(NB: I will go into an explanation of my thoughts behind this story afterward, so you can stick around then if you'd like).

SOMNAMBULANCE FOR THE SAKE OF SOVEREIGNTY

By Quillon42

SOMETIME IN 1988 IN NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK

Both teams felt burned through in more ways than one at this juncture of the Infernal ordeal, just after the devastating death of their dear friend and, unfortunately also, the dread Goblin Majesty. Generally speaking, the 'Factor and the 'Men alike—they had undergone so much, just this night alone: an endurance run of enemies, from the otherworldly to the most personal possible. And this last took more out of them than they anticipated or appreciated.

The 'Men, earlier in the evening, they faced off against the miserable muffups known as the Marauders for at least the third time on record—this instance after having tangled with them once during a most malevolent Massacre, and after that the fracas in Frisco after Sinister's underlings tried unsuccessfully to take out the then-innocuous Maid Madelyne. This time around, though, the skirmish with them wasn't the main draw; it was just a warm-up, the evening opener to the headliners that were the apparently-equine evil known as N'astrih and his cohort—the one who of late had been the ally of the Uncanny—the aforementioned maid herself, distorted drastically into a conquering Queen.

The 'Factor, for the most part, "only" had to face the entourage of imps that heralded their red-haired regent; then they faced the lady herself. This lady, of course, being the same maddened Madelyne as mentioned above, the media-branded "mutant hunters" joining the above battle that their compatriots eventually engaged.

Of all the encounters, again, this most recent horror had been the most harrowing and heartrending. The enemy had been a woman who was, to her fellow outliers of the Outback, the Marian to their Merry Men, the old school April O'Neil to their classic Ninja Turtles, the analogy of the latter appropriate even down to the full pocketed bodysuit—with Madelyne's drab green flight uniform comparable to April's banana yellow..um…journalistic apparel (to be euphemistic).

And to Alex in particular, Maddy was so much more. A kindred spirit as lost and out of place as he was on the team, even though Havok had superhuman talents at the time of Ms. Pryor's joining in San Fran, and she was then seemingly a mere homo sapien. (Which, of course, would change in due time). Someone hellishly heartbroken and in need of a hand to hold, a figure to embrace. They found each other in the darkness and never let go…the lusty younger Summers not relinquishing his desperate hold on her, even through the carriage-ride to near-perdition that left him as sparingly tattered as his latent love, and his soul as terrifyingly corrupted. Fortunately for said soul, but tragically for his heart, Alex was rescued from the regent's clutches just in time before she was defeated, his queen ending herself in a fury-fueled blast that burned her out but good.

To the Original Five, now Factored out, Madelyne was relatively not-too-well-known to four of them, but the fifth would never forget her. Warren and Hank and Bobby knew her briefly and wished her well, well before she turned totally to the darkness, but that was about it. To Scott, Lynne was so much more, a woman who was there for him at a time when a voluminous void was in his life and he needed someone most; a woman who was, yes, a reminder of and a replacement for the one whom he was with right now, his beloved Jean…but as Scott would realize over time, Maddy was really so much more than that, and his love for her was real, was genuine. And to Jean…well, Madelyne was a mirror of herself, distorted, one which she could not clean and could not salvage, as hard as she tried. And the two met far too late in Miss Pryor's life for her to come back from the confrontation upon her defeat.

The baker's dozen of brave do-gooding mutants now hunched over Madelyne's tragically departed form, wondering where it all went wrong, wondering what if anything they could possibly have done to help or save her. The older Summers was mauling himself mentally for adventuring in New York when he should have stayed with her in Alaska; the younger Summers was mutilating himself mindwise for crusading in Denver when he should have looked out for her more in Australia.

Amidst all this, there were those who, again, were much more removed from the trauma of being torn from the former tenderness of Madelyne Pryor. Just before the dance with all these demons out in Manhattan proper, the most Archangelic of all mutants had his own little soiree with them, his own little horrific hor d'oeuvre in the final battle with an old acquaintance, who just happened to, well, kill off his first real love, Candy Southern—a prelude that weighed so much more heavily than any Marauder matchup for the Outbackers. And the relatively-perimeter player known as Psylocke—who was much more of the Western persuasion at the time, than the Eastern that more recent readers knew and loved—she hadn't really had too many emotional attachments to speak of at all, at least not here in America. Beyond Doug Ramsey, with whom she lost touch recently, there was a bit of romantic tension with Alex, sure…although he also had similar tensions with a latently-possessed Lorna, and of course Madelyne, and even a tiny bit with Alison…

…No, apart from a bit of an intense portrait-painting session with Peter, with he all in steel and she only in skin and nothing but a comforter covering, Betsy right now really didn't have anybody in earnest. For the record she was just "going steady" with the work she had as the resident telepath, ensuring the security of the others in her squad to the best of her psionic ability.

