This is a SEQUEL. Please read WAIT FOR ME by McQ (that's me) or none of what you're about to read will make sense.

Chapter 1: Compliance

"Magneto. Magneto?"

Was he temporarily deaf? No, he knew someone was calling his name but he heard nothing, or, if he heard it, he did not process it. It was like someone calling you in a dream. Hollow, dead.

"Dead?" he must have said aloud.

"What'll I tell him?"

Tell him…tell him? To tell is to relate a piece of news, a fragment of information. Telling involved speaking. Speaking involved words. What words were there for this?

"He's coming."

He gathered his wits, his vocabulary. "Well, if he's coming," he said slowly, "then we don't have to tell him anything." Magneto turned. "Do we?"

…eight months ago…

When you move fast, faster than anything alive, everyone else seems to move slowly. Slowly like…like school. You watch the clock and minutes feel like hours and an hour feels like a year! And you wait and you wait and when the bell finally rings, you feel like you haven't moved in decades.

For Quicksilver, this was more true than anyone could understand. Minutes were hours! Hours were years! What one person could accomplish in an hour, Quicksilver could finish, with energy to spare, in five seconds. He read books like an android. TV moved far too slowly for the speed demon and life—life moved more slowly than…than…than…than the slowest thing you could possibly imagine moving as slowly as it possibly could in the rain on the hottest, most humid day in August!

"Yeah," he mumbled to himself, agreeing with his own fleeting thoughts. He tapped his foot at lighting speed. He sounded like a telegraph.

Magneto and Juggernaut were talking…talking…talking! Goddammit, all they did was talktalktalktalktalk!

Juggernaut turned. "So you agree wif me?" he asked Quicksilver.

"Uh, I stopped paying attention like a year ago, but if you just said we should get out of here and actually do something, than I'm all for it," he answered, without looking up.

Magneto sighed. "Quicksilver, you must understand that action without planning is useless…and dangerous."

He stood up…too quickly! Dizzy. "Wow, yeah, um…" he shook his head vigorously. "Look, I brought you those damn disks with all that info on it."

"Which has proved invaluable," Magneto interjected.

Quicksilver, of course, was referring to the disk he had stolen from the crazy lab coat guy's office, Dr. Weir, or whatever. And also, to the disk which he had used to dump all of Weir's computer files onto during the battle. He had taken little time to accomplish this and had presented his findings to Magneto not long after they had arrived at the Lair.

That was three weeks ago. And they were still here. And they still hadn't done ANYTHING!

"Well, I mean, is there anything on that…in that?…stuff that I got that we can use?" he asked.

Then there was laughter, high pitched laughter, the kind only a girl can make when she's being chased or tickled.

Out of nowhere Eden and Toad sped across the upper walls at lighting speed. She was ahead of him, and he was letting her get ahead. He wanted to chase her. He laughed and sped up slightly. They were there and gone in a second, unaware that anyone had been witness to their antics.

Magneto's head had turned toward the noise and Juggernaut smirked. Quicksilver rolled his eyes and flopped back down onto the couch.

"Well," was all Magneto said.

"Jus' got his tongue back," Juggernaut explained.

Magneto's eyes widened and met Juggernaut's. "Ah," he replied. "I see."

And then they started talking…all over again.

"Toad, stop, I can't breathe!" she cried, laughing and coughing at once.

He stopped immediately. "Ok, ok, we'll stop." They were on the roof now. She sat back leaning back on her arms, trying to catch her breath. Toad looked at her with concern. "That was too much, sorry."

"It's ok," she answered. A few moments later, she was breathing more steadily. He lay down and put his head in her lap.

"I love you," he said.

She stroked his face and hair and smiled. He closed his eyes. This was heaven. Had to be. He felt her fingers, her touch…listened to her breathe, felt her blood pump through her legs…her hair wisped in the wind. He reached up and stroked the back of her neck with the tips of his fingers, let them fall down her back, and then up again, and down again…a rhythmic motion he knew she liked. Then he opened his eyes and saw she was staring right at him.

