“You guys really didn’t have any summer plans?”
He caught Gray’s glance at Cipher, the dark-skinned young woman far better at not giving anything away. He raised an eyebrow at them both.
“Well, there were some plans in consideration,” Graymalkin admitted, looking almost sheepish. “We had thought we might… travel.”
“A vacation,” Cipher elaborated for the eighteenth-century kid. “We were thinking about going on a road trip. The three of us, after you’d been with your parents for a few weeks.”
“Where to?” Vic asked, genuinely surprised. He’d never really considered either of his friends to be road trip types. Cipher disliked the unknown and was practically wedded to the school’s security systems, while Graymalkin still seemed to struggle somewhat with the modern phenomenon of travelling for recreational purposes.
“We were thinking the Rockies,” Cipher said. “Maybe drive north to south for a week or two. Gray wanted to see them, and I wanted to get a nice postcard for the common room fridge.”
“The finest mountains on the continent,” Graymalkin added with what amounted to an enthusiastic smile.
“You always say you don’t really like living in the school,” Cipher went on. “We thought it’d be good for all of us to get out for a bit. Change things up.”
“Let’s see if I’ve got this right,” Vic said, shifting on the chair’s back. “You two were planning a surprise road trip for the three of us to celebrate the end of exams? A trip that I’ve just ruined by bombing the history exam?”
“The examination is only halfway complete,” Graymalkin consoled. “There is yet time for you to wrest it back.”
“The second half is about emancipation and the civil rights movement,” Cipher added. “And before you ask, the Emancipation Proclamation was 1863. Same year as Gettysburg. You know the start of the Gettysburg Address, don’t you? Four score and seven years. That’s eighty-seven years since the Declaration of Independence. Easy way to remember it.”
“Easy!” Vic exclaimed. “How was anything you just said there supposed to be easy to remember? What the heck’s a score? How am I supposed to know how many that is?”
“A score is twenty, of course,” Graymalkin said, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.
“Vic, shut up,” snapped Mark Sheppard. The raven-haired student was standing beside the old television that had been linked up to one of the room’s many monitors. He was working the tuning dial, trying to resolve an image on a display dashed and distorted by digital static.
Vic abruptly realized that the idle chatter which had filled the break room had grown quiet. Everyone’s attention was on the monitor, and the words now coming in over its speakers.
“Early reports indicate that there are a further five rallies planned across the Midwestern United States in the coming weeks. We can go live to our correspondent right now in Columbus, Ohio, where the self-styled Prophet Xodus is leading what he dubs ‘a sermon for his congregation.’”
The screen resolved itself fully just as the camera switched from a CTV news anchor to a crowd in Columbus Commons. As the live reporter narrated the gathering behind her, Vic felt a chill run up his spine. He knew what this was. They all did.
The view changed again – now it was a wide shot of the head of the rally. A stage had been erected in front of the crowd, topped by a lectern that was draped in black cloth and emblazoned with a white cross-and-circle crest. A large timber rendering of the same emblem had been raised behind the lectern, framing it.
Nine figures occupied the stage. Four stood flanking the lectern, clad in long black robes that had been embroidered with the same white cross-and-circle. They had cowls raised, and their faces were concealed by silver grotesque masks. The remaining figure stood between them. He too was dressed in black robes, though his grotesque was golden and fashioned differently to the leering harlequin faces of those flanking him. It was angelic, expressionless and serene. It gleamed brilliantly in the stage lights.
The audio cut from the reporter’s voiceover to the words booming from the mics rigged up to the lectern. The words rebounded around the break room, the tone powerful, stentorian, and riven with a raw, tangible hatred.
“Make no mistake, my children! Be not in doubt! A reckoning is coming! A judgment long overdue! Your prophet is here to herald it, to give you fair warning! When the fires come, they will not only burn the mutant. The unrighteous will go up in the inferno with them!”