Each of the two stood relatively at the margins of his or her group, at this moment anyway in

X-History. Warren was a literal Mr. Blue, with the new flesh he flaunted courtesy of the ancient evil who also bestowed upon him new wings and a proposed darker, deathly purpose. Since that time, he stopped being the frivolous flyboy he once was, became a brooding avenger in the eaves of whatever structure or other context he and his fellow heroes occupied.

Betsy, on the other hand, was a figurative Ms. Blue, a sort of female counterpart to the character of the same color from the first renowned, "Reservoir" work of an ultraviolent Nineties director whom this author despised—but the analogy of which this author would bring up because it fit Elisabeth so well. Whereas Wolverine might have been Mr. White, and Havok Mr. Pink, they all explosive and fighting it out at the forefront, Betsy was Ms. Blue (or Ms. Purple, really), the one who hung in the background, who was just sort of there, whom some readers, at least at this time in the Eighties, might not have even noticed for her lack of rambunctiousness and hunger for exposure then.

(Which of course, again, would change in due time, upon her rather intimate melding with a maiden from the other end of the Earth).

For now, though, this was Warren, and this was Betsy. Each of them beautiful in his or her purity, in his or her resolve, in his or her relative inconspicuousness.

The respective leaders of the 'Men and the 'Factor, though, would make each of them, in this moment of this alternate reality, come forward and play a more pivotal role than they did in Earth-616 at this moment of Inferno. Here, Ororo requested that Psylocke go to the top of one of the old school World Trade Center towers to expand her scan for any wayward demons, any other major threats that might still be extant for the heroes to face. Scott, in turn, wiped away enough Madelyne-mournful tears from his visor to order the 'Angel to carry Betsy to her destination.

As Warren carried the armored adventuress via his own personal iron aileron express, as the two hovered higher and higher into the miserable New York skyline, the man could already feel more than one kind of connection to the lady he conveyed. His purple "passenger" had that stillness to her that ran so deep, that quietude which he himself exhibited and cherished, something magnificent that he wanted to know about more and more. While everyone else was lusting and pining after so many strawberry sirens like Jean or Madelyne who slugged it out in the heat of this salacious summer evening, or vanilla vagabonds like Alison who insisted on the constant spotlight, here was a grape governess whom no one seemed to notice, who was perfect in her imperceptibility.

After so many silent minutes of the two scanning, scanning atop the Trade Center, Betsy with her telepathy and Warren with his avian-apt eyesight (as he had the eye of an eagle as well as the fly of one), the latter:

"Looks like the proverbial prurient coast of Manhattan is pretty much clear."

He probably could have done with a much better line than that. But it was a crossover event, so everyone's abilities in every respect were rather strained by now.

Elisabeth turned her hooded head and gave a tentative look. "I'm still scoping out the city…I don't really detect any 'prurient' presences as you might say. I want to cover all the bases, though, all the blocks of the metropolitan area, to make absolutely sure."

Warren took this as a sign to clam up for the moment, so he did, the hero continuing to use his enhanced eyes to scout here and there for any abominable aberrations.

A couple of moments later, and the fuchsia butterfly alighting Betsy's face pulsated ever so intensely. "Archangel…!"

"Psylocke…?!"

The two weren't close like that yet, as this was their first-ever encounter, so they kept it professional, of course. Warren glided to the lady's side, held her up as she started to tumble from the incredible psionic strain she was presently undergoing.

"Wh…what is it? Psy…"

The prim, proper psi held her hands to her temples a long beat. Then: "It's…it's something that I'm trying just now to grasp. An onrush of thoughts…emotions…impressions from afar…from far away in a geographic, as well as a temporal sense."

"You mean…from across the globe…and from the future?"

