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The first giveaway had been the smell.
Not perfume—not really. The scent rolling off her was something sharper, more primal, something that definitely didn't belong to Audrey Hepburn. But at the time, Henry had brushed it off as some weird chemical reaction from a fancy fragrance.
And that's how Mystique got him.
"So… you've figured out where we are, haven't you, brother?" she said, now fully in her natural form.
Henry kept his expression cool. "I was guessing it was either the X-Men's HQ or the Brotherhood's base—"
He paused deliberately, letting the implication hang. "—but seeing the famous Mystique in person? Yeah, it's not hard to connect the dots. Just don't call me your brother. I'm not one of you."
Mystique's yellow eyes narrowed. "Why deny it? We are the same."
Henry folded his arms. "We're not."
She stepped closer, her tone shifting from coy to deadly serious. "Don't let the lack of headlines fool you. Just because you don't see mutants being hunted on TV doesn't mean the world has accepted us. We've suffered more than you can imagine. And if we don't stick together—help each other—those tragedies will happen again."
"Not my problem," Henry said flatly. "And I'm telling you, I'm not one of you."
"You think denying it changes the truth? This world was built by humans—for humans. The only ones we can truly rely on are each other."
Henry's patience snapped. "Okay, you know what? I'll say this one last time—because I'm not a mutant. I'm a goddamn alien!"
The words came out like a gunshot.
If he had to choose between getting pulled into mutant politics or revealing his Kryptonian secret, he'd take the latter every time. Mutant affairs in the Marvel Universe were a political nightmare—worse than any racial issue, worse than any other marginalized group. Even your own parents might turn on you. No matter which side you chose—the idealistic Xavier or the militant Magneto—you'd still end up under the government's microscope.
Better to make a clean cut right here and now.
I'm an alien and proud of it.
Mystique froze, caught between disbelief and… was that actual shock? "Wait… Walter. You're… what?"
Henry smirked. "Let me guess—you're picturing some tiny, wrinkled, brown-skinned thing with a glowing finger and a neck like a toothpick. Yeah, no. Not every alien looks like E.T. That's just Hollywood's idea of an alien. Real life's a bit more… varied."
For emphasis, he hunched his shoulders, stuck a finger out, and croaked in his best movie-robot monotone: "Elliot… I'm your friend."
"Or did you really think all aliens had to look like that?" he said, dropping the act and glaring her down. Kryptonian rage had a way of shutting people up.
That's when it happened—he went rigid, mid-step. Completely frozen.
Mystique's head whipped toward the mansion gates. "Charles!" she snapped.
And sure enough, a group emerged from the estate's front lawn: Beast, Jean Grey, Cyclops, Storm, Nightcrawler, Quicksilver… and at the center, rolling forward in his chair with that damnably serene expression, Professor Charles Xavier. His fingers touched his temple, eyes locked on Henry.
"Raven," Xavier said mildly, "I told you—he doesn't have the X-gene."
"Great. Then let him go. What the hell are you doing?" she demanded.
"He claims to be an alien," Xavier replied. "I need to verify that—and find out why he's here—wait. What are you—? No! Stop!"
The calm veneer shattered. Xavier's face twisted in pain, eyes bloodshot, veins bulging against his scalp. Blood trickled from his nose and ears. Then, with a strangled cry, one of the world's most powerful telepaths slumped forward, unconscious.
Henry rolled his shoulders, the telepathic hold dropping. "Wow. All I did was start calculating pi to a novemdecillion decimal places and you tap out? I wasn't even gonna hit you with the infinite geometric patterns."
This—this right here—was exactly why Henry had no interest in stepping foot on X-Men turf. He'd known Xavier would try the instant he heard "alien," and sure enough, the man had gone straight for the telepathic lock-and-read.
Privacy? Consent? Apparently those didn't apply to extraterrestrials.
Henry figured mutants had just discovered the one group lower than them on Marvel's social hierarchy. Hell, maybe aliens didn't even register as people to them.
And as much as Kryptonians could tank artillery fire, magic and mental attacks were… not their strong suit. Xavier could've crushed him mentally before Henry even blinked—if Henry hadn't improvised.
The trick had been realizing that while his body was frozen, his mind was still free. If Xavier wanted to rummage through his head, fine—Henry would just flood it with something no brain could comfortably process.
And now the "world's strongest telepath" was lying unconscious on his own front lawn.
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