A/N: Please read and review!
We helped the kids out of the little prison. They were still in the pajamas that they had been wearing the night they were taken from their school, and we quickly led them through the maze that was that dam-base. We found the others as we were trying to leave the base.
A limping Jean and her tired-looking husband, Scott (Cyclops), were doing their best to support Professor Xavier as they were trying to leave the base, and Storm and Kurt had the lobotomized Jason Stryker whose hardened stare was both horrifying and very unsettling. Logan appeared out of nowhere, covered in blood and both angered and at peace with what had happened and probably what he had learned in dealing with the figure who had so changed and affected his life for so long.
The older kids helped carry or support the younger ones as we left the base, following Logan to where he had claimed to be a large enough helicopter to take them back to the jet and to the school.
Nothing.
"It was right here!" He yelled, upset with with what had happened and what was about to happen.
An injured and chained Stryker, the son of the man my grandparents hated so much when he struck that deal with Soviet Russia back in the sixties and the father of the mindless Jason and of the one me and Scarlet Witch had saved despite his hatred about us, gave us a bitter and defeated laughter. That dark chuckle was connected to a man who had already accepted his death. There was something in his eyes, though. It was like he realized that one plan didn't really work, but another started to slowly be realized.
"They'll come out of the shadows," he told us. "And, there's nothing you can do to stop that from even happening."
Stryker deliberately stopped explaining that, and by the small smile that he had started to wear, it was clear that he was amused by what could happen.
That was only meant for me, and what he had told Logan was horrible, hinting at what he had done to him. Logan showed his real strength of character, and he only turned his back on him and walked away. Never once looking back at him.
Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch were quietly talking with each other in the language that they had spoken when they had been growing up with Gypsies, and they weren't happy. Apparently, Magneto took Mystique and John with him and left his children behind him. He was so focused on his mission that he just left his children behind. What a great father.
The jet landed hard on the ground in front of us, and when it opened, we quickly climbed into it. Kitty was holding the controls to the jet, skin pale, arms shaking, and eyes tightly closed. The sound of thundering and rushing water filled the air, so we really needed to leave. I was at Kitty's side, quietly trying to calm her down, so I could sit in the seat and help pilot the jet.
Jean watched the water as it rushed through the countryside, stopping herself from moving onto the jet.
"Jean!" Scott was yelling, but he stopped moving the moment she waved one of her hands.
Nate pulled him onto the jet, somehow knowing what his mother was going to do and realizing there was nothing that could be done to stop her. The jet was closed up, and me and Storm began the work to start the jet and quickly get out of there. I could clearly see what Jean was doing.
Without even flinching when she saw the roaring water, she raised one of her hands. The water stopped moving towards us, and it soared high overhead of her as the pressure began to build up. She looked back at us, and there was that strange, fiery birdlike aura surrounded her again.
Her expression was that of being at peace at what she was about to do. Scott wore a look of complete horror, and Nate and Rachel were just as horrified. Rachel was almost crying as her older brother held her.
The jet was ready to fly, and Jean only watched on as the jet began to hover. That aura only strengthened for a short moment before she lowered her arm and closed her eyes, and the water rushed around her.
"Jean!" Scott yelled, his voice shook with his intense sorrow.
Jean was no more. She sacrificed to save us all.
It was the night when Obama was giving one of his final speeches on national television to address the Mutant Problem. He looked both serious and horrible about what he was doing, but he felt he was doing the right thing after the attack on him a year before and everything that was happening all across the country after New York.
There was a flash of lightning and a loud crash of thunder, and everyone around him stopped moving. He stopped talking and looked around him with surprise, and the lightning flashed again as we appeared. To his credit, he kept his cool.
"Do not be alarmed," Charles Xavier told him with his calming and soft-spoken voice. "We are Mutants."
Obama sat back in his chair. "Why are you here."
"We're here to clear up something big," I told him, earning some weird looks from the people around me, but I didn't care about that. I was in my element, so the words were just flowing right out of me. I set the file that Mystique had compiled (among other things) about what he had done to coerce the president to his line of thinking.
Obama looked through it, becoming more grim, and he actually looked guilty for giving those orders to Stryker, what he had just allowed to happen.
"How did you get this?" He asked. He believed what we had given to him.
"A girl who can walk through walls," Xavier replied. "Among other things."
Kurt crapped up a little when he said that as if remembering something that he and Kitty had done at the school with their strange powers.
"There are people out there that think we are on the verge of war," Xavier told him. "There have been casualties, but now it is your move."
"And," Logan said. "We'll be watching."
I left one typed noted for him to read, knowing I wasn't going to ruin the moment with my own words.
"Even though people hate and fear us, we still protect them from whatever the world would would throw at them. No matter what would happen, we'll be there. Just like there are good and bad people in the world, there are good and bad Mutants."
The lightning flashed again, and we were gone.
Obama sat back in his chair, and he was pretty thoughtful. Everyone was moving again, and it seemed like he had suddenly stopped talking in the middle of his speech, staring at the cameras and his teleprompters.
"Mr. President?" One of the reporters asked in surprise and expectation.
That was when Obama took my words from my little note, and actually supported Mutant Rights.
"They are like us," he ended up saying. "They have families. They try to live normal lives. The only thing that separates us from them is an accident of birth. . ."
