"Hang on!" Wanda shouted as she crashed Lance's jeep through the
Institute's front gate. Toad shouted as the metal bars went flying and the
jeep lurched heavily and skidded to a stop.
"Do me a favor, never do that again!" he begged, and they got out of the vehicle. They gasped as they saw the carnage unfolded on the lawn.
Wanda saw Logan lying motionless on the ground, his own claws stuck in his body like a mutant voodoo doll.
"My god," she muttered. Suddenly, Logan abruptly raised one of his arms and pulled the adamantium claw out of his throat. Blood began to flow from the re-opened wound and Logan struggled to breathe.
Wanda ran up to Logan and knelt down next to him. "Don't move, you'll make the bleeding worse. Tell us what happened," Wanda said urgently.
"Magneto," Logan gasped as his healing powers began to take effect, and the stream of blood flowing from his throat slowed to a small trickle and then disappeared altogetherl. "He came to get Electra,"
"I knew it!" she growled. "He's never going to stop until he gets his hands on her,"
"I'll be fine in a while," said Logan. "You gotta get in there and stop him!"
"Right," said Wanda. "Toad! Come on!" she called to him, but got no response. She turned to see Toad standing by the fountain, his face pale.
"Toad, what are you waiting for?" she insisted, and then looked down at what Toad was pointing at.
"Pietro," she said softly as she looked at her dead brother. She closed her eyes and dropped her forehead. Toad saw a solitary tear trickle down her right cheek.
"Wanda, I, I'm sorry," said Toad, putting his arm on her shoulder.
"Don't be," she whispered coldly and brushed the tear off of her face. "He got what was coming to him," She turned away and walked towards the mansion without giving Pietro's body a second glance. Toad took one last look at him and followed Wanda inside.
X
Inside, they found Scott and Jean lying unconscious on the floor. Scott's visor was missing from his face. Jean groaned and slowly sat up.
"What happened?" asked Wanda, helping Jean up.
"Magneto," she said. "He was too much for us,"
"Where did he go?" asked Toad.
"He's heading for the lab. Take the elevator at the end of the hall," she said, gesturing in that direction.
"We'll make sure he doesn't get Electra," said Toad, and the two mutants ran off again.
X
Down in the lab, Xavier looked up as Bobby, Sam and Amara ran in. "Report!" Xavier insisted.
"Magneto's here," said Bobby. "We held him off for a little bit, but he was too much for us. Scott, Jean, and Logan are still upstairs,"
Xavier kneaded his forehead in concern. He had seen all that had unfolded upstairs on the security monitors, and knew that he was in trouble. He had contacted Kurt, Rogue and Kitty, but he knew that he could not expect them to arrive in time to help, even if Kurt used his powers to teleport them all to the Institute.
"Professor, what are we going to do now?" asked Sam. "Magneto's still coming!"
"You've done the best you could," Xavier told them. "We'll have to hope that Electra's transformation finishes before he arrives. If he does, he will have no use for her,"
"How much longer is it going to take?" asked Bobby.
"We've just begun to rebuild her body," said Xavier. "If we are not interrupted, we should be finished in time. Come, you can watch how she is progressing," he said, indicating to his control monitor.
Bobby, Sam and Amara walked up to the control monitor and looked at the numerous displays. They saw that Electra's skeletal system had been rebuilt and that the reconstruction of her vital organs was just underway.
X
Inside the chamber, Electra had been completely oblivious to the events transpiring outside the lab. All of her energy had been drained away, leaving her as pure consciousness. She could not see, hear, feel, or smell anything, but she was still aware of her own existence and lay in the chamber, wondering at the miracle that was rebuilding her body. Already, she could sense her bones as they were restored, and felt lungs and a heart begin to form in her chest. As the blood vessels of her circulatory system rebuilt themselves, she felt her heart begin to pump real blood throughout her reforming body, and felt a rush of air enter and leave her lungs. Something began to tickle her face, and she realized that she once again had human eyes and could see the world as it really was. She looked around the chamber and gazed down at her body as best as she could, and saw muscles and skin reappearing around her stomach and chest.
Almost there, she thought to herself in her restored brain. Just a little bit further.
