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Emma paused, shifting back to human form. Alex and Sean came to a halt behind her. This had happened several times before as they wove through this maze and the boys knew she was telepathically scanning for Raven.

After a few seconds, Emma turned the corner, shifting again as she ran.

The base was surprisingly populated for a Sunday evening. When they found themselves down the hall from two workers holding coffee mugs, Alex covered his ears. Sean yelped. He could reach a pitch high enough to knock himself over if he sustained it long enough, but less than a second incapacitated the two employees.

Leaving them on the ground, the mutants continued around the next corner. They had found a stairwell to take them one floor higher and the more turns they took, the more Sean and Alex hoped they would be able to find their way back.

Could they really trust Emma? Her telepathy allowed her to absorb information. They… well, they had Alex, who could just blast their way out.

"Here." Emma stopped once more. This floor, like the other, was all metal. The door had a keypad. Emma had anticipated that, ripped the code from a mind earlier, and now entered the numbers. The doors slid open.

"Emma!"

A little girl stood behind bars, eyes wide. She couldn't have been more than eight years old, a ponytailed blond thing. She was not in the best shape: smudges under her eyes told of a long while without sleep and there were splashes of sickly bruises across her face and arms.

Had there been any doubt as to her identity, she confirmed it with theirs: "Banshee? Havok?"

"Hey R—" Alex began.

Sean interrupted, "Hey, Mystique."

The little girl grew taller. Her skin turned blue and her clothing melted away, until Raven stood before them as herself, scaled and blue and just as worn down. The bruises stood out less now.

"Well? Get her outta there," Sean said.

"I'm trying," Emma snapped. The diamonds had once more faded from her skin. Now she stood, telepathic and vulnerable, trying to find the second code. She knew the keycode for the main door, but hadn't realized she needed a second one. She hadn't searched that far.

"I didn't think you'd come for me," Raven said. "I mean, I knew they would come," indicating Emma, "but I didn't think I'd see you."

Alex and Sean traded a glance, confirming that neither of them knew what to say to that. One didn't speak that way around Charles, that was for sure. Erik and Raven were dear to him and he had no trouble reminding Alex, Sean, and Hank that Angel had been a friend of theirs as well.

It seemed Erik held with a far less fond attitude.

Emma punched in a code. "Same one as the first door," she informed the others. "Idiots."

She strode into the cell, reaching her hand out to Raven. They really were a special kind of stupid, these people. They built robots to hunt and capture mutants, yet used a single security code for—

A metal panel fell behind Emma, trapping her in the cell with Raven. Sean and Alex turned. They had been found! The man in the doorway wore the same uniform as the guards Erik killed earlier. He held what looked like a two-way radio, but must have somehow allowed him to set off the alarm. In his other hand he held a gun.

Three sounds crowded into the room: first, the falling door; the blaring alarm; and nearly swallowed up by it, a gunshot.

"What's happening?" Raven called. The boys barely heard and had more pressing concerns than answering.

Sean yelped and the guard fell to his knees, then he stepped forward. He had not properly mastered that one-slap-to-the-neck technique no matter how Ruth tried to teach him. He settled for wrapping his hands around the man's neck and squeezing.

Behind him, Alex shouted, "Emma, cover her!"

He could only hope Emma understood before sending a blast at the cell door. The two girls emerged, diamond and blue, just in time to see Sean drop the guard's body.

"Oh my god, Alex!" Raven reached for the growing stain on his shirt.

Alex shook his head. "It's not bad." He kept his hands pressed against it. He kept bleeding—bullets weren't subtle things—but Alex was well enough to insist, "We have to go."

"C'mon!" Sean agreed.

They made a slow run for it. Emma took the lead. Raven kept up under her own steam, so long as they didn't rush. The alarm wasn't helping, but luckily no one had signaled where the intruders were. The mutants could only hope their friends had taken care of the machines by now.

When one among them kept falling behind, Sean took one of Alex's arms and laid it across his shoulders.

"Hey, man," Alex objected, "I don't swing that way."

"Everyone swings my way—Raven!" Sean warned. Emma seemed to have better resistance to his sonic blasts while in diamond form; Raven understood the warning and covered her ears.

One shout cleared the hallway.

They didn't have time to worry about this. They needed to meet up with the others as soon as possible, needed to get out of here. Azazel could take Alex to a hospital.

Getting down the stairs could have been easier. Raven tripped and Emma caught her; Alex and Sean made their way slowly, carefully, Alex gasping when the stairs turned and he hit the rail.

"Hang in there." Sean was not overly encouraging, breathless and more than a little frightened himself. "Almost there. Almost—Sabra!"

This was in reference to the woman standing in the hall. The others were there, too.

"We heard your shout," Ruth explained. Sean's voice carried more than a little. "Alex!"

"'m okay," Alex insisted.

Sean didn't believe him. From the looks on the others' faces, neither did they, and one glance told Sean why.

Alex's mouth was red with blood.