[OP: "Trouble" --P!NK, Music Video]

In fact, Mystique had determined in herself not to wait around while the others planned for things.

She had every reason to want to get this over with as soon as possible, she thought.

And she knew one other person who was as anxious as her to do that.

"You're asking me if I want to help you?" Emma Frost was shocked.

 "I think we both know that getting you back to your dimension suits me as much as it suits you," Mystique said coolly. "And both of us don't want the X-men controlling us, is that about right?"

"I'm listening..." Emma said.

"If there's one person I know who would know where to find the kind of mutants who'd be targets, it's Psylocke," Mystique said.

"Ah...the plebeian," Emma said. "But we can't locate her using Cerebro...and we can't find Blink either, if she exists at all here, because we don't know what we're looking for."

"If there's one person who'd know about other mutants, it's Psylocke," Mystique said. "She makes it her business to know. She's been informing Magneto...but I know she'd keep her own assets, if she was smart. Her and her brother."

"I see," Emma said. "And how do we find another telepath? Aren't you cut off?"

"Yes," Mystique said. "But I know some people who recently got arrested who Psylocke was employing...and they might--"

"--Know where she can be found. I read your mind already," Emma finished. "I just said that to annoy you."

Mystique frowned.

"And you think a telepath would be able to help you get this information? What, your charms aren't enough?" Emma said.

"Even if I question people, they can only tell me what they think is important," Mystique said. "On the other hand, a telepath can find even what they don't think of."

"That could be an advantage in this case," Emma admitted. "And we are not inviting the X-men because...what, because you're still sore about being duped? Get used to it, Dear, it's the way of the world."

"You feel secure in your position here once they find out your past?" Mystique said tightly. "Or would you like leverage?"

"You had me at secure." Emma stood up. "Though working with you is the fly in the ointment. But I suppose we have a common goal, for now. I don't want to be here either."

"And I can compromise for the right reasons," Mystique said.

"And the wrong ones," Emma added. 

"Does it matter?" Mystique asked.

"Frankly, no. Just don't think this means I trust you."

"Vice versa." Mystique frowned. "Shall we?" 

"By all means," Emma said. "Are we stealing a car?"

"Borrowing, yes," Mystique said.

* * *

By the time the X-men realized a car was missing, and that so were Frost and Mystique, they were long gone.

"Oh..." Emma put a hand to her head. "They're trying to find us with Cerebro.... I'm blocking them out, but that's annoying."

"Just keep it up," Mystique said impatiently.

"I hope you actually know where you're going," Emma said.

"You read my mind--you should know I know," Mystique said.

"Yes, well, using telepathy for something that trivial is just a bit demeaning, isn't it?" Emma said.

"You would know," Mystique said.

"You know, you're distracting me. How about silence?" Emma said.

Silence she got.

After a moment, Emma announced, "They gave up...but they'll want an explanation when we get back."

"And if this works, they'll get one," Mystique said.

"All right, I'm finally going to ask," Emma said. "Why do you work with these people? I thought I had a hard time earning their trust, but you've worked for them for months, and they still don't trust you. Why stay?"

Mystique was silent.

"Right..." Emma said. "What do I know? I could just read your mind, but that's inconclusive.... Thoughts, feelings...they don't always explain motive. Motive is complicated. I suppose that it why it fascinates me."

Mystique shrugged finally. "I have to survive. It was the best option."

"You could work anywhere," Emma said. "You came back here because they would take you in, but you stayed for a different reason."

"It doesn't matter. I don't intend to stay after this is over, if we live through it," Mystique said.

"One little squabble and that finishes it?" Emma mused. "Interesting. But that is your MO."

"If you read my mind, then you know it's not a little squabble," Mystique said.

"Well, there is some amount of things I can't seem to access.... That other dimension of time seems to prevent it," Emma said. "But yes...I think I have the general idea."

She grew somber. "Even for you, I could feel pity over that."

"I don't need your pity."

"But I'm serious," Emma said. "It would just about kill me to learn something like that...but if you think this is making up for it, I doubt that's going to appease anyone."

