Alchem reclined lazily, latex balloon in hand, squeezing it tightly. Slowly, creeping, as though unsure of itself, the balloon began to expand and push against his hands. It wanted to rise, fly out of the sewer grates above him and dance in the sunlight. It wanted to escape the stench of rats feeding on the spew of a thousand New Yorkers, their shit and their syringes, and even a few of their dead bodies. In an instant, the balloon sucked back into itself and let out a cold whine. Alchem flicked it aside – next to him lie a hundred more of its kind, in all different colors. He picked up another, pulled it out, snapped it back, and began the process anew. This is what he did to think, slowly convert the air inside the balloon into helium while pushing against it, seeing how long his control could conquer his own mutant powers.
"Eventually, the Sentinels will discover your rainbow trail here and wonder what in the New York diet makes a steady stream of color come out of the sewage." The voice came from behind him. Alchem didn't need to turn around to know who it was – there were only three mutants down here, and one of them was occupied within view at a makeshift computer.
"Remind me why we're down here again, Hank?"
"Because we're locked out?"
"Right." He forced the helium into hydrogen, and flicked another balloon to the ground. This is what he did to think – and he most certainly needed to think. Arguably the three greatest mutant minds in one…well, it certainly wasn't a room – cave?...and they could not come up with a single conceivable way to pick a lock.
Hank gave a bitter chuckle behind him. "You know, we're arguably the three greatest mutant thinkers remaining, and we can't even come up with a…"
"Single conceivable way to pick a lock?" Alchem finished his sentence.
"Y…yes." He let out a long breath. "I guess I should've expected you two to be thinking the same thing."
Naze raised his head from the computer, apparently having listened to the entire conversation. "It isn't as simple as that, you know."
"We know," Alchem replied. A blue balloon wheezed itself into a wall, then popped.
"Quiet!" Hank grabbed the bag from the ground and threw it into the noxious stream of sewage. Alchem sat upright with a start. "Gordon," – right, they weren't going by mutant names any more, it was Gordon, not Alchem – "you don't have as much experience with these things as For…Naze and I do. I suggest for everyone's wellbeing you heed our advice on this – they are the most destructive foe you have ever heard of. There is no such thing as too much precaution." Alchem returned to his recline, dejected.
"Got it," he murmured under his breath.
"Yes, I have!" Naze turned from the computer to face his two companions. "Gentlemen, we have a key."
It had cost Ruckus almost half of Sinister's coffers to become London's new celebrity of the financial world. He had bought hotels he didn't know the names of, attended philanthropic functions for causes he didn't believe in, and had Sinister's jet repainted in a more appealing yet noticeable shade of sage green. It was better than the jungle-camouflage look, at least when Ruckus was trying to attract attention.
He built up the image of the mystery day-trader by throwing so much money at the stock market that he was bound to make some money. Ruckus didn't have the talent for plotting and planning that Sinister did – that's why Sinister was Sinister and Ruckus was just one of the Nasty Boys. But Sinister was in New York under Sentinel supervision – Slab, Gorgeous, and Hairbag had been placed throughout the states in different concentration camps. There were no Nasty Boys now, only Ruckus. And if he was going to take out not one but four different sentinel camps, he was going to have to start being a little more sinister himself.
It was that thought that led him to one of the most baleful organizations in London – the Hellfire Club. They had relocated to the original headquarters since the Sentinel takeover of the United States. Back in their manorhouse on Victoria street and reorganized under Shinobi Shaw – the founder's son and murderer – Hellfire was even more wary of news leaking out that London's financial power-players were mutants themselves. The carrot had been Ruckus' rise to icon status; the stick had been good clean blackmail. Ruckus didn't really care which one had worked. He was in.
Now, sitting at a superfluously long table as the "honored guest" at his induction ceremony, dressed in an 18th century suit with a powdered wig and a puff of lace spilling out of his throat, hearing those who had never met him ramble on about his accomplishments, he had to smile. Not actually smile, of course – to these silverspoonfed children, this was the most serious thing happening in the world at that moment. It was certainly not an event to smile at. But inside, he was chuckling. At the getup, at the characters surrounding him, at the fact that he honestly believed the hard part was over. All he was waiting for were those simple words.
"Finally," Shinobi Shaw intoned, raising his glass and bringing Ruckus back to the scene, "let us welcome our new member. Ruckus!" The forty-some odd members around the table clapped their hands, some chiming their glasses with silverware. Ruckus pushed his chair back, adjusted his wig, stood up, cleared his throat, and prepared to give the crownless White King Shinobi Shaw the biggest surprise of his reign.
