Weapon neXt
by Ironraven, with editing/beta-reading by BabyBeaver
Sorry about the extended delay. The real world has been sucking much, and I had to actually make some pretty heavy changes to this to have it not get clunky, chunky and just downright junky.
So, I do have one request- I love people who favorite my work, and put alert requests on it, but... reviews? I know I'm loved, let me feel it. *chuckles* I know, I sound like I'm shilling, and I hate it when people write for reviews, but being able to read ya'll's words do help when I'm stuck.
-neXt
"So why aren't we going straight there?" Alex leaned down, setting the MFD between the pilots' seats to show short range radar augmented with thermal scanning- they didn't need it running in weather mode.
"We need time to think. To plan. We've been lucky so far." Laura's fingers were light on the controls. This was the first time they both had been at the controls of Blackbird. "Russia takes more than luck."
That was where the fat man's memories said HYDRA's current lab was located. He'd remembered a lot about the new crop of clone killers. There were at least four of each. They came and left by chartered aircraft, the ones having brought them there usually from former parts of the Soviet Union, or places that had been friendly to it. The real value had been that he'd brokered their operations, he'd made arrangements for them to assassinate targets in parts of Asian and Africa and the Pacific Rim, but he hadn't known anything about the Americas or Europe. He didn't even know who Dr Risman was.
He was utterly certain that Madam Hydra was still alive. Laura was just as certain she'd last seen the woman torn to ribbons by shrapnel.
The main reason they were headed for Georgia though was they needed to get cover paperwork. It wasn't like flying into the US or the EU where private aircraft weren't uncommon. Even after 9/11, an aircraft like the Blackbird whose advanced nature was obvious didn't require much more paperwork than owning a more conventional corporate jet. Despite the brewing storm with the Ossetians, Georgia was a good jumping off place into Russia. It wasn't as loose and corrupt as some of the former republics of the Soviet Union, but it wasn't the Ukraine or the Baltic states. And with Georgia trying to get in the EU and already a member of NATO, there was no need for visas for Americans, Canadians, or Germans. The other option was China, which was a paperwork nightmare itself. They could have gone in stealthy, but that would have caused a diplomatic incident if they had been seen- the Professor has said 'low profile', and a complaint about a spyplane in Siberia going to the UN Security Council was not 'low profile'.
Alex's eyes swept the dials and status readouts. He wasn't often in the front seats of any aircraft; unlike Scott, flying wasn't instinctive for him. He should have had gills- surfing, diving, swimming, boating, these were natural for Alex. Scott should have had wings, but at forty thousand feet and clear skies even without the autopilot Alex couldn't screw up too badly. "Laura, you can relax. We're only here in case the computer breaks."
Laura didn't look at him, or relax. She had learned basic flight earlier in the summer from Scott and Kurt, but she wasn't sure she was ready for the pilot's seat yet. What if she did something wrong, and everyone died. She didn't have her hands on the controls, but they were floating about half an inch away. She'd flown most of her life, but she was always a passenger. Like Logan, she kept the heads up display mostly turned off- she knew that Bobby and Kurt and others liked it on, but having everything vomited up on the windscreen bothered her. She'd set it to show only threats and where radar picked up turbulence.
Behind them, Rogue and Logan were looking at maps, she trying to locate a particular lake, while Logan was looking for good places to stash the jet that were within walking distance of the places that looked likely. Remy had his staff disassembled on a white cloth, cleaning and oiling the intricate mechanism. Kitty had completed her shopping list for when they landed in Tiblisi; she snored softly as Kurt rested his cheek on her shoulder, drooling just the slightest bit, his tail wrapped around her waist protectively.
-neXt
Logan left the Canadian consulate with a scowl. He'd gone there to do some research- getting into Russia had gotten easier over the past few years, but it would still take a week to get proper visas. He'd hoped it would be easier on the ground.
He didn't bother to look up as the young men fell into step beside him. "We do it my way now?"
Logan growled- forged visas were probably going to take a few days to get, but he had the languages and the mean while Remy had the eye and the instincts. "Yeah."
Trailing a little further behind, Kurt swallowed hard. His family had been on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain. He'd grown up with the knowledge that some one in a bad suit and sunglasses could appear at any second, asking for papers. Or anything else. That's why his fosterparents had lived as far from anything as they could.
This had been their plan B. Try to find decently faked papers. With or without them, they could leave the country tomorrow evening- as a group, they agreed it would be unlikely that HYDRA, even if informed, would be able to fully cover their tracks in less than 48 hours after they had left Madripoor.
