A Third Path to the Future

by Vimesenthusiast

Rescued from the Negative Zone by the Fantastic Four, Harry Potter discovers he is a mutant and decides to take up the cause of equality between mutants and humans (among other causes). How will a dimensionally displaced Harry Potter, one who is extremely intelligent, proactive and not afraid to get his hands dirty effect the marvel universe? Pairings: Harry/Jean/Ororo/others pos.

20. There's gonna be a rumble

I don't own Harry Potter (Harmony forever~!) or Marvel. Time travel should not be so common place, those bloody morons, and there should have been someone sane yet powerful that Jean Grey could have been paired with without going all psycho stalker/control freak/cheater her.

Want to thank you all for the number of thoughtful reviews I receive for this work, and to those individuals who are willing to let me bounce ideas off them in particular. After talking to a few reviewers, I am working on a power level chart, and I have to say, a lot of the most powerful creatures, those that are so powerful they are actually limited in what they can do with that power, will not be appearing, or at best be making cameo appearances. Eternity and his family and Entropy for example, they are simply concepts, and making anthropomorphic personifications of them is silly in the extreme. Death on the other hand, has always been represented by physical personifications in nearly every culture, so that makes sense. The One Above All is still around, but won't have anything to do with the story. For those wondering, the Infinity gems will be changed so they aren't so ridiculous.

DANGER! WILL ROBINSON, DANGER! This has not been beta-ed by Jessolt, read at your own risk! This has not been beta-ed by Jessolt, read at your own risk! DANGER! WILL ROBINSON, DANGER! Kathryn518 and I have gone over it, and she helped solve one big issue inside, but I don't doubt there are a lot of errors. I will replace it with Jessolts beta-ed version when it becomes available, but perfection takes time. But seeing as I won't have time to write for the next two weeks (going away for family business away form my desktop at the same time my classes have dumped work on me, yay…) I wanted to get this out there now.

Chapter 20 There's Gonna Be a Rumble

General 'Thunderbolt' Ross stared out of the window of the Army transport plane his mind working furiously. He'd just come from a second hearing with the higher ups, all of whom had fallen in line with that damned spook Fury. Though Ross didn't really think he was the real Fury, no matter the tales about Fury since he hung up his spurs, he had been a man who knew a threat to national security when he saw one. I can't believe that, that fake convinced the brass to shut down my Hulk Busters! Why the hell can't anyone see that green menace is a danger to America, but that his powers could be a great asset too?

That had been the deciding factor for both hearings: that he had continued to research how to create new Hulks. Abomination had been a control failure, but he felt it should've shown that the technique at least to create superpowered soldiers was viable. The brass didn't see it that way, looking at the cost, in lives, in money, and in public opinion of the army.

Ross couldn't understand it, so what if an inner city had been destroyed in the battle between the Hulk and Abomination? Only fifty people had died after all, what worth was that in comparison to having soldiers with Hulk style powers under American control? Even one soldier with that kind of power would be worth an entire army, let alone the savings in upkeep, and what about using them as a deterrent? But all of his arguments had gained little toehold in his superiors' eyes.

His gloomy thoughts were interrupted as a voice spoke up behind him. "Is this seat taken, General?"

Ross turned to see a man in Air Force Colonel's clothing standing alongside his seat. He was a younger man, about fifteen to twenty years younger than rose, with the build of a soldier to go with his army uniform, and short cropped gray hair. "Who in the blazes are you, Colonel?" Thunderbolt looked around, noticing there wasn't anyone else nearby.

"A friend who believes much the same as you, that America needs to look to new and different ways to strengthen its position against exterior threats." The man said obliquely. "Though I personally believe that the mutant threat is the primary concern not the Hulk." The man sat down uninvited and looked at the general searchingly. "Tell me, what do you think of mutants? Or worse, the idea of them teaming up with the Hulk?"

Ross frowned. He'd seen the news reports about mutants, both here in America and worldwide. There'd been an incident a few years ago involving super-strong mutant in red armor, but he honestly didn't think that any of them could match against the Hulk. Still their powers were much more insidious and wide ranging than the Hulk's. "I suppose I can see your point on mutants, though that isn't my particular beef to grind."

"What if I said we could work together? You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. I have a plan to show the world why I think mutants are so dangerous, as well as take the fight to them. But I need a man with your experience to help me. In return, those resources will be yours whenever the Hulk shows up again. Don't worry about the higher ups either, I've got backers that are higher up the food chain the five stars in the Pentagon."

"I'm not going to agree to anything unless you lay out your plans out in full, Colonel." The general said angrily. "They haven't stripped me of my rank just yet soldier, and whatever you might be, I do by God outrank you! What's your name for starters? And I'll tell you flat, that I'll kill you myself if I think any of these so called plans of yours threaten the US or its security."

The Colonel leaned back thoughtfully, not having anticipated that Ross would take such a stern line given his initial offer. Still, he nodded. The leadership ability of Ross was important enough to get him to agree to that. Plus there were the resources that as a general Ross still had nominal access to, let alone the ones his name would get them. "My name is William Stryker. As for my plans…"

OOOOOOO

Harry woke up slowly, much more slowly than normal for him. He was one of those people who went straight from sleeping to wakefulness instantly, a holdover from his days with the Dursleys, but today that seemed to be in abeyance. Still, he knew he was sleeping somewhere safe. He reveled in feeling the arms of Ororo and Jean around him, with his own arms around them in turn. With his eyes still closed, he slowly took stock of his body.

The ribs which he knew had been broken in that fight were healed now, as well as a few other smaller injuries, including his hand, which had been badly burned, despite his Magia Erebeahealing himafter he burned it, and a cut he had taken along the side of his face. Moving his tongue around his mouth, Harry could taste the bone-knitting potion, which strangely enough had a sharper aftertaste then its parent potion. His other wounds, a cut here or there, a shattered bone in his arm which he had ignored during the battle, a thigh wound that was deep in to the meat of his limb, thankfully missing his vital arteries, along with a dislocated knee were all mended now.

Most of those Harry hadn't even noticed during the battle, ignoring the pain thanks to his Magia Erebea, but when that spell had died for lack of power, they should have kicked in with a vengeance, though Harry wasn't surprised that in his exhaustion he hadn't noticed. It looked as if most of them had healed themselves however, though Harry was touched to feel they had been wrapped in gauze in several places, knowing his ladies had done that for him.

After that Harry delved inside himself, feeling out his magical core. Normally his magical core would have, even after a strenuous fight refilled itself, but this was the first time he had pushed himself to the limit since coming to this dimension, and he could feel that he wasn't up to 100% just yet. Moreover, his magical core seemed to have shrunk from the gigantic monstrosity it had been after he had drained Balthakk. After it was completely filled once more Harry estimated it would about 2/3 as large again as it had been before he drained the Elder God, but it wouldn't reach the massive amount it had been leading up to the battle against Mephisto, which had been at least twice that.

It seems that there is an upper limit to the power I can drain and actually retain for the long term. A better way to put it might be that my core adjusts slowly in comparison to the power I can take in initially. That was good honestly, after all, on a day-to-day basis there was a limit to the amount of power Harry really needed. And there are all those little knickknacks and treasures from Selene that I can drain if I need more power at any given point.

Not wanting to be sidetracked until after dealing with William and Doom, Harry had allowed himself only a brief look, but some of them seemed interesting from a magical perspective. The painting of Selene, two of the carved gems which looked like lions, and the statue that Jean had found in the second cache in particular were covered with spells that Harry hadn't recognized offhand. And that's not even considering what will be in her last cache down in Greece. Things Selene categorized as odd and unusual knickknacks, brrr, he shook his mental head at that thought. But that could wait a few weeks.

Harry opened his eyes slowly, noticing out of the corner of one eye that the armor that he had been wearing had been negligently tossed to the ground of what looks like a suite in a hotel somewhere. It still retained the massive fist shaped indent where it had been struck by one of Mephisto's spells, the one that had cracked his ribs despite the armor, his crysis suit and his Magia Erebea. He winced a little at that, but hoped to analyze it as he had Juggernaut's armor, since it was definitely a good bit lighter. It didn't retain the same rigidity or strength but it came close enough, and for fighters like he and his ladies mobility was more important than strength. Eventually he hoped to get to a position where he could let each individual teammate choose what kind of armor he wished.

Harry was pulled from his thoughts and he looked up irritably as the faint tone of the bell on the suite's door registered on his senses. He slowly eased himself out from between Ororo and Jean, smiling as the two ladies moved towards one another, Ororo resting her head against Jean's negligée clad breasts, the top of Jean's white underclothing visible above the blanket of the bed.

His hand twitched slightly, and he conjured up a bathrobe for himself pulling it on then and making his way through the suite to the main door. Idly he noticed the time being seven in the morning. That was their normal wake up time, but he wondered why the hell someone was at the door. Opening it Harry's eyebrows knit together and he growled, "Yes?"

The bellhops on the other side of the doorway had won a contest among the bellhops to see who would bring up the breakfast for this suite, since everyone was interested in the trio that had apparently rented it. A hot as hell redheaded twenty something had rented it and paid in advance for three, but then an equally attractive black woman and the redhead had been seen later that same evening while a young man had been seen parking a Pagani Huayra, one of the most expensive and fastest cars in the world. But later, no one on the staff could say if they had seen the man come in all, but here he was. It was minor mysteries like these that made working at a hotel bearable.

Now however the man decided that he would much rather have lost, there was something about this man's presence and the glare from those emerald eyes that made him want to wet himself. "U-um, a Ms. Monroe ordered breakfast for, for three, sir?" Next to him his fellow bellhop was too busy to help him, blushing at the fact that the man was quite obviously naked underneath those robes. Pity he was probably straight if he was dating either of the women that had been seen the day before.

"Leave it there." Harry nodded, waving a hand that was hidden by the doorway around to summon up his wallet, wondering idly why Ororo asked for room service rather than for a house-elf to wake them up with food. Probably still not used to their service deep down, he mused. He pulled out two twenty Franc notes and passed them over, then pushed in the trays himself, thanking them before closing and locking the door.

After that, he cast a charm over both pushcarts, making certain that the food would keep before making his way back to the suite's bedroom. There he found that Ororo had kicked off the covers, and was thus revealed in all of her glory as she lay there on her stomach, her head still nestled into Jean's negligee clad chest. The sight caused Harry's heart to pound and he smiled then moved forward, deciding to wake his loves in the best way imaginable.

Lemon start:

Harry began by working on Ororo's feet, his hands kneading them as he began to suck and lick at her toes, causing Ororo to sigh in her sleep, shifting slightly. From there he made his way up, kissing and gently kneading her legs until he came to her rear, which he began to fondle, lick and occasionally bite gently. His tongue traced from one check over to the other than down into her crack, and from there to her pussy lips, which was glistening with arousal already. For Ororo her feet were a major erogenous zone, something Harry had found out a while ago. With both hands gripping her cheeks he thrust his tongue inside her pussy, licking furiously.

This finally caused Ororo to wake with a gasp and moan, bucking up off the bed. She looked blearily over her shoulder down her back to find Harry at work on her nether regions. She laughed quietly, twisting her body around so she lay flat on her back, giving him much better access. Her hands found purchase in his hair while she murmured quietly. "The best way to wake up Harry, though I had plans to do the same to you."

Ororo quirked an eyebrow suddenly, not finding a few scars on his scalp that had been there. Her eyes traced down his neck and back, what she could see in the light of the dawn coming through the window and noticed many of the scars that he had were gone. In particular Harry had some scars on his back right under his shoulders. He had said once that those had come from his time with the Dursleys.

At that point in her search however, Ororo's higher brain functions went away for a time. "I love the taste of you my Ororo," Harry said, deliberately licking from one end of her pussy down to the other in one long lick as he stared up past her breasts into her eyes. Ororo shuddered in ecstasy at the look of love and lust there, and Harry delved back down to work her over even bit more thoroughly, one hand rising to her a breast to tweak and fondle, while the other began to play with her clit gently.

"MMM," Ororo moaned louder, as she raised her hips up into Harry's mouth. Both the noise and the continued jostling woke up Jean behind her, who looked blearily at the action going on and shook her head faintly for a moment before deciding to join in.

She leaned down, kissing Ororo's face, turning the African woman's face to her. They nuzzled against one another for a moment, their eyes shining with love then kissed tenderly. The redhead's hands began to fondle the other woman's dark chocolate nipples and breasts, tweaking and caressing, heightening her pleasure.

"Jean, that feels so goooood." Ororo gasped, moving back from the kiss to move down Jean's neck to her negligee clad chest, her hands pushed it upwards, while Jean lifted her arms, aiding Ororo in getting her sleepwear off. Soon Jean was only clad in a sheer set of red silk panties. Now it was Jean's turn to moan aloud as Ororo began to kiss and lick at her breasts, while her own hands went back to Ororo's chest.

Below, Harry was now fingering Ororo furiously, in and out, in and out, his thumbs from both hands now moving from between running down her pussy and playing with her clit at the top of it, as his tongue worked the edges and occasionally thrust inside, alternating with the fingers. Moments later, Harry thrust in a third finger, then, as Ororo bucked her rear up again at this more powerful intrusion pulled all three fingers out, thrust his tongue inside, then called on his parseltongue ability. "§Come for me, Ororo, my weather witch§!"

"GODDESS!" Ororo bucked and thrashed cuming with such intensity her eyes rolled back for a moment.

Harry let her rest for a moment, before turning her over onto her chest, positioning her so that she was now on her knees with her head now resting on Jean's chest as the two women exchanged light kisses. Harry divested himself of his conjured bathrobe.

He exchanged a heated glance with Jean who stared down past Ororo at his turgid erection, watching avidly as Harry moved forward to sheaf himself in Ororo's very well lubricated pussy from behind. Her attention was grabbed however when Ororo moved her head down to rest it between the redhead's legs. Her tongue flicked out lightly, licking the outside of Jean's panties, causing Jean to jolt upright with a gasp of pleasure. Ororo's hands moved to bracket her head, and her thumbs began to works up and down the edge of panties that was the only thing between them and Jean's pussy.

"Oh goddess!" Ororo shouted, raising her head just slightly to breathe deeply and moan aloud at once more being filled by her lover. She loved this position at times, it was somehow more primal more animal-like, so for morning attacks like this, it was perfect. And, she thought to herself as Harry leaned over her, his hands now moving underneath her body to play with her breasts and tweak her nipples his lips on the back of her neck, there is a place right theremm! "MMM!" Her thoughts were interrupted as she moaned aloud again. That he can't quite reach if we're face to face! "I love it Harry, more!"

Harry pounded into his African lover, his head thrown back as he tried to keep control of himself. The sight of Ororo eating out Jean and Jean's own eyes on him, her jade eyes clouded over with lust and desire was helping Ororo's pussy to eat away at his self-control. He tried to change the angle and power of his thrusts to increase Ororo's pleasure, leaning forward again to nip and bite at the back of her neck, something Ororo likened to a lion with his lioness.

Eventually the two of them changed positions a few times with Harry pulling Ororo onto her side, one leg thrown over his shoulder. Most of the time during their lovemaking she was more involved than this, but for some reason Harry was utterly overwhelming her this time.

Eventually however, as Ororo came again having lost count of her orgasms, her pussy clamping down on him once more before she went nearly limp, Harry reached his new limit. He thrust deeply inside, bellowing aloud as he came in a torrent. "Ororo!"

Ororo's own scream of delight and the vibrations of her face against her privates sent Jean over the edge for the third time, and she gasped and bucked, her legs rising to clamp down on either side of Ororo's back pulling her face deeper into Jean's cleft.

After a moment the sensation subsided, and she unlocked her ankles from around Ororo letting her legs fall boneless fleet back to the bed. Ororo however fell onto her side completely insensate, as Harry slowly pulled out from her, letting her rest.

At the sight of Harry's still hard cock Jean weakly twisted herself forward, moving towards him on her hands and knees over the bed, her mouth open and her tongue licking her lips, her eyes still clouded with lust. Harry made to lay down, and Jean scooted over, just enough so that he could lay down before she moved in, her mouth gobbling and nibbling at his cock, smiling at the mix of tastes. Today Harry tasted like pear, while Ororo tasted like a musky, heady sort of vanilla. An odd combination, but it worked.

Harry lifted one of Jean's legs over his head, and with one hand pulled her soaked panties down, leaving her bare to his eyes for the first time, which had Harry comparing the two women's private parts. Ororo had actual small lips to her pussy, while Jean had no visible lips, but her pussy did have a slightly larger clit, though overall her pussy looked somewhat smaller which made sense. Jean was hairier down here, trimmed but not nearly to Ororo's level. She was meticulous about keeping her pubic hair trimmed into the shape of a small lightning bolt.

Jean's pussy was also glistening and twitching from Ororo's earlier attentions. So much so a few drops actually fell onto Harry's face as he waited a moment for her to protest or do anything to indicate that she wasn't ready for this. But Jean merely continued her work on his cock, not trying to deep-throat it, merely working up and down his shaft with her lips, occasionally taking tip into her mouth while one hand cupped and played with his balls, the other moving up and down his shaft. With this sign of approval, Harry pressed forward, his mouth finding her pussy and his fingers already tweaking it flicking in and out slowly.

As sensitive as they both were from their previous orgasms the sixty-nine couldn't last for long, and not twenty minutes later they both came once more, with Harry only warning Jean by the barest second to pull back before he came, shooting his spunk up onto her face and into her hair, so much it nearly covered her entire face. In turn Jean came with a wail of "HAAARRRYYYYY!" She actually squirted a little, her juices filling his mouth as he clamped down on her pussy again.

The taste was a heady mixture of cinnamon and vanilla, making Harry wonder idly if the two of them had shared some ice cream the evening before after looking after him. While surprising, it also brought a smile to his face, happy that he had made Jean cum so hard. Switching her twitching a bit in aftershocks however, he knew the fun was over for now.

Lemon End

Ororo gently reached down, pulling Jean up over her body to rest on the right side of the bed, as Harry wearily fell backward. The three of them exchanged heated kisses for a while, their tongues out and questing as they kissed and cuddled in the afterglow of the moment. Then Harry pulled back and said with a grin "so, ready for round two?"

Jean gurgled with laughter, smacking his shoulder lightly before nuzzling in between the other two for a moment, one arm going around Harry while her other hand found Ororo's. "On a somewhat similar note Harry, Ororo and I decided we all needed a few days off. We've got a lot of work to do when we get back, but let's face it, we've been running ourselves ragged the past few weeks, and we can afford some down time now that Dr. Druid, Ms. Brown and father Garnoff can watch the kids and Shiang Chi can continue training Piotr and Nikolai. Nothing needs us right now save our own long term projects, none of which are time sensitive."

Harry nodded. "I suppose we could take a break, three days, four?"

"Four if we can get away with it," Ororo said firmly, recovering a bit more quickly than the other two, humming in contentment as her free hand rubbed her lower stomach, where she could still the warmth of Harry's essence deep inside her. Harry's hand covered her belly for a moment glowing briefly as he cast the anti-pregnancy spell. Normally he would've conjured that before beginning, but it had slipped his mind this time, still it was within the time limit for it. "That will allow us all to go out on dates, and for Emma and myself, if she can get away at least, to spend some time together."

Harry nodded not commenting on that until Jean raised an eyebrow. "Come on Harry, we're not going to bite your head off or anything. What do you think about her joining us? You have to admit that there is some kind of chemistry between the two of you."

"Am I attracted to her? That would be a hell yes; I do have a pulse after all. Is there a connection there, yes." Harry said shrugging with a lopsided smile on his face. Jean chuckled but Harry went on. "Am I ready to say that I love her as much as I do the two of you, no. Could it go that way yes almost certainly, but I'm worried about messing what up what we already have. Sooner or later," he said smiling wider as his fingers began to trace down Ororo and Jean's sweaty sides. "You two are going to realize that I'm only one man. I've been trying to be the perfect boyfriend, and I think I've succeeded, but could I do that for three women, not just two? That worries me, and you all are worth it."

"I for one am not letting you go regardless," Ororo said firmly, both of her hands now grabbing his and bringing it to her lips to kiss gently. "Face it Harry Potter, we both love you, and you're stuck with us."

"She speaks for me too," Jean said firmly as well, leaning up to kiss Harry's cheek and neck, nuzzling there for a moment. "We're together Harry, that's not ever going to change. I'll say that I would like Emma to join us, I think that we could be good together all four of us, but it's still Ororo's decision as well as yours since I know my own attraction to her is clouding my judgment there. Do I love Emma as much is the two of you, no, but I am attracted to her. But Emma has said she loves you, and that's not something that she would say lightly."

Ororo nodded pressing close to Harry, "As I said, she and I will talk. I have no problems with you dating her, to see if the attraction and the connection between you can go deeper Harry on your part. But she and I still need to get to know one another before I am happy about her joining the relationship we have full time."

"Agreed," Harry replied quickly. "I think dating her is a good idea so long as you're certain you're fine with it, but this isn't one of those old-style harems the sheiks used to have. I'm not the center of this relationship." Ororo and Jean exchanged a glance and very carefully did not giggle at that, since he most definitely was. "This is a triumvirate; if she joins it will be a… whatever you call a group of four. Equals, all of us, with all of us having equal amounts of affection for one another."

Ororo and Jean exchanged another smile, and proceeded to kiss Harry senseless for a time. Once that was done, the trio got up to eat breakfast and plan out the first day of their vacation. The evening before, while Harry was out of it, Ororo had told Nessy to inform the others that they would not be returning for a few days since they were having a little break, and that they weren't to be bothered except for emergencies. The house-elf had returned promptly and stated that the others at the castle all understood, and that Melody in particular wished them well.

After a bit Harry described the changes in his core, and the fact his injuries had healed without even any scarring. Ororo had him stand up and turn around for a moment, then nodded. "I thought it might have been my imagination, but many of your scars are gone my Harry. The ones on your back are gone, and from what I can remember the ones on your scalp as well. You still have your lightning scar on your forehead, and the one on your arm, you said that one was caused by a basilisk tooth? Those and two more on your side is all I can see." It also had heightened his endurance, both regular and sexual from what Ororo could tell.

"So my little near-immaterial moment did have some long term consequences." Harry mused. "Interesting, but not in a worrisome way. So, what do you have planned for this little vacation?"

One thing however Ororo and Jean would have to take care of quickly was that neither of them had brought along enough cold weather clothing. "This hotel has shops does it not?" Ororo asked as she bit into her fresh orange slice, a smile on her lips.

"I saw some yesterday when Harry and I checked in," Jean affirmed. "This high up in the Alps, the ski season is nearly year round, so we could go skiing, but well need some more clothing for that."

"Cushioning charms got it," Harry muttered shaking his head. "I've never been skiing, and I understand that crashing is a part of learning that particular sport."

"Most definitely, but that'll just make it more fun for us," Jean grinned at him. Harry stole a piece of her pancake as it moved towards her mouth, smirking at her in retaliation and Ororo shook her head at their antics. After that, the conversation continued from there to less serious topics.

After the meal was over the two girls went to shower and get ready for the day, while Harry cleaned up the mess from the meal, and set it aside by the doorway. He noticed however that the house-elves had already come in and cleaned up the bedroom, and he thanked the air around him for that, then waited for the two girls to come out. "I'm going to head up to London for a bit," he stated as they rejoined him. "I should only be gone a few hours, but I want to check in at the Braddock estate. I need to figure out if whatever took Betsy was magical in nature. If it left even a trace, I can figure out a way to track it."

Jean frowned. "Would your magical sight carry over into your memory thingy, the P something?"

Harry nodded, "Yes and it's called a pensieve."

Jean laughed at the note of censure in his voice as Ororo finished toweling her hair. The two girls had a few more moments in the confines of the shower to make out, but they were careful not to get too into it just at that moment, with shopping to look forward to later on Jean's part, and some lingering sensitivity on Ororo's. "Good, in that case maybe it'll leave some residue if you see any kind of energy or anything. I wish had developed a scanner for that, but I don't suppose you could nip over to the Fantastic Four and grab one of theirs?"

"I'd rather not find out firsthand what kind of anti-teleportation defense Reed has developed since the last time we talked," Harry said dryly. "However, it's a good idea, so I'll call them right now."

While the two girls were getting dressed Harry did so, and was surprised to get Johnny Storm on the other end, with some toddler noises in the background, indicating Franklin was up well past his bedtime. "Babysitting Johnny? How did things go with your sort-of ex-girlfriend?"

"Irritably," Johnny growled. "We're still communicating, but her family is rather… isolationist I suppose you could say." That was of course understating the case, but even to an ally like Harry, Johnny certainly wasn't going to share the secrets of Inhumans unless he had their permission. "What's up? Oh, and Wyatt said that he had figured out a time and date for you to meet one of his friend's relatives or something in the next few days."

"Excellent," Harry nodded. I'll be happy to meet with them whenever. But right now I have a quick question. Do you know if Reed has anything that can detect energy signals?" Johnny laughed and Harry rolled his eyes. "Alright stupid question. Can you find it and place one example of such somewhere where I can come and get it?"

"I can find one of them easily enough, though I don't think you'll be able to teleport in. Reed put up a new anti-teleportation defense recently, and Agatha says it blocks even her technique."

That caused Harry's eyebrows to rise, since Agatha's personal method of teleportation, while requiring a bit of a ritual to use, was actually much smoother and better than his own. Anything that could simply slide through Dr. Strange's wards after all was something to be respected. Let this be a lesson Harry, he thought to himself, anything magic can do science might be able to accomplish with the right mind behind it. "In that case, how do you suppose we could get it to me quickly? There is a woman in the UK, a friend of ours that has gone missing recently. I have to admit that we didn't keep in contact with her as much as we should, simply because of well, practically everything else that happened recently."

"Why do you think I'm babysitting?" Johnny growled. "We've had four different crises since we last saw you one after another, including a few that, well let's just say that there are a lot of creatures that live in odd areas of the world shall we? Including one group in the Himalayas which just had to be seen to be believed, and of course they had a world domination scheme that we had to stop. Seems everyone and their grandmother has one of those."

"I understand, though I'll see your odd species bent on world domination and raise you fighting a Demon Lord in his own dimension. It was not a pleasant experience." Harry smiled darkly.

"Not even gonna ask." Johnny shook his head as he stood up, the phone in one hand and his nephew hanging from the other as he looked around. "I have one device here already, I don't think that the anti-teleportation field extends to the lower levels of the building, I'll head out, and you can teleport in to the lounge or something."

Or, Harry thought to himself. Since I don't remember the entrance lounge of the Baxter Building nearly well enough to teleport there, I could teleport up to High Note then move it over to America and fly down from there. "I'll be there in an hour and a bit then."

This put him back around an hour and a half, so by the time he had the device it was time to go back to the girls. He did so, popping into the suite just as they came in carrying a bag each. Jean's was noticeably bulging while Ororo's was much smaller. Ororo didn't particularly like shopping, and had simply taken what she liked and went with it while Jean insisted on trying things out. This included some eyeliner that she thought looked fantastic on Ororo, but which Ororo had declined. There were only a select few individuals that she wanted to look at her with desire, and they already did so, so she and saw no point in adding to the effect.

"Your suggestion was a good one Jean, though I was right, Reed's put up an anti-teleport block. He also wasn't there to take it down, apparently he and Sue were out on a date." It was actually nine hours ahead of California time here, so in California it wasn't past two in the morning just yet. Johnny was probably going to be yelled at by his sister for letting Franklin stay up so late, though Harry had been happy to see the little tyke. "Thankfully there's no indication that its anything but the two of them spending time away from the others. They've been having a busy time of it too, apparently."

Ororo laughed quietly, leaning over to kiss Harry on the cheek, still feeling very affectionate from the morning. Jean had come into quite a lot of kisses as they were shopping, and the two of them had startled a worker rather badly at the ladies lingerie shop at one point by making out in the changing area. "Even if something has happened, I'm certain the Fantastic Four can handle themselves my love, they've been doing it for several years after all."

"Oh yes, I'll be sticking this problem, if it is a problem at all, under the heading, 'not mine'. It's a glorious heading, I wish I could use it more often," Harry quipped, pulling her into a deep kiss, still feeling a little randy himself actually. He hadn't been joking earlier about a second round.

Jean laughed and after the two broke off pulled Harry into her own kiss, then pushed him away. "Go on, figure out what the hell happened to Betsy. I'm worried about her."

"So am I," Ororo said, her own ardor dissipating at the memory.

"I am too, that girl's as tough as nails, she did a hell of a job at directing the Gurkhas during that incident with Selene, and her refusal to simply give up after her eyes ripped out…" Harry shook his head. "There's a lot of strength in that girl."

Ororo smiled hearing the admiration in his voice and kissed him on the cheek again. "Go on then, Jean and I will figure out what the three of us will be doing for the rest of the day, and then will contact Emma to see if she's free to join us."

After another round of kisses Harry bowed his way out, heading down to where his car was parked to drive it out of the city then teleport it and himself to London. Despite his desire to take it out for a spin, this errand was such that he didn't want to spend much more time lollygagging about.

About an hour later, he was once more pulling up outside the Braddock estate and ringing the doorbell. Brian himself answered this time, and met Harry at the door, looking haggard. His sister had been gone coming up onto a week, and he was becoming more and more concerned. "I hope you find something Harry, I am, I am deeply worried for my sister."

"If it was a magical anything that took her, I'll find traces of it almost immediately and I'll be able to track it down with ease." Harry replied tapping his eyes for a moment. They glowed light green slightly as he activated his mage sight. "If not, I have this device that will scan for various energy traces, and a contact that could tell us something. He's not in the office today, spending time with the wife apparently, but he'll be able to help us if Jean can't." Harry would back Jean as an engineer, but this wasn't really engineering was it? And despite their initial plans, she hadn't had time to start to take long distance courses of her own in other areas.

Brian nodded, and led the way up to Betsy's room. The interior hadn't changed overmuch, though the bed had been made recently. "And you're saying Betsy disappeared directly from her room?"

"Yes, one moment she was here the next she was gone. We had had lunch as normal, and she made her way up the stairs." Brian smiled somewhat proudly. "She was very happy to be able to get around without her eyes, though she had hoped to hear from you or the others. I know that Ms. Monroe has called her several times as has Ms. Grey, but…" he shrugged. "A part of me wants to blame you for not getting back to us about helping her eyesight come back but my honesty forbids it."

"I'll be honest with you, I haven't been able to work on that project at all. Other things have taken precedent, and that'll be a tough one anyway. Creating the eyeballs will be one thing, connecting it to her mind will be another, and both will take time. I was hoping to talk to my scientist friend to see if we could come up with a mixed technological and magical solution, but even that hasn't been easy." That wasn't the only thing he wanted to talk to Reed about, of course. It was time to move some of his plans forward, especially his space-born ones. "I apologize for that, but we had no hint she was in danger, so thought we had time on our side."

"Can you see anything?" Brian asked after a moment of silence.

Harry didn't mind Brian jogging his elbow, if Harry had a sister and she suddenly disappeared… well the phrase 'move heaven and earth' would fit quite well. "No, nothing with my mage sight." Harry straightened up from where he had been looking underneath the bed, and shook his head. "Time to turn to technology."

He pulled out the device, a small handheld scanner about as large as his palm, with a radial disc at one end that fanned out as he turned it on. Almost immediately the thing began to beep loudly, and Harry frowned toggling it's controls. A brief hologram appeared in the air, showing a circle of some kind of energy beyond the visible spectrum in the air right above the bed. "I think that might be the scientific equivalent of a teleportation," Harry said frowning deeply. "I need to meet with my friend, but off the top of my head, I can't think of someone who has access to teleportation technology like this, not without knowing this room as well as their starting point."

Doom had some teleportation technology, but he also had no need to take Betsy that Harry could see. Reed might as well but again no reason, Tony possibly could create something but hadn't yet, and of the other geniuses he knew by name, none of them were working in this area of expertise.

Even this little bit of information made Brian smile, happy that some progress had been made though he was still unhappy he had to wait. "The moment you do, I trust you will contact me? If we need to mount a rescue expedition, you will bring me along, do I make myself clear? She is my sister Mr. Potter."

