(England, in October)

His body thought it was about three o'clock in the morning and long past time to go to sleep on a Saturday night. The sunlight, however, insisted that it was eight in the morning on Sunday and he should have slept on the plane because it was now a brand new day and if he slept now, he'd never get adjusted. I couldn't sleep on the plane, he glared back at the sun, I was too busy trying not to throw up. Unicorns were not meant to fly. If they had, they would have been born with wings. Apparently they also weren't meant to skip several timezones at once. The sun, shining brightly down, did not pity him at all.

It had sounded like a good idea at the time. The Royal Air Force Station that Maya wanted to visit was close to the airport they had arrived at; they could pick up the car they rented and stop by the RAF Kenley right away, because it was so close. Sebastian hadn't realized that he'd be so tired. Not that he was complaining. This was important to his wife, so it was important to him as well that they visit this place.

RAF Kenley seemed a lot like the air port they had just left. There were runways spider webbing out from a central building or cluster of buildings and there were planes parked here and there, with a few taking off or landing form time to time, ripping the sky apart with noise of their engines as they traveled so fast even the sound of their own engines couldn't keep up. The differences that Sebastian could see were the the base had much smaller airplanes and much tighter security. He hadn't thought any place could have tighter security than the airport that metal detected, x-rayed, and magic wanded everyone who walked through the doors. Until he got here, that was. Here unfriendly looking barbed wire coiled itself like a snake waiting to bite at the top of every fence. Angry yellow signs with electrical bolts warned that the barbed wire wasn't the only thing about the fences that would bite. Guard towers stood tall, guarding the perimeter at evenly spaced intervals.

Sebastian wasn't sure what they were looking for, but the fences probably weren't going to help in their quest. Maybe if they went up to the main gate, the nice army people would let them in? Excuse me, but my wife had a dream about this place and we were wondering if you'd let us in to have a look. Right. At least it was a nice autumn day out, so if all they could do was walk around the perimeter of the place it would be relatively pleasant. Relatively, because bed would be even more pleasant right now.

“What exactly are we looking for?”

Two little words were the bane of a free spirited air elemental. Pressurized cabin. They were sealed in. With the same air. With all those mouth breathers. With a little window that didn't open. Oh sure, take off was fun. The feeling of your stomach rising before the rest of you and that roller coaster jump at the end where everything begins to get small... that was fun.

But once they reached cruising altitude and once Maya had pried Sebastian's white knuckled fingers from the arm rest, there wasn't anything to do but wait in agonizing limbo until the flight attendants passed out the little cards everyone was meant to fill out for their visas. And really, would could sleep sitting upright?

Not Sebastian. Not Maya. Oh sure, she dozed off once or twice, but it wasn't restful in the least. And the air... it was just so stale.

The next night (or was that morning) wasn't much better. Stale air port. Stale hotel room. She was getting nervous about seeing Weather Island, as the inhabitants called it. Would it even be there? She had walked those halls a hundred-thousand times. She knew security codes and access codes. She knew that they wouldn't even be allowed on base as civilians without an escort or a CAC.

So what was the point really? If it never existed...

Maya tried not to toss too much. Sebastian didn't seem to be having a very restful night either. He looked quite ragged by the time the sun had come up, but at least by then Maya had tea waiting. She dozed off accidentally and got a bit of a horizontal nap in, but she would have to actually sleep later after her nerves and time zones had calmed.

The rental car, the driving... she didn't remember much. Her leg was bouncing out the anxiety that the rest of her body refused to admit. But she did remember the turn off. They circled the base as much as was feasible by access road, but it wasn't there. No building. No expansion. But... they didn't build it until after the Gulf Stream had gone down.

They parked the car and went on foot. No doubt the guards thought they were high risk and were watching closely.

“What exactly are we looking for?”

Maya stopped and looked back at the husband who was trailing behind, tired and confused. She was driven, but equally lost. She went back and took his hand. If nothing else it would keep them from getting separated. "I don't know... not exactly." She lead him further toward the empty plot. "If the Gulf Stream collapses, in three years they will begin construction on a new segment of this base. It will go here... but maybe it won't."

