The helmet was so uncomfortable that Sebastian Shaw left it for the last moment, after the bodies were already thudding. "The box," he instructed Riptide, and the other mutant obeyed instantly. Lifting the metal shell from its padded cavity, he made a face at the tastelessly florid trim around the edges. How like the Russians! Settling it into place and leaving Riptide to wait for his signal, Shaw strolled down the walk casually.
(In the meantime, a frantic council of war was going on in the mutants' Rec Room. "We need some kinda strategy, fast and dirty," Logan assessed the situation. "I'm taking the outside; unless they're dumber than posts, they'll have a point man out there. He's my look-out. Mystique, Banshee—you get to the office bloc. They're targeting the suits, not the science labs. Ya work as a team. No splitting up. Chimera, you get the rest. Shaw's their big gun, and ya know him."
"Attack Shaw directly and he'll only absorb the blow, whether it's physical or an energy bolt," Joon-Yi took over. "Nor will he come in unprepared for a physical confrontation. I'm sure he powered up before he arrived. That means unconventional methods are called for. We'll have to improvise…")
Shaw expected armed opposition when he entered the CIA base. Azazel would have decimated their ranks, leaving the living panicked and trigger-happy. After proving his superiority beyond any possible doubt by laughing at their feeble attacks and crushing them like the insects they were, he would proceed to the room where the terrified recruits were cowering and magnanimously point out to them what a mistake they were making. They would then gratefully accept his protection (although perhaps one or two would persist in their folly) and depart the CIA.
However, it seemed that someone was not following the script. When Shaw entered the building, against all expectations, it was eerily silent and to all appearances, deserted. Looking around the entry hall, he was visited by a vague unease, as if he were a schoolboy summoned to the headmaster's office for some unknown reason— to be rewarded for some achievement? Punished for some infraction of the rules he didn't recall making? Told bad news? Told good news? Whipped until he bled or violated until he screamed?
The anti-telepathy helmet muted ambient noise slightly. He lifted it up enough to expose his ears, but the complex was just as quiet. His source had not known if any of the recruits had mental powers, but it was best to be cautious, so he lowered it again before he called out, "Azazel!"
The empty halls made mock of his call, echoing it and amplifying it, but it had the desired result. The red-skinned mutant popped in next to him. "Some half-dozen did I slay, but I have not yet found the director, " he said. "One moment, they were everywhere. There was a big whooping alarm. Then the alarm was silent and there was no one."
"Where did they go?" Shaw asked, his words sounding complaining in his own ears. He was beginning to feel foolish and he did not like it.
"Out for pizza," said a male voice, and a match flared. As the speaker slipped into view, he lit a cigar. "What's it to you?"
Shaw recognized him immediately. "Jimmy," he said, with a fraternal fondness. "I'm glad to finally meet you."
"The feeling ain't mutual. There's only one person alive who has the right to call me that, and you're not him," snapped the younger Creed brother. "If ya gotta call me anything, make it Logan, or else Wolverine. You've gotta be Shaw." The last sentence was said in a louder voice, pitched to carry; someone was listening.
"My apologies," Shaw smiled, but it was thinner than the air at ten thousand feet above sea level. "Where are the others, if the humans are not at home?"
"Hangin' out in the Rec room," Logan turned and walked away.
"Is that where you're going?" Shaw motioned to Azazel to continue his search. Assistant Director Black had to be found and done away with; there was too great a chance of some compromise being worked out if he remained alive, such as civil rights being granted to all citizens regardless of genetic variation. A human-loving peacemaker like Xavier might see that as a positive development, but Shaw knew better; it would be an impediment to the dominion of the Evolved.
"Can't go in there with this, I'd never hear the end of it," Logan said, waving the foul cigar. "It's that way, though." Only someone who had met Victor Creed could see Logan as any improvement. Shaw followed where the cigar pointed, to a room where the unfortunate and misled recruits were—acting as if nothing was wrong.
Acting, however, was the operative word. The dancer looked up from a fashion magazine to regard him with mild interest, her eyes heavy-lidded, her lips full of promise, but the others were too stiff-spined, aware he was there and acting as though they weren't. There were two boys clustered around a pinball machine, the dark-skinned one playing while the blond exclaimed at his prowess, and over there at the table was a young man in glasses playing cards with—Jenny Song.
(Outside, Riptide leaned against a railing, waiting. He never heard Wolverine at all. As Logan had said, he was real good at stealthy.)
"You're supposed to be in Russia," Shaw burst out, accusingly.