X
Magneto floated through the mansion unimpeded and arrived at the elevator shaft that led down to the basement. The elevator was locked down, but Magneto did not stop. He used his powers to force open the doors and drop the elevator all the way down the shaft, where it came to a rest on the bottom as he gently set it down. Then he stepped into the shaft and floated down to the bottom, landing on top of the elevator. He pulled off the roof panel and lowered himself into the car, then opened the doors again and stepped out into the hall and began to walk towards the lab.
X
"Professor, Magneto is almost here!" Storm called from the security console.
"Just another minute!" Xavier called back, his eyes locked intently on the control monitor.
"Everybody get ready," Bobby called to Sam and Amara, and they positioned themselves by the door and waited for their enemy to appear again.
X
Wanda and Toad reached the shaft and found that the car was nowhere to be seen.
"Now what?" asked Toad.
"We climb down," said Wanda. "Be careful,"
She jumped into the shaft, grabbed onto one of the cables, and began to shimmy down it.
"Oh man! Why couldn't Pietro have trained us to do this?!" Toad complained, but followed Wanda's lead. After several tense minutes of climbing, they made it to the bottom.
X
Magneto stopped outside the lab and stared at the massive door in front of him.
"One more delay, as always, Charles," he muttered, and reached out with his powers. He strained against the heavy metal door as he tried to pry it open.
X
Inside the lab, sparks began to fly from the lights and alarms began to blare.
"Professor, something's wrong!" Storm shouted. "Magneto's powers are overloading our generators! We have to stop the procedure!"
"We can't, Storm!" Xavier shouted over the noise. "She'll die if we do!"
Inside her chamber, Electra saw the bolts of electricity change color and felt pain as they struck her again and again. She screamed in agony and felt a familiar rush of power inside her just-reformed body. She looked at her hands and to her horror saw that they were beginning to glow bright blue once again.
"No!" she shrieked. "Not again!" She began to pound on the sides of the chamber with her reformed hands as her entire body began to glow.
X
"Here he comes!" shouted Sam as the doors of the lab opened up, revealing Magneto. Not waiting for him to attack, Sam launched himself into the air. Magneto used his powers to alter the boy's course and Sam crashed headfirst into the wall of the corridor and slumped to the ground. Storm, Bobby and Amara tried to use their own powers, but Magneto put up a force field and deflected the energy blasts, then used his powers to wrap metal beams around them, trapping them.
"Now, Charles, I will take what is mine!" Magneto roared.
"Eric, is there no limit to your madness?" Xavier asked.
"I will pursue her to the ends of the earth if I must!" Magneto said, and clenched his fist. The chamber containing Electra began to shake as Magneto tried to lift it off the ground. It shook itself free of its bearings and rose into the air.
"Farewell, Charles," Magneto said. "I have a world to remake,"
Inside the chamber, Electra was knocked to the ground as it lifted off the ground. Her whole body now glowed with the familiar bright-blue aura. Furiously, she pounded on the glass, trying to get out. The glass held, but she felt solid hands strike the glass. What's happening to me now, she wondered.
As Magneto turned to leave, he heard a loud noise and felt a bolt of energy strike him. A blue energy field sprung up around him, crackling. He suddenly felt very weak and lost his grip on the chamber. The chamber fell to the ground with a crash. On the other side of the room, Storm, Bobby and Amara found themselves freed from Mageneto's grasp.
Magneto looked up to see Wanda standing over him, a look of pure rage on her face.
"You never stop, do you?" she asked vengefully.
"Wanda, don't do this!" Magneto begged.
"I should kill you for everything that you've done to me, and Electra, and Kurt, and all of us!" said Wanda. "But I think I'll let her decide what to do with you instead," she said, pointing to the remains of the chamber. Magneto looked and saw a blue figure emerge and begin to walk towards him.
"Wanda, no!" Magneto shouted, terrified, as Electra walked up to him. "Electra, please, don't do this," he said to her.
"You!" Electra snarled at him. "You stole my life from me! You took everything I had and smashed it to pieces!"
"Please, don't!" cried Magneto, powerless inside the field of Wanda's hexbolt. "I just wanted to help you find your full potential. I gave you a glorious gift!"
