A/N: I know this is wildly similar to the movie thus far, and I apologize. It's a lack of crativity, I know. And these chapters are short, I know. BUT THERE IS A REASON: I am building up to and recapping for the major changes that will occur later on. So be on the lookout for that, all right?

IV.

They go on a very specific mission to find Ms. Shaw in Russia, Mark and some military men on their side. But it's a false alarm; instead of Shaw being there, it's her I'm-better-than-everyone-else cocky minion, Emmett Frost. He's another telepath, like Charlene, and he can alter the carbon in his body to make himself into diamond.

But Erika can't let this be. Shaw's right-hand man is just as good to her for part of her revenge as Shaw himself. It helps clear out some of the obstacles to getting back at the woman, anyway, and that's really all Erika cares about.

"Erika, wait!" Charlene calls out as softly as she can, while still being heard. "Just because you aren't truly CIA doesn't mean you can –"

"Don't even try to talk me out of this, Charlene," Erika snaps back, and then she's grinning, her teeth sharp and white, and she's turning and darting stealthily out of the line of trees to rush up to the building before them.

"Brash girl! She's going to get us killed!" Mark McTaggert grunts under his breath, and he stands to bring Erika back. "She's compromised the mission. We need to leave her."

"No, no, Mark; that isn't the way to do this! Please, I'll handle this," Charlene says swiftly, standing and dusting off her coat. She rubs her fingerless-gloved hands together and looks somber. "I can't leave her, even if all of you could. Please, don't wait long for us. Gather everyone up. We should rendezvous in thirty minutes, if all goes smoothly." She gives a curt nod, touches Mark on the shoulder as she walks by, and then moves to race after her dearest friend.

Some men are tangled in barbed wire – that must be so painful! Charlene thinks before she dips into one man's mind to calm him and make him forget he saw her or Erika – and some are unconscious on the ground, their own guns used to knock them out, or their guns lacking magazine clips altogether.

Inside, she's able to catch up with Erika after passing by a string of groaning or unconscious men in uniforms. There is a private room, one with a bed, and a older woman – a leader of some sort, no doubt – giggling and touching at nothing where she sits in the bed. A quick peek into her mind reveals a mental illusion like one Charlene herself did recently on the way here.

"Neat trick," Charlene mutters. "You even make her think she feels you, Emmett. Clever." Shaking her head, she watches as Emmett rises and tussles his blond hair with one hand. He turns to diamond, and smirks at Erika – who is on edge, Charlene can tell – and the other telepath.

"All with practice, my dear," Emmett continues to grin. Charlene tries to delve into his mind, but Emmett has a shield up: his diamond form. "Don't even try to read my mind, pretty little thing. You won't get a whisper from me while I'm like this."

"Then we will have to resort to other means, won't we?" Erika growls, and she tackles Emmett, her skin bruising, but Emmett goes down because he is a slight man and Erika is an athletic young woman.

Erika holds him to the brass bedpost with her bending talents, and he struggles against it, still a diamond, but Erika simply stands, huffing a breath, and tightens the grip.

"I'd stop squirming if I were you, Telepath," the German-Jew woman sneers. "All that movement plus a little pressure will crack your form, and it would be such a same for such a large diamond to break to pieces, don't you think?"

"Erika, you wouldn't –!" Charlene interjects, stepping forward. She touches her hand to her friend's forearm, and the other brunette's face relaxes slightly.

"I will, Charlene, unless he starts talking, or lets you in. Either way works for me."

Charlene sucks her bottom lip into her mouth, and whips her head to the side to look Emmett in the eye where he's seated on the floor before them. "Please, Mr. Frost. Be a good lad and let me in before Erika hurts you." She doesn't want blood on Erika's hands, more than she knows already exists.

Emmett rolls his crystalline eyes, and finally shifts back to his human form. "Make it quick; I have a lot bigger fish to fry than you two or the U.S.'s Central Intelligence Agency."

Charlene closes her mouth, nods firmly once, and kneels before him. She touches a delicate digit to her temple, then another. She sees so much in the forefront of Emmett's head; nuclear war, radiation not affecting mutants the way it will affect normal humans, Shaw taking over as the first female dictator, death, destruction, resolve only in mutants wiping out humans or enslaving them.

"Awe-inspiring, isn't it?" Emmett quips smugly as he stares at them both.

Charlene gasps as she reels backward, her eyes wide, and her hands falling to her mouth. Erika is seated on the antique couch. "What? What did you see?" Erika mutters darkly. "Say it, Charlene."

"It's… it's worse than we imagined," Charlene whispers. She turns to look to Erika, and her eyes scan the other woman's. "We need to tell someone, and get Mr. Frost on the transport home." Charlene stands and clenches her fists at her sides, her manicured nails digging a bit into her palm. "Plenty is about to go down, and I must say, Erika, I am terrified of it."