Blood poured. His concentration faltered.
“No!” he cried.
Even as he knitted his force shield back together, Cyclops took advantage of the opening, and fired a full-power optic blast through the narrowing gap. It slammed into Magneto’s chest, and threw him backward and down. His concentration evaporated; he fell.
To one side, a row of windows exploded outward, powered by Jean Grey’s telekinesis, and the shards rained down on him, lacerating his scalp, face, and neck. The rest of him was protected by body armor, but if he hit the street, he would most certainly be dead.
That would not do. His destiny was one of greatness, not the ignominy of such easy defeat.
Several yards above the asphalt, Magneto gathered the Earth’s magnetic field around him and simply stopped his fall. He hovered there a moment, took a painful breath—Cyclops’s last attack had broken several ribs and blackened his body armor—then lifted himself back into the air. His force shield knitted itself back together, the sphere of green electric energy even stronger than before.
“Hit him again, X-Men, before he is fully recovered!” Cyclops shouted from below.
“Not to worry, Scotty,” Iceman replied. “We’ve got the bum on the ropes.”
But Drake had always been a foolish young man. His ice making propelled him forward, up toward Magneto. He was cocky now, foolish. Iceman thought it was over. And it was.
For him.
Magneto gestured, and magnetic power arced from his fingertips, shattering the ice slide. Iceman fell. He tried in vain to form a new slide beneath him, but Magneto struck him again, and Drake fell, disoriented.
“Bobby, go limp!” the Beast cried from below. “I’ve got you.”
“No,” Magneto said softly, “no, you don’t.”
The Beast bounded across Sixth Avenue, trying to get under his falling comrade. Magneto wrapped his magnetic tendrils around a yellow cab, lifted it off the ground quickly, effortlessly, and dropped it on top of the Beast.
Hank McCoy died without screaming.
Bobby Drake crashed through the windshield of the cab. Inside, the warmth of his blood began to melt the ice from his body.
“Oh, my God!” Jean Grey screamed. “Hank, Bobby! Scott, he’s killed them!”
Archangel screamed a curse, dive-bombing Magneto from above, apparently hoping for a replay of his earlier, successful attack.
It wasn’t going to work.
“You are appallingly stupid, Worthington,” Magneto said. “All of you. I never wanted you dead, don’t you see? But you have backed me into a corner. You have put me in a position where killing you is the only logical option.”
Archangel launched dozens of wing-knives.
Magneto reached out, focused, attuned his power to the strange metallic structure of Archangel’s wings, and then he pulled. Warren Worthington screamed, wailed, shrieked, as his wings were torn from his back.
While Archangel fell, Magneto didn’t even watch.
Only Grey and Summers were left, the loving couple in whom Xavier had placed the future of the X-Men. They were to be the parents, both literal and figurative, of the next generation of X-Men. His heirs.
“You fought well,” he said, almost kindly, as he floated down to street level to face them. “You had almost beaten me, there at the start. Teamwork has always been the X-Men’s greatest weapon. But your time is done. In a way, I will miss you.”
Grey was a beautiful woman, her red hair lustrous even in the neon-lit night. Her face was filled with loathing, but no fear. Her uniform in tatters, and yet she was still noble.
Summers limped slightly; blood ran from wounds on his chest and legs.
“If you don’t fight me, I will make it as painless for you as possible,” Magneto promised.
Grey and Summers bowed their heads.
The taxi slammed into Magneto from behind. His protective sphere held, but he was driven through the plate glass windows of a women’s clothing store and trapped beneath the yellow cab with whatever remained of Hank McCoy that still clung there.
Grey and Summers had chosen their mode of death. They would die like warriors. He was glad. Proud of them, in some way. And never more sorry to have to kill them.
“Enough!” he cried.
Magneto lifted a hand, and the taxi levitated above him in a green glow of magnetic power. Cyclops and Jean Grey entered through the shattered wall. Summers continued to let loose with bursts of energy from his eyes, but they were growing weaker. Grey tried to use her telekinesis to wrest the vehicle from his magnetic grasp, but Magneto resisted her. She was greatly weakened as well.
