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"So what happened in the years you were away?"
Dante finally got the chance to ask the question that had been sitting in the back of his mind for hours. It happened fittingly after they had a meal in the dark, gritty dining palace of her palace. They were sitting around a long table while a muscular purple demon in a green vest and underwear had served them. The food had smelled surprisingly decent for Hell's food, especially the roasted meat.
Frankly, he was happy to see food that didn't try to crawl off his plate like the usual meal in Hell he remembered from Doctor Strange's life.
Illyana propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin on her knuckle. "You really want to hear my sob story?"
"I want to know how you left this universe."
"Belasco held me captive for over a decade. He subjected me to dark spells I can't even name. He beat me up, forced me to fight against beasts. You get the idea."
Her tone was calm as though she was reading from a diary. So much time had passed that she had grown indifferent to her tragic past.
"He wanted to corrupt my soul for opening the gate." She pointed at her head, where two horns curved out. "This is the result of having half of my soul corrupted."
Silvija glanced at him, clearly caught off-guard to hear Illyana's past. "Did anyone help you?"
"Someone did help me." She smiled faintly. "It happened that day. Belasco had prepared to extract five most corrupted fragments of my soul to create my five Bloodstones. I was happy it was going to end things… I wanted to end it myself."
Her voice grew even more detached.
"But I pushed myself for Piotr. Poured everything I had left into one last act of defiance."
She reached for the Soulsword leaning against the table and lifted it up like a trophy.
"I passed out the second this came into existence. When I woke up, I was with the X-Men in a completely different world."
Dante had been hoping she would have more. A face or at least a name. Instead there was just the before and the after, with nothing in between she could account for. "And then?"
"It was… another type of Hell. Mutants were basically extinct." She let out a sigh. "My brother… he was also killed by Sentinels."
The structure was similar to what SHIELD and the government had been developing here. The difference was that here, the Sentinels were a tool of control rather than a weapon of outright slaughter. For now at least. Their method could change any day. Only one spark would start a war between mutants and humans.
Silvija kicked his shin under the table. "Aren't the machines in our garage also Sentinels?"
Illyana's eyes turned to him, sharp as a hawk spotting a prey. "Why do you have Sentinels in your garage?"
Silvija put a hand over her mouth, realizing she might have committed a little blunder. "Those are from a mutant named Trevor. That bastard brought them from the future to kill Emma's students."
"Future?" Illyana looked a little intrigued. "What an interesting power. Where is this Trevor now?"
"Emma choked him to death."
"Emma Frost. Cold-hearted as ever." Illyana hummed, clearly pulling up memories from her other timeline. "She was among Sentinels' first targets."
"Here, she is different," Silvija said, shaking her head with a soft smile. "She is rather smitten with this charmer, who won't stop charming ladies."
"Emma Frost? Isn't she in love with Scott?"
"Scott? Xavier's student?"
Illyana looked between them, eyes wide with genuine disbelief. "Dante, you are… a talented individual."
It was all she could say about the absurd situation of Emma falling for someone else other than Scott.
He cleared his throat. "We're getting off track."
Illyana nodded and continued, "The other universe, I'll call it World B to avoid any confusion. The mutants banded together under Professor X and established their own nation on a sentient island named Krakoa. The government wasn't happy, but they decided to let it be."
She traced a line from the center of her Soulsword to the tip of its blade.
"Peace was fragile between the two sides. One rogue mutant assassinated a Senator and all hell broke loose. Sentinels were sent out to hunt down mutants. Ten years later, only five mutants survived."
"How inhumane." Silvija closed her eyes. Although death was common in her line of work, she had never been subjected to something so horrific. "I can see it happening here. SHIELD has too much power over mutants."
Illyana turned to him for confirmation.
"Which year did you wake up in?"
"Around the end of 1982."
"Well, that's a completely different timeline. This is 2008." Dante crossed his arms. "Who were the last mutants?"
He had a clue about the timeline, but he needed more information to make sure he was on the right path.
