As the wooden stairs echoed with a sound like knocking, the warmth inside contrasted sharply with the snow accumulating outside the window.
The decorations and furnishings in the corridor greatly complemented this atmosphere.
When Su Ming saw Charles, he was tiptoeing, lying on the windowsill looking out at the swamp, perhaps occasionally sensing the hibernating alligators.
However, he was only a few years old, and his face was completely calm, as if he had lost all emotion, which was quite eerie.
"You're back, Mr. Wilson." Charles turned his head, leaning against the windowsill. The snow on the treetops outside swayed and fell to the ground.
"I've caught the murderer who killed your father. If you want to know the reason, you can go see for yourself."
Su Ming pointed to the floor, indicating that the person was downstairs.
Seeing Su Ming still carrying the chill, Charles nodded politely, "Thank you."
He did not show any emotions of anger or frenzy, remaining as calm as a well, without waves, and leisurely walked downstairs at a normal pace.
"What do you plan to do with the murderer?" Su Ming followed Charles, putting his hand on his bald head.
Charles stood at the top of the stairs, gazing at the translucent hibernation pod in the lounge below, and pondered for a moment before saying, "I don't know. When you fulfilled my wish, I instead felt at a loss. I've always wanted to catch the murderer, but now that I have, I don't know how to deal with it."
Su Ming sighed, taking Charles further down, "You should first read his memory. There are some things I need to verify from him. Where's your mother?"
"She was secretly crying all last night and just fell asleep," Charles said, holding onto the stair rail as he descended step by step, "Am I really a monster, as others say?"
Su Ming knew Charles was talking about his lack of emotions. Many people with exceptional intellect are like this; their rationality is so strong that their emotions are almost completely suppressed.
Batman and Deathstroke face the same problem. When thinking and calculation become instinct, and they always seek to find the truth from an objective perspective, it creates a sense of disconnect from the world.
Su Ming became Deathstroke, bringing ordinary human emotions to the shell, but the problem didn't improve much.
"We're not without feelings, just better at controlling them than others," Su Ming touched the little bald head and pushed him closer to the hibernation pod, "You want to cry for your father because everyone else would do so, so you think you should too. But your powerful rationality tells you that crying afterwards is useless and finding the murderer and uncovering the truth behind the event is what's most important. Therefore, your brain doesn't allow you to shed a single tear."
"Isn't that still a monster?" Charles turned his head, looking up at Su Ming.
"I'm the monster; you're just a precocious little brat," Su Ming stepped down the stairs, standing next to Charles, "This is an Inhuman. There's a difference from mutants, but he has superpowers. He once infiltrated the institution where your father worked and that's where he attacked him."
Charles nodded, tugging at his pajama sleeve, seemingly feeling the cold from the hibernation pod.
"Can you let him out?"
Su Ming shook his head and pressed Charles against the pod wall, "He's a Space Ability User. If he revives, he could teleport to any corner of Earth instantly. I can't control him, can you?"
"I can, but it's fine as is. There's no need to trouble ourselves."
Charles dragged a sofa over, stood on it, and then raised his right hand, pressing his ten fingers and middle fingers against his temples, eyes fixed on the person inside the hibernation pod.
Soon, his nose bled, the blood beads trailing past his lips and chin, rolling down his pajama.
Both Charles and the person in the coffin began to tremble violently, the veins bulged on the little bald head, his eyeballs covered in red veins, his face flushed red.
"Wow."
Charles suddenly spat out a mouthful of white foam, his eyes rolled back, and he fainted. Su Ming reached out to catch the small body, preventing him from falling to the ground.
Despite pinching his philtrum and slapping his cheeks, Charles still didn't wake up.
Su Ming knew this was due to excessive use of his abilities, causing brain overload. What Charles had read was far beyond what his four-year-old self could endure.
If it were just information, it wouldn't harm Charles so much. This meant that something in this fake Colonel's mind was beyond Charles's comprehension, or even his worldview.
The current Professor X was still a child, and his ability development was much weaker, unable to withstand the strain.
Seeing Charles, now bleeding from seven orifices after spitting up white foam, Su Ming felt overwhelmed, having to take him directly to the headmaster's office, and with Hamill's help, used the Time Gem once more.
Although he didn't obviously lose anything, using the gem repeatedly in a short time left Su Ming feeling somewhat hollow.
This time, he didn't reverse Charles's time; instead, he pushed it forward by three years. If time was reversed, Charles would return to the state before reading the memory, and the information would be lost.
