Chapter Twenty:
After Cyclops blasted through the living room wall, he entered the house just as Magneto and Pyro headed down the front hall. He moved to follow them, and was met with the snarling obstacle known as Sabertooth. As the large mutant reached for him, however, his arm was coated to the elbow with a thick layer of ice.
Sabertooth turned toward Iceman and lunged at the much smaller mutant. Iceman jumped back in surprise and hit the intact living room wall. With quick skill he formed a large layer of ice between himself and his attacker. Sabertooth swung the heavy ice-coated fist and it slammed into the frozen wall.
Iceman gaped as a circular crack began to grow along the wall and he could hear the large mutant growling behind it. There was a glow of red and the hulk of a man was blown to the side. Iceman stepped out from behind the ice wall just as Sabertooth recoiled and lunged at Cyclops again.
On the other side of the room, Storm noticed a very much alive, very familiar green mutant dragging a young woman she did not recognize into the next room. She began to head in his direction, when Mystique stood in her path. Storm's dark eyes suddenly became ghostly white in the darkness. Rain and strong lightning were useless indoors, so she created a focused tunnel of wind to shift the blue mutant out of her way.
However, Mystique skillfully darted out of the way and morphed quickly into an exact copy of her teammate. Storm faced a duplicate of Sabertooth, equally as vicious and dangerous as the original.
Storm glanced back to Gambit and pointed in the direction of the dining room.
"Follow them!" she shouted, "Get the girl out!"
Gambit was staring wide eyed at the beautiful blue woman who just changed into a large cat guy, and nodded to Storm before heading after Toad.
Mystique charged toward Storm with heavy pounding steps. Storm felt the power crackling in her hands and raised one up in a halting gesture. Suddenly, Mystique morphed back into her much smaller and agile self and slid skillfully beneath her attack. She kicked the white haired mutant in the stomach and Storm stumbled backward.
She steadied herself against a charred piece of furniture and reached out toward Mystique, electricity flowing up through her, up from the ground and impacting a tall metal lamp on the far side of the room. The white light blinded her opponent temporarily and she met the blue mutant head on.
***
As his Brothers battled, Magneto headed quickly out the back of the house followed by a very angry Pyro. He was glancing back as he walked, toward the fighting mutants, and hated that he was being forced to keep away.
"I can help them!" he shouted as his leader moved across the grass.
Magneto ignored the boy's demands, focusing instead on finding the Lady Deathstrike.
"I need you here, Pyro," Magneto said evenly, a contrast to the fury in his eyes.
Charles, he thought, You just don't give up, do you? Not even when one of your children has been killed by your foolish ideals…
"I should be back there!" Pyro shouted again, "I want to fight!"
Magneto stopped suddenly in his pace and spun toward the boy. He loomed over the youngest Brother, and Pyro froze and fell silent when he looked into the older man's eyes. They seemed to be filled with more than one life's share of shadows, and shone with rage like steel on fire. Every argument ringing through Pyro's mind a moment before disappeared and he recoiled as Magneto began to speak.
"Do…not…challenge…my…authority…boy," he said, enunciating every word with specific intent, "And…do …not question my decisions. Now…FOLLOW ME."
Pyro stared at Magneto, for the first time, with real fear. Any trace of the older man's simple grace and stateliness vanished behind his fury. Magneto glared down at him for another moment, then turned and continued to march around the house. Pyro did not hesitate to keep step behind him, but inwardly was still quaking from the dark warning. The rules of the Brotherhood were few, and Pyro had broken the most important one. Right now, he was simply thanking his maker that Magneto's reprimand had been so light.
From around one corner, the biting clash of steel on steel rang through the darkness, and Magneto grinned broadly. As he and Pyro walked, the Lady and the Wolverine came into view. In the heat of battle, neither noticed as Magneto raised one hand and took control of their adamantium bones.
***
Deathstrike grinned viciously as five long claws on one hand slashed easily into Wolverine's arm. She twisted her fingers and watched fresh blood pour from his wounds.
Logan roared from the sudden pain and swung his fist towards her face. His three blades impacted one of the metal plates encasing her skull and ripped through the skin. Deathstrike reeled from the blow and stumbled backward. She glared ferociously at him and felt her face begin to regenerate. At the same time, Wolverine's arm stopped bleeding and the torn muscles returned to their perfect condition.