Toad took his hand from behind her and touched her collar bone, back and forth. Still she looked into his eyes. He let his fingers fall, gently and softly down between her breasts and outside her shirt to her stomach. He stopped there and edged closer to her and hid his face against her stomach, kissing it and sighing, taking in the smell of her, the feel of her.

She lay back all the way and he crept up her body with kisses. He kissed her everywhere. He knelt up with a knee on either side of her body and just looked at her. He ran both hands down her body and felt such a strange seriousness and sadness as he did so. It was a happy sadness…if such a thing existed. Suddenly, he felt he wanted to die.

He wanted to die and stay in this moment for eternity. Everything, just as it should be…just as he had always wanted it to be.

She rested her hands on his thighs and stroked them with her fingertips, such a simple, erotic sensation. It drowned him.

From where he was he extended his tongue, went round and tickled the back of her neck, and then he went more slowly up the side, to the front and then the other side. She closed her eyes and breathed, her fingers tensing. She opened her mouth just slightly and let her quick, beautifully black, forked tongue swirl up and down his and her eyes smiled. With surprising force, she pulled his tongue into her mouth, rode up it with her lips, sucked on it, until she was raised off the ground, with her mouth against his. Unbelievably erotic…

Their bodies pressed together, hearts and minds thumping impatiently and wantonly and passionately…playfully and without scruple.

He might have died and lived again in a kiss like that. But it was over in a second—she pulled away—escaped!—and raced across the roof and slithered over the edge.

"Oh! You bitch!" he cried. He went to stand, but couldn't just yet. "Jesus Christ," he exclaimed to no one, the pull in his groin almost unbearable.

And then he laughed, despite it all.

He was going to catch her. He'd give her a head start.

And then she'd pay.

Hawk crouched low in the trees, almost blending in, but Cain could see him. He signaled his team and they moved forward.

You would not presume, looking at Juggernaut, that he was capable of being covert. He was however, it was not easy, but it was possible. His team hid well and though Hawk was above them, he was not looking their way.

Jewel and Graze moved around behind the prospective location of 'the enemy' while two other mutants, fast as cheetahs and quiet as mice, charged forward. Toad leapt from above towards their position. Caught by surprise, Hawk's team unleashed what they could, but Cain's team…

Well, Cain's team had Cain.

He plowed into the location last, knocking the other team aside, carefully reserving his full strength so as not to kill anyone.

The battle was over.

"Goddammit, I didn't see you," said Hawk, nursing a bloodied arm. Cain wasn't sure where Hawk was from, but he had some kind of an accent—Middle Eastern, maybe.

"You didn't see me?" Juggernaut laughed. "What's it they about hawk eyes? Don't seem like a great advantage to me."

Hawk hissed at him and spread his wings, lifting off the ground.

"Ah, come on, Hawk, noffing personal mate," Juggernaut called up at him, but he pretended not to hear.

"Sore loser," Toad said, coming up behind him.

"Yeah," said Cain. "Good to see you up and about mate," he turned to the other man, "but you've been up and about, ain't ye?" he finished pointedly.

Toad grinned. "What's it to ya?"

Juggernaut laughed. "What's say us two limeys 'ave ourselves a pint, or two, eh? Talk about being up and about?" Toad frowned. "Ah, come on, I just wanna know if she's as good as she looks."

"She is," he responded.

Juggernaut removed his helmet. He laughed, "Lucky man." He grinned. "I'm almos' all right," he commented, "you?"

Toad flexed his fingers and rolled his shoulders. "Yeah. Jus' get the webbing back in my fingers, a bit more strength. I'm almost all there."

They walked towards the Lair. Cain liked Toad. Maybe it was a kindred spirit kind of thing…of the same land, or something. "I kind of expected us to get stronger," Toad continued, "you know, more than we were before. Like what happened to Magneto."

Cain shrugged. "Maybe it's got somfing to with the amount we got," he suggested, "Magneto got more than we did."

Toad shoved his hands into his pockets. "Maybe."

Jaida was walking towards them looking serene and beautiful.

"Oy, Jaida, we was just talkin' about you," Juggernaut called.

She approached them, smiling. "What about me?"

"Nothing—in particular," Toad said before Juggernaut had the chance. "What's up?"

