THE CAPTAIN AND THE DEATHSTRIKE
by Gunman
Disclaimer: I do not own Captain America, The X-Men, or their characters.
Summary: Captain America is found by William Stryker, who is then freed by Yuriko Oyama and together must help the mutants stave off the end of the world.
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(Alkalai Lake, Canada)
The grizzled old war veteran and military scientist, Colonel William Stryker, adjusted his glasses as he grinned and looked at the frozen block of ice that his Washington contacts had brought him. Inside the ice was the body of a frozen man, whom most of the world had been looking for for the last few decades. Surrounding him were several of his most loyal officers.
Off to the side was another smaller block of ice that contained a circular red, white and blue shield.
"This must be my birthday and Christmas all rolled into one." Stryker said with a slight southern drawl in his voice. With Captain America in my possession, I'll be able to create the perfect human race. A race of super soldiers! And once I wipe out all of mutant kind, this world will be free to live in the perfect state of peace and harmony. He thought to himself.
"Sir! The readings indicate that... he's alive!" Sergeant Lyman, Stryker's right-hand man, said as he scanned the block of ice with a specialized medical device.
"Alive? That's impossible!" another soldier gasped.
"Incredible. Even after being frozen for over 60 years, he's still alive. He's far more powerful than I'd heard. The possibilities are limitless." Stryker grinned.
Stryker began his experiments as soon as he could, making sure to keep the Captain in a state of unconsciousness so as to ensure no trouble.
However, he was so giddy at the prospect of examining his blood and recreating the Super Soldier Serum, that he did not realize that he had missed his mind-control injection of one of his own soldiers.
Though 'slave' would have been a better way to put it.
Her name was Yuriko Oyama, a beautiful Japanese woman with an accelerated healing factor and extendable claws that came out of her fingers.
She was a mutant that Stryker and his team had captured, drugged, and experimented on.
Her bones were now covered in an unbreakable metal called adamantium, and her mind had been constantly exposed to that vial mind-control serum that Stryker used on that other mutant. She had not known his name, but she remembered his blue-skin, yellow eyes, and long prehensile tail. He was a teleporter, if she was not mistaken.
She watched patiently as Stryker preformed his experiments, keeping a detailed and analytical eye on everything going on around her.
No one seemed to notice her. But she had come to expect this. She was Strykers obedient mutant pet. Whether they knew about the mind-control serum he used on her, or that she was simply conditioned to be this way, they didn't seem to consider her a threat.
A mistake that would cost them dearly.
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Stryker had eventually realized that he had missed Yuriko's mind-control interval, but was curious as to why she hadn't done something. Like escape, or attack them.
After giving her another injection to the back of her neck, he pondered that.
Was the serum having more of an effect on her than he figured it would? Her mutant healing powers might have been strong, but they were not able to resist his formula. It was a thought that made him smile.
Thus far her powers had healed her from all manner of injuries Stryker and his men had inflicted upon her. Beatings, knife wounds, bullet holes, even poisons and tranquilizers didn't work on her. She healed in a matter of seconds, perfectly healthy.
Her adamantium skeleton, which Stryker had bonded to her in similar fashion to 'Weapon X' had only made her stronger.
But clearly, her mind was still unable to resist the mind-control serum he used on her and other mutants in his possession.
Possession, or incarceration, was a better way to put it, since they were not willing soldiers in Stryker's group.
However, Yuriko was keenly aware of everything around her. Having missed one of her regular intervals, Yuriko was slowly beginning to fight against the serum. She only hoped she would be able to reject it completely next time.
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Yuriko just looked on as Stryker was gloating over Professor Charles Xavier, a mutant without the ability to walk, but possessed of a highly telepathic ability that Stryker wanted to make use of.
"For a man who hates mutants as much as you do, you keep some strange company." the bald-headed teacher and mutant said, the device on his head keeping his powers under containment.
"Oh, they have their uses. If they can be controlled." Stryker said with a smirk.
Yuriko remained still. She knew that her interval had worn off. She was free. But she had to keep up appearances, at least for now.
Stryker noticed that she was not moving, remaining still as a statue, which he expected.
He walked over to the door that was just behind her, opening it up and waving his hand at someone outside.
Yuriko watched as another soldier pushed a sickly looking man in a wheelchair into the room. A man with one green eye and one blue eye.