The large figure struck a palm flat against the lectern, then did so again, emphasizing each sentence with a fresh blow. “All who have aided them, all who have abetted them! Any who give shelter to their depravity or approval to their deformity! All are unclean, all with be remade in the fire! So says Prophet Xodus!”
A brazen cheer swelled furiously from the crowd just as the image cut back to the live reporter. Struggling to be heard over the uproar, she went on to describe how the rally was set to be repeated in states along the East Coast.
The report began to distort again as the static returned, chopping up and crazing the image of the rally. Sheppard tried to adjust it, before giving up and angrily hitting the off switch. The screen blinked to black.
The silence that followed seemed absolute. Nobody spoke. Vic found himself glancing back at Cipher and Graymalkin. The latter looked blank, an expression Vic had come to recognize as the mask Gray drew down whenever he was troubled. Cipher looked furious, and for a second Vic thought she was going to phase out.
He could understand why. This wasn’t the first rally that had made the news. For the past two months the Purifier cult had been resurgent across the northern United States and southern Canada, carrying their quasi-religious anti-mutant vitriol to every town and city. And it wasn’t just angry gatherings, burnt-out cars and cross-and-circle symbols daubed on doors and windows. The parents, friends and family of half a dozen of the students at the Institute had been attacked. There were even rumors of abductions. Vic had found himself worrying more and more about his parents, regretting how little he’d seen of them since he’d enrolled at the Institute. Now there was an added threat, the looming uncertainty of civil unrest, he found himself thinking about home almost every day.
Worst of all, it looked as though the authorities were powerless to stop the outpouring of hate. Arrested cultists seemed capable of affording the best legal counsel money could buy, and several police chiefs had spoken about their desire to avoid “riots in the streets” and “full-fledged civil unrest.” As far as Vic was concerned, they may as well have just released a press statement saying, “go ahead and target that mutant minority, just try not to upset their neighbors while you’re at it.”
He looked at the rest of the class in the break room, seeing a bitter mix of anger and fear. Nobody met his eye. Somehow that made him feel even worse. The silence was unbearable. “Think Xodus would do well in our history exam,” he said slowly. “He sounds like he belongs in the eighteenth century.”
Nobody laughed, but then he hadn’t expected them to. The words had the desired effect, breaking the silence that had taken hold of the room. Conversations restarted, though they stayed muted.
“How can we stay down here while those lunatics are taking over half of North America?” Vic muttered under his breath.
“Ms Frost and the rest of the X-Men are dealing with them,” Graymalkin said without much conviction, his expression guarded once more. “They will do what is best.”
“And when will it be our turn?” Vic said, trying not to let Gray’s stoicism get to him. He found staying detached in situations like these almost impossible. “To hell with history exams. History’s happening right now, and it’s not going the way it should be. You want students like us to be reading about the successful Purifier uprising in fifty years’ time? If there’s even any mutants left, that is.”
“There’s nothing we can do rig
ht now,” Cipher said, sounding exasperated. “I wish that wasn’t the case, Vic. There’ll be a reckoning, but right now that’s not up to us.”
“One day it will be,” Vic said, standing up. He saw Graymalkin and Cipher exchange a look, but neither replied. They knew he was right. One day they’d all be X-Men, and things would start to go very different for Prophet Xodus.
There was a buzzing sound from the direction of the exam hall. The twenty-minute interval was up. Not speaking to anyone, Vic joined the flow of students leaving the break room, his thoughts turning over darkly.
•••
The fly was gone. Vic knew he’d have been able to detect its maddening buzzing from the other end of the hall. Had it found an escape route through the AC, or had it finally pulverized itself to death against the exam room window?
He forced himself to look back down at the page, to read those unblinking, death-stare letters.
1) a. In what year did the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation take place?
Was it 1862? What had Ci said? Four score and seven years. A score was eighteen? No, twenty. Gray had said twenty. So twenty times four plus seven. That was eighty-seven. But eighty-seven from what? The Declaration of Independence? That was 1776. He’d seen the musical. So, 1776 plus eighty-seven was… 1863. That sounded right.
