3 Years Later
“Aren’t you ready yet?” Aiden asked, shifting his weight from one foot to another as he stared at his brother lounging in bed, flipping through a new edition of X-Men.
“We’re not going to school today,” he announced, and an uncharacteristic flash of annoyance swept through Aiden.
“Why not?” he asked. “Are you sick?”
He couldn’t imagine a world where they would be so sick that they would want to stay home with their unpredictable mother.
“No,” Xander replied. “I just don’t feel like it.”
Aiden eyed him uncertainly. It didn’t seem like a valid excuse.
“We have to go,” Aiden replied, his eyes scanning the room for his twin’s knapsack. “I have a history project due and if it’s late – “
“It won’t be late if there’s a snow day,” Xander answered smoothly, making no effort to shift his body off the bed.
Aiden gaped at him as he realized what Xander wanted him to do.
“No!” Aiden said firmly. “Not today! I can’t keep doing – “
“Sure you can,” Xander replied, lowering his voice as he gazed over Aiden’s shoulder and into the hallway to ensure they were not being heard. “It’s never stopped you before.”
Aiden peered at his twin, chewing on the insides of his cheeks.
Xander seemed to be asking a lot of him lately, and while Aiden had always been happy to indulge his twin’s whims, it was getting to be too much.
“We’re overusing our abilities,” Aiden muttered, but even as he said it, he knew that Xander rarely used his powers, at least not in any way which Aiden was aware.
It was possible that Xander projected into anyone he pleased, but it was never at Aiden’s request.
He expects me to control the weather at his command. It’s not fair.
“What’s the point of having these abilities if we don’t use them?” his brother retorted. “You don’t see the Flash rationing his powers, do you?”
Aiden pushed aside the unfamiliar bitterness he was feeling and yanked on Xander’s arm.
“We are not superheroes,” Aiden reminded him. “We’re in the fifth grade and we have to get to school.”
Xander grunted.
“You never look at the big picture, do you?” he snapped. “We don’t need school. We can get anything we want if we use our talents the right way.”
“And creating a snow day so you can stick your nose in a comic all day is the right way?” Aiden replied dryly. “I’m not doing it. Not today.”
“Think of Sarah,” Xander said, and Aiden raised a dark eyebrow, worry flooding him at the mention of his delicate blonde sister.
The twins knew they were adopted but Aiden could not imagine loving a full-sibling any more than he did their angel-faced baby sister.
“What about her?”
Xander shook his head mournfully.
“You really haven’t noticed, have you?” he asked sadly, and Aiden felt a glimmer of guilt. He had been consumed with his extra curricular activities lately, trying to keep away from his parents’ wrath.
When Charles wasn’t home, the rampage came from Lisa who took out all her frustrations and inadequacies on the children.
Has something happened to Sarah that I didn’t know about?
It seemed unlikely; Sarah came to him with all her woes. That’s what big brothers were for, after all.
“Noticed what?” he demanded. “What happened?”
“She’s just not happy,” Xander explained and Aiden felt his brow knit together. Their sister was only two years younger. It seemed odd that he wouldn’t have noticed anything.
“She’s always tired, and pale. And I think she’s losing weight,” Xander argued. “She could use a day to rest.”
Xander shrugged again and turned his eyes back to the magazine.
“But if you don’t care, that’s fine,” he guilted further. “I’ll take care of her.”
That was exactly the right button to push. Aiden always felt inadequate when it came to protecting their sister since his ability to control the weather couldn’t influence their abusive parents whatsoever. The protection of siblings always fell to Xander to take care of.
Xander looked up and grinned as if reading his brother’s thoughts.
“You better hurry up and decide,” Xander told him casually. “The buses are going to start leaving for pick up soon.”
Swallowing, Aiden nodded, summoning his abilities to bring forth another storm, quickly and furiously.
As the winds picked up outside the windows, he heard Xander chuckle.
“Would you look at that!” he called, laughingly. “There’s a storm coming in!”
Aiden shook his head, unsure if he was doing the right thing.
Even at the tender age of eleven, he knew there were repercussions to toying with the weather, but Xander always managed to convince him to go against his better judgement.
Xander and I have to be more careful about how we use our abilities, he thought, dropping his backpack onto the floor beside his bed. But a day off school won’t hurt anyone.
He perched on the edge of his mattress and shook his head solemnly.
“Don’t look so glum! We get a day off school!” Xander chuckled, turning back to his comic book.
But even then, Aiden had been filled with the feeling that something terrible was about to happen.
If only he had known just how terrible. If only he had known that Cassidy, his own classmate, would be stuck at her bus stop in the freak storm he had created. A mere three blocks from her home, from safety, unable to make it back before she succumbed to the blinding blizzard that popped up out of nowhere.
6 Years Later
Sarah covered her mouth to stifle a sob and seventeen-year old Aiden glanced back at her warningly.
“Don’t move,” he instructed her, slipping back into the hallway, keeping her body close to his so she would not panic. “Stay right here until I get back. Be brave, Sarah. We just need to stay together as always. Everything will be fine, I promise.”
He offered her a reassuring smile and while Aiden felt as if it was more of a grimace, it seemed to placate his sister - at least temporarily.
“Okay, Aid,” she whispered.
Another crash followed the first and he flew into the kitchen where Xander was backed against the wall.
“What the hell!” Charles hissed furiously, his face a drunken mess of fury. “I knew you would be nothing but trouble from the first minute I laid eyes on you! No matter how much money they gave us, it wasn’t enough to take in your unruly ass!”
Xander tried to grin lazily but it didn’t reach his eyes as he shifted his gaze toward his twin. There was a fire in Xander’s expression which caused Aiden’s body to stiffen. Don’t do it, Xander!
