Burn My Way Through

21C: "Sway"

His entire life has been a dance, a desperate attempt to keep one step ahead or catch up because he’d already fallen five behind.

The most intricate dance of all is the one he performs when he’s a student at the Xavier’s institute. He learns to curb his more destructive ways, learns how to be a good room-mate (even if his side of the room is always messier) and he has friends.

It’s all a lie; a brilliant piece of performance art and John reckons if his parents gave a damn they might actually be proud of him. The only thing about a lie? It can only last so long and John’s never been real good at staying where he’s clearly not wanted, needed, or appreciated.

So when he gets the chance to leave, he takes hold of it with both hands. Not like Bobby cares or even wants him around, hasn’t given a shit since he got together with Rogue. Magneto’s offering him something better, a chance to do something and be someone.

It’s the one thing he’s always wanted: to be someone and to explore his power.

Xavier never let him, too scared of what he could do, but Magneto? He lets John use his power however he damn well wants and for the first time in his life since starting the dance John’s free, free in a way he’s never been before.

Pyro’s a reed blowing in the breeze, liable to sway whichever way the wind is blowing just as long as it works out better for him.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 261

December: Choice A, Silence

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When he was younger John used to welcome the silence, it meant his folks had stopped fighting and maybe things were okay again and it meant he didn’t have to hear the anger in their voices.

People say that when you’re a child you can’t remember things like that but obviously they’ve never been a child trapped between two parents unhappy but completely unable to do anything about it because of circumstance and fear.

When he was in regular school with other kids supposedly like him, silence usually came after they’d had their fill of making him feel like shit. Only so many times a kid could punch you before the cries stopped coming and all that was left was dry heaving. They left him alone after that, not for long, but it was usually long enough.

During the time he was a student at Xavier’s, the silence usually meant that curfew was up and lights were out and there was nothing more you could do without fear of reprimand and consequence. Not that he’d ever let that stop him. He’d even persuaded Bobby to break the rules once or twice but the instances had been rare.

Over time, silence had become his escape because one wrong word and the weight of Xavier and his X-Men came down on him like a ton of bricks, righting his wrongs and making him feel like every thought and feeling was of no consequence. It was their way or the high way.

He’d grown tired of watching humanity trample all over mutants without anyone saying or doing anything and tired of being treated like a child. Magneto had offered him a chance and he’d taken it with both hands.

After Alkali Lake, the silence had taken on a whole new meaning. It was no longer a reprieve or escape; it was simply the quiet before the storm. The silence was always what came first and everything else followed second. For better or for worse.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 331

18B: Clock

It’s always the same, the classes drag and the clock hands never move any faster despite the amount of times he wishes they would. If he had telekinesis, he’d use it to move those hands and no one would ever know but he’s pyrokinetic and somehow he doesn’t think setting the clock on fire would be received with great enthusiasm.

He’s already set off the fire alarm three times this week and gotten two weeks of detention with I-have-a-stick-too-far-up-my-ass Scott fricking Summers so John is on his best behaviour or as good as he ever gets. It still amuses him that he’s best friends with the all American boy-scout Bobby Drake. How that ever happened John has no idea but hey it has.

John knows that the longer he watches the clock the longer the class is going to be, it’s just the way things are. Time seemed to stretch into endless eternity when you were consciously aware of it, it’s weird and not very fair but nothing’s fair in the world so why should time be any different?

He taps his pencil against the table, tries to concentrate on the interesting equations of a equaling z and vice versa but he can’t, his mind keeps drifting and his eyes keep lifting to the clock that taunts him by moving slow. He looks around, sees everyone is thinking and feeling the same then smirks because one instance of the fire alarm going off won’t be enough to slap another two weeks onto his sentence.

So that’s what he does, smokes his pencil for long enough until the bells are ringing and everybody’s scrambling for the exit and he’s just disappearing into the panicked masses. They’d find him later when they discovered the charred remains of his pencil but until then he is free.

Pyro had never been good at waiting.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 310

15C: "Glass"

People would have you believe that friendship’s a bond nothing can touch, that it’s going to be there for the rest of your life, but it’s all a load of bull.

Bobby and I, we used to be friends, never quite figured out why, but we were. Now we’re enemies, enemies because he stands on the side of what’s good and proper and I stand on the side that doesn’t.

It’s not that we don’t fight for what’s good and proper; we just don’t take as much shit as the X-Men. See, we’re the Brotherhood and we don’t let people walk over us and treat us like second class citizens just because we’re different.

Friendship’s as fragile as glass; it’ll shatter as soon as one scratch mars its so called perfect surface. All it takes is a cut just deep enough and nothing’s the same and everything changes.

Bobby and I? Our friendship shattered into pieces the moment I stepped off the plane and the real kicker? I wouldn’t change anything.

So there you have it: friendships break just like glass.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 181

"What is your greatest fear?"

Being normal, average, regular; all that jazz.