With the taxi as his bludgeoning tool, he crushed them both.
When Magneto walked out of the shattered store, past the vehicle and the corpses of several X-Men, blood still ran freely down his left leg from the wound in his side. Every breath brought new pain to his broken ribs. But he was triumphant.
Compared to the X-Men, a battle with the American military would be simplicity itself. He was determined to remake Haven, and to hold it this time. His mistake from the very beginning had been to rely upon the Sentinels. He ought to have done it himself from the start.
He stumbled slightly.
“I hope you’re proud of yourself,” a familiar voice said. Magneto looked up, held his chest in pain.
In the center of the street, amid all the debris, among the dead and injured, Professor Charles Xavier sat in his wheelchair. Alone.
“I’m glad you came, Charles,” Magneto said, coughing slightly, the pain in his chest intense. He wiped his fist across his mouth and was astonished to find blood there.
“You’re not doing so well, it seems,” Xavier said calmly. “I doubt you’re happy to see me.”
“No, but happy to know I can destroy you, now that you’ve saved me the trouble of finding you,” Magneto said.
“You were never a killer, Magnus,” Xavier said. “Look around you. A man of your intellect, your courage—couldn’t you have found another way than murder?”
“My dream, my destiny … its fulfillment is worth any price.” Magneto coughed. “Haven will be a reality.”
“Don’t you see,” Xavier pleaded, and at last the man sounded like the Charles that Eric Magnus Lehnsherr first met in Israel all those years ago. “Your dream cannot succeed. The best you can hope for is to rule a world that is in the process of self-destructing. Your dream will destroy the Earth, not only for humanity, but for all.”
“I don’t believe that, Charles,” Magneto said. “We have been over this time and time again. I’m afraid, old friend, that we will have to agree to disagree. My way is the only way. You believe the same of your own dream, do you not?”
“The difference, Magnus, is that my dream does not require force, violence, oppression, and murder,” Xavier said.
“Never mind the philosophical debate,” Magneto said. “Only time will reveal who was right, and I intend to bend the future to my own whims. But let’s talk about you, shall we? For a man about to die, for a man who has just seen his entire family killed, you seem awfully calm.”
“You just aren’t paying attention,” Xavier said. “I’ve never been more enraged, more disgusted, more disappointed. But it has nothing to do with the X-Men. In your right mind, you would never have committed such wholesale murder, especially of individuals you value so highly.”
Magneto frowned.
“You’ve gone mad, Charles,” he said. “They are dead. Their corpses litter the streets around you.”
“No,” Xavier answered. “You often dream of killing me, Magnus. Of killing the X-Men and so many others. But you aren’t a murderer. You would avoid such things unless your hand was forced.”
Magneto faltered. He was confused. Xavier’s words rang true. He had often felt driven to kill the X-Men, to kill Charles himself, a man who had once been his closest friend. But he never had. Had never intended to do so. Once, he had spent time with them, almost been one of them. In his
own way, he cared for them, like an angry, impatient parent with naughty children.
But he had killed them. He had killed them all.
“I …” he began, and faltered once more. He didn’t understand.
“But, just in case I had misjudged you,” Xavier said, “I couldn’t possibly allow you the opportunity. The X-Men are, as you say, my family. I love them as dearly as any good parent.”
His mind was reeling, but Magneto knew what he must do. “Enough of your hysterical babbling, Charles,” Magneto said. “The time has come. I’ve got to kill you.”
“You’re welcome to try,” Xavier said.
Then he stood up, out of the wheelchair.
Magneto could not contain his astonishment.
“You—you’re walking,” he said in awe.
Xavier walked swiftly toward him, stepping around debris and the still forms of human beings. When he reached Magneto, he balled his right hand into a fist, and hit him.
Magneto fell, mouth still hanging open in surprise. He reached up to massage his cheek where Xavier had hit him. He looked up, saw Xavier glaring grimly down at him.
Then he understood.
