“’Tis a neural disruptor,” Raza said as he and Gambit caught up with the others. “Thou wilt find it far more effective than a mere blaster. Whilst a blaster may wound thy body, this weapon shall cause all of thy nerve endings to fire at once.”
“Try dat again in English, homme,” Gambit said, shrugging his shoulders.
“It hurts,” Jean said simply. “And my guess is that even Rogue might not be able to stay conscious if she was hit by it.”
“So what now?” Rogue asked.
“We take it away from them,” Jean said grimly. “This has already been too long a delay as far as I’m concerned. Gambit, Raza, be ready with blasters. Warren, when the weapon is out of their hands, take them all down with your wing knives.”
“Jean, you know I don’t like to …” Warren began, but then let it go.
Rogue knew what he was going to say, that he didn’t like to use his wing knives because he could not truly control them. Her ability to steal skills, memories, powers bothered her in much the same way. She understood. But she also knew that Jean’s plan was the most expedient. And time was of the essence. Warren obviously knew that as well.
“Rogue …” Jean began, but she was way ahead of their leader-by-proxy.
“I’ll shield you, of course,” she said quickly. She could see that Jean was about to protest, to offer her an out, to warn her of the possible danger. There wasn’t time for any of that.
“Let’s go,” Rogue said.
With Jean behind her, Rogue stepped out into the hallway into a barrage of ineffective blaster fire. It was impossible to see the force, the psionic “hands” that Jean’s telekinetic power used to manipulate objects. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t see its effects.
Even as the Neural Disruptor erupted, the dish around its muzzle focusing its energies on her—even as Rogue screamed with pain, her brain overloading with signals from every point in her nervous system—she saw the weapon explode into dozens of pieces. At least it seemed to. In reality, Jean had reached out for the thing with her telekinesis and torn it apart, flattening the two soldiers who had wielded it.
Rogue couldn’t appreciate the drama, however. She had collapsed in the hall. Jean was at her side immediately. Rogue felt her teammate probing her mind for damage, felt Jean’s relief, and shared it, as she found none. In a moment, she was sitting up. Gambit sat by her, holding her right hand, stroking it gently, unconsciously. He didn’t say a word, but his grin when she got to her feet was communication enough.
“I guess I missed the exciting part,” Rogue said as she surveyed the hallway, where the Shi’ar soldiers lay, paralyzed by Archangel’s wing-knives.
They all stood there looking at her, even Jean, whose lover was still captive only yards away. Even Raza, who had no reason to care for her. Their concern was just another reminder of what she was fighting for. This was her family. For better or worse, they were the only family she had ever really had, or was ever really likely to have.
“What are y’all gawking at?” she asked. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”
* * *
CYCLOPS sagged against his restraints in despair, hoping desperately that Jean and the other X-Men would arrive soon. He was not in any extraordinary pain, nor did he have any real doubt or anxiety about their ability to come to the rescue. Put simply, he couldn’t stand being in the same room with his fellow inmates.
“Guilty she is!” Hepzibah snarled, then hissed at Candide, who glared back at her. “Fool you, Corsair. Cannot believe you, I. Death sentence, we have, all because still love her, you!”
“I don’t still love her,” Corsair insisted, and his exasperated tone matched Scott’s own waning patience.
“Oh, thank you so much,” Candide said, honey sweet voice filled with sarcasm.
“Don’t you start,” Corsair snapped, and the Kree/Shi’ar halfbreed only smiled. “I figured you for a mercenary to the core. If I’d had any idea you knew what you were getting into, that you were actually smuggling arms to the Kree rebellion, I never would have risked my life and the lives of my crew to come and get you.”
“So, what you’re saying is, because you thought I was a heartless bitch whose only concerns were financial, you felt like you needed to save my life?” Candide asked with a knowing smirk.
“Still love her, you do,” Hepzibah growled. “Admit it, can you not?”
“Enough!” Corsair shouted, then continued through clenched teeth. “Hepzibah, you know that I love you. Only you. I’ll admit I had a little crush on Candide back in our early freebooting days. But that was a long time ago, and nothing ever happened between us. Did it, Candide?”
