Deadly Song
Chapter 1: On the Hudson River
"Have you considered my offer?"
Three people sat together at a table on a nighttime dinner cruise down the beautiful Hudson River. On one side of the table was an elderly couple. On the other side was a teenage boy. To all observers, they seemed like an ordinary boy out with his parents. Or perhaps his grandparents.
"Yes, we have," the boy answered in a hushed voice, "but one of us is reluctant. If it were up to me, we'd all be behind you, one-hundred percent. I, for one, don't want to spend any more time rotting in that little hellhole, waiting for the cops to find me."
The man smiled. "My Brotherhood would welcome you wholeheartedly. Lady Deathstrike gave you a fine recommendation." he said.
"Yuriko? She's okay?" asked the boy, sitting up straight.
"She is recovering," said Magneto. "But back to the matter at hand. We'd be pleased to have someone so enthusiastic fighting for our cause, Crescendo."
The boy called Crescendo did not answer immediately. He stuck a piece of steak into his mouth and chewed slowly, watching the shoreline float by. He was thinking back, remembering the last time he had heard the beautiful song of cracking bones and tearing flesh. He remembered the last time he had felt the sweet bliss of revenge.
On the outside, Crescendo had been and still was the epitome of average. His clothes, green eyes, and blond hair were simple and unostentatious. He'd had a 3.5 GPA, playing second seat clarinet in the school band. He wasn't out of shape, but he wasn't well suited for athletics, either. He'd had a few dates, but no steady girlfriend. His family life was normal. Two married parents, a thirteen year old sister, and a baby brother. The only thing distinctive about him had been his complete lack of distinction.
But he had been unusual, even before he had become Crescendo. Unlike many people his age, Crescendo had always wanted to become a mutant. He had craved the power they wielded and, more importantly, the fear that mutants inspired. His daydreams had always involved someone confident and smug reduced to a quivering lump, begging for his life, when he revealed his godlike powers. The day his mutation appeared was the third happiest day in his life. The second happiest was when he first made his daydream come true. And the events of the happiest day of his life were what had led to his "discovery" by Magneto and the Brotherhood.
Crescendo was snapped out of his thoughts when the yacht was passed by an unmarked cutter with a machine gun mounted on the stern. Looking past the boat, he could see the Statue of Liberty, its golden torch blazing. "Tight security," he said. "Because of that incident a few years ago."
"Mutant terrorists with a bomb, according to the media," said Magneto.
"Your doing?" asked Crescendo. Magneto gave a knowing smile, which faded as he glanced at the window out of the corner of his eye. The cutter had dropped back and was shadowing the yacht. They heard someone asking, "Hey, why are we stopping?" Another person asked, "Is this some kind of security thing?"
Crescendo jumped as he heard the window crack. He saw a bullet stuck into the glass. A man onboard the cutter worked the bolt of a high-powered rifle and took aim at them again. Magneto, with a lazy gesture, stopped the bullet, tossing it harmlessly into the water. "It's time for us to go," he whispered. The three mutants went out onto the ship's deck. The old woman pulled a small communicator from her pocket, whispering some command into it.
"Erik Lehnsherr, stop where you are and surrender." Boarding the yacht were three men swathed in black Kevlar armor, their faces hidden by dark plastic shields. They brought plastic flechette guns to bear. Three deadly, ceramic-tipped darts shot towards the mutants. Magneto ripped away a section of the metal wall, blocking the darts. He then slammed the wall into the men, mowing them down.
The cutter had attached three rope ladders, made of some strong plastic material, to the handrail of the yacht. Two more of these unidentified gunmen were climbing on board. The old woman who had posed as Magneto's wife began to change. Her flesh shifted, giving her the form of a woman with scaly blue skin. The lead gunman raised his flechette gun but before he could get a shot off, Mystique did a graceful back flip, her legs wrapped around his neck. With a slight twitch, she snapped his spine. Snatching up his weapon, she skillfully put a flechette through the weak points in the other man's armor.
Meanwhile, Magneto was taking care of the cutter. The metal hull off the cutter began to shudder and crack as Magneto began to tear it apart. A sailor manned the machine gun and, unconcerned about the ship's passengers, fired a barrage at Magneto, trying to distract him. He froze the bullets in midair, putting Neo to shame.
"Crescendo!" he called. "Can you take down the boat?"
Crescendo nodded. He eyed the metal in the boat's hull. He could see the almost imperceptible vibrations within it, its natural frequency. Raising his hands, Crescendo concentrated his power into in air surrounding the cutter. He saw distortions forming in the air, like heat waves, vibrating at the same frequency as the metal. Soon a large crack shot down the side of the hull and water began flooding in. The man at the machine gun, in his surprise, made the fatal mistake of releasing his weapon's trigger. At that moment, Magneto reversed the bullets he had collected and sent them flying through the poor man's body. Meanwhile, more cracks appeared in the hull until the metal simply fell apart.
The three mutants heard the roar of an approaching motorboat, a young man with greased-up hair at the wheel. The surviving gunmen, treading water, clung to the wreckage of the boat, trying to bring their weapons to bear. The man extended his hand, launching a stream of fire that washed over the boat's wreckage. The humans, with their soaked weapons, never stood a chance.