"You and your gift can go to hell!" Electra roared, and shot a bolt of energy into Magneto. Magneto screamed as the energy wracked through his body. Electra continued to pour energy into Magneto until she was completely drained. As she tried to summon more energy, she saw her glow fade and her human hands reappear.
Magneto gasped for breath and tried to sit up. Storm walked up to him and lifted him off the ground. "Electra is one of us now. This is our house, and you are NOT welcome here!" she said menacingly to him.
Wanda shut down her hex field. "He's all yours," she said to Xavier. "Come on, Toad, let's get out of here. We got what we came for,"
"Just a sec, sweetums," Toad said as he walked up to the fallen Magneto and looked down at him. "Ah, I never wanted to join you anyway!" he said, and gave Magneto a kick in the ribs for good measure. The two of them walked out of the lab hand in hand, leaving the X-Men alone with the fallen Magneto.
"I'm sorry, Eric," said Xavier as he wheeled up to Magneto. "I cannot let you leave this time. The authorities must be told about what has happened," With that, he pulled out his cell phone and placed a call directly to the FBI. A few minutes later, he hung up, knowing that Agent Simons was on his way and would soon have the mutant he was looking for.
Magneto looked weakly up at Xavier as he realized his failure. Just seconds ago, the world had been in his fingertips, but now everything was ruined. He contemplated his failure for only a second more before he collapsed, unconscious. His Spartan-style helmet fell off of his head and rolled around on the floor, finally coming to rest face-down at Xavier's feet. Xavier leaned forward and picked the helmet up and gazed at it.
"Such a pity," he mused. "If only we could have worked together, perhaps humanity would have seen just how peaceful mutants can really be,"
X
Electra looked at her hands, seeing smoke waft off of her human fingertips. "I don't understand," she said to Xavier. "Did it work? Am I human again?"
"Yes, and no," said Xavier. "Magneto's interference caused an overload before the procedure was complete. Your body has been restored, but as you saw, you still possess your powers. I am at a loss to explain it for now. Until we run further tests,"
"Those can wait, Professor," she said. "I have my body back, and you have Magneto. For now, that's good enough,"
X
"Do me a favor, never do that again!" he begged, and they got out of the vehicle. They gasped as they saw the carnage unfolded on the lawn.
Wanda saw Logan lying motionless on the ground, his own claws stuck in his body like a mutant voodoo doll.
"My god," she muttered. Suddenly, Logan abruptly raised one of his arms and pulled the adamantium claw out of his throat. Blood began to flow from the re-opened wound and Logan struggled to breathe.
Wanda ran up to Logan and knelt down next to him. "Don't move, you'll make the bleeding worse. Tell us what happened," Wanda said urgently.
"Magneto," Logan gasped as his healing powers began to take effect, and the stream of blood flowing from his throat slowed to a small trickle and then disappeared altogetherl. "He came to get Electra,"
"I knew it!" she growled. "He's never going to stop until he gets his hands on her,"
"I'll be fine in a while," said Logan. "You gotta get in there and stop him!"
"Right," said Wanda. "Toad! Come on!" she called to him, but got no response. She turned to see Toad standing by the fountain, his face pale.
"Toad, what are you waiting for?" she insisted, and then looked down at what Toad was pointing at.
"Pietro," she said softly as she looked at her dead brother. She closed her eyes and dropped her forehead. Toad saw a solitary tear trickle down her right cheek.
"Wanda, I, I'm sorry," said Toad, putting his arm on her shoulder.
"Don't be," she whispered coldly and brushed the tear off of her face. "He got what was coming to him," She turned away and walked towards the mansion without giving Pietro's body a second glance. Toad took one last look at him and followed Wanda inside.
X
Inside, they found Scott and Jean lying unconscious on the floor. Scott's visor was missing from his face. Jean groaned and slowly sat up.
"What happened?" asked Wanda, helping Jean up.
"Magneto," she said. "He was too much for us,"
"Where did he go?" asked Toad.
"He's heading for the lab. Take the elevator at the end of the hall," she said, gesturing in that direction.
"We'll make sure he doesn't get Electra," said Toad, and the two mutants ran off again.
