CENTRAL INTELLIGENGE AGENCY DOSSIER-CLEARANCE LEVEL A
COINTELPRO-OPERATION IRON FIST
HANDLER NOTES
03/01/1970
Target FROST apprehended. Analyzed by LT. STRYKER and DR. TRASK. Sedated to hinder apparent telepathic abilities. Processed at TRASK Industries HQ.
03/04/1970
Subject FROST uncooperative and not receptive to promises for her release. Must be constantly sedated in order to remain docile. Resistant to sodium pentothal. DR. TRASK recommends further processing.
03/11/1970
DR. TRASK and team discover and manage to crack Subject FROST'S secondary mutation. Bits of her diamond-like shell have been moved to Pentagon for further study.
In addition, Subject attempted to seduce Handler in a moment of lucidity. Handler believes she is psychologically desperate and "on the brink." Am optimistic that she will provide valuable intel.
03/17/1970
Subject is now responsive to processing. Handler is in possession of a list of Brotherhood member leads.
03/19/1970
Subject's fingernail beds have become infected at the removal points. Nose also fractured during sleep deprivation phase 3 when Subject's ropes snapped on impact with the floor. Sodium Pentothal now having an ancillary effect, possibly due to her compromised immune system. Breakthrough has led to the decryption of the mutant dialect purportedly invented and canonized via an underground printing press over the last five years.
03/21/1970
Subject continues to translate documents brought to her in the Omega Epsilon language.
03/24/1970
Subject attempted to ingest finished pages of translations and swallow her own tongue. Attempt was unsuccessful.
03/26/1970
After 24 hours of catatonic unresponsiveness, Subject FROST was deemed moot and terminated at 08:00 hours this morning by lethal injection. DR. TRASK hypothesizes DNA will be invaluable in discovering the long-elusive power of ESP. Handler has read the translations of the rogue mutant zines and transcribed them below. Handler believes they are press releases put out by Subject IRON FIST at the behest of Deceased Subject FROST via telepathic link unbeknownst to the CIA.
Subject IRON FIST will be moved accordingly to an underground facility.
DR. TORUKO has replicated the molecular structure of the alloy used in Subject IRON FIST'S helmet. Contractors commissioned to line walls of new cell.
-TRANSCRIPT-
CIA0005636-FAV-1/ZINES
Perceived Overall Purpose: Pontification and Recruitment.
Secondary Documents And Entries: Personal in nature. Elude to a deviant homosexual relationship with Target X. Target X still at large.
Ordered by: Date
12/11/1963
Zine Title: A Brotherhood of Mutants
Author: Magneto
My fellow mutants. If you are reading this, then you have already discovered that you are not alone. One of my band has trained you to see in ways that humans do not see, to read what the humans do not read. My associate assures me this will be distributed by the end of the day, and, although I am being kept covertly in a concrete box made by the homo sapians, illegally tried in absentia by a military tribunal, I will smile when they bring me the horse shit that passes for dinner, knowing that there's a strange Cyrillic on newsprint in your hands.
First I'll address the rumor mill. I did not assassinate President Kennedy. On the contrary. After the Cuban Missle Crisis, when our kind was exposed to two superpowers, the original Brothers and I felt we had to be preemptive. As preemptive as the missles on that beach. The teleporter in our group transported us directly into the White House Master Bedroom in the early hours of the morning, where I planned to take him hostage and figure out our next move.
What I found was not what I bargained for. For one, First Lady Jacqueline was awake and reading by lamplight. When we three appeared she started, but after the initial knee jerk reaction, her eyes narrowed. There was not a trace of surprise on her face.
"So you finally decided to make an appearance."
Her tone was almost bored. But I recognized the upward tilt to her chin, and the tension in her shoulders. It is not the object to conquer fear. Only to limit it's power over you, and do what needs to be done.
"Wake your husband." I said to her.
"John." She said his name, loudly and evenly, and the President's eyes snapped open.
There was a surreal moment where we were all silent and regarding; the Jew who can move metal, the Devil, and the Ice Queen. The President and his stoic wife. It was like something out of Brecht. But then the president sighed the sigh of world leaders, and reached out his hand.
"It's a relief to finally meet you, Mr Lehnsherr. You're sort of a loose canon, but up until the aerial footage, I thought I was the only one who had...gifts."
I took his hand mechanically, but as he said the last word, a shot of warmth traveled the full length of my arm. Trying to describe this is like trying to describe color to a blind man, surely. But I have to try. The more we know about our kind the better. When President Kennedy took my hand, I felt all the things that he felt in that moment. Anxiety, curiosity, and wonder. Fear, for himself and for Jacqueline, but also for us, a big-picture fear and a stewardship for all the underdogs of our time that I've only ever encountered in one other man (more's the pity to him). Contentment in his marriage, confidence in his position, pleasure in the creation of change. John Kennedy was an open book to me, and I in turn felt the rape of my own heart, torn open and taken and understood, even more galling than the intrusion of a telepath, because the language of the heart is primal. There could be no hiding behind internal German grammar drills or muddled words for an-
"Empath," I whispered.
"Yes, and if you don't mind me saying so Mr. Lehnsherr," Jacqueline's voice was prim as she closed her book and rested her head against her husband's shoulder. "You're reading like a basket case right now."
What had been a planned kidnapping turned into a joint strategic meeting. John Kennedy's mutation was an extraordinary one, and a fortuitous genetic accident for a politician. His innate understanding of the pain and struggles of others made him a powerful advocate for the oppressed, and it didn't take him long, then, in his bedroom at an ungodly hour, to add mutants to his list of personal causes. In a perfect world, a world where our kind live freely and without fear, his power would be something to covet.
But the same thing that made this great man great made him weak in the end. His controversial agenda offended the small minds of other politically powerful humans, and from what my telepathic associate could glean, money changed hands between one of them and the Central Intelligence Agency. Three CIA issue bullets were fired that dark day in November. I regret to say that I was only able to curb two before the syringe got me in the back.
And so here I sit, a scapegoat like my father and his father before him, paying for the crimes of smaller, inferior creatures. Their psychiatrists have dubbed me a narcissistic personality and so are keeping me locked up in solitary confinement as a form of torture, hoping to soften me so that I break like brittle tin, too afraid, really, to get near me and speed up the process.
They do not know arena we play on, let alone the rules of our game. Tonight is the first night of Hanukkah, and the candle burns bright in my heart, for the late President Kennedy, for my Brothers, and for all of you.
More Soon
Magneto