Scott's car shattered the speed limit as they sped back to the institute, only to find that they were too late. The front gate had been torn open like Juggernaut had just jogged through. Beyond that, the mangled front door was in the middle of the lawn. As the four ran up to the mansion, they saw no signs of life. In the main hall, closest the front door, was Rogue. "Ah tried to stop him, Scott, ah really did," she mumbled, her hand pressed against a cut on the side of her head.
"Go look for the others," Scott said to Kitty, Kurt and Peter, his voice in its team leader tone. "Rogue, come on, stay with me," he said, shaking her a little by the shoulder. "What happened?" She groaned and then started to tell the story to him in bits and pieces.
In the next minute or two, Kurt found Jean out cold in the hallway. Peter found the Professor with his wheelchair flipped over on top of him and Alex by his side, nursing his own injuries. "Wolverine and Spyke went after him," he told Peter. "Oh great," he replied, talking more to himself than to Alex as they helped the Professor up. "They have no idea what they're up against! Mutants, sure, but you've never tangled with a Bestial!" "You've never tangled with Wolverine," Alex said.
Kitty went further down the hallway, past where Peter had found Alex and Xavier, to find Ororo laying among the mass of splintered wood that was once the door to Jameson's room. Hours later, after tending to their wounded the best that they could, the remaining X-Men regrouped outside in the now pouring rain. "Bro, if you're gonna go looking for that thing, I'm coming," Alex protested, but it was obvious that he wasn't in good enough condition.
"Should have put a Spider-tracer on John before nightfall," Peter scolded himself. "Hey, it's not your fault," Cyclops said, "This was a total accident. But now its our job to clean it up. Kurt, can you see anything?" Nightcrawler, who had night vision just about equal to Wolverine, squinted as he surveyed the landscape. "Ze rain's coming down too hard, I can't see any further zen you."
"They went that way...ah think..." Rogue said, stepping to where the front door once was and pointing out towards the woods. She had taken quite a shot to the head, and Scott wasn't really sure if she knew what she was talking about. But it was the only chance they had.
When they came to the edge of the woods, all four sighed with relief when they saw one of Spyke's bone spikes stuck in a tree. A bit further into the forest, there was another. "Smart kid," Spider-Man said, firing a webline and swinging into the darkness. "Wait!" Cyclops called, but he was already out of earshot. "Come on," Kurt said, grabbing Shadowcat and Cyclops and BAMFing in short bursts to stick to the spike trail, but fast enough to keep up with the webslinger.
"Zis is ze last stop," Kurt said, totally exhausted a few minutes later. "The trail just, like, ends here," Kitty observed. Scott's reply was cut off by an eerie, ear-piercing howl from not too far away. "I think it came from over here!" He shouted, even though the cry of the wold had echoed off of every tree around them.
Kitty screamed as she tripped over a log. Kurt helped her up, but then the log started moaning. "Evan!" They all shouted at the same time. "I knew I shoulda drank some more moo juice before I came out here," he said weakly. If Spyke didn't get enough calcium, or if he created too many spikes, he would get worn out to the point of passing out. "Where are Wolverine and Spider-Man?" Scott asked. Spyke shrugged.
"NO! DON'T HURT HIM!" Spider-Man's voice rang out from just out of sight, followed by a chorus of roars and snarls. All at once, Wolverine and the monster that was John Jameson spilled out into view. Even in the poor visibility, it was clear that Logan had been torn apart by this..."Werewolf," Cyclops said out loud. The werewolf easily overpowered Wolverine and Spider-Man together, tossing them aside like small children before bolting into the woods again.
"He's gonna wish Venon finished him off when I get a shot at him," Scott swore.
"No...he's not in control of himself...you can't hurt him..." Spider-Man said, slowly getting up. Wolverine, or what was left of him, was not moving. "Mr. Logan?" Kitty asked, nudging him a little. "Wolverine? Come on, wake up..." She found herself staring at the unusual sight, his uniform shredded and blood-stained, but his skin mostly healed so that the injuries didn't match the damage done to his suit.