"It's…it's an honor…truly…to be inducted as a Lord Cardinal amongst all you privileged pah-pah-people…what I'm trying to say is…" Exhale. Think. You're in. No need to be nervous. "Shinobi, I thank you for granting me such a position of power. I know that in whatever I do, the Hellfire Club will be behind me. Which is why I already have my first request." The room shifted – this was not procedure. He was supposed to accept demurely and sit back down. "I understand that you have access to the design plans for the sentinels." The shifting became murmurs, stares, and gasps. The White Queen Emma Frost held her hand to her forehead – was she trying to get into his mind? She suddenly look up, into his own eyes. She knew. It didn't matter. "Shinobi, I need to see these plans."
The White King never lost his smirk. He could've been cute if he wasn't such a pric. "First, Lord Hennessey, I am to be addressed as the White King. My father before his untimely demise funded the project. His files on the matter are in my office, but frankly whatever you are attempting to do…"
"Give him the documents, Shinobi." White Queen was looking down at her hands in her lap, but her voice came as though she were proclaiming it from the top of Buckingham Palace. Maybe being in the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club took more than just wealth.
"Emma," Shinobi turned to his Queen, "you know that the sentinels cannot be persuaded by the means we prefer here."
Ruckus made a show of yawning. It was his induction ceremony, after all. "Then perhaps I will persuade them by other means."
Zoe answered the phone. "Morning, Sunshine," she said.
Charles' sleep face shone up at her from her cell phone. "I hate you, did I ever tell you that?" He was never at his best before dawn.
"Frequently," Zoe grinned boyishly. There was something to be said for videophone. It conveyed world's more detail.
"You're cheerful tonight. Any reason?"
"I got the call." Her voice trembled slightly. She had been waiting for this. This was why she was here, in the middle of nowhere.
"Tell me." The sleep, and the friendship, was instantly gone from Charles' face and voice.
"I got a visit from Creed himself today. How was I enjoying my new security clearance? Did I have the latest test results? Did I have any ideas about the last model's failures?..."
"What did you tell him?"
"That I was sure it had to be my fault."
Charles' grin returned. "Good."
"Then he asked if I could come to his office tomorrow. Important guest he wanted me to meet."
Zoe lost sight of Charles for a moment on her screen. There was a whoop, and he reappeared, looking somewhat flushed and disheveled.
"I apologize. Carry on."
"That was it. Tomorrow – or I guess it's today now – at eight am sharp. She let out a laugh, throwing her head back. "He wanted to know if that would be too early."
Charles didn't think it as funny as she did. "Anything else?"
"Um, don't think so. Same old same old for the rest of the day. Oh, yeah, one thing – Creed's wife wanted me to say hi to you."
There was a long pause. Charles looked down, opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
"Charles?"
"His wife?" Charles' voice was careful, tight.
"Yeah, weird huh? She's pretty, though."
"Zoe, Graydon Creed's wife has been dead for twenty years. Breast cancer."
"Oh. Guess I must have imagined it, then."
"I'm hoping so, too."
Charles left it at that. But when she hung up, Zoe's elation was gone. There was too much that she had been seeing, believing, knowing, that wasn't really there. When you're crazy back in Israel, they put you in a ward, they study you, they pray for you. When you're an international secret agent working to infiltrate the Friends of Humanity headquarters and stop a budding sentinel program, that's not really an option. Hallucination is a little more dangerous. And if she didn't keep it under control, Charles was going to pull her from the island.
It was three in the morning, but Charles hadn't woken her. Ever since her mutant powers had developed, she didn't really sleep. Everlasting endurance did that to you. But now, running on about ten hours of sleep for the past six years, her mind was no longer keeping up with her body. Physically, she was the best that the Ops had to offer – on nights like tonight when she couldn't sleep, she would do pushups or jumping jacks for hours on top of hours. But mentally, she was becoming a klutz, a schlemiel – in her line of work, slipping up didn't mean a stern talking to by the rabbi anymore.
Tonight, jumping jacks were simply boring. Tonight, she decided to read a good book. The Good Book. Cover to cover – and in English. On those nights when exercise wasn't appealing, she had been working on her English. She could communicate it well, but reading was a problem for her. And what better place to start her work than the Torah.
She was done by seven, enough time to shower and dress for the day. Today was the day that she finally saw Albert, the new sentinel program that she had been sent to destroy. She really didn't know what to expect – she pictured the sentinels, then enlarged them and glossed them with adamantium, but after hearing reports of "Nimrod" the deadliest sentinel that was the size of a human, she doubted her own preconceived notions of this beast. The adamantium part was the only part she knew. In developing her cover, Ops had to make her needed for the Albert project, and all that they knew was that Graydon Creed was receiving vast quantities of adamantium from some unknown source. So they made her a specialist on the stuff. And in her free time at night, she read books, articles, journals, everything that she could get her hands on. She was an expert on the stuff. And when she had arrived on Genosha, this tiny ant-infested Southeast Asian jungle, they put her to work on integrating electronics and adamantium metal. So the new sentinels were probably made out of adamantium. Just a hunch.