"Am I?" she looked up for the first time. "I—."
Something flickered in her eyes for the briefest moment, and then she lit up with a demonic glee. "Oh, my god! You got your head stuck in a bucket! And you've come here for help! Good decision. Don't worry, I know just what to do. There's liquid dish soap in the kitchenette. I'll have that off you in a jiffy."
"It always pleases you to goad me," he grated out. "I'm not about to rise to the bait this time, Jenny. I'm sorry; Mrs. Lensherr. This," he tapped the metal, "is a silly looking thing, but necessary. You know, you and I are not that unalike. Both with powerful but flawed fathers and mothers who had little choice but to accept their fate. Both abandoned and impoverished at an early age, left with unstable mothers. Both determined to gain an education and better ourselves despite all obstacles."
Again something flickered in her eyes. "Two words. Nazi Scientist."
He ignored her and addressed the others. "My name is Sebastian Shaw. I don't know what she may have told you about me, but I'm not here to hurt any of you. Not even her. A war is coming in which the humans will learn who we truly are and what we can do," Shaw made his tones mellifluous, letting the love he felt for them shine out of his face. "You have a choice to make, each of you. You can either bow down and be enslaved—or rise up to rule." He let his gaze fall on each in turn. "Why fight for a society that hates and fears you?"
(Meanwhile, in the office bloc, Azazel popped into the assistant director's office only to be taken aback. A very beautiful young girl stood there, her skin a deep, glowing blue, and not a single garment obscuring her loveliness. "Hello," she whispered shyly. The young man he didn't see for gawking at the naked girl let out a short, focused shout that shattered the window behind him and sent him to his knees. The girl calmly laid him out with a flying kick to the jaw. Then they bound and trussed him, hands, feet and tail. leaving him facedown on the floor.)
"Follow me, and you shall live like kings. And queens." He caressed the dancer with his eyes.
Then Joon-Yi opened her mouth. "If you mean the way kings and queens lived in 962, not 1962. Dysentery, plague, rotten food, rotting teeth, no running water, the Dark Ages come again. Both science and common sense are on my side. I could go on all night about it, but I won't. There's no need. Your plan will never come to pass, and on October 22, you will die. I have seen it."
"And on October 23, I will—prove you wrong," he replied. What he wanted to say was, cut out your tongue and your vocal cords, but it would ruin the impression he was trying to make.
"You won't, though," said the bespectacled youth. "I don't mean about the vision, I can't comment knowledgably on future events, but scientifically speaking, she is correct. After an initial interlude of chaos and anarchy, conditions will rapidly sink to that of the early Medieval period, but without adequate food stores, I foresee a further erosion into cannibalism shortly thereafter. In any case, without insect pollinators, the point is moot. Extinction will inevitably follow within fifty-four to sixty months. If not sooner."
"Shoot, am I the only one who can't follow what he says half the time?" complained the dancer.
"No," said the blond boy. "Hank, put a sock in your mouth and chew on it."
"The bucket isn't helping your credibility either, to be quite frank." the young man—Hank—finished.
He took a deep breath. "Those who are not with us are by definition against us."
"Those who are with you are by definition idiots and it's going to be a cakewalk for us." Joon-Yi Lensherr smiled sweetly and venomously.
"You truly think so? What about this?" Goaded beyond endurance, he flung a searing lance of energy at her, and had the satisfaction of seeing her small form fly through the window, shattering the glass, and continue all the way across the courtyard until she impacted against the building wall on the other side. He poured on more power, rupturing the earth, making it break apart into burning chunks, fragmenting the wall and burying her under it.
He heard the screams and outcries of the recruits, but he kept up his onslaught. The blond boy leapt in, countering his lance with a seething pulse of red, but at an angle, diverting it. Their combined force made a sizzling fireball that swept out, setting fire to trees and tearing up a geodesic dome.
Shaw got no good of it; the boy had not attacked him, had aimed away deliberately. He summoned up a small inferno, made to fling it at him—and then the dancer spat.
She didn't get his eyes, thanks to the angle and the helmet, but his nose and chin—. "AH!" Burning without flame, chemical! Shaw swiped at his face, feeling skin disintegrate.
"Now, Darwin!" Hank cried out. Hard shelled, steel-strong arms swept around him from behind, lifting him off his feet. He struck out, grabbing for the energy, but then there was a prick of a needle at his throat, and unconsciousness claimed him.
TBC….
A/N: Yes. I AM evil, I truly am. I am cutting it off here. Hooray for teamwork!