"I understand." Harry said straightening further and reaching out to grip the other man's shoulder. "If we do need to rescue her, I'll call you in. Until then, stay strong, and don't give up hope."

Brian nodded and escorted Harry to the door, sensing he wasn't in the mood to hang about. Moments later Harry was on the road again, driving down the road a ways until he could teleport back to the place he had teleported up from the Alps.

OOOOOOO

Emma walked into the Hellfire Club for only the second time since she had taken control of Frost Corp, and was greeted as the royalty she was. She waved one hand at the servants who were hurrying towards her to see if she needed anything. Emma knew they served the club, and the Kings in particular, so could not be trusted beyond providing good service. Still, in that they could be trusted at least.

People moved aside for Emma as she strolled through the main area of the club. She smiled very briefly but warmly as she noted Paris moving towards her. People got out of her way as well of course, and there was much whispering in corners as the two Queens exchanged polite greetings then moved to a table together. The fact the queens were on good terms wasn't news, but speculation always ran rampant on the why of it, as well as what deals the two would be working on together. When you were talking about multi-billion dollar businesses, everyone in the club wanted to see if they could jump on the bandwagon.

While the two kings had their own secret chamber where meetings between the two of them could take place, the queens had no such resource, nor could they use the Kings. So they were forced to use one of the upstairs meeting rooms, or a table on the first floor. As the two women made their way toward the large central staircase they took the time to nod pleasantly at Pierce who was once again at the bar, drinking something dark in a tall glass, who simply nodded his head at them, his eyes watching them as they moved away.

Emma's true thoughts about Pierce never showed on her face, as she turned away to follow Paris, but she felt it was time to do something about him. He had been much more wary, of her since her father had died rightly assuming that she had something to do with it. On top of this wariness Emma could also sense Pierce was jealous of her wealth and success, not just as leader of Frost Corp, but the success she had in working with the rest of the club, making contacts and gaining more business for her companies. It seemed a mix of honest jealousy and masculine anger that a woman was doing better than him. As she stepped up onto the first stair, she read a surface thought to that indicated he wanted to intimidate her in some physical fashion but after a second he thought better of it.

Yet beyond that, Emma sensed the thoughts that told her it was time to move against him. His increasingly rabid feelings towards mutants were becoming closer and closer to the surface of his mind. She didn't know what was causing it, certainly the public debate on mutants hadn't changed lately, though Britain's pro-rights stance had sent ripples of shock throughout the rest of the world. It seemed to challenge the other democracies saying 'we are leading once again, will you follow'? So far, none of the other governments of the world had decided to take up that challenge, but the debate in the halls of power here in America had definitely become even more vociferous.

As Emma and Paris sat across from one another in a small, very nicely appointed room however she kept her thoughts on Pierce, and what she was going to set into motion today for the man. Late the evening before, her worms had finally found some solid information about him and his plans, and they weren't pretty at all, based around some of his company's holdings that dealt with artificial limbs and robotics. They were so disturbing she was willing to pass it on without any strings attached. I find it ironic in the extreme that Pierce, for all his hatred of mutants, is willing to… augment himself in such a fashion. Still, we will see if Shaw responds as I believe he will.

"So, are you enjoying your new status? And exactly what did you want to meet about?" Paris asked drawing Emma out of her thoughts as the two women finished ordering a few drinks and some aperitifs. Say what you would about the servant's trustworthiness, but the food was excellent. Almost as good as Harry's house elves.

"I wanted to thank you in person for all your aid as I was getting used to the club and its foibles." Emma replied looking across at the older woman. "On a personal level, I thank you for your help, woman to woman. On a professional level, it let me get my feet wet much more easily they would have otherwise been the case."

They both knew that she was talking about how Paris had basically kept the other two kings from interfering at first, convincing Buckman to join Shaw in merely observing her, and Paris had been a friend to her visibly, something that made the bishops much more cautious in trying to take advantage of her. After the first few days of course that was no longer necessary as Emma had proven that she couldn't be taken advantage of, and could stand on her own, but it had still been helpful.

"On another happier topic, I read in the tabloids a few days ago that you and Edward have decided on a date for the wedding? The Caribbean would not be my choice, I think no pun intended that Paris would, but…" she shrugged. "Congratulations in any event."

Paris's smile became much more warm and genuine at that. It always amused Emma how much Paris was looking forward to just being a simple housewife, and a mother in particular. She genuinely loved Edward, which was rather startling given how rare it was for anyone in their positions to feel such emotions. "Thank you Emma, I'm rather looking forward to it. Of course Edward has left all the arrangements to me, saying what is that old saw oh yes, 'weddings are for brides, wedding night are for grooms'."

Emma laughed politely at the older woman's put upon expression, and then they got down to serious business. The two of them had talked before Emma over her company of the possibility of Paris using her companies' advertising power to push Frost Corp goods and services. Now they hammered that deal out, until they both felt it was one that would make both of their companies quite a lot of money in the future.

"By the way," Paris said as Emma went over some of the paperwork, both of them eating from a plate grilled shrimp. "Those new weapons that Cold Steel has come up with are making headlines already. It won't be very difficult to bring them to center stage in any number of ways but do they work truly as well as you claim?"

"The long-range tazer system in particular is an excellent weapon yes, and one I would like our first run of commercials to be about." Emma replied.

Harry had passed on two other designs both of which were good, and had a wide range of applications. A wide area sound-based knockout system that had been tested numerous times and been found to work on crowds was the second, and it had even more applications in terms of security than in police keeping. The third design was a wrist-based system much like the tazer they could be hidden under civilian garb just as easily as a watch, something that had been making it one of the big time draws for plains clothes operators of all sorts. SHIELD in particular had ordered an even hundred of them.

After a little while they finish the paperwork and exchanged it, both of them pleased with how it had gone. The rest of the time while they finished their small meal was spent discussing the club in general, the upcoming wedding, and various economy-related news. Naturally they both watched the international news and the international business news very closely, and both women had already pulled some of their holdings in Spain and Greece out. The Greece government in point of fact was so corrupt that it was in danger of collapse, and neither wanted to deal with the upheaval of that affecting their profits. At the same time Shaw and Buckman had actually been moving in, if somewhat small scale in comparison to Hammer Industries, which always saw profit in such chaos.

"You do know that you have made yourself a target with Hammer? Not only is Cold Steel once more a viable name in the weapons industry albeit in a different direction than most Hammer stock, but that embarrassment that his American representative got into with your sister has given the whole company a black eye. Justin Hammer isn't one to take such things lying down."

Emma looked at her interestedly. "Have you ever met him in person?"

"Twice actually, once at a social function, once at a business deal that never went through." Paris closed her eyes for a moment bringing the man to mind before opening them. "By this point he's an older man, pushing 65 or so, his hair was going gray the last time I saw him so probably all gray by now. Somewhat wrinkled face, like someone who's been worked outside, though the rest of his body gives that the lie, no tan to speak of. Tall, thin very thin fingers I remember. Somewhat strong for all of that, he's one of those men you know, who think that a good strong grip gives them a position of power in a discussion."

"Oh, one of those, that's just grand." Emma rolled her eyes.

"Oh definitely one of those," Paris laughed. "He's an arrogant little so and so. Admittedly with more reason than most, but he doesn't try to hide his arrogance. I wouldn't say he's a genius, but he's methodical, meticulous, and employs several scientists who on the whole can possibly stand up to Tony Stark. He is also personally unscrupulous, not just in his business dealings but his personal arrangements, worse than Shaw in a few ways. I know for a fact that he has forced a few women he's been with over the years to have abortions, and then quietly removed them."

'Remove them' of course in this parlance meant 'kill' but Paris was loath to use such words thinking them, and the people who resorted to such methods, beneath contempt. "He has a dominating personality and tries to dominate any deal he makes, and is not above threatening in person if he thinks he can get away with it. He tried in my case, which was the entire reason why he wanted to meet with me in person but it didn't work."

"I've dealt with that type before." Emma frowned. "I didn't expect someone he in his position to be that blatant though." Shaw, for all his thuggish attitude, was careful to hide such in most situations.

"It's just part and parcel of his personality. If you are in his presence, he will be as overt as he can, he doesn't seem to honestly think anyone is his equal. I'm not certain why frankly, nor do I care. But don't let that fool you. That man is very capable of subtlety in business and clandestine operations, it is simply not his preferred method."

Emma nodded and waited until Paris finished copying her signature to another paper before speaking again. "By the way, I have been approached by a startup company in Britain, which may be looking for some commercialization a few months down the road. Would you be willing to talk to them?"

"That would depend on how big the business is." Paris replied coolly. Just because they were friends didn't mean that she was going to do Emma any favors, after all. Plus startups rarely had the money available to pay her rates.

"Well apparently their first earnings, even before they have officially come out into the open is nearly $4 billion pounds sterling." Emma very carefully hid a smirk at that, remembering her own not insignificant role in that.

"Significant…" Paris murmured letting none of her initial surprise show. Raking in that much money before even actually officially becoming a corporation was astonishing, let alone Emma's interest was impressive.

The conversation diverged from there, while Emma's mind was busy elsewhere, delving into the mind of one of the club's workers. She left the club an hour later with a faint smile on her face at how well it had gone. She spared a moment to nod at Pierce who nodded back from his own position as he was leaving, and thought pleasantly to herself yes, we'll see what Shaw chooses to do, I do hope he reacts as I expect him to, you half-alive abomination.

Emma's day only got better when she came home to receive a message via their mirror communicator that Jean, Harry and Ororo had decided to take a few days off, and had invited her up to join them at a very high-class resort deep in Switzerland. While she couldn't get away for the entire time, she found herself eager to join them of an evening, and replied fervently. The fact that Ororo had agreed to talk to her was icing on the cake.

That very evening Sebastian Shaw walked into the club. He entered the upstairs area, finding the Inner Circle's meeting area empty as he had expected it to be. From there he entered the king's observation lounge, and stopped as his foot hit something by the door. He looked down at it quickly, wary of some kind of trap, but only saw a small data disk, half hidden under the door. Reaching down swiftly he scratched at one ankle as if he had been bitten by something, while thumbing the data disk into his palm. Underneath it was an equally small piece of paper folded over many times.

Once within the confines of the King's viewing room, and the palm and eye protected door closed behind him, Shaw folded out the pace of paper to look at it while waiting the data disk in his hand. On the piece of paper were several addresses and names. Below this was the phrase 'I believe it is time to move against Pierce, how you do so is at your discretion. If you need further aid, you may contact me'. There was no signature but the handwriting was clear enough, at least in that portion.

Shaw frowned for a moment then stuck the data disk into a small recorder set into his chair. A screen popped up and out of the other armrest moving on a metal arm to set itself to go over the information, his frown deepening as he did so. Two hours later he leaned back and nodded. "Yes, time and time past to move against Pierce. And to think after all I've done for him, he is most definitely not who I expected him to be. Now, how to go about it…"

OOOOOOO

Later that day it turned out that Harry's sense of balance didn't translate well to skiing. Ororo and Jean had laughingly forbidden him to use any kind of magic to aid him, since they weren't using any of their powers either. Still, they had fun, especially when Emma was able to join them for a few hours. She couldn't stay for very long that first day, but thanks to the time difference she would be able to spend time with them over the next few days.

After thoroughly humiliating himself on the slopes, Harry took Ororo out on their date, though it wouldn't just be the two of them. After talking it over, the two of them had decided that what Harry wanted to do sounded more like something Melody would positively love, and they had popped up to Hogwarts to ask the girl if she wanted to come with them.

When informed that she would have to get dressed up she had looked a little skeptical, but the lure of actually going to Les Miserable at the Queen's Theater was too good to be true. She had heard a few of the songs from it, and was ecstatic to see the real thing. That, plus the fact that the songs around her parents, even if she didn't call Ororo mother, that was the position Ororo had taken, were brighter and stronger than ever.

She could however see that it wasn't just the Harry and Ororo, but Jean's song wended its way through theirs, adding a bit of energy and a faster beat to the mix. What was strange however, was that now she could see another song wending its way into the quartets, a lyrical flute number that was deep despite itself, which she somehow recognized as Emma, though it had lost none of its prideful nature. That solo hadn't quite joined the others just yet, though she expected if it did then the overall song would be even better.

Thus, while Jean and Emma spent an early dinner together after spending a few more hours on the slopes, Harry, Ororo and Melody went out on the town in London. First, they went out to a fancy restaurant where Harry had booked the evening. While most of the time Ororo preferred that they make their own food, tonight was about lavishing attention on her and there were some proprieties to be met in doing so. The meal was decent, though Melody commented after eating her own spaghetti that she much preferred Harry's food.

Ororo nodded in agreement with the young girl. "My own veal parmesan seems to be trying too hard, there are too many flavors trying to battle against one another in it."

Harry laughed quietly taking her hand and kissing it. "You know you don't have to sound like a food critic just to give me a back handed complement, love?"

"Well then tell me what you think of your own meal." Ororo replied promptly. "I notice you haven't eaten it all."

That was actually more on target than normal, since to get his magical core back up to strength Harry's appetite had risen dramatically. In fact he had two large meals earlier that days when they rested from skinning. Harry answered honestly. "It's subpar, the salad was excellent, the appetizer was good, but this steak is a little too stringy. I'm not certain this place is really worth a Michelin star to be frank."

The waiter winced a little and apologized as he was filling up their water. "Sorry about that, we got a new chef in. He's also a little temperamental Frenchman, so I'm not even going to try to pass on your comments to him. Still if you leave a message with the maître-d, we'll add it to the growing pile."

Harry nodded agreeably, and the three left a comment card with the front desk, before leaving the restaurant. From there they had twenty minutes before the show started. They spent it walking around, picking up some munchies for Melody and Harry for during the show. After that they moved towards the theater.

They never noticed that they were being discretely followed. They looked like normal people, but they weren't, neither normal, nor people in the strictest sense. One was an android specifically designed to blend into the crowd, assigned to London since it was one of the places that the mysterious wizard that had sent ripples throughout the world was known to be. AIM was interested in acquiring the man behind the new medicines that their spies had reported, and had flooded the UK with spotter droids in an effort to find him. The other was a man working for Interpol, who had been stationed in London for much the same reason.

And while Harry, as a matter of course, had covered his features and those of his daughter and Ororo with a Remember-me-Not, that very forgetfulness could be tracked by a sufficiently paranoid and prepared human or a computer. The crowds however worked against both more than they had anticipated/calculated.

When they handed in their tickets Ororo and Melody discovered that Harry had gone all out. He had booked them a stall seat on the second floor of the theater, directly overlooking the stage from the right side. "You spoil us Harry," Ororo murmured kissing him lightly on the cheek as they entered. Their strange, not exactly matching appearances caused a bit of a stir in the crowd but Ororo and Harry took no notice of it.

Melody on the other hand seemed to shrink a little and clung to Harry's hand. Thanks to how loud Harry and Ororo songs were, she hadn't had the normal problems she ran into in crowds as they walked around managing to avoid being overwhelmed by the different songs of the people and places around her. But now that they were in a real crowd rather than just moving about the city or sitting down to eat it was starting to get to her little.

Harry smiled reassuringly at her and they moved away quickly through the crowd up to the second story of the theater into one of the stalls where Harry put up a very low powered sound dampening charm, causing Melody to breathe a silent sigh of relief.

Outside both the android and the agent hid in nearby alleyways, waiting, never noticing one another. The android had not been able to obtain a ticket to the theater, so was waiting for his targets to come out. At the same time, he was also getting in contact with the strike team his creators had on standby, ready to use their latest matter transportation devices to teleport directly there. It would be expensive in terms of energy, but it would be worth it in the end if they could bring the mysterious Wizard into the fold.

The Interpol agent on the other hand simply wanted to talk to them, and pass on a message from his superiors. To do that he was able to use his own initiative, which despite its human and myriad abilities, the android could not do. To that end he had made his way to the back of the theater then inside, quickly finding an employee to bribe to let him take his place. It took a little longer however for him to figure out a way around Harry's Remember-Me-Not to figure out where the trio was sitting. Concentrating on that feeling allowed it, but was difficult.

Inside, Melody still looked a little uncomfortable as the theater filled up below them, while she sat in a comfy chair between Ororo and harry. Luckily once the play actually began all of her concerns and worries fell away. All the songs of the people below and even Ororo and Harry subsided as they focused almost entirely on the play, as did Melody. She began to hum along to the songs, and even joined in during Cossette's solo 'castle on a cloud'.

The girl who was singing noticed this halfway through her second refrain. She looked up as much as she could without breaking her role to the stall where the music was coming from. Harry's sound dampening charm wasn't quite up to this, though it did at least cover from their stall to the rest of the audience well enough that no one else noticed. The girl went on gamely enough, smiling to herself as she finished and could hear faint yet rapid clapping from there as well as from the audience. Nor was this an isolated incident. Melody sang along in perfect harmony to many of the songs through the opera.

At the intermission, there was a knock on the door leading into the box. "Drinks or snacks sir?"

Melody sat up promptly. "Grape juice?"

The two adults shared a laugh. The place they went to eat didn't have any grape juice or soda, meaning Melody hadn't had her daily 'fix' just yet. With that in mind, Harry went over to the door, looking out at a middle aged man, with brown hair peppered with gray, and wearing a butlers uniform pushing a cart. "I don't suppose you have any grapes or grape juice do you?"

The man blinked then quickly looked in the cart. "Um, yes sir, we do. Would you like anything else?"

Melody had come over to look to see if there were any snacks she could persuade Harry to get her. Harry would be easy, he could barely say no to anything she asked. But Ororo had firm views on the amount of junk food growing children should have, particularly Melody.

However when Melody caught sight of the man, she frowned trying to place the song she saw in him. "Hmmm… Dana Danaaa Danana dananana nanana…"

Harry's eyebrows cocked in question, but Ororo frowned suddenly, having heard that tune in a few movies she had seen when going to college. She looked sharply over at the man pushing the cart, looking for anything that could imply he was something other than what he appeared.

The man felt her sudden searching stare, and very carefully pulled out a badge from his jacket pocket. It had a globe on it, backed by a sword going behind it as well as an old-fashioned set of scales. "Er, I'm from Interpol sir, just want to talk and pass on a message. I would've introduced myself if you had let me in but this is as good so long we can talk inside."

Harry's eyes narrowed, angry at having this family evening disturbed by business and a little leery of the now self-professed spy. "Come in then, quickly. Know that I am watching you sir, and if you threaten me and mine they will never find your body, quite literally."

Something in those jade green eyes made the Interpol vet nod rapidly, believing the man. He pushed the cart into the box, closing the door behind him. "We'll have to be quick, or else some of the other guests may be looking for me. To be brief, Interpol has been twigged to you and some of your deeds worldwide Mr. Wizard."

"Guardian now," Harry interrupted blandly, though he still stood between the man and Melody. "I finally found myself a better handle."

"Er, yes, well anyway, we have also been informed by parties that want to remain nameless of your abilities and a few of your long term goals. Seeing as we do have a few mutants on our roster, we are behind the idea of equality by law." He emphasized their position there deliberately, wanting there to be no doubt they wouldn't support acts of terrorism. "I am also to inform you we would be… willing to look aside at times of distress that we are ill-suited or simply unable to respond to, so long as we have an observer of sorts on the team. We would also be very interested in buying some of your medicines directly from you. To further both those ends, I am to open up a dialogue between you and the Secretary General."

Harry's eyebrows rose in surprise, and some supposition. I wonder if Fury passed on what he could and if so what outcome he wanted. Or if Banshee somehow figured out a way around the spell Ororo had on her. It should have made him unable to remember what they talked about if he tried to share it with anyone else, but its still possible I suppose? Regardless, this is an interesting development. "I am willing to open up a dialogue certainly, though the idea of an observer, that might be a sticking point, which I'll talk to your bosses about in a few days. Let me give you a phone number you can call, then give my daughter her grape juice and please, get out. This is family night."

The agent smiled a little sheepishly, knowing how irritable he got if his family time was interrupted, then quickly jotted down the phone number Harry gave him. Needless to say it was one of the numbers that was routed to the cell phone Reed had given him, making it utterly untraceable by anything Interpol had access to, or even SHIELD for that matter.

With that done, the man moved off quickly, leaving Harry and Ororo to thank Melody for spotting him and the young girl sipping at her grape juice with a smile on her face. Soon however, the show began again, and the two adults put the interruption aside to enjoy the play.

All three of them enjoyed the play, though Melody and Ororo both cried when Cossette's mother died, as well as at the end, while Harry simply sat and felt. Afterwards Ororo leaned over Harry's chair and gave him a long languid kiss. "That," she murmured against his lips. "Was fantastic Harry, even with the interruptions. Thank you for taking me out to see this."

Melody hugged him as well as they stood up, voicing her own thoughts.

"I didn't honestly expect Les Miserable to be that powerful," Harry admitted. "The performance was amazing, and the story is too when you come to think about it."

After that they left still talking about the show, never noticing that a few of the actors/singers had made their way through the crowd to see who had been singing. They just missed Harry and company, as the trio ported out from there once they found a corner that didn't have any security cameras, nor were they the only ones. The AIM android also missed them, and was later recycled for its failure.

Not knowing of their close call Harry and Ororo dropped in to Hogwarts to put Melody to bed, kissing the girl good night before they left to head back down to the Château. There they found a note stating that Jean and Emma had headed out to go clubbing, leaving the two of them alone.

"This has been a fantastic and dare I say a magical, not to overuse the phrase, evening Harry. I loved every bit of it even the horrible food." So saying Ororo drew Harry into a kiss.

Harry broke off the kiss for a moment to nibble at her ear. "The night is still young you know." This won him a gurgle of approval as she began to kiss his neck. His two arms went down her back and Ororo squeaked a little as she felt herself picked up by her rear, her skirt clad legs parting quickly to wrap around his middle as Harry carried her into their bedroom.

OOOOOOO

The next day of their vacation, Emma was able to get away in the morning for her, which was late afternoon to Harry and the others. While Jean was busy teaching Harry to ski, Ororo and Emma sat. Emma would've preferred to go as well but, surprisingly, didn't enjoy actually skiing. She liked snowboarding, but this mountain didn't allow snowboarding. Tomorrow they would transfer to another resort in the morning to go skiing/snowboarding there but until then, Emma would have to simply deal with it, since they hadn't known that before purchasing the tickets. Ororo too would have preferred to go skiing, but this was more important.

At first their conversation was rather stilted, since this was the first the two of them had talked without one of the other two there. After a while however the conversation got going as they compared their childhoods. Ororo's growing up on the streets of Cairo was surprisingly like Emma's in that neither of them had anyone they could truly trust. It was a lesson both had learned early on, and it had stuck with them for quite a while. If Emma had not met Harry that time in Switzerland, she might not have learned that lesson even now, while Ororo had begun to learn it even before Professor Xavier found her on the plains of Africa.

From there the conversation moved on to other things, when they discovered their powers, their first impression of Harry, and eventually their feelings for him. It was a good conversation, and it allowed the two of them to come closer, which ended when the two skiers came back that evening.

Ororo stood up and moved to open the door for them thinking hard about what she wanted to happen here. She still wasn't certain if Emma really loved Harry, or simply was infatuated with him, but that distinction could only be seen by letting Emma spend time with him. Ororo had seen that they could work together well enough in a social function, and that Harry needed Emma's expertise in the business area.

He now had a good grasp of some of the details of business, but Harry wasn't quite as cold-hearted as you needed to be to make some of the decisions a businessman sometimes needed to. While Harry did not suffer fools lightly, he would make more allowances in that direction then Emma would, and he also needed her to offset his excesses when dealing with governments. The distrust Harry had for governments was a holdover, and a understandable one, from his time in his previous dimension, but Ororo could see it making trouble in the future.

Ororo was also very perceptive. Emma was definitely concerned about the fact that she was coming into this much relationship later then Jean and Ororo. She was not a woman who would be second in any way to someone else and Ororo could tell that this was worrying her little. Still, her emotions towards Harry were strong, and could grow deeper over time.

The weather goddess took a moment to look at all of them as Emma helped Jean out of her ski gear laughingly commenting on something or other that Ororo couldn't make out from her place by the wall. Harry sat down on the bench that was part of the foyer of this suite for this very purpose smiling at her faintly, his voice dry. "They're getting along well."

"That was never the question my love," Ororo replied sitting down on the floor and helping his boots off looking up at him from beneath her eyelashes. "The question was, would Emma fit with all three of us."

"That was the question, and have the two of you determined the answer?"

"Say rather, that we working towards the answer. I don't suppose you have anything in your bag of date ideas that all four of us would enjoy? I think we all four need to spend time together, a few weeks of foursome dates perhaps, so that Emma can realize that we're all equals in this relationship. She is worried about that I think."

Harry's hands reached down and stilled Ororo's where she was unbuckling his second boot. He had surprisingly felt the burn of his legs a little today, in odd and unusual places, but it wasn't as if he really needed the help, it was more simply that Ororo wanted to than anything else. "And what do you think of this? Answer as if you didn't know I am attracted to her, or that Jean is. Do you think that's she can work in this relationship, and do you want her to join us?"

Ororo gently kissed the palm of his hand, leaning against his knee for a moment then sat up, moving to sit beside him and nuzzling to his neck, while deeper in the suite Jean yelped about something and Emma's rich laughter reached them. "I respect her Harry, I can see myself attracted to her a little, but I'm not in love with her, not yet. But I don't really have to be in love with her, to allow her into this group relationship of ours. So long as eventually she and I come to care for one another, that is enough. You can't use me to get out of this."

Harry looked at her in a little shock and she laughed. "You mentioned it yourself Harry, you're concerned about how well you will be able to perform as a boyfriend if another girl is added to the relationship." Well the word husband worked better in Ororo's case, and she knew it would soon for Jean's too, whatever their legal status. "Given our hectic lives, we have all done amazingly well in keeping this relationship going without letting it dominate our lives, and I've seen how you look at her at times."

Some of those looks were oddly sad, not wistful, just sad, something Ororo couldn't quite figure out. It wasn't pity or regret, but simple sadness, or possibly the prediction of grief to come? She couldn't decide.

At this point however, Ororo decided to change the direction of the conversation a little. She smiled a little sexily at Harry which caused the blood to start to pump faster through his veins. "On top of that you seem to have more than enough left in the tank physically, as it were."

"Trust me Harry," she murmured leaning in to kiss him gently on the lips before pulling back just enough so that she was speaking almost lip to lip as she looked into his eyes. "So long as we don't rush things, I think Emma will do very well with us, and will fit as well."

She pulled back as Harry moved forward laughing a little. "Now, do you have anything in your bag of tricks that all four of us could enjoy?"

Harry grinned at her and looked over through the foyer into the main suite. "Hey you two, would you like to go for a drive?"

Not twenty minutes later Emma and Harry stood in her mansion's garage, and Emma looked on with barely hidden trepidation as Harry shrunk her car. This was something she would never get used to, magic like that was just too phenomenal for her to really get her mind around. "Are you sure you'll be able to enlarge it again without harming it?"

"Positive," Harry replied patting his pocket. "I already did it to my car after all, and trust me I wouldn't hurt my baby for love or money."

"I suppose," Emma murmured still looking a little worried, but she willingly linked her arm with his before the two once more teleported out of her mansion straight back to the suite where Jean and Ororo were waiting for them.

Harry led the way out to the suite's patio, where he laid out the flying carpet. All four of them got on, facing one another in a circle while Harry activated the carpet, which floated into the air and away, zooming as fast as a fighter jet after it's magics covered them.

"So where exactly are we going?" Emma asked smirking at Jean as she lightly ran one finger up the redhead's side, causing the redhead to shiver and smack her hand away. Jean glared at her, but caught her hand the second time she tried to do it bringing her finger up to lick at it while waggling her eyebrows over to where Harry was watching them causing him to groan aloud.

All three of the girls laughed at that but Harry shook his head and turned to concentrate on controlling the carpet for the moment. "Well, I figure we could drive down to Germany to this place I've heard about called the Nurburgring."

Emma's eyes widened in shocked happiness, showing an openness that would have shocked anyone other than the people who currently surrounded her. "I've always wanted to drive that circuit!"

"What is this Nurburgring you are talking about?" Ororo asked and Jean nodded, seconding the question.

"It's a famous racetrack, where you can pay for a days' drive. It's used to test new cars as they come out, and it's one of the best driving experiences in the world apparently. As I said, I've always wanted to go there, but my father already knew about my predilection towards speed."

"There are worse things to get addicted to." Harry replied from the front smirking a little at the ladies behind him. "Speaking of which, have you decided on the car you wanted to buy?"

Ororo didn't particularly want her own car. While she enjoyed driving around, she didn't actually enjoy driving herself so much. She much preferred flying, and felt the flying carpet was the best magical item Harry had created thus far. Jean on the other hand, had been thinking about one for a while.

"I'm going to wait a while, after all we just cashed those checks from Friday this morning, but yes, eventually I'm going to want to buy my own car, and it will definitely be something racy. But it's a tough decision, like I said. I've looked closer at the Mclaren, and though this might sound strange coming from an engineer, but it's a little too mechanical. But there's another car, the Bugatti Veyron, that is supposed to be even faster in a straight line than yours Harry."

Emma whistled at her top choices but Harry looked at her reaching across and playing with her hair for a moment as it blew in the wind. "I would think that you'd want to find a car you can work on. The Veyron, from what I've heard about it, isn't something you're going to want to tinker with, and I know you'd want to tinker with your car. I had the thought that maybe a high end kit car or something would work better."

"True," Jean replied leaning into his touch for a moment. She was very much looking forward to their one-on-one date tomorrow, very eagerly indeed.

The rest of the time was spent with Emma and Ororo asking questions about the cars, which Jean and Harry fielded them, as well as Harry suggesting some changes he could make to any car Jean chose. After hearing about what Harry could do Emma insisted he put the same enhancement on her fuel tank that he had done to his car, as well as a few other tricks that Harry had added to it. Harry promised to do so, by which time they were over Germany and heading down towards their destination. They were a ways away from the destination anyway, a narrow strip of road which didn't have anyone on it at present.

Moments later, Emma's face broke into a wide, eager smile as she watched her car expand once more under Harry's touch. "So who's driving with who?"

Ororo and Jean exchanged a glance, then Jean smiled and gestured towards Harry. "I'll drive with Harry I think, I actually haven't been in his car when he can go all out after all, should be an experience."

The African woman nodded and moved over to Emma to join her in her car. "We'll switch off after a few laps I suppose, other than that, this is all for you racers, go all out."

"Hah! Don't have to tell me twice!" Emma's smile widened still further as they got in their cars and completed the trip to the Nurburgring. Not fifteen minutes later they were on the grid, having just paid the token amount they had to for a days' drive.

The moment they were allowed out onto the track, Emma floored it. There was just something about going fast like this that appealed to her. Possibly it was the very well hidden adrenaline junkie in her, or perhaps this equated to the feeling of getting the better of an opponent in a business deal or something. Whatever it was she loved to go fast, something she had never been able to do often enough for various reasons.

The group raced on throughout the rest of the late afternoon, occasionally switching side passengers, their conversations dominated by talk about the course. Jean learned that she did indeed enjoy going fast, both as passenger and as driver. She and Ororo actually took turns driving their friend's cars, and Jean decided that Harry she much preferred the interior of his car to Emma's Ferrari 458. Jean simply liked the 'pageantry' of the inside, how everything was setup as if someone from the early 70s had pictured a spaceship and decided to create a car with that theme. The 458 was an amazing technological marvel, and certainly one of the two best cars she'd ever been in, but it didn't have enough character for her.

As the sun went down the four of them went to a nearby restaurant that Emma recommended, a very high-class, glitzy place, prompting Harry, and surprisingly Jean to transfigure their clothing to match, while Ororo had Cory pop her back to Hogwarts to change. The conversation that evening was varied and fun, with Harry having all three girls in stitches about how the bank manager had reacted to his three checks. All in all, it was a very satisfying evening for all four of them, even if Emma only was able the kiss Harry very briefly on the lips before having to transfer back to her mansion for the night.