"No...but it secures the future...if we can."

"Very thoughtful of you. So...one other question. Are you ever going to allow Morph to explain himself?"

"Are you ever going to tell Cyclops the truth about what happened?" Mystique shot back.

"What truth?" Emma frowned at her. "Likstar didn't tell you, did she?"

"I'm no fool. I put it together all on my own," Mystique said. "Phoenix...betrayal...the crush."

"There's no crush. Mind your own business."

"You first," Mystique shot back.

"Perhaps I did invite that..." Emma admitted sullenly. "But I haven't completely exposed you."

"So far, I haven't said a word to Cyclops," Mystique said. "And I don't intend to. It's more fun to wait for the axe to fall all on its own."

"You're too kind." Emma was bitingly sarcastic. "I don't know what they see in you. But if they see something, I'm surprised that you'd discard that so quickly."

"A potential threat, that's all."

"That's all?" Emma said. "My word, you're as blind as you are stupid, aren't you?"

Mystique slammed on the brakes a little too hard, and Emma hit her arms on the dashboard.

"Oops...forgot you couldn't turn into diamond," Mystique said.

Emma rubbed her wrist. "How droll," she said tightly.

Mystique just turned a corner, and for a moment there was silence.

"I suppose you've made up your mind, then," Emma said.

"What do you care?" Mystique said.

"I don't really care...I just find it interesting--what could possess you to do that?" Emma said. "Even if they fooled you, the treatment here has to be better than anywhere else. I wouldn't turn it down myself if I had a choice about it. Even now that you know, they're willing to let you stay, practically begging you. It's pathetic. You would spurn it just out of spite? It's just fascinatingly illogical."

"Oh, pipe down, Spock," Mystique said, slowing at they got nearer to the location she had in mind. "I don't like being lied to."

"You lie to people all the time, and when they return the favor you get all huffy?" Emma said. "Why? Turnabout is fair play."

"Why do you not like other telepaths?" Mystique said.

Emma paused. "I see your point...but it's still stupid. But if it's what you want, who am I to stop you...? I suppose you're not interested in knowing what I've picked up on of their intentions."

Mystique was parking the car, and she stopped it suddenly and was quiet.

"I thought so," Emma said. "You want to know, don't you?"

"Why would I trust what you say? You always have some angle."

"I suppose... So if I am lying, then what is true?" Emma said. "Only way to know is to hear the lie itself."

"Crack logic."

"Well, fine, I will keep it to myself," Emma said.

Mystique got out of the car.

Emma did also.

"I don't need your help," Mystique said. "I can figure out for myself what they meant by all this. I already know. Their righteous cause... All those people are the same."

"Yes...so starry eyed," Emma said. "While it's amusing at times, it is a nice break from the selfish and cynical ways of the rest of the world, isn't it? Unless you don't like that."

"Why dream if it's impossible?" 

"I don't know...perhaps the dream of making the world better is not impossible," Emma mused. "Fixing all the problems in it, that's impossible, in my opinion. I set out to remedy a few here and there...and I ended up failing at that. But the goal at least was honest. You have no goal. You keep ending up as a pawn. I think you like it. No responsibility that way."

"And I don't have to listen to people like you tell me what I'm doing is a waste of time," Mystique said.

"It is a waste of time," Emma said. "Just one that could have gotten us all destroyed, if things were just a little different. You think Apocalypse is behind this, don't you?"

Mystique froze.

Emma smiled. "It makes sense."

"But he's dead."

"Yours is..." Emma said. "We have no way of knowing if there was one in my world... I'd hope a monster like that only exists in one place...but I don't know. Sinister is another possibility... Why did he disappear suddenly? But they aren't the only choices. You're not sure, are you?"

"No one is," Mystique said. "But I always think where there's smoke, there's fire."

