Chapter Nine

Travelling in our newly acquired jet, the journey across the Atlantic Ocean took less than two hours. As the shores of Britain appeared in the distant horizon, I realised it was the first time I had been back home since my parents had taken me to the X-Men's school. My life had been irreversibly changed that day – there was no going back now. There was no way I would ever go back to the life I had had before, living amongst humans, going to school with humans, being hated and attacked daily by the scum. My parents had thought that bringing me up in an environment full of humans would make me like the sub-creatures. It hadn't worked. It had worked on my sister, but I wasn't as blindly trusting as she was. I was capable of thinking for myself.

And now I was going back, back to Edinburgh, back to where I had been born and lived almost all of my first fourteen years. Back to the humans who had always hated me, and who were now rising up against my kind. It was time to show them that there was no place for them on our Earth. It was time to avenge every mutant who had ever been hurt or killed due to the bigotry and hatred of humanity. Marina. Overlord. Toad. Sabretooth. All of them had died because humans wouldn't accept us. It was time for revenge.

It was getting on for the late evening – due to the time difference – when we touched down in an area of wasteland at the outskirts of Edinburgh. Pyro assured us that the jet was undetectable by radar, so we assumed nobody was aware of our arrival. This was a pretty remote area, and the chances of anybody coming out here were slim indeed, but Pyro wasn't taking any chances. He had Recyclo program the jet's auto-pilot to respond to his remote signal, and he had Vertigo park the jet inside an old abandoned warehouse. Once our leader was satisfied that nobody would find it, we were on our way to the city centre.

"The human scum will be starting their march within the hour," he said as we went. "We should get there in enough time to be ready for them."

"It's a bit dark, isn't it? Why didn't they start in the morning?" Gemini asked curiously.

"Because they spent the morning giving speeches to the adoring crowds," Pyro said darkly. "They're going to stop at each major city on the route to London, hold rallies, churn out every kind of anti-mutant propaganda – their hope is that the King will greet them when they reach Buckingham Palace, and add his voice to their cause."

"But they aren't going to get there, right?" said Mole.

"Not if we can help it. Gladiator, which is the quickest route we can take?"

I quickly brought up a mental map of my home city, then pointed ahead, "That way."

"Let's go."

Before long we reached the first housing estates at the edge of Edinburgh, and people glanced in our direction as we walked along the streets. This was not a pleasant area of the city – I'd never been here before – and most of the looks we got were suspicious and hostile, since we were clearly better dressed and better fed than the people who lived around here. There were no obvious outwards signs that we were mutants – Pyro had made sure of that; he didn't want to tip off the sub-creatures to our presence – but nonetheless nobody tried to approach us. Mole was wearing gloves to cover his metallic fists, and Cassandra wore a baseball cap to hide the small area on top of her head that was visibly mutated. It was fully covered by her hair, but Pyro didn't want to take any chances. The rest of us had nothing unusual, appearance-wise, and for all these humans knew we were just a group of ordinary people walking down the road. Quite why a man and eight teenagers would be seemingly casually walking through the middle of West Pilton was something they could only guess at.

"Um," said Atlas nervously. "Sorry to bring this up again, but I just want to make sure – there is absolutely no chance of the X-Men getting in our way this time?"

"If we act quickly enough, they shouldn't have enough time to respond," said Pyro. "And if the worst comes to the worst, we've already shown we've got the beating of them in a fight. We may have to face them. Do you have a problem with that?"

"Uh, no. Just wanted to make sure."

We went on in silence. Pyro was setting a quick pace, and it didn't take too long for us to reach the city centre. By this time, the trickle of humans on the streets had turned into a massive crowd, clearly waiting for the demonstration march to begin. As we moved on, more slowly this time as we to push our way through the crowd, we could begin to hear a voice, amplified and booming out of banks of loudspeakers that had been set up on either side of the road. We went a little further, and then I could see her. It was Claire Stewart, the woman whose picture Pyro had shown us. The leader of the demonstration, and the one we had come to kill above all others. She was standing on a makeshift platform in the centre of the Royal Mile, the road that led to the Castle, holding a microphone and speaking to the crowd. From the looks of things, they were totally caught up in her passion and hanging on her every word.

"Do we want our children in school with mutants?" her voice blasted out of the speaker nearest us.

"NO!!" the crowd roared.