If they were careful, the Russian air defenses wouldn't see them. They'd be tight on fuel, but if they did it right, they'd be able to land in Alaska or maybe Japan on the way out. That was assuming the whole thing wasn't a wild goose chase.
They were going towards a part of town that the travel guide had simply described as 'someplace tourists should avoid'.
-neXt
Kitty had gone hunting for computer components almost as soon as they landed, some of them pretty specific, but what she needed was sold all over the world. In a few hours, she had the drives they'd taken from HYDRA plugged into a box that simulated being what she called a "raid array". (Logan had asked if it was a special hacker thing- Kitty had giggled.) In reality, it was a slave living in a virtual world she controlled from her laptop and had connected to a hasty network.
It took a few hours, but once she was into the unencrypted files, there was lot here. A lot of purchase records, some personnel data, a mountain of email, HYDRA recruiting videos. Those were disturbing, reminding her of a mix of jock rallies in high school, movies about the Nazis and terrorist videos. She pushed back from the table she'd taken over with a snort, "Worthless."
"What is?"
"The encrypted stuff." She waved her hand at the improvised rack. "Without the password, we could throw ten Cerebros at it for a century and it would, like, probably still be gibberish."
"This is bad enough." Laura was looking through sales records. "This mostly mostly weapons and sensors technology- American, British, French, German, Russian, Israeli, Chinese, South African, they are dealing with everyone."
"How bad?" Alex was reading people's email. HYDRA apparently didn't do spam, but they were in communication with radical religious and race hate groups all over the world.
Laura glanced back up to the one that had concerned her the most. "Tritium, forty liters, four years old, Indian origin. Sold to someone in Khaurtom, along with krytron switches, shielded microcontrollers, and polonium-210, four kilograms."She looked up at her friends. At least she'd been paying attention in Magnus' lectures on what Mr McCoy had described on 'misapplied mad science'. "These are parts for a simple H-bomb. And they sold it."
That meant HYDRA was either so crazy they didn't care, or they had enough for their own needs and could sell the surplus.
-neXt
"Come on Elf, hit me- the girls will freak if they see me with my nose like this." Logan growled- he'd been asking for three minutes.
"Logan, I'm not hitting you! Ask Remy." Kurt's back was stiff. He was not enjoying himself. He was with two of his closest friends, and even though they normally were a little chilly to eachother, they would both being smug.
The cajun shook his head. "Uh-uh! Logan, no 'fense mon ami, but we ain' close enough fo' me to break your nose and know you ain' gonna hit me back."
Logan rolled his eyes. One of the guys in the bar had put a chair right across his face. The problem with very fast healing was that sometimes things healed as they were, not as they should be, and right now his nose was a little lopsided. "Fine."
Logan walked up to a light pole. He looked around- just the two jokers were watching, no cameras. He took a deep breath and slammed his face into metal shaft. There was a muted clang and the pool of light danced in the night, again, twice more- he was rewarded with the wet pop and tears he was looking for that time. He pinched his nose, getting the cartilage lined up close enough for his body to figure it out. His bones might be adamantium, but his cartilage wasn't. He turned to Kurt and Remy, giving them an inquiring grunt.
"Close 'nough." Remy grinned. Logan grunted in response- at least now he could breathe through both nostrils, last time it had healed with only one.
Kurt wouldn't dignify it with a response. It wasn't his fault that they'd been in that brawl. He'd tried to keep them out of it. He wanted to leave, but Remy had been insulted when someone accused him having improper relations with a pig. It had gone down hill from there. Very far down the hill. At least Logan had left his claws sheathed.
Kurt reached into his pocket, offering Logan a disposable clean up wipe for the blood on his face. There wasn't much they could do about the shirt, but it was a black tshirt, it wouldn't really show. Kurt didn't shake his head when Logan thanked him.
They made their way back to the hotel by the airport. It was in a place where they could watch Blackbird. It was nearly three in the morning.
They found Rogue in the lobby. She was watching the door while she sat stiffly in an overstuffed armchair. Copies of English and American newspapers were on the table in front of her. Her voice was a low, angry purr. "So."
"We couldn't find it."
Rogue nodded. Plan C, sneak into Russia. She pulled herself to her feet. She had been waiting for them to call- they had gone to the Canadian embassy before noon. Kitty had gotten worried shortly before sunset. Rogue had tried to contact them over the comms at midnight. An hour ago, she'd ordered Laura to stand down and go to bed rather than going into the city and looking for them the hard way. "Kurt, you're limping. What did you do?"
He hadn't gotten his tail out from under a boot in time when the fighting started. Not broken, but bruised- again.