"Yes…it would seem that way. Warren…if I may call you Warren…?"

The man nodded readily, hoping to be able to address her in kind.

"I have an idea. You have those…augmented birdlike eyes of yours, correct?"

"I do."

"If you would…but allow me to…occupy your mind, for only an instant…we could pool our talents, my telepathic with your optic…and I could increase our general range of perception beyond what either of us have ever undergone."

He had to admit, Warren did, that over the past several minutes, he wanted so to connect with this woman. The hero didn't think it would happen this way, though.

"Of course, Psylocke."

"Please…call me Elisabeth. Or Betsy."

"Alright…Betsy."

The two came together, in brain, if not totally in body. As Betsy entered Warren, though, she felt the same, quiet depth to him that he sensed in her as he carried her aloft to the top of these towers. A depth that came from introversion, which she knew sporadically in her life and which he knew mostly recently, given the difficult experiences of his existence the past year or so. A depth that came from trauma, from artificial additions to the body; for him, steel wings from Apocalypse, for her, bionic eyes from Mojo (after a brutal blinding from the assassin Slaymaster). She could relate to his silence, to his suffering, and for that she appreciated this opportunity to merge consciousness with him at this moment. It was a connection between the two that no conversation or circumstance otherwise could possibly bring about.

Upon the meeting of their minds, Warren and Betsy focused their amplified attention first to the horizon level to them, atop the towers. Nothing too overwhelming, though Elisabeth especially could hear, could feel the stimuli much more intensely than she could before. She then made them shift skyward, at forty-five degrees; it was ever stronger now, some menacingly mental man up above making machinations to commandeer, control all of the cowled heroes and heroines that Archangel and Psylocke knew.

When the two brain-bonded acquaintances shunted their focus spaceward, directly over their heads into the ether beyond the Earth, what they discovered was so overwhelming that it almost floored the both of them. (Or "rooftopped" them, given where they were currently positioned).

Warren and Betsy each spent the next minute or two reeling, there on the roof of the South Tower, their connection abruptly broken and each of them struggling to maintain consciousness, struggling to maintain sanity in the wake of all they absorbed. When each was ready to stand, they did so and looked one another straight on.

"Betsy…we have to tell the others…we have to warn them."

"Certainly, Warren. This threat from above is…worse than anything we've ever encountered."

"How ironic that it would be from…from the man who was almost another father, to me."

Yes, the one whom Archangel and Psylocke jointly perceived was none other than the Xavier savior himself, now turned soon-to-be-enslaver, and to none other than his own former children. And this was no Early-Nineties War Skrull simulacrum—this was positively the Professor himself, he steering his Shi'ar spaceship directly for Earth, initially to ensure that no Sinister intruders would bring harm to his precious Mansion—which, as a matter of fact, was going to occur in the ensuing hour or so.

But Profex also had much baser, insidious intentions at heart for coming home as well.

First Betsy: "I can't believe it…I've only met him a couple of times, and Charles seemed so nice…now it seems he wants us all in his thrall. He knows of the small rubyish trinket that Roma gave me and my teammates. But I can see it envisioned in his psyche, its purpose warped to suit his ends. Xavier gives it his own pet name…calls it the 'Streams Scurrilous.' He's thinking…something about…the X-Men…'selling out to the mainstream'—whatever that means—and the trinket will be the doorway, the beginning of the end for all of us."

She obscured her hooded, masked head with her hands, doing all she could to hold back harried, frenzied sobs.

"Elisabeth…"

"No, Warren…it's horrible. He's going to take away all our autonomy…our control over our destiny…all the freedom that we have, that we X-Men clasp as ghosts in the Outback…we're just going to be brought to our knees, in dueling teams of Blue and Gold. It's so awful.

"And you know, too, Warren, that it'll happen to your people as well."

"Yes…I can see it too." The Archangel allowed himself a deep, sullen sigh. "…I didn't even know that Ship would ever have a name. But the Professor…he twists that appellation too, calls it SLOSH, his own personal acronym, although Ship's own name is not such an abbreviation…it stands for 'SelL it all out Oh SHit.'

"And," Warren continued, shakily, "just like with your ruby trinket, Ship's going to be the conveyance by which we're to be delivered directly into Xavier's hands. Just as with your people, Betsy…we're going to be split apart, into bonds of Blue and Gold, and we're going to lose the freewheeling sovereignty that we enjoyed as de facto guardians of Manhattan."