"Meet Mutant Experiment 143." Stryker said.
"Jason." Xavier said as he saw the man. "My god, William he's your son."
"No, he's not! My son is dead. As will soon your whole race will be." Stryker said as he walked out of the room, waving his hand at Yuriko, ordering her to follow.
She followed with only a slight hesitation as the soldier closed the door on Xavier and Jason.
Once outside, an assistant came up to him, looking like he had run the whole way.
"Sir! We have a problem!" the man said.
"What problem?" Stryker asked.
"It's the Captain, sir! He's awake!"
"What? That's impossible!" Stryker said as he rushed down the hallway ahead of the group.
They entered the room where a dozen men were trying to hold a blond-haired man in a red, white and blue outfit down, only to get punched, kicked and thrown off in every direction.
"Deathstrike! Stop Him!" Stryker said as Yuriko stepped forward, her claws extending from her fingers.
The men were thrown off of the super soldier in one mighty heave as Yuriko leapt at the Captain, knocking him down and pinning him to the floor. Her claws pinned his wrists to the ground.
Steve Rogers looked up and stared at the beautiful woman who was on top of him. She looked back and felt a small flush of blood rush to her cheeks.
"Do you want to escape this place?" she whispered to him softly.
"Y-yes." he said to her.
"Then you must trust me. Quickly, throw me off, towards the door." she said.
Steve quickly pushed Yuriko off of his body, throwing her into the air, towards the door, towards Stryker.
"What the..." was the last thing Stryker said as Yuriko swung her arms at him, slashing Stryker and his men across their throats and faces.
The men went down as Captain America quickly sprung back to his feet, knocking down the other soldiers who tried to restrain him.
The super soldier and the razor-clawed mutant made quick work of the soldiers, until they were the last ones standing.
"What's going on? Who are these men? Where am I?" Steve asked, looking at the men who were unconscious and dead.
"It's a long story, Captain." Yuriko said. "Come! We have to go quickly." she said as the blond super soldier followed her, grabbing up his shield on the way out as he did.
"Is there way out of here?" he asked.
"Yes. But... we can't leave just yet." she said to him.
"What? Why not?" he asked.
"We have to rescue the others." she said.
"Others?" he asked curiously.
"Please, follow me." she said as she turned down the hallway.
"Wait! Who are you?" he said, grabbing her arm and causing her to stop walking.
She looked at his arm and then into his eyes.
"Yuriko Oyama." she said.
"I'm Steve Rogers." he said to her.
"I know who you are. Captain America, from World War II. Encased in a block of ice for over 60 years." she said.
"Wha... 60 years?" he gasped.
"Yes. A lot of things have changed, Captain. But innocent people still need your help." she said as she led Steve to the room where Xavier was being held.
There weren't any guards, which Steve found odd, until Yuriko opened the door and saw two men sitting in wheelchairs.
One of the men was an older bald gentleman with a strange spider-like device over his head and was handcuffed to his wheelchair.
The other man seemed younger but sickly, dressed in a white hospital gown, and appeared to be staring off into space, almost as if he were lost.
Yuriko extended one of her metal claws and cut the bald-mans shackles. She then removed the spider-like device that was around his head.
"Oh! That... feels much better." the bald man said as he breathed a sigh of relief. "Yuriko... you're free."
"Yes, Professor. Stryker is dead. I've come to help you escape, and I've brought help." she said to the bald man.
Xavier looked up at the blond haired young man, gasping as he realized who he was.
"Steve Rogers. Captain America." he gasped.
"You know me?" Steve asked.
"Of course. I still have your old comic book. Somewhere." he said with slight humor.
"Right." he grinned.
"I am Professor Charles Xavier. I am pleased to meet you." he said.
"Nice to meet you too." Steve said to the man. "What about him?" he said as he gestured to the other man.
"There's nothing we can do for him." Xavier said, using his powers to block Jason's attempts to confuse him.
"What about the others?" Yuriko asked.
"Others?" Steve asked.
Xavier froze for a second, as if he was seeing what she was talking about.
"My students." the bald telepath said.
Steve pushed Xavier out in the wheelchair while Yuriko lead the way through the tunnels and corridors of the underground base.
As they turned another corner of the base, they were met by several armed soldiers.
"Halt! Surrender Or We'll Open Fire!" one of the soldiers said.