She rocked back a step to take in the whole scene for a moment. It really wouldn't. That was a life altering idea. "Haywire was stopped so... no mishaps that lead to a collapsed Gulf Stream. No collapsed Gulf Stream... no building. There would never be a need for everyone to get over the sapien/superior thing and work together to maintain livable conditions in Europe... because they're already livable." Talking it out made it seem more real... or less real. It was a future averted.

Sitting down seemed like the best option now. She took another step back and stepped on something. Something paper. It was... a flyer. A flyer advertising tryouts for the X-Force, a team that by all rights shouldn't have existed in this time since it was founded by CB cast off.

Maya rubbed the wrinkles out gently so that the weather worn paper wouldn't crumble in her hands when she unfolded the part with the map. "We need to go here." And she handed the paper to Sebastian.

The other future had been averted, and even if it hadn't, they were several years too early. The buildings Maya had lived in on the air base wouldn't exist for another three years even in the dream's time line. Now they might never exist at all. Maya took his hand, which helped ground him in the reality of here and now. It was a little bit sad that all the connections she had made to people here might never happen in the real world.

Was it selfish to be glad that the future in that dream would never come to pass? He was personally much happier in this time, forging a new life with the a lovely wife and without any wars to fight.

Maybe they could still find some of the good parts of the future and work towards those, like in the countries where humans and mutation had learned to cooperate or build the friendships that could have been and might still be if people were willing to track each other down across countries and through the years. That was why they were here, he thought. It was the people that were more important than the building.

“Maybe we're too late. Maybe anyone who was going to come here already,” his musings trailed off as he was distracted by the paper Maya had picked up. It was advertising tryouts for the X-force. “Isn't that...”

>>>"We need to go here."

Sebastian took the paper and studied carefully. It seemed real enough, but, “I thought this group wasn't suppose to exist yet.” Then again, things had changed. They couldn't expect anything to be the same the second time around, nor would Sebastian want it to be that way.

The map inside indicated a location that was not very far away from the airbase. “If you navigate, I'll drive.” That particular combination had gotten them fairly lost in the past, but this time they at least had a map to guide them.
--

A short time later, Sebastian pulled the car into a parking space in front of a rather tired looking old brick building. It had windows, but some of the ones in the upper story were boarded up. There had been a fire escape once, but only a few rusty pieces of it remained, near the top, as well as the faded markings that showed where it used to be. It all, it was one of the more respectable looking buildings in the area.

Sebastian double checked the address on the paper by leaning over to where it lay on Maya's knee. It matched the number on the building, but he still wasn't convinced.

“Does any of this look familiar?”

“Maybe we're too late. Maybe anyone who was going to come here already,” Ice ran through her veins. Sebastian had a way of doing that... even without his mutation. "I should have come right away..." But getting married had been a pleasant detour. If she had left for Europe the same day that she broke Sebastian's window, would she have ended up in his arms?

"This changing the future stuff is... confusing." She let Sebastian inspect the paper, but her fingers itched for the physical proof that there was merit to her dream.

“I thought this group wasn't suppose to exist yet.”

"It isn't." She let the full importance of the paper resound in those two words. Things had changed already. Sebastian being here was tangible proof. She assumed the role of navigator and for once, she knew exactly where she was going. Oh sure, a coffee shop was under a different name here and a warehouse wasn't nearly as rusted now as it would be 10 years from now, but it was the same path she'd traveled a million times over ghosted or not.

“Does any of this look familiar?”

"The entrance is actually on the side, but you can't go directly. That's a one way street. You can park here and we can walk or you can go down to... Classen, I think is the next east-bound street." In short. Yes. She might know this area better than people who actually had lived here.

They parked. Ghost brought the flyer with her as if it was the magic talisman that was making this real and not a dream. It felt strangely... right. Not odd like she had expected, but... real.

When they turned the corner there was one thing that was completely out of place. The windows had always had bars on them. It wasn't the safest part of town, after all, but there was an explosion of color attached to the bars. Papers, stuffed animas, silk flowers, notes mostly. A banner across the top stated something to the effect of "rid the world of haywire." That's right... she needed to tell them all that Haywire was gone. These people didn't know it was a future averted.

She saw her name once or twice and reached out to disentangle the papers.

[/color][/ul]
The messages were all much the same. Look me up if you are real and you get this. They listed their current information including age. What a difference ten years made! Sure, Max had acted 14, but to imagine up to seven 14 year olds with his personality...?