The smuggler was silent.
“Candide?” Corsair asked again, the warning clear in his tone.
“Not for lack of my trying,” she answered finally, and everybody seemed to relax. Scott himself breathed a sigh of relief, though none of the conversation pertained to him.
“Okay, maybe I was stupid to come after her,” Corsair went on, speaking only to his lover, Hepzibah, now. “Maybe I’ve still got an old-fashioned damsel-in-distress program running in my head. The Starjammers wouldn’t be in trouble now, and I wouldn’t have dragged my son and his friends in after us. But it’s too late for recriminations now. We’ve been in tighter spots than this and gotten out. Scott’s already told us all we have to do is just sit back and wait for the cavalry to arrive.”
There was a moment of silence when all three of them looked at Cyclops, who smiled sheepishly at the attention.
“Believe you, maybe I do,” Hepzibah said. “Love you, that you know. Doubt your handsome son, not at all do I. But what if never come, the cavalry? Then what do we?”
“An excellent question, Mademoiselle Hepzibah,” Candide agreed.
“Scott?” Corsair said, and looked at his son with inquiring eyes.
“They’ll come,” Cyclops said confidently. “And if they don’t, we’ll figure a way out of here. Or we’ll die. Pretty simple, really.”
Silence descended upon the cell once more. Moments later, it was broken by the screech of tearing metal, a distorted underwater-style echo that made Cyclops wince and close his eyes. There was a series of loud, staccato popping sounds, then the door seemed to burst outward, sparks flying as the cell’s technosecurity shorted out.
Rogue stood just outside the cell, holding the crumpled door in her hands. She threw it aside with ease and it landed in the hall with a resounding crash.
“The cavalry,” Scott said simply, as Rogue rushed into the cell with Jean Grey at her side.
“Jean!” Corsair boomed. “It’s a pleasure to see you, as always. My son offer to make an honest woman out of you yet?”
Cyclops blushed, but Jean merely laughed.
“Not yet,” she said with a wink, then her demeanor became far more serious. “We’re all present and accounted for, Scott, but the Imperial Guard will probably be along any second. We’ve really got to get out of here.”
“You can start by getting us down from here,” Candide snapped, and Cyclops saw Jean’s eyes narrow in annoyance and contempt.
“Candide, I presume?” Jean asked.
“Is not her strong point, charm,” Hepzibah sneered, and it took Scott a moment to decipher the insult. Jean, apparently, had no such difficulty.
“That’s fairly obvious,” she said. “A lot of people have risked their lives to get you out of here. A little gratitude might be in order.”
“You didn’t come here for me, Terran,” Candide observed. “But you get me out of here alive, and you can be sure I’ll be grateful.”
“The cell is offline,” Corsair said, ignoring the exchange. “It shouldn’t take much to shake us loose from these restraints.”
He was right. After a few moments, and several well placed optic blasts from Cyclops, they were able to free themselves with relative ease. In the time it took to do so, Archangel, Gambit and Raza had all joined them in the cell.
“Beautif
ul,” Warren sighed, “now we’re all in prison.”
“Not for long,” Cyclops replied, then turned to Corsair. “Dad, why don’t you signal Ch’od to teleport us out of here, and we can all go home?”
Blaster fire shook the hall outside the cell.
“And perhaps thou ought to make haste, my captain,” Raza added.
Corsair pressed the comm-badge on his chest and was greeted with the hiss of static.
“Interference,” he said confidently. “Ch’od, this is Corsair, do you read me? Come in, Ch’od.”
Static, crackling, popping, then finally: “Ch’od here, Captain. Good to hear your voice.”
“You too, old friend. But we’re in a bit of a hurry here. Prepare to teleport nine aboard the Starjammer,” Corsair ordered.
More hissing, then: “There’s nothing I would enjoy more, Corsair, but I’m afraid it’s impossible. Teleporter’s still down. It will take days to fix it.”
“Damn,” Corsair said under his breath.