Xavier held up his hand, and soldiers froze in place.
Steve looked at the soldiers in confusion, before looking at Xavier.
"How did you..." Steve asked.
"It's a gift that I possess. Which is why Stryker had the device strapped to my head." Xavier explained.
"Yeah. I see that." Steve said as he gently moved the men aside so that Yuriko and the Professor could get around them.
Eventually they came to the holding cell where the children were being kept.
However, the door was being guarded by a unique individual.
A man with short brown hair, dressed all in black with a strange visor over his eyes was blocking the way.
"Scott?" Xavier gasped when he saw him. "No... something's wrong with him."
"What?" Steve asked.
"Stryker must have used the same mind-control serum on him that he used on me." Yuriko said.
"Yes. I can sense it. He's not in control of his body." Xavier said.
Scott raised his hand up and touched his visor, right before a red bolt of energy exploded out of his visor, right towards them.
Steve jumped in front of the pair and blocked the energy blast with his shield. The crimson beam reflected off of the vibranium shield and blasted the stone and concrete walls all around the mind-controlled mutant.
"I've got him!" Xavier shouted as he held out his hand towards Scott. The optic-firing mutant just gasped for several seconds until he felt his body go limp. His mind and powers shut down as he slumped to the floor.
Steve pulled Scott out away from the door and set him by Xavier.
"That took some effort since I had to get past Strykers control of him. I'll try to help him. See if you both can get that door open." Xavier said to the pair.
Yuriko and Steve went up to the door. Yuriko punched in the code to the panel on the side of the door, but nothing happened. She punched it in again, but nothing happened.
"It's not working. That blast must have damaged the door controls." Yuriko said.
"The door looks damaged as well." Steve said. "Maybe we can remove it."
She looked at him incredulously, but agreed to help.
The pair clutched the sides of the large door, Steve on the right Yuriko on the left. Gripping the door tightly, they pulled. They yanked on it hard, and door gave way. Just a bit. They yanked on it hard again and again.
Several long seconds followed, then into two minutes, until the door finally gave way.
A loud cracking and thunderous crash preceded the large hole in the wall and the six children on the other side.
"Who is that?" a voice on the other side shouted.
"Hello?" another voice called out.
"Children!" Xavier shouted.
"Professor?" a voice called out.
"It's alright. You're safe now." Xavier said as six children of different ethnicities appeared through the cloud of dust.
"Children? What are they doing here?" Steve asked.
"Stryker's forces kidnapped them from the Professor's school." Yuriko said.
"Kidnapped children? Why?" Steve asked.
"They're mutants. They have powers and abilities, like the Professor." she explained.
"And that's why Stryker wanted to... kill them?" Steve asked.
"He wanted to use me to kill them." Xavier said.
"You? How?" he asked.
"Cerebro." Yuriko said.
"What?" Steve asked, confused.
"I'll explain later. We need to find a way out of here. Are there any transports nearby?" Xavier asked.
"Yes. One. This way." Yuriko said.
Yuriko lead the group out of the underground base. Steve was carrying the unconscious Scott over his shoulders, while the Japanese mutant was carrying Xavier, since the wheelchair wouldn't go over the rocky terrain, until they reached the helicopter that sat on a small makeshift landing pad outside by the lake itself.
Everyone was quickly loaded up into the helicopter as Yuriko jumped into the pilot seat. Scott was sat down in a seat beside Xavier as Steve secured the door and made sure the other children were belted up in their own seats. The super soldier jumped into the co-pilot seat as Yuriko fired up the engines.
Xavier just looked back at his formerly captured students, then to his still-unconscious student that sat beside him, and to the Japanese mutant and American super soldier who were piloting the helicopter out of Alkalai Lake and back to their home.
But as they left the Lake and the dam that had been Strykers base for the last few decades, they heard a mighty CRACK! Yuriko circled the dam for a couple minutes, as the dam soon exploded out with tremendous force. Meter by meter the dam broke open, crumbling and crashing all through the small valley area until the entire area was drowned by the lake it had so extraneously sought to hold back.
It was this CRACK that awoke Scott from his slumber.
"Oh. What? Professor?" Scott groaned as he shook the unconsciousness from his head.
"Scott. It's good to see you awake." Xavier said.
"What happened?" he asked.
"It's a long story. But we need to meet up with the others."