The door next to Ghost burst open with explosive force almost as if someone had kicked it open from the inside. Instinctively Ghost put her hand out in front of Sebastian. She would protect him since her powers were more active.

Luckily no protection was needed.

"Ghost! I thought that was your little white mop!" Gary scooped her up and squeezed her tight enough that her feet actually left the ground.

"Oof. Gary... your suffocating me."

"But the point is I can! You're so solid! And this is your real body? Not the fake? You look so young!" Somewhere in the stream of words he put the elemental back on her feet.

A blond woman cleared her throat and shifted out from behind her husband.

"M-Maggie? Gary that's--" Gary put his hand on Ghost's lips effectively cutting off her words. "My wife. Maggie, This is Ghost our team's air elemental. Who's your pal?"

Ghost actually had to look back at Sebastian before she remembered him. Her cheeks went pink. Ooops. She wasn't used to having a husband yet and in the future she certainly hadn't had one. "Gary, uh-Maggie, meet my husband, Sebastian."

"But you never... I thought if anyone, you'd marry the nerve guy."

She shrugged. "We changed it. Sebastian, more than me. Haywire is gone, Gary. The future is ours to make of it what we will." Ghost slipped her hand back into Sebastian's. She did feel a little guilty.

Maggie cleared her throat again. "It's just so odd. I feel left out every time you have these reunions. I wish I had shared your dream." She pouted in a cute way with her full lips. Ghost enjoyed seeing her future friend watch the movement. Maggie had died unexpectedly of cancer some days before Gary had initially founded the X-Force. They still had time... but it wasn't nearly long enough.

Maggie invited them all in for tea and as they shuffled in the door Ghost tugged on Sebastian's arm so that she could whisper in his ear. "Can you heal cancer? Maggie dies of a brain tumor in less than three years."

>>>"I should have come right away..."

Sebastian disagreed, but kept it to himself. He would have been rather lost without her this summer, struggling through mountains of papers by himself and one particular piece of paper that only she could have helped him deal with. They were already changing the future, he would prefer not to go back and change the past.

Maya navigated them to the address of the X-force head quarters with the ease of someone who had been there many times before. Sebastian locked the car, double checking to make sure that the little button on the key chain had indeed magically locked the door, and followed his wife around the corner towards the entrance and into some kind of memorial wall.

Memorial window, was a more accurate description. People from all over, who had never met each other except in a dream, had left each other notes and gifts and directions to their homes. From the looks of it, they had found the evidence that others had the same dream, even an ocean away. Sebastian felt a little lonely looking at all the letters. He had made his own friends in the future, too, but his memory of the dream wasn't as clear as his wife's. He knew he had run a school and had been friends with the teachers that worked there, but their faces had grown blurry so quickly upon waking and the scenes that he remembered the most vividly were the death, destruction, and chaos that the Haywire Plague had caused, and of trying to stop it and failing.

He tensed when the door slammed open, not liking being behind where he couldn't shield Maya from whatever harm might be coming. Luckily, it was excitement and not intent to harm that had caused such an explosive exit from the building. Never had he had a heartfelt reunion with a dream-friend like Maya and this man 'Gary' were having. He was glad for his wife, but a little left out. His hanging back while the two future friends hugged was mirrored by the blonde woman in the doorway. Sebastian bowed politely, tipping an invisible hat as he was introduced to each of them, which also served to hide his blush at the mention of the nerve guy. That would be their neighbor, Garrett, if he was not mistaken. A man that had a past and apparently at some point a future relationship with Maya, but as his wife so aptly put it, they had changed things.

And things were still changing. Organizations were founded early, others would never have need to exist. People sought each other out and met earlier than they would have, or they got to meet people they never would have had the chance to meet.

>>>"We changed it. Sebastian, more than me. Haywire is gone, Gary. The future is ours to make of it what we will."

“I, for one, am glad that things are a bit different. I'm glad that in this time we get the chance to meet.” Sebastian nodded to Maggie's invitation to tea and began to follow the other couple inside when Maya tugged on his sleeve.

His face fell at her question and he shook his head, “Not cancer. Nothing that is of the body's own creation.” How many times had he come across someone whose own body was killing itself? More times than he cared to count. He hadn't always known what the disease was called, but it was always the same terrible feeling of helplessness when he realized he couldn't help.

