Marvel Classic Novels--X-Men
Page 52
But evasion was not going to be a possibility. She was already drained by the incredible amount of energy she had put into the storm. No, there had to be something.
Then she had it. Ororo cursed herself for never having thought of it before. The perfect, perhaps the only, defense against Magneto that the X-Men had. It would have been far easier if Iceman had been with her, but they weren’t even certain what had happened to him. The Acolytes claimed that they had killed Bobby. Storm didn’t want to think about that. Nor did she have the time.
Magneto was mustering his strength, so Storm did the same. While he was, most probably, summoning all the power he could to destroy her, she enacted a desperate plan to save herself from that attack.
Diverting some of her attention from the storm, from her attack on Magneto, she drew all the moisture in the air around in front of her, using the wind to sculpt clouds that had not been there a moment earlier. The sky was clearing already, the sun breaking through and shining down. Many citizens of Magneto’s new empire crept from their hiding places or went to help one another up, tending to those wounded during the tempest.
Four feet from where she floated on the air, Storm created a blizzard from thin air. She concentrated her power on that spot, used the winds to whip up a circular motion, keeping as much of the generated snow from falling to the ground as possible. By the count of six, there was a gossamer layer of snow swirling together to form a weather wall between herself and Magneto.
At the count of seven, he reached out for her with his magnetic power. And he was rebuffed. Storm could barely make him out through the curtain of snow she had conjured, but she did not see him to sense his frustration. Like all the X-Men, Storm had received a college-level education at the Xavier Institute, once called Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. That education included the basic natural sciences. Electromagnetic energy was radiation. Snow absorbed radiation, such as the sun’s heat, like a sponge. The blizzard she had created assimilated and diffused Magneto’s blasts.
Try as he might, Magneto would not be able to break through the snow barrier as long as she could continue to generate it. The question was, which of them would become exhausted first? Ororo feared that she knew the answer. Just as she was attempting to determine her next move, she heard Magneto’s voice very faintly over the roar of the storm.
“… far more clever than … credit for …” she heard. “… nearly as clever … you thought …”
The last part, she heard clearly.
“Look up!” Magneto shouted.
Surprised by the tone of victory in his voice, Storm could not help but obey. She looked up, through the heavy blanket of snow and clouds that she had called down on the city in her wrath. Only then did she notice that the sun was no longer breaking through the clouds. But it was not her doing. Something else was blotting out the sky above her. Something huge.
The Sentinel’s eyes glowed red.
“Alpha mutant designate Storm, surrender now to avoid painful apprehension procedures,” the Sentinel commanded in its flat, emotionless voice.
Realizing she had lost, Storm attempted to retreat. She did not get very far.
SEVENTEEN
“WE have hope now, Charles, that is what is truly important here, isn’t it?” Valerie Cooper asked.
Xavier still felt some of the revulsion that had crept into his psyche when he lowered himself to steal the Sentinel override command codes from Gyrich’s brain. The feeling lingered within him, never quite disappearing, the way the acrid odor of sulfur remained after a match had been extinguished.
“Indeed,” he answered at last. There was no reason for him to burden Cooper with his troubles. In any case, a woman of her pragmatism would not understand them.
“We do have a chance at this, now,” he agreed. “Perhaps the only chance we’ll get. Once I have communicated the override codes to the X-Men, and redirected them to find the Alpha Sentinel, we’ll have done all we can from here. What we need now is some visual cue to identify the Alpha Sentinel.”
“Of course,” Val said, a bit cynically. “That would be nice, wouldn’t it? Thing is, you’re not supposed to be able to identify the Alpha Sentinel. That would make things too convenient for someone, like us, who is trying to put the damn thing out of commission.”
Xavier frowned. The X-Men certainly had their work cut out for them.
“If you’ll excuse me, now, Valerie,” he began.
“Do you want me to go?” she asked, very respectfully.
“Not at all,” Xavier answered. “Just bear with me. For a moment, it will seem as though it is I who have left.”
With that, Xavier cast his mind out over the island of Manhattan. He concentrated on midtown and began moving south. With the millions of minds on the island, it would take a few moments longer than usual to identify the X-Men’s thought patterns. But, as he had once explained to Cyclops, mentally recognizing an individual mind was no more difficult than visually recognizing an individual face. In many ways, in fact, it was easier.
Professor Xavier had taught and trained the X-Men, some for many years. Some of the lessons he imparted to them had to do with the mind, and the protection of its secrets. Their thought patterns were as familiar to him as the faces of children he had never had. When he reached out with his psi power to scour the island in search of them, it was with the utmost confidence.
Indeed, he found them. One by one, he made contact with the X-Men. One by one, he found them unable to respond, or communicate in any way. They were unconscious, had somehow been sedated. At least, that was the case with Storm, Bishop, and the Beast. Iceman had been knocked unconscious, and was far from where the others were being held.
Held. The thought came to Xavier so easily, but he knew it was the only solution. The X-Men had been captured by Magneto, were his prisoners even now. Xavier could only thank God, in that moment, that they were still alive. As long as they lived, there was still hope. But it seemed, at that moment, a slim hope indeed.