"Professor X, Logan, Ororo, Kitty Pryde, and Bishop," Illyana continued. "I became the sixth. We lived like rats, moving every few days, doing whatever it took to survive the Sentinels. Darkchylde certainly helped with the distraction."
Every time she had fallen asleep, Darkchylde would take control and she would wake up in a completely different location, completely covered in blood.
Silvija gave him a meaningful glance, reminding him of Illyana's connection to the X-Men. Here, he had made the worst impression on them. He took away one of their core members, killed one of them, beat up the rest of the students, and left Xavier and Scott depressed. Silvija was worried Illyana would take issue with it.
He shook his head. Illyana might return to them someday, but Piotr won't ever leave the Wild Pack. His loyalty to Silvija and his friends was just that deep.
"And then?"
"Over there, I decided to kill Belasco and take Limbo. The gamble turned out fine. Belasco was pathetically weak."
"Which explains why you underestimated this Belasco."
She looked away for a moment, embarrassed at nearly getting caught. When she turned back, her eyes held a stern look. "I had to kill him. He wouldn't have let me live in peace."
Which was true. Belasco had been too obsessed with bringing the descent of his Elder Gods, who in reality were some extraordinary demons created by Chthon, the Author of Darkhold.
Illyana continued the story with patience. She wouldn't have done any of it if he hadn't helped her immensely.
After taking over Limbo, Illyana had the bright idea to time travel ten years in the past and stop Mystique from assassinating the Senator. Stop the chains of events that led to Sentinels being deployed.
Kitty Pryde had the same idea with different execution: send Logan's consciousness in the past to have him stop Mystique.
The events unfolded almost like that X-Men movie.
Illyana allowed Logan to have the first try since her Limbo time travel would require many attempts to arrive at her desired point in the past.
Logan's effort succeeded. And then Illyana had to stand in Limbo and watch everything disappear as the timeline rewrote itself around her. Every person she'd survived alongside blinking out as the version of history they'd existed in ceased to exist. She had to escape into Limbo before she vanished along with it.
She came back to a changed world.
Rather than Sentinels, the mutants were suppressed by their own kind. Apocalypse and his Four Horsemen, which confirmed she had been in the X-Men movie universe.
She didn't rejoin the X-Men even though her brother was alive in that version. That wasn't the brother she grew up with. The X-Men had no idea who she was anyway.
Surrounded by strangers everywhere, she went solo, hunting a way back to her own world. During her search, she stumbled across an old sorcerer, the Ancient One of Kamar-Taj. He mentored her for two weeks before his other student assassinated him.
Illyana had to self-study afterwards using the Ancient One's knowledge as a foundation. Combat came easy to her, but research made her brain shut down. She was seven when Belasco had kidnapped her, before she had the time to build a proper academic foundation. Still, she persevered just to reunite with her only family member.
At some point, she reconnected with the X-Men, who had taken care of Apocalypse at the cost of losing a great deal of the world population. This was how she made friends with Laura.
She bounced back and forth between Limbo and the real world, making it hard to discern the number of years that had passed. Eventually, the interdimensional travel spell came together.
"I've always thought of Piotr as my younger sibling," Silvija said. "Wouldn't that make Illyana the older sibling?"
Illyana smirked. "That's right, little queen."
"Shit."
The story had gotten heavy, so the two women leaned into a joke to cut the tension.
Dante patted Silvija's back as she faked a depressed pout. "You've been through a lot."
Illyana shook her head. "I'm back home. Everything else is nothing in comparison."
"Do you miss the other world?"
She frowned, honestly piecing together her feelings. "A little. I don't think I can return. I might end up in a completely different world."
"It's only natural. You spent most of your life there."
He couldn't agree more with Silvija. He himself still felt a longing for his parents and cousin.
Illyana sliced open a rift with a flick of her hand and shoved her Soulsword through it. "Did you get a little teary-eyed at my sob story?"
"Yes, I'm deeply emotional right now," he said with a sigh. "I'd cheer up with your dimensional artifact."