Zoe climbed into the jeep parked outside, hers courtesy of the Friends of Humanity. And by Friends of Humanity they really meant Killers of Mutants, Humanity's Last Hope. From everything that she had read about the sentinel program, these machines weren't stopping at exterminating mutants. The logic went something like this: sentinels are programmed to stop mutants; humans mutate into mutants; therefore, the only way to truly stop mutants is to kill humans. It made sense to Zoe. It probably shouldn't have.
She reached the bunker at quarter-to-eight. Time to kill, as always. It was another habit of always having the energy to be early. She parked the car, flashed her ID to the armed guards at the front of the compound, and entered. The facility was a bizarre combination of military bunker, research lab, and indigenous ziggurat. It rose up out of the jungle in successively smaller plateaus, made out of some gray slate with markings Zoe couldn't identify – nor had she made the effort to. At the top was the main entry way, the one she passed through every morning. She could appreciate the strategy in that – those guards had seen her car since before she even got in it less than an hour ago. The only hiding from the eyes of the Friend's of Humanity was in the jungle deep beneath her. And even then, she was sure they had thought of that eventuality.
She made her way familiarly through the twist and turns of the headquarters, winding down to Creed's office. He was, of course, not there yet. She asked for him, and the secretary, who had ants crawling up her leg, told her to wait in the lobby. Zoe considered pointing out the ants, then reasoned that if the woman was truly bug-infested she would know it.
See? She thought. I don't know what you're bitching about, Charles. I'm doing just fine here. The ants began streaming across the carpet toward her. Just as she went to foolishly react yet again, Graydon Creed entered. Tall, handsome in a slimy way, and dressed in a black power suit. He reminded her, oddly enough, of Rebbe Yosef ben Akiba, the Yeshiva instructor who had slapped her when he caught her practicing English on a Gentile boy two days past her Bat Mitzvah. Come to think of it, Creed looked exactly like Rebbe Yosef. You could even see the beginnings of earlock spiraling down from his temples.
"Zoe, good morning." He extended his hand, but Zoe was still focused on the ants to notice.
"Good morning, sir."
"I hope I haven't kept you waiting long."
"Not at all, sir." Only two years, bastard. The intensive preparation that had gone into this operation was, in the grand scheme of things, not at all bad considering the secrecy of the plans about to be revealed to her.
"Why don't you come inside?" They stepped into his office, another plain room with one very noticeable feature; a large, metal, triple-bolted door. Albert was probably in there. Just a hunch.
She sat down in a big red leather chair positioned for guests, and Creed took his place behind the desk. Before sitting down, he offered her coffee, which she gratefully accepted. The caffeine, oddly enough, soother her nerves. The earlocks now reached past his chin.
"I asked you here this morning, Zoe, to introduce you to a special guest."
"I know." Crap.
"You know?" Yosef was not a stupid man.
"You told me. Yesterday afternoon. You said that you wanted me to meet someone." Close call, Zoe.
"Ah. Yes, I did, didn't I? How…incautious of me. Now, don't be alarmed at his appearance. He has undergone certain…operations, which, while they look a little scary, are invaluable to our purposes." As he spoke, he reached under the desk and moved his fingers a bit. The triple-lock door began to open. He motioned for her to stand, and then entered the corridor. There was a long hallway through what felt like a metal tube, and at the end, more doors. How long is this going to take?
"The program has been in the design stages since the mid-1990's, when we confronted with a very grave and serious threat…" Zoe just nodded, though it was becoming more difficult to understand Rebbe Yosef through his pronounced lisp. Rebbe Yosef's wife used to teas him about his lisp. When she showed up at Zoe's father's doorstep with a black eye, Zoe knew she had teased Rebbe Yosef once too often. She looked up. While she had been zoning out and nodding, he had continued talking, giving her the technical specs of the new sentinel that she had been sent to destroy.
"Before I introduce you to him," he concluded, "is there anything you'd like to ask about the Allan project? After all, it is your technical expertise which we are hoping to rely on."
"Albert."
Rebbe Yosef was suddenly very much Graydon Creed. The resemblance vanished. Creed nodded once. "Oh. Yes of course. How silly of me. It is Albert, isn't it?"
Graydon Creed may have reminded Zoe of a stupid man without the call of Gd in his heart, but he is by no means a stupid man.
