Tony and I touched down on the roof of Xavier's school. Across from us were Hank and Xavier.

I turned to the blue beast, "Have you confirmed what we told you?"

Xavier nodded, staring at me, "We didn't want to believe it at first, but every non-mutant sample had the infection. Now that I know what to look for with Cerebro, I see it."

"We've been working on a solution for the disease. Specifically, I've managed to create a counter-plague. We need help contacting the Mutant community to make sure everyone is prepared for when Sublime inevitably lashes out to try and curtail our efforts to destroy it." I inform him seriously.

Xavier looked at us, "It works?"

Stark grinned, "Yep, tested it on myself. I'm free and I can't be infected again as long as I keep dosing myself."

"Stark has been liaising with a number of governments in his new telepathy-shielding rooms to start deploying it as soon as we give the word." I offer.

Xavier nodded, "I've been in touch with a number of my global contacts, and we are starting to spread to the point that start going to ground soon."

Hank paused, "What's the transmission vector for the counter-plague?"

"Airborne or direct contact with the bloodstream." I informed him.

"Can you produce a lot of it? We can distribute it to the mutant communities to aid in the spread."

I shake my head, "We can, but our information on Sublime suggests that it cannot make large behavioural changes in a short period of time, a rollout by governmental forces would result in more widespread adoption, while mutants spreading the cure would be more likely to spark distrust in it, and from there reduce adoption of the government spread."

Tony nodded, "Yeah, and we can't expect this solution to be instant. Sublime isn't a particularly powerful psionic, at least in the concentrations it is normally present in. But it's insidious. It makes changes in decision making long term, so that people don't think that they are acting out of character. That said, we should see that mutant right activism is much more effective now, and the trials of the cure among Stark Industries personnel have made them far more accepting of mutant co-workers. I'm glad to say that Stark Industries is the primary employer of Mutants in the US!"

Xavier nodded, "I've heard. We were wondering what the cause of the sudden change in recruitment numbers was."

"After our recruiters were dosed up, we had them go over the applicants again and hired anyone that was missed." Stark explained, "Quite a few people were passed over for no apparent reason, and it turned out, most of them were mutants, even if the recruiters had no way of knowing that they were in the first place."

I took a look at him, "How is Forge doing, by the way?"

"Loving the chance to help me design Candyland." Tony reported with a grin, "He's actually pretty smart, you know?"

Beast rolled his eyes, "I guess so."

"Don't be jealous, big guy." Tony said with a grin, "You can join me too."

Xavier was unimpressed, "Please don't try and poach my staff, Mr. Stark."

"Hey, I'm just letting him know what his job prospects are!" Tony said with a mock wounded expression, a whole new world is going to be opening up to him soon."

I shook my head as Tony grinned, "Speaking of which, I'm looking to offer an internship to some of the kids here. That Kurt guy seems pretty bright."

Xavier visibly aged in front of us as he realised just what was about to happen.

"I need an assistant." he said massaging his temples.

I chucked, "Spider-Woman knows a few people doing a communications major in NYU, I'll bet that having a job lined up when they graduate in a few months would be quite valuable to them."

Xavier looked at me gratefully, "That would be amazing. The students are great about handling the maintenance for the most part, but I don't think any of them have the experience needed to set up open days."

Xavier guided us down deeper into the building, "Why did you want to come here? If it was just that, a call would be sufficient."

I shook my head, "I actually want to take a look at Cyclops and Rogue. I've heard about their mutations through my sources and I think that Cyclops's control issue might actually be addressable. Rogue's might be more troublesome, but I still want to see if I can pick up what exactly is going on there so that I can do about it."

"Have you confirmed that theory of yours? About how all mutant powers are actually the same power expressed in different ways?" Xavier asked me.

"It seems to be a little more nuanced than that, but Across all the mutants I've scanned, I've detected something like what I was expecting to find with my experiments, but not all the mutants had quite the same ones. There seems to be two… maybe three different expressions that I was able to discover from the scans that your staff was willing to volunteer for and if I'm not mistaken, I believe Rogue might have a fourth, as yet undiscovered expression of mutant powers."

Hank nodded, "If that pans out, I'd like to see your research. Being able to turn off my powers would be incredibly useful."

"I kind of want to see if one of my theories holds true, but it runs the risk of completely depowering a mutant or sending their powers do out of control that they tear themselves apart and destroy anything in the immediate vicinity." I muse.

Tony and Xavier turned to me, "What are you talking about?"

"I've been following up on some theories on the mechanics of mutant powers, and one of them, in particular, has been giving me some interesting results." I explain to Tony, "My experiments have been a little mixed, but I want to compare the results against your research once I'm done."

Tony nodded, "Are you talking about the dimensional disturbances?"

Xavier looked a little lost, but Hank nodded, "I've been trying to get in touch with Reed Richards to see if his experience with the Negative Zone could be used to allow me a more mundane appearance."

"Yeah, I've been looking into those in relation with certain planes of existence that the sorcerors of Kamar Taj draw from after I found a spell that's very similar to the way that Pyro is able to manipulate fire." I reveal.

Stark nodded, "Their abilities do seem quite magical.'

Hank looked at me, "And you think that my powers might be similar?"

"My sensors detected a bit of dimensional bleed that causes your body to act in a manner more consistent with the properties of a realm quite different to this one - though, I haven't identified which one it is. The addition of Mystique's powers seems to allow you to draw on the energies of two different planes." I explain.

"So, these Sorcerors, could they help me gain control of my powers?"

I shrugged, "There are spells that transform people into bestial forms, so perhaps they might recognise the dimensions your mutation draws upon? If nothing else they should be able to dampen your connection to them. Might be a useful intermediary to see what happens in my proposed experiment. Dampening your ability to access other realms would give me a useful data point."

As we entered his office, we found ourselves greeted by Rogue and Scott.

Xavier nodded, "So, Rogue, Cyclops, this is Jon. He goes by Ripple when he operates publicly, but he is interested in studying you in order to see if your mutations can be brought under your control."

Rogue's eyes locked onto me, "You trust this man?"

"Ripple has been incredibly helpful and has shown us no ill will. The tests will be done under the supervision of Hank regardless, there should be no risk of you encountering any danger through this experiment." Xavier informed them.

Scott seemed a little less trusting though, "Are you sure?"

"Kid, if you don't want me to take a look, then just say so." I said bluntly, "I don't take unwilling patients, and if you are uncomfortable, then tell me as much. I'm sure Rogue wants to see what she's getting into."

Cyclops set his jaw and stared at me.

I sighed and turned to the younger woman, "Okay, so here's the drill. I'm oing to take you down to Hank's lab and I'm going to put down a sensor pad. I want you to stand on it and hold a few things then we give them to you. Please inform us if you are uncomfortable taking any of the objects so that we don't give you anything you are uncomfortable with."

"I won't be hurting no one, right?"

I shook my head, "No, nothing should cause you any damage on this front. We do have cloned samples from willing donors as a part of one of the tests, but no sapient individuals will be exposed to your power during the course of these tests."

Rogue took a deep breath and nodded, "I guess I'm ready then. When do we start?"

"We can start as soon as we get to the lab." Hank answered.

Rogue took a breath and nodded, "What are we waiting for then? Let's get moving."

Scott stared at us, "I'm going to watch."

I just ignored him and lead Rogue down to the labs.