Red lights started to fill the room that the fake Cerebro was in as Professor Xavier concentrated on finding all of the mutants. The little girl who was really Jason, stood behind Professor Xavier and watched with a smile on his face as more and more red lights filled the room.
"Have you found the mutants yet," the little girl asked Professor Xavier. "Have you found all of them?"
"I'm trying," Professor Xavier said. "There are so many of them."
"Then concentrate," the little girl told him. "Concentrate. Find all the mutants. Find them. Find them all. Each one. Concentrate! Concentrate harder! Now find them all! Find all the mutants!"
***
Back at the X Jet, Kitty had gotten to her feet and walked over to the control panel.
"What are you doing," Rogue asked her.
"It's been about a half an hour now and John and Melissa aren't back yet," Kitty told her friends. "I'm contacting the others."
But just as she reached a hand out to activate one of the com devices, a horrible pain filled her head and she screamed as she covered her ears and fell to the ground.
"Kitty," Mike shouted as he watched his girlfriend fall to the ground. But as he stood up to rush over to her the same pain filled his head and he fell to the ground as well.
Bobby and Rogue were also on the floor and they were wincing in pain as their heads felt like they were about to explode.
***
"How much farther do you think it is," Pyro asked as he and Melissa continued to search for the base. They had been following trails of footprints but it still seemed like it was taking them forever to find the base.
"It can't be much farther," Melissa said. But just as she said this, she let out a scream as she fell to her knees and placed her hands over her ears.
"What," Pyro asked with concern in his voice as he knelt down beside her and placed his hands on her shoulders. He was about to say something else but never got a chance because he was now screaming as the horrible pain filled his head. "Ugh! What's going on," Pyro asked with pain in his voice.
"I don't know," Melissa said.
She had grabbed a hold of Pyro's hand and he squeezed it back. He looked up and saw that tears were streaming down her cheeks. He knew she was scared and a part of him was scared to. He didn't know what the hell was going on but he knew he wanted the pain to stop.
***
"I can't take it anymore," Kitty shouted out.
"It's gonna be okay," Mike tried to assure her. He had crawled over to where Kitty was and he had a comforting arm around her.
Bobby was holding onto Rogue's hand as they cried out in pain. But just as suddenly as the pain came it stopped. Bobby and Rogue opened their eyes and stared at each other with confused expressions on their faces. Finally the two got into kneeling positions and they threw their arms around each other. Mike got to his feet and he helped Kitty to hers. She threw her arms around him and he put protective arms around her.
"What was that," Bobby asked.
"I don't know," Mike said. "I'm just glad it's over."
***
The pain had stopped for Pyro and Melissa as well. The two were now in sitting positions and they were breathing heavily. Pyro turned towards his girlfriend and looked at her with concern in his eyes.
"Are you okay," Pyro asked.
"Yeah," Melissa said after a few seconds. "Are you?"
Pyro answered by nodding. "What happened," he asked her.
"I'm not sure," Melissa said. "I just know it felt like my head was about to explode."
"That's what it felt like for me to," Pyro told her. He then got to his feet and pulled Melissa to hers. "You sure you're okay?"
"Yeah I'm fine," Melissa assured him. "I hope that doesn't happen again."
"Same here," Pyro said with a grin on his face as he put an arm around her and the two continued walking again.
***
"We can't just sit around anymore," Rogue said as she made her way to the pilot's seat.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa what are you doing," Mike asked with panic in his voice when he saw Rogue take a hold of the controls.
"Flying this thing to the base," Rogue told him.
"Do you even know how to," Kitty asked with the same amount of panic in her voice.
"No," Rogue admitted. "But for once John may have been right. We can't just sit here and do nothing. Especially not after what just happened."
Before anyone could argue, Rouge had already started flipping switches on the control panel. Bobby hurriedly took the co pilot's seat and he strapped himself in. Mike and Kitty said in the seats behind them and they strapped themselves in as well. Within seconds, the jet was in the air.
***
After about ten more minutes of walking, they managed to find the entrance to the old base. The two looked around and something caught Melissa's attention out of the corner of her eye. Pyro was about to walk through the front doors to the old base but Melissa grabbed his arm and she pointed towards a wall. Pyro spun around and saw what she was looking at. There tied to the wall in chains was Stryker.
Something about this man quickly caught her interest and she slowly began to walk towards him. Pyro followed Melissa and once they made it to Stryker a smirk appeared on his face.
"Well, well look who it is," Stryker said with a small laugh. "I never thought I'd have both of my creations come back."
"What the hell are you talking about," Melissa asked him.
"Don't you remember me Eruption," Stryker asked with a smile on his face. "I gave you your claws."
