Date: Tue, 09 May 2006 12:54:48 -0400
From: Dusty Hansen <dustyh75@hotmail.com>
Subject: Newest Ultimate X-Man

Obligatory warnings and disclaimers:

1) If reading this is in any way illegal where you are or at your age, or
you don't want to read about male/male relationships, go away. You shouldn't
be here.

2) The X-Men and any related characters are property of Marvel Comics,
trademarked and registered and copyrighted and all that. I'm using them
without permission.

For those who read the comics and worry about such things, this story takes
place in the (much simpler and easier to follow) Ultimate X-Men universe,
right around issue 54. If you don't want to dig out your copy, the team at
that time is Jean Grey, Cyclops, Iceman, Kitty Pryde, Nightcrawler,
Collossus, Angel, and Dazzler.

Comments can be sent to "dustyh75@hotmail.com"

Thanks.

***

Seth stumbled blindly down the alley, trying to outrun the mob behind him.
It was really hard to make an escape through a strange neighborhood at
night, in the rain, with one eye already swollen shut from the punch in the
face he'd taken at the diner.  He also couldn't run very fast with the pain
in his side, where one of the guys had kicked him when the punch to the face
dropped him to the floor.  He wasn't really sure, but it felt kind of like
his ribs could be broken on that side, and every time he breathed in
something dug painfully at him.

He could have tried breathing shallowly for a while, but it was hard to
control your breathing when you were running as fast as you could to get
away from the group of guys behind you.

"Mutie!  Your ass is mine!"

It was an accident, like it always was.  He'd been having them since junior
high.  He'd tried to control it, but that didn't always work, and his
parents didn't want the stigma of a mutant child, no matter what the media
said, especially not on top of having a gay son.  Some things were just too
much for some people, and they'd made it clear that they'd rather not have a
son at all.  Since then, he'd tried to take care of himself, tried to blend
in, but it was hard when he kept having these little incidents, and
accidentally hurting people.

"You might as well stop running!"

Maybe he should.  It might be easier.

All he'd wanted to do was pay for dinner.  He'd had a quiet meal, sitting in
the back of the diner, his bag on the seat next to him in the booth.  The
bag was lost now, everything he still owned in it, but he didn't have time
to regret that right now.  Maybe later, if he was still alive, if the guys
from the diner didn't catch him.  He'd watched them during dinner, wary,
trying not to be noticed by them or by anyone, really.  There was a group of
four of them, frat guys, big jock types with the beginnings of beer bellies,
crashing in a diner late at night on their way home from drinking, full of
themselves and on top of the world.  They'd flirted with the waitress,
braying loudly as they tried to find excuses to paw her or make her bend
over the table, and they seemed like the kind of guys Seth always wanted to
avoid, the kind who didn't like fags and liked to use their fists.

They didn't like mutants, either, it turned out.  He hadn't had an incident
in over a week, but when the waitress tried to take the check, reaching out
for the money even as he tried to put it on the table, her fingers had
touched his hand.  That's all it took, that little touch, and she was down.
He hadn't meant to hurt her, but the guys at the next table didn't care.
Even as Seth panicked, jumping out of the booth, trying to get away, they'd
grabbed him, one punching him in the face and the other kicking him before
they realized that their friend, the puncher, was on the floor, too.  In
their surprise, they paused for a second, and Seth ran.

"You better get the fuck back—"

Their voices cut off behind him, but he didn't look back.  He had to keep
running, get some distance, before they caught up or he ran out of breath or
someone called the cops.  It was only a matter of time.

BAMF!

Seth jerked to a stop, staggering, lurching away from the sudden flash and
puff of smoke that appeared in front of him, dazzling in the darkness and
the rain.  He had a second to wonder what that horrible sulfur and rotten
eggs smell was (Did they throw something? A bomb? What the hell?) before he
saw the glowing yellow eyes in the shadow, and realized that there was
someone there, some... thing?