“Get the fuck out of my house!” Charles roared, raising his fist menacingly. “I have no use for a criminal under my roof! Stealing from the neighbors! Next thing I know, you’ll be robbing banks and murdering people!”
Suddenly, Xander’s face went blank and Aiden’s stomach dropped as he realized what was happening.
Charles’ thoughts were forced out of his own body and Xander took over. But instead of simply knocking his father unconscious as he always did, the older twin directed Charles to do something he had never done before.
Charles spun abruptly and walked toward the counter, picking up a knife from the block. He stared at it for a long moment before raising it high, aiming the downward arc toward his abdomen.
“XANDER NO!” Aiden screamed as he recognized what his father was about to do under Xander’s control.
Charles froze, before turning his head to grin lazily at Aiden.
“Why not?” he asked. “He doesn’t deserve to live. Neither of them does.”
Aiden’s blood was ice in his veins as he watched his brother’s lazy smile slowly appear on his father’s face.
“You can’t do this,” he begged. “Think of Sarah. She’ll never recover from this.”
Charles/Xander laughed derisively. The display was terrifying when you knew that Charles’ psyche wasn’t present in his body at all. The laugh even sounded like Xander’s.
“I’m doing us all a favor,” he snapped. “The last thing we need is these assholes around. We can take care of Sarah.”
“We’ll all be sent into foster care,” Aiden tried to reason. “We’re not old enough to take care of Sarah. Come on, Xander. Just knock him out like always.”
Xander snorted.
“And just like always, he’ll get back up and do it all over again,” Xander growled. “Then what?”
“Then we’ll deal with it then,” he promised. “We’ve gotten this far together.”
“I’m going back to juvie tomorrow,” he reminded Aiden. “Who’s going to take care of you and Sarah – since you’ve conveniently forgotten how to use your abilities?”
Aiden bristled.
“Xander, I’ll protect Sarah,” he promised. “Another way. You can’t do this. You’re not a killer.”
But even as he said it, he wasn’t really sure how accurate his words were. Lately Xander seemed to push more and more boundaries. He was angry and resentful at the world and he acted on it by performing small felonies. And if that wasn’t bad enough, he seemed to take a certain amount of satisfaction when he was caught and his parents were told what had happened. Aiden couldn’t understand what made his brother do it.
Xander scoffed – through Charles’ body. I’ll never get used to that, Aiden thought.
“You’re weak! What happened to you?” the older twin demanded. “You used to care about Sarah and about me. Now you only care about yourself.”
“You’re the one who continues to get arrested,” Aiden retorted, an uncharacteristic anger mounting within him. “Our powers have brought nothing but trouble to us.”
“Speak for yourself,” Xander spat. “I’m offering us a way out of this. You sit by and allow this to happen over and over. He can kill himself and no one will be the wiser.”
“You’ll know! And so will I,” Aiden yelled, his face red with fury. “Stop and think about what you’re doing!”
They glared at one another for a moment and Charles raised the butcher knife again.
Aiden gaped as the blade came down, swiftly. Arcing through the air almost gracefully. In his panic, Aiden reached out to stop his brother from acting.
The knife stopped in mid-air, hovering, suspended, and Charles’ angry eyes pinned Aiden, his expression changing to one of shock.
“What are you doing? How are you doing that!” Xander gasped, his eyes swinging accusingly toward his twin. But Aiden didn’t have an answer. Somehow, he had managed to block his brother from stabbing Charles. Was he able to project now too? Since when? He had never shown any signs of having that ability before.
“How are you doing that?” Xander screeched, trying to fight him off. But there was no contest.
Easily, Aiden cast his brother back into his own body, the blade clattering to the kitchen floor as Charles gasped a deep breath into his chest. Xander stood gaping at him from his own body.
The twins stared at one another, neither fully understanding what had happened, but there was no time to discuss it.
Charles was lunging for Xander again.
Get him outside and do something! Or I swear to God, I will kill him. Xander screamed silently as he jumped out of Charles’ reach. But Aiden couldn’t do it.
After what had happened during the snowstorm that fateful day, Aiden could not bring himself to do it, to use his abilities.
Knock him unconscious! Aiden growled back. You don’t have to kill him. Just reclaim his body and do what you always do!
A chair flew over and Xander dodged another blow, but he still managed to give his brother a scathing look.
I am already responsible for one death, Xander. I’m not going to claim another life. Not when you can just knock him out.
Like a deranged monkey, Charles leapt onto the table and flew onto Xander’s back, as Aiden watched in horror. The noises emanating from Charles were unlike anything Aiden had ever heard and for the first time, he wondered if he had made a mistake in letting him live.
Aiden made the decision to act, his need to protect his brother overwhelming his hesitation to use his abilities. But his brother moved at precisely the same moment.
Xander spun, tossing his father into the far wall, stopping only to cast Aiden one last baleful look before he overtook Charles’ body again.
Suddenly, the older man fell forward onto his face, unconscious.
“Thanks, brother,” Xander hissed sarcastically when he was certain Charles was out. “I hope for your sake, that these two don’t kill Sarah while I’m locked up. If they do, it will be completely on you. You know I’m right.”
“They won’t!” Aiden retorted, horrified at the idea. “I won’t let anything happen to her.”
“You almost let him kill your flesh and blood, your fucking twin. I doubt you’ll give a shit if they do anything to Sarah.”
Xander did not give Aiden a chance to respond, spinning to rush from the house.
In his wake, Aiden stood, consumed by guilt and worry.
I would do anything to protect Sarah, he told himself.
But he could not get the image of his dead classmate out of his mind.