Valerie must have noticed some disturbance on his face, for distantly Xavier heard her call to him.
“Charles, are you okay?” she asked.
He might have replied, but instead ignored her question. For there was one X-Man he had not yet found. Xavier scanned the island again, searching frantically for Wolverine. He could imagine only two reasons why he might not be able to find Logan. The first, that he had already left Manhattan, did not seem very likely to Xavier. The second, that Logan was dead, he dared not seriously consider. Therefore, he reasoned, there must be a third.
Taking a deep breath, Xavier scanned again. If Wolverine had been part of the melee where his teammates had been captured, and had left the battle of his own volition, he would most certainly be making for the city limits, and reinforcements. Xavier knew Wolverine would choose the most direct route, through one of the tunnels. With great care, he reached out with his mind, as if slowly dragging a mental net over the area of the city between Times Square and the two tunnels.
Finally, Xavier sensed Logan’s mind. His psi-scan had not initially pinpointed Wolverine because the man had gone primal, had descended into the predatory persona that seemed to overcome him when stalking his prey.
Wolverine, he thought, and he could feel Logan’s instinctive response to the psi contact.
You got beautiful timin’, Chuck, Wolverine thought in return. Where were ya when we needed ya?
We have no time for such foolishness, Logan, Xavier chided, knowing that Wolverine’s jibe was insincere. The others have all been captured, as I’ll assume you know. Now that I am aware of your predicament, you don’t need to be concerned with calling in reinforcements. I’ll do what I can. In the meantime, you must find the Alpha Sentinel and reprogram it with the following override codes …
When Xavier was through communicating the codes, he could feel Wolverine’s anger and hesitation. He did not want to leave his friends in Magneto’s hands for any longer than necessary.
Instantly, contact was broken. Xavier’s eyes began to focus once more, and he saw Val Cooper staring at him, her curiosity etched in her face.
“The X-Men have been captured,” he said, and watched as Cooper sighed and buried her face in her hands. “Wolverine remains free and has begun the search for the Alpha unit.”
After a moment, Cooper looked up, her brows knitted with concern.
“Well, Charles, any ideas as to what the hell we do now? I’m fresh out, I’m afraid,” Valerie said gravely.
“I know,” Xavier answered. “I told Wolverine to leave rescuing the X-Men to me. But I’m not even sure where to start. He may very well be our only hope, now. One man against a city filled with humans who hate him, and mutants out to destroy him.”
“Of course,” Val said, trying to lighten the mood, “every day is like that for Wolverine.”
* * *
AMELIA Voght did not want to see the X-Men killed. Not that she had any great love for Xavier’s puppies. Or any sympathy for them. But there was something about the purity of their optimism that she saw as valuable. Magneto clearly did not want them dead either, and that made her think that perhaps he had seen the same value in their continued existence. It also didn’t hurt when one considered that, if the X-Men could be convinced to support Magneto, they would not only have much greater firepower in their arsenal, but many other mutants who supported their efforts and not Magneto’s might come around. There might be thousands of mutants who would join the cause if the X-Men were among Magneto’s followers.
Not that Amelia thought there was a chance in hell of that ever happening. But still, she didn’t want to kill them. Not that she ever wanted to kill, but this was something else entirely. The purity of their efforts, sure, that was part of it. But maybe, just maybe, she had a soft spot still for Charles Xavier. And if the X-Men died, as far as Amelia was concerned, much of Xavier’s soul would die as well.
On the other hand, there was Wolverine.
He was different from the rest of the X-Men, somewhat less pure. He was more like her. The other Acolytes worshipped the ground Magneto walked on, thought of him as second only to God, infallible as the Pope—if you believed in that kind of thing. In their own way, they were pure as well. Though some of them, Amelia wouldn’t mind seeing killed. Ironic, sort of. She didn’t want the X-Men to die, but Unuscione? That was another story entirely.
But she and Wolverine were two of a kind. He didn’t really walk the path of righteousness that Xavier had laid out for the others. Wolverine was jaded, had seen too many battles, seen the inside of too many human beings, friends, lovers. Voght didn’t really know him, but she knew his dossier front to back, same way she did all the X-Men. Yes, Wolverine was different. He’d left the X-Men and returned several times, never completely satisfied with what Xavier had to offer. He was their friend, and loyal teammate, to be certain. But he knew the way the world worked was more complicated than either Magneto or Xavier had ever imagined.
Voght was the same. She chose to follow Magneto, but she knew full well that he was as fallible as the next man, and that she was the only one of his followers who was willing to point that out to him. Idly, she wondered if Charles Xavier, her old lover, had anyone around to do the same. She doubted it. In fact, in that way, she wondered if Xavier wasn’t even more of an insufferable egotist than Magneto.
Amelia Voght had seen more than most of the other Acolytes. She understood Magneto better than the rest, knew he was slightly mad, and followed him anyway. Was, in truth, even somewhat attracted to the man.
