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chapter ten
I ALWAYS FEEL LIKE...
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CERES KNOWS SHE'S being watched. She can feel eyes on her at the strangest times—when she's picking out produce outside the bodega near her house, walking home from a shift at the café, even at the bank. Every time she gets that prickling sensation down her back, she tries to find the culprit, but it's like she's chasing air.

Not to mention she keeps thinking back to Frank and Annie from the bar. Something about their interaction scrapes down her spine like talons, raising alarm bells. Ceres has never been innately distrustful of people. Hell, look at how she trusted a witch and got cursed. But she's sure down to the marrow of her bones that something is not right.

Ilyas, of course, has his own opinions about this.

"Have you been taking LSD?" he asks, sprawled out on their sofa, sorting through his guitar pick collection. "That can make you pretty paranoid, you know."

Ceres glares at him. "I'm not on any drugs. You haven't noticed anything... off, have you?"

"What, you think it's something X-Men related?"

"We did just help them take out a massive Hellfire Club base and put several key members in the Raft."

Ilyas shakes his head, tossing a pick into the plastic container so it makes a clackclackclack as it hits the others. "Stalking isn't the Hellfire Club's style. They'd just ambush us on the street or break into our apartment. But aside from that attempted robbery at the parlor last week, everything's been fine."

"The what?" Ceres launches herself upright. She had been lounging in her chair as well, leaning her head back, but now every piece of her is rigid with alarm.

"Oh." Ilyas's eyes shift to look at her. His passive expression still hasn't changed; he may as well be chatting about the weather. "Did I not tell you about that?"

Ceres's eye twitches. Sometimes she wants to strangle him. Is it normal to wish violence on your best friend so often?

"Yeah, some guy tried to take our money while his friend was getting inked. Didn't work. He got caught. Police took him away. Happy ending for all."

She has a hard time believing it was so cut-and-dry. "Who caught him in the act?"

"Me. I stopped the inking process and launched a needle at him from across the room. Landed in his arm. He was screaming like I shot him."

That indifferent tone again. Ilyas is difficult to surprise, and it's even more impossible to deregulate his emotions, so as soon as he'd taken down that person, he'd probably gone right back to doing his job like nothing had happened. It had made him an excellent—if not incredibly annoying—part of the X-Men because you could always count on him to remain calm.

Ceres frowns. Ilyas's shop has never been the target of criminal activity before. He's not famous, but most seasoned customers know he's a mutant and word has since spread. Some people probably go to him so they can say they've been inked by a superhero.

A guitar pick hits her in the nose with a little plink.

"Stop it," Ilyas says. "Stop overthinking this. It was a really bad criminal who picked the wrong place to try and rob. Crime happens all the time here—not everything is some huge conspiracy."

Unconvinced, Ceres grabs the remote and switches on the television. Though she intends to mindlessly flip through the channels until she finds something suitable to watch, she's stopped in place by the newscast that appears on the screen.

"As the six-month anniversary of Midtown's brush with the extra-terrestrial passes, many citizens are left to wonder: where are the Avengers now, and will something like this happen again?"

"Hey, look, it's your boy toy." Ilyas points to the photo of Steve that appears on the screen after Tony Stark's.

Ceres rolls her eyes. Her mouth opens to fire off a rebuttal, but she freezes as more of the team's faces materialize. Everything inside of her screeches to a halt. Her words, her thoughts, even her very cells seem to cease movement as she gapes at the television.

"What?" Ilyas questions, noticing her expression. His confused gaze flickers from her widened eyes to the screen.

Without responding, she rockets to her feet and shoots toward her bedroom. Ceres seizes her laptop from her nightstand. By the time she reaches the living room again, she's already typing, balancing the computer on one arm until she sinks back into her chair and can put it safely in her lap.

First she goes to Google and downloads an image. Then she opens Photoshop. She selects the color replacement tool, makes the necessary adjustments, and—yes. Her suspicions are proven correct. But being right doesn't bring any relief. If anything, she just has more questions.

Back at the bar, she had noticed that Frank's skin was smudged with black as if he had dyed his hair. It makes sense now. Because Frank is originally a blond. Because Frank is not Frank at all... but rather Clint Francis Barton.

She's had an Avenger visiting her at both jobs. But while Steve was upfront about wanting to get to know her, Clint lied to her face. Not only did he use a fake name, but he also made up an entirely false backstory. He was undercover. But why? Was any part of their interactions real? Was 'Annie' even who she said she was?

These questions don't stop following her. They torment her dreams that night, make her anxious the following morning, and cause her coworkers to ask if she's all right.

Ceres doesn't tell Steve about her suspicions, but he notices that something is off anyway. She fabricates a lie about watching a scary movie that Ilyas won't stop teasing her about, and he keeps popping up at unfortunate times to frighten her. In reality, she wishes it were just Ilyas lurking in the corners of her vision. At least then she could hit him over the head and make him stop.

No, she doesn't want to bother Steve with something Ilyas considers to be trivial—a problem that doesn't even exist. So she goes to the person she trusts most in the entire world.

Ceres doesn't bother telling anyone about her visit before walking up the front steps of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, brushing right through the doorway she'd stopped and stared at a few months ago. Now, she has only one thing on her mind, and it's not nostalgia for the time she'd called this estate home. What she wants now is answers.