OOOOOOO

At the same time that Harry and his ladies were having some down time life continued in the castle. Ms. Brown led the children of all ages in their classes, helped at times by Father Garnoff with the older two teens, though he usually spent most of his time interacting with the Big Book of Students. By some means the castle's magic seemed to understand what he was trying to do, and it had somehow altered the spell matrix on the book to allow him to interact and guide it in some fashion, allowing him to find out more information about a few of the students, those within a set range at least. His telepathy was too limited, too weak, to allow him the range Charles or Jean could do with Cerebro.

Shiang-Chi continued to put Nikolai and Piotr through their paces, with Laynia joining them occasionally simply for the exercise along with Kitty taking a break from her work on the runic arrays Harry had set her to. Kitty didn't really need the exercise, but she did like to watch the three young men go about their exercises getting all sweaty. She hadn't seen Lance for a few days, and part of her felt they were moving toward a breakup, whatever they really wanted, simply because their schedules were incompatible.

Of course Nikolai and Piotr also stretched their minds with access to the Internet and some classes Ororo had set up for them. They also did some combat exercises that Harry had set up on the castle's computer network. Nikolai found that Piotr was actually hiding a pretty darn decent mind behind that farm boy exterior of his. He was also a highly moral individual, something Nikolai found out during their talks and which he respected. Indeed, the two Russian natives were fast becoming real friends.

At Ms. Brown's behest Melody joined her classes along with Illyana, getting along quite well with all the children after they got over her odd mutant power. The older two boys had the most trouble with this, simply because the songs Melody professed to see in them weren't exactly pleasing to them. They were after all growing teenagers, and teenage boys and girls routinely did not exactly have organized minds or very deep thoughts. None of them however were about to make fun of Melody for her looks or power, having gone through much worse than that themselves in the past. Ms. Brown quickly found the same thing that Ororo had found in terms of Melody's learning abilities, but thanks to the fact that the class was so small in comparison to what she was normally used to she was able to give all the children, even the teenagers, some one-on-one time.

The two Rasputin grandparents had taken over the position of 'den mother' from her, watching out for the children when they weren't in class, being there for advice, and generally becoming grandparent figures to all and sundry, not just Illyana. Piotr of course had long grown out of the need for such attention, and they were extremely proud of the role he was making himself here.

Dennis and Dr. Druid continued their work, with Dr. Druid finally creating his first few accurately brewed potions. With that under his belt, Harry would put Druid in charge of overseeing the house-elves who would be doing the actual work creating the potions for a time until they got used to it. Then once one of the house-elves stepped up to take over that job like Dilly or Gordon, Druid would switch over to full time pediatric duties for the students. He was already doing that in a way, simply being there to talk to the boys Jesse and James. Sergei and he had also developed a close bond for some reason. Despite Sergei's inability to actually read them he was quite good at crossword puzzles.

Sir Dennis continued to compile his list of agents and informers who were willing to work for him. Thanks to Friday's work, he was also able to guarantee that they would paid. Of course he wasn't the only one doing this. The PR director was doing the same exact thing, and Ms. Brown was going over the list of teachers that Ororo had previously vetted at her behest. Once the leading trio came back more teachers would be brought in and vetted by Kitty's finished lie detecting arrays then asked to move in and start to work.

This was based about the fact the BBoS with father Garnoff's aid was amassing a list of names. Most of these names were not thankfully in danger, though a few of them were going from green to orange slowly. These names were switched to the top of his list, and he and Harry would discuss moving on them when the trio got back. Of course if any name went to red they would have to respond immediately.

However, while Harry had passed on that in such cases they should get in contact with him, the adults had all decided to let him and the girls have some time alone. Unless it was a true emergency none of them will willing to bother them, not after seeing how hard the trio had been working for weeks now.

On Monday morning however that question changed from an academic one to a real-life event. Father Garnoff came back from breakfast to look at the Big Book of Students as it continued to compile names. He then frowned deeply, gulping down the last bite of toast as one name that had been denoted by bright pulsing green suddenly changed to orange then red and orange again. After a moments chewing, he looked around and said calmly. "Could I ask for a house-elf please?"

Dilly, the elderly house-elf that ran Hogwarts, popped in to existence next to him. "Yes?" He said brusquely. Unlike the youngsters who had gotten used to taking orders from people who were not their master, or even magical at all, the oldsters still didn't really approve of anyone but the master the mistress or the two young mistresses giving them orders. Still it was his job, and he had been in the area in any case.

"Could I ask you to bring Piotr, Nikolai, young Kitty, Dr. Druid, Dennis and Shiang-Chi up here please? I think we need to have a little talk." The others arrived quickly, and he waved his hand at the book. "There is a name that was bright green that has changed colors to orange and red and then back again. Now it is pulsing between the two of them, I am not certain what that means but it cannot be good."

The others crowded down at the book and read the name 'Guthrie, Paige, Cumberland County, Kentucky' and a series of coordinates. Kitty frowned a little. "It's in America, I wonder if the professor has heard of her. Cerebro isn't quite online yet, the plans and designs are done from what I understand, but it has to be installed so I don't know."

Nikolai frowned. "I really don't want to bother Harry and the others, I realize we should, but we're all adults here, I think we can handle this ourselves. What do you think Piotr?"

That was the thing that Nikolai remembered later on. When he asked that question, everyone looked at Piotr. Even the father and Dr. Druid looked ready to follow Piotr's suggestions.

The former farm boy frowned rubbing his granite-like chin. "If it was another country, I am afraid we would probably have to call in Harry if only because he would be able to get us there. The house-elves cannot get us anywhere where they have not already been, and this might be too public an area in any case. So we would be forced to take High Note first over it and then go from there down, which only Harry, Jean or Storm can do." The three of them could have floated the team down.

"However," he continued tapping his finger on the name thoughtfully. "Because it is in America that gives us a another option. Don't the X-Men have a plane?"

"A supersonic one, now." Kitty answered promptly. She had spent the night at the castle last night, putting in a full days work the day before and not having any real reason to be back at the mansion until the afternoon local time.

"We went out and picked it up just two days ago to replace the old x-jet. Should've seen Scott's face when he saw it, he looked like a man falling in love." That jet was in fact a sign that the powers that be which were backing Charles' dream had decided to up their ante so to speak. When he heard of it Harry would be of two minds on the new plane, but at this point there was no downside to the generous contribution. "And unlike Cerebro, it's in perfect working condition. Should I call ahead?"

"Do so, ask the professor if he knows the name, tell him what's going on and that we're on our way over." Piotr and Charles hadn't met yet, but what Piotr had heard about the man gave him a good impression at least. He looked over at Nikolai and Shiang-Chi. "While you do that, the rest of us need to get ready to go. Will you be joining us giáo sư?"

Shiang-Chi thought for a moment then nodded reluctantly. "I would not normally be willing to go out into the field, but since we are so understaffed here, especially in terms of experience, I cannot in good conscience let you two go alone."

That made both younger men smile in thanks and Piotr went on. "Sir Dennis, could you get the com units and meet us in the dining hall please?"

After that they all went about their business quickly, not even wondering why, rather than Nikolai who had been trained to be a leader, that Piotr had taken the forefront. In actuality, this was because of two things. One, Piotr had impressed them all with his down to earth nature and grasp of common sense. This coupled with his empathy and understanding had won the respect of everyone there in short order.

Nikolai in contrast didn't really grab peoples attentions unless he was really trying outside of combat situations. He was a decent field commander, or even a logistical officer, but he wasn't really willing to put himself forward outside his comfort zone so to speak.

While the two young men were getting ready, Kitty quickly pulled out her cell phone and called the mansion, thankful that they could now get better signal in the castle than what Ororo had reported a few months ago. On the third ring Charles responded, sounding a little jittery rather than sleepy, as he should have been considering it was only three thirty in the morning in New York.

He actually sounded as if he was in pain for some reason when he spoke. "Kitty, is there something wrong?"

"We think so professor, you know that big book of students thing that Teach made? Well, one of its names is sort of pulsing orange and red, which means the person is in trouble. Do you know a Paige Guthrie?"

"Paige?" Charles's voice was still sounding as if he was in pain but was much more alert. "No, I do not. I know a Sam Guthrie however, and I believe he has a younger sister named Paige. Why, are you saying that she is now a mutant?"

Kitty recited from the memory of what she had seen on the book as well as the notes that father Alexi had prepared. "She activated her powers on Friday professor but until just now her name was green which means she wasn't in danger. A few of the people Teach has gathered are getting ready to go over to the mansion, are you and the others willing to help?"

"Very willing, though we also have had a bit of a crisis ourselves. I'll tell you more when you arrive."

Kitty nodded and raced off. Soon enough they were all there, with Piotr, Nikolai and Kitty surprisingly having changed into their uniforms. "The professor said he knows a Sam Guthrie," she reported quickly. "But didn't know his sister was also a mutant. And there might be something else going on, he was already awake and said something about their own crisis."

Nikolai and Piotr looked at one another shrugged and nodded. "Let's get a move on." Piotr said. Cory and Clare appeared in front of them, both of them ready to transport the four of them to the mansion. The two glared at each other, but Cory eventually backed off. Like Nessy to Ororo and Cory to Harry, Clare had sort of become Kitty's go-to house-elf, and since Harry wasn't here and taking part she took precedent.

Clare nodded self-importantly, then grasped her mistress' hand and moved over to the others thankful that the big one hadn't tried to transform into his metal form. Weight impacted the distance she could pop a lot, and despite her own ego, Cory was simply better at popping than she was.

Still from Scotland's to New York was within her range even with four people. From one second to the next the five of them appeared in the entryway of the mansion, finding the X-Men moving down the stairs towards them, all of them already dressed in their uniforms. Rogue even had her armor on, the red of the metal contrasting sharply to the yellow and green of her uniform.

"Kitty could you introduce your friends?" asked Charles looking at the trio of young men.

Kitty nodded and quickly introduced the trio. "This is Nikolai codenamed Vanguard, Piotr codenamed Colossus, and Shiang-Chi, no codename. He is not actually a field agent really, he's their trainer, but since Harry and the others aren't along he decided to come with them."

Scott nodded cordially, then said briskly. "Pleases to meet you, but we've got a problem. Professor?"

At that nudge the professor simply nodded. "I was woken up this evening by a psychic scream of pain and fear. It is originating somewhere in the China Sea, I have the longitude and latitude coordinates. A telepath is in great and painful agony, one that has crossed a surprising distance, a young one by the feel of the mind that made that scream, and female. While I've tried to give what aid I could mentally, I cannot get through her fear to truly help her, not from here, not without Cerebro. I cannot in good conscience leave her alone. That means that I need to use the new jet to get to her."

Kitty cursed. This proved beyond doubt that the book of students didn't pick up on mutant powers that had already activated. That meant they were missing a lot of older students, along with those mutants whose physical forms were always mutated, maybe even younger mutants whose powers had activated before Harry had finished his work on the book. That was bad.

Scott looked at Nikolai and Piotr. "How good are you two really?"

Most young men would've taken umbrage at that question, but these two simply took it in stride. "I was trained as a Soviet super-soldier Cyclops." Vanguard replied using the team leader's codename now, slipping into his combat mentality. "And Colossus is extremely durable in his other form. We have both been training with Shiang-chi, who is also extremely competent in the martial arts and with any hand to hand weapon."

Scott nodded then looked over his own team, frowning for a moment then nodded. "Nightcrawler, you'll go with the professor. Professor, you can drop us off in Kentucky and then head on to China, the new jet should make that distance easy and there's no time to waste. Let's get going."

The others all nodded, understanding his decision. Kurt was a teleporter after all, and could get the professor from the aircraft to the ship where this telepath was in pain if necessary. On top of that as a solo operative he was very dangerous, especially in close with a possible hostage situation in comparison to Scott or Evan.

They all raced through the mansion and into the hangar Bay in the basement. Nikolai and Piotr stopped and stared for a moment at the jet whistling in approval. It was sleek, it was black, it was dangerous looking, and they shared a grin of sheer boyish enthusiasm for a moment before coming back to the here and now.

Moments later the hangar bay doors opened. With Professor Xavier blanketing the minds of everyone within a two-mile radius who could see them take off, the jet streaked into the sky. A moment later its holographic based technology kicked in, rendering it invisible to both sight and radar.

Or at least so professor Xavier thought. There were in fact several radar systems in the U.S. that could detect it, but that technology was not widespread just yet and at the moment it did not belong to anyone who cared one way or the other about the X-Men taking off. Except the brief hope by SHIELD director Fury, once he was told about it, that it didn't involve any more damn paperwork for him. This hope would be in vain.

The speed of the jet was phenomenal in the air, and not twenty minutes later it was slowing down, banking down toward the ground to land near a very small town in Kentucky. Looking out the window as they slowed down and began to descend Piotr smiled faintly. "Definitely not farm country."

"Coal country," Charles responded crisply. His mind was still reverberating with the screams of the telepath in the China Sea, despite his best attempts to calm her down. Whatever was happening to her, and Charles had a very grim idea of what it was, was ongoing. "Sam Guthrie and his family are a family of coal miners. Their father died two years ago in a mining accident. Be aware the Guthrie's are a well-respected part of the community here, you might have trouble with the locals if it looks as if you're trying to take his younger sister away even if it is for her own good."

"Cyclops, Sam was going to be among the teens coming in later this summer. His powers are based around flight; he creates an explosion behind his body propelling himself forward, along with creating a force field that is extremely powerful to defend his body from impact. As far as I know Sam still lives with his family who all know of his mutation. The rest of the community hadn't formed an opinion one way or another about mutants the last time I was here, but I do not know if that has changed."

"Understood professor." Scott replied moving towards the back of the jet in preparation to exit. He was tempted to ask the telepath to do a sweep for aggressive minds in the area, but judging by the grimace on Charles' face he was still dealing with the pain broadcast by the telepath, and that wasn't a good sign. "Nightcrawler, take care the professor, everyone else, let's go."

Piotr smiled and he and Nikolai exchanged a glance nodding approvingly. Scott had come up in conversation with Jean and Harry had as well as Ororo at one point. They'd been blunt about their opinion of him, as well as the problems he'd had earlier after Harry had arrived, but he had overcome them to become a decent team leader. This certainly was the case right now, and the three newcomers joined with the X-Men quickly, with Colossus changing into his metal form the moment he exited the jet, eliciting a bark of surprise from Evan and Rogue.

Kitty was surprisingly with them. While she wasn't willing to engage in combat any longer, she was willing to be a scout for this kind of mission. This she did so at a nod from Scott, changing into her immaterial form and racing off through the woods, covered still further by a runic array that imitated the Disillusion spell.

The jet had touched down about a quarter mile from the outskirts of the town which was spread out through the woods. It wasn't what any city-dweller would call a town, it had only a few shops, a general store a pharmacies and things like that as well as one large bar set along a single paved road and about 30 or so houses spread through the woods. There was also a single story hotel, more of a motel really, where a vast majority of the singles in the town stayed year-round.

Cyclops and the rest of the team followed Shadowcat as they made their way through the woods. It was around three in the morning here, since Kentucky this had begun in around nine in the morning in Scotland. This, along with everyone's wearing night vision goggles, aided them greatly moving through the woods undetected by the locals, and hopefully the people who are here to threaten or kill Paige, whoever the hell they were. Scott was worrying at that very problem as they moved on, wondering if it was an anti-mutant hate group like the Friends of Humanity, a Brotherhood of Mutants chapter, or someone else altogether.

Soon Shadowcat raced back towards the group, stopping right in front of Cyclops. "Whatever it is going to happen hasn't happened yet." she reported quickly. "I think we might've beaten whoever is coming here. The address the professor gave me, nothing's happening there, they're all in bed I think I wasn't able to hear any noises as I moved through the house."

Scott frowned thoughtfully, wondering how to play this. "All right, here's the plan.…"

OOOOOOO

Sam Guthrie was a 17-year-old young man with a wiry yet powerful build and short cropped blond hair. Around here the jump from boy to man came quickly. Sam had been the man of the house since his father died, which had forced him into the coal mines for a year until his mutant powers activated during a mine collapse, saving his life and that of a friend trapped with him. A few days after that professor Xavier had shown up, and with the checks he sent Sam no longer had to work mines for which he was very thankful for.

He shared a room with his next oldest sister, Paige. This wasn't exactly abnormal around here, but it had elicited a few embarrassing moments over the years. Paige's bed was directly across from his, the difference between her area of the room and his very visible during the daytime muted now.

Sam would be asleep right now too, except something had woken him up. That something was a hand over his mouth. As he began to jolt upright, a female voice whispered into his ear. "Quiet. I'm going to take my hand away from your mouth for a moment, and wake up your sister. We're not here to hurt either of you, but someone else might be coming soon to do that very thing. We're not sure, our method of knowing where mutants are isn't exactly that accurate. I'm Shadowcat, I work with Professor X?"

That name made Sam calm down, though what he could've done stuck in his bed was a mystery. He needed a second to activate his flight power, and with a hand over his mouth already it was clear that this shadow woman had gotten the drop on him.

The hand receded, and he sat up in bed realizing that the woman wasn't alone. Two other figures loomed in the dark of the room, one a full head taller than the other. That one nodded at him and said in heavily accented English "apologies for interrupting evening, issue not waiting."

Sam grunted irritably, but the shock of having been woken up like that had jumpstarted his brain allowing him to operate.

Across the way Paige was woken up in the same manner, though she tried to fight it at first gasping in shock as her hand passed right through the suddenly immaterial girl standing by her head. Paige was a year younger than Sam, and at 16 was growing out nicely, something Sam was unhappily aware of since he'd had to deal with a few other young men who had noticed the same thing.

He most definitely did not want his sister to go the same way as too many girls around here did knocked up before twenty. With her blonde hair, long legs that went on forever, a decent sized chest already, and cute girl next-door face with freckles to match, as well as a vivacious attitude Paige would have been a little heartbreaker if Sam had allowed it. Even so she had a string of admirers, though none of them were brave enough to bear Sam's irritation.

She sat up now looking around in confused worry and anger. "What the hell's going on?"

"Paige Guthrie?" the woman asked. "I just want to make sure." The girl nodded irritably and Shadowcat went on. "This is Cyclops and Colossus, we're sort of the good guys." Two different camps of good guys, she thought to herself, but still on the same side. "Anyway, we have this… device that allows us to see when new mutants activate their powers, and it read you activating yours last Friday, Paige. Up until a few hours ago though that was fine, because your name was in green, that means you were safe, in no danger. But that changed a few hours ago, so we're here to, well, protect you if we can."

Cyclops spoke up at that point. "We were aware that you were a mutant Sam. I understand that you had already accepted Professor X's invitation? I'm Cyclops, team leader. When you arrive at the Institute you'll be working with me and the others on the team in order to learn how to control and use your powers, regardless of whether or not you choose to go out on missions with us.

He held out his hand, and after a moment's hesitation Sam reached out to grasp it surprised with the firmness of that grip and the even stare coming from the man even in the darkness of the room. "You mind if'n I turn on the lights?" Sam asked.

"Will the blinds scream it from the outside?" Cyclops asked seriously.

After a moment Sam shook his head. He looked over at his sister. You never said anythin' 'bout havin' powers. Are they right?"

Paige blushed, invisible in the darkness thankfully, and made to stand up only to trip a little. She was caught by a metal hand around her waist pulling her up right and she stared up and up some more at the large man who had helped her. "First hard step, yes?" The man tried in very heavily accented and garbled English.

The younger Guthrie grinned and moved to stand by herself, looking around at her brother and the others. "Yeah Ah've got a mutant power, it's a weird ass one, but yeah." She looked embarrassed. "Ah have to strip off my skin, literally. It peels away like wrapping I suppose, and underneath I can form a new skin into metal, once I did it with rock, another time wood."

Her brother nodded at that confirmation and looked at Cyclops. "So what's the game plan here, sir?"

"We're hampered there by not knowing who were dealing with." Cyclops shrugged. "The method we used to know if the mutant is danger isn't very accurate in telling us what that danger is." Cyclops didn't think they needed to hear right now about the division between Professor and Harry. The fact of the matter was if push came to shove he and most of the X-Men would follow Harry though. They followed the dream of the professor, but they wanted to take a more proactive stance themselves. Hopefully that would change once Cerebro was working again.

"We think it might be a group called the Brotherhood of Mutants, they're sort of a recruitment branch for a terrorist organization run by a man named Magneto who wants mutants to dominate the world. That's just a guess, it could be a group like the Friends of Humanity, or it could be someone else we don't know. We've got other team members outside on watch. The problem is, we don't know that the danger will pass for your family if you're not here. Do you think…"

He stopped talking as the earbud he was wearing under his mask suddenly came alive. "Cyclops, this is Rogue, there's three people at least moving towards the house, possibly two more behind 'em. No idea where they came from, one moment everythin' was clear, the next they were walking through the woods towards us. They don't look to be threatenin' just yet, and they're dressed normally. At least the three that are moving towards the house. The other two are moving through the woods, don't know where they're going."

Cyclops frowned for a moment. "Shadowcat, do you have any runes in your bag of tricks that can make me and Colossus invisible for a time?"

Both the Guthrie's looked confused at the mention of runes but Shadowcat simply reached into a pouch and jingled the stones there. "Yep," she chirped. "And for some reason, they're lasting longer these days, kind of fun. Might be because I'm spending so much time at Hogwarts."

"Hogwarts?" Paige asked incredulously. "Someone named a place Hogwarts?"

"Don't ask." Shadowcat laughed bumping shoulders with the other girl. "Trust me, the owner, Guardian's, naming sense is really horrible, and it sort of endemic of his people I suppose you could say. If you think Hogwarts is bad, some of the names for their families were worse. Lovegood, Longbottom, Weasley, there were a few others like that."

"Those sound more like those girls from the old Vietnamese movies…" Paige said shaking her head. "The ones who'd bang American soldiers for a pack of cigarettes."

"Can we get back to the point?" Cyclops muttered rubbing his visor irritably. It just wasn't the same though and he stopped after a second. "Make us invisible, you two act as if you've just woken up, if they're going to go for the soft sell. Sam, Paige, I hope you two can act, this is going to rely on you, answer the door if/when they knock act like they woke you up and lets see what they have to say. Once you make us invisible Shadowcat, keep an eye on the parents."

"Parent." Sam interrupted. "My mom and my two younger siblings here. Are they mutants too?"

"Maybe." Shadowcat shrugged. "We can only detect a mutant once their powers activate. Before that, well do you know anything about DNA? Neither Guthrie responded with an affirmative and she shrugged. "Let's just say it's really fracking complicated."

Sam frowned for a moment. "You really think my mom and my siblings are in trouble?"

"Hostages for your good conduct wouldn't exactly be a new idea would it?" Cyclops muttered as he led the way towards the bedroom door. Paige stayed behind to quickly get dressed from her rather childish sleepwear, coming out moments later with really short cropped pair of daisy dukes, and a tight T-shirt. This was visible by the light of the moonlight streaming through from several Windows set into the sitting area that was the main room of the house. When he caught sight of it, Sam groaned while Colossus coughed uncomfortably looking away

In contrast Cyclops ignored it, concentrating on the task at hand. "Colossus, you take position in the doorway here, I'll be by the doorway to the kitchen." He looked over at Shadowcat as they began to hear the sound of footsteps on the gravel path leading up to the house. "Just to be clear, once were invisible light won't give us a way will it, like a shadow or something?"

"Nope no shadow, not certain how that works honestly, but you'll be invisible." With that said, Shadowcat quickly moved over to both young man in turn, placing a small rune inscribed stone into their hands and muttering activate as her fingers brushed the still expanding stone.

The spell activated, and the two began to disappear from their hands backwards throughout their bodies, an interesting experience for Cyclops who hadn't felt this before. Colossus had and took it more in stride. Paige and Sam on the other hand simply stared in shock wondering how the hell that had happened.

Kitty backed away her intangibility activating as she moved through the wall towards the other two bedrooms. She waited in the wall between the rooms for whatever would happen.

Seconds later there was a knock on the door, and a woman's voice muttering a complaint about how the hell can someone be so poor as to not have a doorbell. The knocking grew progressively louder, until finally Sam, waving Paige back into their room, moved forward to answer it.

"What the hell…" he growled, doing a pretty good job of acting like someone just woken up out of the blue. He looked up at the sky, which was still black, without even a hint of the dawn that was two hours away still. "I don't care what the heck you want, come back at a normal hour."

In the doorway stood a young Mexican man, or so Sam thought. Since everyone in town was white and he very rarely saw even a black man he didn't really know anything much about Mexicans, them bein' foreigners and all. Two other people stood with him, both girls. One was tall and lithe looking, sort of like a gymnast in build while the other one was somewhat shorter and more normal looking, with wavy blond hair down to her shoulders and a smile on her face, a sort of wicked look from what Sam could see from the moonlight. The others face was blank, and she seemed to be looking around constantly, though her eyes were bright yellow, gleaming like a cat's in the dark.

The boy who had been knocking was evidently the spokesperson since he said quietly. "Sam Guthrie, we've a bit of a job opportunity for you and your sister. Could we talk to the two of you please, now?"

If Emma had been there, she would've recognized the young man as Empath, the young idiot who had tried to get into her mind during Shaw's attempt at intimidation. However she wasn't there, and she had forgotten to mention his looks to Harry and the others when talking about how Shaw tried to bully her into her mansion. If she had, maybe Cyclops and Colossus could have done something immediately, knowing how dangerous he was.

But now his powers were already working at Sam's mind, or at least, already filling him with artificial feelings of interest, working against his distrust in order to get the younger man to welcome them in. This Sam did so now.

The TV room was dominated by a single sofa and two chairs, with a small TV set between them making a rough triangle shape in the middle. The trio of newcomers, which Cyclops could barely see were wearing suits of dark purple in the faint moonlight, took the sofa. Sam, after retrieving Paige, who was still dressed in a manner to set his brotherly instincts on edge, took the two chairs.

The Mexican boy let his eyes rove up and down Paige's body in the dark, smiling as he now split his mental assault between the two, adding his own little fillip to the suggestions he was implanting in Paige's mind. She was a cute little thing after all, and once these two joined them, well, she would have to have someone around to show her the ropes, right?

For now however, he kept his mind on the task at hand, easily splitting his attention between using his powers and speaking to the two Kentucky natives. "Ahem, I'm Empath, this is Catseye and Roulette. We represent a group of very well off Homo-superiors who have watched the growing issues between normal and Homo-Superiors with some trepidation. We wish to bring all home superiors together to work towards bettering our position."

Paige frowned, the assault on her washing away her paranoia and eating away at her ability to think straight. But Sam was made of slightly sterner stuff, and had been an A student at the local high school before he had to quit to start work in the coal mines. "That sounds nice'n all sah, but you gonna have to be more specific in what you mean. And if this is all above board, why the hell 'ave you come to our door at this ungodly hour?"

"Because there are others who wish to use their powers to prop up the status quo, and still more that will strike out at any Homo-Superior they can. We wanted to reach you before they could realize your sister had awakened her powers. You've been on our radar for a few months Sam, but you've also been circumspect in using your power." Empath replied glibly, then smiled charmingly (or so he thought) over at Paige. "Your lovely sister however hasn't been so much, and has been seen a few times in her alternate form, though no one seems to have put two and two together yet around here."

Actually, the system that Shaw used to find mutants was nowhere near as accurate as even the old Cerebro, but his computers ability to search out odd news reports and other wired and unusual sightings was somewhat better. Shaw, or rather the two people he had placed in charge of finding and recruiting new members to his Hellions, had found Paige, and upon further review found Sam. Two for one was just too good to pass up, even if they might run into someone who had been able to cover up most signs of Sam's power.

"As to how we mean to achieve our goals," Empath went on, his voice smooth, calm, working together with his powers to erode his targets' minds. "We mean to take action against any threat to ourselves before it can get to us. We mean to… influence lawmakers into not passing anti-'mutant' laws, and to control enough of the economy to make us indispensable to normals. Eventually, we will take our place in the world precisely where we should, on the top."

Sam at least would have realized this was an elitist agenda and that Empath was talking about at best open conflict at worst war, but he wasn't in his right mind. Empath had gotten even better at using his power since his humiliation at Emma's hands, so the changes to Sam and Paige's minds were already well on their way.

However Cyclops wasn't under his influence. Empath's power wasn't real telepathy, not nearly as applicable as that power, he had to see his target for it to work, nor could he use it to find minds as Emma or other telepaths could.

Cyclops had been in a combat frame of mind before Empath even knocked, and now, despite not knowing what was going on, Scott could see something was up. Sam had struck him as intelligent at least, and not the sort to jump at a new opportunity after having already signed on with the professor. With that in mind, and having caught the look Empath sent Paige, something Sam should've taken umbrage at, he decided to act.

He stepped forward, his eye beams already shooting out to slam into Empath's chest on his lowest setting, knocking him unconscious. "That's about enough of that! You two, put your hands…"

The two women however had combat training too and despite their surprise they had already ducked and covered, with one of them throwing some kind of black energy disk at Cyclops, which he dodged automatically. He had no idea what it was, but he wasn't about to let it hit him.

The other woman's body suddenly changed, going through a transformation much like Piotr's, only she became some kind of werecat. Her teeth and nails elongated into claws and fangs in an instant. She jumped for the now visible Cyclops, only to be clipped from behind by a punch from Colossus who had moved up behind the sitting trio.

With Empath unconscious, all he had done to Sam and Paige's minds disappeared, coming undone between one second and the next since he hadn't worked on them long enough to make it even semi-permanent. Sam immediately sprang to his feet, his fists clenched as he glared at the two women.

Paige shook her head, standing up a little more slowly since Empath had been turning most of his power on her, wanting Paige to see him as attractive. She growled angrily, moving over to kick the unconscious Empath in the junk for a moment and sighed, feeling a little better after that.

In reaction to the sound of Cyclops' blast and the resultant fight, lights came on in both of the remaining bedrooms of the Guthrie house. A Second later, they could hear their mother shouting. "What in god's name was that! Samuel, what was that?"

Ignoring that shout and Cyclops's attempt to get them to surrender both women moved as one, Catseye surprisingly having been able to take the punch from Cyclops and roll with it to come up with a leap to take her back towards him, her foot lashing out in a kick. That kick however did more damage to her foot then Colossus' face. The metal clad Russian simply turned his head slightly, barely even feeling the blow while she leapt away with a curse wincing as her foot once more took her weight.

By this time however Roulette had thrown out more than a dozen of those black balls at the first attacker that appeared. Cyclops was only able to dodge a few of them before one hit. One moment he was aiming and firing at her, the next second he had tripped and his blast instead caught Colossus in the back throwing him to the ground. "What the hell!?" He muttered shaking his head. "Are you all right Colossus?"

Colossus stood up and was immediately hit by another black sphere as the two women retreated out the doorway. Between one step another he tripped over nothing, slamming into the ground once again. "What are those little things?" he muttered in Russian, then asked in broken English. "What things they are?"

"I don't know?" Cyclops muttered. "They seem to either do something to our balance, or maybe luck? I don't know."

He was interrupted by both the slamming of a door as Sam's mother came out of her room with a loaded shotgun in her hands, and the sound of a rifle going off in the distance. A bullet slammed through the window behind the team leader, catching Cyclops in the upper arm and throwing him to the ground with a grunt of pain. His suit had kept it from penetrating, but ye gods that had hurt, and Scott was certain his arm was broken.

But he still had enough presence of mind to roll as the unseen rifleman opened up again. Two bullets actually ricocheted in an almost improbable manner to impact right where he had been.

"Everyone duck and cover!" He shouted, watching as Sam ducked behind the sofa while Colossus jumped in front of the Guthrie matriarch, causing her to squeak before ducking around and staring out into the darkness behind the broken window. Paige had gone to ground right by the window.

The two younger Guthrie children had been woken up at the same time as their mother, but they had enough presence of mind to stay in their room, crying out at each rifle shot, yet staying out of the way. This was thanks to Shadowcat actually warning them to stay down until their older siblings and friends could chase off the bad-guys.