Of all of them, enemy or titular friend, however, Voght could only claim a real feeling of kinship for Wolverine. She wished she had been able to meet him under different circumstances, wished she was not given the responsibility of hunting him down. But that was the way it had come down, and now, despite the kinship she felt toward him, Wolverine had become the one X-Man she would not hesitate to kill. For a very simple reason.
He frightened her.
Voght would pit herself against any of the X-Men, or the Acolytes, against Xavier or Magneto if it came to that. She would not run from the Sentinels, or the U.S. Army, but the idea of hunting Wolverine had given her fits of trepidation she had not felt since childhood.
After all, this was not a normal human being. This was a savage animal, with human—or more than human—cunning. Unlike the other X-Men, he would not hesitate to kill if it became necessary. In fact, Wolverine’s dossier suggested that he had often reveled in killing.
She swallowed her fear. It would not do to have any of the other Acolytes know, or even sense it enough to speculate, that she was afraid of Wolverine. Her leadership, indeed even her life, might be in jeopardy because of it. Amelia stepped carefully, eyes and ears on alert, as though she were hunting the most vicious grizzly that urban forest had ever known. In many ways, she was.
Cautiously, Voght stepped from the shade of an Italian restaurant and quickly crossed the avenue in front of her. She had long since lost track of her precise location. A moment to check the street signs might be the moment she compromised her personal safety. Glancing north for Wolverine, she saw Harlan Kleinstock rushing across the street, and wondered if he were frightened as well. Or simply too stupid to be properly aware of the danger.
It didn’t seem right that it was day, that the sun shone so harsh upon her shoulders. It was too warm, too bright for that most dangerous game, the hunting of a human being.
There were several humans on the street ahead, speaking outside the glass doors of an old office building. After a few moments, one of them looked up, then motioned quickly to the others. In a heartbeat, they had retreated inside the building, and when Amelia passed the glass doors, she didn’t even see them inside.
There was a noise behind her, panting, the pad of bare feet, and Amelia spun around ready for a struggle to the death.
It was a dog. The mangy mutt stopped in its tracks, surprised by her quick movement, then gave her what passed for a canine dirty look and crossed to the other side of the street.
Enough of this foolishness, she told herself. By thinking so much about Wolverine, rather than about actually finding him, she might well be endangering herself further, leaving herself open to attack. She shook it off, looked up and down the street, and continued the hunt.
* * *
AS Bobby Drake began to wake, his first moment of awareness was consumed by pain. His head, his skull really, hurt so much that he did not dare even move for several moments. When he opened his eyes, sunlight forced them shut again, and he winced with the additional pain of the glare. It felt as though someone were trying to crush his skull like a walnut, that the thin shell would give way at any moment.
“Oh this sucks,” he muttered to himself.
Then he remembered it all. Colorado. Magneto. The Sentinels. Manhattan. Getting shanghaied by the Blob and his cronies. He had to get up, he knew, get moving and warn the rest of the X-Men. The temptation to just lie there and whimper was great, but Bobby quickly overcame it. He might have been the joker on the team, but he knew how to play when the stakes were high.
His eyes fluttered open again, and he held his forehead with his left hand, as if trying to hold it together, and began to sit up, blinking back the light. As he looked at the ceiling above him, the windows to his left, he realized suddenly that he’d been moved. He’d been outside after the attack.
“Oh, perfect,” he sighed. “The tastefully appointed dungeon of Magneto, Master of—”
“Not another move, Ice-Boy!” a male voice rasped.
Bobby spun toward the harsh voice, wincing again at the pain in his head, and was startled at the number of people in the room with him. He’d thought himself alone, but there were eight or ten others, humans, in a semi-circle by the door. They were armed, several had
guns, and none of them looked particularly friendly.
“That’s Iceman, buddy,” Bobby said, eyes narrowing as he glared at the man who’d spoken. “And you’d best get out of my way before somebody gets hurt. We’ve got a situation here, as if you didn’t know.”
“Oh,” the man said, smiling thinly. “We know. See, we’re not sure if you’re part of that situation or not. And until we are, you’re not going anywhere. You make one wrong move, and you’ll be nothing but ice chips. Maybe we’ll make margaritas out of you.”
Bobby considered the man’s words a moment, surveyed the weapons in the room, then let out a deep, relaxing breath.
“Come to think of it,” he said. “A margarita would taste pretty good right now.”
“I don’t think you’re funny,” the man growled, and thumbed the safety on his automatic pistol.
* * *
IN the small office they had commandeered, Trish Tilby and Kevin O’Leary sat in silence. He had tried to get her to talk about what was bothering her, but Trish hadn’t been in any mood. And anyway, she wasn’t so sure she knew exactly what she was feeling.
Yes, mutants were a menace. Magneto had proven that.
Yes, she was getting the story of her life.
Yes, she wanted more than anything to live long enough to tell it.
But then there was Hank, and that put the whole situation in a new light. Hank McCoy was kind, brilliant, amusing, and above all, gentle. He was not, nor did Trish believe he ever could be, a menace. There should not only be a place for him in the world at large, but a prominent place. If not for his fur, for the obvious changes his mutant genetics had wrought upon his body, he was the kind of man who became a university president, or a presidential cabinet member.