"Psylocke probably won't be able to tell you that," Emma said. "If she knew the answer to that, she'd be long gone, wouldn't she? Any of us who knew for sure would be. You must suspect the reason these people have not attacked is because they simply don't need us yet.... They can find us any time, likely as not. For now, exposing themselves would be foolish, if they are still vulnerable. And you think we have to take the fight to them? I concur...but wouldn't it be best to tell the X-men this?"

"Without a lead, they wouldn't listen to it," Mystique said.

"They wouldn't trust you, is what you mean," Emma said. "Well...I suppose interviewing one of their worst enemies will gain their trust." She gestured around flippantly. "But it's not a bad idea, in of itself.... Who knew they were keeping him so close to the mansion?"

"Why risk moving him farther away and giving him a chance to be rescued?" Mystique said. "Not that Magneto couldn't come any time...but he hasn't."

"And we're banking on that making this fellow angry," Emma said. "I've never met him, but I gleaned a bit from Wolverine.... I didn't know you two had a history though."

"Ages ago," Mystique said. "I used to think he was reliable."

"Well...being nearly choked to death will change a woman's opinion on that," Emma said. "Unless you like that sort of thing."

Mystique turned to give her a look.

"Sorry...perhaps I've hung around the wrong people too long..." Emma said. "That joke came out of nowhere... Oh, shove it, your mind is more in the gutter than mine is."

"Stay out of it and you wouldn't know, would you?" Mystique shot back.

Sneaking into a federal prison was easy--for a shape-shifter and telepath.

The whole thing was so rote to Mystique by now that she hardly gave a thought to impersonating a guard, stealing ID, and walking inside.

Emma covered with her telepathy, to make sure no one remembered them.

"It pains me to admit it, but you are efficient at this," she said. "My other self worked with you once, didn't she?"

"I wouldn't go that far," Mystique answered. "We ran in some of the same rings...but the Inner Circle wasn't for me. Bunch of nut jobs who like to reenact their favorite fantasy."

"And you're not into that sort of thing?" Emma said dryly.

"Not when it's pointless. Chasing a pipe dream."

"It didn't seem pointless at the time," Emma sighed. "How things change with a little perspective."

"The creepy cult didn't work out for you?" 

"The mad scientist with the devil plants didn't work out for you?" Emma retorted.

Mystique didn't argue that.

"I know you want me to probe his mind," Emma said, "but if someone knows you're doing it, there's info that's hard to access.... I can't damage him--it'd be traceable that way. So...I'll need a distraction. I could make one myself, I suppose, but it's extra work."

"And we wouldn't want to risk you having one of those episodes, would we?"

"Do you want to blow our cover?" Emma asked.

"I already had a distraction in mind," Mystique said.

"Oh...please don't make me witness anything I'll never be able to un-see," Emma said.

"You just do your job and let me do mine," Mystique said.

"I see why you didn't want to involve the do-gooders in this little escapade..." Emma muttered.

https://youtu.be/axlK4QHPevU

[High Horse-- The Crane Wives.]

They found Sabretooth in solitary confinement, naturally.

Mystique would have put money on that, even if she didn't already know.

"Better if he never knows I'm here," Emma told her. "He won't suspect then. As long as he's distracted, he'll never notice my little probing.... Just so you know, I can hear everything."

"Focus," Mystique said. "I just need to have a little chat with an old friend."

"A chat...is that what they call it now?" Emma said.

"Who's in the gutter now?" Mystique said.

"Still you, Dear," Emma said. "But proceed."

She had a hand to her head.

Mystique opened the door with ease.

The really shocking thing about this prison was that it was not just for mutants...at least, Emma thought so.

The MRD didn't exist yet, so the prison system had instead modified certain cells for mutants.

Sabretooth was restrained in a reinforced cell that he couldn't break the walls of.

He also had a mutation-blocking collar on, which would only hold him back so much. And he was chained to the wall.

Beyond that, it seemed they hadn't bothered to restrain him, thinking he had no where to run and that he wasn't that dangerous.

"So," Mystique said, resuming her usual shape, "Weapon X hasn't come to claim its own yet? Shocking."

Sabretooth looked up.

"Well, look who finally decided to show up," he said. "Miss me finally?"

