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Scene Ten
"I'm gonna go find Magneto," Blaze told Gambit, breaking the kiss. "The sooner we get this started, the sooner it'll be over." Gambit nodded and let her walk away. As soon as she had disappeared, he took out her cell phone and redialled the last number. After two or three rings, a male voice answered, "Hello?"
"We got your kids," Gambit told Jacobi coolly. "Whatever you're plannin' tonight, drop it."
"Really?" Across town, Jacobi chuckled royally. He bounced Mischa in the crook of his arm and tossed a lazy wink in the direction of a trussed Scarlet Witch. Paradox stood over Wanda, preventing her from affecting anything with her powers. Wanda glared back at Jacobi, wishing him dead. "Now, now, Gambit, you should know better than to threaten me. You can tell Magneto and my dear wife that I have their daughters, and let that she-wolf of yours know I have the Scarlet Witch." With that, Jacobi hung up the phone, leaving Gambit speechless.
Blaze had convened with Magneto and the others near the front of the SHIELD building. As Gambit joined them, they were discussing what would happen if Magneto took down the building's security systems with an electro-magnetic blast.
"It would give us no more than a thirty second window," Blaze informed them. "The building has an emergency generator in a shielded room that would kick in after that. The e-generator links directly to SHIELD HQ. Its activation would bring SHIELD agents down on us like a tonne of bricks."
"Can we stop it from activating?" Nightcrawler wanted to know.
"Not easily," Blaze admitted. "There are two switches that have to be deactivated in order to disable the e-generator. They must be deactivated at exactly the same time, within the thirty-second window, or it won't work. And Magneto's EM pulse will deactivate our phones and radios."
"Rogue," said Magneto. "Can you absorb Kurt's power without leaving him unconscious?"
"Ah think so," Rogue said, "but how we gonna know when to push the button?"
"The switch rooms are there and there," said Blaze, pointing up to windows on the second and third storeys of the building. "You should both have a view of the street. Gambit, can you send up a flare as a signal?" Blaze baulked slightly when she turned to Gambit. He was glowering at her with something clutched in his hand that looked suspiciously like her cell phone.
"I'll send up a flare," Remy agreed, not taking his eyes off Blaze. If anyone noticed the tension between the two, they did not mention it. Magneto left immediately, manipulating magnetic fields to raise himself into position above the building ready to disable the security. Rogue whipped off a glove and held out her hand towards Kurt. Kurt gulped as he let his furry blue fingertips brush against Rogue's. Storm caught Nightcrawler as he stumbled backwards, dazed but conscious. Rogue tested her new power briefly, bamfing across the street and back again. Kurt shook his head to clear the stars he was seeing. Then they were ready.
Storm took off, riding the wind to join Magneto in the air above the building. The hairs on the back of Kurt's neck stood up as an invisible magnetic pulse raced down the building. The streetlights flickered and died. Blaze, Gambit, Rogue and Nightcrawler stood in a swathe of fog and surrounded by darkness. As soon as that happened, Rogue and Nightcrawler bamfed into the building to the rooms Blaze had pointed out. Gambit took the moment to turn on Blaze.
"You dropped dis," he told her, handing her cell phone back.
"I doubt that," Blaze accused him, bristling at the invasion of her privacy.
"Gimme one good reason why I shouldn't tell Magneto and Storm dat you sold 'em out to Jacobi?"
"Easy," Blaze replied hotly. "If you do that, neither of us will get the weapon. Throw the flare, now!"
Gambit let rip with a playing card, throwing it straight up into the air. An orange streak zipped through the fog, before exploding in a rain of sparks some ten metres in the air. Inside the building Rogue and Kurt both flicked switches. Blaze did not wait to see if the second generator kicked in. She raised her hands and launched a fireball straight at the building's front doors. There was a flash as the doors were blown apart. As the smoke cleared the doors were black and smouldering, hanging loosely from their hinges. Blaze and Gambit jogged inside, joined seconds later by the others.
"Well that was painless," said Kurt as they crossed the threshold into the building's foyer. The only light came from the full moon, distorted by Storm's fog, as Magneto's EM pulse had disabled everything electrical in the area. In the gloomy foyer smooth concrete floors contrasted with block-work walls. A bank of elevators stood lifeless to the right hand side, whilst straight ahead a concrete staircase with angular steel railings led up into the building. The interior was blank and military. There was not a single feature installed for comfort in the whole of the foyer.
"Don't get ahead of yourself," Blaze warned. "We only knocked out the electronic security. The room containing the weapon is more traditionally fortified."
"What about SHIELD patrols?" Storm asked. "Will we come up against resistance?"
"SHIELD patrols are the least of my worries," Blaze replied, glaring daggers at Gambit, "but yes, there should be some."
"Which floor is the weapon located?" asked Magneto.
"Top," the redhead replied. "Elevators will be out. I suggest we take the stairs." Kurt bamfed across the foyer and looked up the stairwell. He blanched, telling the others that there were an awful lot of stairs to climb.
"Whatcha worried about Kurt, ya can just 'port us all to the top?" said Rogue.
"No," Magneto shook his head. "We stay together and go floor by floor. If there are SHIELD patrols I do not want them getting in behind us and cutting off our retreat."
Everyone accepted that this was sensible, heading up the stairs on foot to the first landing. Fanning out, they discovered two SHIELD operatives patrolling the corridor. Gambit and Magneto took the lead. Magneto disarmed them both with a flick of his hand. Gambit ran at them, staff extended, before planting the end of the staff on the floor and spinning round to clout both men solidly in the midriff with his feet. The men gave a collective "Oaf!" and fell backwards into the wall. Storm called up a gale, picked both men up and flung them out of the window. The glass shattered and the men disappeared. The X-Men moved on.