X
Down in the lab, Xavier looked up as Bobby, Sam and Amara ran in. "Report!" Xavier insisted.
"Magneto's here," said Bobby. "We held him off for a little bit, but he was too much for us. Scott, Jean, and Logan are still upstairs,"
Xavier kneaded his forehead in concern. He had seen all that had unfolded upstairs on the security monitors, and knew that he was in trouble. He had contacted Kurt, Rogue and Kitty, but he knew that he could not expect them to arrive in time to help, even if Kurt used his powers to teleport them all to the Institute.
"Professor, what are we going to do now?" asked Sam. "Magneto's still coming!"
"You've done the best you could," Xavier told them. "We'll have to hope that Electra's transformation finishes before he arrives. If he does, he will have no use for her,"
"How much longer is it going to take?" asked Bobby.
"We've just begun to rebuild her body," said Xavier. "If we are not interrupted, we should be finished in time. Come, you can watch how she is progressing," he said, indicating to his control monitor.
Bobby, Sam and Amara walked up to the control monitor and looked at the numerous displays. They saw that Electra's skeletal system had been rebuilt and that the reconstruction of her vital organs was just underway.
X
Inside the chamber, Electra had been completely oblivious to the events transpiring outside the lab. All of her energy had been drained away, leaving her as pure consciousness. She could not see, hear, feel, or smell anything, but she was still aware of her own existence and lay in the chamber, wondering at the miracle that was rebuilding her body. Already, she could sense her bones as they were restored, and felt lungs and a heart begin to form in her chest. As the blood vessels of her circulatory system rebuilt themselves, she felt her heart begin to pump real blood throughout her reforming body, and felt a rush of air enter and leave her lungs. Something began to tickle her face, and she realized that she once again had human eyes and could see the world as it really was. She looked around the chamber and gazed down at her body as best as she could, and saw muscles and skin reappearing around her stomach and chest.
Almost there, she thought to herself in her restored brain. Just a little bit further.
X
Magneto floated through the mansion unimpeded and arrived at the elevator shaft that led down to the basement. The elevator was locked down, but Magneto did not stop. He used his powers to force open the doors and drop the elevator all the way down the shaft, where it came to a rest on the bottom as he gently set it down. Then he stepped into the shaft and floated down to the bottom, landing on top of the elevator. He pulled off the roof panel and lowered himself into the car, then opened the doors again and stepped out into the hall and began to walk towards the lab.
X
"Professor, Magneto is almost here!" Storm called from the security console.
"Just another minute!" Xavier called back, his eyes locked intently on the control monitor.
"Everybody get ready," Bobby called to Sam and Amara, and they positioned themselves by the door and waited for their enemy to appear again.
X
Wanda and Toad reached the shaft and found that the car was nowhere to be seen.
"Now what?" asked Toad.
"We climb down," said Wanda. "Be careful,"
She jumped into the shaft, grabbed onto one of the cables, and began to shimmy down it.
"Oh man! Why couldn't Pietro have trained us to do this?!" Toad complained, but followed Wanda's lead. After several tense minutes of climbing, they made it to the bottom.
X
Magneto stopped outside the lab and stared at the massive door in front of him.
"One more delay, as always, Charles," he muttered, and reached out with his powers. He strained against the heavy metal door as he tried to pry it open.
X
Inside the lab, sparks began to fly from the lights and alarms began to blare.
"Professor, something's wrong!" Storm shouted. "Magneto's powers are overloading our generators! We have to stop the procedure!"
"We can't, Storm!" Xavier shouted over the noise. "She'll die if we do!"
Inside her chamber, Electra saw the bolts of electricity change color and felt pain as they struck her again and again. She screamed in agony and felt a familiar rush of power inside her just-reformed body. She looked at her hands and to her horror saw that they were beginning to glow bright blue once again.
"No!" she shrieked. "Not again!" She began to pound on the sides of the chamber with her reformed hands as her entire body began to glow.