"We don't need to do this," Wolverine said in between deep breaths.
Deathstrike growled at him, "Yes…we do."
"Why?" he asked and she stalked toward him again. They kept an even distance apart, pacing in a slow circle as they spoke.
"Stryker was my enemy," she said angrily, "He made me, as he made you. But, I was his puppet…I was his slave! Years of torture, years of suffering his humiliations and not being able to do anything but WATCH!"
She held up her hand and pointed her artificial claws toward him.
"And then you…the one other in the world who should have known. Who should have understood! You are blind. You left me to die in that lab…that tank…the fucking core of our NIGHTMARES!"
Wolverine stared at her with disbelief. At the time, he had not thought of who she had been, at the time he had only been trying to save his friends…his family. She had attacked him on Stryker's order to kill, an order she could not disobey, and he had reacted in turn. Each of them, in that moment, had been what Stryker had meant them to be…weapons who killed mutants.
Wolverine shook his head, "I didn't know…"
"Now you do," she replied immediately, "Think of me…now. Think of me…as you die…Brother…"
Deathstrike leapt toward him again, and Wolverine prepared to defend himself, as she once again left him with no other choice.
As Wolverine tried to move, he found himself frozen in place. Likewise, Deathstrike hung suspended in the air, fighting against the invisible hold on her limbs. She glanced to her left and noticed Magneto standing nearby.
"Let me go!" she screamed, and Magneto tilted his head sympathetically.
"Now, now, child," he chided with strange kindness, "I'm afraid…the time had come for us to depart."
Magneto made a soft motion with his hand and the Lady floated to the ground. She glared at him in fury, but retracted her claws and stood at attention. Unlike Pyro, she was a learned soldier and knew better than to argue with her commander.
Magneto smiled, "Let your dear Wolverine…think," he said the word with some doubt, "…about what you've told him tonight. Let your memories haunt someone else tonight…"
Wolverine ground his teeth and fought against Magneto's power as the older man stared down at him condescendingly. He shifted his gaze back to Deathstrike and her face had become blank and cold.
Think of me… he heard her words in his mind again.
Then, a low hum filled the air. The wind changed, the cool night air displaced and drawn upward in an artificial vacuum. The four mutants looked into the night sky and saw a new nightmare lowering slowly to the earth.
The machine was round and narrow, nearly ten feet in diameter, and hovered above the house. It seemed to be sectioned into a broken spiral, and from the edges shone four dim spotlights. The beams glowed green, meant to reveal the darkest hiding places.
"What the hell is that?" Pyro said and instinctively opened his lighter at the sense of new danger.
Magneto and Wolverine exchanged glances, each searching the other's eyes for some kind of explanation. When none was found, Magneto released Wolverine from his power, who stumbled and turned to better see the unusual aircraft.
Deathstrike glared at her freed enemy and waited for her commander to speak.
After a moment, the machine rotated and began to change. The spiraled sections began to open, folding out upon each other, as it lowered to the ground. It spread into a star shape, and its true form became clear.
Magneto, if none of the other observers, realized what he was seeing. Mystique, in one visit to Stryker's offices before Alkalai Lake, had found blueprints for a machine, a giant machine, created for one purpose.
To collect and detain so-called "mutant threats." To gather Magneto's people…and take them somewhere else…away from society…segregated into camps…
"No," Magneto said quietly and raised his hand toward the giant, humanoid shaped machine. He focused all of his significant strength toward the robot…the Sentinel…and willed it into his command.
But, nothing happened. Whatever the machine was constructed from…it was not metal.
Before his horror could take hold of him, Magneto ran quickly toward the house, and the three other mutants followed.
"What are you doing?" Wolverine shouted to his enemy, "Stop the fucking thing!"
Wolverine then heard something in the other man's voice he had never heard there before…fear.
Magneto's eyes darkened and filled with hate, "I can't."
***
Author's note: I own no characters depicted here. I do own some soup and paper towels I bought at the grocery store today but they don't have very interesting dialogues or super powers.
If anyone is curious, the descriptions of the Sentinels were taken from a spoiler pic I found online. The same pic is also on the X2 DVD somewhere. Hope it's a good visual aid for what Magneto and company are now faced with. Mwahahaha…