HEAVY IS THE HEAD: Part One, SINISTER LEGACY Fallout

[astonishing_xmods]

WHO: The Students and Faculty of the Xavier Institute
WHAT: Charity work in District X, but things are getting bad again
WHERE: District X
WHEN: Thanksgiving Weekend
WARNING(S): Violence, language, etc

So this was Christmas, and War was Not Over. The soup lines, this time, were alongside official Vaccine Centers, cures to the Legacy Virus being handed out alongside plates of hot food for the needy. Once more, winter was bleak in the world of mutants living in forced squalor. Attitudes were not particularly bright. People were no longer dying in the streets from illness, but were conditions really any better? War with Genosha was imminent. The National Guard was already standing post around the community, enforcing curfews, treating the area now more than ever like an internment community. Xavier's students were allowed to move around freely, but only with special ID badges that marked them as such. It was the same all over the country.

This wasn't Mutant Registration... it somehow felt worse. And it didn't help that the Mutant Liberation Front was still very active in the area, and many of them entirely blamed the X-Men for Renko's apparent 'death'. There were antagonistic forces around them, and desperate faces looking at them for some kind of hope. And if they couldn't get it there...

There were whispers, a lot of them, about fleeing to Genosha. About joining the MLF and working alongside Genosha for 'true' mutant liberation. About kickstarting this war on local soil. And really...

... was there anything the X-Men could do to stop it? Should they stop it?

Comments

[soundandfurry]

"... I used to think a lot like that," Kagerou's voice softened a bit, turning her eyes to the crowd, as well as the soldiers.

"But what ended up almost killing me wasn't human, but a mutant."

[long_live_the_queen]

The horned mutant blinked, turning backwards partway away from the truck. She didn't look directly at Kagerou, but she was still paying attention.

"When did that happen?"

[soundandfurry]

"When the guns at school went out of control. A mutant had done that, the Sinister guy. When he got everyone sick. When... when Mr. Wagner died...," Kagerou sighed, looking out to the crowd.

"A mutant did all that..."

[long_live_the_queen]

"Oh. Him." Ugh. Such...familiar arrogance.

"So what would you do instead? Kill everyone? Even I think that's a bad idea."

She turned away, facing straight ahead again.

"No. There are more humans that hate us than us. More humans that want to kill us, more humans that would kill other humans just for being friends with us--" Kaede's voice cracked, interrupting her usual angry rant.

It had been...some time since she tripped over that memory. If it was almost anyone else listening, she might have lashed out. Instead, Kaede just went very still, as if she could disappear if she stayed motionless long enough.