Moreover, this brain damage, though harmful, ironically trained his superpowers. Su Ming merely skipped over Charles's vegetative state phase.
With the green light dissipating, the slightly grown Charles clutched his head as he clambered off the sofa. Before speaking, he spat out a mouthful of clotted blood, then supported his hands on the ground, breathing rapidly.
His memory is still stuck at the moment of his coma; now it's just a normal reaction after awakening.
Su Ming tossed him a towel, letting him wipe his own eyes and ears; the sight was just too pitiful.
Hamill brought tea and placed it on the coffee table, then stood quietly aside.
Su Ming opened the window to let the room's bloody smell dissipate, casually fiddling with Hamill's flowers on the windowsill. He had a lot of plants growing in the office, and even though it was winter, it was still lush indoors, with many Alternate Dimension flowers blooming that even Su Ming didn't recognize.
After fiddling with the plants for a while, Su Ming closed the window, watching Charles gradually calm down.
"How is it? Feeling better?"
"I'm fine now." Charles rubbed his bald head, "How long was I in a coma?"
"A few minutes." Su Ming took out a cigarette, casually tucked it into his mouth; he wouldn't mention that Charles had been a plant for three years.
Charles looked down at his clothes; what used to be a perfectly fitting pajama had now turned into a crop top, with the pants legs reaching his calves. How could this be just a few minutes? Did he swell up?
He extended a hand, looking at his noticeably longer palm, shook his head helplessly, but didn't pursue the issue.
If the other side doesn't want to talk, asking won't help.
"I already know why my father was removed; that Colonel wasn't just working for the Kree People." He chose to discuss serious matters first; the memories he just retrieved were very important.
"The issue still lies with your father's experiment, the Black Womb Project."
"Yes, in the Colonel's memory, there's a future that hasn't happened yet. In that future, my father created a very terrifying existence."
"An artificial Inhuman? The Kree People achieved this technology a million years ago; it's not terrifying." Su Ming shook his head as smoke slowly poured from his nostrils.
"He used an Obelisk to create artificial Inhumans, but he still wasn't satisfied, thinking that human material wasn't good enough. He began to fuse genes of Inhumans, Mutants, and Blood Race together..."
"Wait, genes aren't children's building blocks that can be pieced together casually. An animal with so many kinds of genes would surely die from gene collapse." Su Ming raised a hand to signal for a pause, "X Gene collapse would cause physical Death, let alone Blood Race and Inhumans."
Charles patiently explained, "But these mentioned races all have a common Origin, Earth. We're not scientists, and we don't know how my deceased father would do it. Perhaps there's scientific basis, or it's just a coincidence, but he created the God of Mankind through test tubes and petri dishes and an instrument called the Black Womb."
"Sounds stronger than Sentinel Robots..." Looking at Charles's puzzled expression, the child had no idea what Sentinels were. Su Ming brought the topic back, "Continue."
"The result was, a God emerged, but mankind disappeared." Charles touched his head, directly skipping the steps and stating the result.
Su Ming sighed; he knew it would be like this. Humans are constantly walking the path of self-destruction, ignoring all relationships.
"This counts as a kind of Biohazard, right? I've seen many scripts of artificial monsters slaughtering humans, Frankenstein being the earliest archetype."
Upon hearing this example, Charles shrugged slightly, it was about the same.
"In any case, the culprit you caught is a triple agent, and there's a mysterious organization behind him. They're the ones who ordered the killing of my father."
Su Ming clicked his tongue, flicked ash into the pot, pondered as he took a puff, "So they're modifying the worldline, changing the future to their desired direction?"
"Yes." Charles nodded, very certain.
"The name of this organization?"
"I didn't retrieve it; the Colonel's brain has been specifically modified, seemingly locking all information about that organization in memory."
"You forced a breakthrough, resulting in your coma and turning into a plant, so you must have seen something." Su Ming stroked his beard, leaning against the windowsill.
Charles flashed a smile, very slight, but the benefits he gained were already showing. His control over his power had increased, allowing him to express more emotions.
"I did see a sentence, which was that organization's creed or motto."
"What is it?" Su Ming drew the cigarette to the bottom, casually extinguished it.
"We are a protection measure, specifically countering those hindering the world from proceeding according to our designs, countering the obstructionists as a protection measure."
Charles fluently recited a long sentence, and it was in Italian, a language he had never learned.
Su Ming's hand paused for a moment, then tossed the cigarette butt onto the windowsill.
"I see. I need you to promise me a few things..."