He scribbled it down. Next question.
1) b. Give a brief (200 word) description of the work of Frederick Douglass.
He knew that one too. Triage had played Frederick Douglass in a roleplaying exercise during class. Vic didn’t think he could’ve done a better job himself, which was probably for the best as he suspected the real Frederick Douglass hadn’t possessed a ridge of bony scalp nubs or a prehensile tongue.
1) c. Give the rough percentage of African-American soldiers in the Union Army by the year 1865.
He had no idea. Maybe the next question would be better? Nope. He didn’t know the winner of the 1876 presidential election, let alone how it had impacted the Reconstruction era. He sat back, trying to think. Don’t let your mind wander. Focus and you’ll get through this.
He turned to look at Graymalkin. The pale, shaven-headed youth paused and looked back at him. Just as before, the fellow-mutant’s face remained inscrutable. This time however – and clearly unsure about the gesture – Graymalkin slowly raised a single thumb.
Ordinarily Gray’s tentative effort at something so recognizably modern would’ve left Vic battling laughter. This time though he just nodded and looked away. He felt sorry for Gray. Sorry for everyone. None of them deserved this. To live underground, hidden away in an old, derelict military facility, unable to do anything but watch as the world caved into hatred and discord. If they stayed here over the summer, what would they be emerging into after? What would be waiting for them once the fire and brimstone had died away? Would there be anything recognizable left? Anything not burnt or blemished by smoke and ash?
Snap!
The pen in Vic’s hand shattered. He looked down at the black ink dripping slowly over his hand and down onto his answer sheet. He watched it drip and spread gradually, his expression blank. Then, abruptly, he dropped the shattered pen and stood up. The scrape of his chair echoed, cold and lonely, through the hall.
Heads turned. He ignored them as he signed and dated his ruined sheet and carried it to the front. Ms Pryde watched him approach. He held her gaze as he laid the sheet on the desk at the end of the hall.
She said nothing. Vic turned and left.
Chapter Three
It was almost midnight when Vic heard a familiar knock at his door.
He’d been avoiding reality since leaving the exam hall, making a quick visit to the cafeteria to boil up some pasta before locking himself in his dorm room. Like all of the accommodation in the Institute, the space was cramped and overwhelmingly subterranean. A small window – which Vic had shuttered – looked out onto the corridor, presumably added in an attempt to lessen the claustrophobia. Thankfully, the confined nature of the room had never really bothered him. He’d made the space his own, even more so after his roommate had moved out last semester. Movie posters and autographed actor headshots adorned the walls, while an Xbox hummed softly in one corner beneath a TV screen. Since the start of exam season it also seemed as though a library had been upended inside the room. Books were stacked in teetering piles by the bed or spread in arcs across the floor, some lying open, pages stuffed with note tabs. Late nights studying – or, as often as not, procrastinating – had also ensured that there was a regular student detritus of stale clothing and even staler plates and ready-meal packets scattered around.
Clutter wasn’t like him, but he’d been too deep in the stresses of studying to tackle the mounting mess. Now he was just too on edge. He tried to read for a bit after picking at his pasta, but it felt as though the history textbooks heaped across his desk were judging him. He fired up his Xbox and sank into the beanbag at the end of his bed, losing himself in button-mashing for the next few hours.
It didn’t do much good. He tore through four or five levels of Total Combat – ones he’d completed dozens of times before – but it didn’t banish the thoughts that had been with him since the break room. In the solitude of his cramped dorm, it was impossible to deny that there was more to his frustration than just news of the Purifier rampage.
It had brought back memories. The shadows of a time Vic thought he’d put behind him. He remembered his childhood: the struggles, so often unspoken, faced by his parents. How the hell did you go about raising a mutant kid in small-town Illinois? How did that turn out OK?
