Fatal Trouble : Act 2

Steel had managed to stop him. The Michael-enhanced boy had defeated the monster Irene had created of him and then defeated his essence in the MAMA. He hadn't tried to defend himself, only lifted his precious Nemuriri and prepared for death. A fitting end to the monster he had become.

Only, it hadn't been the end. Holy had risen up from the depths of Tegral, summoned by the Ancient he had so callously slain, the MAMA itself rising to defend The Planet and its human dependants. As his own life force had dwindled away, seeking to enter that swirling mass of pure Michael in the manner of all dying things, a voice had called to pull him from the light. A cry of denial, an endless scream of rage and grief and despair, and the part of him that had survived Irene's machinations had responded.

Instead of forgiveness and the peace that came with it, he had found himself in this night-black null, trapped by his own burning desire, still tethered to the alien bitch he had so stupidly accepted as his mother. Though weakened, Irene had had enough power to make one more bid for The Planet. She had reached out to the young ones, the three remnants created by Harland, hidden deep in the depths of a classified Babble laboratory. Their lives, an inglorious chain of torturous indignities, had opened them to the horror they had also came to call 'Mother'.

Children, made over in Xander's own image by a conscious-less madman, desperate for an emotional link in a world that couldn't possibly accept them, they responded to that call with all the fervor of religious zealots. Three brothers, born of different mothers, infused with his own warped cells, gifted with abilities far beyond human. Leon had been the first, a corporeal manifestation of Xander's physical strength, well-muscled and surprisingly emotional in way he himself had never been. The second had been Yujin, a slim, graceful young man, his face and form more reminiscent of his 'Father's', the epitome of allure, Xander's long-suppressed sexuality hidden behind the deceptively tranquil façade that had once been his own refuge.

But the third. . .Xander winced as he thought of the youngest remnant, the boy who'd had the misfortune to inherit his madness. Ricky had been physically small, petite but muscular, with a swaggering walk that belied the churning mass of self-doubt that writhed within. He had been delicate and childlike, a pretty china doll with the temperament of a shrew, spoiled and pampered by the brothers who adored him, their unquestionable love unable to fill the gaping void inside of him. Only one man had the power to do that, and Xander would always be surprised by who Tegral had chosen.

In the end, that strange, impossible love hadn't been enough. Ricky had managed to trigger Reunion, and Irene had once more used his own form to summon Meteor. Calvin Steel had stopped him-them-from destroying The Planet, this time interrupting the silent incantation before it could be completed, but Ricky had been the one to pay the price for his 'mother's' ambitions. Left broken and battered once Irene had withdrawn, he had died in Steel's arms, a tragic end to an equally tragic life. His brothers had shortly followed, killed when they attempted to avenge their beloved baby.

Steel's had survived only because of his ties to the Ancient, but he had never recovered. Xander had been granted glimpses of the world he had helped create, a place of loneliness and despair, and there were none more desolate than Tegral's chosen hero. Steel hid it well, smiling for the sake of his friends and family, forcing himself to be a part of their lives once again, when all he truly wanted was the release of death.

Tegral, of course, refused to grant such a request. She still had need of her 'Golden Weapon', a Michael-enhanced human whose body carried the cells of its greatest enemy. Were Irene to ever rise again, Steel would be called to combat her. She must have other, separate plans for Raphael, one which he in his exile was not privy to. No matter, Xander told himself firmly. Raphael was alive, and he would find him.

Xander shook himself back to awareness, his body still trapped in the void of endless nothing, but not for much longer. He closed his eyes in concentration and drew on his own innate abilities. There was nothing on Tegral that would stop him, nothing that could keep him from the heart that had been so recently revived. The power he called on was one of the many 'gifts' that he had born with, an endowment bestowed upon him by the Irene cells he would never be rid of. His tall, deceptively slender form began to flicker in the darkness, each glimmer accompanied by a flash of bright white light, the power which filled the darkness around him enough to rival that of his newly awakened lover.

With an ease born not of arrogance but of confidence in his own abilities, Xander teleported out of the nothingness which had contained him for so long. In an instant he was gone, leaving nothing but the lingering traces of his astonishingly strong will, and the enraged lament of an abandoned mother.