“You’re walking,” he said, eyes narrowing with hatred as the full realization of what Xavier had done began to sink in. “If you’re walking, that means we’re—”
“On the Astral Plane, yes,” Xavier admitted.
Everything went black a moment, and Magneto felt nauseous, his equilibrium shot. Then the world came back. He was standing in the middle of Sixth Avenue. Xavier was gone. Or at least, his body was gone.
Turn around, Xavier’s voice said inside Magneto’s head. He turned.
A full-power optic blast hit him in the chest, driving him back. Lightning flashed from the sky, and only his own innate magnetism saved him from being electrocuted.
Cyclops hit him again, and this time he felt his ribs crack for real. A second bolt of lightning struck pavement not far from him.
A blue-furred hand grabbed him by the shoulder, spun him around. Magneto tried to put up a fight, tried to get his hands up, to concentrate, to defend himself.
He wasn’t fast enough.
“You have wreaked enough havoc, stolen enough souls, for one day, Magnus,” the Beast said.
McCoy hit him, hard, and Magneto stumbled backward into a yellow cab. He lashed out blindly, and the Beast was tossed away by a lance of magnetic force. The taxi began to feel warm beneath him, and when Magneto looked down, he saw that it was glowing with energy.
Explosive energy.
“’Bout time we got you on de run,” Gambit said. “You in trouble now.”
Magneto tried to run, but only managed a few steps before the car exploded behind him, throwing him into the air. At great velocity, he slammed into something hard and unyielding. Nearly delirious, he looked up to see that Rogue was holding him up by the shoulders of his body armor.
“See, sugar?” she said sweetly. “I didn’t even have to hit ya to take y’down.”
Then she let him go, and Magneto fell. And fell.
He hit something cold and slick, and began to slide. It was ice, he knew suddenly. Bobby Drake had saved his life. At the bottom of the ice slide, he rolled over, unable to get to his feet. A massive weapon was thrust into his face.
“Up,” Bishop snarled. “Get up and walk before I incinerate your head just for the pleasure of it.”
It was the disdain, the almost pitying disgust, that brought him back from the brink of unconsciousness. Mind beginning to clear, Magneto acted quickly.
Bishop’s weapon exploded in his hands. Magneto reached for him, focused down and down and down until he could sense the iron in Bishop’s bloodstream. He was going to just pull, just burst every blood vessel in the man’s body.
Then he remembered Xavier’s words, remembered his own misgivings about killing the X-Men. Bishop was a stranger to him, a recent addition to the team. He meant nothing to Magneto. But he meant something to Xavier, and to Xavier’s dream.
“Kill me if you like,” Bishop said, already weakened by Magneto’s tampering with his blood. “But learn from the future I represent. Learn that you can’t win by tearing the world apart.”
Magneto was sickened by a sudden, terrible realization. He preferred Xavier’s dream.
The blood drained from his face and he let Bishop fall to the pavement. He preferred Xavier’s dream. Xavier was right. No, not right, just more human. Xavier’s dream might be preferable, he knew now that it was, but Magneto did not, could not, would not, believe that it would ever be realized.
Therefore, no matter what he wished for, Magneto knew that his own dream of the future was the only practical solution.
Still, he could not kill Xavier, the dreamer. He could not kill the dream, for it represented something he had never had, not since the day his family was murdered.
The dream represented hope.
The X-Men were the living embodiment of Xavier’s dream. He could not kill them.
Magneto turned to walk away from Bishop, and Archangel’s wing knives slashed into him, paralyzing him where he stood. He fell to the street, bleeding, something broken in his chest, for real this time. Magneto was horrified by his sudden new understanding, of himself, of Xavier, or their eternal struggle with each other.
He had been defeated.
Haven was lost.
The empire was gone.
* * *
WOLVERINE saw Magneto go down, and knew it was his only chance. Maybe the last, best hope they would have to rid the world of the scourge of Xavier’s dream. Magneto was the mutant bogeyman that humans told their children stories about. His actions had fed the flames of hatred for years. With him gone, they could begin the hard road to peace that Xavier had always talked about.