Cyclops felt the dread overtake him in an instant. For once, nobody had a wisecrack to make. They all simply stood, in silence, glancing around at one another to see what the next move would be. Corsair looked at Hepzibah, and though they did not have the psychic rapport that he shared with Jean, Scott could see that some unspoken communication passed between them.
“Only chance, it is,” Hepzibah said, and laid a comforting hand on Corsair’s shoulder.
“Not to rush you,” Cyclops said to his father, “but the blaster fire sounds closer, and the Guard’s probably …”
“Probably nothing!” Jean said, holding one hand to her head as she often did while making a psionic scan. “They’ll be here in seconds!”
Corsair slapped his comm-badge once more, making his decision in that instant.
“Ch’od! Planetfall!” he barked. “Come and get us!”
Before he could ask another question, Corsair put his hands on Scott’s shoulders and looked into his eyes. “We’ve got to go up,” he said, “as far as we can.”
Then he looked around the cell at the others gathered there, Starjammers and X-Men, and one lone half-breed smuggler.
“If we don’t make it to the dome, we’re going to die in this hellhole.”
FIFTEEN
THE Acolytes were still putting up something of a fight, but the tide had clearly turned. It would be mere moments before the last of them, the Kleinstock Brothers, were contained. The X-Men had defeated the Acolytes in open combat.
That in mind, Hank McCoy could not figure out what was causing the anxiety that was rising to a fever pitch in his mind. Just as the X-Men were not at full force, neither had the Acolytes had their entire roster present for the confrontation. It was possible there were more still inside, but Hank had to assume the others would have come to the aid of their comrades when the battle turned against them.
The same was true for Magneto. If he was inside the facility, why had he not emerged to protect his flock in their time of need?
“What is it, Hank?” Storm asked, and he explained.
“What might he conceivably expect to accomplish, other than the demolition of the Sentinels?” the Beast asked. “And if that is Magneto’s design, the ultimate strike against Operation: Wideawake, I’m not unconditionally confident I would be predisposed to thwart him.”
“Nor I,” Storm agreed.
“That isn’t it, though,” Hank continued, more to himself than to Ororo. “If it was, Magnus would anticipate that the X-Men would have conflicting emotions. He would not have directed the Acolytes against us.”
As they were speaking, Bishop had absorbed what energies the Kleinstocks had still had, and they had fallen unconscious to the grass. Wolverine stood by Storm as Hank spoke, and the Canadian’s response was typical.
“We can stand out here and jaw about this ’til mornin’, folks,” Wolverine said, brandishing his claws. “But the only way we’re gonna find out anything is by goin’ up there and knockin’ on Magneto’s door. Believe me, if he’s in there, he’ll answer.”
The Beast looked at Storm. She was the field leader, but due to his experience, not just with this team, but with the Avengers and Defenders, she often looked to him for guidance. There was a question in her eyes, which was uncommon. Hank had found that, more often than not, Ororo knew what to do merely by instinct. He suspected that was one of the reasons Charles had made her the team’s second-in-command, after Cyclops. This time, however, she seemed unsure.
He understood her trepidation. They had already encountered federal troops. Though they had defeated the Acolytes, if Magneto was not inside they would be breaking into a top-secret U.S. military base. That would be bad. On the other hand, if Magneto were actually inside, one reason for him not to have emerged during the battle was if the entire thing was an elaborate ruse. Some kind of trap.
“We can’t take any chances,” Hank said, and Storm nodded.
“Bishop and Iceman take point,” she said. “Iceman, give us an ice slide down. Wolverine, watch for more Acolytes once we’re in. If Magneto is down there, we’ll have to take him out quick if we’re going to take him out at all.”
The X-Men moved swiftly toward the unassuming brick building that masked the huge military base and silo that existed under the ground they were crossing. The Beast knew it was unwise to leave the Acolytes simply laying about the field, that any moment one or more of them might revive and attack once again, but there was nothing to be done about it.