Not since the dreadful death of Phoenix, not since the untimely passing of Candace, had Archangel wished to bawl so badly.

Psylocke was similarly inconsolable:

"I can even see leashes in his mind, Warren…they more electrified and vicious than the lasso by which Madelyne ensnared Marvel Girl in her last hurrah. These leashes…will strip us of all that is autarchic…that makes us pioneers of our own destiny. We'll be reduced, once more, to Children of the Atom…with emphasis on the 'Children' part.

"H-ho-hold me…!"

And then Elisabeth almost collapsed again. Though Warren was the weaker of the two at the moment, he reached down inside himself to prop up Psylocke once more.

In their apprehension and misery, the two found each other's arms. After embracing for a long minute, they found each other's eyes.

Then each other's lips.

The two held the pose for another long, emotional minute, each finding a quenching of spiritual and emotional thirst, a purifying pause on this most debasing of evenings.

Betsy then disengaged and held Warren by the shoulders.

"Oh, Warren…we have to do something. We all have to…get away."

"I know. Let's go back and tell the oth…"

He was cut off by another kiss, this one quicker and livelier.

"Wait," said Elisabeth. "Tell me something…something based on what else I just saw, as well as what might happen to us in the future, good or bad.

"Would you still like me, Warren, if I were in another world?"

"Yes…of course, my lady, I would like you in any world."

A small, pert nod from Psylocke. "Would you still like me, if I were in another body?"

A smile from the Archangel—his first ever, in this iteration. "Yes; I think I would adore you, in any body."

She held him close. "And would you still like me, if I were still in this form, but if it were clawed up completely, and I had half my face shot off by a laser of light, and my brain were skewered by a psychic blade wielded by my own hand, and nobody seemed to give a crap—not a single, metaphorical iota of diarrhea at all—that my body was totally, utterly butchered as such…?"

Because that's exactly what happened a few years back, under the haphazard jurisdiction of the incompetent Governor of Fractiorida.

Warren: "Um…yyyyyeahhhhhh?"

Betsy then glommed onto his face with hers, one more time, then crushed his chest to her own.

They waited one more, tense minute. This evil, Infernal night…it had to be savored as much as possible.

Because neither of these two, nor their beloved companions, would ever know another evening so free, not ever again. At least not on 616 Earth.

Psylocke stared out into the burning distance, taking this all in. Neither spoke for another several beats. At last, a bit later:

"Ah, Warren, it's going to be so tragic."

As the two gathered themselves up to start their descent from the WTC Rooftop, Warren again: "What is?"

"That, despite our wondrous, magical moment just now…we may never see one another again."

The two continued on, sauntering aerially in silence, until they came back to their respective homo superior peoples. Scott and Ororo looked mutually irritated at the amount of time their scouts took to report back—but in this reality, while Xavier was a lot faster in his pending return, Sinister was a bit slower in his assault, as was Jean insofar as her connection to Madelyne had not yet psychically yanked everyone in.

"I know we took a while, Cyke, but believe me: it was all worth it."

"Warren's right," said Psylocke, as she went to Storm's side. "We've got to get the heck out of dodge."

And the two explained the oncoming advent of the all-too-familiar monster who stood a greater threat than anything which either mutant cadre could ever face, on its own or combined as one. The autonomy-offing…Onslaught that, in this reality too, was Xavier, would be far worse than any other threat that Xavier could ever pose to his students in any other universe.

So the solution, then, was to go to those other universes or at least another world in this one.

The 'Men gathered themselves up, after planning for several minutes. After elaborating on what Roma might be able to do for Madelyne, Scott allowed the team to take her body with them. And so, the Uncanny ones passed through another portal, courtesy of Gateway, and started preparing themselves to spirit to the Otherworld that initially led them to the Outback.

In turn, upon Archangel's counsel, the 'Factor readied themselves to run back to their Ship and chart a course to a planet on which the omnipotent and all-knowing, yet insipid and character-blank Celestials had focused their attention. There the mutant heroes would manage haven, at least until they could figure out their next move.

