"How are you feeling, Anna? Not too hot or too cold?"
Anna stared at the smooth wood-paneled ceiling of the library. She could feel the heat of the fireplace licking the souls of her feet, and the reassuring weight of the blanket pressing down on the length of her body. The couch was like a little nest made of cushions and on the coffee table to her right was a sweating bottle of water she hadn't cracked into just yet.
"I'm okay. Tired. Honestly, I could just about fall asleep here."
"Understandable, but it would be helpful if you tried to keep conscious." Anna heard the whining electric whistle from Xavier's wheelchair as he moved around the couch and popped open the door to the hallway. "Excellent. I'm glad you were able to come."
Anna couldn't see much from her tucked-in position on the couch, but she could just hear the carpeted floor flatten beneath treading feet. A moment later Jean's blazing red hair illuminated by the fire came into view as she sat on the coffee table. "Hello, Anna. How are you?"
Anna blinked, "Confused." She craned her head in the direction she thought Xavier was. "Hey, I thought you said this was just going to be you and me."
"Jean will be acting as our intermediary." Xavier came into view at Jean's flank. "She will be watching over us both and step in if things were to get out of control in any way."
"Do you… anticipate that happening?"
"No," Xavier dawned a pair of gloves he had kept in the pocket of his slacks. "I've done this a number of times and never had an incident. Still, it doesn't hurt to be prepared." He looked at Jean and she began to shed her oversized turquoise earrings. "It's important that you remember, Anna, that everything we are about to do only exists in your mind. What you see and feel isn't real, and should you want to end prematurely, you need only ask."
Anna swallowed, "alright."
Xavier nodded at Jean and then rolled his chair till he was positioned facing the armrest of the couch where Anna's head lay. "Jean, are you ready?"
Jean crossed her legs on the coffee table, took her time on a long inhale, then exhaled slowly through her mouth. "Ready, professor."
"Anna, I'm going to rest my fingers on your temples. When I do, I'd like you to close your eyes and bring that dream to mind."
Anna did as ordered, and when she opened her eyes next she was surrounded by an inky blackness laid heavy with fog. When she looked up she was the sky above a canvas of glistening stars. "My god." When she spoke, a cloud of hot air escaped her lips and she recognized the icy tingle of winter air goose-pimple her skin. She took a step forward and heard something crunch beneath her boot. When she glanced down, she found she was standing on a long wide bridge covered in snow glazed over with ice. Long ruts in the form of tire tracks and been pressed down into the older dirty compacted snow.
Anna felt her hand wrap around her throat. "Oh my god, I'm here. This is the place."
"Remember," declared Xavier's almighty voice around her. "None of this is real. This is just a construct in your mind. What you see and feel here is just in your imagination."
She walked to the edge of the bridge and leaned over the side. A dark gushing river was spilling over great jagged rocks just beneath.
"Anna, pull the woman from your dream to the forefront of your mind."
Without having to even think about it, Anna was the woman running across the bridge again. The difference was this time, she could feel how heavy and wet the jacket was she was wearing. She spotted the strange patches on the upper arms that looked to belong to some sort of military outfit. A long black skirt was fighting against her legs and ankles as she ran and her red hair felt matted against her head. Then, there was of course her baby pressed against her chest. She could feel his little hands pressing against her skin and the heat radiating from his head under her coat.
"Very good, Anna. What is it you're feeling?"
"Fear. Terror. I - I have to get away!"
"Breathe, Anna, breathe. Remember this is all imaginary. Do you know who you are?"
"I was betrayed.
"Betrayed by who?"
"Oh, god. Oh god, I can hear the jeeps!"
"Anna, slow. Breathe. Who is it that betrayed you?"
"The doctor. The doctor said he could fix everything! He lied! I have to get Kurt out of here whatever it takes! I'll kill if I have to!"
"Do you know where you are?"
"It's so cold during this time of year. So damn cold. Horrible drafty cold castle."
"You're in a castle. What's the castle's name, Anna?"
"I don't know. I don't know. I don't know, I have to leave!" Anna was halfway through the bridge now when the spotlights hit her, blinding her. "No! No!" From all around hands grabbed her when… then the world suddenly stopped.
"Breathe, Anna. You're doing well, but you need to slow down. Stop and tell me what you see."
The world around her completely stopped. Anna took a moment to breathe as instructed and found her shoulders fell out of place of the woman's. She turned her head and her body followed. She found herself physically separating from the woman like a ghost from a statue. "Oh, man." As she walked, she stepped through outreached hands and pointed rifles. "This must be how Kitty feels."
"Focus, please. What do you see?"
Anna looked at the men pulling at the woman. They were all dressed in black with long silver stripes on the right side of their uniforms. They looked like soldiers in combat attire complete with rifles and bulletproof vests. On their upper arms, they had similar military patches as the woman did on her jacket.
She walked down the bridge a little further and found the great spotlights were mounted to a couple of parked jeeps with two machine gunners sitting in the back. "She was never going to get out of here."
"Xavier, the woman's face!"
Anna looked around, "Jean?"
"I've… patched Jean through to help sort through this mess. Anna, take a look at the woman."
Anna walked through the group of men and stopped short when she caught a head-on look at who Anna had been this whole time in the dream. "… Mom?"