"If it comes up in conversation, could you neglect to mention your healing abilities? I don't want to compound their hurt."

To think that today was the first time that Ghost and Gary had met was preposterous. They sat across the table and talked of everything from the horrible food in the cafeteria that didn't yet exist to the group of misfits that had come and gone in the ranks of the X-Force. Gary had set up the headquarters early and it had naturally become a hub of those looking for the weather program that would never be.

He'd met so many of their mutual friends. It was good to hear of them.

After bringing out the tea and biscuits, Maggie tarried in the kitchen doorway. She wasn't stupid and she didn't care to hear the details of a life in which she was obviously missing. Anyone who had come to their home, to this place. They all looked at her like a ghost.

The fact that they knew her meant Gary had spoken of her. Often. Had shown her picture. But no more than that. They knew of her. They never knew her. Maggie noticed that Sebastian looked equally out of place. She slipped him an extra cookie and a smile.

"So what did you do? In the future? And now? What's New York like?"

“Best not to give false hope,” Sebastian quietly agreed to his wife's request to not mention the healing aspect of his ability. The look of disappointment was never pleasant to see one someone's face when they realized you couldn't actually do anything to help them.

Maya and Gary commenced catching up on like two old school mates at a class reunion, which left Sebastian and Maggie to chat with each other. Sebastian ate his extra cookie and answered her curiosity, quite glad to have someone to talk to while the two former (or future) X force members chatted.

>>>"So what did you do? In the future? And now? What's New York like?"

It was interesting to hear the British inflections to words again, Sebastian found himself slipping a little bit back into his old accent, forming a sort of hybrid between the American he had been listening to for nearly two years and the British version he had originally learned a long time ago.

“In the future I was the headmaster of a school for mutants and humans that taught students to coexist peacefully with each other and to bring peace to the rest of the world. As you may have gathered from all the stories you hear,” Sebastian gestured toward where their two spouses chatted, “we weren't entirely successful. It was too little, too late, I suppose.”

He ate his extra biscuit and sipped his tea before continuing, “In the real world, I work at a clinic.” Delete healing ability description here. “We serve both humans and mutants, trying to overcome some of the barriers society has built up. I suppose I am still trying to change the world a little at a time, it just turned out differently than it did in the dream.”

“As for living in New York, there is a lot more hustle and bustle than I am used to; I spent most of my life in far more tranquil places, but I wouldn't want to move anywhere else now that I've settled down there.”

Maggie listened attentively, apparently glad to have someone to distract her from the fact that she didn't know any of the people her husband had met in the future dream. Sebastian wondered if her husband had told her how much time she had left, or if she any hypotheses of her own as to why she wasn't a part of her husbands dream-future. He tried to imagine knowing that he would die in a certain amount of time; what would he do if his time were limited? Three years until cancer claims your brain. Ten years left before you disappear into thin air. Eighty years left until you die of old age. Would his life perhaps be more meaningful if it had a time limit?

“How about you? What do you do,” he asked gently as he sipped his tea. Somehow she had managed to make it the perfect temperature, so it wasn't so hot it burned the lips nor too cold that it failed to offer pleasant warmth to his stomach. The English were good that way.

"It was too little, too late, I suppose.”

"Well perhaps now it's just on time? The founding of this X-group seems to be rewarding already. Not specifically for the capacity that it worked in the dream, but Gary's hopeful that it may grow into that."

She smiled when Sebastian remarked about what he did in the "real world." It was nice for her to meet someone grounded and equally ready to dismiss the dream for what it was: not real.

"It sounds nice. I'm actually a sauteing technician and Gary is... was an Information Technologies expert for Cysco. Maybe... not all as exciting as this..." She motioned her hand to their spouses. "We didn't realize he was special until his dream... I thought he had just gone bonkers." It was clear that this mutant business was new, the dream distressing, and their life changes not wholly welcomed.

Still Maggie smiled. It was nice to be heard.

Gary and Ghost were on to talking about Jude now.

"No, no. He's eleven. Surely his powers have manifested. He can't be like Dryad. Really, you're going to have to recruit from scratch until all our kids grow up enough."

It sounded as if the had come to a sort of consensus. Ghost would hook up Gary with the American team, the X-Men and Sam and Streak would help him get off the ground as far as administration went. He would have to recruit for himself and find donors, but again Sam and Xavier weren't bad people to hit up in that department either.