He knew the answer. It wasn’t just that his parents had fought his corner from day one, though they certainly had, unflinchingly. They had come through because the town had been with them. Dan and Martha Borkowski were members of the community. They were known across Fairbury for their generosity, hard work and honesty. Dan had founded the town’s electronics store and went out of his way to employ local kids struggling with their grades. Martha had worked as a receptionist in the hospital for the better part of thirty years, all the while juggling active memberships with the Fairbury Historical Society, the Illinois Alliance for the Protection of Animals, and the First Presbyterian Church. They worked hard, they lived honestly, and when Vic had come into their lives, they’d found they had far more friends in Fairbury than enemies.
There’d still been a few who didn’t appreciate him, of course. Vic remembered one particular priest from an outlying neighborhood who’d preached against him on several occasions. He’d only found out years later, but he always remembered the man’s unyielding, dead-eyed glare whenever he’d passed him in town. It had taken Vic the longest time to figure out why someone he’d never met, never spoken to, would feel that way about him.
The town had sheltered him. He’d been invited to barbeques, sat in church, played on the Little League baseball team. Any hint of bullying in school had been clamped down on by his teachers. His friends had seemed in perpetual awe of his ability to climb the sides of buildings, vanish into his surroundings, or catch flies with his tongue – an act he had disavowed as gross from the age of eight onwards.
It hadn’t all been easy, but it had sure seemed that way to Vic growing up. After coming to the Institute he’d started to realize just how heavily he’d been shielded. He learned how rare a happy childhood was when he’d started meeting other mutants. Growing up free from trauma was a priceless blessing, something to be cherished. Graymalkin and Cipher were proof of that. Gray had been attacked by his own father when he’d tried to come out to him. He’d been buried alive, only discovering his mutant powers – his ability to endure in the dark – after being entombed. Cipher was even less forthcoming about her childhood, but Vic knew that she’d been abandoned by her parents. After a rare attempt by Gray to learn how to play Vic’s console, he’d told him about the rumors that Jean Grey had found her after she�
�d infiltrated the school, using her invisibility and phasing powers to stay undetected. She’d never told Vic how long she’d actually been there before she’d been discovered. He got the impression it was a while.
All of them had been shaped by their upbringing. Vic was just thankful his had been so happy for so long. But now all of that was at risk.
GAME OVER.
He’d been stuck on level seven of Total Combat for almost an hour now. He needed to get a combo kill on Boss Red, but he was too distracted. He tossed the controller onto his bed, about to give up. That was when the thunderous knock came, making Vic leap to his feet.
For a brief second, he thought the Institute was under attack. The door to his dorm shuddered in its frame, enduring successive strikes, two, three, four. In the silence that followed he realized who it was. Nobody else in the school knocked like that.
He stood up, checked he hadn’t spilled pasta down his tank top, and opened the door. Instead of the corridor outside he found himself face-to-face with a cliff. A mound of craggy, gray stone appeared to have collapsed outside his room, a mound that now looked down at him with pale and unblinking eyes.
“What’s up, lizard boy?” said the rock.
“Not much,” Vic answered.
Santo Vaccarro, better known around the school by his alias, Rockslide. His particular mutation was as obvious as it was impressive. Over six feet tall and seemingly almost as wide, his size alone was enough to attract attention, but that was before factoring in that his biological makeup consisted mostly of stone. He was all broad shoulders, rough-hewn pecs, and arms thicker than Vic’s torso, cast in coarse, solid rock. It was as if a sculptor with a background in brutalist architecture had hewed a statue of a football lineman from the side of a mountain. His craggy head, perched like a boulder on the ridgeline of his shoulders, regarded Vic for a moment with all the inscrutability of a mountain peak.
“Can I come in?” he rumbled.
Vic stood aside, encompassing his room with a sweep of his arm. “I’m sure you know the way, Rocky.”
First Team Page 2