Magneto, Mystique, and Crescendo all boarded the motorboat. "Good to see you again, Pyro," Crescendo greeted the driver. Pyro nodded back.
"How did they know about our meeting?" asked Crescendo.
"I don't know," Magneto admitted. He folded his arms and frowned, thinking. After a while, he said, "We'll drop you off somewhere safe and contact you later."
"What happened to that boat back there?" asked Pyro.
Magneto grinned. "It was all Crescendo's doing."
"What? How do you do something like that?"
"Sound waves," answered Crescendo. "I can control sound waves."
"Well, I've never seen any radio that can do that! How does it work?"
"It involves a lot of physics," said Crescendo. Pyro decided that his curiosity wasn't worth a scientific lecture. They continued the rest of their ride in silence, dropping Crescendo off at a deserted dock.
XXXXX
Home, sweet, home, thought Crescendo as he wearily climbed the steps to the abandoned building where he was staying. The place was three stories tall but very thin. He had no clue what it had once been.
"I'm home," he called into the darkness.
"Hey," called the voice of another young mutant from another room. "We're in here."
Crescendo pulled open the door and gasped at what he saw. His friend Swarm was lying unconscious on a thin blanket beside a flickering lantern. Deep cuts and purple bruises covered her face and body. Kneeling beside her was a boy slightly younger than Crescendo, doing his best to ease her pain with the rudimentary skill and limited resources at his disposal.
"Midas, what happened to her?" Crescendo asked urgently. "Why is she like this?"
"She went outside," was all Midas said.
"Oh," said Crescendo. "Did she use her powers?"
"No, but she was seen."
Crescendo understood perfectly. Swarm was a person who had embraced her mutation wholeheartedly and wanted to express it externally. She dressed only in yellows and blacks, going so far as to dye her naturally blond hair with stripes of black, like the bees and hornets she controlled. But the public's fear of mutants had spilled over towards anyone who looked different. Dyed hair, colored contacts, and tattoos were rapidly disappearing. People with physical deformities were afraid to leave their homes. They were afraid to be mistaken for mutants.
Crescendo closed his eyes and made a quick mental prayer, thanking God for Magneto. When he'd first met Magneto, he had learned of a fool named Charles Xavier, who wanted to unify humans and mutants, bringing them together as friends or something like that. But the way things were going, humans were becoming more, not less, intolerant. It was a time when dyed hair was enough of a reason to label someone as a demon. Xavier's dream was just that. A dream, and nothing more.
"It's too bad the clinic's gone," said Crescendo. "They'd fix her up well enough."
"Yeah," said Midas. "Do you know what's going to happen to the people in that mob?"
"Absolutely nothing," said Crescendo. "The mob was made of humans, remember? The cops are after me. And any mutant who so much as looks in my direction will be considered my accomplice."
"We're running out of supplies," said Midas, holding up yet another empty jar of food. "We can't keep living like this."
"Don't worry," said Crescendo. "We'll be with the Brotherhood soon. We'll be with others like us."
"You should get some sleep," said Midas. "You've had a tough night."
After saying goodnight, Crescendo made his way to the upper floor and headed for his bedroom. He stretched and yawned. He glanced into another room, wanting to check on another member of his group.
"How did the meeting go?" asked the voice. In the tone of the voice, there was an accusation, a charge of some transgression.
"It ended badly," Crescendo said evenly, his own voice carefully neutral. "Magneto was ambushed. I don't think they knew who I was."
Crescendo entered the room and leaned against the wall. Sitting on the only chair in the building was the mutant who called himself Raptor. Like his namesake animal, Raptor's body was covered with dark green scales. His long hands and bare feet were tipped with deadly black claws while serrated fangs filled his wide mouth. His eyes were a dark, murky amber, stuck in an eternal glare. He was the nicest person anyone could meet.
"Police?" asked Raptor. "Or government?"
"I don't know. I didn't see any markings."
"So," Raptor said softly, "what are you going to do? Will you join the Brotherhood?"
"I will. But what about you?" Crescendo asked, already knowing the answer.
Raptor's reptilian eyes dropped to the floor, avoiding Crescendo's gaze. "If you join the Brotherhood, then I won't be with you," he practically whispered.
Crescendo lost his patience. "Don't you understand?" Raptor snapped his eyes up to meet his friend's gaze. "You know better than any of us what humans are willing to do to us! Are you willing to go and face those people alone?"
"I won't be alone," said Raptor, his voice gaining strength. His hand rubbed against his right arm, feeling the pain of an old injury. "I'll…I'll join with Charles Xavier."
Crescendo put a hand to his face and shook his head in amazement. Because of his fearsome appearance, Raptor had suffered far more than the other three mutants hiding out in that old, empty building. Telling the story of Raptor's past would be enough to recruit any mutant to the Brotherhood. Yet he was still ready to believe in Xavier's utopian fantasies. But still, there was a tiny, smoldering spark of hope in Crescendo that forced a sort of respect for Raptor's idealism.
Frustrated, Crescendo sighed. "I'm going to sleep."
"Good night," Raptor said in a peacemaking tone.
"Good night," Crescendo answered, in the same tone.
XXXXX
Well, that's the first chapter of Deadly Song. I hope you enjoyed it. Chapter 2 will be a flashback, explaining how Crescendo and the others first met the Brotherhood.