"Hardly," Mystique said, leaning on the wall. "Nice digs.... They make those collars custom fit?"

"You didn't come here to talk," Sabretooth said. "I thought I smelled someone familiar.... Who else is that out there?"

"Some guard I knocked out," Mystique lied glibly. "I came here to ask a few questions.... You're going to answer them, aren't you?"

"What do I get in return?" Sabretooth asked.

Mystique smiled vaguely. "Depends on how good the information is.... I want to know where Psylocke is hiding."

"So it's revenge," Sabretooth said. "Well, it's been a while since they put me away.... How should I know? And why should I help you? You sold me out."

"And you almost killed me," Mystique said. "Twice."

"What's a few hard knocks between friends?" Sabretooth said. "It wasn't personal."

"Then neither was this." Mystique gestured around. "We do what we have to."

"Yeah, always about that," Sabretooth said. "I'm not too happy with Magneto for not busting me out of here. Maybe I'd like a good shot at him myself...but his lapdogs? I don't keep tabs on them."

"When they broke you out, they must have taken you somewhere," Mystique said. "Or mentioned somewhere..."

"Other than the camp?" Sabretooth said. "I dunno.... So far, nothing's in it for me."

Emma slowly, while probing his mind, found a train of thought that seemed promising.

If his other thoughts weren't so loud, it would have been easier.... Men, all the same.

If Mystique could just keep him talking...

"So far, I've heard nothing useful," Mystique said lazily. "You have to give a little to get a little...and you're the one who's chained up to that wall.... I'm sure there was something."

"I don't know much about Psylocke," Sabretooth said. "And I don't care...but I guarantee, she's still dividing work between her brother and Magneto. We found her in that warehouse the first time. She might still visit it."

"That's not that useful," Mystique said.

"Well, I don't know," Sabretooth said.

"In that case--" Mystique turned as if to leave.

"Wait," Sabretooth said. "There's someone who might know where to find her. Your other old buddies...they picked me up out of the slammer before. If any person had a hideout, it was them."

Duh, Mystique thought.

She had considered them, but they had already made bail...or escaped.

"If I knew where they were, I'd ask them," she said.

"You don't keep track of your own team. That's sloppy," Sabretooth said.

"Seems I was well rid. They just abandoned you."

"I did have a visit from one person," Sabretooth said.

Emma perked up her ears at this.

"Some nut from Genosha," Sabretooth said. "Said he was looking for mutants with certain powers...asked if I knew of any who could teleport or use telepathy. I told him if I did, I wouldn't be in here. Left right off."

"From Genosha?" Mystique repeated. "Why would they want mutants like that? Both those people are completely useless to them. One lets you escape the island, and the other would be useless for work."

"Yeah, well, who knows what they're up to now?" Sabretooth said. "Kidnapping mutants maybe. I bet some group is just paying them off to hunt useful mutants for them."

Not a bad guess for this kind of Neanderthal.

"Good enough?" Sabretooth said. 

"We'll see," Mystique said, turning.

"You're leaving?" Sabretooth said. "What about one for old time's sake, eh? It gets lonely in here."

Emma made a disgusted face to herself.

Mystique paused and glanced back. "I'm sure it does." 

She walked for the door anyway.

"Hey, b----! Get me out of here!" Sabretooth called.

"Knowing you, you'd just kill me as soon as I did," Mystique said. "I'm not falling for that again. Enjoy solitary."

"I helped you!" Sabretooth said.

"Then count this as you making up for almost killing me," Mystique shot back. 

"If I wasn't chained up, you'd sing a different tune," Sabretooth said, the bully in his tone stirred.

Despite herself, Mystique felt her skin crawl.

"Maybe," she said. "But you are."

Sabretooth tried to charge her again, and the chain strained like it might snap.

Mystique got out of the room and shut the door in a hurry.

"I don't think the monitors will stay down much longer," Emma said. "We'd better run. I think I got all his useful information."

Mystique didn't argue. They ran for it.

Somehow they got to the car unimpeded. 