Melissa's eyes grew wide when he said this. She then drifted back to her nightmares and she saw herself in that same long tube. She was in a green colored liquid and wires were all over her. She saw shadowy figures walking around the room but suddenly one of those shadowy figures came into view. It was Stryker. He stood over the tube that Melissa was in and he had a smirk on his face.
"It was you," Melissa said. Anger filled her voice and her fists were shaking at her sides. "You're the reason that I have nightmares every night! I want to know why you did this to me and I want to know now!"
"You volunteered," Stryker told her with the same smirk on his face.
"Why the hell would I volunteer to have a procedure done like that," Melissa asked.
Pyro turned to his girlfriend and saw that she was now shaking with anger. He then saw something that he had never seen before. Her eyes suddenly changed from their normal brown color to a red orange color. "This was more than likely not going to end well," Pyro thought to himself.
"Oh you did volunteer Eruption," Stryker said. "It was about four years ago if I remember correctly. You were just a frightened thirteen year old who had just discovered her mutant powers. You didn't want anything to do with them. I eventually found you and said that I could cure you. You were happy when I told you this so of course you would have agreed. But I had no intention of curing you."
"You lied to her," Pyro asked. Anger was starting to fill his voice as well. "Why?"
"Because I had a new project I was working on," Stryker said. "And she was a perfect fit. You see if it wasn't for her healing factor I wouldn't have even bothered. I had discovered adamantium the world's strongest metal. I wanted to use that to create the ultimate weapon. But of course no human could survive the combining of the liquid to their skeleton so I needed a mutant."
"And so you used me as your guinea pig," Melissa asked in her same angry voice.
"Yes," Stryker said. "But you had no way of knowing that you were a guinea pig. You just thought that I was going to cure you. But that was not the case. The procedure worked and your skeleton successfully bonded with the adamantium giving you your adamantium claws. You were the second one that it worked on. But you were also quite a handful like the first before you."
"You mean Wolverine," Melissa said with anger in her voice but there was a slight smirk on her face.
"So you know my other failed weapon," Stryker said. "Yes Wolverine was the other person I tried it on. It worked on him but he got angry and escaped the base destroying everything in his path. After I did the procedure on you and you found out that it wasn't a cure, you did the same."
"So, do you do any of these procedures on humans," Melissa asked. "Or just mutants?"
"Just mutants," Stryker said. "You're all a bunch of animals anyway. Might as well be treated as such."
That was the last straw for Pyro. How dare that bastard call them animals. He was going to pay. Pyro flipped open the lid of his zippo and the small flame appeared. Melissa saw Pyro getting ready to attack out of the corner of her eye and she held out an arm in front of him.
"He's not worth it John," Melissa said. "Don't waste your power on him."
With that said, she turned around and started walking away from him. Pyro hesitated for a moment as he looked back and forth between his girlfriend and Stryker. He wanted revenge for him calling them animals and was shocked that Melissa didn't want any revenge. After a few more seconds of silence, he sighed in defeat and he closed his lighter and he followed her.
"Where are you going," Stryker called after them. "Your just going to leave me tied up here?! I gave you more power!"
"You want a mutant to help you," Melissa asked as she stopped walking and turned to face him. "I'm just an animal remember. A guinea pig for your experiments. You're on your own."
With that said she and Pyro continued walking away from him. Pyro noticed that they were going in the opposite direction of the base and he spoke.
"You're not going into the base," Pyro asked.
"There's no need to," Melissa said. "I found out what I needed to."
Just then they heard the sound of helicopter blades spinning and they glanced at each other before running in the direction of the noise. Once they climbed a small hill they saw a white helicopter being piloted by Mystique and Magneto was riding in the co pilot's seat. Mystique turned her head towards the windshield and saw Pyro and Melissa standing on the hill. She tapped Magneto on the shoulder and pointed out the windshield. Magneto turned his head and saw Pyro and Melissa as well.
"You thinking what I'm thinking," Pyro asked as he turned towards his girlfriend.
"If you're thinking about joining them then yeah," Melissa said.
Pyro saw Magneto motion for them to come and Pyro turned to Melissa. "You wanna go with them," Pyro asked her as he held a hand out to her.
"Yeah," Melissa said as she took his hand. Pyro gave her a small smile which she returned. The two then headed off towards Magneto's helicopter.
I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. I wanted to change it around more so that it focused more on the kids. Oh and if you were confused as to why Melissa's eyes suddenly changed color, it was because that anger is one of the things that triggers her fire powers. But she was able to control herself because she wanted the truth from Stryker. Don't worry though, you guys will get to see a lot more of Eruption's powers and the other kids powers in the next story. But that's still another chapter away yet. I'll try and have the last chapter posted soon. :)