While the two teams (with the former Goblin Queen's body in tow) prepared to go their separate ways, Psylocke collected another thought from close by, from some strange, maleficent presence. She motioned for Storm to come close, and whispered to the leader about the Sinister skinny.

Ororo: "It would seem, then, given our change of plans…at least part of what this 'Mister' wants is exactly what we want, now. Let's help him, then…at least with that one thing."

Minutes later, Nathaniel Essex was approaching the Mansion with Malice/Polaris in tow when

(BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM)

the blast brought both him and his companion off their feet, hurling them into the hills nearby. It didn't make sense, Sinister thought as he flew through the air, as he calculated the charges to go off in another half hour or so.

Bringing himself to standing once more, brushing himself off, and making sure that the maligned Mistress of Magnetism was okay too, Essex pondered further, figured that someone, somehow, must have accelerated the process a bit of exploding the X-Mansion.

But why?

A second later, on the other side of all the wreckage, a mystical portal was already closing, and Sinister's desired power couple in Scott and Jean were already long gone as well. The wicked geneticist would have to sort it all out with the perverse Professor who was alighting onto his own property now, instants too late, Xavier at the moment more hateful and incensed than Mister Essex.

The fact was now that in this reality, the 'Men were off, with Forge accompanying at Storm's request, to Otherworld where Roma would not only revive Madelyne as she did with all the heroes after the Fall in Dallas, but she would exorcise her as well with her extradimensionally-based abilities. So it was here, then, that instead of Madelyne's first rendition of existence ending in cremation—which it did, ironically, after she swore that the Inferno would 'consume all' of the others around her—she had a chance to live on once more, and live she did, free of demonic corruption again.

The Goddess of Otherworld would also take in the good guys for a while, as they figured out what to do next, with Psylocke sure on the perimeter to check perennially for any pervading presence of Xavier—and his leashes—which might appear. The mutants allowed themselves to relax after their harrying set of adventures with the Brood, Genosha, and Inferno straight…and did they ever pair off to boot. Ororo came together with Forge, Maddy with Alex, Rogue with Logan (which was a twofer for him, as the girl was also virtually Carol Danvers), Ali with Longshot…and Betsy, she and Peter found one another in the end, finding some kind of kismet connection in the armored forms that they took on. In time, Betts would also help Petey control his skin/steel transitions much more effectively, mainly so that their own intimate…encounters would go a bit more smoothly. And were there ever a greater number of painting sessions between the two of them now.

And the 'Factor, they shoved off with Ship to another, more Judgmental world than Otherworld—a world for which they were to be bound anyway in any reality, wherein there was much struggle with caste and fixations on "perfection" and such, which the heroes were resolved to fix. Marvel Girl kept her codename, and kept the duty going through her recurring telepathic talents to make sure that chump change Charles wouldn't chime in on any of their fun on this new frontier. Here as well, the good guys each found or kept someone, as Scott of course had Jean (which again was a twofer, as she was also virtually Phoenix after Inferno—though not Madelyne, as Roma's revival of Miss Pryor sucked that consciousness out of the Marvelous Girl), Bobby found the incendiary Lev, Hank was once more graced with the appearance of the otherworldly Synthia Naip (NB: This is really obscure, so this author will just tell you: Check out the X-Factor: Prisoner of Love one-shot for this character)…and Warren found someone in Perfect Seera, to make it all complete.

But Archangel, he never forgot that even more perfect seer, the purple seductress that was Psylocke, and he wondered if it would really be true that he would never see her again.

Elsewhere, in Otherworld, Elisabeth thought of Warren too, and she became determined that the 'Factor and the 'Men would somehow, some way, cross paths once more.

Meanwhile, on Earth, a repressive Professor prepared to recruit students for his cause once more, pupils to replace those who sleepwalked away from his Dream. As he ran through the possibilities on Cerebro, a favorable amount of results came up from which he could choose. The annoying orphaned mallrat who shot fireworks from her hands would do, for starters, as would the Cajun with his cheap yet kinetically effective playing card tricks. The kunoichi called Kwannon, with her psi-talents and fighting savvy, would prove a great asset as well…

…though she would also serve to remind Charles, by free association, of the other purply psionic whom he almost had in his clutches—the English lady whom he in this reality would miss sorely, and whom so many in the reader's reality had missed for her dearth of presences since the score-of-years-ago-lashing-out of Xavier's leashes.