X
"Here he comes!" shouted Sam as the doors of the lab opened up, revealing Magneto. Not waiting for him to attack, Sam launched himself into the air. Magneto used his powers to alter the boy's course and Sam crashed headfirst into the wall of the corridor and slumped to the ground. Storm, Bobby and Amara tried to use their own powers, but Magneto put up a force field and deflected the energy blasts, then used his powers to wrap metal beams around them, trapping them.
"Now, Charles, I will take what is mine!" Magneto roared.
"Eric, is there no limit to your madness?" Xavier asked.
"I will pursue her to the ends of the earth if I must!" Magneto said, and clenched his fist. The chamber containing Electra began to shake as Magneto tried to lift it off the ground. It shook itself free of its bearings and rose into the air.
"Farewell, Charles," Magneto said. "I have a world to remake,"
Inside the chamber, Electra was knocked to the ground as it lifted off the ground. Her whole body now glowed with the familiar bright-blue aura. Furiously, she pounded on the glass, trying to get out. The glass held, but she felt solid hands strike the glass. What's happening to me now, she wondered.
As Magneto turned to leave, he heard a loud noise and felt a bolt of energy strike him. A blue energy field sprung up around him, crackling. He suddenly felt very weak and lost his grip on the chamber. The chamber fell to the ground with a crash. On the other side of the room, Storm, Bobby and Amara found themselves freed from Mageneto's grasp.
Magneto looked up to see Wanda standing over him, a look of pure rage on her face.
"You never stop, do you?" she asked vengefully.
"Wanda, don't do this!" Magneto begged.
"I should kill you for everything that you've done to me, and Electra, and Kurt, and all of us!" said Wanda. "But I think I'll let her decide what to do with you instead," she said, pointing to the remains of the chamber. Magneto looked and saw a blue figure emerge and begin to walk towards him.
"Wanda, no!" Magneto shouted, terrified, as Electra walked up to him. "Electra, please, don't do this," he said to her.
"You!" Electra snarled at him. "You stole my life from me! You took everything I had and smashed it to pieces!"
"Please, don't!" cried Magneto, powerless inside the field of Wanda's hexbolt. "I just wanted to help you find your full potential. I gave you a glorious gift!"
"You and your gift can go to hell!" Electra roared, and shot a bolt of energy into Magneto. Magneto screamed as the energy wracked through his body. Electra continued to pour energy into Magneto until she was completely drained. As she tried to summon more energy, she saw her glow fade and her human hands reappear.
Magneto gasped for breath and tried to sit up. Storm walked up to him and lifted him off the ground. "Electra is one of us now. This is our house, and you are NOT welcome here!" she said menacingly to him.
Wanda shut down her hex field. "He's all yours," she said to Xavier. "Come on, Toad, let's get out of here. We got what we came for,"
"Just a sec, sweetums," Toad said as he walked up to the fallen Magneto and looked down at him. "Ah, I never wanted to join you anyway!" he said, and gave Magneto a kick in the ribs for good measure. The two of them walked out of the lab hand in hand, leaving the X-Men alone with the fallen Magneto.
"I'm sorry, Eric," said Xavier as he wheeled up to Magneto. "I cannot let you leave this time. The authorities must be told about what has happened," With that, he pulled out his cell phone and placed a call directly to the FBI. A few minutes later, he hung up, knowing that Agent Simons was on his way and would soon have the mutant he was looking for.
Magneto looked weakly up at Xavier as he realized his failure. Just seconds ago, the world had been in his fingertips, but now everything was ruined. He contemplated his failure for only a second more before he collapsed, unconscious. His Spartan-style helmet fell off of his head and rolled around on the floor, finally coming to rest face-down at Xavier's feet. Xavier leaned forward and picked the helmet up and gazed at it.
"Such a pity," he mused. "If only we could have worked together, perhaps humanity would have seen just how peaceful mutants can really be,"
X
Electra looked at her hands, seeing smoke waft off of her human fingertips. "I don't understand," she said to Xavier. "Did it work? Am I human again?"
"Yes, and no," said Xavier. "Magneto's interference caused an overload before the procedure was complete. Your body has been restored, but as you saw, you still possess your powers. I am at a loss to explain it for now. Until we run further tests,"
"Those can wait, Professor," she said. "I have my body back, and you have Magneto. For now, that's good enough,"
X