With the civilians and his friends secure, Cyclops turned his attention to the fight, using the com gear under his mask to get in touch with the team members left outside. "Vanguard, Rogue, Spyke, what the hell is going on out there?"

OOOOOOO

Her name was Domino, and she was a mercenary for hire. She was very damn good at her job, an expert martial artist and with any kind of weapon. Domino was one of the trainers Sebastian Shaw had retained for his Hellions. She was generally speaking in charge of this mission, which should've been a simple one given Empath's powers. Once with the two targets were with them of course he would no longer need to be continually influencing them, and the effects could be made permanent with enough… technological and pharmaceutical aid.

The moment Domino had seen that red flash in the heretofore dark house however she knew something had gone wrong, and using her night scope had circled around, getting into a spot where she could shoot through the window. She cursed however as her first shot hadn't taken her target in the head as she had hoped but in the arm as he moved forward a bit turning at the same time.

Still Domino was a professional, and despite the fact she missed her orders to the rest of her team were crisp. "Beef, Jetstream, Random! I count at least two hostiles in the Guthrie house, and the targets should be considered hostiles as well. Move in on the left side of the house, stick together as much as possible until we know what we're dealing with here! Catseye, Roulette, move in that direction to meet up with your team members. All regular units move in on the right side of the house, I want to take these fuckers from multiple angles. Black Dispatch 1, release air drones!"

It was only a brief violent pulse of light that warned her in time for her to duck away, and she cursed as she heard a fizzing sound from behind her. Something had just slammed at extremely high speeds into the tree that she had just been lying in front of, blowing off a large chunk of its bark and digging in, burning it at the same time. "What the hell was that!?"

She rolled again as another light flashed followed by two more in quick succession. Some kind of laser gun, she thought to herself as she hid behind a rock. Whoever the hell they are, they certainly have some impressive toys. With that she moved off through the woods, intent on getting closer, certain her orders would be obeyed, and wanting to get it stuck in herself.

OOOOOOO

Cyclops cursed, and this time it had nothing to do with the injury his arm had taken.

"Repeat multiple targets inbound," Rogue said her voice clip and crisp despite her southern twang. We got about 12 or 15 uniformed toughs moving in on the right. A few of them are larger than normal humans, but other than that I can't make out any other features. Some kind of porcelain mask or something covers their faces, and I think they're wearing dark blue or purple but I can't tell in the dark." Night goggles were food for seeing in the dark, not so good about color.

"We've got incoming on my side too!" Spyke said quickly. "At least three, dressed in the same uniform minus the masks. One of them looks as large as Colossus, the other one is… really weird looking. Gray skin, I can see that even in the dark, and someone else that looks as if he's got some kind of rocket pack on his back. Yep, he just now took off, into the air." Indeed the boo of a rocket launch could be heard even in the house. "I think we can kiss any attempt at anonymity goodbye boss!"

Cyclops thought furiously and began to bark orders. "Vanguard, can you take that sniper under fire?"

"Affirmative," the answer came back calm and clear, an ocean of professionalism in this sudden combat.

"Do it. Keep the sniper under fire until I'm clear, then switch over and see if you can help Spyke, you're in charge over that end. Shiang-Chi, move back through the forest to take them from behind." With his disdain for ranged weapons Shiang-Chi would be at a severe disadvantage against armed opponents unless he could close. "I'll move in to help Rogue, then whoever finishes first can come to the aid of the other." Even as he said this the distinctive "FZZARK!" sound of the plasma rifle sounded in the evening air outside.

Cyclops turned to the Guthries and Colossus. "Colossus head out now, meet up with Spyke on the left. My bet is those two girls that were in here will meet up with trio that is already approaching from that side. Rouge and I will finish off their other troops and join you." He looked over at the downed Empath, and asked the Guthrie matron. "Do you have anything we can use to tie him up with?"

She frowned angrily, still crouching behind Colossus' metal legs. "What the hell is going on?!"

"It turns out that the professor isn't the only one who knows Ah'm a mutant mama." Sam said. "The guys shootin' at us want to recruit me for something a hell of a lot worse than just figurin' out how to control mah powers and maybe using them to help others. This one," Sam said kicking the downed empath in the side. "Did something to us, which made both Paige an' me think it was a good idea tah listen to him and maybe even go with 'em. Cyclops interrupted that." Paige in particular shuddered a little.

"I'd love to stay and chat," Cyclops interrupted as more plasma shots rang out outside. "But right now I have two quick questions: would any of your neighbors that might hear all this come to help or call the police, and are you two willing to stand and fight?"

That last was directed to Sam and Paige, and both of them got bullish expressions on their faces. No one had ever said a Guthrie backed down from a fight before, and neither of them was going to do so now.

With an apologetic glance at her mother, Paige began to peel off her outer skin, wincing not in pain but because it looked a little gross, and she didn't like showing it to either of these young men. The peeled skin revealed underneath a metal body much like Colossus, though she had to some odd contortions to peel the skin off and keep her cloths on at the same time.

Sam simply grinned, reaching into a pocket to pull out a pair of clear glasses. He didn't really need them, since his force field kept the wind from bothering his eyes, but he thought they looked cool. "What do you want us ta do, sah?"

Their mother glared at both of them and shook her head. "Police? Out here? You must be joking, we've got two deadbeat sheriffs, that's it. As for the neighbors, they might, if the fight goes on long enough, but sound doesn't travel far in these woods, so it'll take a bit. And as for you two…" she glared at her kids but shook her head resignedly. "Come back safe, you hear? I'm not going to have to bury you next your daddy, understand?" Both kids nodded.

By this point the other two Guthrie children had recovered from their fright, and with Shadowcat following them came to look for their mother both of them wearing expressions of fear as the sounds of combat resounded outside. They stopped and stared at their sister however, now clad in metal, and their brother who was hovering a bit off the ground as his powers activated.

Cyclops nodded. "If they get involved, we'll deal with it as we can, hopefully by that point we'll have made the fact that were here to defend you all clear enough. Paige, you head left when we get out the doorway, you're with me and Rogue. Sam, overhead watch, knock their flier out of the sky then head to the right, see if the team on that side needs any help."

Sam grinned cracked his neck and with a roar took off from his standing start slamming out of the room in a plume of fire coming from his legs. Soon he was moving as fast as if he had been shot out of a cannon.

He was followed swiftly by Colossus, who only took a few shots from the dark of the forest before he was in among the woods on the right side. Rogue hadn't been able to intercept her group before they got within gun range of the house unfortunately.

Paige and Cyclops rushed out as well, with Cyclops stopping to lay down some cover fire as bullets began to rip up the ground around them from where they were rushing toward. They had also spread out, making her unable to cover the entire axis of approach.

Two of them made the mistake of coming out of the woods to try and take Paige from the side, but Cyclops blasted them off their feet. He had taken the time to switch his visors setting to a more lethal punch so rather than simply blasting them off their feet, both men were smashed back in a welter of blood and burned flesh.

Paige had reached the woods, slamming as fast as she could into one of the larger bruisers coming out of the woods. The thing had been wielding a large side pumped SAW of some kind, but she crushed it with one punch. Along with making her skin metallic, she also gained much of the strength of the metal form. After a series of punches one punch slammed into the big guy, lifting him up off his feet to crash into a tree. The tree trunk cracked under the blow, and began to fall and there was some cursing behind it as four more men scrambled out of the way.

Paige now felt bullets slamming into her, but she ignored them confident in her metal body's ability to take the punishment.

The man she had just punched got to his feet woozily, but a thin arm grabbed him by behind, gripping his shoulder and tossing him further into the woods. "Ahm Rogue, you must be Paige."

"That's me." Paige grinned, flashing the older girl a peace sign. "So what do we do, just smash as many of these bastards as we can?"

"That's the plan sugah, but there's more of 'em than I thought. Lets stick together okay, just in case they've got somethin' we can't face alone."

"Good thinking," Cyclops said as he joined them, smacking Rogue lightly on the shoulder to warn her about situational awareness. He ducked under a tree, since he wasn't nearly as bullet proof as the two girls. While his suit gave him some defense against bullets, unless he wanted to be a black, blue and broken bruise tomorrow he had to watch that kind of thing. However he had been trained for things like this, and both Logan and Harry had made certain that he and the rest of his team knew what to do in a night operation. "You two keep together, move in a half circle around the house and take out anyone you see. I'll fade to black and hit them where and when I can. They need to have some kind of team lead too, so if I can take that out their organization goes by-by."

Just as he said that his eye beams lashed out smashing into another of the troopers who he spotted through the woods, sending him lifeless to the ground. "Let's do it!" With that he moved off leaving the two girls to exchange a shrug and then moving in the opposite direction, charging a pack of shooters through the trees, smashing aside anything in their way.

Above them, Sam had found a few drones with guns trying to blast down at the action below. These he smashed out of the sky with almost contemptible ease only to find his air superiority challenged by a streak of someone coming from the right, reminding him of his original job.

The man tried to attack him with two handguns, blasting out at full auto. However, Sam's blast shield didn't drop so long as he was moving, something had a bit of in common with the Juggernaut for some reason. The bullets therefore did nothing but irritate him.

In response, Sam flipped around to face towards the man, boosting towards him as fast as his powers could go.

The man tried to dodge, but he did so too soon, allowing Sam enough time to compensate. Sam wasn't trying to slam his full body into the man, he knew that might kill the man so instead he had aimed for what he assumed was the man's rocket. "CRAck-ooom!" With a boom and the sound of exploding metal and ripping skin, the thrusters that were actually cybernetically molded to his back disintegrated under the impact, while Sam kept on going.

The man screamed aloud in agony even as he began to fall like a stone towards the ground, unable to regulate his mutant power without the thrusters there to guide the propulsion he created. Sam swooped back, reaching out with his hands to grab the man's leg and slow his dissent enough to let him land relatively intact. At this point he came under fire from below, and rocketed back up into the sky zooming around to see if he could find any more targets.

OOOOOOO

Domino cursed as she saw Jetstream fall out of the sky. He wasn't her favorite person really, he and Empath were a little too egotistical for her tastes, but still a team member was a team member. She ducked under another plasma blast, circling around a tree and then leaping up into the branches as silently as she could. That damn sniper was getting on her nerves, and Domino knew they had been moving closer to one another.

She moved silently from tree to tree as the battle continued around the Guthrie house, stopping intermittently to range through her night scope at any target of opportunity she could see. At one point Domino glimpsed a woman dressed in red armor of some kind over a brown and yellow suit. She took a shot at her, only to watch it bounce off the armor without the girl even noticing, but right after she had to dodge another plasma bolt.

Ducking back down to the ground Domino set up the rifle on a high tech tripod based off a new military version of a base defense system that fire on any movement in a 275 degree radius.

With that she jumped to another tree, pulling out a handgun in one hand and a long heavy knife in the other. She kept waiting, watching as the gun was taken under fire from the plasma user and then rushed in that direction as silently as she could move.

"Chyort voz'mi!" Vanguard cursed as he realized he'd been had, and began to divest himself of his latest hide, but was barely able to do so before bullets began to fall in where he had been laying.

A second later he brought his shield out from behind his back, catching the skittering blade his opponent, a woman by her figure, drove at him point first but in a fit of bad luck for him it skittered along the edge as he couldn't. The blade caught right above one eye, cutting a thin but deep cut there.

"Yob tebye suka!" He cursed again as the blood began to fall into his eye blinding him but he kicked out at the same time catching the rather attractive woman, from what he could see in the dark anyway, in the leg before she could dance away.

"I've been called much worse than a bitch you Oyobuk!" Domino laughed wildly even as she cursed the man in the dark red suit back. She opened up at point blank range, but Vanguard activated his power grateful that all the training had finally give him some control over it, though he couldn't keep it up for long or bring it up quickly. The bullets spanged off his impenetrable shield.

He raised the shield of the Red Guardian and threw it towards the woman who ducked under it quickly, reaching up after dropping her knife and actually catching it by its strap, pulling it down to use to block his charge.

"Nice try sookin syn!" she muttered, handgun now pressed against his chest as she emptied the clip but even there his shield was between him and the bullets ricocheted directly back into the gun, making it explode, though she was quick enough to drop it before it could take her hand with it.

"Back at you, shloocha!" He grinned as he punched her in the side of the face throwing her way. But even then she was able to recover her balance and kicked out hard catching him in the crotch.

The blow was so strong it actually lifted him up off this feat despite his shield, and he grunted a little thankful beyond words for his mutant power right now. The shield lashed out slamming into his head edge first but his power blocked it again throwing her back off-balance, literally flying off her arm and she cursed luridly.

His shield flickered out just then, his lack of endurance telling at the worst possible time. A kick lashed in, catching him on the shoulder, but Vanguard rolled with it, his hands lashing out to catch and twist the leg.

Domino however had run into sambo users before. She kicked out at the hand holding her leg, catching his wrist and forcing him to let go.

Another exchange of blows followed, but without his shield Vanguard was now getting the worst of it. It was only his own training and the fact he was a good foot taller and much weightier that kept him in the fight, since every exchange seemed to subtly go Domino's way. She would dodge just enough of a punch even when of balance or surprised to not take the full force, while the exact opposite would happen to him.

Domino grinned, knowing she had the young man on the ropes. Pity, he's been well trained, and his power is damn interesting too. Ah well. She spun around, ducking under elbow blow and away kicking backwards as hard as she could, catching Vanguard in the stomach.

Luckily for Vanguard his powers once more sputtered to life, blocking the blow. Vanguard stumbled but didn't drop and his return blow caught her in her thigh. She winced, but rolled away putting some distance between the two.

Out of the corner or her eye she saw a hand suddenly coming out of the dark formed into a chop aiming toward her neck from the right. She desperately dove forward, and once again her 'luck power' aided her in letting her dodge despite the suddenness of the assault. She kicked out only to feel it blocked but she used the momentum this gave her to roll away. She turned quickly, grabbing up her knife from where she had dropped it and holding it along one forearm as she stared at her new attacker.

The man in front of her now didn't wear any kind of suit, he was dressed simply in a red martial arts gi with a line of blue on the sleeves, though his face was marred by a black eye and a major looking bruise on his jaw. He stood there in a Nhất Nam stance, one hand thrust forward the other kept low to protect himself, his body half turned to her presenting her with less of a target.

"What is the phrase, 'tag in', Vanguard? I regret to say that my skills availed me little against the troopers that Rogue has taken to call bruisers, though I was able to take out a few of the regular troopers before this was rather strongly pointed out to me." Regardless of his skill, Shiang-Chi was not bullet proof, nor superstrong. He had in fact disabled the bruiser that injured him by attacking his pressure points, but Shiang-chi had noticed that the man had already sat up by the time he had pushed himself to his feet. Deciding on the better part of valor, Shiang-chi moved off in search of softer targets, and had found Vanguard and the woman dressed in black and dark blue fighting it out.

Vanguard grimaced around what he knew was at least one cracked rib along with numerous other wounds. He hated to admit it, but he had been getting his ass kicked. One hand went up to the cut over his eye, trying to wipe away enough blood to at least see out of it again. "Thanks for the save, giáo sư. You, woman, what is your name?"

"Domino, remember it, xyecoc!" Domino muttered, her eyes flicking between the two young men.

"I will remember it. My name is Vanguard, you remember that, yes?" Vanguard turned to Shiang-Chi, but before he could say anything a howl of pain sounded out past his savior's shoulder. "I will leave you to this, I think I've been overlong getting back to the others."

"Spyke and Colossus will probably need your aid more than the others, go." Shiang-Chi replied. Vanguard got, leaving Domino and the Vietnamese to stare at one another from their respective stances.

OOOOOOO

While Rogue, Paige and Cyclops were basically rampaging through the regular troops the three Hellions were proving a bit more of a match for Spyke.

Beef was a massive boy who was his teams strong man. He was nearly as tall as Colossus, twice as wide, and had a surly disposition, cursing every time one of his blows missed. But he was slow allowing Spyke to dodge his blows and return his own. He was durable, but Spyke knew he could get through to him eventually

The one who introduced himself by morphing his pasty white yet muscled arm into a three barreled gun and firing some kind of green energy at him shouting, "You think you got a chance against Random spikey!" Was more of an issue. His skin seemed to give way under any blunt blows but hardened against cutting attacks. After either there were no visible wounds or anything, and he seemed to be able to change his body shape into a few set mutations, as evidenced by his cannon, which seemed to be his favorite, and the sledgehammer his other fist transformed into randomly.

When they escaped from the Guthrie house, the two female Hellions joined in quickly, with Catseye closing in quickly to aid Beef up close. She was more than a match for Spyke in terms of speed, and the two of them exchanged blows several times in those first few moments, but she couldn't get through his bone armor giving him an advantage there.

She did however pin him down enough for Beef to land a blow upside his head. Spyke winced as his bone helmet cracked a little under the blow, but that was all.

Roulette seemed reluctant to be pinned down to this fight, but when she tried to fade into the dark of the woods Spyke targeted her with a few of his bone bullets. She dodged them, returning fire with black balls of some kind of energy, occasionally throwing black balls at him while hitting his opponents with white ones. Spyke only noticed what they were doing when Beef impossibly was able to Dodge one of his blows because he moved in the correct direction to do so and Spyke tripped at the same exact time.

It was only because he had speed and mobility on his side that Ororo's nephew lasted the few minutes that it took Colossus to slam into the battle. He picked up the girl who was throwing around the odd energy balls from behind before slamming her to the ground face first.

Piotr was a pacifist at heart, and more than a little bit chivalrous but that woman had irritated him quite a lot, and he had been just gentle enough to knock her out rather than permanently wound her with that body slam. He jumped forwards now, moving much more quickly than anyone his size should have been able to, closing swiftly with Meat.

Colossus slammed into the Hellions' strongman throwing him away from Spyke. A quick jab to Beef's stomach made him double over, and a follow up spinning kick sent him flying away before Colossus jumped in front of Spyke to take a few of the odd green bursts of whatever-they-were coming from the older looking strangely lumpy and white skinned fellow. The blast hit him with force, throwing him back slightly on his heels, but that was all. His metal body was well up to the task of taking those blasts, whatever the heck they were. They didn't seem like anything Colossus had run into so far.

The bone user took this opportunity to charge forward, trying to getting in close once more with Random, but Catseye had other ideas. She jumped in growling and hissing to land on Spyke's back. Once there she gripped him with her legs around his waist while she began a spirited attempt to trying to claw out Spyke's eyes, which was the one place he couldn't cover with his bone armor. "Let's see how hot you are without your eyeballs!"

Colossus reached over to try and remove her, but gasped as his face took a few hits from the odd gun of their opponent, this time however he caught a glimpse of the actual gun. Somehow the man had changed the shape of his hand into that of a gun and firing at him with it. At the same time Roulette, clutching her head from Colossus' slamming her into the ground. With two probability balls she shot both boys' feet out from under them.

Taking this opportunity Beef rushed in, concentrating on Spyke along with Catseye, while Random's arms changed into some kind of clamp, pinning Colossus down. "Got you now boy!"

Whether this would've worked for long or not would never be known because at that point Sam and Vanguard arrived on the scene from their own respective battles. Vanguard had taken the time to call Sam down out of the sky for a moment to talk as he raced away from where he had left Domino and Shiang-Chi. The two of them arrived on the scene at that point in a coordinated strike.

Nikolai's rifle fired twice as he ran in, blasting into the side of Catseye and Beef's shoulder. The girl gurgled and was thrown backward in a welter of blood, out of the fight. Beef however simply took it rolling with the blast, cursing as he felt his skin burn, but that was all.

At the same time Sam rocketed out of the air barreling into Random with punishing force slamming the large gray-skinned man down into the ground and then away with a "Wuff' of agony. Before Random could recover Sam had one of his legs between his hand and was rocketing back up into the air.

Random recovered surprisingly quickly from that initial charge. He tried desperately to change his legs into a configuration that would lock onto his captor's hand while both of his arms changed into tri-barreled cannons which blasted away at the rocketing man. This proved ineffectual however since Sam's shield was active since he was in flight. It did blind Sam for a moment, but it didn't stop him from whirling around in midair before he let Random loose to fly away from the momentum. "Have a nice trip, ya hear!"

Back on the ground Colossus had struggled to his feet leaping forward to smash bodily into Beef, bearing him down to the ground before the other strongman could try to get away. Beef tried to fight back, his large ham-sized fists pounding on Colossus, but his metal form was more than up to the task of taking his blows.

On the other hand Beef's brain and face couldn't take the punishment that Colossus dealt out in turn. As one hand held the other muscleman down Colossus wailed on him, landing several quick, hard blows to his face and side of his head, rattling his brain box and pounding Beef's face into mush. He stopped as the other man's struggles ceased. Colossus quickly checked for a pulse, sighing in relief as he found one.

With that done Colossus stood up, quickly moving to the girl who had been shot in the side by Vanguard. Luckily Vanguard hadn't aimed to kill, for some reason the girl had looked a little young to him in the dark, and so he hadn't wanted to kill her. The girl was badly burned on her side, but was alive nonetheless.

Seeing she was alone now against at least three enemies, Catseye used her reflexes to bound up into a tree and away, using the nighttime forest to her best advantage to put distance between her and her pursuers. But Vanguard and the others didn't have any thought of pursuit.

Vanguard moved over to Beef, turning the huge young man over. He could tell now they were this close and with his night vision goggles that the boy was actually a little younger than him, at least his face, what could be seen below the damage Colossus had done, implied that. With Colossus holding the large man's arms behind him as he laid chest down on the ground, Vanguard looked around for something to bind them.

Shadowcat came upon them at that point, gasping a little as she saw the damage that the other girl had taken. She looked reproachfully at Vanguard, but he was already looking up at her gesturing at the two. "If you've got any something that can secure these two, use it. Colossus, Spyke, on me. There's still a battle going on." Through the woods they could still hear the staccato blasts of machine guns, rifles and other weapons, so they knew the battle was still ongoing on the other side.

Struck by a sudden thought, Shadowcat paused even as she reached into her special pouch. "Can I have a have a house-elf's help please?"

With a pop Clare appeared before her smiling brightly, curtsying. "Yes mistress?"

The brunette teen's eyes widened in shock, she hadn't actually thought that would work, but she then shrugged it off as a mystery for later. "Do you think you could get me some burn paste, please?" If she was going to be stuck looking after the prisoners then she would do something about the girl's injuries. Shadowcat knew that was actually a pretty good use of her talents especially since she didn't want to fight and there wasn't any time for her to scout around. Most of the damage to the musclebound boy looked cosmetic in nature, so she'd leave that for later.

As the house-elf popped off Nikolai left the other two off through the woods.

OOOOOOO

There were at least twice as many regular troopers and bruisers than what Rogue had reported, which meant the fight on the other side of the house had dragged on and spread out. Paige and Rogue however were practically immune to the weapons of their enemies, and they ran roughshod over the opposition, but could only be in two places at a time, having split up despite Cyclops wanting the more experienced Rogue to stay with the excitable Paige. This allowed the battle to spread out even as the Hellions themselves went down.

Cyclops had taken the roll of a classic skirmisher, hitting and fading back into the dark, regardless of what the enemy soldiers tried to do to stop him. Even when they closed, his training with Harry and Logan enabled him to match them in hand to hand. Cyclops had just met up with Paige, who had broken off from Rogue, turning back an attempt to get around the house even further to possibly take hostages, when the battle changed.

The noise had brought out the locals and they announced their presence in no uncertain terms. In this area of Kentucky nearly everyone owned a gun, if not for self-defense then for hunting, and all of the locals knew how to use them.

They were aided in this endeavor by a hail of sudden fire coming out of the woods, the staccato 'bang, bang,' of hunting rifles and the 'boom' of a shotgun. This fire took the troopers from surprise in the side after they had turned to fire on Cyclops and Paige. Two of the six regular troopers went down at once, while two more dropped into cover.

The final two had no such chance as Paige was in their faces, her metal fists lashing out to smash them boneless to the ground.

There was a bruiser with this group, and he turned to bring his SAW machine gun to bear on the woods where the hail of gunfire had come from. He ignored the few bullets that smacked into him almost contemptuously even as they struck sparks from his body, something underneath his skin. Before he could however, Cyclops' eyebeams lanced out, slamming into him with lethal force.

The two troopers who had taken cover tried to make a run for it back to their fellows, but Cyclops caught one of them, while the crack of a hunting rifle rang out just once, dropping the other with a bullet to the back of the head.

There was a brief moment of silence there in the woods behind the Guthrie place, even as the battle raged elsewhere. Cyclops and Paige stared into the woods where the bullets came from, with Cyclops trying to spot the group that had opened fire, but finding no sign of them, a startling realization given the night vision setting on his visor, while his body was tense, ready to dive for cover or fire if need be.

This silence was broken a crackling, elderly sort of voice ringing out in tones of censure "Paige Guthrie is that you under that shiny stuff? And what by our holy lord are you wearin' young lady?"

"Erk!" Paige gulped, her hands now trying to cover her body, which still wore the tattered rags of the daisy dukes and tight t-shirt she had put on after being woken up earlier. Despite her body being metal underneath, she knew that wouldn't matter much to the owner of that voice. "Yeah, its me. Um, er, sorry Mister Timmons. Er, this happened so quickly, Ah wasn't able to change out of my sleep cloths."

Cyclops watched as five locals made their way out of various hides, whistling in appreciation at how well they had hidden themselves. After that first group came seven more, with another older man followed by two sheriffs with gleaming badges who moved forward to stare at Paige before flicking his eyes over at Cyclops.

This man though wasn't the one who had spoken up. That was a small, mousy man who looked sort of like a teacher of some kind, who began to remonstrate with Paige on her lack of proper attire in no uncertain terms. It was amusing to see the self-possessed, confident Paige shrink under this verbal assault, but Cyclops had other fish to fry at present.

The old man who strode towards Cyclops was a broad shouldered man with close-cropped gray hair, a trimmed, well-kept beard and a tattoo of some kind visible only thanks to Cyclops' night vision visor. "Tom Lawson, mine manager. Who're you son, and what in god's name is happening here?"

Cyclops had learned a lot on how to read people since that first Danger Room session against Harry, and he sized this man and the locals up quickly. He decided to tell a bit of the truth, It wasn't like he had a choice at this point. "My codenames Cyclops sir, I work for a group that want to take in mutants and help them train in their powers peaceably if we can, but also in self-defense. We were warned that young Paige had activated her power, but ran into another group that tried to abduct her and her older brother, who had already signed on board with us. They call themselves the Hellions from what they said when they tried to convince Paige and Sam to go with them, but they also have a lot of regular seeming troopers with them. I'd say they're some kind of terrorist group."

"It's true Mistah Lawson." Paige interrupted, looking over at the mine manager who had taken a pay cut of his own to help the Guthries along before Sam started to work the mines in place of their father. "One of 'em, he tried to do something to our minds, get us to agree with their sales pitch."

She shivered a little, remembering what else the man had tried to do to her, deciding then and there that maybe she should change her style of dress. Fun as it was to flaunt her body now that she had one worth the effort, it might attract further attention she didn't want to deal with.

"Nice to see some signs of thought in that bubblehead of yours." The mousy Timmons snorted, then touched the ancient single-action hunting rifle that was slung over one shoulder. "What do you think we should do Tom?"

Tom stared at Cyclops, trying to get an impression of the young, he could tell that much from the voice, man behind it, then nodded decisively. "I'm going to believe you for now son, but if you think we're just gonna stand aside and let you take Paige and young Sam away without more than that, you've got another thing coming. For now, let's get it stuck in again."

Cyclops grinned, then tapped his earbud, activating his com gear. "Vanguard, how are you doing on the left flank? We're about to enclose from the right and behind with local partisans, so watch your fire discipline! Now let's finish this!"

OOOOOOO

Shiang-Chi and Domino continued their battle for nearly twenty minutes after Vanguard had left them, though it seemed much longer to both. Hands and feet flashed, smashing into one another with brutal, punishing force, with neither of them gaining the upper hand while the main battle started to die out.

Domino was more flexible, much more aerobatic, able to leap and jump around far better than Shiang-Chi. But he was the better trained martial artist, and in close it was only Domino's luck powers that let her stick around with him. She had lost her knife in the first pass, the man she was fighting breaking it with a kick when he dodged to the side, allowing it to sink into a log rather than his side.

She kept on trying to pull out some of her holdout daggers, more throwing daggers than a her short sword unfortunately, but even there, Shiang-Chi was good enough to keep her from using them. Whenever she tried to get some distance he would close rapidly, sometimes disarming her before she could put fully pull out the knife, other times simply forcing her to abandon the effort.

They were both covered with bruises and wounds here and there, but neither had been able to get the upper hand until finally her luck kicked in decisively.

Shiang-Chi gasped as he suddenly lost his footing for just a second as he tried a high kick, extending it too far for him to recover quickly. Domino ducked underneath the kick pulling out a knife at the same time, slashing upwards into his chest. Even so Shiang-Chi was able to dodge that slash just enough to make it nonlethal, opening a wide gash over his chest, and thundering back with a wild blow had caught her in the side of the head.

He sprang backwards, doing a handstand and flipping himself over, one hand going to his chest as he stared at Domino who had been flung to the side by his punch. She had rolled with it however, and came up pulling out a holdout pistol now that had been strapped to her back, blasting away at him forcing him to dodge.

Domino grinned, pushing forward to continue pressing her advantage, eyes alert as she stared into the woods around her. However at that moment the tiny display on the small monocle that covered one eye pinged at her. Tapping her headpiece she cursed as she noticed that only Random and Catseye's life-signs were still reading as active among the Hellions. Jetstream was still reading as badly injured, Roulette was now reading as injured and unconscious, then faded to dead as her vitals stopped. Beef and Empath were both unconscious.

She changing the display to show her the life signs the regular troopers that had been assigned to her team as backup. Her frown deepened as she noticed there were only five of them remaining, and as she watched they all went out, one after another. Two of them were unconscious joining ten others including two bruisers, while the other three flat-lined, joining the majority of the squad.

Domino scowled, but like any good leader, she knew when to cut her losses, and she opened up the com unit, waiting only a second as the mouth piece extruded itself from her headpiece. "Catseye, fall back to the transport but see if you can loop around in direction where Jetstream went down. Random, see if you can do the same thing, or if not prepare to defend the transport ship, I'll see if I can get Empath out and meet you three there."

"I'm already retreating." The catlike girl's voice was somewhere between a female growl and a cat's snarl. "Beef's down and Roulette is probably dead. She took a shot from that red bastard's high-powered blaster."

Domino nodded. "Understood, just do it." With that, she faded into the gloom of the now near silent forest, throwing as many of the smoke pellets as she could around to cover her treat from her battle with the marital artist. A moment later however she cursed, moving back even further into the woods. There were now a dozen men surrounding the Guthrie place, all of them armed. Those were odds she could have taken on, but she noticed two women there as well, the one clad in metal and the other the one who had ignored her bullet before in the woods. Even as she watched more people came out of the woods, dragging the unconscious bodies of a few troopers.

Damn, Shaw's not going to be happy about that. Empath was important to our ongoing recruitment efforts, without him it will be much harder to convince mutants to join up with us. Still, Domino knew better than to throw good money after bad. She once more silently moved away through the woods away from the Guthrie house.

She toggled her heads up display again and was able to use it to home in on Catseye's position, and the two of them moved through the woods towards where her heads up display told her Jetstream had crashed. They found him burned, battered, and his back maimed from the explosion of his thrusters, but still alive. Catseye and Domino grabbed an arm each, ignoring his groan of agony and began to drag him along to the extraction point.

The team leader was pleased to find Random already there, battered and bruised and nursing what looked like a broken arm despite the mutagenic properties of his arms. "Who the hell did we run into?" he growled. "These guys fought like damn professionals, who else is putting together a team of mutants?"

"I don't know." Domino replied. Professor Xavier had been very good at erasing any hint of the X-Men from anyone who saw them in action, and this had kept them and their powers a secret from most up to this point. Added to this, no one on American soil save for a few SHIELD agents knew about Vanguard and Colossus. A few people in the government knew about Charles running the X-Men, but they didn't even put that in writing, certainly not on any computer or anything else where any of Sebastian Shaw's agents could find information about them. "I don't know, but when next we meet with them, we'll have a much better idea of what they can do."