"Wait, please," it hissed, the shadowy face revealing a mouth full of fangs,
reaching for him.

"No!  Ahhhhh!" Seth screamed, trying to backpedal, his feet skidding on the
wet sidewalk.  The monster reached for him, one weird, three fingered hand
grabbing his wrist, and Seth felt his power flair up again, too scared to
even try to control it.

"Unh!" the monster yelped, jerking away from him to land with a crash
against a garbage can, twitching.  Seth caught a flash of yellow and
realized the monster was wearing clothes, some sort of strange costume, but
a noise to his right caught his attention.

"Kurt!"

Seth turned and saw another monster, a boy his size made of ice, charging
toward him, sliding along the sidewalk on a glistening sheet of clear ice.
Seth knew he should recognize him, but it was all happening too fast, and
the boy's hands were balled up into fists, swinging toward him.  Seth threw
up an arm, trying to block, his heart racing as the pain in his side
overwhelmed him.

"You just made a big mista-"

The boy's words cut off as his fist touched Seth's arm and he, like his
friend, jerked backward, gurgling an inarticulate cry as he fell.  The
feedback from the two touches, so close to each other, dropped Seth to his
knees between the two strange boys, and the world seemed to spin around him.
  His head was throbbing now, black waves rolling along the sides of his
vision, everything narrowing to a tunnel.  He knew who these people were,
could almost place them.  He'd seen them on television.

"Stop, please," a soft voice said.  The alley was lighting up in front of
him, and he was dimly aware of a girl, a pretty red haired girl who seemed
to be on fire, but not burning.  The air around her danced with flames,
lighting up her strange black and yellow outfit, but the fire looked more
like wings than anything else.

"I didn't mean to," Seth whispered, feeling weaker and weaker with every
second.  "I'm so sorry."

"It's ok," she said, reaching out, the flames following her arms.  "I've got
you."

"Don't," he said, slumping forward, falling. "Don't touch."

"I don't have to," she said, and he felt the flames close around him as he
blacked out.

***

When he opened his eyes, he was standing on a lawn in front of a large,
brick building.  He should have called it a house, but it was bigger, much
bigger.  Looking around, he saw a gate, a driveway, beautiful grounds, but
it all seemed empty.  It looked familiar, like the uniforms he had seen on
the strangers, but he still wasn't quite getting it.  How did he get here,
and where was everybody?

"Seth.  Seth Rand.  You're safe here."

He turned, and the red haired girl was standing next to him on the lawn, a
light breeze ruffling her short hair.  She smiled at him, green eyes
sparkling, and he suddenly realized.

"You're X-Men.  I saw you in a magazine, and on the news," he said, smiling
as she nodded at him.  "You're mutants.  You're like me."

"I'm Jean Grey, and this is our institute.  Our headmaster, Professor
Xavier, has sensed you on and off for a couple of weeks, and we've been
trying to find you to see if we can help."

"You can't help me," he said bitterly, looking away.  He realized that he
could see out of both eyes, and that his side didn't hurt anymore either.
What was happening?  "How did we get here?"

"We're not really here," Jean answered.  "We're really on a jet, and you're
unconscious.  We're inside my mind right now because the professor and I
thought it would help calm you down if we chatted a little before you woke
up.  We think being calm helps you control your gift."

Seth laughed bitterly.

"Gift?  You have a gift.  You and all your friends, you have all these
wonderful amazing powers.  Me, all I do is hurt people."

"That's not true," Jean said, shaking her head.  "Do you understand how your
power works?"

Seth shrugged.  He had to admit that he didn't, really.

"People touch me sometimes, and I, well, I hurt them.  Sometimes they pass
out, sometimes they have seizures, sometimes they start crying.  I don't
know why, and I can't really always make it not happen.  I don't mean to do
it, but it just, you know."

"I know," Jean said, patting his shoulder.  They were walking across the
lawn, and the sun was shining, but there weren't really any sounds or
noises, no birds or animals.  "Bobby and Kurt got a pretty good idea of it,
too."