They had also narrowed down Jude's location to somewhere in the south of France. From their pieced together time line he was with a foster family or possibly he was back in the system. Either way, he had left the British Isles by his tenth birthday.

They'd swapped phone numbers and some stories, and while there were plenty more stories to share both had noticed their neglected spouses. "Actually... I hadn't thought beyond this point. I didn't know how long it would take. Where are we supposed to go next?"

Gary thought Sebastian was a saint for starting off their honeymoon by sharing his wife.

>>>"Well perhaps now it's just on time?”

“Perhaps you're right.” He was now trying to make a difference in the world, or help Slate to do it, which amounted to the same thing. Before the dream he had never really tried to change the course of human and mutant history; but now he had been convinced that one individual or a group of individuals could make a difference, could make things better for all.

He listened with interest as she described the living they were making together, “What does a suateing technician do?” He'd never heard those words in quite that combination before.

“It sounds like a lot has changed for you since this business all started. Do you help run things with the team or anything? I know without Ghost, I'd be completely lost when it came to dealing with paperwork for the clinic. And with all the X-force team activity happening right in your home, are the two of you still able to find time to spend together?” He hoped very much that they were making the most of their time together.

More listening, more tea sipping. English tea was every bit as good as he remembered it being, not just the tea itself, but the biscuits and the conversation that accompanied it as well.

It wasn't too long before their spouses remembered them, they had exchanged the necessary phone numbers and information and it sounded like Maya was pretty much ready to go.

“We could stop by the Halifax estate and see what has become of the place, if you like. It's been years since I've been there.” About a hundred, give or take a decade. “It's out in the country a ways, maybe an hour drive from here, providing we don't get lost.” They might have to consult a map, because while Sebastian's memory was perfectly clear on where it was, all the landmarks had plenty of time to change since he'd last seen it.

“Don't forget to collect all your letters your friends left you. Did you want to leave any of your own?”

Sebastian shook hands with Gary and kissed Maggie's hand before they departed, “It was good to meet you both, and I hope we get the chance to see you again. Until then, you have my best wishes.”

Maggie was glad to be able to explain the mundane and meticulous nature of a soldering technician's job. She took joy in pointing out that beyond the potential to breathe lead, it was a very safe and moderately remunerative position. It was also a line of work that lent itself nicely to the habit of growing fat, happy, and old.

Oh Maggie helped with the X-Force as she could, but the visitors all seemed to avoid her. "And besides. With hardy two members to the team, it's hardly anything to run." Making tea and the money for this meager living was quite enough for her now.

The way that Sebastian flattered as well as phrased his questions seemed to put Maggie quite at ease.

"I would love to visit the Halifax estate." Ghost attempted to imitate Sebastian's slightly more proper manor of speaking. Her intention wasn't to mock, but to point out to him that he had slid right into an old habit. An adorable habit at that.

"If it's too much a drive all in one day, you're free to hang around a bit."

Ghost glanced at Sebastian. As lovely as that sounded... Ghost felt better knowing that it wasn't some twisted part of her mind that made all of those people up. They existed. Their lives had yet to be ruined. "Maybe we'll stop by on the way out again... I fully expect you to change the banner about Haywire. And I'll write you a letter with all the details I know."

Did Ghost want to write any letters? Actually... she did. To the most important people, it wouldn't matter. They were still going to try to track down jude in person.

Ghost wrote a quick note to Hawley and another note to any future (and/or present-future) X-Force members.

Ghost tied the papers to the window and made sure that she had Gary's promise that he would let everyone he could about haywire before they made their goodbyes.

“It was good to meet you both, and I hope we get the chance to see you again. Until then, you have my best wishes.”

Then it was back into the car. Ghost fell renewed and worn out all at once. "Dinner on the way home to the Halifax estate?" Several hours of talking was a good way to rustle up an appetite.

Sebastian had a mental to do list. If he were to write it out it would look something like this: open clinic (check), get into medical school, figure out a way to make Maya not disappear...

After talking to Maggie he added another item: find someone or something that can cure cancer. He couldn't do it himself, but that didn't mean that there wasn't another way. He just had to find it within three years, just like he had to find a solution for his wife within ten; for the first time he had goals with deadlines.