"Our Intel was off too." Catseye growled. "Whoever these guys are they had already met the Guthries, they were waiting for us inside for fucks sake! Could someone have told them we were coming?"

Domino frowned as the three of them dragged the badly wounded Jetstream into the small VTOL plain they used as a transport. It had much the same technology as Xavier's new black-jet. Though much slower it was even more invisible, and had much more offensive capabilities as well. Domino was actually tempted to take it and bomb the hell out of the Guthrie place in the hopes of getting some of their opponents, but that wouldn't be in keeping with the low profile that they were supposed to try and keep. Of course this entire nighttime battle wasn't exactly very low profile either, but it hadn't been avoidable either, not after Empath went down.

She climbed through main sitting area into the cockpit as Random secured Jetstream into a chair while Catseye took out the small emergency medical kit to see if she could find anything to help him. Soon both of them were feverishly wrapping up every wound they could find, while sticking in an emergency pack of blood, though the prognosis was still very grim for the flyer.

Domino started up the engines, lifting them off the ground. Before she turned the plane away however she chanced a glance back into the main section of the jet. Seeing the two youngsters, and despite what he looked like Random really was young, around college-age actually, were busy, she toggled a few switches in the plane which made a hidden section of the controls iris out from where it was concealed.

Another glance back showed the two teens were still busy with their work, and she turned back. A big red button was the first and easiest for her to hit, but the others caused her to frown, feeling a bit of guilt for what she was about to do. After a second however she pressed the buttons next to the scrawled names of Empath and Meat's names, before once more toggling the controls. As the hidden section once more slid back out of sight, she turned their VTOL away.

OOOOOOO

Shadowcat had been forced to give the badly burned Roulette a potion to put her to sleep since the moment she tried to apply the paste Roulette had woken up from the pain of having her burns touched. The damage she had taken was also worse, and deeper than Shadowcat had previously thought. But the only one of those she had access to was the Draught of Living Death, since it was the only one Harry had brought with him from his old dimension. This moment of serendipity was the only reason her current patient's kill switch was not activated with the others by Domino.

She was just finishing her work when next to Roulette Beef suddenly shuddered, his hands scrambling at his chest as a hoarse scream came from his bruised mouth. She gaped for just a second then scrabbled over to him. It was too late however, the small kill switch that had been embedded next to his heart had imploded, killing Beef almost instantly.

Appalled, Shadowcat backed away, her eyes wide while her hands covered her mouth. She turned quickly, but thanks to the potion couldn't tell if Roulette had been similarly killed. "Clare!?"

The house elf appeared once more, her face wide and beaming once more as the young mistress called for her by name. "Yes mistress?"

"Can you tell me if this girl is still living, I gave her a potion and something happened and, it, I mean that big guy, he's dead! I mean, she's got no pulse, but I don't know if that's because she's you know, or because of the potion I gave her." Shadowcat babbled.

The house elf nodded slowly, looking over at the sleeping woman. "She is fine mistress, she be alive but sleeping deep, very deep. The potion you gave her will be keeping her alive, but stopping all blood from flowing and stuff." As one of the younger house elves, Clare had taken to Ororo's lessons on how to speak quickly, but her general knowledge, especially of potions, was still lacking.

Shadowcat breathed a sigh of relief, thanking Clare profusely for her reassurance, letting the elf disappear once more.

The others soon converged on her position, bringing with them the local partisans led by the mine manager. All of the locals were looking a little wary of the costumed crew, but Cyclops had impressed them with his openness, and Sam and Paige were well known. Though Paige had broken off to dress more appropriately, much to the noticeable chagrin of the younger set of locals.

As they came up Scott was wondering how Professor Xavier was going to want to handle this. He'd made the call on the spot to be up front about what was happening with the locals, but now he was second-guessing himself a little, and worried about what the professor would think. That thought flew out of his mind when he spotted Shadowcat, who was shaking a little as she looked down at Beef. . "Shadowcat!" he said sharply making her look up. "It wasn't anything to do with you! We took a few prisoners as well, and they all died suddenly a few minutes ago. They all must have some kind kill switch or something inside them."

Indeed, in the bruisers' case it went further than that. The regular troopers had the same thing Beef and the other Hellions had, small bombs set right next to their hearts. The bruisers however didn't just have a small bomb surgically placed in them, they had several small packs of incredibly powerful acid placed at certain points of their bodies. It was an incredibly painful way to die, much more so than even the normal method, and it served to erase nearly all the clues anyone could use to figure out where the bruisers had been… modified.

The sight of the girl shivering in place at the dead body at her feet mollified Tom Lawson. Whatever else these kids were, they obviously weren't remorseless killers, which after the battle in the woods was a comfort to him. He watched as the girl with the southern twang named Rogue went over to put her arm around the other girl's shoulders giving her a brief reassuring hug.

Sam looked disconsolate. He didn't like the idea of killing, though he understood the necessity and was willing to do it to defend himself and others if need be. Life was hard here in the mountains of Kentucky, and had bred hard folk. Paige simply shrugged. She wasn't one for deep thinking.

After a moment Shadowcat composed herself and looked around at the others who were talking quietly with a few of the locals going over the bodies of the dead they had dragged here while even more people moved towards them from the Guthrie place, leading the rest of the family. "What do we do now?"

Cyclops, Vanguard and Colossus exchanged glances wondering the same thing. It came as no surprise however to those who knew him when Colossus came up with a sensible suggestion, even if he did have to say it in Russian and have Vanguard translate for him. "This has gotten completely out of hand, there are far too many witnesses, far too much physical evidence. I think we need to call in Guardian. He and Professor X should be the ones to decide what to do."

That made Scott frown a little, knowing that the Professor might erase minds first and ask questions later but there was simply too much physical evidence around for that to have any affect other than making the locals even more paranoid and distrustful. Still he knew it was a decision for the two older men, and he nodded. "I'll get in touch with the Professor, hopefully he and Nightcrawler are finished their task. Can one of you contact Guardian?" He smiled briefly, thinking how apropos the name was for Harry.

The X-men's field commander was able to get through to the professor quickly enough, or at least Kurt anyway. "Nightcrawler, are you and the professor finished? We need the Professor here soonest. This became quite a bit larger than we expected."

Nightcrawler's voice was apologetic, but firm. "We're on our way back, but the professor might not be able to help you right away." Despite his firm tones, Kurt's voice was a little shaky. He was an individual who believed strongly in God and the goodness of man, but in the last hour or so he had seen things that shook that faith considerably.

The two of them had found the target ship, and Nightcrawler had easily been able to make his way aboard. Thanks to Kitty's runic additions to his X-Men suit his bamfing no longer carried that smell of brimstone, and as long as he was careful enough to pop in out of someone's line of sight he could sneak around very easily.

The target was a refugee ship, carrying a group of refugees fleeing from the area between Vietnam and Cambodia, where battles were still going on between pro-communist guerilla groups and the governments of both countries. They had fled to the sea in an attempt to get to the promised land of America, but they hadn't made it out of even the South China Sea before their ship had been boarded by pirates.

Before this event Nightcrawler had a somewhat normal teenager's view of pirates, thinking them honorable rouges who swashed their buckles. Now he knew the truth. The only men still alive aboard the ship were those needed to run it, all of the others had been killed and their bodies had been flung up on deck in preparation to be thrown into the sea after the… festivities… were over. The women had been rounded up, and the group of about fifty or so Pirates had taken turns gang-raping each of them in turn, regardless of age.

Upon finding the bodies stacked up on deck Kurt had become grimly serious and begun his work to kill any of the Pirates that came upon him, but upon finding the women he had immediately begun to massacre the Pirates, using his powers ruthlessly, appearing here, there and everywhere, cutting them down. His swords, gifts given to him by Wolverine before he left the mansion, were literally drenched with pirate blood by the time he was done.

He was surprisingly aided in this by Charles who was still driving the jet in the sky above the ship. The Professor ruthlessly shut down the mind of any pirate that tried to get a bead on Nightcrawler that he didn't see or any of them that were even tempted to try and use a hostage as a shield. Those shutdowns were permanent, he literally liquefied their brains in his fury. Charles was all for giving people a second chance and for due process of the law but there were just some crimes that even he would not forgive.

Kurt would never forget the broken gazes of those women, even as he ruthlessly killed each and every one of the pirate he could find aboard the ship. He had been gripped by a monstrous fury which he willingly let loose on all the pirates. The fight with the Hand had given him nightmares for days. This fight would give him nightmares as well, but not a one of them would come from what he had done, only that he hadn't gotten there sooner.

With the Professor signaling an all clear Kurt began to help the women up onto the deck, flinching occasionally as they flinched from him in turn, though it faded quickly in each with Charles' mentally calming them as Kurt helped them through the bloody abattoir of the boat's interior. Eventually he found the telepath whose scream had brought her to Charles' attention. She held a family resembled to another woman beside her, who looked to be middle-aged. The possible mother had several broken bones, certainly internal bleeding, showing she had fought their captors, but if they got her aid quickly, she would possibly pull through.

The girl was possibly as old as 18, it was hard to tell given her thin body type, with short dark black hair and no broken bones to speak of though bruises aplenty from where her captors had been rough with her during their turns with her. Her mind now was blank, having shut down in self-defense during the ordeal. It remained to be seen if Charles would be able to coax her back to life from wherever her mind had retreated.

Kurt was able to get the two into the black-jet, while Charles called in the position of the ship to the nearest authority using the blackjet's voice scrambler, which in this case was the Vietnamese government. Corrupt it might be, they would still send aid out to the ship, especially since Charles had broadcasted it on every frequency, including ones Japanese and Chinese ships would pick up. Vietnam would rush ships here to help if it meant keeping Chinese interests out of their waters.

After that, Kurt took over the controls of the plane to let Charles begin his examination of the two rescued women. Thankfully the black-jet had a small med bay, which allowed Charles to work on the more horribly battered woman first. The daughter was of more importance to him, but he could not leave the woman's injuries as they were.

It was as they were pulling away that the call came in from Cyclops. Hearing this the team leader frowned sadly shaking his head at what had occurred and wishing by all the gods that these two events had happened at different times so he and the rest of the X-Men could have aided Kurt. He knew intellectually that they still couldn't have gotten there in enough time to do stop what had happened, and that Kurt seems to have handled it as well as he could, but still.

He looked over at Vanguard and the others, relaying in quiet tones what had occurred. Luckily Colossus was eventually able to reach Harry.

OOOOOOO

Jean woke up rather irritably for a few reasons despite feeling the oh-so delicious glow of having her body worked to the limit. Harry was no longer beside her, a situation that irritated her any day since she had begun to sleep in the same bed as he and Ororo. But last night had been the first night the two of them had spent together alone since they had originally got together, and it had been amazing.

First Jean had cooked for them, simple fair since she wasn't as accomplished a cook as Ororo or Harry. Homemade pepperoni, sausage and roasted tomatoes deep dish pizza, salad and fresh-squeezed cherry lemonade had been the faire. The pizza was a major hit, since Harry hadn't yet had the deep dish variety.

For his part, Harry had remodeled the viewing room up in High Note with the same spell he used on their suite in Hogwarts, making it seem as if they had simply strode out and was standing on a floor suspended in space, with nothing else on every side of them save back towards the door. They had spent the entire date there, with Harry simply transfiguring the furniture to suit their needs.

They talked about Harry's plans going forward with the team, bandying about names for said and his potions company. They of course also for his space ventures, going over the enemies the FF had run into, from Galactus to the Skrull. Harry mentioned the blood sample from the Russian magic user, and his worries there, which concerned Jean as well, but the magical aspect not so much. She had been learning to use her telekinesis to block or offset a lot of what magic could do, and her powers were still growing steadily.

From there the discussion turned to sci-fi shows and books, with Jean expounding on some of the ideas developed there, missing Harry's introspective look when she mentioned the Star Trek food dispensers, but Harry listened very intently when she talked about the problems of being in space.

After that Harry transfigured the table and chairs into a sofa and the date continued as such things do, ending with them both once more naked and the two of them having done literally everything but go all the way. As she pushed herself up on one arm, Jean smacked her lips, remembering that Harry had tasted of blueberries and star fruit this time. He had mumbled, while she had her legs clamped around his head, that she had tasted of cherries and oranges for some reason. She looked through her tousled hair to see Harry sitting up, his legs over the side and a pair of conjured jeans covering his legs already.

Rather than a smile and a warm welcome on his face for her, his attention was taken by the receiver he had in one ear. He had been always carrying it just in case during their holidays, and it looked as if something had happened. "All right Colossus, we'll be there presently." With that he pulled away the communicator, putting it down on the bed very carefully. No longer holding the fragile communicator, Harry's hands clenched, magical power sparking from them as he was gripped with a terrible fury of some kind.

Jean reached out hesitantly touching his shoulder. "What happened?"

Soon enough she was as angry as Harry. Still she reached forward and kissed him gently on the cheek, knowing she had to diffuse him somehow from the rage that he had descended into after hearing what Charles and Kurt had run into. "Harry, it's not your fault. Neither of us knew this would happen, and judging from the fact the book didn't warn the others that anything was happening in the Chinese Sea, we wouldn't have been warned about it anyway."

"I know." He replied grimly. "It doesn't make it any easier though. Still, we need to get moving."

"If you want some advice, I think we should handle the stuff in Kentucky low-key. Don't come over governmental, citified or anything like that, I think we should port in someplace close, then take your Huayra up the rest of the way. We need to be seen as human and down to earth, and while the Pagani isn't what I would choose for that kind of thing, it's what we've got. No suit either, jeans and a good shirt maybe."

Harry nodded, putting what happened in the Chinese Sea out of his mind. Charles handled it as well as it could be handled, and I think we can trust him and Kurt to keep doing so. Still, Harry did ask Cory to pop over to the mansion and drop off some of their healing potions. That was all he could do from here really without going himself, and Colossus was right, he or Charles needed to be there for this. With that done he and his redheaded lover got ready for the rest of the day.

Or at least Jean did. Harry used his time to call Ororo who promptly ordered a few house elves to take her over to the mansion herself. She knew she wouldn't be able to fly to meet the black-jet in his sort of time to come to their aid, but Ororo was determined to be there and help however she could.

Seeing Harry so grim Jean knew she needed to get his mind out of the dark places it had descended into after hearing what Kurt and Charles had run into. She could almost see flashbacks of his war against Voldemort going off in his brain, and knew he had to get past this before they arrived. So she decided to not only dress down a bit to appear more human herself, but also to get a rise out of him.

She came back in a pair of her daisy dukes, which were actually longer than the ones Paige had worn into battle, but then again Jean had a better body and longer legs. She also pulled on a very tight, cropped T-shirt, with the words 'Engineers Do It With Imagination' stenciled over her breasts, underneath which she wore a sports bra. Her hair was a wild mane down her back, barely showing any sign of having been combed, and there were visible bite marks and hickies here and there on her neck, legs, and arms. All in all she looked fantastic.

It certainly arrested Harry's attention. "Good God Jean, when you're dressed like that I just want to drag you back to bed!"

She pulled him into a kiss before pulling away hugging him closely. "You were falling into your memories Harry, right now you need to concentrate on the good things, not the bad."

Harry blinked, then after a moment nodded. He kissed her gently on the forehead. "Thank you," he murmured. "You and Ororo, always keeping me grounded one way or another."

"That's only part of the package love, now come on. We've got work to do." After moving High Note over America they flew down in the general direction of Kentucky, eventually homing in on Colossus and the others thanks to Sir Dennis back in Hogwarts guiding them.

"We need a heads up display or something!" Jean growled as they neared the ground, both of them once more covered in one of Harry's Notice-Me-Not's. "I could develop one of those if someone else can do the programming, and we could add them to our head gear."

"Sounds like an excellent idea to add to the battle rattle. We'll be sitting down and talking about that in the near future you, Nikolai, Kitty and me."

"Kitty? Why Kitty?" Jean asked as they alighted on an empty dirt road. This early there was no one around, the sun was just peeking over the horizon, and this wasn't farm country so people got up a little later than would be the case there.

Harry reached into one of his pockets and pulled out the small shrunken Huayra, setting it on the ground and enlarging it quickly. "Because she's probably going to be put in charge of designing most of the runic arrays for it. I have a few ideas, and one or two of them in particular I'll do myself, but I want to see what kind of technomancy you and she can come up with between you."

The two of them got into the car, with Harry driving of course, though Jean quickly took control of the radio turning it to the local country station. "Really?" Harry said dryly. "Really? Do you think country is appropriate for this car?"

Jean smiled happily at this acknowledgment that he was out of his funk. "Yes Harry, it's most definitely appropriate. We are in a hot, fast car on a dirt road. You don't get more country than that!"

"Despite the fact this is a European car?" Harry replied drolly, and kicked it into high gear as they raced along the road up towards the small mining town that was their destination.

By the time they arrived even more of the locals had gathered around Lawson and the two sheriffs. Many of the menfolk had gone through the woods gathering up the dead, exclaiming at the size of some of them and wondering why the hell they looked as if they had been crossed with robots then their robot bits melted. One of the youngsters knew what a cyborg was and tried to explain it to the others, which didn't really go over well to this God-fearing bunch. Anyone who wanted to add metal to themselves like that just wasn't right in the head in the local's opinion. Empath's body had also been removed from the Guthrie house to join his fellows.

The two sheriffs had wanted to call in, but when the youngsters with the superpowers had tensed up at that had decided against it. They could still do it of course, but both of them realized that none of the locals had anything that could really stop Colossus or Rogue. They had watched the Southern girl pick up and throw around tree trunks to get at the bodies underneath, and Colossus had done much the same with even more ease.

Then too, all of the X-men and their allies had gone out of their way to talk to the locals. Colossus in particular had become a favorite of the locals along with Rogue. Rogue's accent was pleasant to the ear, and Colossus was obviously farm boy, a group of individuals everyone there was well familiar with, even if his being a Russkie was worrisome. Scott came off as a soldier, which was even better, though Nikolai who did the same was not as welcome due to his foreign accent and not having his countryman's easy going manner.

Some of them had even brought out food, and despite a little lingering tenseness it was a convivial atmosphere, the locals understanding Cyclops and his team had helped Paige and Sam, both popular youngsters, from being kidnapped, whatever else was going on. Certainly there were a few who were unhappy about their presence, but they were in the minority. This feeling was heightened as coming up the dirt road leading up from the town to the Guthrie place they all began to hear a booming sound.

The car coming up was of a kind that none of the locals had ever seen before, and they all gaped at its smooth lines and the speed of it coming up the road. It stopped just as quickly though, and the country song 'Small town throwdown', which was appropriate which all the locals commented on, was beating out the refrain "We've got a field of daisy dukes, sure we know how to grow 'em" as it pulled to a stop.

Paige laughed and danced in place for a moment as the song blared out, it wasn't blue grass, but it would do. She was not at all put off by what had happened that night, simply having had a lot of fun testing out her new mutant powers. She was pretty much a typical egocentric 16-year-old girl in that manner, and despite the fact that she had killed a few times last night wasn't thinking about it. In the dark of a sleepless night it would come back to her, but for the moment she was still elated at how well she had done and the fact that she might be joining a superhero team.

All the locals gaped at the statuesque redhead that had gotten out of the car. Despite the clothing she wore Jean looked like someone had just stepped out of a Miss America contest, she was just that good looking. "I'm Phoenix." She said walking over and reaching out to shake hands with Paige. You must be Paige Guthrie?"

The younger girl smiled shaking her hand. "Where can I get one of those T-shirts?"

"First you have to actually be an engineer," Jean laughed, then looked over at the others nodding at the people she knew and bowing her head towards the locals she didn't. Sam was still looking at her with a blush on her face, and Scott had taken one look then sighed loudly and dramatically before burying his head into Rogue's neck. Rogue laughed a little at his overreaction patting him on the head.

Despite their various injuries all of the fighters save Vanguard and Shiang-Chi were somewhat elated at events of the evening before. They had faced a numerically superior enemy, many of whom had powers similar to their own and not only survived but defeated them, forcing them to retreat. All of the youngsters were elated at how well they had done, save Shadowcat who simply saw Beef and Empath's dead bodies and couldn't help but be sad. They looked her age for God's sake.

Vanguard on the other hand knew he had lost the one on one contest fight against Domino, as did Shiang-Chi. Neither was happy about it, though Vanguard also knew that the next time they saw Domino she would be better prepared for what they could do. It was never a good idea to let an enemy go like that. Shiang-Chi was simply unhappy that he had lost.

Harry got out of the car after pulling out the keys, cutting of the country station much to the disappointment of a few in the crowd. He moved forward clasping Cyclops's hand, nodding in approval at Colossus and Vanguard. That told them they had done the right thing, and both young men stood a little straighter. While Harry could obviously have handled it better, and would have very much preferred to be on site, Harry also knew that some days he wouldn't be available to lead his team, and they needed experience. He couldn't simply rely on his powers and those of Jean and Ororo, couldn't simply assume they could overwhelm the opposition.

As for the X-Men, they had performed excellently under fire, and this was precisely what he wanted them to be doing, acting on their own as well as they could. He certainly didn't want to be around holding their hands all the time.

"We'll talk about the specifics later." he murmured looking around at the locals who were now looking at him as well as Jean, wondering which of them were the higher ups that the X-team had called in. A few of them were already moving over towards him, probably spokespeople. "But for right now, give me the highlights."

"Other than what Colossus told you sir, we came in as quietly as we could and were able to convince the two local mutants, Sam and Paige over there, of our good intentions." Scott nodded his head towards the two Guthrie's who were now talking with Jean.

Sam was still blushing hotly at the sexy redhead. Certainly he wasn't alone in that, even Colossus and Vanguard had stared at her when she first got out of the car. And all the local men were sneaking glances her way. Rogue, Shadowcat and even Paige were sexy in various ways, but certainly weren't dressed to show it off as Jean was. Paige might have been last night, but it had been pitch black, her body had been metal underneath, and she had quickly changed her clothing after the battle, not wanting to deal with Mr. Timmons.

"After that, the opposition arrived. We still have no idea who they were, they called themselves the Hellions, but that's it. They went with the soft sell at first, we got the drop on them after one of them started to do something to Paige and Sam's minds." Scott was now talking loudly enough for the local trio of leaders to overhear from where they had walked up to stand behind Harry. They were still waiting though. "After we ambushed the first three, the rest of their team moved in, after their leader, or who we think was their leader anyway, she was definitely older and more experienced, shot at me through the Guthries' window."

Cyclops gestured to his bandaged shoulder, which was held against his body by a makeshift splint. Harry nodded, wiggling his finger to indicate he would heal that up later, and the X-men's field leader went on. "Their forces consisted of a platoon or so of troopers, both regular and cybernetically modified, along with three more powered members plus their leader. Vanguard and Shiang-chi both fought her, they said her name was Domino, and that she might have had some kind of, well, luck power or something. They're not too clear on that."

"I see…" Harry nodded. "I'll be interested to see you and Vanguard's AAR." Harry however had heard the name Hellion before from Emma and he frowned looking over the bodies before moving in that direction. He waved Scott and the others to follow him as he moved over to examine the bodies.

The three younger men did, while behind them Shadowcat hugged Jean a little shakily, relating what had happened. The locals had heard this before but it had definitely been a mark in Cyclops and the other's favor that they were willing to take prisoners. After comforting Shadowcat for a few moments Phoenix moved to join Harry, frowning thoughtfully.

The two of them met up and exchanged glances, Jean having made the same connection Harry had. Harry simply looked at one of the bodies and nodded grimly, then looked over at the teens, especially Shadowcat, who he could tell was barely holding herself together. He wished he could care for her now, but he had to deal with the locals first. "I think I know who was behind this. Don't blame yourselves, the man is ruthless in the extreme, and very hard to nail down. If I could I would move against him now, but that's not going to happen. Not unless we can find something incriminating on these bodies to give us a target anyway."

"You're not talking about taking the law into your own hands are you Mr.?" Asked one of the sheriffs. He was fingering his rifle, which was slung over one shoulder by its strap, looking a little poleaxed really. All of this was a little beyond him really but he could understand the gist of what the man with the hot car (and hotter redhead) was thinking.

"I look on laws more as guidelines, like, you know speed limits." Harry replied drolly, which earned him a bark of laughter from all within hearing range. Ignoring that, he looked over at Colossus and Vanguard. "I don't suppose either of you were able to give my sales pitch to young Paige?"

Both shook their heads and Harry shrugged. "Not important, I can do it now. Besides, if this community's as close as it looks the locals should all hear what I'm going to offer her and her family."

That raised some eyebrows, but they remained silent as Jean and Harry bent down to look at the bodies more closely. They didn't find anything incriminating of course, the locals and the X-Men had done the same thing.

Harry got Jean's attention subtly, before gesturing slightly at his head. She willingly opened the telepathic communication between them and Harry asked "Do you think you could find anything that would point to their place of origin from the cyborg's parts?"

"It's worth a try," Jean replied dubiously. "Though whoever designed the kill switch on the bruisers thought of the same thing obviously. Still, I'll relay that suggestion to Kitty. She can put one of her illusion ward stones on one of the bruiser's bodies while you work the crowd. I wish we could take them all but I don't think we can."

"You're right about that, way too much physical evidence for any kind of cover up to work. All I can do there is use a magical suggestion on them all to not talk about it with strangers or record our words. I was doing that while you were wowing the crowd with your entrance. Other than that, I'll contact SHIELD, that'll get the two sheriffs off our back, and get a cleanup crew in here for this lot. If we let them take the girl called Roulette away, her interrogation might also open up a second avenue of attack on Shaw if SHIELD can get any info out of her."

Jean shrugged at that, not wanting to be drawn on that subject, since she doubted the girl would know anything major. If whoever was behind this was willing to implant kill switches in their troops, then it was doubtful even the mutants among said group had any real information.

With that they both straightened up. While Jean moved back to Shadowcat, Harry immediately moved to the two sheriffs and the older, tougher looking man standing with them. "I understand that you two might feel a little ambivalent about the lawlessness of what happened last night, but we do have connections with one of the secret agencies in America, and if you let me I'll call them in to help clean up this mess. While they are on the way however, I want to tell you all about why we were looking for Paige, and what I wish to offer her and her family."

The two sheriffs and Tom Lawson as well as the mayor who really wasn't as powerful as Tom since the mine was really the only large employer in the town, got together and nodded eventually. Tom strode forward clasping Harry's hand. "That sounds fair enough Sir, but realize if you try to take the Guthrie kids by force there's gonna be a rumble, as that song your redheaded lady friend was playing said."

Harry smiled. "Sounds fair to me gentlemen." He liked people like this, tough, down to earth sorts who looked after their own whatever came. He wished rather wistfully that more of America was like this rather than, as Ororo had once put it 'namby-pamby democrats who don't know what liberty really means or that freedom has to be paid for'. She had routinely voted democrat since Charles brought her to the States and to say that Ororo had been increasingly angered at the fact that her party hadn't gotten behind mutant rights and pushed was putting it mildly.

Harry pulled out his phone, calling the line he had shared with Duggan. The Bronx born secret agent cursed like a sailor for a few minutes, but replied that a cleanup crew would be on the way, though he wasn't in a position to lead it at present. The team would arrive in ten minutes. This was because the helicarrier was over Virginia at present, and their VTOLs were somewhat faster than the new black-jet Charles had received from one of his backers.

After that Harry conjured up a box, causing a bit of an exclamation of surprise from the locals, but they all simply put it down to it being some kind of mutant power or other. Harry didn't comment on that, not seeing the point of the moment. He raised his hand, getting their attention including Paige who had been trying to flirt outrageously with Colossus at that moment, and was succeeding. The two steel clad youths had a bit in common after all, and Paige had already shown she had a bit of a brain and a fighting spirit underneath her outgoing nature.

"Can I have your attention up here, please? Now, I won't go into why last night happened, I have no idea what motivated the Hellions as they're called, to come here."

He looked over at Scott and the other youngsters who had been in the house and Sam replied, taking that cue to spread that part of the story first hand. "They were here spouting some neo-Nazi crap or other, about how Homo-Superiors are some kind of master race."

The mutterings of the crowd began to crescendo at that. Many of these people after all had fathers or grandfathers who had fought in World War 2. Harry simply shook his head. "If I ever find the first person who labeled mutants Homo Superior, I will knock their lights out."

That won him a chuckle and the attention of the crowd once more. "I do not think mutants are superior to humanity. I think we are all human, it is just that mutants have powers beyond the norm, they do not define us as individuals or as a subset of humanity. Yet with power comes responsibility, the responsibility to use that power if not for the betterment of their fellow man then at least in a way that doesn't harm anyone else. That is what I offer, training in your powers, Paige Guthrie. You don't have to sign up with my team, you just have to learn how to use your powers wisely, how to make certain that your decisions don't harm those around you. To that end, I wish to offer Paige, Sam and their family room, board, jobs and education. At the moment we've had a bit of a setback in the education area because a lot of the mutants we found recently are young kids, so we're set off up only at the elementary level, but that will change."

Cyclops spoke up from where he stood by the others, standing at attention as the crowd turned to him. "I actually represent a smaller group that's primarily American-based while Guardian here is international. We do have a high school nearby that's pretty good, and if you room with us we'll be able to get you in there easily. I would say we are very strict about grades though." That caused a chuckle but also some nods of approval. "Sam here has already signed on with us for that purpose, and the option is open for Paige. We don't have enough room at the Institute to take in their family however."

That tossed the ball back to Harry rather neatly and he smirked inside at how well Scott had backed him up there. That young man has come a long way.

"I am not going to be taking her family away from Paige. They will still live together and have all the same opportunities, and I will in fact allow them to communicate with anyone they want here. I'd like to believe that if I simply left her family here they could go on with their lives communicating long-distance with their daughter or sister like any family with a family member away at school could. Last night however proved otherwise. If they're willing to attack anyone who gets in their way of recruiting someone, they might be willing to take hostages."

"You said something about jobs," Tom asked quickly. That was the important point to him. As chief mining supervisor he knew that the mine was running out, and with it the lifeblood of the little town. They had been bleeding people ever since he was a young man, and it was only going to get worse. Sam had a good head on his shoulders, and it would be good to see him getting an education even if it happened elsewhere.

"At present, I can only say that I will be offering scholarships, jobs will come later, and will be dependent on individual effort and drive. In the future however, I'm going to…" Harry paused thinking for a moment before he shrugged, it wasn't exactly like he wanted to keep this part a secret after all, and thanks to the spells he had hit the area with before getting out of his car they wouldn't be able to share anything he said outside it anyway. "In the future, I'm going to look to the stars. Anyone ever hear about asteroid mining?"

That got him some exclamations of surprise, but Tom frowned. He'd worked as a young man on an oil rig, and had been part of the team that did some underwater repairs. He knew the trouble working underwater had, space would be much worse. "Working in space would be a stone cold bitch." he said out loud looking up towards Harry.

"We know that. However, we will be looking into solving problems there, not only as they crop up but as we can imagine them in the future. This is all building up of course, it's not set in stone when that will happen, but I guarantee that it will. This will be a major opportunity for anyone, not just mutants, but anyone who can weld, mine, knows anything about mineralogy, or anything of that nature, well when the time comes I'll be advertising for those jobs, and I hope you all think of signing up as well."

From there he went on to describe what he was offering now, as well as what he would demand education-wise. Harry was a little surprised at how the crowd had grasped on to the economic and educational aspects of what he was saying rather than the mutant angle, but he shouldn't have been.

This was a small-town community, and they didn't really care much for international or national politics. They kept themselves to themselves, and trusted their neighbors more than somebody on TV. They had all heard the anti-mutant rhetoric, and maybe one or two of them might have been swayed before this. But Sam and Paige were good kids, and that plus the evenings doings, and the impressions Peter and the others had made on them held more water than anything else. There were still a few naysayers, but none of them had a problem with mutants per-se, they had more of a problem with Harry having recruited to Russkies than anything else.