Strike 2.
Zoe ran as fast as she could back down the metal hallway with Creed on her tail, chasing after her. She slammed through the open door into his office and turned to see her pursuer, diving after her, attempting to get her tackled. She jumped backwards and burst out the office door past the startled secretary – now sporting a fetching array of cockroaches across her bustline – just as Creed pulled a gun from behind his desk and started firing. She made for a bee-line for the exit, left her car, and ran down the pathway outside into the jungle. She was safe there. They could chase her with whatever they wanted to. Men tired, dogs tired, machines ran out of gas. Zoe could run until she hit water, could swim until she could hit shore. They'd never catch her. She threw back her head and let out a laugh as she heard the gunshots fading behind her.
When Katherine had brought Rachel to the now-deserted Weapon X facility in Canada, neither really knew what to expect from the place. From what Rachel knew, Katherine's close friendship with Wolverine had opened to her certain tidbits of information – whatever Wolverine was willing to give. Whatever Wolverine remembered. But Rachel Summers, despite being related to two of the founding X-Men, was never invited in that close to share in their personal secrets and dark pasts. In fact, until the Phoenix force had passed into her after her mother passed away, the X-Men had never taken an interest in her. Now she was best friends with one of them, giggling like schoolgirls and trying to reenact a childish youth they never had. Every once in a while, though, their age showed.
"What exactly happened here, Kitty?" They talked without looking at each other, their gaze captured by the simple laboratory falling apart in front of them.
"Seems like all the people who know everything that happened here are dead. All I know is that it's where Wolverine got his temper, so to speak. And met Sabertooth. Everything from World War II to the Sentinel program has been rumored to have connections to this place. It's like the crossroads of history."
"You're getting a little too deep for me, Sprite."
"Sorry Ray." She turned to face her friend. "I had a lot of friends threat were caused a lot of pain by this place."
"But it's dead now, there's nothing going on here. If you're looking for ghosts to exact revenge from, this isn't the place to do it."
Katherine let out a bitter chuckle – so short that Rachel thought it was just a stuttered exhale. "Not quite. Before this place was shut down, but after Weapon X was finished with it, our good friend Bolivar Trask set up shop here." Rachel rolled her eyes with an aggravated sigh. "He figured the mutant DNA lying all over the place would be a fun way to test out his latest Sentinel designs. It was here that he developed the Sentinel we now know as the Hunter."
"Nimrod!"
"The one and only. Before we can shut down the concentration camps, we have to stymie the flow of mutants collar-bound. And that means taking down the main Sentinel capturing them. If there exists any way to kill Nimrod, it's in there."
"But Kitty, I took care of Nimrod, remember? I sent him back to a time where he couldn't do any damage, to where there were no mutants. We're done with him!"
"I wish it were that simple, Ray. Nothing can kill Nimrod, and as far as we know, he can time travel just like you. Hell, he was responsible for 90 of the mutant captures, and have you even seen a difference? We have to find the secret to destroying him once and for all."
"Why us?"
Katherine reached out her arms and spun around in the snow. "Do you see anyone else here?" she stared her friend in the eye, seeing the shared understanding no doubt reflected in her own. "You stand guard, Ray, and let me know the minute you sense any danger. I can make it through the facility phasing a lot quicker than you. We'll be out of here in no time with just another tiny piece of this complicated mess." She walked up to the door, paused, and turned around to give Rachel a reassuring nod, before stepping forward. Straight into the door.
"Ow!" She rubbed her face, which had taken the brunt of the blow. "What gives?"
"Are you ok!" Rachel came running up to the door and put her arm around Katherine.
"I'm fine…but I thought I was phasing! What gives?" She turned intangible, and Rachel's arm right through her, throwing Rachel off balance. "Sorry."
"Ok that's just creepy. Let me know when you're going to do that, ok?"
Katherine didn't respond. She had reached out her hand towards the door, slowly approaching it, getting ready to feel the inside and the otherside. Her hand hit the door, and she became instantly solid again. "I don't understand what's going on."
Rachel eyed the walls around the door for clues. So much was worn away by the winds, the snow, and time. Dirt was caked around the crevices, cobwebs hung down in the corners, claw marks marred the metal surface…claw marks?
"Do those belong to Wolverine?" Rachel pointed at three lines scratching at the wall about chest high only a foot from the door.
Katherine walked up to the scratch and put her hand on it. "Logan…"
"Doesn't adamantium cut through anything? Even this stuff?"
"Unless it wasn't adamantium. Wolverine's claws were just bone before he disappeared, you know."
"And he couldn't get through this wall?"