"Others?"
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Xavier directed the helicopter to a small clearing where the rest of the X-Men were waiting.
Scott and Jean were happily reunited, and Storm was glad to see the children who had been taken from the school.
Xavier was pleased and confused to see Erik Lehnsherr out and about, and more so to see Mystique as well, whom he once regarded as a sister, before he and Erik had their little falling out.
But Logan was both shocked and confused to see Steve.
"Steve?" Logan gasped.
"Logan?" Steve gasped.
"You two know each other?" Storm asked, looking back and forth between the pair.
"Yeah. We fought together. During the War." Steve said.
"Vietnam?" she asked.
"No. World War II. In Europe." Logan said.
The group looked at Logan in confusion. They knew he was long-lived, but World War II was over 60 years ago.
"Wait! You fought during World War II. Together?" Rogue asked.
"Yes." Logan said. "It's funny. Seeing you again... it's bringing a lot of things back." he said.
"How is that possible? Logan's regenerative abilities kept him young, but... who is this guy and how is it he is alive after all this time?" Jean asked.
"He was found frozen in a block of ice by Stryker's people." Yuriko said.
"That's not possible." Scott said.
"It is, if a person possessed the super soldier serum." Xavier said.
"Super soldier... you mean..."
"This is Captain America, the first and only super soldier created by the Allied Forces." Logan said.
The group looked at the handsome blond-haired man in the red, white and blue outfit, who looked younger than Logan did.
"Stryker was planning to use his blood to create an army of super soldiers. Human super soldiers. To use against mutants. If his plans to use Xavier didn't really work." Yuriko explained.
"Use the professor, how?" Rogue asked.
"Cerebro." Erik Lehnsherr said.
"You mentioned a 'Cerebro' before." Steve said. "What is that?"
"A special computer that I invented which enables me to locate any mutant on the planet. I use it to locate mutants that are in trouble." Xavier said.
"So... Stryker wanted this Cerebro so that he could locate mutants? To kill them?" Steve asked.
"Yes. With Charles's help." Erik said.
"My unwitting help." Charles added.
"What do you mean?" Logan asked.
"When Charles mind is connected to Cerebro, he is connected to everyone on the planet. If he were forced to concentrate on a particular group, say Mutants for example? He could kill us all." Erik explained.
"But how could Stryker make you do that? With that mind-control serum?" Steve asked.
"No. With Jason, his son, casting illusions into my mind to make me think otherwise. Without access to my own powers, I wouldn't have been able to resist him." Xavier said.
"You mean with that thing that was around your head when we found you?" Steve asked.
"Yes."
"And this mind-control serum. He used it on Kurt." Jean explained.
"Who?" Steve asked.
Nightcrawler suddenly appeared before him in a cloud of blue smoke. Steve was a little shocked at that.
"Kurt Wagner, at your service. But in the Munich Circus I was known as the incredible Nightcrawler!" the blue-skinned mutant said with a bow.
Steve just stared at the blue-skinned mutant with shock on his face.
"Stryker used that mind-control serum to force him to attack the president. He used it on me, and on him." Yuriko said, pointing to Magneto.
"Which is how Stryker found out about the school, and Cerebro." Xavier said.
"And he used it on him." Yuriko said, pointing to Scott.
"I couldn't stop myself from attacking them." Scott said as he looked at Steve, Yuriko and the Professor. "It was like someone else was controlling me. Like a puppet."
"And this is?" Storm asked, looking at Yuriko.
"This is Yuriko Oyama. She was once Stryker's slave. She helped us to escape from Alkali Lake." Xavier said to them.
"Wait, aren't you the one who attacked me at the prison?" Scott asked the woman.
"Yes. I apologize for that." Yuriko said. "I... wasn't myself."
"Yeah. I understand that." Scott groaned.
"So... what will you do now?" Erik asked.
"Return to the mansion. Locate our students. Try and go on."
"Stryker may be gone, but others will try and finish his work." Erik said.
"No. They won't." Yuriko said to the group.
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(Two days later)
Professor Xavier and his team, along with Steve Rogers and Yuriko Oyama, met with the President of the United States and were going over the files that Yuriko had handed over to the X-Men, taken from Strykers office in Washington.
Needless to say that President McKenna was not happy about this whole thing.
