Within an hour, the seven of them had made it to the sewers and were wandering through the tunnels while Logan sniffed around. The five teens wore black body suits, hard leather boots, black leather gloves, and masks that covered everything except their eyes and mouths. Scott looked around the tunnels and said, "This is what we do most of the time guys. It's not all fighting to save the world. Hey, Wolverine, are we getting any closer?"
Logan stopped and gave Scott a dirty look. "I could go a lot faster if I weren't constantly being interrupted. But, we are getting close. And I think there are two of them." Mary was crawling around the tunnel's ceiling looking around. "Well, my spidey-sense isn't going off, so we're not in any immanent danger. Psycho, are you getting anything?" Lucas seemed to be thinking intently on something. "No. It's odd, but I can't sense anyone or anything." Logan sniffed indifferently. "Well, they're down here, both of them. My nose doesn't lie."
Caileen stared down one of the tunnels for a moment, and then began to pound her fist on Logan's shoulder. "What?" he said, "What is it?" She pointed down a tunnel towards a shadow some fifty feet away. Logan fixed his eye on the shadow and nodded. "Good work, kid. I think that's our friend." Before anyone could say anything else, Mary darted along the tunnel walls towards the shadow. She stopped a few feet from the shadow. The others quickly caught up. Scott stepped forward and stretched out his hand offering a handshake.
"Hello. My name is Cyclops. We're here to…"
"No, no, no." the shadow said. "You're here to hurt us." Two eyes within the shadow started to glow blue. The mutant stepped out of the shadows. He stood a full six feet tall. He was covered in rags around his head, shoulders, and down his back. He had on a torn pair of pants. His forearms and hands were covered in some sort of blue scale that reflected the groups' flashlights. The mutant started backing up with a look of fear in his posture.
"No," began Mary, "it's ok. We're not here to hurt you. We're like you."
"No you're not," the mutant said. "You're one of them, from above. You just like to hurt us. I won't let you!" With that the mutant pulled his head back as if taking a deep breath. Lucas got a twinge in the back of his head at the same time that Mary's spidey-sense warned her. They both jumped to the side yelling for everyone to get down. Finishing his breath, the mutant leaned forward and opened his mouth. Bright blue flames erupted from his mouth onto the floor in front of the group. As they watched, the flames climbed around the walls of the sewer tunnel, forming a ring. Then flames shot down and across the ring, making bars of flame to tight for anyone to get through. The mutant turned and ran down the tunnel.
"Well," began Logan, "I don't think he wants us to follow him."
"Too bad." said Scott. He reached his hand up to his visor and selected a low setting to put out the fire. Opening his visor, stored sunlight converted into ruby red energy shot out from his eyes and snuffed out the blue flames. Mary ran down the tunnels after the mutant with Logan right behind her and the others pulling up the rear. As they approached a corner in the tunnels, they heard the water of several sewer pipes combining. Rounding the corner, they saw the fire breathing mutant standing on a metal slab which stood out past the edge of the tunnel with the water running around his feat and falling dozens of feet to a huge cavernous pool below. When he turned and saw the group approaching him, he put one hand on the rags adorned around his shoulders and tore them off, revealing his entire visage.
He stood over six feet tall and was covered with blue scales from head to toe. On his baldhead above his eye sockets were two horns. His ears were also blue and pointed and there were fangs in his mouth, much to the distress of Steve. His fingers and toes ended in claws. Growing out of his back were two enormous blue leathery wings. He turned to the edge of the cavern and jumped into the air, spreading his wings to their full span of fourteen feet. He began to flap his wings and fly across the cavern to the other side where another tunnel opened up.
Mary reached out her arm and flexed muscles which few, if any, other humans had in their forearms. White webbing spewed out from a small slit in her wrists and attached itself to the ceiling of the cavern. Ignoring the warnings and protests of the others, she swung out over the cavern, shooting out another web from her other hand to keep swinging. Pulling with her well-defined arm muscles sped up her swing and allowed her to catch up with the fire-breather. She swung ahead of him letting go of the web and landing on the wall, sticking perfectly to it. The fire-breather watched in shock, the loss in concentration causing him to slam into the wall. Recovering quickly, he sank his claws into the wall and look up at Mary above him.
