Revelations (Magneto)

[lorna]

Magneto's Office

She was positive she was going to regret this.

The letter in Lorna's hand had been read and reread numerous times in the last week, the contents thereof completely memorized by now and it already had a worn, handled look to it. Ever since she'd stumbled across it in the box she'd brought back from home, she'd been an emotional wreck.

If not for everything else that seemed to be happening in her life, she might have let it take her over completely. As it was, she'd run the gamut of emotions, everything from crying to raging, grateful that the Danger Room could take the full brunt of her powers and still survive for the next person. It was likely the only reason she hadn't gone insane yet.

The letter had been in depth, more so then she ever would have thought. She hadn't even noticed it at first because it had been tucked away in a photo album and it wasn't until she'd taken the time to see the pictures that had been buried therein, did she even see it. The envelope had simply had her name on the outside.

As she approached the office door, she opened it one more time and scanned the contents again. Like it had every other time before, her stomach clenched and her jaw tightened.

Dearest Lorna,

I feel really silly writing this but Sarah and Paul have insisted on it for whatever reason. They also believe that it's best I leave you in their care while I am on my quest. I don't want to, you are still so new, so tiny and so dependent on me for everything. However, it is important that I find your father and let him know about this, about you. He is going to be so happy and proud.

Your father...what a lovely man. I can't wait for you to meet Magnus. He's different, like you. No, he wasn't born with your beautiful green hair but I think you are going to be a mutant like he is. I haven't told your aunt and uncle this, though. They believe he was a man that I had a one night stand with while on holiday but once they meet him, they will see. We have a lovely relationship that lasted much longer then one night and he is so wonderful even if I haven't seen him in nearly eight months.

So my quest...I am going to find him. I had to return home after holiday, to continue my education, having no idea that I was expecting you. Once I found out, your aunt and uncle convinced me that I needed to take care of having you before I took off to search for Magnus. So I complied, believing he'd write like he had promise. Something must have happened and I have been worried for I have not heard from him.

I am going to start in Germany and go from there. I will be home with him in no time but just in case, this is my heartfelt letter to you, my little darling. You will never see this, I am sure but it does appease your aunt and uncle. They are good people, my brother more patient then most men and they will care for you in my absence.

Until we reunite, my precious girl,

I love you.

Lorna had done her research, had asked questions of people who had known Magneto, Erik as he was known now, for a long time. I had been verified that he had indeed once gone by the name of Magnus. The similarities were too much and she had to know, if only for her own sanity. Where she went from there, she had no idea. Reaching his door, Lorna knocked once, knowing he was in there. She could feel him, her own powers attracted to him like opposite ends of a magnet.

“Magneto, It's Lorna Dane. I...I need to speak with you, please,” she called out. Their last conversation hadn't ended very well and hopefully he wasn't going to be holding that against her, but all the same, her breath caught in her chest as she waited his reply.

[magneto]

Magneto had been reading all afternoon, enjoying the calm that for so many years he had not had. Sitting in a comfortable chair in his hands a book title. "King Lear. Shakespeare. " How many times he had reads that book for life. Maybe 20 times. He took the glass of whiskey he had filled and drank a small sip, feeling the heat in the throat.

He had the whole afternoon off, that day was not going to bear more children and teenagers with hormones riots and more as he was so close to Valentine's Day. This will be unbearable. He decided to be locked all day in his office. Thought he was going to be alone, that nobody would visit it. The truth is those students still were afraid of him. But no. Someone knocked on his door.

The blue orbs of his eyes were lifted from the book, he heard the voice, the voice of Miss Dane. He sighed deeply, closed the book and went to the door and he opened it without hesitation when he heard that she wanted to talk to him.

"Miss Dane. A pleasure to see you dear today. Enters please. I see you a little worried " Magneto Smiled softly opening the door for her.

[lorna]

She didn't have to wait long, could hear him moving within the room once she announced she needed to speak with him. It was good thing, too, because her fight or flight instincts had kicked in and she was so tempted to just turn on her heel and walk away.