>>>"Dinner on the way home to the Halifax estate?"

Sebastian's stomach grumbled its enthusiasm for these dinner plans, "I used to know of a really great place to eat; a little field not far away. It had the sweetest clover you ever tasted, with the nicest lilacs for dessert in the Springtime. Unfortunately they are out of season now." He glanced to the passenger seat, the corners of his mouth twitching ever so slightly upwards.

"Actually, I think I saw a cafe on the way here. I would guess that they have salad options there."
--
Yatta! He had guessed correctly on the salads. The cafe hadn't had anything fancy, but the food was edible and filling, the restaurant conveniently located and they served tea: basically all they could ask for in an eatery.

During the meal, his thoughts had strayed from the X-force to the X-men, and from Pax to the Kabal. Each group was trying to make the world a better place, but each had different methods. Thus far none of them were perfect, and none of them had made a very large impact. At least, not for the good. In the dream, the group he had helped run had the best of intentions, but probably caused the most harm in the end.

Once they were on their way again, he asked, "Do you think it is possible for one person or one little group to make a lasting difference in the world?" There were plenty of instances where groups made a difference, but peace only seemed to last a few hundred years at most. It almost seemed that conflict and discrimination were so deeply ingrained in the human existance that it was impossible to permanently remove them without something as extreme as wiping everyone out.

"I've never before been one to try and change the world. I've seen so many people try, and in the end all their work is undone in just a few short years, in one big circle. The world improves a little, then falls back on old ways again. Again and again, the same thing plays out at different times in different parts of the world."

"I feel now like I have wasted so much time. Ten years from now, I was too late to make a difference. Maybe I'm too late, even now."

Ghost had heard bad things about British food. She didn't remember a whole lot besides the poor cafeteria quality food so despite her feeling as if she'd lived and worked in a project based out of London for several years of her future life, eating out in Britain was a new thing for her.

They didn't seem to have maybe solely vegetarian items that were strictly "British" excepting beans on toast and... that just didn't sound appetizing. Her favorite part of eating out was probably the ridiculous short apron the waiter wore and the way Sebastian kept slipping more and more toward a less than American accent. The company was so good that the food went unremembered. It was edible in a way that didn't leave a negative impression.

Back in the rumbly car, Ghost had mostly curled up with her feet in the seat and her body leaned against the car door. She had agonized over scenarios, worst and best case, last... day... and hadn't had the most restful plane ride. Suddenly the rumble of the car and the song of tires on asphalt was a comforting lullaby.

Sebastian's voice made her realize that the passing countryside scenery was sort of hypnotic. She had to think for a long moment about what her husband had actually asked her before she could formulate a response.

"Do you think it is possible for one person or one little group to make a lasting difference in the world?"

It rattled around in her head for a bit. "I hope so."

Ghost stretched her legs from the American's driver's side of the car and rallied herself for some conversation. He was getting a bit too philosophical for her tired brain, but she would try to keep up.

"If anyone could have a lasting impression on the world... I would think that it would be a person who lasts." She yawned and stretched again. She didn't want the tiredness to spread to him if he was driving. Some intellectual discussion would help keep him awake. "No pressure... or anything." She smiled.

"But even if the world is only better for one lifetime, isn't it still better? Even if the things are undone, for the that lifetime it was still better. Maybe you see it differently from your many lifetimes, but I only get one. I'd like to make it better for everyone while I'm here at least."

"I feel now like I have wasted so much time. Ten years from now, I was too late to make a difference. Maybe I'm too late, even now."

Ghost stretched again and pat Sebastian on the shoulder. "I think you can still make a difference. You're just on time as long you act on your time, right?"

>>>"If anyone could have a lasting impression on the world... I would think that it would be a person who lasts."

There were people in the world that were leaders, who had the vision, the charisma, and the leadership capabilities to see what changes needed to be made, to gather the people who could help change them, and to plan and execute the steps necessary to make a difference. These men and women could overturn unjust laws, overthrow governments, and eradicate injustice with enough followers behind them. They were people like Slate, who burned as brightly as a flare for people to follow.

Unfortunately flares had a tendency to burn out quickly. Eventually they reached the end of their fuse and the torch had to be passed on. Hopefully to someone whose flame shone just as brightly.

>>>"No pressure... or anything."