"Don't scare me like that ever again," Emma gasped. "For a moment, I thought you were going to do it. Did you want to?"

"I'm not enough of a masochist to be interested in someone who's tried to kill me twice," Mystique said. "Old habits, I guess."

She leaned back in the seat. "I don't know what it is. It's easy to forget how untrustworthy certain people are. But never others."

"You mean that pull to trust those reprobates?" Emma said. "I believe it's called a trauma response...seeking the familiar? You don't know this about yourself yet? What's 80 years of living worth if you don't gain any introspection?"

"The spring chicken shouldn't be talking, then," Mystique said. "And for a telepath, you don't seem to know yourself that well. Or is that just the cruel irony of telepathy? All of you are like that."

"The trade off?" Emma said. "I suppose there is one. So much time in other people's heads, you aren't always sure what you think. But I've always thought I was quite independent even so."

She cast Mystique a sideways look.

"You're lucky I was there," she said quietly. "He thought you would give in... You knew I was listening, he didn't. He did intend to silence you after he got what he wanted. Men like that don't care about us..."

"There was a time he might not have done that."

"If that is true, that time must be long past," Emma said. "Too much cruelty changes people... I've noticed that. I prefer not to be cruel...callous at times, I suppose, but cruel is different. Something goes wrong with your head when you hurt people just for the fun of it. All the evil we play with, who wouldn't want to lose their ability to distinguish between it and good?"

"You think we're on the side of good?"

"At least I tried to be," Emma said. "You may not care."

"You think that makes you better than me, don't you?"

"Frankly, yes, I do."

"Maybe it does," Mystique said. "But we ended up in the same place, didn't we? Maybe goodness isn't that easy to attain as we think. Maybe some people are just born on a course to make it impossible."

"I hope that's not true," Emma said. "Though the course of my life might make me question it... I don't know why we're here. I suppose some people think it's God...others think it's nothing, and we decide for ourselves what our purpose is. I can't seem to decide which of those sounds more idealistic and preposterous."

"I'd have pegged you for the second type."

"And before my entire life fell apart chasing that ideal, I might have agreed. But you have no ideals... I suppose that makes it easy for you...but dull. There must be something you wanted once."

Mystique was quiet.

"Perhaps the answer is in the evidence of what you go after," Emma said. "Affection, for the most part. Whatever way you can get it, even if it's not real... Shooting yourself in the foot, aren't you though? You lie to everyone, that Rogue girl also...then you're shocked when people think you don't really care... Or do you think you don't really care...? The danger of showing your real face to people? You might have real feelings also."

"Shut up," Mystique said. "If I wanted this, I could get it from Shine and with less insults and sarcasm."

"Yes...her concern for your feelings probably makes her hold back," Emma said. "And I have no concern for your well being at all, but as in a psychological case, you do have something to offer for my consideration... It's really quite sad."

"I said shut up."

"And I care because...? What are you going to do?" Emma smirked.

There was nothing to do.... Emma was even driving now, so she couldn't even slam on the brakes.

Mystique knew she couldn't stop her...so she was sullenly listening.

"Perhaps I shouldn't be overly harsh, however," Emma said. "I don't want you to go crying to them.... But I have this theory: You always distance yourself from people, because you are never just Mystique, or just Raven Darkholme, with them. Always some role, always some trick. And you take that false version of a relationship, that you know is based on lies, and you let it substitute for the real thing, because that's how pathetic you are... But strangely enough, when the real thing presents itself to you, people who know what you are, and offer you forgiveness or love or help, just out of their conviction--(the only pure reason to offer something to anyone, I might add, since it's the only thing that gets us nothing in return)--you turn it down and scorn it, because you can't stomach the real thing anymore. Does it kill you how easy it is to put it together?"

Mystique was listening still, burning with indignation...and shame.