She smiled when she said it, taking a little of the sting out, but Seth
immediately felt guilty, and then felt even guiltier when he realized he
hadn't asked about them.

"Are they ok?  I didn't mean to do it.  They just, they scared me, and I was
so afraid, and then they touched me, like the woman in the diner, and I
just, I'm sorry I hurt your friends."

He looked away, and jumped a little as she laced her fingers through his.

"It's ok.  We're not really touching," she said, shrugging.  "And they're
fine.  You caught them a little off guard, but they could use that every
once in a while.  Keeps them on their toes."

Seth smiled a little, too.  She was so relaxed about all of this, and he
felt himself starting to calm down.

"Why was that guy," the name Bobby popped into his head "Bobby trying to
punch me, anyway?  I thought you guys were coming to help me."

"He just got a little excited when he saw Kurt pass out.  Like I said,
they're fine now, and it helped me and the professor understand your powers
better."

"What's to understand?" Seth asked, shaking his head.  This was a pointless
discussion.  All he did was hurt people, and that wasn't the kind of power
that anyone wanted.  He'd never be able to touch anyone without wondering if
this time he'd hurt them, too.

"For starters, you do more than hurt people," she said matter of factly.
Seth glanced at her, surprised.  "I'm reading your mind a little to talk
like this, but don't worry.  It's just on the surface.  I'm not digging
around in there.  Anyway, so far you've only used your power when you're
upset, right?  Like tonight in the diner, you were nervous and unsettled,
and when the waitress brushed your hand, that's when it flared.  Same thing
with Kurt and Bobby.  If those diner guys had caught up with you, instead of
me convincing them to beat up each other instead, you would have done it to
them, too."

"That's still all me hurting people."

"Because it's all defensive.  The professor isn't really sure what to call
your power, but we figured out how it works when you used it so many times
while I was nearby.  You have the ability to make other people feel things
when you touch them.  You can cause pain, pleasure, or both.  You just
haven't realized it because you've only used it defensively, when you're
upset.  For now we're calling it tactile empathy, but we think it has
potential for more than just emotions.  We think that, with a little
training and some practice, you'll be able to control it and to fine tune
it, and maybe to use it to make people feel physical sensations, too."

"And then what?" Seth asked.  It all sounded good, but then what was he
supposed to do?

"That's up to you," Jean answered.

The two of them sat for a minute on the fake lawn, fake sun beaming down on
them.

"What happens now?" Seth asked.

"Now I'm going to let you go to sleep," Jean answered.  "We gave you a
sedative when we got you on the jet, and when we get back to the mansion
we're going to take you to the infirmary so that we can clean up your eye
and take a look at your ribs.  They're not broken, by the way, just bruised.
  We'll let you sleep through all that, and when you wake up in the morning,
you can meet everybody for real.  What do you think?"

Seth was quiet for a moment.  He'd only had his gift for a few months, but
he was already tired of running.  If Jean and this professor were right,
then it wasn't really a curse, and he wouldn't have to be an outcast.  If
they were right, and he could learn how to control it, he could maybe have a
normal life, a job, get some friends, maybe even a boyfriend.  If they were
right, maybe someday everything would be ok.

"Give us a chance?" Jean asked, waiting.

"Sure," Seth answered, smiling.  Jean's grin mirrored his as she patted him
gently on the head.

"Good.  Now get some sleep."

Everything around him started to go dark again, and Seth gave himself up to
it.  It felt so good to finally rest.

***

Later that night, Scott Summers, the team leader codenamed Cyclops, heard a
noise coming from the infirmary, a soft gasp that sounded like pain.  He
knew that the new kid, Seth, was in there sleeping, and wondered if he'd
woken up or maybe rolled over onto his bruised ribs and hurt himself by
accident.  The professor had said to let him sleep, and that he would move
into a room tomorrow, but Scott figured it wouldn't hurt to check on him
even though he was hooked to monitors.  A friendly, human face would
reassure him in a strange place, even if it was wearing dark red glasses.

