Chapter 3 The Plan Unfolds
Disclaimer: It all belongs to Marvel, except Krull, which belongs to Columbia-Tristar
At about the same time:
Essex looked at the bodies in the suspension chambers. Success.
He had managed to create pseudo-clones of all of the X-Men and the Brotherhood from the samples he had taken. They were not viable, and couldn't even use their powers. They were essentially biomatries of cells imbued with the X-genes of the various members spliced into them. They had the entire genome of each of the members, but were just goo, living human tissue but not human flesh. But they could transfer the powers of the X-Men, as well as the powers of Juggernaut and of Magneto, of whom Essex had taken cell samples many, many, years ago. The biomatrices were all being mixed together to form a goo that had the various X-Men's powers in it, but not usable for any purpose but transfer.
The goo was gathering together in a bath. Since killing Mesmero, Sinister's attentions had been entirely focused on getting this bath to be just right.
"There. Come now, Rogue 2."
Rogue 2, as she was called, stripped off her clothing and got into the bath. Slowly the goo, which looked like white tofu, turned black and ashen.
"Absorption complete," smiled Sinister. "I would have you absorb the Nasty Boys as well, but you see, I need to make certain that I have some leverage over En Sabah Nur."
Sinister walked over to the tub and punched Rogue 2. She split in two, using Jamie's power. Then she got out of the tub and the Rogue 2 put on her clothing. Rogue 3, having no clothing, simply copied Rogue 2's using Mystique's shape-shifting ability. Sinister took a device on his belt and pointed it at the Rogues. Pressing a button, he zapped both Rogues. "There. Now you two are separate. On to the Himalayas."
Ms. Dexter and Slayer walked in. "You called for us?"
"Yes. These here are Rogue 2 and Rogue 3. They will be used by me to awaken Apocalypse. In the meantime I want you two to watch over Mystique. Make certain that she is able to get a message to the X-Men, to the Brotherhood, and to the Acolytes. I want them all to come to this base and attack it."
"Why?" asked Ms. Dexter. "Why should we want them here?"
"No major experiments are being done in this base. However, if they attack, they will not be guarding the little blue elfette, now will they?"
Slayer smiled. She was physiologically almost a year older now than when she had fought the X-Men, proving that Sinister had finally managed to get his maturation-acceleration process to work for older children. Her platinum hair with two symmetrical streaks of black nicely offset her emerald green sunglasses. "So the Nasty Boys will take her?"
"Yes. And by the way, I have decided that Slab is no longer of service to me. Make certain that in any fight that occurs, he dies. I need exactly four Nasty Boys, no more, no less. And tell my workers in the Brazilian base to begin building the prototypes. We have the necessary information from Stark Labs. Now, I will be gone at least a week. The little elfette, Talia, should be kidnapped by then. And after Mystique sends her message, kill her. I have no use for her, and if I find I do later, I have her DNA so I can clone her. Hmmm... anything else? Yes. You, Merith," he pointed at Ms. Dexter, "are not to get involved in any actual fighting. You could damage the child. And you," he pointed at Slayer, "Slayer is not a usable name when you are with other people. From now on your first name is Lyssa when you are in social situations. Lyssa Summers. Slayer is your code name for official business."
"Yes, sir, and thank you for helping me to reach my full potential."
"Yes, well, you'll need weekly treatments if you are to reach full maturity by June. I'm afraid that my methods are a little more intensive on people your age than on babies. I wish I had been able to improve you earlier, as I did with the Wagner child."
After showing a moment of tenderness towards Lyssa, Mr. Sinister turned to his "clone-daughter," Merith Dexter. Suddenly he was businesslike, which for some reason his daughter took as a sign of affection and respect. "I am going now. Put the plan in motion in about one hour. Good-bye."
A few hours later, Slayer came into Mystique's holding cell with some food. Mystique had noticed that she carried a communications device that would be very easy to take off of her belt. Mystique immediately realized that she was supposed to take the device, and also figured out Sinister's plan. Good grief, it was so obvious that it was an insult to think that she'd fall for it. So Mystique made like she didn't notice it, hoping that she would buy a little more time to make her escape.