The Shield crew had arrived during Harry's speech, led by Carol Danvers. While her men began to load up the bodies to be taken away for autopsies, Carol moved through the crowd listening with more than a little shock to the speech and the mutters of surprise and support that it was answered with.

Harry had charisma with a capital C, when he spoke people listened. Nick Fury would have been appalled with him sharing as much as he had, but he really haven't shared any details, he had shared enough however to get the crowd behind him, and he came across as real, human and trustworthy. Even Carol smiled in approval at his plans going forward.

The four local spokespeople gathered together, whispering with one another and with the Guthrie matriarch whose decision it would be in the end. Her two kids were over by her two older children, and she glanced their way occasionally, wondering if this mutant thing ran in families. If Paige and Sam were both mutants, what chance was there her other two were? If so, she wanted to get them training now.

For her the education aspect was a major draw as well. She'd been proud, despite learning of his superpower, when Sam had been able to pass Professor Xavier's tests a few months back so that he could enter high school at the junior level as his age should have commanded. If he kept his grades up, Sam would become the first person in her family to graduate high school. She was determined that the rest of her kids would continue that trend. She asked Harry some questions about that topic which he fielded easily enough, while Tom grilled him about his future plans, and his stance towards America in general, something Carol listened to as well.

That was a bit of a sticking point, because Harry actually wasn't pro-America. He felt America had tremendous potential, but he didn't see America applying itself, he didn't see the American government following the 'all men are created equal' portion of the Constitution.

"But if you're asking if I'm an enemy or something like that of America the answer is a firm hell no." Harry said simply. "I don't get along with people in charge until they prove themselves worth it, so I don't get along with the government. But I don't have any problem with the people, and I think that's there's a lot of things to admire about America." After which he went on to enumerate a few.

That seemed to be the appropriate response, and the crowd nodded and muttered approval. Eventually the Guthrie matron nodded as well. "Alright Mr. Guardian, I think mah family will be takin' you up on your generous offer, and thank you very much for saving us and my two eldest from whatever was being planned for them last night."

Harry smiled, hopped off his conjured box, moving over to shake her hand. With that everything calmed down even further, and the crowd dispersed, most of them stopping by the Guthries to wish them well. A few volunteered to help them clear out the house though Shadowcat interjected that that wouldn't be necessary since they had help that would do the job in mere minutes.

Carol moved towards Harry through the crowd, stopping out of speaking range as he and the local big fish exchanged a handshake and a few words, then as the older man moved on to shake hands with Colossus and exchange salutes with Cyclops and Vanguard she moved in. "Interesting plans you've got Mr. Guardian, I wonder what Director Fury will think of them?" In fact Fury would be too enraged to know Domino, the result of an American Super-soldier program, was apparently working for terrorists, to do more than grumble automatically at Harry's sharing his plans or even said plans. "I also notice you took a live prisoner, you do realize I can't let you take her with you? She could give us a lead on this new pro-mutant terrorist group."

"Please don't call them pro-mutant." Harry replied mildly, though there was nothing mild about his eyes. "I really doubt their vision of pro-mutant supremacy is really pro mutant so much as simply pro-themselves, I really doubt they care overmuch about mutants unless they have useful powers. I also knew that you couldn't let me take Roulette before you spoke, Ms. Danvers. If you could find it in your heart to share anything you find out from her questioning, I'll give you something to counteract the potion that is keeping her in suspended animation, though I would recommend that you figure out how to get whatever kind of device is inside her before using it. As for Fury, he'll probably see the downside and imagine me as some sort of villain who's going to create a death ray in orbit or something." He shrugged. "Fury's a little too used to seeing the worst in people, and too wedded to the status quo."

"I'll agree with you on a bit of that," She replied shaking her head. "I can't promise to share anything with you, but I can promise I'll try, that's the best you're going to get I'm afraid, though I will make certain our medical staff is standing by. Incidentally, about these space-going ventures of yours, I don't suppose you have any job openings right now do you?"

Harry looked at her askance at that, though the bit about not being able to promise to share didn't surprise him. He also knew that with Emma on the inside funneling information to him, that Roulette was worth more to SHIELD than to him. But he didn't have any background in Danvers, so didn't know what her own interests were. He eventually shrugged. "I'll tell you my hiring practices are very strict, and I won't hire someone who's already got a job. Other than that, keep an eye on the news, and if you want, come and see me when the time comes."

"Don't think I won't." Carol warned. With that they shook hands and she moved off, wondering how long she'd have to wait until Harry was ready to move into space in the open, and she could kiss this SHIELD job goodbye.

She liked Nick Fury, and she liked many of the senior operatives she worked with, but she was sick to death of all the claptrap she had to deal with, the bureaucracy, and above all the narrow-minded focus that they were being forced to concentrate on. It seemed to be changing gradually under pressure from Nick, but it would be years yet before they were in any position to tackle what she saw as a major concern: space and what could be coming out of the great dark aimed at their little puny world.

After a bit more, the group broke up, with Harry using a portkey to get the X-Men back to their mansion, and using the same method and along with Hedwig to get the Guthrie clan, Vanguard and Colossus through the wards to Hogwarts, with a house-elf following up with their belongings.

Shadowcat would've gone with them, but Harry told her Storm was at the mansion, which changed her mind. Kitty wanted some time with her older sister/role model after what had happened with Roulette.

Harry and Jean were the last to go, and they only did so after the SHIELD agents were finished taking away the bodies save for the one that Cory had already taken to Hogwarts, frowning thoughtfully as they stared after them before exchanging a glance. "I think Sebastian's Shaw's time on this world has just begun to suddenly shrink." Jean sent down their link.

"Oh yes," Harry's said grimly. "If Emma or you can find us a target, we're going to start going after him as soon as we can. I want us as a team to have a few weeks of training, but then yes, Shaw has just become a target, if we can find some way to hit him where it hurts."

'Sounds good to me Harry," Jean said as the two of them got into the car and started up driving away. "Sounds good to me."

OOOOOOO

"I see…" Sebastian Shaw sighed, leaning back and sipping at his whiskey. Domino had just finished giving her report of the events that had occurred in Kentucky, a brutally honest one that pulled no punches and spared her none of the blame, something Shaw approved of.

After a moment of silent contemplation he shrugged. "You had no reason to expect you would run into opposition, with that said you performed well enough, especially since you covered your trial as you should have. The losses can be born easily enough, with our recent acquisitions Beef, Roulette and the others on your team save Random would have been surplus to requirements in any event going forward. I am going to switch you over to training our newcomers, I trust that you will incorporate the skills of this group that you ran into in your future training."

Domino nodded, glancing over to a screen on which three young people were currently exercising on three separate screens. One was a blond with a surfer tan blasting out beams of force from his hands, while next to him stood a woman with green hair who was somehow lifting up a huge metal container with a greenish sphere of force, then crushing it. The other was a man whose body seemed encompassed by some kind of burning black energy, which he could fire off from his hands. It could also apparently give him flight ability.

"Yes indeed, I think the next team of Hellions will be far more deadly than the previous version." Her employers words brought Domino's attention back to him. "In fact I should have a target for your team in a month or so, a job I will be joining you on. It is time to prune the Hellfire Club of one of its subversive elements. I trust you and the team will be ready by that time?"

He went on without waiting for Domino's response. "However, you may have the rest of this day and the next off, it will take that much time for my doctors to see if Jetstream can be saved. Spend time with Dr. Thurman if you wish, though try not to mention anything about world news. He seems to have run into something he can't predict for some reason, and it's been throwing off his normal sunny disposition."

Domino smiled at that, and bowed her way out to see her beau. His rescue from an attempted kidnapping, which incidentally got them both away from the feds, was the reason she worked for the man at all. Ruthless he might be, but he repaid loyalty to those worth it, and had set up Milo and her in a lifestyle they could never have paid for on their own along with security from whoever was after Milo and her.

Sebastian waited until Domino left. He spent a brief moment at his terminal, sending out his own kill order, one could never be too careful after all. After that he composed a memo to his spies, to see what they could find out about these X-men, wondering if they had anything to do with the teen his recruiters had failed to bring in months back in upstate New York. But for now, he had other fish to fry. Shaw finished his work on that quickly, then began to go over his list of targets for the actions against Pierce and his so-called Reavers.

OOOOOOO

"FUCK, what just happened?" A male voice shouted. The automated hands he had been using turned to slag as the small device he had just removed from the young woman's chest exploded, peppering the young woman's still open upper body with shrapnel. "SHIT, Shit, Shit! I need everyone in there, shrapnel wound to the chest, I can't do it from in here!"

As the doctor and her team rushed from the safe zone into the isolation room, Carol cursed angrily, her fist pounding the wall from where she had been leaning up against it. "Doc, any chance…"

"Not now Danvers! Right now I've got more important things to do than tell you lies!" The doctor rushed away, leaving the blonde special agent to rub her face irritably.

At that moment the nearby phone ran,g and a second later a voice came over the speaker. "All medical personnel, we just detected a signal aimed at us, location aboard ship indicates it was in the medical wing, anything happen down there?"

"Oh yeah, asshole, something happened alright." Carol muttered, rubbing at her forehead harder. "Someone out there believes in redundancy. Fuck!" With that, Carol leaned back against the wall, waiting for news, either good or bad.

OOOOOOO

By the time Jean and Harry arrived at the mansion, the blackbird was back carrying Kurt and the mother and daughter pair. Charles was still working with the telepathic woman, and had barely begun to make any head way bringing her mind back to her body. The young woman had retreated into the deepest, darkest corners of astral space, leaving only a faint connection to her body in a desperate attempt to escape the horror that had been inflicted on her. But Charles was the best and most powerful telepath the world had seen yet and he would find her and lead her back eventually.

Ororo had taken command of the medical side of things the moment she arrived via Clare teleporting her in, and had the medi-bay ready and waiting. The team itself had only a few wounds worth mentioning, Scott's broken upper arm. Nightcrawler had caught a bullet to the chest, but his suit of unstable molecules had kept it from penetrating, and his general level of toughness allowed him to walk away with only a major bruise. Vanguard had a cracked rib and Shiang-Chi a large gash across his chest along with numerous other wounds for both form their battle against Domino. Sam had a cut on his forearm from a piece of glass which had caught him after Domino shot through the window of his home. Rogue, Paige and Colossus had been literally unstoppable, not taking a single injury.

This allowed Ororo to concentrate on stabilizing the new, and as yet unknown telepath's mother. She had numerous internal injuries, both her legs had been broken, her hands mangled, and that wasn't even considering the internal damage she had taken in the actual gang rape. When Harry arrived he immediately moved to aid her, his spells aiding the potions and regular medicine she had already used. Eventually they got her to the point where she was stable, but magic could do only so much for the mental and physical injuries she had taken from the pirates. She had fallen into a deep coma, but they were both glad to report she would eventually come out of it.

Once they were done healing the woman, Ororo immediately searched out Kitty, enveloping the girl in a hug as the two of them moved into the room that had been her bedroom to talk Kitty was still shaky from Beef's death, so some time with her big sister/role model was just what she needed right now.

After hours, Charles sighed leaning back form the bed the young girl now inhabited. "I've done all I can for now. Her psyche once more inhabits her own mind, but it is now up to her to do the rest."

He looked up as a hand held out a steaming mug of tea. "Good work Charles." Harry smiled sadly at the man, while he waved his hands over the girl, casting spells to heal as much of the damage as he could. The girl hadn't been nearly as badly battered or used as her mother, something Harry was thankful for.

"Harry. I understand Cyclops and the others called you in to deal with tier issue once it became too public?" Charles sipped gratefully at the tea as he watched the other man work, always amazed at this aspect of magic. Healing was one area where wizards had a significant edge over any other type of magic user, even witchcraft and druidism was slower than the results.

"I think we handled it as well as we could. Both the X-men and my team handled themselves well enough." Harry explained what had happened, missing Charles frown at some portions of his speech, though all in all the older man was happy enough with the way things went as well as the steps Harry had taken to keep on a neutral stance with SHIELD. Moreover, Charles felt he knew more now about what had formed the man Harry Potter had become. There was just some evil that changed who faced it, and what he and Kurt had run into was an example of such. Charles just hoped that Kurt would come through it.

After a moment Harry stepped back, nodding. "I've done all I can for her body, though obviously there are some things even magic can't fix. The rest, as you said, is up to her. I trust though you'll be here to help her."

"Of course." The two of them stayed silent for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts as they looked at the young girl who had been so horribly victimized. After a few moments Harry patted the older man on the shoulder then left, heading out to find Kurt to see if he wanted to talk.

He found Kurt already out of his uniform and with his image inducer on, arguing softly with Cyclops by the doorway. "I understand what you say miun fruend, but I would still prefer to go and speak to a priest about this. There are some questions I require god's guidance to answer about this nights business."

Cyclops frowned, knowing his friend was religious, but not really wanting to trust a complete stranger to give him good advice about this. Harry however injected before the argument could go further. "Perhaps I could suggest an alternative. About a week ago I rescued a Russian Priest who is also a mutant at the same time I recruited Piotr and Nikolai. Father Garnoff is trustworthy, and you can share everything about this deplorable episode."

The young German frowned for a moment, but nodded. "That would help, thank you Mr. Potter." He had been a little distant from his former pranking role model since he had learned he was dating Ororo and Jean. Polyamory like that was immoral in his eyes, no matter what the guys at school said about dating two girls being a man's dream. He still liked Harry, it was just taking some getting used to.

"Excellent, you can come with Jean and I back to the castle. Oh, and don't try to teleport while you're there, I'm really not certain what the anti-apparition wards would do to you if you tried. Scott, if you can come with us we can get the AAR out of the way now." This way Harry would use the pensieve to go over everything, which would be a better learning experience for Scott and Nikolai.

Scott nodded. "Just let me go get changed sir."

With that he walked off, leaving Harry to round up the others coming back to the castle. Ororo, Evan, Kitty, Rogue stayed to hang out, both young women wanting to ask the former teacher some advice. Piotr had already been transported back to the castle with Nikolai to show the Guthries around. Jean came with them back to Hogwarts then flew down via the flying carpet (it was faster than her in atmosphere) to check them out of the lodge they had been staying at.

Soon Nikolai and Scott were watching as Harry extracted their memories of the battle one after another then put them in the modified pensieve. After viewing them he nodded. "You made one mistake right at the beginning Scott, and that was retaining control of the team before you were out of the house. You should have turned it over to Nikolai or Spyke until you could break out and assess the situation. As it was though with the amount of chaos, the fact it was a nighttime action, everything beyond that was well done, though you put a lot of pressure on Evan in those few moments before Colossus arrived, something you should watch out for in the future when facing enemies on multiple axis of attack."

Scott nodded in relief while Harry went on. "Nikolai, you probably already know this, but you got too caught up in your one on one battle with Domino. You need to keep one eye on the larger picture at all times. Other than that, good job, that woman was obviously a piece of work, extremely well trained and tough regardless of her power. Now, lets go over some specifics…" The rest of that discussion wasn't nearly so nice on the younger men's ego as the beginning, but it was still a good learning experience.

Later that day, Harry used the pensieve to look at his own battle in Mephisto's realm. Not only did he analyze his battle against Mephisto in order to learn a few tricks that the devil had used against him, he also used it to analyze Dr. Doom.

He came away very impressed indeed with the Latverian king. Harry had long thought that science could eventually duplicate many magical abilities, if in bulkier and more time-consuming forms, but to have the truth of it staring it in his face was a different story. As the battle continued throughout Mephisto's dimension Dr. Doom's defenses became more and more adapted to the attacks, his assaults more deadly. It almost looked as if the frequencies of his shields and repulsor blasts keyed themselves to be the most effective. That was startling, as was the way Doom was able to offset much of the advantages magic gave their enemies.

His research into Mephisto's weaknesses also showed, which was worrisome considering the man knew some of what Harry could do now, and would plan for it. Harry doubted that any kind of straightforward spell Doom had already seen would work on him now, either via his own magic or his technology, which would make him that much more dangerous. Still, Harry felt he could do the same to the abilities Doom had shown him in time.

OOOOOOO

"Sir, I realize you never wish to be disturbed while conducting research, but something important has come up."

The man that Mystique and Irene knew as Nathaniel Essex was anything but a normal man, as most people would think of the term applied. Here in his inner sanctum, he had allowed his normal appearance out. He had utterly white skin, not Caucasian, but white, like paper, standing out even more on his face thanks to his matte black hair, a small perfectly formed triangle goatee and red eyes. He stood a little over six feet tall, with decently broad shoulders though he was no musclebound man. A ruby, or something that looked like one anyway, was centered in his forehead like the bindi of Hindu women, though the comparison would not please any Hindu woman who knew this man.

He wore a from fitting black outfit with a high collar that couldn't seem to decide if it was armor or normal leather, having at times the appearance of metal in the light of the lab, at other times cloth. In the center of his chest was a red diamond shape, and on his back he wore a very odd cape that wasn't so much a cape but several long strips of cloth that curved up over his shoulders before falling back down.

With the lighting of the lab around him, coupled with the fact that he was currently operating on a unconscious man, his chest open, he looked the very picture of a mad scientist. Which most of the world would agree, if his exploits became known, fit him perfectly. The small scowl on his chalk white face completed the image as he turned to the small featureless droid with a large screen for a face that had interrupted him. "What is so important that you would interrupt me?"

Despite its robotic appearance, the droid's voice sounded almost human as it spoke. "One of our robotic observers on the Guthrie clan reported in. We/I have the full report here, but one thing was clear. Subject Jean Gray and subject Summers were not together, they didn't even seem to be on the same team."

That caused Essex to raise an eyebrow in surprise. "Give me the report." The droid reached behind it after a second of buzzing and handed over a printout consisting of several sheets of notes. The man who had… donated his mind to the android watching the Guthrie's had been ex-CIA, and retained the need to make copious, often times irritatingly so, notes, hence why this report went to one of his robotic minions rather than Essex himself.

The notes about the battle that occurred was interesting, as was the sighting of Domino, the results of yet another American attempt to create a super-soldier who had turned mercenary. He had been watching on and off for years. Her 'luck' based power was interesting, but not powerful enough to truly excite him, but couple it with something else and maybe it would turn into something more impressive.

He idly wondered who she was working for now. Whoever she was reporting to was ruthless enough to kill his pawns was telling, as well as the calculated resources needed to put these bruisers along with the regular troops into the field. Oh, he had a short list of suspects, but who on that list was something he wasn't particularly interested into looking into before this.

Essex frowned when he got to the part where his robotic agent began to talk about the crowd and what happened after this Guardian person showed up. As his aide had said, the redhead with him did indeed match Jean Gray's description, though the clothing was something he would never have thought she would wear. The reaction of the crowd, the speech this Guardian made, all of it pointed to a new, possibly dangerous, voice in the world of mutants, one who seemed on the side of Xavier. "Get me all of the reports we have on the Xavier estate for the last few weeks, but tell me when the last sighting of subject Gray was?"

"The last sighting we had it was at her graduation, she might have been inside after that, but that was the last sure sighting. As you know we cannot access the mansion itself, either physically or through hacking."

So Jean Gray has moved on. The man who had indeed been named Nathaniel Essex at one point, thought to himself. And she has joined someone who is apparently very passionate about Homo superior/Homo sapien equality. It was always a tossup of whether or not Jean Gray would be able to throw off my suggestions that I implanted in her as a baby, Scott of course won't have, and they're buried so deeply that even Xavier would never find them unless he had reason to go looking. But this is not good, to put it mildly my project X is in jeopardy if Gray and Summers don't produce a child. Perhaps I have been wrong in concentrating solely in America, that seems to have bitten me on the ass lately given how my search for Mystique has led to no result, I must figure out a way to enlarge my sphere of influence without running into any of my 'masters' other tools.

It was that master who had given him the name Sinister, the last word Essex's dying wife said to him. Over the decades since, that was how the man had come to think of himself. Now he moved over to the computer console. A moments typing brought up a screen, one that he had viewed many times over the centuries, showing what would happen if Summers DNA and Gray DNA merged.

Ever since he had first experimented on Summers ancestors in England, he had been obsessed with figuring out ways to use their powers. The Grey line, while at first despite his experiments on it back in England as well had yielded little result, it had produced Jean Gray, a telepath/telekinetic of incredible power. For several years he had been concerned by the fact that none of his agents in Bayville had reported that the girl had as much power as she should have. But the last report had shown significant progress when she battled Magneto's follower Pyro in one of the town parks.

Perhaps she had a mental issue of some kind holding her back from using her full powers, but right now that was immaterial to Sinister's true concerns. What he was concerned about was the fact that he had worked for years to bring about a union of those two lines because his tests proved that a baby of Scott Summers and Jean Gray would be super-mutant, possibly powerful enough to battle his 'master' while leading mutantkind to their destiny.

He frowned in thought, then decided. I need to put more resources into figuring out what has gone on in Bayville and where Grey is now. I personally might have to become involved as well, if only to discover the extent of the changes since the last time I checked in with them.

Sinister had honestly expected something to happen with between the two during their college years, since he knew Xavier would be pure death on anything that smacked of teenage pregnancy, so he had thought he had another year or so before he had to start truly observing the two. But if they never got together in the first place, then all of his plans were forfeit.

Perhaps…Sinister glanced over at one specific medical cabinet at the far back of his lab, which held several small vials, each of them filled with DNA samples of particular interest to him. One held a sample taken from Scott Summers when he was a boy at the orphanage Sinister had run for a few years. Another held his brother, and a third the father.

Still, to have the true genetics imprint of both of them, I will need to replicate Jean Gray's DNA, and even then merely making a clone of them will not produce a true offspring, the cloning process cannot take the place of the true genetic mixing that goes into a child of the body. To do that I need to follow her, find out where she has disappeared to, if I can. The fact that none of my agents have reported her anywhere since her graduation is disturbing in the extreme.

He frowned thinking hard, and decided he would have to reassign the agents currently trying to find Mystique. They had narrowed their search down to India but that wasn't narrowed down enough really, especially since she'd had nearly a week to get lost in that monstrously large country.

To that end he turned completely away from his current subject, ignoring the man's groaning. He slapped a button to administer some more knockout gas then walked away, already devising plans to use what contacts he had in the world, wondering how the hell Jean was keeping herself hidden and wondering how he could find her. Or perhaps, I can figure out a way to make her come out of hiding instead…

OOOOOOO

The day after the Guthrie clan moved in, Harry paused as he noticed something while leading the way from the trio's room down to the dining hall. "Huh, I wonder where Hedwig is? She's normally still sleeping at this hour." Ororo and Jean both shrugged, and they continued their way down to breakfast.

A few hours later, Harry had his answer. Hedwig flew in landing on the table Harry was working at, which was covered with pages of notes on runic arrays, as well as notes on magical properties of gems. There were also a few notes Harry had made on the spells Selene had cast on various knickknacks from the third cache. The curses on them were interesting, but it was some of the other spells that interested him. For example, two of the carved ruby lions had extremely advanced spells on them designed to let the caster hear what was going on around them no matter how far away they were. Those were very interesting indeed, though Harry had to wonder why they had been kept with the rest of Selene's 'artsy' cache.

But what interested Harry most was that there was a distinct difference in the magical potential of the various carved gemstones. He'd had to borrow a microscope to find out why, but it looked like high grade rubies were able to contain charms and other spells much better than any other gem. This was an area of magic that no one back home, outside the goblins, the little conniving hate-mongers, had delved into, at least to the best of his knowledge.

Now he was testing how well precisely gems, or in this case, gem dust, ground as fine as he could do it, retained magic. If they could retain enough power, they could be used to possibly power runic arrays if 'charged' by, say, being in a magically active environment like Hogwarts. Later, it would turn out that they would retain magic for long stretches of time even under heavy use, though their output was very low even so. Still, it gave Harry a lot of ideas of things he could bring to the discussion he wanted to have with Kitty, Nikolai, and Jean sometime soon.

Still, he looked up in welcome as Hedwig held up a letter tied along one leg. "What do you have there, girl?" Through their link he could sense his familiar's smugness, as if she had recently surprised someone or done something amazing. Still, he opened the note, and read it through quickly.

Mr. Wizard, Phoenix, or whoever this reaches:

I do not know if you remember me, but my name is Amara Aquila. I met Phoenix as she flew through Brazil.

She mentioned how you were trying to put together a team of powered and non-powered individuals to stand for mutant rights as well as other problems.

I was interested then, and am interested now, in joining such a force, but a matter has arisen here demanding an immediate response.

My asshole father has been in contact with characters in Greece and elsewhere who I feel are not as honorable as he thinks.

Two in particular worry me, and he has decided to marry me off to one (no that is not the whole reason why he worries me).

Again, I would like to join your cause, but it must be soon.

Signed, Amara Aquila

After a moment's thought, he shook his head. "I had hoped to wait and get in contact with her after we had the school set up, but since it looks as if we'll be set up first as an elementary school with only tutors for the older students, I suppose we don't have any reason not to. Though I wonder what her father and these 'characters' Amara mentions are up to."

So saying, Harry summoned up a Patronus. "Ororo, it looks as if we might have to go and get the Amara girl Jean ran into down in Brazil, she seems to have run into something. I think we should go now, Hedwig was able to feel her desire to contact me despite the two of us never having actually met in person, that means her desire was very strong indeed." While the Patronus pranced off, Harry scratched Hedwig's plumage for a moment, then sent her to the kitchen for an extra-large portion of her blessed bacon, while he went to get Jean.

Unfortunately, Jean was literally hip deep in parts taken from the two powered armor units Harry had demolished in Russia, which Nikolai had called the Crimson Dynamo and the Titanium Man. None of them were under any illusions that they wouldn't eventually run into other examples of said armor, and knowing how they ticked would be helpful in knowing how to stop them doing so.

Jean also wanted to learn about the movement actuators in the hands, the Heads Up Displays they used, as well as the programming for said. The HUD would help her program one for the team to use in the field, one that would tell them enough information on the team without getting in the way.

When told about the trouble Amara might be in, she looked conflicted, but shrugged. "It doesn't sound like you're heading into a warzone Harry, so I'm afraid I'm going to bow out. This is really interesting stuff, and if I try, I can get through both suits today. I've already determined the Titanium Man's is actually a much more viable armor type, but the movement actuators in the other suit is almost up to what I would think Iron Man uses. After the suits are done, I'm going to start in on their onboard weapons, which will be very interesting indeed."

Harry nodded agreeably, kissing her on the cheek before turning back towards the door. "Nikolai is out with his sister shopping for her and the other girls. I'll see if Piotr is busy, and we'll see you when we get back." Shiang Chi trained them all morning until two in the afternoon, but the team had the afternoon's free dinnertime while he trained the youngsters (including Paige, much to her vocal displeasure) after they all finished taking classes with Ms. Brown.

Today Piotr had decided to have a 'me day'. Harry found him outside on the lawn with an easel in front of him, painting. He seemed to be painting the castle, and stopped as Harry came out and moved over to him. "Piotr, do you think I could pull you away for a bit? Ororo and I are going to go pick up a prospective team member/student Jean met a few weeks ago. She mentions some trouble down there, so it might be good to have another pair of eyes along."

"I suppose," Piotr sighed. "I would like to finish this before the weather turns however." While in America the weather wasn't nearly ready turn to fall, here in Scotland that change was underway.

"I think you've got another week or two before it becomes real autumn weather my friend, no come on." Piotr sighed again, but willingly set aside his paints and moved with Harry back up to the castle, finding Ororo dressed in one of her conservative teacher's uniforms. Piotr was dressed in heavy jeans and a long sleeved plaid shirt, which was spattered with a few drops of paint here and there.

Moments later, the three of them used the magic carpet, which had been further magically enhanced since Harry had used it two weeks past to head to Buckingham palace, to take them to Brazil. With its new enchantments this trip took a bare hour, though trying to find the new city was more difficult since it wasn't yet on modern maps, even online ones. Dennis, who was once more guiding them in, had to hack into a few satellites to find it for them. So it took them in total two and a half hours to get to Nova Roma.

The volcano sitting right next to the city, along with the general construction which was in the Roman style to the light, made Harry shudder a little and think of pictures he had seen of Pompeii. Although, he thought to himself, given the powers this Amara girl has, that could be more accurate than I want to think about if she becomes too pissed off. Let's hope her father hasn't tried to cross that line just yet.

Harry set them down on the cleared side of the volcano nearest the city, and the three of them walked into the city from there. With Hedwig guiding them they made their way through the crowded streets, though many people, who seemed to dress in either Roman togas or modern Brazilian clothes, turned to look at them from time to time.

Ororo in particular drew some admiring glances from many, though from her twitching fingers, the words many of the men muttered were not pleasing to her. Thankfully Piotr's size and the sword of Gryffindor, which Harry had summoned to his side to add that little bit of panache to his otherwise ordinary (almost like Piotr but a good silk shirt rather than cotton and no suspenders) appearance, made her admirers keep their distance. Her haughty, cold face, which became more pinched with every phrase muttered her way, might also have had something to do with that.

Soon enough however Hedwig had guided them to a large manse set along the edge of the city nearest the volcano. "So Amara is here?" Hedwig bobbed her head at Harry's question, and the wizard pushed open the outer gate of the property, heading inside.

The inside was wide and open beyond the two staircases leading up to either side, and they immediately ran into trouble. A somewhat large, not up to Piotr's height, man came toward them, his eyes narrowed. "Yes foreigners, can I help you?"

Harry wondered about the whole foreign thing, considering this entire city was sitting inside another nation's borders it seemed rather stupid to him, but he answered readily enough. "I am here to speak to Amara Aquila about a learning opportunity, you might say. I believe she is expecting us."

That seemed to mollify the man, who led the way up the stairs. Two rooms down, they entered a third which had a simple cloth doorway, which the servant pushed aside. Amara sat inside looking out the window, though she turned quickly after the servant had ushered her guests inside.

Amara was a teenage girl around seventeen or so, with a lithe, the girl was lithe, gymnast's build with black hair falling to midway down her back, and tanned skin. After sending the servant away, the girl asked. "Are you Mr. Wizard?"

She spoke in the same language the crowd outside and the servant used, a very old fashioned form of Greek. Harry had anticipated this and hit all three of them with a translation charm, something which made Ororo wince, but she had gotten past her original anger at such a spell.

"I am, though I go by Guardian now in the field. I received your message. I take it you want to get out of here soonest? Be aware the school portion of what we offer isn't open just yet, though the training portion is rolling along nicely. This is Storm and Colossus by the way." Harry smirked a little. "Believe me, the codenames make a lot more sense when we've got our game faces on."

Amara was studying the three of them keenly, though she blinked at the odd bit of modern speech there. It was obvious to her that the African woman and this Guardian person were together, they were standing too close for it to be anything else. But the large young man was interesting too, handsome in a rugged way, and his eyes were looking around warily, showing he was more intelligent then he looked at first. "Yes I do, in fact if we can we should leave right now."

"What about your father?" Ororo asked. "I read the message you sent to Guardian, but surely your father loves you, even if he is trying to use you as he is. Wasn't that sort of thing normal for Roman times?"

"Roman times yes, but those needed the first time the Brazilians found us, and they disappeared entirely, or should have, after the first McDonalds opened downtown." Amara replied dryly. "No, this is something else. He's trying to drum up support for some move in Greece, our ancestral home, for some reason. I don't know what it is, but he and few contacts he made in Greece in the past few days are courting a Luchino Nefaria, some kind of Italian noble or something. He gives me a creepy sort of feeling, not just because my father wants me to marry him. He's, well he's got manners and seems courtly enough, but I can tell he has a lot more going on under the surface, and the Brazilian ambassador was not pleased to see him. I think he said something about Luchino being indicted on connections to organized crime, but it never going to court thanks to how corrupt Italy's government is."

That last was probably untrue or at least an exaggeration, but she had followed up on the first bit, and found the man had indeed been accused of such, but his accusers had a tendency to not survive to the trial. Luchino, though no one here knew it at present, was a long standing member of the Maggia, and shared with the other leaders the infatuation with high tech toys.