As they reached the third floor, a blood-curdling howl echoed up the stairwell behind them. Kurt and Rogue exchanged a worried look. Magneto muttered, "Ilehana."
"Why doesn't that surprise me?" Blaze said rhetorically. "Keep moving. I'll head her off."
"Blaze no," protested Storm. "She will telepathically annihilate you!"
"The White Queen and Mastermind shielded my mind," Blaze reminded them. "It worked last time, hopefully it will still work. The only other protection we have from her is Magneto's helmet, and we'll need him to get access to the weapon. If any of you have a better idea I'd love to hear it." Gambit opened his mouth to speak, but Blaze was not interested in what he had to say. If he had told Vixen about Emma Frost's protection then Blaze knew she was dead meat. Before he could say anything Blaze had turned and gone back down the stairs.
"You're going to just let her go?" Kurt was incredulous.
"She has told us all we need to get to the weapon," Magneto replied stoically. "Blaze knows she is buying us the time to act. Standing here debating her actions is not the best way to honour her sacrifice."
"Sacrifice?" Kurt was aghast, but the others were already moving on. "Gambit, what sacrifice? She's an X-Man, we can't just abandon her! You can't just abandon her!"
"She's bad news Kurt," Gambit told the boy. "We're all better off without her."
"Dude, listen to yourself! You saved her from Ilehana last time, and she has come through for us so far. Do you really want to give up on her so easily?"
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Vixen loped into the SHIELD foyer in her favourite grey wolf form. Besides her strode Pyro with flames belching from the kit that was strapped to his back and arms. Cackling to himself, Pyro formed the fire into two more wolves that raised their fiery heads to the ceiling and howled. He glanced at his leader to see if she was impressed, but Vixen hadn't even noticed. Her hackles were up as she bared her teeth in a snarl. All her focus was on a slender figure on the stairs.
"Is this all you brought," Blaze asked the wolf flippantly, "one half-baked pyromaniac?" Vixen gave a low growl as an instruction Pyro to deal with the girl. The Aussie moved forward, flexing his powers. Blaze feigned disinterest, pausing to examine her perfectly manicured fingernails. Pyro seized his moment and flung an attack of raw flame straight up at Blaze. The darkened foyer was lit up like a summer's day. Pyro cackled, sure that Blaze must be engulfed…
Just at the crucial moment the girl raised a hand and said, "No." The fire stopped, falling back on itself in a wave as though it had hit an invisible force shield. Blaze drew Pyro's fire into a ball, quashing it and absorbing it into her. Pyro could only watch helpless as his best attack dissipated before his eyes. As soon as darkness fell once more, Blaze looked up, pinning Pyro with a fierce gaze. "My turn," she said. She flung out a hand, palm outermost, twisting her wrist in the air. Pyro's fuel tanks exploded. The Aussie was catapulted into the ceiling, bounced off the floor and was ejected back out onto the street. That left Blaze and Vixen-as-Wolf alone in the darkness.
"The way I see it," Blaze told the wolf calmly. "There are two possible reasons why you came here with only that muppet for back-up. You wouldn't be so cocky, not with so much at stake. So either you are completely confident that Rogue and Gambit still work for you and will betray Magneto and the X-Men. Or else you are terrified because Gambit and Rogue really have betrayed you, and you don't know who of else your Brotherhood of Mutants has also been turned against you. Which one is it, Vixen? Who has Gambit betrayed?"
For all her projected calmness Blaze was stalling. Her heart was pounding against her rib cage and she felt sure that even if Vixen-as-Wolf could not read her mind she would be able to smell the fear in Blaze's scent. Before coming to Bayville Blaze would never have defied such a powerful mutant. She was a thief. Her expertise was sneaking about and running away, not being drawn into conflicts she could not win. Yet now here she was again, taking on the world's most powerful telepath so Magneto could get to the weapon. She must be mad, barking even.
Nevertheless, the way Vixen was reacting gave Blaze hope. The wolf shifted her weight from foot to foot, unsure about something. Those massive predatory eyes had a glint of madness and insecurity in them. The wolf was worried. It suddenly dawned on Blaze that maybe she was onto something. Maybe, just maybe, Gambit had betrayed Vixen after all. Even if he hadn't, if Vixen thought he might be tempted then Blaze had all the weapons she needed.
"He's been playing you, Vixen. Gambit's been playing you for a fool and you didn't even know it. You wanted so much to believe that he had helped me escape for your benefit, but you were wrong to forgive him…"
Vixen let the wolf form slip, turning back into the lean blonde as she encroached on the bottom of the stairs. "No," she told Blaze, "no, he wouldn't! Gambit is loyal to me. And I am going to turn your mind into a nest of writhing vipers for insinuating otherwise." There was desperation in her voice, almost as if she feared the rejection of her fellow mutant more than anything.
"Go for it," Blaze told Vixen, clenching her jaw and her fists in readiness for a telepathic onslaught on her mental barriers. Vixen bared her perfect white teeth and her mind leapt across the gap between her and the girl. Vixen expected to have to blast through the leftovers of the telepathic shielding. She was not prepared when, like a matador dodging a bull, Blaze pulled the pathetic remnants of the barrier aside and let Vixen into her mind. Before Ilehana had chance to recover from the shock, Blaze thrust back with several carefully stored memories, crippling Ilehana with the truth.
"No!" Ilehana screamed, recoiling from Blaze's mind almost as quickly as she realised when Blaze was showing her. Blaze in Gambit's strong arms, Gambit catching Blaze by the wrist, Blaze being kissed by Gambit... "No! No, he wouldn't. He wouldn't!" Ilehana could taste the Cajun's lips, feel his hands running through her thick red curls… "NO!" Vixen lashed out with her telepathic anger, aiming a blast right at Blaze. There would be no escape from Ilehana's wrath...