Logan was no optimist, but he knew an opportunity when he saw one.
“Wolverine, no, he still has his powers!” Archangel cautioned.
Ignoring the warning, he loped across the street, even as the other X-Men gathered around behind him. All of them. His friends, his family.
Wolverine leaped onto Magneto’s chest. His claws slid out with a snikt, and he leaned down, breathing in Magneto’s face, whispering low so only he could hear.
“It’s over, now, bub,” Logan growled. “You’ve given us all a world o’ trouble, but the end is here. I’m gonna put you out of the world’s misery.”
He held Magneto by the throat with his left hand and lowered his right, claws pointed at Magneto’s heart. Adamantium would slice through the tyrant’s body armor like a razor-wire garrote through tender flesh. Then it would be—
“Back off, Wolverine,” Cyclops ordered.
Logan wanted to ignore him, but Summers had that tone about him. He was a Boy Scout, sure, but he was something else as well. Scott Summers was good. Simple as that. Wolverine didn’t like to take orders from him, didn’t like knowing Summers was the boss. But all the things he loved about the X-Men, all the things that made the team so important to him, all those things were represented by Cyclops.
“He’s gotta die, Scotty,” Logan said, low, menacing. “If we let him live, who knows what he’s going to do next? What then? He may win the next time.”
“Magneto is paralyzed, Logan, but not without power,” Jean Grey cut in. “Why hasn’t he lashed out at you, tossed you away? I’d say he’s waiting for you to decide what you’re going to do.”
Wolverine looked around at his friends, at his team, his family. Jean, so beautiful, so benevolent. Scott, every bit the hero, filled with impractical ideals and the guts to try to make them work. Ororo, his best friend, the noblest of warriors. Hank, brilliant and tender. Warren, lost and brooding. Bobby, who didn’t think life was so funny anymore. Bishop, terrified of the future. LeBeau, injured, hurting, trying his charming best to hide how badly he needed the X-Men. Rogue, always alone, even with those who loved her most.
In the back, silent, stood Cain Marko. He had not participated in the final atta
ck on Magneto. Xavier’s intervention had made him back off. The Juggernaut hated his half-brother more than anything. He was a bastard, but even he had helped the X-Men to defeat Magneto.
Wolverine let out a long breath.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s gotta end now.”
Logan drew his arm back, prepared to drive his claws into Magneto’s chest. Magneto’s eyes flared with surprise and hatred, and Wolverine knew he had a heartbeat to act before Magneto lashed out at him.
“Attaboy, Wolverine,” Marko shouted. “Perforate ’im!”
Adamantium claws touched Magneto’s throat, but went no farther.
“Hell,” Logan snarled. “If Marko’s eggin’ me on, it can’t be …”
He looked into Magneto’s eyes, saw the anger and the amusement there.
“Ah, hell,” Wolverine said.
Then the power burst from Magneto and Logan was whipped up and back, tumbling to the pavement thirty yards away. He was up in an instant, and he ran back to help the X-Men if Magneto was on the attack again.
But Magneto was in no condition to attack. The paralysis was wearing off, but the tyrant was on his knees, coughing blood.
With a crackle of energy, Amelia Voght flashed into existence by her master’s side.
“Lord Magneto,” she cried. “You are injured.”
“It will pass,” he said, then hacked and coughed again, before spitting blood on the street.
Magneto looked up at the X-Men, gave a small laugh and grimaced with the pain of it. Then he turned to Wolverine and hatred altered his features.
“You should have killed me when you had the chance,” he said. “Next time, Logan, I’ll tear you apart.”
“You don’t look so hot, bub,” Wolverine said confidently. “I’m not real sure there’s gonna be a next time.”
“Amelia,” Magneto said, then turned to look upon Voght, almost tenderly, “let’s go home.”
The air crackled again, and they disappeared in a flash of phosphorescent light. Voght had teleported them back to Avalon.
Marvel Classic Novels--X-Men Page 78