"Cheri, your brother, it wasn his fault." Remy smiled, the special one filled with charm. "A very rude man... He called you a pig. Remy could not let that stand. Kurt and Logan tried to stop me. Then his friends-." He shrugged, cocking his head to one side.
"Really." With a voice that was almost cold enough to make liquid air, Rogue crossed her arms. She could see Remy's lip was split, and blood had rubbed from Logan's tshirt to his skin. She could also smell the vodka. She was annoyed with the whole bunch of them. "Upstairs. Now."
"Rogue, we-"
"Don't care, Logan."
-neXt
They had crossed from Georgia to Azerbaijan in the late afternoon, racing the beginning of darkness. They had informed the Azerbaijanis that they were flying through into Kazakhstan by short range radio, with the intent to go to village in the mountains for 'academic cultural research'. They had filed the same plan with the Kazakhstanis by satellite phone. They hadn't bothered to tell the villagers
Kazakhstan is a large country. With a lot of very tall mountains which would create blind spots in the radar. It was going into one of those blind spots that they dropped altitude, moving like they had every intent to land at the village's local field.
Logan reached up from the pilot's seat flipped the covers from a series of switches and then the switches themselves. They turned off the radar transponders- they read radar signals that hit the aircraft, and then sent appropriate responses to spoof military search radars and to tell civilian traffic control radars follow them by sending out their identification codes. Those ten switches were highly illegal any place where there was a real government. The skin and bones of Blackbird-1 were made to absorb radio waves, everything from the scatter from a microwave oven to cell phones. They had become a hole in the sky, swallowing all but a fraction of a percent of the electromagnetics that hit them- they had the radar cross section of a bumble bee. A skinny one.
In his seat, Kurt moved the stops on the throttles to keep them below the speed of sound- a shockwave from a sonic boom could be seen on some radars, and could be heard for miles. It also kept the engines cooler- they were still hot, they couldn't have thermal black hole system like on Velocity if they were going to push the jet through the sky, but there were other things built into the jets to minimize the thermal signature. He also killed all of their running lights, and most of the cockpit lights. "Vhe are dark, Logan."
So long as they avoided population centers, air ports, rain, and mountains, they could only be found three ways- a military patrol that got very lucky, or by following the blank spot they were making for radio transmissions, but that kind of sensor network was expensive and not very mobile. They had a good idea where those would be, and unless someone was following the dropped cell phone calls it was unlikely. The radar wasn't transmitting, but it was set to recieve. They'd get hints of radar to avoid long before it could detect them.
The third way was if they ran over something that could detect the radar altimeter's signal, but it was only a few millimeters wide when it got back to the aircraft. "Setting AGL to three hundred meters. Hang onto your lunch!"
Logan set the autopilot's switch from off, through on, to 'special'. They were going to go nape of the earth all the way to the steppes, to be sure they were good and lost. Despite having been reassured that the seven computers couldn't all fail, Logan wasn't planning on resting for a second until they were over the steppes and climbing for their cruising altitude. They'd tried the system in the Canadian Rockies, and even he'd lost his lunch, which is why he hadn't eaten anything today.
Kurt's eyes were on the thermal imaging that the computer was using to see if there was anything that had to be flown over or dodged. Already he could feel his stomach's displeasure with the roller coaster ride; he would be praying the entire time.
Rogue was looking at more aerial photos and maps, but these had been stored to the onboard computer. They had turned off all of their communications devices and removed the batteries from all of those they could. She had it narrowed down to two lakes at this point, and had the computer creating artificial terrainscapes based on the topographical maps and satellite photos, trying to be match what she still could remember from the fat man's mind- she hadn't found his name, something she found more than a little creepy, but it was far from the worst thing she'd found in there.
Alex and Laura both slept at the back, silently, their fingers together on their shared arm rest, as Blackbird hurled herself up and down, frantically trying to escape an electromagnetic boogeyman that probably wasn't there, but could bring their night to a screaming halt.
-neXt
"That's it, that's IT!" Rogue pointed down at a scar in forest, a short airfield and a few prefab buildings, with a large, bunker like structure going into a hillside.
Logan nodded. " 'Bout time." He'd picked a clearing about 14 miles away, on the other side of a ridgeline. They'd be able to land and then walk in. As it was, they were going to have to drop below the horizon and come back in just off the deck. There was the visual risk if anyone was on the ridge; not for the first time, he was wishing he'd brought a telepath or empath. Danielle was an expert with her bow, she could put an arrow into a quarter at forty yards, and her ability to sense others and trigger their fears might have been useful. Jean would have been great, but she was too important as part of the backup plan if this went wrong. Charles or Betsy each had their own strengths, but what promised to be a flat out combat mission was no place for them, despite how well they'd adapted to their disabilities. So no telepaths.