"Made lunch. I came to get you."

Toad put his arms around her and pulled her in. "I thought we could go for a swim," he said.

She looked up at him with a stunning sexual innocence. "You're not hungry?" she asked sweetly.

"Oh, I'm hungry," he laughed quietly and kissed her neck…and kissed it and kissed it and suddenly Cain was forgotten.

"Right, I'll jus' go inside then," and he did and they never heard him or if they did, they did not answer.

"I don't understand."

Hank looked hopelessly at Logan. How could he understand? Logan lived in world of action and reaction. Hank—well, Hank was a diplomat. He lived in a world of indecision and bad decision. "Try to Logan," he said, "one mutant killed over four hundred men—military men, armed men—and she did it in less than ten minutes."

"Yeah, and then I killed that mutant," Logan growled. "I killed her," he repeated, more to himself.

"Logan, I understand your anger, but I understand their's as well."

He heard none of it. "They made you the fucking UN Ambassador, for Christ's sake!"

Hank put his furry blue face into his furry blue hands. What could he say?

Logan went on. "We helped them! We killed one of our own to save them!"

"Logan!" Beast raised his eyes. "Don't you understand? There were more mutants attacking Alcatraz than there were defending it!"

Now they had reached a stalemate. Nothing Logan could say would change what happened there. Beast was right and Wolverine knew it.

Storm spoke. "We have to fight this…You have to do something!"

"We can do nothing but comply," Hank said. "You don't understand…I have tried…I have fought." He shook his head. "I'm not even supposed to be here telling you this."

Storm did not seem to hear him. "We'll help you Hank. We'll fight with you."

Hank's eyes swam. "Ororo, you don't understand—" he stopped.

"Hank?"

He looked away from her, out of the window and beyond that room. "I've already registered."

"So, they gather us in order to count our numbers?"

"Looks that way," Juggernaut replied. He switched off the TV. A group of mutants in a line a mile long disappeared. It had not been a line a protestors, no…it had been a line of registers…mutants willing to write their names, ages, dates of birth and their abilities into a little book for little people that would keep track of who they were and where they were from.

Magneto sat on the couch, fingers steepled, eyes gray with contemplation and plotting. Eden was beside him and Toad beside her. Quicksilver tapped his foot anxiously. He may have been talking to himself, it was hard to tell. Hawk's wings were erect and his arms were crossed. He leant against the wall. And they all waited for him to speak.

"Whadda we do?" Juggernaut asked.

Magneto smiled placidly. "I think we should go register."

"I have to put down my abilities?" Marie exclaimed.

Storm had just finished explaining the new Mutant Registration Law and her students sat dumbfounded and nearly silent. "Yes," she answered with as much composure as she could manage.

The girl fumed. "How do I write down that I can kill people just by touching them without getting arrested!"

Storm sighed. "This is hard for all of us—"

Marie leapt out of her chair and made for the door, turning as she got there to face her teacher. "It's harder for some," she replied. She opened the door. "And I'm not doing it."

She slammed the door behind her.

"Storm…do we have to do it?"

William looked up at her with his strange, sparkling eyes. The width of his powers were uncertain as he was so young, but someday, she knew, he would be incredible.

"Yes, William, we do. It's the law."

The students stirred and mumbled to one another. "What if we don't?" someone asked.

"Then we'll be punished," she answered. It cut her to say it. It ate at her soul.

"Like, put in jail?" Kitty asked. "They'll arrest us?"

"They can't arrest us," Bobby interjected.

"Yes," Storm said, "they can. And they will." She ran her fingers through her hair. This was harder than anything she had ever said, or ever would say, or ever expected to have to say. "We will also…be given…special identification cards, like driver's licenses…which we will be expected to present at any time…"

The students were more than stunned, they were horrified. They didn't breathe. They didn't move.

She continued. "I will take groups of you for the next week to City Hall where we will register. Tomorrow…Bobby, Kitty, William, Frances, and Jubilee will come with me. There will be a schedule up tomorrow for the rest of the week." There were no protests. Nothing said out loud, at least. In that case, there was only one more thing for Storm to say.

"Class dismissed."