The hood of the jacket was drawn back, it was Mystique whose long red hair was being wrenched back by one of the thugs, and it was Mystique was desperately clinging to who Anna now knew was an infant Kurt. "What? How?" She slowly reached forward and tried to brush the falling sleet off of her mother's distressed face, but her hand slipped through the frozen woman's brow and skin like a specter.
"Can you see Kurt?"
Her mother's coat was in the middle of being wrenched open by a trooper, and inside Anna spotted Mystique clinging to a loosely bundled blue-skinned baby with an outstretched hand featuring 3 fingers.
"It's Kurt…" Jean's voice softly echoed around Anna.
Anna gently wrapped her forefinger and thumb around the tiny hand. "Kurt." She looked back into the face of her distressed mother. "What does this mean?"
"It's difficult to say what the situation is here for certain." Said Xavier, his voice without any loss of bravado. "But it seems a strong possibility you and Mr. Wagner share a relation through Mystique."
"Kurt's my… brother?"
"It looks like that's what this dream would have you believe, yes."
The scene before Anna suddenly fast-forwarded back up to speed and she watched as the men viciously attacked her mother with their fists and groping hands. Mystique backed away towards the edge of the bridge, throwing elbows and kicking, all while keeping Kurt as close to her chest as she could. However, her back foot slipped on a chunk of icy snow, her back smashed into the stone railing, and she finally lost her grip on Kurt who went plummeting off the side.
"My baby! My baby boy! Kurt!"
Anna found herself at the railing next to her mother, looking down into the inky abyss that was the torrent below. Kurt was gone. Heart pounding, she looked to the side and found her Mother frozen in time, her face affixed in a permanent scream.
"Do you remember anything after this?" There was a pause. "Anna?"
Anna blinked but kept staring at her mother. "No. This is always where it ends."
"I see. Jean? Is there anything more you wish to see?"
"… no, professor."
"Understood. Anna, I'm going to bring you out now. Again, try to relax. Focus on your breath and-"
When Anna next opened her eyes she was gasping for air and her forehead was slick with sweat. She shot up and gripped the side of the couch with an iron fist. When Jean touched her on the shoulder, Anna just about bolted out of her skin.
"You're okay, Anna. You're safe. You did great."
Anna looked back at the other girl with wide eyes. "Kurt. Kurt, I - I watched him fall off the bridge."
"In a dream, you did, yes." Xavier's chair whistled and he pulled into view next to Jean. "As I said before, it was all in your imagination. It felt very real, but I assure you, no one was ever in any danger at any point."
"But it wasn't a dream, was it?" Anna panted. "It was a memory."
Jean leaned forward and held Anna's gloved hand. "What are you talking about? This has been a reoccurring dream, hasn't it?"
Anna stared into Xavier's eyes. "Yeah, it has. A dream I've had since the mountain. A dream I've had since I fought my Mom and touched her. Now I found out I was my Mom in the dream the whole time." She shook her head. "That wasn't just a dream. But I'm pretty sure you already knew that, didn't you professor?"
Xavier carefully shed his gloves and rested them in a neat pile on his lap. "You did remarkably well, Anna. I can see now how traumatizing that dream was. I'm very sorry it's something you've been afflicted with for so long."
"You knew something about this, didn't you?" Anna got closer to Xavier's face, "Didn't you!"
Jean gently pressed a hand on Anna's chest. "Anna, please -"
"After witnessing your abilities and their effects on you in the Danger Room, yes I had my suspicions. However, I can assure you, I had no idea Kurt was your relation."
"Bull!"
"Anna! He's just trying to help!"
"You read people's minds! You know everything! You could have pulled this out of our subconscious or something! We don't see you in the Danger Room! We don't know what you can do!"
Xavier threaded his fingers together in his lap, looked at her, and waited.
"I know who Logan is, I know who Ororo is, I know everyone else who lives in this stupid mansion. I don't know who you are, Mr. Charles Xavier and I think you like it that way, don't you? You look at us, watch us, keep your little notes on us. Still, we know nothing about you! But you get to poke around in our heads all you want!" Anna panted, her eyes stinging.
"May I speak now?" Xavier said, his eyebrows level and his shoulders relaxed.
Anna felt her nose flair and her lip snarl, but no more words fell from her lip.
"Believe me or don't, I don't go around reading minds. Even if I wanted to, I can't access the subconscious without significant work. The truth is, I respect other's privacy, and reading minds all day is frankly exhausting and uninteresting." He grabbed his gloves and stuffed them in his pocket. "If you want to know about me, then know this. I work much and I am tired, Anna. I'm sorry I can't give you sage advice like Ororo or old war stories like Logan. I contribute towards our cause in a very different way and perhaps one day you'll be able to understand. I don't have a vendetta against you, or Kurt, or anyone in this house. I suppose you'll just have to take my word on that."
Xavier sucked in a breath and sat straight. "This dream won't bother you anymore. It may come up occasionally, but it will be far less vivid and will likely fade from your memory if you let it." His eyes flicked to Jean, then back to Anna. "If that will be all, I'm going to retire for the evening. Goodnight to you both." With its typical electric whine, the wheelchair spun and scooted out the door and out of sight.