Harry and Ororo exchanged a glance. "Well, I'd still like to talk to the man, but if you're certain he wants to get involved in something like that, We'll be taking you with us in any event." At Amara's quizzical expression, Harry shrugged. "I can get us out of here regardless of anything your father tries, so it isn't difficult."

The young girl still looked a little dubious, but led the way to her father. Surprisingly the man was happy to see her go, though to her regret it was because he feared her powers going out of control, as well as wanting to remarry. Amara's mother had died a few months before her powers activated, and he hadn't decided on who to court before her powers activated. After that, no Nova Roman woman would marry him if she had to deal with the Volcano caller. He wanted, in his own words, 'a son to succeed me, a pliable daughter to wed off to expand my influence, and a wife to bed.' To say there was no love lost between them was underestimating the facts.

He was a little irritated that his plans to marry her off to Luchino for his monetary and tech support of a coup in Greece wasn't going to happen. But he was old fashioned and chauvinistic, not stupid or criminal. He too had done some background work on the Italian, and had found that while his aid would give the coup weapons the other side couldn't possibly match, he was also personally corrupt and dishonorable behind his noble affectations. So, with a little work, Harry was able to talk him around to letting them take his daughter for training in her power, rather than continuing his attempt and possibly resulting in a Krakatoa moment on his doorstep.

Not ten minutes later, Amara gasped as the carpet Harry had told her to join them on, something she had initially thought was a joke, rose into the air. "Oh, wow!"

Harry laughed at the young woman's expression, then commanded the carpet to rise further into the air before turning to home. "By the way," he asked twenty minutes later as Amara looked over the side at the ocean far below. "You mentioned to Jean another mutant in Brazil, a Roberto Da-Costa?"

"I did, though I am afraid he disappeared the very next day. I went with my father to some party or other in the capital, and his father informed us he had gotten an offer from someone he knew to help train him in his powers." She shrugged. "It didn't sound as if he was taken by force, so I have no idea where he is now." She turned to strike up a conversation with Piotr about painting. She had spotted the paint splatters on his clothing ,and it was something she had dabbled in a time or two.

Harry frowned, wondering what that was about, but shrugged it off for now. If the kid turned up and needed help, Harry would bother about it then. Until then, he had enough on his plate, and a new member for the team to put through her paces. Luckily, Shiang Chi has asked for us all to spend an entire day training with him, so we'll see what she is up to quickly enough. Part of me is hoping that she's at Paige's level. That girl is going to be trouble, she's already pushing for more training time in order to catch up to the rest of the team, but she's so young, and her mother hasn't really given her permission to join us for anything other than training in control of her powers.

At that point Harry was pulled from his thoughts by the sound of Amara laughing at something Piotr said, and he looked over at the two youngsters, who were smiling at one another. Huh, first Paige, now Amara, seems Piotr has that whole 'handsome artiste' thing going for him. Amusing.

Later that day, as the rest of the team, Paige and Amara were laughing at him, Harry had little to find amusing. "Oooof!" Because that was the sound he sound he had been making ever since Shiang Chi had asked him to make part in the one on one unarmed competitions, and he made it once more as his ass hit the padded floor of the training area.

Harry, despite what was an education in various styles that amounted to a brown belt, wasn't really trained in hand to hand to the level Shiang-Chi was. He was fast, had insane reflexes, and, thanks to his magic being at so high a level, was now much stronger than he looked. If he could land a single blow that might well have done it, even with him suppressing his magic to the point it was literally painful.

But that amounted to naught at all against the supremely trained marital artist. Harry had tells, lots of them. He didn't have enough experience in hand to hand to spot his tells despite his skill at cold reading. What was worse was he didn't use his legs or footwork nearly enough to match his trainer's.

As Shiang-Chi chuckled, Harry shook his head. I suppose this means I too am still human. The thought actually brought him some comfort for some reason and he joined in the laughter as he flipped himself up over his head, to crouch low on the ground, before moving in quickly, trying a feint, before kicking out low as swiftly as he could, barely pulling back in time to avoid Shiang-Chi's attempt to grab his leg.

The rest of the day was a humbling experience for Harry, but also a learning one for both him and Shiang-Chi. By the end of the day Harry was actually making Shiang Chi martial artist work for it, and only Nikolai and Ororo could keep up with him. Ororo was actually a little better with knives than Shiang-Chi, making any armed match between them with those weapons an almost even one. Nikolai's mastery of Sanbo, a style built around grappling, gave Shiang-Chi trouble, since the two of them had fought several times, and learned eachother tells and moves before this.

Harry never fell for the same trick twice, his reaction time allowed him to stay in the fight longer than most would have with his training. His tells also slowly disappeared as the day went on, though his footwork and use of his legs still needed a lot of work.

Surprisingly, Amara was quite a bit tougher and better trained than Harry had expected or hoped in interest of parity. She was already trained in the roman sword style, and wielded a gladius very well. As a weapon it left much to be desired, but it gave Shiang-Chi a very good starting point for armed combat. He decided however to test her on various blades, to see which one was best for her strength and speed at the moment before deciding on a set style for her to learn.

Her unarmed skills were based off mobility and use of her legs and takedowns as well as elbow blows. It seemed like a very rough version of capoeira, the Brazilian martial art, but there was no dance moves to it, or wasted motion. Since Nova Roma had last been seen hundreds of years before capoeira was developed before it was found again a bare few months back, that made sense. She didn't have nearly as much training in that style, but again, it gave the martial artist a darn good starting point.

Paige was ambidextrous, which was actually excellent for a budding martial artist, and had good body control. That was it. She had never gotten into a real fight with anyone but her siblings and a few neighbor children, she was tough, fought dirty, but she was utterly untrained. The Kentucky native knew how far behind even the newcomer she was, but was determined to catch up as soon as she could.

Both girls showed off their powers of the rest of the team later that day, and Harry noted how Amara was able to change into a magma based energy form at will, yet needed to do that to use most of her powers. Many of those were so destructive, Harry was glad it happened in the confines of the RoR. Her powers were not however based on magma or the control of said, but based on the control of seismic forces. She could cause earthquakes, rupture the very earth, and even cause miniature volcanos, from which she could pull magma and use it as a projectile. All in all very dangerous powers, coupled with the fact her energy form gave her improved stamina, a lot more durability, and immunity to fire.

Paige's abilities, on the surface at least, were a lot less destructive, but they could be even more useful, something Harry pointed out after they were finished for the evening. "You've shown us a metal form, and a rock for so far Paige, but there's no reason to assume that would be all you can do. I bet you can learn to be other things, merlin, I bet you could even change your body shape. That could possibly let you blend into your surroundings, or turn into something like the Orihalcum metal, though I think that might take a while. Still a fantastic power, Paige."

The Guthrie matriarch frowned from where she sat with Ms. Brown surrounded by her brood and the other youngsters save Illyana and Melody, who sat next to Harry and Piotr at the other end of the table. She didn't like what she was hearing, and particularly didn't like the wide, happy grin she saw on her daughter's face. She wasn't against her children fighting for a cause. If Sam had wanted to join the army or something like that she would have said yes, so had no problem with Sam joining the X-men. But Paige was fifteen, too young in her opinion to be fighting. Training in her power fine, she could see the point to that, but actually fighting, no. It looked as if that battle however was going to be an uphill one, even though Harry had told her Paige wouldn't be allowed out on missions until she was at least sixteen without her consent.

OOOOOOOO

Over the next week, while the new residents got used to living inside the Castle, other projects proceeded apace. While Ororo and Emma had dinner with one another every other evening, Kitty and Jean would continue their talks, putting together the battle rattle. Nikolai would often join them, but he would more often than not join Harry and Piotr, simply talking and hanging out, introducing Harry to sports outside football, which the American Kitty insisted on calling soccer.

Training continued apace for all of the students in the respective powers as well as their martial arts. Shiang-Chi decided to teach Penckat Silat to all of them, which would aid their footwork and mobility, while deciding on Escrima, a martial art based around the use of paired weapons, in this case iron sticks in both hands from the Philippines for Paige. That style included hand to hand, emphasizing grappling and joint locks, which would work well with her various bodies abilities.

He was still debating on what specific style to teach Harry and Amara however. Harry was insanely quick so a dual blade style was possible there, as well as building up his knowledge of Judo, maybe some more Krav Maga. Amara obviously had an armed style, all that was left was to modernize it, but unarmed was still something the Vietnamese specialist was thinking about. Well that and his two countrywomen, neither of whom had woken up yet form their ordeal over at the mansion. He had asked for and gotten leave to head over there whenever he could, though he took pains in his appearance to make certain he looked nothing like the pirates that had so brutalized the two of them.

Nikolai took over training everyone in ranged weapons. Paige had a natural hunter's eye along with other skills that hinted she had stolen the family's rifle a time or two to go hunting with the boys. Amara had no knowledge at all about guns, but good eyes and hand/eye coordination. Piotr had okay eyes but would never be a sniper. Ororo could shoot easily enough, as could Jean, but Harry's accuracy was incredible.

Harry also spent time down at the area that had been designated as Magical Mind's headquarters. With the help of the crown he had been able to gloss over the fact that the wards had come down, the fact that some kind of magic finally died away went over surprisingly well for the populace of the area, most Brits were more at home with the idea of magic than Americans, who in the main refused to believe in it.

The work was continuing apace, with the house-elves he had assigned to the task setting to with a will but it would take them two weeks considering all that had to be done, including the amount of magical defenses Harry was installing, which included one of his two hearth stones. While the building would never be as well defended as Hogwarts, it certainly was going to be well defended, both in terms of security and in terms of physical defense. This was especially important because it would also double as a distribution point for now.

He also met with Stephen O'Cairn and began to vet some workers, including PR directors and other managerial positions, as well as working with Frost Pharmaceuticals to work out the distribution to their three current clients, who had given Harry the locations they wanted the first shipments to be dropped off at. The man found Harry easy-going and likable enough, but very stern in terms of what he was looking for, and many a time prospective employees were turned away.

He didn't realize that the chairs Harry had specifically set up in the little office he had taken over in London for these interviews had Kitty's lie detector arrays on them. Since some of these people would be in very good position to hurt him if they turned out to not be very trustworthy, Harry wanted to start as he would continue. The company wouldn't' go public until the building was completed, but by then Harry wanted the staff for said building and as many other positions as they could get filled.

Even so, Harry spent most of his time working on a few minor mysteries one of which he had been very interested in looking into properly, that of the nature of magical cores in this dimension. To that end he had developed a new runic array which could read a person's magical aura, based off a series of healing spells that Madame Pomphrey had once used in his presence. It was set up on a raised dais, because he wanted to add this into the future medical examination that any student would go through at Hogwarts.

First he looked at his own core, and was unsurprised to find it had grown considerably since he had last examined it closely. Next he looked at Melody, who volunteered for the duty and found not even a trace of a magical core growing in her. That was a surprise considered what he suspected, but he shrugged it off. Then he looked at Illyana, fobbing it off as another medical review, and found that Illyana did have a magical core, in point of fact she had a decently sized one already, almost as large as a Hogwarts student in her fourth year, which was a telling sign of her magical potential.

Kitty was next. He scanned her surreptitiously using the original spell, not wanting to get the girls hopes up in case he was wrong. To his shock however, Kitty now had a bit of magic in her. It wasn't a large core, she had nowhere near the potential that Illyana had, but it was there, where before there hadn't even been a hint of magical potential in her.

Or perhaps I didn't know what to look for, Harry mused as he moved on to his final target of this experiment. Ororo looked up as she felt something hit her then looked over at Harry. He was looking at some kind of reading that had appeared before him, his eyes widening. "What was that Harry?"

"Something I'm going to talk to you about later," he said obliquely looking around at the other students who Ororo was just about to lead out onto a nature walk. "When you're done talking to Emma this evening, I'll want to talk to you before we head to bed." Ororo looked at him askance at that, but nodded.

Later that evening she ascended the stairs to their rooms, finding Jean nowhere about at the moment. Apparently Harry wanted to speak with her before talking to Jean about whatever was bothering him.

Ororo sat down at the table where he was sitting, and looked at the odd images that were hovering above him. They had to be magically created, not scientific hard light holograms, since that system haven't been set up in their rooms yet, nor would they be until after Harry began to make connections in the business world. They just weren't important to have everywhere just yet. "Yes Harry, you said you wanted to speak to me? Is this about whatever you are looking at?" She noticed her name as one of them, and wondered what it was.

Harry looked up at her and smiled faintly waving her to a seat. "Yes it is. You know how I've wondered about how magic was different here from my old dimension?" Ororo nodded and Harry went on. "I've mentioned that in my old dimension there were people who were not related to any pure bloods but who developed magic? I think I found out the reason why here. For whatever reason, I think it's because wizards began so much later in this dimension and retreated so much more quickly, so they didn't have time to interbreed as much with mundanes. I also have a theory about how the ley lines here are set up, there were much more of them spread out though each was less powerful in my old dimension, but I don't know if that's really a part of the reason or really has anything to with this, its just a theory on prevalent magic…"

"Harry," Ororo said firmly reaching out to take hold of his chin. "You're babbling. Stop it. Simply say what you mean."

Harry smiled, took a deep breath and then went on. "I have been trying to figure out the differences in the magical corners here and in my home dimension. A wizard such as myself is born with a magical core already 'on' I have would say, or given what I've found out a better choice for it would be 'kindled'. It's burning, yes? From the moment we come into this world, hell, it's burning in us from the moment we're conceived. Sirius often talked about how much accidental magic occurred even when I was, you know, still growing inside my mother."

He coughed and went on ignoring Ororo slight smile at his expense. "In any event, there are individuals here who have in them the potential to become magic users. Those people need their cores to be 'kindled' somehow. Invocation, the act of calling upon otherworldly sources of power for your magic can do the kindling, but eventually most sorcerers get to the point where their magical core is self-sustaining. After that, they don't actually need to rely on the deities that they have been calling upon. Most sorcerers however would lack the inherent power of a wizard, and they're not quite able to use that power in a manner that a Wizard would. Stephen for example cannot transfigure things as easily as I can, though his ability to use pure magic is a lot better than mine at this point, and the things he can do using invocations go beyond normal wizardry."

Actually Harry didn't know that was still the case, but he wasn't going to get into that right now. "You remember Dr. Druid nearly killing himself trying to use a simple transfiguration spell? His magical core wasn't up to powering the spell, not since his injuries against Selene. The point is, I have recently discovered that you don't have to call on an elder god or any otherworldly being to kindle your magical core. Simply being in a magically rich environment, like, say Hogwarts or around, um, me, is, well, is enough to do it."

Ororo almost stopped breathing as the implications of that and Harry wanting to talk to her hit her. "What are you saying Harry?"

"I don't know if it's just you, or maybe something that runs in your family I don't know enough about your ancestors for that to…" Harry stopped at her look.

Gulping he went on quickly. "Anyway, I have looked at your core, and Illyana's, and Kitty's, as well as several others. But the reason I mention the three of you in particular, is because all of you have magical cores now. Yours is actually very large already, I'd estimate its size as matching Professor McGonagall, and she was the most powerful which in the UK at the time of my self-imposed exile." That was only because he had killed Bellatrix well before he left, but again that was a side note. "What I'm asking, I guess, is do you want to learn how to use it? Do you want to be my apprentice?"

Ororo responded by leaning over and kissing him deeply on the lips. "Of course I do you foolish man!"

Harry breathed a sigh of relief, feeling a sense of joy filling him He had found out through his studies recently that a magical core once ignited could have deadly consequences if it wasn't regulated, teaching Ororo would prevent that from happening. And magic would retard her aging process, removing a fear that had been slowly growing at the back of Harry's mind, that he would eventually outlive the women he loved. Jean, as the avatar of the Phoenix, might well be immortal, but Ororo was still mortal. Yet now, with a magical core, and the size it was already told him she would be very powerful indeed, she could live for far longer than he had feared. Of course Emma was still all too mortal, but that, and whether Harry would let his fear in that direction stop her from joining them, was a problem for the future.

He pushed her back slightly. "I'm happy you thought that, but we need to think about this a little more. Like I said, you're not alone here, there is also Illyana whose core is developing, a little faster than I am happy with to be honest. And then there's Kitty. I don't think she'll ever be as powerful as Illyana or you have the potential to be, but it's there already. What I'd like to do, is for the two of us to sit down and hammer out a basic Vow."

"You capitalized that when you said it, Harry." Ororo said sitting down again beside him. "What is this Vow you speak of?"

"A magically binding oath preparatory to any magical training." He said simply. "I don't think you or the other two ever would, I don't want to, either now or in the future, accidentally let loose someone who will abuse their magical powers. I want to make certain from the very beginning that they understand what they're signing up for. That's why I won't start training anyone until their Kitty's age 15 or 16, old enough to make their own choices, young enough to be taught yet not so young that they'll come to resent being forced to sign something like this in the future.

"So you're not really worried about the three of us, but those who come after us." Ororo mused, then nodded her head. "That actually makes a lot of sense in my opinion. You wish to do this now?"

"Actually, I want to ask you another question. When you and Kitty first met, was your connection, did you…" he faltered. "What I mean is did you have a connection almost immediately, were you drawn to her in some way?"

Ororo frowned thoughtfully. "I believe I was actually, I thought she was very amusing, and fun to be around and nice, I'm not certain how to put into words but there was a sort of connection there."

Harry nodded smiling faintly. "In my world, there were many ways to become an apprentice to a master. One of the ways which was almost unheard of and yet was in many ways the most powerful, was to simply meet a person that you had an instant connection to, not in the terms of possible soul-mates or something, those things really don't exist no matter what certain Teen-witch magazines used to say about them. But master apprentice relationships occurred, though they were astonishingly rare."

"I felt something like that when I met Illyana, and I intend to take her on as my apprentice in a few years. Before that I'll be giving her some instruction, basic mental organization, a few defensive spells that she can could call upon, enough to start her on that path before we hit her with the vow. But Kitty's old enough right now, and while her magical core is still developing, I think the two of you…"

He stopped then as Ororo's lips was on his, a wide smile on her lips at the thought of teaching magic to her younger sister in all but blood.

The proceedings were interrupted by a voice neither had ever heard in their lives speaking out suddenly. "I honestly hate to interrupt this, truly I do, but I've waited years for my chosen to recognize her full potential, and I'm afraid it's past time the two of us talk."

Harry and Ororo wheeled in two directions, a spell in Harry's hand and a lightning bolt forming in Ororo's, but instead of releasing their respective attacks, they stopped and stared. The woman who spoke was indeed someone they had never seen before, but it wasn't that which stopped their attack, quite the opposite really.

No, it was her appearance and the sheer overwhelming presence the woman gave off that stopped them. She gave off more of a presence than even Cytorrak had when Harry 'met' him the first time, more than even Mehpisto in his own realm. Despite this, she was dressed simply, in a long, flowing toga/skirt of green cotton. On her feet were a pair of equally simple sandals, with small bangles of bronze and silver adorning her ankles, while on her ears she wore small ringlets of gold.

In appearance she looked like a painting of motherhood come to life, with long brown hair, a welcoming smile on her lips and a full figure. She seemed middle-aged, but somehow ageless. Her body was that of a human, but her eyes told a different tale. They were green and blue swirls, shot through with white. "Good reaction time Defender, but you have no need of this martial ardor for me. My chosen knows me."

Harry looked over at Ororo, to find her on one knee, looking at the woman in awe. "Goddess…"

The woman laughed, a throaty yet cheerful sound. "That is what I am known as in the Savannah my dear. But please, stand up, you have never come to me on your knees before, don't start now. Your lover hear has probably heard my original name. I am Gaea."

At that name Harry allowed his spell to dissipate, his own eyes widening. He had heard from Dr. Strange that the Earth itself had a personification in this universe, but hadn't really believed it. Yet based on the books he had read about deities, Gaea was one of the most reclusive yet positive towards humans in general terms. According to what he read she had become the 'mother' of many of the main godly pantheons, and she had been around well before even the gods that Strange called upon, the only one of that first group of primordial gods who hadn't fallen into darkness.

He shook his head. "Well I suppose that answers who you are, and if Ororo trusts you I will trust her judgment, though how you got through my wards with nary a whisper is a question I'd like answered."

"Do you think you could build a ward to keep out the spirit of the very earth they are placed on?" The woman asked, arching one eyebrow. "I am Gaea, my power infuse every rock and tree of this world, to a greater or lesser extent. This castle is situated on the intersection of several of my veins, what you call ley lines, making it all the easier."

Harry frowned a little at that, but Ororo's hand on his arm made him simply nod. He still didn't like the idea of otherworldly deities in general, but Gaea was one of the few he should be able to trust. Ororo smiled at his acceptance before turning back to the deity that had suddenly appeared before them. "My lady, I am honored beyond words at your presence, yet I must ask, why have you come?"

Gaea laughed again. "I have come to speak to you my dear. You do not know this, but you descend from a powerful line of sorceresses, all of whom looked to me to, in your lover's words, kindle their powers. Those ancestors were queens in Africa based on their power, though it alas dissipated in your great-grandmothers time during what Europeans call the colonization era. By the time your grandmother moved to America, it was barely a whisper in your line. In you however it has come back."

"That and your powers make you a perfect chosen for me. No this is not the same as an avatar, oh suspicious wizard," Gaea laughed again as she looked at Harry's dubious expression. "I would simply train her in her magic, Ororo would not draw power from me or have to invoke my name, but she would learn spells and abilities that you would not be able to teach her. Moreover, I can use my own magic to speed up time in her mind so that my chosen will come into her power that much faster."

"Why?" Harry asked, still suspicious. "Why is it important to you that Ororo studies with you, Gaea? Everything I've heard about you says you look at the long term, and you don't routinely show interest in one human, or even one family."

"My reasons are twofold," Gaea replied before Ororo could take umbrage at Harry's suspicions of her goddess. "One, I speak the truth when I say that your powers make you a perfect match for me, Ororo, and two, that I do have a historical connection to your family. I am happy to see that you have chosen a love worthy of you, unlike your grandmother, who was taken in by glib phrases and 'a life of luxury' in those sprawling concrete constructions you humans are so fond of."

The scathing tone in her voice brought brief smiles to both her listeners. "I also have a vested interest in humanity as a whole, and what you and your faction are about benefits all of humanity, though most will be blind to that for some time, and you will continue to run into opposition there."

Ororo and Harry exchanged a glance, speaking as couples do without words for a moment, then Harry waved one hand at his weather witch, indicating she should be the one to answer. Ororo smiled, and nodded her head. "So long as I can learn the skills and spells that Harry would teach me, my goddess, I agree."

"Excellent!" Gaea clapped her hands in joy, though the sound had an odd timbre to it, like the toll of a bell for some reason. "I will appear before thee tomorrow morning then. Be warned however, I am a stern taskmaster. I will have your best, nothing less." Ororo nodded and Gaea moved forward, touching her forehead gently. "You are so much more than I had any hope to dream my chosen, you and your Harry both."

With that she disappeared, leaving Ororo and Harry to themselves for only a moment before Jean came up the steps, stopping momentarily as she took in her lover's expressions. "Hey you two, what did I miss?"

OOOOOOO

True to her word, Gaea did appear the next morning, and her mental instruction of Ororo began. At the same time, Jean was finishing up her own projects with the stuff they had up absconded with from Russia.

Harry however, since he wasn't needed down at the construction site today, teleported to California to meet with Reed Richards at last. The two of them had been so busy lately they hadn't had time to meet despite Harry's wish to do so. But Reed, at Harry's behest, had been able to clear today to meet with him, the same day that Wyatt and Harry had set up to go and meet the mutant cousin Wyatt's friend had heard about, Danielle Moonstar.

He smiled as he ported it into the small area that Reed had opened in his defensive scheme, wondering really what would have happened if he hadn't. He was in no rush to find out firsthand however, but if Reed agreed would be willing to see what would happen to something which was portkeyed in. Getting Reed's agreement would be relatively simple, this would be an experiment that they would both benefit from.

His thoughts broke off as Ben opened the door at the far end which led into the rest of the FF's suite. The orange goliath's craggy face was split into a smile. "Hey a magic boy, how's it going?"

"I'm fine Rocky." Harry replied smiling as he reached out to grab the larger man's hand in his own.

Ben raised an eyebrow at the surprising strength of that grip, and asked, "Expecting trouble or something?"

"No, I've recently gone through a few changes, and one of them seems to be that my physical form is a lot stronger without my activating my magical strengthening technique. Let's just say I've had a few interesting adventures of late."

"Yeah interesting times abound." Ben said grimly, shaking his head.

Harry looked at him as the two walked down the corridor one eyebrow raised in query.

After a few steps Ben sighed and shook his head. "We've been so busy lately that I haven't had time to spend with Alicia, and things aren't… going well there."

Harry winced a little and shrugged. "Er, if you want my advice, it would be to sit down with her and simply talk about it. If you two want to make it work, you'll both have to make it work, and that means putting in the time. In your case that will be damn hard, I understand, but she has to understand that too. If you can't put in the time for whatever reason, or if she's not waiting willing to wait for you to put in that time, if she doesn't understand that you have other priorities, then I'm sorry to say but it might not be the best relationship for you, Ben. That doesn't even consider other things."

"You sound like Susan!" Ben laughed, though there was scant humor in it. But it ain't like there're that many fish in the sea for a man who looks like me, ya know."

"There are probably more than you think." Harry replied shrugging. "Besides…" He paused and looked around making sure they were alone, "What, um what would've happened if you two had gone, y'know, um all the way? I mean you need a sort of… er stronger girl just um…" Harry trailed off uncomfortably.

After a seconds shock, Ben began to laugh. He laughed loud and long and he reached out to slap Harry on the back with a rocky fist. That pat would've sent the old Harry to the floor, now Harry simply took it with a somewhat embarrassed but warm smile on his face. "I hadn't thought that far ahead!" Ben laughed shaking his head. "I'll have to think about it."

"There's no rush, keep trying with Alicia, you don't want something like that to just peter out, it leads to hard feelings on one side or another." Harry shrugged, and the two stopped in with Wyatt, watching as Hedwig took a small letter from the Native American before winging off, with Wyatt joining Ben and Harry to the main sitting room.

There they found the Fantastic family all spending time together. Their days had been incredibly busy lately, and moments like these will had become few and far between yet all the more dear for it. Reed and Susan smiled in welcome while Franklin clapped his hands, seeing his old friend.

Harry smiled at them all, his first friends in this new dimension and the tyke he who had begun to heal Harry's sanity without even trying. "Hi guys. I wish this visit was simply to hang out, but I am afraid I do need to talk to Reed for about a few things, nothing serious I hope, but still."

"Yes, Johnny mentioned that you had taken one of my energy scanners. Did you want my help in figuring out what the energy reading meant?"

"That and this," Harry replied, holding up what looked like a vial of blood. He sat down and Franklin immediately waddled up to him. Harry absently picked up the baby as he handed over the pile to Reed. "I took that from a corpse after a battle three weeks ago." He paused. "God has really only been three weeks?" He shook his head and from there he went on to describe what he had run into in Russia, leaving off just enough to keep the conversation light about what they had run into.

Ben and Reed glanced at one another able to read between the lines there rather quickly. Both knew that the fight had been much more serious than Harry was letting on. Still Reed looked at the vial thoughtfully. "And you don't think this was some form of mutant?"

"No, I don't though I couldn't say why, it didn't look human really, I know that doesn't mean much, but… Something tells me it's important."

"I'm not going to question your instincts about this." Reed pressed a small button on his cufflinks and a small robotic drone floated through the air buoyed by two small vent fans. It floated in front of Reed for a moment, its back opening up to reveal a series of holding areas. Reed placed the blood sample into one of them then turned back to Harry as the drone zoomed off.

The wizard reached into his newly finished expanding pouch at his side to pull out the scanner he had borrowed, smirking a little as Susan and Ben gasped at that feet. Reed however looked only a little interested, and Harry wondered, not for the first time, if something like this would be possible via technology eventually. Still Reed took the scanner, punching in the commands to bring up the last scan, which after a moment sprouted into being in the air above him.

Looking between the image and the actual energy reading, the elastic genius frowned suddenly, shaking his head. "I'll need time to tell you more, but I can already tell you one thing about this. The spike here in the omega-waves and this one here in the phi-wave intersecting it at precisely equal points, that tells me this was a spacial opening of some kind, either space or dimension, I'll have to look closer at the output to tell you which."

Harry's eyes squeezed shut and one hand rose to his face rubbing at it irritably. "Fuck," he muttered just low enough so that Franklin wouldn't hear it. Not, he thought wryly looking over at Ben and Johnny, that he probably hadn't already been exposed to something like that.

It definitely wasn't low enough because Susan said sharply "Language Harry, there is a child present!" Harry nodded ruefully waving one hand placatingly and she looked at him closely. "This friend you say was possibly abducted, was he or she a close friend?"

"She, Betsy Braddock is her name, a young telepath who used to work for the British government until a horrifying assault forced her medical discharge. Honestly I think we would have been closer if, well you know how time gets away from you. I just didn't have any time to…" He frowned guiltily. "I just didn't honestly think of spending time to, you know keep in contact with her with everything else that has happened lately, and all my responsibilities. That's going to eat at me for a while, until we get her back."

"I'll look into this further and see if I can't narrow where this portal came from down for you. Reed replied simply, handing that to another droid that whizzed up through the air at his command.

The two of them then began to discuss what Harry had offered those months previous, a laboratory in space. In return Harry wanted some kind of scanning device that he could use as an early warning system that would cover all the approaches to Earth.

"You can't honestly say that you are pleased with how little movement there has been in the space program can you, Reed?" Harry asked looking at both him and the others one after another. "After your accident, nothing, no manned ships, no probes even past the moon. And yet some of your adventures show conclusive proof that there are aliens out there and that they aren't exactly friendly. I looked over your case files, and the Skrull you faced sounded more like a special operative rather than regular military, do you agree?"

Reed shook his head slowly. "I have long been concerned about what could happen if a alien race launched a major invasion, but I had hoped to have years to work on the project, and to have more public support in that direction. That there hasn't been anything in that direction concerns me greatly, when I have time to think of it at any rate."

"It does me too, and almost smacks as if someone is trying to prevent us going into space, but if that's the case then we might've already been invaded and just don't know it yet. Hence why that blood sample might be more important than I initially thought, if that woman was just one of many."

"Like the Skrull you mean? Ben asked shrewdly. "Not a full-bore invasion, tryin' to take us out with brute force, but infiltratin', maybe ta turn us against one another."

Reed nodded. "I already have several devices that could be used for that purpose, a gravitational scanning device would be best I think for an early warning system or at least the best in terms of range. I'll look into it and get back to you either tomorrow or the day after. That's a firm promise Harry, whatever else happens you're right, we need to start moving on this."

"I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks so." Harry responded. "I will say that I've been setting up my own team, and once we get fully up and running, we'll be able to handle space-borne threats just as well as you guys can."

"Good to know," all four of the Fantastic Four replied as one.

Franklin then took command of the discussion, irritated that no one had been paying attention to him. For the next half hour or so Harry and the others simply talked and chatter about mundane things while playing with the toddler.

Eventually Wyatt came in with Hedwig flying before him. At Harry's behest, Wyatt had used Hedwig to send a letter to the address of his acquaintances family, which would allow Harry to apparate the two of them to that location. "Are you ready to go Harry?"

Harry nodded, but before Wyatt and Harry could teleport out Reed coughed to gain the wizard's attention. "Could I speak to you alone for a moment Mr. Potter?"

The younger man blinked at the formality but shrugged and moved off with Reed into a corner. "You are an observant person Harry. I know that you have noticed that there is something… odd about Franklin. Odd powers, telekinesis for certain, maybe others." Harry nodded and Reed went on. "I have determined that he might be a mutant, though the mutant power might have been given a jumpstart by the gamma radiation that he was exposed to in his mother's womb. I hate to ask this, but I want him to receive training in how to use his powers, and particularly how not to in a few years, as well as making contact with others who have powers his own age."

"I'm glad you brought it up but I was going to offer it in any event." Harry said simply reaching out to grab the older man's shoulder squeezing lightly. "I'll see to it personally Reed, if that's possible. If not, as I said I'm setting up an entire school at the elementary level now for students. When he's ready to go to kindergarten, I'll enroll him there regardless of whether or not his power's mutation based."