Scott was intrigued by Seth, mainly because all he knew about him was based
on his teammates reactions.  The professor had briefed them all on Seth's
ability while they gathered in the infirmary, standing around the gurney
over his slim body as the professor examined him and assessed his injuries.
Jean already seemed to like him, explaining that they had "talked" on the
plane while she was piloting it home.  She'd lifted Seth onboard with her
telekinesis, her power protecting her from his.  Kurt seemed a little
chagrined, agreeing that he shouldn't have startled him by teleporting out
of nowhere and grabbing him in the middle of an alley.

"Ja, my appearance can be a little unsettling," he'd sighed, smiling.  His
blue face, covered with an invisibly light layer of blue fur, gleamed when
he smiled and the light hit it differently, but with his yellow eyes,
pointed ears, fangs, and pointed tail, he could be very scary to some
people.  It wasn't the way they usually approached people, and Kurt agreed
that he should have known better.  He described the sensation of Seth's
power as being locked in a vice, like his own grip on Seth's arm had been
multiplied by a thousand and his whole body had been squeezed at once,
knocking him out.

Bobby, on the other hand, was pissed.  While he grudgingly admitted that
Seth had been defending himself, especially since Bobby was trying to punch
him for knocking down Kurt, he was taking it personally and being pretty
immature about it, especially since he said it felt like he got punched by a
hundred different fists, over and over until he collapsed.  Scott knew that
Bobby was more pissed at himself, and already blaming it on the new kid
instead, but he'd still have to watch that and address it if it got worse.
When Seth woke up, he might win Bobby over, but Bobby had to give him a
chance.  They'd been such a mess as a team lately, anyway, that the last
thing they needed was more infighting.

The only light in the infirmary when Scott entered was from the glow of the
monitors and displays, but it was enough to tell that Seth seemed to be
asleep.  Scott walked over quietly, wanting to double check before he went
back to bed to try, again, to get some sleep.

"Please," Seth whispered quietly, and Scott paused.  Was he awake after all?

"Seth?"  No answer, so Scott stepped closer.

Seth lay on his back in the medical gurney, his short blond hair looking
almost white in the low light.  His eyes were closed, and the sheet had
fallen down to his waist, his bare chest and abs gleaming softly in the low
light.  He was slim, with a runner's body, kind of like Scott's rather than
Logan's squat musculature or Peter's bulk.  Seth's clothes had been filthy,
and Jean decided they should go ahead and strip him down to his boxers and
wash everything before he woke up in the morning.  Scott smiled, remembering
Kitty's giggle at seeing Seth's boxers decorated with tiny yellow happy
faces before the professor silenced her with a stern glance.

Seth was still asleep, and obviously dreaming about something from the way
he was muttering and shifting in the bed.  Scott had no idea what it was,
but Jean had cautioned them all that he needed rest and that they should
leave him undisturbed until he woke up on his own in the morning.
Remembering that, Scott reached down to grab the sheet and pull it back up,
more or less tucking in their new arrival before he left for the night, but
he gasped and froze in place as his fingertips brushed Seth's side.

Skin to skin.

The contact needed to activate Seth's power froze Scott in place.  Jean and
the professor had made it sound like Seth needed to be conscious to use his
power, but they hadn't really tested him yet.  Now it looked like they
wouldn't need to, but that was Scott's last clear thought before a wave of
sensations crashed over his body.  He gasped, unable to move, as Seth's
power flowed through him.

Fingertips ran under Scott's t-shirt, tracing his lightly haired pecs.  They
caressed the curves of his chest as another sensation, the feeling of a
soft, wet mouth, began to nip at the side of Scott's neck.  The hands slid
all over his torso, probing, seeking, rubbing up and down his abs even as
another set of hands slid up and down his lean thighs.  Moaning softly,
Scott's legs slid open, his knees shaking, as the hands moved up his inner
thighs rubbing higher and higher.  At the same time, the hands on his chest
circled his nipples, teasing them as they stiffened into firm points, and
Scott gasped again as he felt the phantom fingertips pinch his nips lightly,
rolling them away from the hard planes of his chest.

