open door, where three women and one man stood, staring at them
with varying levels of annoyance and interest.
“You seen a teenage girl with short, spiky, pink-tipped hair around
here?”

“Who wants to know?” one of the
women asked.

“Her guardian.” Forge said shortly.

The man replied, “I saw her last
night. Looked drunk, leaning on some
long-haired girl. They’re the ones who
set off all the fire works.”

“Oh really?” Banshee murmured. “What did they leave in?”

“Uh, a car?” one of the women said
helpfully.

“What kind?” Forge grouut. ut.

“A blue one?”

“This,” Banshee sighed, “is going
to take a while…”

 

 

Bobby groaned at the morning’s
first light seeping between his curtains.
“It’s too early.”

“It’s after nine,” St John said
with a tinge of humor.

Okay, not the first light. More like the second or third… “What’d
you get me up for?”
“Visitors.” He pulled the covers off of his boyfriend
and added, “And don’t even say you aren’t going to see them or so help me I’ll
give you a hot foot you’ll never forget!”

“It’s them?” he hissed as if
they would overhear him. “What’re they
doing here?”

“Selling magazine
subscriptions. What do you think?”

“I’m not going down there!” he said
adamantly, shaking his head like a petulant child. “You can’t make me,” he added for good measure.

“Looks like someone isn’t going to
get any milk and cookies after nap time if he keeps up the attitude.” St John tossed him a relatively clean
shirt. “Come on. They’re down there with the Professor and
Beast. Do you really want to keep them
waiting?”

Bobby felt his jaw drop. “Beast? Massive blue furry Beast is talking
to my parents?”
“Served them tea and coffee
and complimented your mother on her taste in jewelry and everything. Though I think he scared your father when he
mentioned that his cough sounded croupy.”

“Fuck…”

“Maybe later. Right now, your parents are waiting.” St John dodged a tossed shoe and darted out
of Bobby’s room before the other sneaker followed.

 

“Um…”

“Ah, Bobby. We’ve been waiting for you.” The Professor motioned genially for the
young man to enter and, shifting Lucas to his other knee, smiled kindly. “Your parents were just telling me about you
wanting to be a minister.”

“Actually,” he said softly, more
afraid than he wanted to let on, “I don’t.
That was…um…something I just said.”

“Mmm.” Professor Xavier slid a sideways glance at Bobby’s parents and
his smile tightened. “Well, I believe
you have a lot to talk about.” He
nodded at Beast, who preceded him from the room, Lucas cooing happily in
anticipation of yet another clean shirt.

“Bobby,” his mother began, but cut herself off and
looked away, pressing her fingers over her lips to stem a sob.

“Let me start,” Bobby said,
suddenly angry. “You want nothing to do
with me, I’m an aberration of nature, a freak, a blight on humanity, you’re
going to pray for me and this is a punishment from God.”

His father shifted
uncomfortably. “That was my first
reaction, yes.”

“Thanks,” Bobby snarlturnturning on
his heel to leave.

“Bobby we love you!” his mother
cried suddenly. She was on her feet and
behind him with her hand on his shoulder before he could form a response. “We love you and…and we don’t want to lose
you.”

“We did some talking last night,
son,” his father sighed. “We talked a
lot about what we believe, about what we taught you and then we talked about
you. About this whole mutant thing and
being…being…”

“Gay?” Bobby said tersely. “A homo?
Queer?”

“Yes,” his mother sighed. “About you liking other boys. We’re scared, Bobby, but…We talked to your Professor
Xavier and that doctor fellow and they explained mutations to us, how it’s
nothing we did and…”

“And we’re sworn to secrecy,” his
father said dryly as if he were let in on a great joke.

“And,” his mother said,
making him turn to look at you, “we decided something important. We don’t understand you, we don’t necessarily
like the ideayou you being gay but,” she paused and looked askance at her
husband, who nodded. “But we love you
too much to let someone else tell us that we shouldn’t.”

“I think—we think—that maybe it’s
time we found another Church to go to.”

Bobby blinked in stunned
amazement. “What? We’ve gone there
since I was five!”

His father sighed again. “It’s time for a change, we think. Somewhere with more progressive views…”

“It’s the twenty first century,”
his mother said wryly. “Times cing…ing…”

“I think I need to sit down,” Bobby
murmured, heading for the settee. “I
don’t know what to say!”

“Maybe apologize?” his mother
suggested.

“For what?”

“For thinking that we’d abandon
you, that we wouldn’t even try to understand…”

“But after all those things dad
said about...fags…”

“Homosexuals,” his father corrected
primly, making Bobby snort. “It’s not
going to happen over night, but I can learn to deal with these ideas… If my own
son is gay, and he’s not some sex crazed maniac grabbing little boys off the
street and snorting coke in public bathrooms…” he trailed off. “You’re not, are you?”

“I don’t grab boys or snort coke,
Dad.” He decided St John would beg to
differ on the sex crazed aspect so wisely left that out. “Where do we go from here?”

His parents exchanged glances. “We’re not sure,” his mother admitted, “but
we’ll get there together.”

“How After School Special of you,”
Bobby said, smiling “No “Now, where’s this…friend…of
yours? We think we need another
introduction…”