"Do we want to walk into supermarkets, restaurants, cinemas, polling booths alongside mutants?"

"NO!!"

"Do we want mutants to breed together and create even more mutants?"

"NO!!"

"Do we want a Britain that's safe for us and our families?"

"YES!!"

"Do we want mutants to be fully registered and kept in secure units where they can't hurt our children?"

"YES!!"

Gemini had clenched her fists, every muscle taut, and was almost spitting with fury. Pyro put his hand on her shoulder and said, "Stay calm. It's not yet time to act."

"I guess this is the side of humanity that the X-Men choose not to see," said Vertigo.

Recyclo merely said, "She's a good public speaker."

"So was Adolf Hitler," said Pyro. "All right, it looks as if they're going to start marching soon. All of you get ready. On my signal – hey, wait a minute – where's Mole?"

I glanced behind me. The rest of the Brotherhood were there, gathered loosely around Pyro, but I couldn't see Mole anywhere. Was he so small that we had lost him in the crowd? Had he taken a wrong turn? Pyro's hand moved automatically towards his communicator, but with all the noise the crowd was making, there was no hope of using it.

"Where is he?" said Cassandra.

"Oh, he's probably got lost," said Pyro. "He'll find us soon enough, once the killing starts. OK, I'll signal you when I want you to move. Spread out a bit. We want to attack from as many directions as we can."

"What's your signal gonna be?" Scarab asked.

Pyro smirked, "You'll know it when you see it."

Vertigo whispered to me, "Somehow I think we will."

Our group separated, and we moved off singly or in pairs. Cassandra and I stayed together, and we moved over across the street to stand on the other side, ready to attack from there when Pyro signalled us. The woman was still yelling into the microphone, stirring up the crowd into an ever fiercer frenzy of anti-mutant hatred. At any moment she could let it all spill over, and woe betide any mutant who got caught in their way. Except us, of course. There were enough of us to stand up to them.

"Are we going to stand and do nothing while mutants threaten everything we hold dear?" the woman demanded.

"NO!!" the crowd roared in response.

My anger began to rise once more as I heard her venting her stupid bigoted hatred. What was it about humans that meant they couldn't stand to live with us? Why did they think we weren't good enough, that we didn't deserve to live on this planet? It wasn't their planet – they had no right to decide who lived on it and who didn't. We were the next stage of human evolution – we were what they were meant to become. It was impossible to fight against evolution, but they were stupidly and mindlessly trying nonetheless. It doesn't matter how many of us you kill, sub-creatures, I thought angrily, there will always be more of us. Then I amended, but even one mutant death is too many. What I do today, I do for Marina and the life you took away from her.

A shout came from my left.

"A mutant!"

"We've got a mutant!"

A gang of youths, guys probably about sixteen or seventeen, were pushing their way through the crowd to the front, dragging a struggling figure between them. The crowd pressed closer, eager to see what was going on, and Cassandra and I moved forward with them. The youths – or 'neds' as they were called here – were manhandling a small girl, maybe seven or eight years old, roughly pulling her weakly resisting body towards the platform. Her clothes were torn and dirty; her eyes were streaked with tears; she was screaming at the top of her voice, begging to be released, begging for rescue.

"We've got a mutant!" the lead ned announced to the woman with the microphone.

"Kill the bastard!" somebody demanded, and the rest of the crowd roared their agreement.

One of the neds had a switch-blade knife in his hand, and was moving towards the girl. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe a mutant – a child – was going to be killed in broad daylight, in front of thousands of onlookers. It was like a sacrifice before some obscene altar. The crowd had been stirred up into such a fury that they would probably have killed the little girl themselves. The neds pushed the child forward, and she stumbled and fell on to her knees. Free of their grasp, the girl struggled to her feet and desperately tried to run to safety. It seemed a hopeless attempt – she was too small to have any chance of outrunning them – but as I watched she began to accelerate away from them, her tiny form hurrying across the ground faster and faster, until she was moving at unbelievable speed. Of course – this had to be her mutation. Someone in the crowd grabbed her as she went past, and flung her on to the ground once more. A cheer went up from the rest of the humans. My blood began to race in my veins, and fury flowed into my heart like fuel in a reactor. It would only take a spark to make it explode. Cassandra put a hand on my arm, "Wait – wait for Pyro's signal!"