Reed breathed a sigh of relief and grasped the other man's hand firmly. "Thank you, that is a load off my mind." In their short acquaintance, Reed and Susan had both come to respect Harry, both his integrity and his abilities, and neither could think of another person who they would rather have teach their son how to use (and most importantly not abuse) his powers.

Harry, Hedwig, and Wyatt left, heading back to the teleportation area and then, after Harry spent several minutes communing with Hedwig, they teleported out.

One moment they were in the plane, unadorned room in the Baxter Building, the next they were standing in the sparse desert of the Colorado Plateau.

Wyatt gasped, not having traveled by this method before.. "That was rather bizarre." Wyatt muttered, showing considerable self-control to not fall to his knees.

"It takes people like that the first time." Harry commiserated, holding the broader man by the shoulder for a moment. Wyatt quickly recovered however, and the two of them looked around. Hedwig had decided on a small knoll near the house the Moonstars had moved into after Danielle had begun to exhibit her odd powers. The knoll overlooked the house from the eastern side. They their way down quickly, following a little trail through the scrub brush that was all that was green in this area, and Harry looked around interestedly. He had never actually been in a desert environment before, unless you count a few Negative Zone worlds that were pretty much all desert.

Soon they were at the front door the small yet well kept house, and Wyatt was knocking on the door. The house was a single story affair, broad at the back with no garage, but space for two cars by the gravel road that lead up to it. Harry looked around, noticing that the nearest house was barely in sight miles away, despite there being nothing between them to block his sight.

The door opened revealing a middle-aged native American woman with a severe countenance. She was heavily weathered, the look of a woman who spent most of her days outside working. On top of this she looked like she hadn't been sleeping well, with bloodshot eyes, bags under her eyes and drooping expression.

But she came alive when she saw who was at the door. "Wyatt!" she exclaimed. "Oh thank goodness, we got your message but... Her powers, over the last week they've been activating on and off more often, we don't know what to do!"

"Calm down, Peg." Wyatt said, keeping his voice level and phone. "We're here to help. This is Guardian, I mentioned him to you as Mr. Wizard, but he changed his codename."

"Ma'am." Harry said bobbing his head briefly. "Maybe you should just take us straight to Danielle?"

Peg nodded distractedly, letting them inside. "My husband's gone off to work, in fact he's been staying over there at night. We just can't handle it anymore! We know she's not doing it on purpose, she sometimes turns them around on herself, and those are the worst moments for her, though they give us a brief rest."

"What exactly are her powers?" Harry asked calmly, deciding he would leave a dreamless sleep potion with the woman, she looked about a second away from a nervous breakdown. Thankfully he still kept an emergency set of potions on him at all times.

"We, we don't know. At first we just thought that she had a way with animals, but lately she seems to be able to create images taken from people's minds around her, most of the time it's, she…" Peg stammered going a little pale, visible despite her Native American coloring. "M-Most the time is our fears. Deep fears."

She shuddered. Peg would never forget the sensation of suddenly falling deep down into a well of pitch black, which encapsulated the two things she was most afraid of, heights, and darkness. And she didn't mean night time, in the night even out here there were always the stars above to give light. But that had been simply a blank nothingness of darkness, like the deepest cave. She loved her daughter dearly, but that, she would never forget it and she couldn't get past the fact that it had been Danielle whose power had forced her to see it.

Peg and her husband William had initially been a little leery of sending their daughter off, not just because they didn't want to, but because they didn't really know anything about this foreigner, and it was to a foreign school from What Wyatt said. Danielle's grades were good in the public school back in Boulder where their real home was, but how would she stack up against the students in a private school? Would they be able to come and see her whenever they wished, and how would they get there in any case? It wasn't like they were made of money after all.

Now however… After the past few days Peg was more than happy to see her daughter heading off to a place that might be able to teach her how to control her powers. As it was, Danielle was a danger to anyone around, not physically, though her illusions were getting more and more detailed despite the fact that she couldn't control it, but mentally. Both she and William had decided this was for the best.

The beleaguered woman quickly showed them to the small room set against the kitchen that did for Danielle as a room while they stayed here. The young girl was laying out on the bed, her hands covering her eyes.

Danielle looked up as the door opened and pulled her hands away from her eyes. "Mom, get away! I can feel it coming again!"

Peg bolted back out the doorway, shuddering and shivering already. Wyatt followed quickly at Harry's nod, but Harry made his way forward. 'Get away!" the girl shouted again, then it happened. Something, almost seen but not quite, a wave of some kind of energy, telepathic in nature for certain but not quite as solid as the energy Harry recognized as true telepathy flashed out from the young woman.

It wavered over him, not finding any kind of purchase thanks to Harry's special mental defense. It also seemed to have a distance limitation, because after a second it retreated, not having found a mind to grab onto.

The girl looked up at him in astonishment and Harry smiled. "I'm a bit unusual myself, my dear." His smile turned into a smirk as he conjured a chair to sit on next to the bed. "My name is Guardian, or for now you can call me that anyway. It's my nom-de-plume I suppose you could say."

That actually won a tired giggle from the girl and she collapsed back onto bed, but her eyes remained locked on Harry's face. Any other time she would have been blushing a little at having a handsome older man (she had a thing for them, she knew) in her room, but right now she was too tired and too exhausted to care about that. "Mom and Dad mentioned you. I suppose, I mean I guess I was a little leery of going away from them but now, get me out of here, teach me how to control this, how to stop it!"

Harry leaned back looking at her and smiling briefly. Danielle Moonstar was a rangy seventeen year old. She looked almost as coltish as Kitty did in many ways, but in her case it was the sprightly appearance of a youth who spent most of her time running around outside, which matched with what Wyatt had mentioned once about her being a track star.

Yet for all her coltish appearance there were hints of what would be an amazing womanhood. She had a heart shaped face, tear streaked of the moment and ragged with lack of sleep, yet despite that still beautiful. Her hair was done in an intricate braid down her back, showing her heritage with a few feathers here and there, and what looked like something written on a little leather disk of some kind halfway down its length. Her eyes were also very expressive, and he wondered how Illyich, who continuously attempted to flirt with Paige and Amara, would take to her.

"I'm here to indeed offer you a place at the school I've set up Danielle."

"Dani," Danielle interjected. "I prefer to be called Dani, thanks."

Harry nodded. "Well, Dani,

Harry went on. "I have a telepath there who can hopefully help you figure out how to control your powers, and until then she can set up temporary shields in the minds of everyone around so you won't be able to affect them. I also have a training area where you can practice control. I noticed that your power has some kind of range limitation, is that right?

I'll warn you though it isn't just a school to train your powers, but an actual school as well. In fact I hope that you and all the other teens that join us will be able to go on to college eventually." That caused Danielle to smile at the very idea of going on to college, which she would only have been able to do if she got a scholarship, her parents would never have been able to pay for it.

The girl nodded. "It doesn't seem to go very far, about ten to fifteen feet I guess, in all directions around me. But I can't control it at all! At first, you know, I thought it was interesting because I seemed to be able to talk to animals, get them to do things for me, get them to understand me and even the reverse. But then, it seemed to spread, but not in a good way." She shivered. The ability to manifest other fears was not exactly pleasant.

"Good to know." He nodded. "In that case, if you can't control it while you're asleep and it doesn't look as if you've gotten any sleep lately my dear, we'll have you bunk down in one of the family areas. Eventually most of the students will be up in a tower, and you'll join them there eventually, but only after you have control of this. Don't worry, as I said we have a telepath who will be able to help you."

The girl nodded relieved. She was so relieved in fact she found the courage to ask. "So what are your powers?"

"Me?" Harry laughed. "I'm a Wizard." He tapped the chair he had conjured, and it disappeared. "Unfortunately, while there are offensive spells to attack the mind, I don't know any ones to give another person a defense, though I will ask Jean to start you on the mental discipline that takes the place of meditation in magical circles, it seems to work better than the mundane equivalent for some reason."

That actually wasn't an area he had actively looked into, giving someone else a mental defense through magical means. Certainly in his own dimension there hadn't been any such, but he vowed to himself to make certain that was case here. Later, in a discussion with Stephen he would find that this was indeed the case. Minds were so individualized that there was no spell you could cast that would last over long to defend someone else's, and they would only defend them from other spells, they didn't quite have the correct waveform as it were, to defend from a telepathic assault.

He helped Dani to her feet, and though she was shaky once on her feet she shrugged off his aid, standing there proudly. This power had bothered the hell out of her, but Harry could see Dani still had her sense of self.

"By the way." he began, probing a little for information that could affect her training. "was surprised that when you're power failed to find a target it didn't rebound on you. Your mother said it had affected you as well."

"It only does that when I'm trying to sleep." Dani shook her head irritably. "And I figured out a way to fight it anyway. It tries to manifest my fears in my head, in my dreams, but I…" She paused. "I suppose you could call it a dream avatar? I put myself in whatever dream it is, and have my avatar create a sort of spear of light, which I use to destroy whatever fear is. It's actually been somewhat good for me, I've come to grips with a few of my fears this way, and beat them. For me, when I make them disappear it goes away permanently."

"Lately," And here she smirked a little despite her exhaustion. "It's had to work hard to find a fear to work on. It's even begun to do other things at least to me, other dreams."

Dani Blushed and looked away but Harry didn't question what kind of dreams her power was manifesting subconsciously. In actuality she'd had a very tawdry dream of herself being a Bond girl. She played the part of the young skater Bibi Dahl in For your Eyes Only, which had just come out on VHS. But with Dani playing the part instead of repelling her advances Sir Roger Moore had given in.

Who says blondes have more fun she thought now, a little amused despite herself and the total exhaustion she felt. That was the other downside, her powers forced her mind awake, and she hadn't actually gotten any REM sleep for a few days now.

Her mother was looking relieved as Harry led Dani out, and Harry smiled at her. "As soon as Dani has control of her powers, we'll get back in touch with you. Until then, I'll be leaving a phone number here for you to contact me. If you have any questions later on don't hesitate to call, myself or one of my senior aides will always be available for questions, so long as you remember the time difference between here and Scotland." Senior aides at this point meant Jean or Ororo, though for questions about schooling Jean would have to refer to Ms. Brown, who would eventually take over that aspect unless she and Ororo were able to vet a actual principal.

Peg nodded, then reached out and pulled her daughter into a fierce hug. "Stay safe Danielle, and call us as soon as you have control of whatever is doing this to you! Don't think we don't love you, we do, but this, it, it's just too much!"

The young girls eyes watered slightly and hugged her mother back fiercely while Wyatt and Harry moved away, letting the Moonstars have their moment. "I will mama, and don't worry I know how bad it's been for you and Dad both. I love you!"

As Wyatt led the way outside where they would teleport away, Hedwig alighted on the girl's shoulder. Harry wondered absentmindedly if this was proof that the girl might have magical spark in her, or if merely a sign of the girls empathy with animals.

Nonetheless, as he crossed the threshold Harry turned to face the girl's mother. "I have a potion that is called the 'dreamless sleep 'potion that I can give you to take now. It will send you straight to sleep, but it will keep you asleep until your body's revived from this ordeal. Do you want to take it?"

She actually had to think about that for a moment but she shook her head. "No, now that Danielle will be with you, my husband and I will finally be able to sleep easily, and I think we would both prefer that sleep to be natural."

Harry nodded. "Again, don't hesitate to call if you have a question. Dani's schooling won't begin until her powers are under control, at which point you, your husband and she will sit down with our academic advisor to hammer out the details there. We'll continue to work on her power after that, see what its limits and limitations are, and of course keep working on her control of it, but after she has enough conscious control to stop it lashing out, we won't let that bother her scholastic development."

The woman nodded, but Harry could tell she was already almost falling asleep on her feet and he ended the conversation there with a firm handshake and another promise to keep in touch the moment Danielle was under control.

He left the house, to find Wyatt looking at him closely. "Tell me Mr. Guardian, do you think you have a place on your team for me? I realize I don't have any powers, but…"

Harry was already shaking his head, causing Wyatt to stop speaking. "I'd love to have you on the team honestly, if you can take the position of sniper and since I know you're a biathlete I think you can, that will free up our current sniper for other duties. But I have to ask why you want to join up? I would think that helping the Fantastic Four out on a few of their adventures as you have would've been enough for you."

"I've realized lately that I want to fight for something bigger than myself, and the mutant/mundane equality cause is a good one. Besides, I'd like to keep an eye on Danielle." T he younger girl blushed and pushed at his shoulder embarrassed. She'd had a bit of a crush on Wyatt for a few years now, but it wasn't that big a one, more on the line of her crush on Roger Moore. It was a little irritating however to have the man talk about taking care of her while she was standing right there as if she was a little girl.

"I would advise you to talk to Johnny at the very least about joining us, if you still want to join up, have Reed contact me, and I'll make the arrangements."

Wyatt nodded agreeably, and after warning Dani of what to expect Harry teleported the three of them back to the Baxter building where they dropped off Wyatt. Harry, after telling Dani his real name, allowed her time to gush over meeting the Fantastic Four and the cute toddler. He was amused that every girl he'd met so far had a soft spot for the kid. After a few minutes however the two of them made their excuses, and Harry teleported them to Hogwarts.

His smile didn't last. Almost immediately upon their arrival however, Danielle grabbed her head and screamed "It's going to happen again!"

Luckily, Jean was in the dining hall where Harry had teleported them, showing something to Paige and the other teens using the hard light holograms. Harry looked over at her quickly. "Jean, cover her in a telepathic shield that'll keep her powers inside or protect everyone else's minds, whichever is fastest!"

Jean acted quickly, bringing up a hand to her temple and throwing her telepathic power around the girl, creating a screen from her own mind around the other girls. This actually didn't cut off Daniela's mind from everyone else's, it simply connected her mind and Jean's right outside Jean's own mental defenses, which made quick work of the girl's powers, smacking and smashing it away with their tentacles. Belsham-trees for the win, she thought to herself sardonically as the assault ended and she lowered her hand from her temple. Still, I need to start practicing my telepathy more, I've let that power atrophy too much. Emma can help me there I'm sure.

After her powers attack finished, Danielle was gasping, swaying on her feet almost utterly drained. Her power used up a lot of her mental strength, and since she hadn't been sleeping she didn't really have a lot of that to spare.

"Dreamless sleep potion for you I think," Harry said grabbing her by the elbow and escorting her past the teens who are all looking around at her in question, wondering what had gone out on just then, save Illyich who was sizing this girl up just has he had Magma and Paige after they first arrived. "Jean, I think you'll need to start training with her tomorrow."

Jean nodded, not asking any questions at this point simply taking Danielle's other elbow to help Harry lead the Native American girl to a room on that level.

Harry transfigured the classroom in under a minute, complete with bed, dresser and a shelf for things. He however couldn't conjure up electronics, even simple light systems that quickly. It took him a while to visualize those, so he simply let the lighting be for now, and the two of them helped Dani into the bed before Harry administered the dreamless potion.

In seconds Dani was asleep, a small blissful smile on her face as she finally succumbed to her exhaustion. Jean looked down at the young girl shaking her head. "This just serves to remind me that not all powers are beneficial in nature even if they don't come with physical deformities." she sighed then shook her attitude off. "So, self-control and mental discipline?"

"That's about it yes, I'm not telepathic so I can't tell you how to train her Jean." Harry said shrugging his shoulders. "Occlumency seems a good starting point, but I want her to get some control quickly, otherwise she'll remain a danger to those without mental defenses. Until then, you'll be on guard duty I'm afraid."

Jean frowned a little. "In that case, I'd suggest we keep the younger kids at least away from her. What are her powers exactly?"

After Harry explained he knew of the Native American girls powers Jean's frown deepened and she nodded firmly. "Definitely keep the kids away from her. I can block her powers easily enough, I've got the feel of them now so I don't actually have to be on site twenty-four seven, but it's best if they're not in the same room just in case it takes me a few seconds to realize was going on. A dedicated, link from her to me is a certainty though, and a house elf watching her round the clock."

Harry nodded, gripping her should shoulder in thanks and then moved his hand around her waist and led the way out of the room. "The meeting with the FF went very well, they're on board. Reed has already devised several space-based detection systems. He seemed a little surprised when I said we'll just try them all, but that's Reed for you: always looking for the perfect solution rather than simply bundling all the solutions together to overpower the problem."

"Well when you're as smart as Reed Richards I suppose continually searching for the perfect solution makes more sense. Oh, Dennis and Emma came up with a few names we might want to bring in eventually on the medical side, you mentioned looking into anti-aging solutions, there are a few names in the medical field that I thought looked interesting, though were not in that position just yet. I'm heading out now to purchase some more equipment for my lab, is that okay?"

"That's fine by me Jean, we have more than enough money, and I finally cleared the rest of the gold we got from your second cache of Selene's. I'm thinking of just handing the gold over to the bank and letting them figure out what to do with it."

"That was Emma's suggestion wasn't it?" Harry nodded and Jean laughed. "Probably the best thing to do, though she'll never forgive you for turning over those gold coins you know. She really did want to create a bed of gold coins to make love on."

Harry shrugged. "Honestly, if I wanted to I could probably create a mountain of gold rather easily these days, though I couldn't actually use it for anything. It's an odd thing, but magic users who try to use money they create via magic always end up in a bad way, something about the law of monetary balance or some such." At least that was the case back in his own world, but he still wasn't about to try it here.

"Something to bear in mind I suppose," Jean laughed, then kissed harry on the lips before moving back toward where she had left the teens.

OOOOOOO

Death sat on her throne in the castle that time could never touch, in her realm, where nothing changed except by her will, where nothing lived, save in a very existential way, her. She felt the reverberation of a higher being's death, and held up a single hand. A week ago countless thousands of souls, human and non, had passed through her realm, souls which had previously been out of her reach, bartered away to a higher Demon Lord. The particular Demon Lord in fact, whose soul she now held in her grip. It was a disgusting scabrous, pulsing sickly green, oozing disgusting white pus down onto her hand. Yet despite the mess it was leaving on her bony hand, she smirked as she closed her grip on it making it disappear into little motes of light, dissipating forever.

Death looked towards the wall, her eyes seeing through it and through the dimensional wall, beyond through time and space. She saw the jackals of his fellow Demon Lords ripping and tearing what remained of Mephisto's realm apart in an effort to grab what power they could. All of them were also fighting one another in this neutral territory, and weakening themselves further though none would perish from it. Mephisto had been so weakened, and his connection to his realm so eroded and chaotic that he could no longer take sustenance from it even as he tried to defend his realm. Even so he had fought as well he could, holding out for many days.

In actuality, Harry had gotten quite lucky. Without his ability to destabilize the spell that originally created Mephisto's realm, thereby messing up that connection so badly Mephisto could no longer access its hoarded power without making the problem worse, he would have eventually lost the battle.

Still, she thought to herself, for someone who is a Defender of Life, he seems to be doing very well in clearing up my paperwork. One technically alive soul returns to the mortal plane, for one hundred fifty million and seven technically dead souls returned to my power to be cleansed and once more returned to the universal wheel. While he in no way is doing this for me, such things need to be rewarded.

Death gestured with one hand and suddenly Hela was standing before her one leg raised, wearing absolutely nothing at all. . Hela's raven colored hair was plastered to her neck and face. Her body, with its pale yet healthy skin, high, full D-cup breasts cherry red nipples and long, firm legs were on display, glistening with water, because Death's summons had taken Hela from getting out of her bath. She looked around, her eyes wide for a second but recovered quickly, snapping her fingers to summon up a bathrobe which she pulled over her body. "My lady." Hela said, bowing.

Death raised a finger, and again the soul of Mephisto appeared dangling from it by a bluish string of power. She didn't want to get anymore Mephisto on her hands after all. Hela looked at it and gasped in shock, not having watched the events in Mephisto's realm since a battle had occurred in Vanaheim earlier that day, and she couldn't look into Mephisto's realm, since the dead there very clearly belonged to him, and his powers kept her own out.

Death said one word "Potter."

That made hell his eyes widen even further. "He killed the demon lord?!"

Death shook her head. "Weakened, allowed others to kill him." She looked at her avatar in the Asgardian pantheon, and gestured again forcing Hela to turn her head to look at what had just appeared. Behind her there appeared a globe of Midgard, with a few dancing lights on it, each a different color of red. "A gift. You intend to pursue him." This was said as a statement, not a question. "When you approach him, you will give this to him, from me. Potter seems to have a bit of a mad on for demons, knowing who has made a deal with said should help him."

Death could have just implanted the knowledge in Harry's head, but this time she had decided not to. Firstly, this time the payoff was much larger, and gifting him something physical seemed more appropriate. Secondly, she knew she was becoming too interested in him, and didn't want to meet him again 'in person' like that. She was Death, objectivity was a necessity, no matter how interesting a particular mortal, which meant a lot more than most humans would assume when used by Death, was.

Hela thought to protest being used as a simple errand woman. She also hadn't yet figured out a way to introduce herself to Harry just yet, nor had Hela figured out what she wanted to do in relation to his current lovers. She was still oscillating between wanting to simply displace them all, get them out of the way in some fashion, or somehow coexist with them. Of course any such thought was premature, she had to meet the human in person, to see if he was as interesting in real life as he was in her scrying pool.

Still, one did not argue against an edict from Death. So Hela merely nodded. "By your leave then, I shall leave, though it might be some time until I can gift it to him."

Death gestured again, and both the Globe and Hela disappeared returning to her realm in as guard, leaving Death alone once more to stare at Mephisto's diseased soul. She chuckled, a sound that despite its sepulchral tone was a happy sound, as she once more closed her fingers around it destroying the soul again and dissipating it into tiny little notes which disappeared into the ether of her realm, to never be seen again.

That this once more held her attention so much that she missed her would-be paramour's attempts to once again get her attention did not register at the time.

OOOOOOO

Odin frowned, setting aside his mug of ale, looking beyond the physical for a moment as he felt the death of a Hell Lord. The cause was beyond his ability to discern, and he knew it would be beyond Heimdall's All Seeing Eyes. That name after all was a bit of a misnomer.

Yet again his wife noticed his preoccupation, sitting next to him at the front of the dining table which dominated the feasting hall. "Are you well, husband?"

"A Hell Lord has died," he said, and the noise of the feast going on around stilled as many heads turned toward him. He waved them off, staring thoughtfully at one or two as the noise level rose again. "I sense the power rising on Midgard is behind it, yet this power is such that it is hidden from my sight. It behooves me to discover if it be friend or foe. Yet forsooth, it is not easy to decide on who is to be sent as my emissary, 'tis a task most in Asgard t'would be ill suited for."

"If you would listen to my counsel, I would send either Sif, Baldur, or Thor." Frigg said simply. "Sif can be diplomatic as can Baldur, and Thor may well go himself the moment you mention Midgard. As such it is better to give him a task, where he knows you will be looking over his shoulder rather than let him sneak past the 'all seeing' once again."

That last was said rather dryly and Odin chuckled into his beard. "I will consider it further, but your suggestions have merits wife."

Unfortunately for Odin, Thor, headstrong in all things, had heard him mention Midgard, and was already making plans to head there. Not so much to seek out this new power, though that would be Thor's stated reason, but to see Jane Foster once again.

The reasons Odin had wanted him here in Asgard had faded, a series of sharp, bloody battles against the trolls and their dark elf allies had set them back, and Thor himself had slain the trolls champion, Ulik. So Thor had no need to be here any longer, and a very good reason to leave, at least in his mind. The other half of his father's speech to him, about how Jane would age and die while Thor was still young and powered mattered not at all. He would rather have love for a day then sorrow for a year. And for all that his parents had assumed he would marry Sif, there wasn't any emotional or mental connection there beyond that of friends.

Now, he thought to himself, I will find Jane, after that, we will see what we will see.

The next day, Odin learned that his son had 'anticipated his orders', and went to Earth realm himself. He growled angrily and shook his head. "Fool boy, loving a mortal! Such is not a worthy lover of the son of Odin." He looked up, and a messenger raven alighted on one of his arms from the rafters high above. "Seek out the Sorceress, I have a task for her."

With Thor gone however, Odin was left with the choice between Baldur and Sif, and after much deliberation, decided to send Baldur instead. He was more diplomatic than Sif, and closer to the throne which would add to his credentials as an emissary. He also had a passing knowledge of Asgardian wards and the spells of their race, which might help him find this new power rising in Midgard.

What neither Thor nor Odin counted on however, was that gossip travelled very quickly regardless of realm. It would not be long before Asgard's enemies learned of Baldur and Thor's absence from the halls of power.

OOOOOOO

That evening Harry sat down with Jean and Kitty one evening to discuss what he and Nikolai called battle rattle. Harry laid it out in simple terms. "One of the main problems that wizards always faced, at least in my old dimension, is that they relied too much on a single trick. It seems to be a problem with a lot of mutants as well, which is why I was so pleased that Charles let me look into developing some tools and weapons for the X-Men, even thought that didn't go as far as I could hope. But I understand that they are still training with many of them?"

Kitty nodded. "Yep, Scott is pretty religious about that kind of thing. He trains with a knife every day, as well as a rifle and Rogue is actually able to shoot at things and hit them one out of every four times now. Kurt and Evan have continued their weapons training too, though that slowed down since Logan left. The new Danger Room subroutine for martial arts training is good, but not as good as a live person."

She didn't actually take part in those, Kitty was firm in her belief that she was now a support member of the team, and had no desire to persuade Scott otherwise, especially after this last mission. She still kept up with the exercise regimen that Ororo taught her, and she was always armed with her bag of runic tricks that Harry had gifted her with, but that was it.

Harry nodded approvingly. Scott had performed well as group leader of that mess in Kentucky, yet it was always good to have confirmation that he hadn't slipped back into his more arrogant ways. "Up to this point," he went on, turning back to the main topic. "We've used magic a lot as defensive measures, I want us to look into using it to create some battle rattle while also maximizing the amount every team member can carry."

"I'd like to see what magic and tech could do together too," Kitty said seriously looking over at Jean. "For instance, I noticed last evening during dinner that you were grumbling about still not having solved the heat dissipation issue on your sniper rifle system?"

Jean nodded looking at the girl with interest. "No I haven't, it's still a major problem. It doesn't slow down the operation of the rifle any longer, that part I fixed, but it still makes the person using the rifle stand out like a sore thumb in the EM ranges. I have no doubt it made Nikolai's duel with this Domino woman that much easier for her. And sooner or later we're going to run into people who can see through your illusion spells Harry, or someone's going to find a scientific way around them, which will make the problem even worse."

"There are already several of those, for instance I can't do anything about pressure sensors, a disillusioned person still leaves footprints, though obviously flying makes that tougher. Though even then, the wind of your passage might give you away against a prepared enemy. And in terms of disillusioned spells yes, heat sensors and suchlike can see through them."

"Kind of like the predator's cloaking device from those horrible sci-fi movies," Jean laughed. "Still, I can't deny that the weapon still has issues."

"Well what if we modify the runic array for the runic doorways? Stick a few of them onto a pylon or something and stick it into the lake outside. Water is a great heat dissipation element."

Jean blinked at that then looked at Harry. "Would that work?"

"I have no idea, but that's precisely the kind of idea I want to see you to work on, using magic to enhance, or ease the use of weapons. Every member of the team will have weapons on them which will include stun weapons both at range and in close, not just their superpowers. I'll be working on creating a few 'bottomless' pouches. Eventually they will be voice activated to summon up the item the user wants. For example…"

Harry waved his hand in the air for a moment and said. "Knife." Suddenly in his raised hand he held a serrated trench knife. He waved his hand again and the knife disappeared. "That wasn't conjured." He explained looking at their amused faces and holding out his hand turning it over. "While this isn't something I'd want you to do Kitty, figuring out the array would be a good project for you." He pulsed some magic into his hand, and a small barely visible, runic array appeared on his palm. This is linked to a pouch that I carry disillusioned here." He said canceling that charm on the pouch by his waist. "I haven't figured out how distance affects this just yet, but I will."

"It's like you're teleporting weapons directly to your hand." Jean murmured excitedly. "That right there is a phenomenal breakthrough Harry, though how would it work on someone who doesn't have magic?" I also wonder if there's an upper limit to what we could port in, say a combat suit or something? Hmmm….

"That is for the two of you two to figure out. Figure out how, copy it into a bit of clothing then experiment with it. See if distance matters to the amount of bio energy that is required to power them, figure out the low-end for the bioenergy quotient, figure out how to power it during a combat situation. Get with Nicolai, see what he thinks, then figure out what all everyone wants to carry. Assume... that the team we've got right now is the team we're going to be going into the field with for a time. Banshee hasn't gotten back to us just yet, but until then this is it."

"Storm, myself, Colossus, Vanguard, Magma," Jean counted off on her fingers. Will you be letting it Danielle or Paige join us when they are ready?

"I don't know just yet. Their powers are interesting, but I'm not going to make that kind of the decision on power alone, plus Paige still hasn't gotten her mother's consent yet, and she only sixteen. We'll see how Dani does with your training in first, then check out her combat skills before making a decision there, though it's obvious she wants to fight."

Jean and Kitty both smiled approvingly at that. Danielle Moonstar was a warrior born, but she was still young barely a year over Kitty's age, and Kitty knew that the things Harry and company would be dealing with would definitely be a step more deadly than what she had been trained to be dealing with as and X-Men.

With that Harry leaned back and let the two girls dominate the discussion, while interjecting a few notes of his own. Yes, he thought to himself, things were really beginning to form here. He only hoped they had time to put it all together before the next crisis hit.

End chapter

Hope everyone likes the X-men and the others getting some action out there. Kurt will still have problems in the future with nightmares for a time, but he will eventually be getting more aid then father Garnoff was able to give him. I hope no one is irritated by the way I played him not going to Harry for aid, but let's face it, modern Catholicism doesn't allow for polyamory, and Kurt is a religious young man, who would rather trust a priest for guidance in any case.

Honestly, the Guthrie clan is bleeding huge, but, and this is odd, Paige is the second oldest child and her father was supposed to have died when she was very young, but there is no mention of her mother remarrying or how they supported the family until Sam went into the mines. Even if she had, wouldn't her kids have become something else? So I cut down on the number of kids, though all the kids I kept will become mutants in time. NO, Paige will not deal with the insanity caused later by her secondary mutation, I'm not certain yet if there will be secondary mutations, haven't gotten that far into the marvel chronology (Master Splinter voice: hah, I made a funny) just yet. Those in the know might have also noticed I changed what drove, well, i want ot see who can guess the young mutant's name, but I changed what drove her family to try to escape Vietnam, to make it fit better into the timeline I'm creating. Doesn't fit perfectly I know, but I tried.

So there you have the new team lineup, or should I say as it stands now: Guardian, Phoenix, Storm, Colossus, Vanguard, Sureshot – name Wyatt might take who might get a version of the Iron Man armor if he joins, Magma, and, to be added in the near future, Husk and whatever name I choose for Dani along with Banshee in the future and one or two others in two chapters or so). A large, varied team, with a lot of power and abilities, whose personalities I will be going into further depth in the next chapter.

Eventually Harry's team will be large enough he can choose who is sent out on any given mission, tailoring the team to the needs of said. And there will be a VERY clear demarcation between the team members, and the students of the school. Also, something I want everyone to remember is that harry and co. will be very proactive about searching for and taking out threats. They won't ever step over the line as Harry did after the battle in Russia, but nor will they shirk from taking action on their own. It may cause problems, but it will solve more than they cause. And they will by god be putting down enemies permanently if the need arises.

Just a warning, the next chapter will have political shenanigans, business matters, and well some bad things begin to happen. Into every life and all that. No more romance for a time, while the group gets used to having Emma around more often. And just so people know, in the original Ororo did have magical potential. Emma did not, and will not become a magic user, sorry. She will remain mortal, and that little bit of drama will remain.

Oh, and for those of you wondering, No Eliphas = No Eli Bard = no Demon Bear, and the song that Melody saw in the spy is that song from James Bond movies during sneaky sessions, sorry if no one recognized it.