See, I’m a mutant and I like being a mutant. I like that I can control fire, make one of the most destructive forces on planet Earth do exactly what I want it to do and I couldn’t imagine not having this power.

Nothing would be worse for me to be like everyone else, to be human when I’ve spent my life since I turned sixteen being anything but.

I won’t admit this to a lot of people but when I heard the government had a “cure”, my blood ran cold. Firstly, mutants aren’t a disease that needs to be cured and secondly, who the hell are they to tell us we need to be cured?

I’ve seen first hand what this “cure” can do, I’ve watched it change Mystique into a regular woman without blue skin and scales, and I’ve seen what she could’ve looked like if she hadn’t been born the way that she was. Beautiful no doubt about that but not a mutant, one hundred percent human and that is the scariest thing I think I’ve ever seen.

Worst of all, our own kind used it against us; turned the government’s weapon on us to try and stop what we were trying to do. Fortunately for me, I lucked out. Got knocked unconscious and had my sorry ass dragged out of there before things really turned nasty.

So yeah I narrowly avoided being turned into something I’ve never wanted to be and I hope that I never have to because that’s my greatest fear; being just like everyone else.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 269

October: 002, If you could create a perfect world, what would it be?

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A perfect world doesn’t exist, won’t exist because everyone is flawed in some way or another but I guess if you’re insisting on me giving you an answer I’d say this:

My perfect world would be a world where mutants are given the recognition they deserve, aren’t treated like secondary citizens and mutants aren’t consider to be a disease.

If you think about it; humanity has made this world what it is. It’s their greed, their stupidity and their ignorance that has led to wars and made people’s lives a misery. Mutants are just convenient scapegoats, easy targets, because people are dumb and ignorant when it comes to anything that’s different.

Magneto says that people are always afraid of the things they don’t understand, Xavier used to say the same thing but Magneto believes in using that fear against them whilst Xavier wants to help ease it.

Fuck that.

This world of ours isn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination but if it was, they’d be a lot more mutants running around and being in control of things.

Maybe then we’d actually get something right for once.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 188

Prompt: "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today." - James Dean.
Character: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Warnings: None
Pairings: None
Your character's fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word count: 312
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Not mine, will never be mine. It sucks but that's just the way things go.

( He’s not afraid of death, has never been afraid of it and sometimes he’s even asked for it because so what if he dies, he’ll come back to do this dance all over again and it’s better he lives his life to the fullest than spend it being afraid and scared. )

October: Choice D, Costume/Mask

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First of all, costumes are just dumb and what lame ass thought up masks?

I mean seriously, have you seen “superheroes” these days?

It’s just plain pathetic, I mean I know Magneto wears a cape and shit but you don’t see him gallivanting around in full blown leather attire unlike a certain team of crime fighting heroes I could mention.

Plus there’s this whole, we wear the same thing so we’re together, a team, yay defeat the bad guys bullshit they’ve got going on. Not that I’m not a team player or anything like that but I don’t think you need to dress the same to think the same.

I was never good at making nice with the other children in school, team sports with the dumbass uniforms? Never my thing. It’s like you’re putting a big giant X on your forehead and asking someone to hit you.

If you’ve got a point to prove, something to fight for, something you think is worth dying for? You don’t hide behind a costume or a mask.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 175

September: Choice D, Outcast

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The word tends to go hand in hand with being a mutant but John’s always been an outcast, long before his X-Gene manifested itself and he found himself with the ability to control flames.

He was a social misfit, his parents were never rich enough for him to afford the cool clothes and after watching the so called in crowd John had made a decision from a really young age that he never wanted to fit.

John was different, excluded and the subject of bullying but he wasn’t the sort to take anything from anyone, dumb ass jocks included so he always went home black and blue. He must have been a sucker for punishment because he just kept going back to school, using the latest split lip to sneer at all those that thought themselves better.

He’d always known he’d shown them the error of their ways, had always known that one of these days revenge would be sweet. Turns out the outcast was right because the gene kicked in and the school went up, sometimes if he closes his eyes he can still hear the screams.

From that day onwards, he was called a mutant and regarded with fear and hatred. His loving parents shipped him off and even in a school full of mutants he was an outcast. Pyro was just never meant to fit in, least that’s what he always thought.

Everything changed when he met Magneto and he saw the power and the potential. He could be anything and do everything he’d ever wanted. Magneto wouldn’t lecture him and he saw John as a ‘God among insects’.

He made a choice and he chose to side with the Brotherhood. John left behind the X-Men and the two people that he might have called friend but in reality he was nothing more than a third wheel to their doomed relationship.

The only thought that had been running through his mind as that helicopter had lifted away from the frosted ground of Alkali Lake was simple and rebellious in nature.

Fuck society, it wasn’t like it had ever done anything spectacular for him.

Muse: John Allerdyce (Pyro)
Fandom: X-Men Movieverse
Word Count: 356