Forget Pyro's signal! The igniting spark came when the small mutant, cowering in terror, raised her hands to try and protect herself, and was kicked to the ground. She collapsed into a pathetic, huddled shape on the road, sobbing uncontrollably; she had given up screaming for help, clearly thinking it was hopeless, that nobody cared about her. She was wrong. I pushed Cassandra's arm away from me, and shoved aside the humans who stood in the crowd in front of me. The neds had clustered around the fallen mutant again. Walking out into the street towards them, I clenched my fists and felt myself ascending into a berserk state.

"Leave her alone!" I yelled.

My voice rang out above the cheers of the crowd. The neds turned in surprise. The humans in the crowd fell silent, shocked that someone was speaking out on to the terrorised mutant's behalf. For a moment all the humans were silent and still, as I continued to stride towards the neds. Then the lead ned gaped and said, "Wait a minute! I know you! You're Gary Rosiçky!"

So he knew my name, or what my name had once been. He was probably one of the scum humans I had gone to school with in my past life.

"This bastard's a mutant!" the ned yelled to the crowd.

The humans surrounding us began to give angry shouts and yells, and at any moment they might come running towards me. I didn't care. Two of the neds had grabbed the young girl mutant, and were holding on to her sobbing, unresisting form.

"Let her go!" I demanded.

"Go to hell," the lead ned snapped.

"You first."

I breathed a jet of flame directly at his face, and he screamed as the fire took hold of him. Collapsing to the floor, he rolled around desperately to try and put the flames out. The crowd of humans reacted in shock, some backing away, some running, most of them screaming in anger or in fear. The rest of the neds were shaken, and a couple of them began to flee. The others hesitated, then took another look at the vengeful juggernaut that strode towards them. They ran. The little mutant was pushed to the ground, and she lay there trembling, clearly expecting nothing but death, praying only that it would be quick and painless. I knelt beside her. When I put my hand on her tiny shoulder, she jerked horribly, and screamed, "Please! Please no!"

"It's OK," I said. "I'm not gonna hurt you."

Hearing the gentle, reassuring tone of my voice, the child looked up. In her eyes was nothing but sorrow and pain, clearly the result of eight or nine long years of it. She looked into my eyes and saw what was there: anger at those who had hurt her, concern for her safety, and a willingness to protect her. It was something she had probably never known before, and something she desperately needed to have. Not quite knowing what I was doing, I let my instincts take over, holding the little girl in my arms, hugging her gently, letting her feel the warmth and protectiveness of my embrace. She didn't know what was going on either, but she reacted in the same way as any child who was desperately seeking protection from an adult, putting her arms around me as far as they would go, and letting her body rest in my arms, releasing all of her worries and pains, knowing that there was somebody who would look after her and wouldn't let any harm come to her.

I felt a sharp sensation as a knife was held at the back of my neck. A voice snapped, "All right, freak. Looks like we've got two of you to kill instead of just one."

The tiny mutant looked up fearfully. In her eyes I saw the reflection of the human standing behind me. It was one of the neds, with two or three more gathered around him. They'd clearly regained their confidence and come after me with their knives.

"I want you to do something," I whispered to the child. "I want you to hold my hand and don't let go, OK? Can you do that for me?"

She nodded, and clasped my hand. I took a deep breath and called on my camouflage mutation. It activated, and I disappeared from the humans' view. It spread from my body into the girl's, and she vanished too. As the humans reacted in surprise, I swung my free arm as hard as I could, knocking at least one of them to the ground. While they were still stunned, I scooped up the little girl into my arms, and hurried back towards the crowd. Ordinarily I would have stayed to fight the scum, but not while I had the tiny mutant to protect.

More screams erupted from behind me, and I turned round to see what was going on. A huge jet of flame had shot up into the sky, and from the sounds of things at least one sub-creature had been set on fire. This would be Pyro's signal. Whether or not he had wanted to act now, or if I had pre-empted him, I didn't know. It didn't matter. Our own 'demonstration' had begun. I looked around for Cassandra. She was there, a few feet away from me. I was still invisible and she couldn't see me. Deactivating my camouflage, I hurried over towards my girlfriend.

"Are you all right?" she asked.

"Yeah. Here I'm going to go and join Pyro. Keep an eye on her for me."