"Rogue, Remy, make sure the packs are ready"
-neXt
Laura had insisted that they eat cold rations once they were on the ground when they asked her what she'd be able to smell. She hadn't been fond of the idea either, but she and Logan would have been able to smell a fire or hot food for a few miles in forest like this. She had relented about the bug spray- she could smell it at a quarter mile. The mosquito bites didn't bother her or Logan too much, but the insects were a living, chunky fog from the moment they'd left Blackbird. They could have been debilitating, even with headnets. Rogue had slathered it on heavily- she didn't need it, but she wanted it. When mosquitoes landed on her, they died instantly, and she had what she called "buggy" thoughts. She'd joked that with this many, she'd turn into a vampire, but she hadn't been able to hide the shutter when she first noticed the ring of dead insects around where she was standing.
They had only brought five sleeping bags- two people would be on watch at all times. Kurt was carrying his medic's backpack, while Remy carried it's twin. Kitty and Laura both had packs of electronics. Logan, Rogue and Alex carried their climbing gear. Everyone had night vision and armour. Even Logan had dropped his canteen in favor of a bladder- it might not be as strong, but it didn't slosh as much.
Logan looked around at the kids, sleeping lightly in the bivy shelters over their sleeping bags. They could have made the full fourteen miles in a day even in country like this, but they'd moved slowly, making sure they weren't being followed. He hadn't bothered with bringing big cameras, but they had little ones- this had become as much an intelligence gathering mission as it was one of search and destroy. HYDRA still lived, they needed to know more. He'd made the mistake thinking they were gone once before.
"Logan?" Alex's voice was a whisper. At Logan's soft grunt, the young man glanced around before asking, "Are you worried?"
Logan could smell the nervousness on him. On all of them. He wouldn't tell Laura that she smelled simply afraid, it would make her doubt herself. He was scared himself. He knew that the only reason he'd been able to stop X-23 that first night was because the part of her that had become Laura had let him. This many Lauras and Creeds might beat him. But he was mostly concerned about the ones who couldn't regenerate. He was always worried when the students were in danger- sometimes the way he showed it was by shouting and growling and being an ass. The longer he was at the Institute, the more he cared, and didn't want the kids ending up like him. Logan knew what Charles had in mind with the Institute. He knew the analysis that Hank and Magnus and Charles had made of recent events and social trends, and he'd met the Professor's precognitive friend Walter a few times. It wasn't a matter of if a war came, but when and which side they'd find standing with them. Just like it was only a matter of time before a student died in one of these fights.
Logan, Charles and Magnus had all seen war. He looked at the dark blue and green gortex sleeping bag covers the kids were in. He blinked, seeing them as black rubber bags in an after image. He felt the flutters in his mind, flashing at images of bodies stacked like cord wood or thrown in pits, in and out of uniform, all ages, on at least four continents. He'd done the stacking, he could feel it in his bones; sometimes he'd lit the fire. He shook his head hard, chasing the demons from his mind.
Alex watched, a crawling sensation reaching up his spine, teasing his scalp with filthy fingers. He knew Logan had been elsewhere in his mind. Even though the Professor had checked and found not a single shred of empathic or telempathic ability, Alex felt like he'd been able to see something. The shadow of something bad.
Logan's voice was soft when he finally spoke. "No worse than normal." He watched the young man for a long, silent moment, taking in the the others with his peripheral vision. I should have sent you home. All of you, damnit. "You'll do fine, kid."
-neXt
Kurt looked up from the map they'd generated with a composite of the topographical data and the photos they'd taken during the approach. He'd thought the printer on Blackbird was a waste of space for years, but not any more. "Jah, I should be able to bamf to here from the bunker."
Rogue nodded, fiddling with her watch to lock in the coordinates in the GPS' memory as others did the same. "Got it."
They packed the spare medical bag, and some of the electronics in a heavy, waterproof bag. The very first thing was modified emergency beacon like the kind found on aircraft and boats, but modified to work only with Cerebro. Pull the safety pin, twist the knob, and in three seconds the Professor's cellphone would have a call. The remaining X-men and the New Mutants would have Blackbird-2 homing in on the signal immediately.
Laura was attacking the ground with her claws to loosen it so they could bury it. The soil would be soft enough for any of them to pull the bag from under ground. They would leave a short length of rope sticking up to grab. No one said it, but even one handed or grabbing in the teeth, there would be enough to pull it up by. Leaving it here would cut their weight almost in half, so they could move faster. And if they dropped their packs, Kurt could get all but Logan and Laura here in one jump.