"It doesn't even look like he tried…"
Rachel stepped back from the door, thinking. It didn't make sense. If he wanted to get in, he could've gotten in…she suddenly had an idea. She lit her right index finger on fire with the phoenix power raging through her. Steadily, carefully, she reached it out to touch the wall. Smoke rose from her finger as the light was extinguished.
"No powers. The wall is some kind of force field. It's turning off mutant powers. That's why you can't phase in."
"That's why Wolverine couldn't get in either. He couldn't keep his claws out."
"What? I thought the claws weren't mutant."
Katherine shook her head. "They were, just not their adamantium coating. Once he reverted to bone, they could've been contained by the camp collars just as easily as our powers."
Rachel pretended to understand. Were they mutant or weren't they? She pulled out her lockpicks – the same set Ororo had given her when she had finished her training. A tear escaped from her eyes. Last she had heard, Storm was in another camp, in Toronto. When the Sentinels had found out about her claustrophobia, they put her in a box. She would be the first they rescued. Just as soon as they were done here…
Success. The door slid open into the wall. "It looks like, with these, I can make it through faster than you. I guess I'm on point."
"Be careful, Ray."
"I was just about to say the same to you."
Rachel took a few steps forward into the facility. It was a good thing Storm wasn't here – the walls were close together, and everything was a dark slate, making the place feel even smaller. And up and down the hallways were seemingly endless rows of doors. "Where do I start?" she asked into her headset.
"Pick a door."
Eight doors later, Rachel hadn't found a damn thing. Ruined computers, people-sized Petri dishes, but no information on any Sentinels, let alone the Nimrod project.
"What now?"
"When I said pick a door, I was kind of hoping you would pick a door that looked important. Generally, the bigger the lock, the bigger the prize."
"Thanks, Kitty. You could've told me that eight rooms ago."
"Why, do you see an important door?"
"Of course." A large door with four different key holes and metal bars running across, fastening it to the surrounding walls. That was probably important. Rachel hunched over the locks. After a little work, one popped open, and then promptly reset. She tried again with a different one, met with the same frustration.
"I don't think I can get this one."
"What's going on?"
"It's four different locks, but as soon as I do one, it resets before I can move on to the others."
"Try all four at the same time."
Rachel scoffed. "Easier said than done." She pulled out some bobby pins from her hair and shook her head back and forth to let it down.
"Who are you getting ready to meet?"
"Wha…?" Rachel turned around to see Kitty standing behind her, and jumped into the air. "Jesus, Kitty, don't scare me like that!"
"Don't believe in 'em," she said with a grin.
"Shouldn't you be standing guard?"
"I got scared."
"Do you remember the trigger word?"
"Yeah…"
"Then go back to your post, Kit. You'll be fine." Rachel turned back to the door as she heard Katherine's steps going back to the main entrance. With her mutant ability to send beings through time, she had placed a hypnotic suggestion on Katherine. All she would have to do is say the trigger word, and her body would be sent back in time. It was an excellent escape mechanism. It was also an excellent weapon – it had worked on Nimrod. Or had it?
Makeshift lockpicks in place, she tried to turn all four at once, which actually ended up as the two on top quickly followed by the two below. It was close enough – the door unbolted, but made no move to open. She threw her body against it and it slowly swung open. She walked through the entrance, and a large screen at the end of the room lit up. A man appeared on the screen, dressed in a white lab coat, with large glasses that hid his eyes.
"I suppose that since you have made it here, you have learned the secret of your reprogramming. Maverick, Wolverine, Silver Fox, Sabertooth, you were our four best soldiers. A pity that you must now be terminated."
The film stopped, and Rachel reeled around to hear a clicking before her. But nothing happened. The door that she had spent so long trying to open was now trying to close, but the sound of the gears whining let Rachel know that old age was keeping it from sealing her in. Thank heaven for small favors.
Katherine rubbed her hands up and down her arms, hopping in place, trying to keep warm in the Canadian snow drifts. It was creepy out here – too many angles to watch.
Rachel came on the headset. "Kitty, what am I even looking for?"
"Anything that helps, Ray. Anything about Nimrod."
"I wish you could give me something tangible to look for. I've been down practically every corridor and I haven't found anything at all. I'm beginning to think Nimrod wasn't even made here."
"Not a chance. Trask was here, I know it."
No answer.
"Ray?"
Nothing.
"Ray, are you ok?"
Static.
"Ray! Say something!"
A cold, metal voice came through the intercom. "CEASE AND DESIST MUTANT. I AM HERE TO APPREHEND THE MUTANT DELATOUR."
"Ray!" Katherine screamed into the headset.
No response.
"Hold on, Ray, I'm coming!"