The little mutant resisted briefly as I tried to leave her with Cassandra, but she looked into Cassie's eyes and saw the same protective instincts she had seen in mine. She stopped struggling, and stood beside Cassie, holding her hand tightly. I knew my girlfriend could use her power to keep the two of them safe. I was heading back into the fight.

As I went back, I could see that the rest of my friends were already in action. Many of the scum were fleeing for their lives, but a good number – driven into a killing frenzy by the woman's speech – were fighting back. Balls of flame were spreading from somewhere to my left – that had to be Pyro, but I couldn't see him in the crowd. Vertigo was nearby, surrounded by a group of four of five humans with murder in their eyes. At least one of them was armed with a knife, but it didn't make a difference. Vertigo ducked his shoulder to avoid a clumsy punch from a human, bringing his knee up into the sub-creature's face. The human screamed and was thrown backwards, blood pouring from its nose. Vertigo jumped, kicked out with both feet, sending two humans sprawling, twisted as he came down, pushed away from the ground with his hands, and hit the last human with a two-footed kick to the throat.

Scarab was grabbing hold of any humans who got close enough to him, his arm snaking around their necks and snapping them as if they were twigs. He wasn't as nimble as Vertigo, and several kicks and punches were landed on his body, but his tough form shrugged them off, ignoring the pain.

I could see Recyclo on my right, a blade in each hand, slicing and dicing his way through the humans who tried to subdue him. One human grabbed his wrist and twisted, forcing him to drop one of the blades. Recyclo merely formed another knife out of thin air, and stabbed it into the sub-creature's chest. The rest of them fled away from him, terrified beyond belief at the prospect of a man who could create deadly weapons out of nothing. Recyclo picked a couple of them off with long-range knife throws, then turned his attention aside, looking for other targets.

The only other friend I could see was Gemini. She too was surrounded by angry sub-creatures, and was fighting them off. Small and physically weak as she might be, Gemini had spent time learning martial arts from Vertigo, and I saw evidence of this now, as both of her acted perfectly in tandem, blocking attacks from the humans then retaliating with lightning fast counter-blows. She was in no danger of being hurt, and didn't need my help.

I scanned the milling crowd for any trace of the woman we had come to kill, the leader of the demonstrators, Claire Stewart. She had been standing on top of the platform with her microphone, but the platform was now empty with the microphone dangling on a cable from its stand. Typical human scum! She'd speak out against mutants to anyone who would listen, but the second one of us showed up, she disappeared from sight! All talk and no action…she should have been an X-Man. Hell, she'd have fitted in perfectly with my sister and her mutant-hating friends.

She had to still be around somewhere. She couldn't have got away that fast. I looked around once more, trying to see anyone who resembled her. Most of the humans left fighting us were men or teenagers, so an adult woman should have been easy to spot. I couldn't see her – she must have been hiding somewhere. A terrified human ran past without giving me a second glance, clearly fleeing from one of my friends. It was a woman, probably in her thirties – it was the one we were looking for! It was the speaker, the woman named Stewart! I hurried after her, determined that she would not escape, determined that I would accomplish our mission. Seeing Recyclo ahead of her, she veered off to the side, and I caught up with her, grabbing her arm and pulling her back. She screamed and tried to pull out of my grasp, but she could never have matched my strength and I held her tightly.

"Let me go!" she yelled. "Let me go, freak!"

"Shut up!" I snapped. "Not so brave now, are you? What was that you were saying a moment ago? Something about how much you hated mutants?"

"You're filth! Let me go!"

"I said shut up! How many mutants' lives have you made hell with your hatred of us?! Huh?! Answer me!!"

"Filth!"

Grabbing her around the neck with my other hand, I lifted her off the ground, and any last hint of bravado disappeared from her.

"Please…let me go…" she begged in terror.

I squeezed her throat harder. She choked out the words, "Please…I've got children…please don't kill me…"

"Why should you be allowed to have children?!" I yelled. "If you won't look after your mutant offspring, you shouldn't be allowed to have any at all!"

"Don't kill me…please…"

She was terrified beyond any rational discussion, and I was wasting time talking to her. What was the point anyway? The stupid, narrow-minded humans would never change their mind about us. Words would never solve anything. Only action could help save our kind. There was only one action I could take now. This human's life was about to end. I held her helpless in my grasp, my fist slowly squeezing her windpipe tighter and tighter, gradually cutting off her breathing. Her life was literally in my hand, and her death was merely a statistic to me – to us – just another human who didn't deserve to live. She had done more than anyone to make mutants, especially children, suffer. She was exactly the kind of person the X-Men sought to protect, and exactly the kind of person we had to eliminate. And here she was right in front of me. It was so obvious and so easy.