"Halfpint, you ok?"
"Yeah. Just a little nervous." Kitty wasn't comfortable with this part of it. They'd never done something like this before. They'd strung the nets on Blackbird, that wasn't that odd, but burying emergency gear half way there and walking for two days was. "This is just..."
"Mo' den anything we don' 'fore?" Remy grinned. " 'Dis is jus in case. When I was a thief, I always had two getaway cars. Never needed both, but I felt better."
"And when did you stop being a thief?"
"When I became a school teacher, Kitty."
Inside, Logan let out a sigh. If they could reassure each other and joke, then they were as ready as they could be. They hadn't been this ready even for Apocalypse- even Scott had been jumpy that day.. "Rogue, I want your team five minutes behind mine. We leave in three, I'll be on point. Alex and the school teacher behind me, then Kitty last."
-neXt
They'd swapped positions every half hour. That allowed the team that been trailing to go into the lead, and the former leader to wait a few minutes to ambush anyone following closely. If someone was significantly behind it might not be noticed, but considering the prey, a close attack was the real threat.
Rogue hadn't liked the idea of splitting team in half, most people who'd done that had names like 'Custer'. The spread was hard to maintain- it would have been impossible without Laura and Logan's noses. She and Kurt had gone to ground a few minutes ago at Laura's hand sign. They'd slowed to an almost dead crawl when they'd smelt the smoke that was following the river. Right now, she and her brother were watching the slightest movement of undergrowth.
The river had bent around a small crest. This close, Laura could smell the people on the other side of the hill. One smelt like Creed, the other like herself. And there was more than one of each voice. She moved slowly, on her knees and fingers. She knew that Rogue was expecting Logan to hurry when their tracks changed; Laura didn't. She'd have followed the pace of the tracks. Laura pushed herself up just a little to look over the crest of the ridge, and felt herself go pale.
There wasn't another X-23. There were at eight of them. And the Creed copies, there were eight of them. They were relaxing on a sandbar that thrust out into the river. It was a clothing optional beach. They were swimming, talking in at least six different languages, laughing, sometimes taking pieces of meat from over the small fire they'd built.
Laura's head was swimming. This wasn't happening. This was not happening. More of her, many copies. And for every one of them, a copy of Creed. There were even two, an X-23 and and one of the Creeds, who were... recreating, unashamedly. If anyone looked, they considered it a sporting event, shouting out bawdy encouragement. She felt her cheeks flush at one particular piece of advice offered in her voice, then blazed crimson as it was taken.
Her... and Creed... It was too horrifying to think about, but she couldn't look away.
With eyes wide, she slipped back and lizard crawled to where the others were.
"Laura? What did you see?" Rogue's voice was soft, barely more than a whisper. She'd heard the howl.
"There is more than one. A lot more. And Creeds."
Rogue and Kurt shared a look. They knew Laura, it took a lot to shake her. In fact, nothing shook her other than herself. They slowly crept up to where she had been, Laura bringing up the rear reluctantly. She'd seen enough to learn everything she needed to know tactically; emotionally, it was shocking and disorienting.
Kurt stared for a moment before calling on Mary in prayer, pressing his fingers to the medallions he wore under his tunic. Rogue shook her head, "That was so not what Ah was expecting."
Laura twisted a fraction of a second before the others at the sound of something behind them. This was what she'd been afraid of- she smelled like herself, as did their enemy.
The smaller figure had a beatific smile behind her energy rifle, her hand at the firing button for the underslung ultrasonic stunner. Laura recognized the HYDRA weapon instantly, but it was the face that stopped her from acting in that first critical second. The X-23 wore a tank top and cut off combat fatigues, her feet in combat boots. Her hair was cut short other than a long braid at the temple, while a copper band wrapped around her muscular upper arm. Laura's voice came from the stranger, filled with wonder. "Sister? First sister?"
The other figure was much taller and broader in the shoulders, with a huge grin. His jeans were tucked into high moccasins, while a necklace of fangs and claws rested on his bare chest. He wore his honey blond in a long, flowing mane bound at the nape of his neck, with a narrow, neat, braided beard. In his hands he carried a long barreled Kalashnikov, the squad support version, holding it casually in no direct menace to any one person but all of them. "Hands where we can see them, or the blue squirrel gets it first."
Author's notes:
Laura's shopping list is just a few of the parts that make an H-bomb go boom, but some of them are pretty common. Krytron switches are part of what makes the compression shell of certain nuke designs work. And photocopiers. Next time you xerox something, remember you are using something that can be used to build an H-bomb.
It should scare you.