Stryker was trying to genocide an entire race, and had used mind-controlled mutants to attack the president in order to 'convince' him to agree to invade the mansion and kidnap mutant children. And then he learned about the machine, Cerebro, which he would have used to kill every mutant on the planet. However, the downside to this whole thing was that Cerebro could have also been used to kill every human on the planet just as easily.
Needless to say the president felt more than a little betrayed by all this.
Humans and mutants were on the brink of war with each other, and all right under his nose.
The last thing the president wanted was bloodshed. Actually, the president never wanted bloodshed, but it seemed that there were people in the world, and in the United States specifically, trying to accomplish this regardless of what he wanted. He was the president, and people were trying to do things as if they were the ones in charge.
The next few days saw massive change in policy and the presidents administration in regards to how mutants were viewed and received by the public.
A lot of people were upset, while most were trying to understand how their own selfish natures had almost lead them to a war they didn't want to fight.
The fact that many of them were being compared to the Nazis back in World War II was the harshest reality of all.
Even so, things were slowly getting back to a semblance of normalcy for the group of mutants.
Magneto and Mystique had taken off when Xavier and his students returned to their mansion. The only problem was that Jean was suffering from strange headaches.
Kurt Wagner had gone back to Munich to rejoin his circus family, whom he had been taken from by Stryker several months ago.
Steve and Yuriko had decided to go with Xavier and his group for the time being. Steve needed time to adjust to this new world he had found himself in, and Yuriko wanted a fresh start in her life as well.
While The Professor and Scott helped Jean to deal with her growing headaches, Storm and Logan were assigned to teach the younger students how to use and develop their powers. Especially in a combat situation.
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Steve sighed as he looked at the gravestone that bore the name 'Peggy Carter'. Born: July 17th, 1910. Died: April 12th, 1999.
Professor Xavier had managed to track down information about Peggy Carter and the other members of the SSR for Steve, though the bald telepath was sure that the super soldier wouldn't like what he had found.
However, Steve wasn't surprised by what he found.
"I suppose this is better." Steve said with a sigh.
"How so, Steve?" Yuriko asked as she stood behind him.
"We were just starting to get to know each other back during the War. 60 years... I can't imagine how much things have changed. How much the people have changed." he said.
Yuriko sighed as he said that.
"Yes. Logan and I... we haven't aged since our mutant powers triggered." she said, remembering the file that Stryker had about Logan. About how his history went all the way back to the Civil War. She even found a file that Stryker had on her. One that went back to just before the First World War. "You might have a similar ability, if your super soldier serum constantly regenerates your cells as well."
"I think it's already been tested, after being locked in a block of ice for 60 years." Steve said.
"Perhaps. But... at least you're not alone in all this."
"What do you..." Steve asked, as Yuriko smiled at him. "Oh. Sorry."
"It's alright. You have a lot to get used to."
"I had a hard enough time getting used to the way things were in 1943. Before Dr Erskine's project, girls weren't lining up to date me." Steve replied.
"Even in the 1940's they were too hung up on looks. That hasn't changed too much. But... there are a lot of girls, in this time, who think more of what's inside of a man, as well as the outside." she said.
"That's... incredibly heartfelt." he said.
"I have my moments." she said, interlocking her arms with his and leading him out of the cemetery. "So, tell me. What does Captain America want to do now that he's returned to the modern world?"
"Well, I don't know about Captain America, but Steve Rogers would like to go see some art at a museum... and then maybe see a good movie." he said, hoping he wasn't being too boring.
"I haven't been to a good movie, or a museum, in a very long time." she replied with a smirk, liking the idea that her 'date' had at least some degree of culture in his bones.
"Well, then... would you like to join me?" he asked.
"I would." she smiled. "There's this place called The Smithsonian that I think you'll like."
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Authors Notes:
I know I'm screwing up a lot of history here, but hopefully no one will be too cruel about that. One of the beautiful things about fanfictions is the ability to change the events of a canon story, which is one of the reasons I love it so much.
I didn't like how Deathstrike was portrayed in the X2 movie, so this is one way I have 'saving her'.
This is only a one-shot. My next story involving these two will be in the 'Days of Future Past' storyline. Keep an eye out for it.
I originally wanted to do a lemon for this, but decided against it. That would have been great right? Kelly Hu is just so sexy.
Anyway, go ahead, read and review. Please.