And yet, I hesitated. Something, somewhere inside of me, made me think twice. Yes, she was an enemy. Yes, she had hurt mutants. Yes, she would continue to do so if we didn't stop her. Yes, her death was our objective for the mission. But still…killing her like this…it didn't feel right. She was helpless – there was nothing she could possibly do to stop me killing her – and that touched a feeling somewhere inside my soul. How could I kill somebody who was utterly vulnerable and defenceless before me? How could I kill someone who was so much weaker and punier than I was? How could I end a life so easily when I was supposed to be saving them?

I pushed my doubts away. It had to be done. It wasn't nice, it wasn't pleasant, but it had to be done, for the greater good. Marina. Any time I doubted what I was doing, all I had to do was remember the girl I had loved. Humans had hated her, and humans had killed her. For that I would never forgive them. The humans had to die – all the humans. Every sub-creature that we killed was one less sub-creature who could hurt mutant children. That was what we were fighting for: the protection of our young, the oldest and most powerful instinct of all. I threw away my uncertainties. This woman was going to die. I tightened my grip further, and she clutched desperately at my fist around her neck.

A sharp gust of wind came out of nowhere from behind me, and I almost lost my balance. I had forgotten how violent the weather could be here in Scotland, and how quickly it could change. I was too used to the warm, calm climes of North America. Knowing my luck, it would probably start raining soon. Overhead I heard a rumble of thunder, and a jagged fork of lightning split the air with a deafening crack. What the hell was going on? A thunderstorm couldn't start that quickly! Or – wait a minute – could it? The wind around me became stronger and stronger, and with a slowly sickening feeling I turned to look behind me.

Storm stood at the end of the road, her eyes entirely white, the gusts of wind emanating from her outstretched hands, as another bolt of lightning cracked through the air, striking the road not ten feet away from where I was standing. I struggled to keep my balance as the wind approached gale force, and the human woman renewed her efforts to escape from my grip. In the corner of my eye came a flash of light, and somebody kicked me in the side of the head. I was stunned and thrown to the ground, losing my grip of the human, who collapsed to the floor, gasping desperately for air. Angrily I rolled over and got to my feet to attack the one who had kicked me.

It was Nightcrawler. As I rushed towards him, drawing back my fist to smash into his face, he teleported, disappearing from my view. A boot in my back told me where he had reappeared. I spun round on the spot, breathing a jet of flame at him, but the force of the wind around me blew it harmlessly aside. I swung another punch, but Nightcrawler ducked easily, and twisted to kick me once more, knocking me to the ground. The wind around me was now like a hurricane, and as I struggled to get back to my feet, it swept me to the floor once again.

How the hell had they got here so quickly? If they'd set out as soon as they'd heard about the attack, there was no way they could have got here by now! They had to have known we were coming here! But how? How could the traitor have contacted them? Pyro hadn't allowed anyone to use the computer room – did the spy have some other way of contacting his fellow X-Men? There had to be…there was no other explanation…was there? Could it be coincidence? Could the X-Men have found out about the demonstration the humans had planned, and guessed that it would be our next target? That was possible…but I couldn't make any assumptions. If the spy had some other way of communicating with our enemies, then we were in serious trouble.

The wind suddenly dropped, and as I looked I saw Storm coming under attack from Vertigo. He ducked, twisted, kicked her in the side, then had to throw himself headlong to avoid another bolt of lightning from the skies. While she was distracted, I wrenched myself upright, and turned to finish Nightcrawler. He wasn't there. He had teleported off elsewhere, and I looked around hurriedly to see where. Pyro was yelling orders to the rest of the Brotherhood, gathering them together, making them aware of the new threat. I could see him directing Cassandra and the tiny mutant towards a position where he and the others could cover them. I still couldn't see Atlas or Mole, but the rest were hurrying over towards Pyro. I could understand his tactics. Storm and Nightcrawler were the only two we hadn't confronted earlier, and thus they must have been the first ones to get out here. The other X-Men wouldn't be far behind…we had to finish these two fast, and get out of here before the rest of our enemies – including my sister – arrived.