Another voice, this time definitely living. "You wan' to play, mon ami? Five-card stud!" There was an explosion inside. "Jacks or bettah to open!"
"What on…it can't be!"
Rachel's voice responded. "Gambit, no, you can't defeat Nimrod alone!"
Katherine grabbed the headset to her mouth. "Ray, can you hear me!"
"Kitty? Come quick! You've got…" her voice faded into static.
Katherine turned back to the door and hesitated. Had the explosion…? She ran into the wall and passed through to the other side. Thank heaven for small favors.
Daniel Ketch was not unfamiliar with death. He had been dead before – what was he up to now, three times? Four? He wished the Sentinels would hurry up about it. He was getting sick of sharing a cell with The Revolting One, or hearing the whines next door from the pipsqueak with dark glasses. The only one who made sense here was Colossus. He knew the name – couldn't say he had seen any of these cats out on the road, though.
He didn't really mind it in here. Sure, the bars were limiting, but with the collar strapped around his neck preventing him from using any superhuman powers, he could actually digest his food here. While others used meal time to socialize, he sat alone at a table in the corner; he wasn't anti-social, he just enjoyed the chance to eat food without the flaming-skull-face. Being the Ghost Rider reincarnate had its downsides.
His cellmate Fugu and neighbors Colossus and Pitch were the only ones he knew here. And for Daniel, that was plenty. The three of them managed to keep their own fucking soap opera running.
Fugu was counting down the days until they were killed. He had worked out some secret formula that predicted four more days, only he had been wrong so far about everybody else down the line of cells. Chalk it up to not having a calculator? The man was disgusting – he smelled, he looked like he was on his last leg anyways, he had a nauseating smoker's cough that rattled his piss-tinted teeth – he was generally unpleasant. The man would murmur in his sleep, only certainly not in English. If Daniel didn't know better, he would say that his cellmate could talk in tongues. But being a descendant from the devil himself, Daniel certainly knew a few things about hell, and whatever Fugu was, he wasn't a demon.
Pitch and Colossus he didn't know too well. They talked, but only to themselves. Pitch kept a journal going, only the point of it escaped Daniel: not only was the kid not getting out of here alive, immediately after writing an entry he would tell Colossus everything he had just written. If he wasn't keeping it a secret, why bother writing in the first place? Daniel chuckled. Kids. Pitch's latest conspiracy theory was that some new Sentinels didn't make a sound, so they could sneak up on you without knowing. And if you saw them coming? Does it really make a lot of difference? When the day is done all you can say once they throw you in the concentration camp is "at least I put up a fight". You're still in here with the rest of the fuckers.
Colossus was the only one doing something with his time. Or should I say "Piotr". It's funny, everyone can tell that Pitch is madly in love with Piotr, but he can't even pronounce his fucking name! Seeing the little Kentucky boy struggle to say "Pio-tr" in just two syllables might've been the highlight of Daniel's day. But Piotr didn't seem to swing that way – he had a girl waiting for him on the outside. His little "Katya". And that at least seem to give him purpose. He was always sitting with different people at meals, but Daniel noticed a few regulars. A man whom he knew only as Flicker. It was interesting to note who went by their mutant names in here, and who, with the loss of their powers, returned to their sapien ones. And a man whom Daniel was sure he had seen out on the open road, and had even had a few run-ins with. The man was mutant legend, but he doubted even a handful of people recognized the name he went by. James Howlett. But Daniel knew the biker routes, knew people who knew people who talked. So when a man with hair pointed up like horns and claws made from adamanitum asked for information, Daniel heard about it. How the undefeatable Wolverine of the X-Men had ended up caught and collared just like the rest of these damn mutants, Daniel couldn't even venture a guess. But nevertheless, every so often he would appear and speak with Colossus over watered-down oatmeal.
Flicker was also an interesting character. Solitary detention was located immediately below the mess hall – there was a lift in the corner that Daniel sat at every day that connected the communal gathering of every mutant interred here with a series of one-man hells. And about once a week, Daniel would see the human guards dressed in Sentinel uniform go down and pull Flicker up out of the lift shaft. Flicker would sit for roughly ten minutes, his eyes bouncing back and forth, taking in everything around him. The fool man was not stupid – he knew something was up. What the fuck that was, Daniel had no clue. Because after ten minutes, Flicker would throw over the table, start flinging plastic utensils with expert aim, and wreaking havoc. If he could ride a bike, the kid might be worth something after all. It often took seven or eight men to overpower the guy. He put up a good fight. But when all was said and done, he was often down there, and Daniel, ironically enough, was amongst the living for a change.