AFTERWORD

Something that a lot of X-fans appear to agree on is that one of the greatest times in the franchise's history, at least that of the initial, "Uncanny" title, was that of the Outback Era, the late Eighties time of the team. During this time, the X-Men were Malcolm-Gladwelly "outliers" who were believed to be dead after having tussled with the Adversary in the Fall of the Mutants, and they did their thing in Australia, just a few but very memorable adventures which were indeed awesome. To me, the Outback Era is to be cherished for three reasons. The first, for me personally, as well as for other readers certainly, is sentimental value: for some of us, this was our first experience with the X-Men, so it makes for tender reading memories.

The second—and this is the illegitimate, whiny reason I brought up in my "Quesadilla" story, but please bear with me for just a minute on this—is that the Outback Era was the last gasp of organized cult X-Men before Marvel threw them to the mainstream. After the UXM 240s, the team was all scattered in the 250s, 260s, and 270s, and by the time they were in the 280s and composed into a real team (really "teams," of Blue and Gold, with X-Factor folks also) once again, they fell once again under Xavier's rule—which I will get to as my third reason for the Outback's awesomeness, and the "thesis" of my story, so to speak. But as another thing on the cult Outback team, what was great about it too was that it didn't try too hard to focus on any one character for "corporate reasons" (ie profit), so that the team in the Outback consisted of Wolverine, Colossus, Havok, Longshot, Storm, Dazzler, Rogue, and Psylocke—whereas in the Nineties, for example, the Blue Team was comprised virtually of Wolverine, Cyclops, Wolverine, Gambit, Wolverine, Rogue, Wolverine, Psylocke, Wolverine, Beast, Wolverine, Jubilee, Wolverine, Wolverine, and Wolverine. The Eighties Outbackers, in any case, were fun, they were freewheeling, and they didn't try too hard to be "hip" or anything, at least not IMO.

Anyway, my third reason, which I think is far less whiny and more legitimate: the Outback Era, as well as the original X-Factor likewise, they were both so great because they were the last gasp also of autonomy the people in either team would have (except for Logan's truly, probably) for a long time to come. Once Xavier laid into them with his leashes of Blue and Gold, the characters arguably just did not have the same stature as they did before. Maybe it's just nostalgia on my part, but take a look at Cyclops, for one—probably the one who was most cowed by Xavier's return—look at him in X-Men Unlimited, Nineties Series Issue 1 for example, and see him reduced to a babbling idiot at times, in his allegiance to the Professor, when he and Jean and Nathan Christopher the infant were a strong, independent de facto family back in the day. The bottom line, and my "thesis," again, for this story, is that the greatest tragedy of the Nineties for the X-Men was not so much "selling out to the mainstream" (which I lamented as a cult fan, although I'm cool with almost all fans of all types (as you saw, though, I did mention "selling out" briefly in this story))—the greatest tragedy was, again much more legitimate as a reason to lament here, the fact that the Xers gave up their autonomy for the sake of Xavier's Dream, when they were arguably so much freer without it. The story above reflects an alternate reality, simply enough, in which the heroes "sleepwalk" away from the Dream in order to preserve that autonomy. I don't know if the story might "work" in the reader's eyes, short term or long; this is all just a reflection of my own opinion. I would hope that some people out there, though, agree with me, and that this is not all just one hundred percent nostalgia and such. At any rate, I hope you guys enjoyed this one as well as at least some of the others, and I look forward to writing and posting another story soon.)

(Update: Thanks again to borismortys for another positive review; I really appreciate feedback on my stuff. I mention this thanks also to clarify for anyone else who might have been a bit confused about certain things like Professor X in space and all; around UXM 275 or so, Xavier is still stuck up in space (which I believe he was for quite some time) and he's with the Shi'ar. For the most part, Profex has been a benevolent guy and all (save for the whole Onslaught thing)-I just broke the fourth wall here and made him a leash-wielding bastard to be metaphorical/allegorical, and emphasize how, at least in retrospect, he ended up really curtailing so many heroes' freedom by forcing him back into his School. I mean, again, if you (readers generally) can get a chance, look at UXM 229-251 or so, and/or X-Factor...really, 1-70 or so, and you can see this sort of freedom/autonomy that the characters had in general.