"Then look at me," Emma said. "I've been alone for years... I might prefer that though... I detest false emotions, unless they're working for me...but I prefer to manipulate people without using feelings...gets a little too personal, I think. I don't think I'd trade places with you, not for the world...but you know how to convince people you have what they want. If it was just true, you'd be in a fair way to be the envy of most of us mutants...but it's the irony of shape-shifting... You can be, but you can't be... And what are you on your own? You don't even know anymore... It's worse than Wolverine... At least he has some sense of self... You don't. I seem to be finding that even you admit this."

"So what? It's the way it is."

"But given the chance to be different, you didn't take it," Emma said. "You want to ruin this one also... I just want to know why... What is so important to you about your current lifestyle that you can't give it up?"

"You really want to know?" Mystique was pushed to the end of her self control by Emma's probing without any thought for her feelings.

She missed Shine's uncanny ability to say things in a way that got you to admit them yourself.... It was somewhat less painful than this.

"By all means," Emma said.

"Because I figured out ages ago I don't deserve any better than what I have," Mystique said. "I'm not fit for it. They may think differently, but I don't. I became what I pretended to be...and I became nothing...really. From the start...I was just off... It's too late to change it now."

"Do you really believe that, or do you just want to believe it?" Emma asked.

"I could ask you the same thing about your choices," Mystique said.

"I wouldn't actually know how to answer it," Emma admitted. "I suppose I have that over you--I'm still deciding... You've made up your mind to always be your pathetic self... You're a fool. They offered you a new chance, free of any catch, and you'd rather stay in the gutter where you think you belong. So what if you belong there? What kind of idiot takes the lesser option on purpose just to prove a point? And to hurt the people who were nice enough to help you? It's something worse than just never realizing you're trash to begin with. At least that's honest."

"I'd say it's more honest to know what you are and accept it."

"People are plastic," Emma said. "We can always change...usually for the worse, I admit. But conceivably, we could change the other way, if we wanted to. Saying you are what you are isn't being honest. It's being lazy, if you ask me. And scared."

"Yes...I have always been a coward," Mystique said.

"And a coward you will stay, with that attitude. They might have made you different, in time. It might already have been starting, for all we know...but you couldn't take the heat of being in their sun, is that it? That truly is pathetic. I feel better about my mistakes just listening to you."

"Shut up and drive," Mystique said.

"Fine," Emma said. "You disgust me anyway."

Mystique said nothing.

Emma was in a mood now.

She had mostly probed to annoy Mystique...but also, perhaps, she was trying to understand what made the others give Mystique so many chances.

Shine had once said Emma was envious of Mystique, and she'd scoffed at the idea then.

But now, in light of the impending reality of Scott remembering about her past, and the others soon learning of it...and her being stuck here, even so...no where to run from it...Emma realized she did envy her.

It made her sick.

Mystique was quantifiably a worse person than her, she thought. And less ready to atone for it... But here she was, allowed to live around them and enjoy the kind of easy friendship with some of them that Emma had never had in her life.

And she didn't even care...and Emma, no matter how hard she tried...never got that kind of leniency.

People expected more of her because she was capable of more. And she was fine with that...most of the time.

But every so often...she ached for the kind of easy acceptance that comes with people not expecting you to know better...and just taking you as you were.

A thing she hadn't even thought existed before, and it would have disgusted her if she'd heard it did.

In action? It did disgust her, but it made her green almost, too.

But she'd rather have died than tell Mystique that--or tell her how lucky she was. If she couldn't figure it out just on the facts, she didn't deserve to know. Served her right if they did just let her ditch them again.

Emma Frost had become one bitter woman.

[And, as someone who has had the high expectations kind of life, I can understand how she feels.

We all need grace, no matter how responsible and composed we are and how high our morals are, and most of us who can meet the standard human experience of goodness, don't feel we get any grace when we do mess up.

But we all need unconditional love. The more perfect we are, the more we need it, because those people will be the hardest on themselves when they do fail.

Ironically, Emma's middle name is actually Grace. It suits her, but she could not be further from understanding the meaning of that word.

Emma means "all embracing, universal, or whole", if you want to know. It's German.]

https://youtu.be/IwtcwQwgdsA

["You Are More" -- Tenth Avenue North]