And from his position in the corner, Daniel noticed Colossus amassing a following. First James, on occasion, with more and more frequency. Then Pitch, Colossus' butt-buddy. Then Fugu, Daniel's own cellmate. And finally, one day, when Flicker had come up from solitary, before he had a chance to throw a tantrum, Fugu had approached him and whispered something. As he walked back to the table, Flicker stood up and followed him. There were five of them now. Huddled over each other in conversation, they all suddenly looked up and stared. At Daniel.
"What?" He shouted across the mass of dialogue clogging the room.
"Come over here," Fugu yelled back. "We want to talk to you."
Daniel wasn't a stupid man. He knew what this was about. Some fool plan to escape. He assumed they had found some way to use their powers, otherwise, forget it, there was no fucking way they were getting out of this hellhole alive. So that would make two strongmen – Colossus and Wolverine – a sniper – Flicker – and two good-for-nothings – Fugu and Pitch. Colossus and Wolverine had some kind of experience with these Sentinels. They could probably make it out of here alive. Daniel didn't particularly want to go through the process of being reborn – first he'd have to haunt enough people to come close enough to the concentration camp, and then they'd have to summon him back, not even mentioning that it hurt like a bitch.
"I'm in." He said as he approached the table. He didn't even have a chance to sit down.
"Daniel Ketch?"
He spun around to see the most disgusting woman he had ever laid eyes on. She was six feet of some kind of Eastern European, but that wasn't the scary part. Every inch of her body was covered in what looked like facial hair – like a body mustache. And it hadn't been cleaned in a while. Daniel had to admit, nobody smelled good in a concentration camp, but damn if she didn't reek. There was dirt trapped underneath all of those hairs, too. Must've been one of the Morlocks he had heard about, a group of underground mutants who couldn't show their face in the real world. He understood why now. But how did she…?
"How do you know my name?"
She reached out a hair covered hand, which he ignored. "My name is Thalberg. I am huge fan. I've watched your stunt biking since I was just little girl in Bavaria. I am biker myself, only not in here." She guffawed. Daniel almost puked.
"You ride, short-stuff?" Daniel turned around to see that Wolverine had lifted his head to address him.
"Yeah, I do. Ever heard of a guy named Cyber? I used to ride with him." Wolverine was silent. "Or the Dark Riders? You know, Cyber mentioned he was looking for a guy that kind of fit your description. Only he was much more feral. Even had an animal name. What was it? Werewolf? No…Wildebeest?"
"Enough, Daniel." Colossus pointed to the bench, indicating that Daniel should shut-up and sit down. He ignored it. "And what can we do for you, Ms. Thalberg?"
"Nothing. I am not interested in your escape plans…"
"Who said anything about escape!" Pitch piped up. Dumb kid. Had a lot to learn.
"Six men conspiring over a table? Hah! The last time that happened I was with their wives in the back doing some conspiring of my own!" And with that she walked away. Motherfucking crazy bitch, she was. Daniel just hoped she didn't blow their cover and get a good laugh at it.
As soon as she was gone, Wolverine lunged up and pinned Daniel against a wall. "What do you know, short-stuff?"
"Are you really calling me short?" Daniel didn't think he could be shoved any further into the wall. Apparently he was wrong.
"What do you know about Cyber?"
"My old riding buddy? He's dead now. Some kid named Genesis killed him. He was looking for an adamantium skeleton. Said some fellah' had lost his own."
"Grrr…" Wolverine let him drop to the floor. "This kid doesn't leave with us."
Fugu let out a nauseating cough. "I'm afraid that's not...possible. Daniel is in my cell." The raspy voice grated on Daniel's eardrums. "They will take us to the Grinder all together. And that is the only time we are uncollared."
Daniel stood up and put his arm around Wolverine. "Looks like you're stuck with me, James. Just one question, why are you working for…?"
Wolverine grabbed Daniel's arm and twisted it behind his back. "Just 'cuz I gotta' work with yah, doesn't mean I gotta' listen to you ramble on. Got it? Good. Siddown." He threw Daniel onto the bench.
"So," Flicker turned to Daniel, "what do you do?"
"That all depends. What have you done?"
Micah Jameson settled into a cracked red-leather booth and stretched out his legs. He had gone for the past three days without sleep, without rest, without food – just drawing pictures of hot dogs, "ripping" them (as he had termed his mutant power), and tricking his body into thinking it was real food. He tried to concentrate on it for a while, but exhaustion was starting to get the best of him, and his body couldn't survive on fake food. It was time for a meal, and he had been fortunate to find a diner in the middle of the desert. Mirage or not, he wasn't about to pass this up.