"How do you do that?"
"I told you," replied Mary, "we're mutants, like you. We just look different, that's all. We're still similar." A look of hope passed over the blue-scaled mutant's face. "And the others, are they mutants too?"
"Yes," said Mary, "they're all mutants, just like us. You can trust us." She reached up and pulled her mask off and let it hang behind her like a hood. "We're here to take you someplace safe where you can learn to control your powers, where no one will judge you. My name's Mary. Do you have a name?"
"Daemon. The few others who were left to raise us when we were little called me Daemon."
"Daemon?" asked Mary. "Who else is here with you?"
Daemon looked at the others standing on the other side of the cavern, as if judging whether he could trust them all. Then he looked at Mary with a set face. "If you try to hurt us, I swear to you I will burn all of you to ash, even your bones."
Mary was a little taken back. "Understandable, and don't worry, you won't have to do that."
"Follow me." Daemon pushed off the wall and spread his wings, flying to another tunnel. Landing, he grabbed several pieces of plank wood and laid them across the chasm, bridging the space between the where he stood and where the group stood. Mary swung across to meet the others walking across the makeshift bridge. They followed Daemon as he walked down various tunnels further and further underground. Finally, the entire group entered another cavernous area, this one dry and well furnished with all the accoutrements of home. Sitting on a chair reading a book was a young woman with long black hair and black skin. She turned towards the entering group. Steve was a little shocked to see that her eyes were fire red.
"Daemon," she said, "who are these people? What are they doing here?" She looked as if she were afraid for her life. Steve walked up before anyone could stop him and stretched out his hand. "It's ok. My name is Steve. We're here to…" His words were cut short when bright red fire erupted from the young girl's hand and encircled him.
Daemon ran forward and put his hand on the girl's. "Danielle, stop it! They're here to help us. They're mutants, just like us." Danielle looked from Steve to her brother and back again, and then lowered her hand. The flames died out completely. "I'm sorry," she began, "I thought you were here to hurt us. So many have tried before."
"It's alright, no harm done. It makes sense for you to be wary." Still, Steve couldn't help brushing his hand across his suit looking for burn marks.
"Don't bother kid," said Logan. "The suit's fire resistant." Steve nodded, but still looked a little shaken up.
Scott walked over to Danielle and shook her hand. "Hello, Danielle. My name is Scott Summers. Some call me Cyclops. We live in a school for mutants up on the surface. We would like for you and your brother to come live with us and learn to control your powers. These others here with us are students from the school." A round of introductions commenced, ending with Steve shaking Danielle's hand a little longer than the others.
"Well," said Daemon to his sister, "what do you think? Should we go with them?" Danielle looked around her home, torn with emotion. "I don't know. This has been home as long as I can remember. Everything we ever had of our parents and family is down here. Could we take them with us?" Scott nodded. "Sure. You'll have a little space at the mansion for personal effects, if you want. But there really isn't that much space."
Danielle looked around the room, and then walked over to a shelf that held a few ratty books and some clothing. Another item on the shelf was a small, brass box. With the care one usually associates with items of great importance, Danielle picked up the box and walked back to the group. "This belonged to my mother." She opened the box, showing a worn and dog-eared picture of a young mutant couple holding each other while looking into each other's eyes. They both had dark skin. The man had black eyes and short black hair. His ears and hands were abnormally large. The woman had black hair, but red eyes. There were no other visible mutations. "These are my parents when they were still dating." Pulling out a small locket from the box, she draped it over her neck. "This was my dad's wedding present to my mom. This is really all I wanted to bring with me."
Turning off the lights in the room, the siblings followed the group of mutants out of the room and back to the surface. Within a few minutes, they were nearer to the surface. The young students and Logan removed their masks and put on trench coats that they had left near the sewer entrance. Steve put on a ski mask to cover his skin. Even with the trench coats that they were given, Daemon and Danielle would stand out a little, Daemon more than his sister. Psycho fixed this by putting a mental cloak over every human's mind in the area, making them not see Daemon's mutation, but instead see a young black man. Within an hour, the group had returned to the mansion and began to settle in a little more.