If Slate were to die, or rather when Slate died, for he seemed to be just as mortal as the next person, who then would take up the torch? Who would hold together the pieces of the world and try to keep them as peaceful as possible for the next generation and all the generations following that?

No pressure or anything.

“I want to make it better for your lifetime, too.” For everyone that he cared about, he wanted the world to be somewhere they could live peacefully and pursue their own happiness, obtain their own goals, achieve their own sense of self without it being defined by a war torn world that crumbled around them.

“I suppose even Sisyphus, who according to legend had spend eternity rolling a rock up a hill only to have it roll down again, still got to see the view from near the top of the hill even if he never achieved his goal in the end. Perhaps that was why he kept trying; failing to reach his goal was still better than sitting in the shadow at the bottom of the hill.”

There was a newer saying, too, something about two steps forward and one step back.

>>>"I think you can still make a difference. You're just on time as long you act on your time, right?"

Sebastian nodded, and yawned. The talking helped keep him awake, but even so he was getting tired. His second wind had come and gone, and his third and fourth, too, had passed by at some point. The day felt like it had stretched on forever and ever, though the sun was just barely setting.

“Thank you for your vote of confidence. I shall certainly try my best.” Would now be an appropriate time to share what means he had already taken towards the goal of making the world a better place? When they were both sleep deprived was probably not the best time to bring it up, but it was also not the best time for any kind of filters to have much of an effect on words that came out of mouths.

“I've already started to help, a little bit. Have you heard of the Kabal?”

Hmmm… Kabal. Kabal.

She wasn't sure what kind of thing he was referring to. Company or Organization of people? Whatever this Kabal was, it was helpful by definition since it was what was helping Sebastian be helpful to the world. Heh. That… sounded a little funny in her head.

Her best guess was a sort of world news organization. Information was very helpful in knowing where to help.

"No, it doesn't ring a bell, sorry." Ghost resettled in her chair so that she was sitting up more. If he was yawning she was falling down on her duty.

"Should I have?"

He had said "the" Kabal. Like there was only one. So… maybe not a corporate chain. Not widely spread. It wasn't unreasonable for her not to know.

Really, she didn't know of the Kabal? It surprised him, because he had thought that the group's existence would be common knowledge among the X-men team to which she belonged. Apparently not. Sam must not have felt that the groups' alliance to bring about the final destruction of Haywire. Then again, the Kabal was a small group and it didn't exactly advertise itself. Maybe he shouldn't be surprised at all.

He shook his head, “No, it's alright if you haven't heard of it before. The Kabal is a small team, similar to the X-men. The X-men, I gather, seek to reduce violence between mutants and humans in New York. The Kabal has a more global goal for peace. Wherever there is turmoil in the world, they try to bring a place back to a more peaceful balance on a large scale.”

Trees flashed by, giving a steady rhythm to their drive. Talking certainly helped break up the mesmerizing affect of the road on his tired brain, so he kept going.

“I don't know if you have been paying attention to world news lately. Romania is the the process of approving a law similar to the one the United States passed two years ago. It is not likely that the law will go over well with the mutant population living there. If the law passes, the Kabal plans to go there to help reduce violent reactions and work to get the bill repealed.”

“If we do end up going, I believe that some of the X-men will be aiding our efforts by helping refugees escape the country if need be.” That had been the plan, anyway. It was possible that word hadn't passed from Sam to the team, or even that Slate had not yet invited the X-men to join them.

The bends in the road were beginning to be familiar, even if the foliage around them was different. A stone wall slithered up to the side of the road and followed their progress along it. At the top of a hill, the walls progress was interrupted briefly by a hole where a gate used to hang. There was no gate now.

“This is it,” he announced as he turned off the road and began up the long, weed choked driveway. Tall oak trees lined the drive, blocking the view of the house. Sebastian could remember when the trees had been planted, just before he had left. They had been no more than twigs with a handful of leaves on them back then. They rounded the bend in the drive, the row of trees gave way to unruly flower beds, and the house finally came into view.

It was the same as ever, and yet different all at the same time. It had been well maintained for a long time, but in the past few decades it had laid vacant of all life but for the plants. Ivy had swallowed entire sections sections of the outer walls, the rose gardens had run rampant without someone to keep them tame, and lawn was now knee high prairie grass.

It was home, and yet it wasn't home any longer.