Wolverine came to after a few more seconds of Kitty trying to revive him, but once he was awake she wished he had stayed out. Seeing the look in his eyes, she screamed and phased herself out just as he lunged at her, instead lashing into a tree behind her. Going completely on instinct, he sniffed the air and then sprinted off in hot pursuit of Jameson.
"Great, now we're back to square one," Scott sighed.
"Not quite," Spider-Man said, "I tagged both our Nature Boys with tracers this time."
Meanwhile, Wolverine stealthily moved through the woods, smelling both his own blood and Jameson's. He was slowly gaining control of himself, but presently all he wanted was to do was do an adamantium taxidermy job on the big bad wolf. He soon got his chance, as Jameson doubled back and pounced when Wolverine took a moment to regain his senses.
Just as the two man-beasts were about to inflict even more damage on each other, both were blinded with some webbing. Nightcrawler BAMFed in between the two, grabbed Wolverine by the wrist, and BAMFed them both a safe distance away. "Logan! Logan, please try to get control! He is ze animal, not you!" Kurt didn't have a prayer of physically restraining Logan, but fortunately he retracted his claws and calmed down.
Spidey detained Jameson with a steady stream of webbing, lassoing him with more every time he broke free. Cyclops moved in close and put the ion generator/watch, the thing that could turn Jameson human again, around the wolf's fingers. But when he turned it on, to his horror, it sparked and fizzled in the rain. "Figures," he and Spider-Man said at the same time, just as the werewolf broke free and hammered Scott with a backhand swing.
Kitty, who had joined Kurt in getting Logan back to his normal frame of mind, vaguely heard Scott say something. By the time she turned around, the werewolf was almost upon her. Its claws dug into her shoulder, but she had the wherewithal to phase through the rest of the slash. From out of nowhere, Wolverine charged through Kitty from behind and drove his claws into Jameson's furry white body again and again.
"STOP!" Spider-Man shouted, grabbing Logan by the arm and spinning him around. Wolverine swung wildly, but Spidey dodged. Not that Wolverine wasn't fast. He caught Spider-Man with his second slash right across the ribs, and got a punch with the proportionate strength of a spider behind it for his trouble. "Hey, HEY!" Cyclops yelled, stepping in between the two and pushing them apart. Spyke helped him break up the situation as Kurt tended to Kitty's cuts.
The werewolf had been defeated, in any event, and the tattered and torn heroes hoofed it back to the Institute where they found the Professor and Forge waiting for them at the doorstep. "I sensed that the device had shorted out," Xavier said, "So I called a repair man." "At your service," Forge said. By the time Jameson woke up, Forge had fixed the gadget, made a spare, and waterproofed them.
By sunrise the next morning, the place was still in a shambles but everything had quieted down. And, as everyone noticed, that wasn't always such a good thing. Whenever they were in the same room, Logan and Peter silently stared a hole through each other, looking like they were seconds away from going at it.
"The werewolf I got respect for," Logan said when Cyclops asked him about it in private, "He almost took me out. But I don't play around with bugs. I squish 'em."'
Cut to the coast of Bayville, where the early morning fishing boats had already been out for some time. "Hey Cal," one of them called, looking overboard. "Ya think it's a baby whale?" "Dunno," the other man replied. As they cast out a net to pull the shiny black mass in, it rolled over to reveal bony spikes coming out of it. "What the sam hill is this thing?"
The man's question was answered as Venom burst out of the water, grabbed him by the shirt, and hurled him into the other man, spilling them both overboard. "Parker's first...then Jameson..." the deranged symbiote said to itself as it hijacked the boat, "And then that freak with the claws...and then that freak with the eyes...and then...ah, we'll execute 'em all! Now let's kick this Minnow into high gear!"