She grinned. "I took it from Belasco of that universe."
"You got lucky. Wait, did you check Belasco's vault here?"
The mention of treasures made her eyes light up with greed. "We can do it now. I'm calling dibs on any familiar. Been looking for a cute fellow my whole life."
"So me and Silvija?"
Silvija gave him a blank stare. Illyana flipped him the middle finger.
***
The vault was massive, a cavernous room stuffed full of gold, weapons, scrolls, weird eggs, gems, magical orbs, and random Earth junk such as old newspapers, magazines, specs, sunglasses. clothes, even a pair of lacy black thongs dangling from a hook.
Illyana threw a glittering stone into the pile. "Even if there is something useful, it's buried under this trash.
"The real question is who owned these. Her ass must be—"
"Fat and huge." Silvija snatched it from his hands and threw it away, clearly a little jealous. "By the way, I can take care of this gold. I have channels to turn it into clean cash."
Illyana raised her eyebrows. "I'll give you half."
"I wasn't asking for a cut, but I won't refuse it. As a queen, there is no end to my needs."
They shook hands with charming smiles. One happy to develop her country and the other imagining the biggest shopping spree of her life.
Dante looked at the abundance of items. There was only one way to sort them efficiently.
'Null, my dear friend.'
Null triggered Death's Resonance link, unlocking senses that still melted his brain. Among all the eggs, only a few had viable life. He set those aside. Next were gems. He picked everything that seemed valuable and everything with mystical energy signatures. The rest were tossed up with the gold. The weapons flew up under his control and neatly categorized on the side.
Illyana watched with a raised eyebrow. "It's not sorcery or science. How is he doing this?"
"He has a plethora of abilities," Silvija whispered. "His powers come from others."
"Oh, tell me more."
"Ask him for the specifics."
Dante ignored them. A familiar object among the pile caught his eye. A crimson gem on a chain, upon which strange letters were carved.
The same chain as Lady Loki.
With the enhanced senses, he could see every little detail in the letters. He knew the broad strokes and the small habits very well.
Death's giggle echoed around me. "This person left this chain on Illyana, but she dropped it by accident. What a pair of clumsy idiots."
The affection and familiarity in Death's voice as talked about this person…
"Was it… me?"
The handwriting was his own, even if the letters weren't in English. He could easily imagine creating the same writing with his current perception.
"Why would I do this?"
Why would his future self drag Loki here? Why put Illyana through another universe of suffering? She was his friend's sister. He would never do that to her, not even by accident.
Even Death's Resonance couldn't give him the power to solve this confusion.
"I cannot say now, Companion. We cannot erase the good future we are heading toward."
Death whispered, appearing behind him and wrapping her arms around him in a gentle embrace. "Forget about everything. Go sleep with Laura."
He stood there for a long moment before sighing. "I'll trust you."
He cut off the Resonance Link and clutched the crimson gem in his hands. "Illyana, these eggs can still hatch."
The knowledge from Doctor Strange's life was still helpful. The creatures would make excellent familiars for him and Illyana. With so many of them, he would have an army of elemental creatures.
Illyana grabbed his hands, her eyes glittering with excitement. "Tell me how."
"I'll explain the process later. I need to sleep."
He opened a portal to his bedroom and helped Silvija cross.
Illyana followed them. "I'm also going to rest."
"Wait, I'll get the maid to clean a room for you."
Silvija and Illyana head off together. Dante snapped his illusion of a long coat and returned to his comfortable clothing. Getting on the bed, he pulled up the blanket.
Laura turned over to face him with half-lidded eyes. "You took so long. I almost fell asleep without you."
"You should have."
"No." She reached out and pulled his hand to her, tucking it under her cheek as a pillow. "I'll punish you for being late."
She draped her arm and knee over him to stop him from leaving. He wouldn't complain about this kind of punishment even if he wasn't.
He closed his eyes in her warmth. What future-him had done and what caused him to make such a choice—he could think about all that stuff later.
***
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