Bobby and Bishop were in the lead, perhaps twenty yards from the two-story structure, when it exploded, blasting them across the field to slam hard against the chain-link fence that surrounded it. Hank didn’t see what happened to Storm and Wolverine, but in a moment he found himself lying on his back, staring up at the darkening sky. The Beast blocked his eyes from the glare of the sun. It took him a moment to realize that what he was seeing was not the sun at all.
Magneto hung suspended in the air above the field, a sizzling, green ball of magnetic energy around him and three of his Acolytes: Voght, Javitz, and another that the Beast recognized as the techno-linguist, Milan. Javitz seemed to have recovered quite well from the wounds Wolverine had inflicted upon him, Hank noticed.
The Beast picked himself up off the ground, not worried about whether or not his actions appeared threatening. They had skirmished often enough that they both knew Hank posed no danger to Magneto from the ground.
“Hear me, X-Men!” Magneto declared. “For the duration of this conflict, you have lived by my sufferance alone. From this day forward, the same will be true.”
Hank was stunned to see that, though she was usually the least fervent of Magneto’s followers, Amelia Voght was gazing at her lord and master with a look he could only perceive as awe. Javitz still seemed disoriented, but Milan stood rigid by Magneto, his face beaming with serenity. In that moment, the Beast grasped the profound nature of the Acolytes’ worship of their master. Not the basis for it, but its depth.
The blue fur stood up on his back and neck, and Hank McCoy gnawed his lip, deeply disturbed.
“They’re moving!” Wolverine shouted behind him, and Hank turned quickly to see that, indeed, the Acolytes were rising from the field. One Kleinstock twin—Hank could not tell which—carried his still unconscious brother, and Frenzy had Senyaka over her shoulder. But the Acolytes had become a threat once again, now that their master had arrived.
Beyond them, across the field, Hank saw Bishop carrying Bobby toward them, slung over his shoulder in a bizarre imitation of Frenzy and Senyaka. He knew that Bishop’s powers would have allowed him to absorb the brunt of the explosion Magneto had caused. Iceman had not been so lucky. Either the force of the explosion itself or his impact with the fence had knocked Bobby unconscious.
Hank wanted to go to him. They had been friends for a long time, and it was hard not to put his friends first. But there were far more pressing matters at hand.
“Though I fear I know your answer, I
make you this offer now,” Magneto continued. “Mutants must conquer humanity. There is no other option which will guarantee the survival of our race. I open my arms to you all. There will be sanctuary for our kind, I will see to it. And there is a place for you in the hierarchy of that sanctuary, should you choose to seek it.”
Silence followed this pronouncement. The Acolytes they had so recently battled glared at them as they passed, but in a moment they were lifted, one by one, to hover in the ever-expanding bubble their master had created and was sustaining with only a portion of his power. Hank, Logan, and Bishop—with the unconscious Iceman—gathered close around Storm.
“What’s the plan, ’Roro?” Logan asked, but Storm held up her hand.
“As you say, Magneto,” she called to him. “You know our response all too well. Whatever your current plot is, we stand against you as always. There is nothing noble in conquest. You are sadly deluded if you believe the world will ever bow to you as its emperor.”
“Not deluded, my dear Ororo,” Magneto said pleasantly. “Merely practical.”
“That’s it!” Wolverine snarled. Hank tried to hold him back, but Logan ran ahead until he was almost directly beneath the shimmering ball of magnetic energy that held Magneto and his followers aloft. In the descending darkness, the green glow bathed the X-Men’s faces in a sickly aura.
“We’re all a little sick o’ your delusions o’ grandeur, bub,” Logan called up to him, brandishing his claws. “Why don’t you come on down and we can discuss this like the savages we are?”
Magneto shook his head. His sigh was audible, even from the field.
“One of these days, Wolverine …” Magneto began, and it was almost enough to get Hank to smile when Logan interrupted.
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard it before. To the moon, Alice,” Wolverine sneered. “Now you gonna get down and dirty, or not?”
“I think not,” Magneto replied.
The mutant master of magnetism lifted one hand and a blast of the same green energy flashed around his fist, then arced high above the field and into the forest beyond.
Marvel Classic Novels--X-Men Page 22