The door opened and she was greeted with a smile. Lorna vaguely wondered how long that smile would last once she finished telling him what she thought. She half expected to be thrown out of the office, to be told that she was just trying to make things up because from what she'd heard from others, he hadn't cared too much for his other children. Why would he want one more?

Lorna walked in but couldn't find a smile within her to return so she replied with a soft voice. “Thank you,” as she walked through the door.

She allowed her eyes to glance around the office. He hadn't been there long and therefore didn't have all the homey items in his office like Charles did. While the Professor's office was immaculate, it was also decorated to fit the man's tastes and it had various knicknacks in it that he'd likely collected from students over the years. It wasn't hard to feel comfortable there. This office lacked the familiarity that came from disuse.

“I am,” she finally admitted when he mentioned that she was worried. “Sort of. I need to ask you a couple of things and to be perfectly frank, I'm scared of the answers.”

Lorna had decided to be candid with the man. After all, she'd never gotten any answers before from people by being coy and unassuming. Maybe her forthrightness came from him? She didn't know anything about her mother short of what she looked like to compare herself to.

Turning to face him completely, she dove right on in at the deep end. “Have you ever gone by the name Magnus and do you remember a woman named Suzanna Dane?”

[magneto]

Erik closed the door when she entered his office that smelled of wood and snuff. He had been smoking all day while reading this book and enjoyed a good whiskey. His office was filled with shelves full of books, incredibly tidy. You could hear a small set of small metal balls that hit each other without them having any kind of grip. It was he who made those areas of metal to move, hitting each other.

"Please sit down. " Erik offered to the girl to the chair for her to sit down. He faced it. "What's what worries you?. You have fear of my answers. First I must know the questions, Miss Dane. " He smiled slightly as he dropped his broad back on the seat while he took his hands around her flat stomach. But his thin face was deathly pale when he heard her questions. Pale, uncomfortable nervously. He moved on the seat before answering. "Many years ago I did not call me Magnus, Miss Dane. I met a woman named Suzanna, many years ago, long ago. But that is what you want to know?"

[lorna]

Although she felt more like pacing, Lorna accepted the seat when it was offered to her. She sat down, crossed one leg over the other but her back was straight. It was a position that screamed just how uncomfortable she was even being in that room with him. If the man himself didn't make her nervous, she had no doubt that his answers would. And she was just a tiny bit frightened as to what he'd say to her. Or possibly even do to her.

She nodded as he suggested that before he could make her fear his answers, she had to ask the questions. Of course he was right and she tended to prattle a bit when nervous. The letter laid in her hand still, the fingers of both hands clasped together tightly and on her knee. The letter was getting rather crumpled from being so abused.

She watched his face grown pale and decidedly nervous as she asked her two first questions. He shifted and the air in the room grew tenser, especially upon his reply. She had been right. Lorna knew she wasn't going to like any of his answers.

With a deep breath, her own face paling slightly, she continued, stubbornly forging ahead. “I was adopted as a very young baby. My mother had placed me with her brother and his wife while she went in search of my father who didn't know I had been born. Not too long after her plane took off, it was struck down by a freak lightning storm and crashed. No one on board survived. Suzanna was my mother,” she told him, looking at him.

Then she looked away, almost as if she was unable to bear the next few sentences and they came from her in a rather heavy tone. “I didn't know any of this until recently. My aunt and uncle raised me as their own child. However, when the revelations did arise, they gave me a box with some of Suzanna's things in it. Inside that box, I found this letter to me from my mother,” she was looking at her hands and the letter now as she spoke.

Finally, green eyes lifted to encounter his steely blue ones and she leaned forward to lay the letter on the desk that separated them. Pushing it slightly toward him, she let go and leaned back before continuing. “Recently, someone told me that you were my father. I didn't believe him. At least, not until I found this. Now I don't know what to believe,” she told him, looking at him once again.