The trip had taken a few hours, but eventually they made it to Magneto’s current hideout. The place looked like an abandoned warehouse with boarded up windows and boxes strewn about the door. The building had graffiti on it and there were cracks in the bricks that made up the walls. Magneto slowly brought Ranma and Hotaru down to ground level. The trip had taken longer than expected, but traveling in a ‘magnetic bubble’ with two curious children while answering all their questions was time consuming.
Ranma had been quite apprehensive at first about the mode of transport, but once they were moving and it proved to be safe, he felt that he could trust the helmeted man a little more. The young boy had asked questions about how he did it and if he could learn. Magneto was starting to wonder again why he was doing this when the young girl had awoken and reacted quite negatively to her current situation, in other words, she screamed repeatedly to be let down. He had lowered them down, if only to get her to stop yelling. When the boy had explained to the girl that it was OK and that the man in the strange outfit was taking them somewhere safe, than she had calmed down enough for them to continue.
Hotaru then had embraced Ranma, seeking comfort in the arms of here big brother. After a half hour of this, she starting asking what had happened, often stopping to ask how they were flying or what that was or why he had a helmet or… Magneto couldn’t be happier that the trip was over. The one time during the trip that he had prepared to snap at the young girl, she had been looking at him with such sorrow filled eyes, even when she tried to put on a calm face, eyes that reminded him of a young boy in a camp who had lost his family… He did not need to be reminded of that.
Blast, he was getting sentimental again. He should never have let himself work with the X-Men, teaching the New Mutants. Dealing with Charles must have affected him more than he was willing to admit. But he had to remain strong, if he was to save all the mutants on earth he would need to be strong.
“So those creatures that I destroyed, they were sent by your father.” Magneto had the full story now, or at least as far as these two understood it.
“Yes, something must have happened to papa in that lab explosion.” Hotaru shuddered as she remembered how her papa was different after the accident. If her big brother wasn’t there at the moment, she wasn’t sure what she’d do.
“Don’t worry Hotaru-sama, I’ll protect you.” Ranma was still trying to figure out the man in the strange clothing, but so far he was helping and seemed to be powerful, staying with him would be good for the queen/his sister.
“Well, you can stay here with me until I finish building my new, er, home.” Magneto wasn’t sure how to explain a space station to the children and he hoped they wouldn’t ask about the ‘home’ he had mentioned.
“Er, excuse me Magneto-san, but how is this a place to stay?” Hotaru wasn’t sure that this would be a nice place to live in, especially after seeing a rat run by.
The Master of Magnetism couldn’t help but smirk at that. He just led them inside, the girl following his lead while the boy kept an eye out for danger. The inside of the warehouse was not in much better shape than the outside, there was still graffiti and boxes all over the place, only the middle of the floor seemed clean of any debris. ‘Let’s see how they react to this’ and with that, he used his powers to open a secret door leading under the floor of the warehouse.
The children were quite surprised and Ranma quickly got in front of Hotaru, to protect her from anything that might jump out at them. When the coast seemed clear and he saw the amusement on the face of the man that had brought them here, Ranma decided that the man was more powerful than he had originally thought. Hotaru on the other hand was starting to get excited, maybe this man was a superhero and this was his secret hideout.
Once Magneto was sure the two children had calmed down, he led them down into the secret basement. The place was not as high tech as most of his hideouts, but this was more of a place to get away and relax. It had a computer room, a kitchen, a bedroom, bathroom and a lavish living room with a television and a large couch that looked very comfortable to Ranma and Hotaru.
“You two may rest on the couch, I have to check something and then I will return.” With that, Magneto went into the computer room. Hotaru was the first to reach the couch, it was every bit as comfortable as she had imagined and after the day she had, she was sleeping in minutes. Ranma had arrived second and had came to the same conclusion as his sister. With the powerful man gone, he let himself relax slightly and laid down next to his sister, holding her protectively. He fell asleep shortly after Hotaru.
When the mutant also known as Magnus returned to the living room, he looked at the couch and once again asked himself why he was doing this, as he got a blanket and covered the siblings. He knew they were different, the scan he had run on them from the computer room proved that much. While the boy, Ranma, seemed to be a mutant of some kind, it was the girl that had piqued his curiosity. The scan that the computer could do was not the most thorough or exact, but it definitely said that Hotaru was not a mutant. It did find a strange energy signature, but it was unsure of what it was.
With every thing that had gone on, Magneto looked once again on the sleeping form of Hotaru.
“Just what kind of power are you hiding, and why were those trying to capture you. Hmm, it seems that I have gotten myself a little mystery to solve and perhaps, something more.” With that, the Master of Magnetism retired for the night. Questions on his mind that currently had no answers.
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(Posted Thu, 09 Oct 2003 10:32)
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