Scott's head fell back as he gasped, eyes closed, the hands sliding
everywhere now.  They kneaded his shoulders, working over the back of his
neck even as they ran up and down his arms and another set slid down his
back to grasp the firm cheeks of his ass, squeezing gently.  It was like he
wasn't wearing clothes at all, and a thousand hands were touching him,
joined suddenly by mouths.  A wet tongue ran across his collarbone even as
teeth gently nipped at his earlobe.  Another mouth fastened itself over one
of his hard nipples, the point of an invisible tongue flicking the stiff tip
over and over as another tongue slid into Scott's mouth, probing, gently but
passionately invading him.

Scott's whole body was open to the phantom caresses now, and waves of
pleasure coursed through him.  He wasn't a virgin by any means, not with a
girlfriend like Jean, but this was different.  This was like being attacked
by ten or twenty lovers at once, lovers who knew where and how to touch and
twist and pull.  Scott's thick cock throbbed as he felt a pair of hands
jacking the shaft in tandem, fingers tightly wrapped around it, bumping the
thick rim of his cockhead on the upstrokes.  Another hand caressed the head,
the palm circling it over and over as another hand hefted his balls,
squeezing them lightly and tugging them away from his body, coaxing a hot
load from his tight sack.

Scott's body was on fire.  A mouth continued sucking at his neck, fastened
over the pulse, a nose nuzzling under his jawbone.  Fingers continued to
pinch and twist one of his nipples as another mouth nursed the other,
sucking and tonguing it over and over.  Another mouth was buried in his
armpit now, sucking at it.  Hands caressed his calves, fingernails scratched
the inside of his thighs, hands squeezed his asscheeks tighter, gripping
them and pulling them forward as his throbbing cock sank into a warm, tight
mouth.  His gasps were smothered by the mouth fastened over his, tongue
ravaging him, sucking at his own.  Catlike, a tongue flickered over his abs,
circling his navel, while another slid deftly through his slit, scooping out
the thick flow of precum before it traced the rim of his spongy cockhead.
Hands clawed at his back, and his whole body tensed as a phantom digit slid
between his cheeks to press against his tight asshole, pushing and rubbing,
coaxing its way inside as the hands in front of him jacked his shaft and
that talented mouth slurped and sucked and nursed on his cockhead.  The
tongue in Scott's mouth was suddenly replaced by something thicker, harder,
and he felt it spreading his lips open even as another cock slid into his
ass.

"Oh, God!" Scott gasped, his whole body locking up as he finally shot,
spewing his hot load into the mouth in front of him.

And then he was back in the infirmary, his hand still holding the sheet as
it jerked back from Seth's torso.  He stumbled, almost falling, as he
realized that the front of his shorts were filled with sticky wetness.
Dropping the sheet onto Seth's still sleeping form, he glanced at the clock.
  One second had passed.  That was impossible.  He'd felt all of that, felt
himself driven right over the edge of pleasure, in one second?  The proof
was soaking the front of his shorts, and he stared down at Seth in
disbelief.  If his unconscious, sleeping mind was capable of that, what
would happen when he was really trying?  He needed to talk to the professor
about this, first thing in the morning.  The professor didn't need to know
everything, but they wouldn't be able to help Seth if they didn't have all
the information.

As he hurriedly left the infirmary for a shower, praying he wouldn't run
into any of his teammates or, even worse, Jean, he thought about what he
wasn't going to tell the professor.  Those hadn't been any hands or mouths.
That had been Seth touching him, and if Seth wanted to do that to another
guy, then he must be gay.  The professor didn't need to know that, at least
from Scott.  The professor also didn't need to know that, even though he'd
been straight all his life, Scott had never been that turned on.

***

The end for now.