Alex Summers had been passing through the foyer as she'd opened the door, and when he sees her, he does a double take. His brow creases. "Ceres?"

He was around twenty when they first met, and now his once-golden hair is more grey than blond. His sharp features have begun to wrinkle and soften from the hands of time. But he's still as tall and thin as he's ever been, appearing more as a cool grandfather than the edgy kid he'd been when he helped found the X-Men.

"Hey," she says. Though she pulls him into a hug, she's distracted, and for once the increasingly fragile bones of her old friend don't weigh her heart down. "Where's Charles?"

Alex shrugs. "I dunno. It's the middle of the day, so classes are still going on. You could always ask him."

That's assuming he doesn't already know she's here. Though Ceres can block mind-readers, that doesn't mean she can prevent Jean or Charles from picking through the brains of anyone who might see her. Including Alex.

She sighs and closes her eyes, opening her subconscious up to Charles. Knock, knock.

He answers immediately, his presence enveloping her brain with the same warmth he exudes from his body, as familiar to her as the sound of his voice. Who's there?

I'm not trying to tell you a joke. I'm here. Are you free to talk?

Moments later, she's sitting in Charles's office, which is just as full of gleaming oak as the rest of the mansion. His bookshelves are stuffed to the brim with textbooks and encyclopedias dating back to his grandfather's time. She wonders if he's read them all.

"And what brings you here?" he asks, blowing on his steaming mug of tea. Sometimes he's so English it's infuriating. "Has Ilyas finally pushed you to the brink of madness?"

Ceres cuts right to the chase. "I think I'm being watched."

Instead of appearing alarmed, Charles merely pauses before setting his cup and saucer on his desk. He folds his hands in his lap. He's... smiling? Or at least he's trying not to, but his wise eyes are filled with amusement.

On the list of things she'd expected him to say, what comes out of his mouth was not one of them. "So you've figured it out, then."

"What?"

This hadn't felt like an X-Men thing. They don't follow people, tailing them like ghosts out of the corners of their eyes, filling them with paranoia. And if it was them, why not just say something to her? Why the dramatics?

"It's none of that," Charles assures her. Ceres realizes a moment later that her mind is still open, but she doesn't shut him out, instead letting her confusion wash over him. "The X-Men aren't following you."

"But it sounds like you know who is."

"I do."

Ceres sets her mouth in a frown, letting him see her displeasure at the way he's beating around the bush. He continues to stare at her with that same expression of mirth as the seconds pass.

She tilts her head to the side. Are you going to make me ask?

He sips his tea.

Damn you.

"Who is it?" Ceres finally questions.

After taking another sip, this one seemingly longer just to mess with her, Charles talks. "Several months ago, I was contacted by an intelligence agency. They wanted information on two of our former members."

"Me and Ilyas," she says.

Charles nods. "Yes. They wanted to know if you would be interested in leaving civilian life and joining their ranks. I said I thought you might. After I called you for the Hellfire Club mission, I knew neither of you were happy with sitting idly anymore."

"You said they could watch us?"

"They already were. They just wanted my opinion. And my information, of course."

"Who contacted you? Did you make a vow of secrecy or something?"

The corner of Charles's mouth twitches. "Nicholas Fury."

Ceres stares at him. "Is that supposed to mean anything to me?"

"He's the director of SHIELD, the agency that organized The Avengers."

Her stomach instantly plummets, her face falling slack. Thoughts swirl through her mind like a tornado before she can stop them. Before she knows it, her nails are digging into the arms of her chair to stabilize her before she can slump to the floor. They were already watching. Does that mean...?

Charles begins shaking his head before she can struggle to form words. He leans forward, resting his elbows on his desk. "No, Ceres. Not Steve. He wasn't a part of it. Your friendship is real."

His reassurance calms her, soothing her racing heartbeat back to its normal rhythm. Ceres releases a slow breath from her mouth. Her body had produced so much adrenaline in mere seconds that she can feel it still flooding her veins. If her friendship with Steve had been fabricated... If he'd only returned to the café earlier this year because it was his mission... She isn't sure what she would have done. Maybe her curse would've broken just so she could die from embarrassment at cracking her soul open to someone who was just doing their job.

"So now what?" she asks.

"I'm assuming Director Fury will contact you about joining SHIELD," Charles replies. He tilts his head to the side, regarding her thoughtfully. "What do you think? Would you want to?"

He could just read her mind and sift through all of the complicated, tangled strings in there, but she appreciates the fact that he doesn't. Instead, he allows her to sit with those complex thoughts and weave through them herself. The seconds tick by comfortably.

A break from the monotony of civilian life—something that she had desperately needed after thirty-something years of working with the X-Men, but has since grown tiresome. Leaving the jobs she's worked and starting a new routine. Getting new opportunities to break her curse.

When she's made her decision, she doesn't have to say anything, nor does Charles have to read her mind. He can see it plainly on her face.

He smiles.

________

a/n:

only 1 more part until CATWS starts! after that, the updates should come faster since i'll have a concrete storyline to follow. i just have a few more loose strings to tie up before it's time to jump into 2014!

thank you for reading! sorry this chapter was short

— kristyn

( word count: 2.2k )