He had been searching for the Great Lord Magnus for almost two years now, starting shortly after leaving the orphanage. Looking back, he was almost amazed to think that two years ago, he was only fifteen years old, tossing around a football outside with kids his age, knowing nothing of the world around him, going to school, laughing – that was something he didn't do very often any more, laugh – and now. Well, now things were different. Two years on your own made you change a hell of a lot.
"Can I get you something?"
"Oh, I haven't even gotten a menu. I don't know what I want yet."
"Menu?" The waitress snorted, wiping some snot from her nose. "We don't got those. You want breffast?"
"Um…do you have eggs?"
The waitress walked away without looking back. Hopefully that meant they had eggs. He could really go for something scrambled. He was trying to remember the last time he had really good eggs. Like, really good eggs. There was a family owned restaurant he had eaten at in New Orleans. They had some damn good eggs. But that was four states ago. Nevada wasn't Louisiana, and he had no plans on swinging up to Las Vegas. So he probably wouldn't be getting good eggs again any time soon.
Micah turned to see his car, parked outside, vanish into thin air. Damnit if eggs weren't distracting. Stupid things always got the better of him, so that what he had drawn and ripped into being and so desperately needed faded away because he was too focused on some dumb eggs. If he was going to impress the Great Lord Magnus, he was going to have to do better.
The waitress came back with his eggs. A runny, gooey mess of sunny-side up. It didn't really matter to Micah – he wolfed it down with alacrity. Finished less than five minutes later, he pulled out his wallet from his back pocket. It was really just for show, he didn't have any money, hadn't since New Mexico. But behind that he pulled out a sketch pad and quickly drew a twenty dollar bill. A flick of the wrist, and the twenty dollars ripped out of the page into Micah's hand, and he put it on the table.
Twenty dollar bill.
Twenty dollar bill.
Twenty dollar bill.
Slowly, Trace slid out of the booth, repeating to himself over and over. Can't lose focus. Twenty dollar bill. Just get out of the restaurant. Twenty dollar bill. This isn't as hard as the car. Twenty dollar bill. The car had way too many parts, but money is just money. Twenty dollar bill. I mean the car had the engine, the wheels, the fuel tank, the windshield, the…
"Hey, what just happened?" Micah spun around to see the waitress standing over his table, holding nothing in her hands. Where he could only guess twenty dollars had just been. Shit.
He ran at the door, the hefty woman chasing after him screaming. Quickly, he dug into his pocket and grabbed his sketch book, flipping frantically as he ran to find some mode of transportation. Laser gun – no. Pen – no, although useful if he was out of them. Hot dog – his stomach queezed. Robot dinosaur - …the fuck? Unicycle. Unicycle? Why did he ever draw a…
"Get back here you son of a bitch!" Micah glanced behind him to see the woman now aiming a shotgun. He dove behind a well placed tree and fumbled through his notepad. Nothing else going.
BANG
The tree shook and a branch fell on his head, knocking him to the ground. How did he end up in a situation like this? He could hear running coming from the waitress' direction. Clearly she wasn't finished yet. He had one shot at this. He flipped open the pad and ripped out the unicycle. It took all of his strength to balance it enough for him to climb on, his head still raging uncontrollably. Unicycle. How the hell do you pedal one of these anyways? Unicycle. She was taking aim again – time to move! He churned his legs as fast as he could, ignoring the throbbing in his head, the blurriness of his vision. Why did he ever draw a unicycle!
"Coward! I'm calling the police!" But it was too late. Micah was already speeding down the road on his unicycle. Too many close calls recently. And he was still days outside of Los Angeles. The city of angels.
Once he got further down the road than he thought the waitress would ever chase him, he fell off the unicycle and let it go immediately. It disappeared before Micah even hit the ground. He lay there, staring up at the desert sun blazing overhead. Every so often, he had to step back from his life and reexamine just what the hell was going on. This – running from city to city for ten years, trying to track a man across the country, riding a unicycle down a six mile stretch of highway – this wasn't normal. There were mutants out there who were just living, just chilling and grooving, sleeping in beds, eating expensive meals and paying with real money, going to school. Damn he wished he could've gone to an arts school Especially now.
And of all the men to waste it on, why one he had never met? Was Magneto really all that great? Micah couldn't really tolerate humans either, not since an unfortunate event back at the orphanage involving a picture of a puppy, but the "Great Lord Magnus" certainly wasn't doing anything more about it than Micah was. Shouldn't he have been looking for the parents that abandoned him? Or his girlfriend Rita back at the orphanage, who took off only days before he did? Of all the people in the world – why a washed up super-villain?
He sat up and immediately regretted it, his head still spinning from the branch strike. Feeling around in his pockets, Micah pulled out a pencil and his sketch pad and began to draw a more suitable vehicle. He had a long journey to go yet.