Editor's Note: As with part 3, BlueFooted did an illustration for this part. And, again, she did a fantastic job of capturing the mood. And, as with part 3, the illustration link is at the bottom, with spaces between everything.
Corruption, part 5Logan called the professor before they left that afternoon. To his chagrin, he got Scott on the other end of the line. Apparently, the professor had been using Cerebro for hours, and had yet to able to locate anything even close to what he, Kurt, and Ororo saw. However, he had found something else, and almost as interesting. At the coordinates of the Identity church was a null spot. At first, so Scott said, Xavier didn't catch it. Only after going back over the area in more detail did he see it. Someone was hiding there. That was all the verification they needed.
The Jesus Christ of Christ Identity church had been built into the hillside, in a similar manner as Beth and Toshiro's home. It seemed to be a popular way to build in this area. Storm, watching through binoculars from several hundred feet away, felt a chill that had nothing to do with the weather. She would be going underground again. Despite the warmth of the previous home, it had unnerved her to be in such a place. This so-called church, with its deceptive, old-time facade and faux steeple, made her feel even worse. She had no idea what to expect, but she doubted it was truly deserted. Someone who could have the three of them seeing a completely different being could make the police see whatever he wanted as well.
"You gonna be O.K. in there, darlin'?" Logan asked her quietly. "Maybe you should stay out as backup while Kurt and I go in."
"Believe it or not, Logan, I'm seriously considering your offer," Storm replied, lowering the binoculars.
"The place is unholy," Kurt said beside them. "You should not be in there unless there is no choice."
"Can you get by the stakeout?" Storm asked.
Logan snorted. "Piece of cake."
"I should be able to appear behind the steeple without being seen," Kurt added. "There is only one police car there. They must have the rest out on patrols."
His voice was still strained. Ever since the discussion earlier, he had been tense. Storm knew that such hate groups, especially those Nazi-oriented, were illegal in Germany. Seeing them in operation, with government acquiescence, must have been difficult for Kurt to accept.
"Just you remember the plan, elf," Logan warned. "We see any victims, they come out first. Let me take the lead guy hand to hand. Don't go off like you did yesterday."
Kurt took a long, steady breath and exhaled. "I will try."
Logan nodded and took off down the slope, quickly disappearing in the underbrush. Kurt knew better than to try and teleport with Logan. He was just too heavy to comfortably travel with, and he didn't need the strain right now. Still, it was an effort to stay put. He kept telling himself that he had to wait, had to give Logan time to get there. He couldn't go alone. Not again.
You nearly died yesterday, he reminded himself. Don't make the same mistakes.
Without warning, he was back in Stryker's tiled lab again. Several men were fighting to strap him to a table. It was not the first time they had done this, and Kurt knew the results would be painful if they won. Something snapped within him. He was no longer afraid. He was angry, even enraged. He bit one of them, sinking his fangs to the man's bone. He punched another one, who tumbled back against the wall. He wrapped his tail around the neck of a third and used it him as leverage as kicked the others away. He sprang off the table and bolted for the door. For freedom.
"Kurt?" Ororo asked softly.
Kurt snapped to face her, and she pointed at his tail. He looked back and realized that it was twisting into knots again. This time, he did not bother to release the tension.
"Is it time?" he asked her.
She looked at her watch, borrowed from their hosts. "Almost--"
Before she had finished the second syllable, Nightcrawler was gone.
Logan smelled the faint whiff of sulfur and looked up. Nightcrawler was a little early. He'd have to stop jumping his cue like that. At least he was waiting for Logan to get to the west side of the church facade before he did anything. Nightcrawler clung to the base of the steeple, looking back and forth quickly with agitation. Logan whistled softly. Nightcrawler spun his direction, then suddenly appeared right next to him. Jumpy, sweating, stressed, clenching and unclenching his fists. Logan had never seen the elf so ready, so willing, for a fight.
Without a word, Logan popped his claws and stuck them into the jutting facade of the building. A few swipes, and the wood and brick yielded a new opening. Nightcrawler teleported into the foyer as Logan stepped through the hole. Nightcrawler inhaled sharply as he beheld the darkened hall in front of him, lit only by the light streaming in through Logan's entry. Three large swastika tapestries graced the walls; one left, one right, one far ahead. Even worse, there was a cross in front of that swastika at the far end of the hall, draped with a garland of white silk flowers. Nightcrawler crossed himself three times, rosary in hand, as Logan came in behind him.
"So much for deserted," Logan mumbled.
Nightcrawler's fists clenched, his voice a strangled, shaking whisper. "This is sacrilege! They may as well plant the cross in filth as to have it in front of the swastika!"
His body was starting to tremble, his tail lashing violently. His breath came fast and through clenched teeth, perilously close to hyperventilation. He was losing it. The rage was about to be released, and he couldn't stop it. The enemy was here.
"Hold on," Logan hissed into his ear. "I don't know what he's doing to you, but fight it."
Nightcrawler shook his head violently, snarling through clenched teeth. "I can't, Logan. I can't!"
He teleported to the far wall, on top of the hated tapestry, and tore it down as he leapt to the floor. As Logan ran to catch up, he saw a door previously hidden behind the cloth. How did the elf know it was there? Nightcrawler jumped up, grabbed the doorframe, and kicked the door down with both feet as he sprang in. With a burst of light, he instantly flew back out, snapped the draped cross at its base, and crashed through two rows of pews before disappearing behind a third.
The tall man, radiating an unearthly light, stepped through the doorway, the top of his head just brushing the frame. Logan felt his muscles start to twitch. The man felt like sandpaper on every open nerve. His scent brought forth memories of Stryker's antiseptic labs, of Bosnian death camps, of killing fields and innocent blood. That beautiful, placid facade was just that.
Logan finally understood what was driving Nightcrawler insane. There were no other words for what he felt. This man, this thing, was pure evil. Logan then did the sensible thing. He screamed and leapt.
Officer Manny knew something was up when he heard a series of loud bangs from inside the church. It sounded like wood splintering, as if chairs or tables were being smashed. It had to be the pews; there was nothing else inside. As he was lifting his radio to his lips, he heard someone screaming and yelling from inside, and more things breaking.
"Dispatch, this is 325," he called, craning his head for a better view out of his windshield. "We've got activity in the Identity church. Sounds like one helluva fight--"
A deafening thunderclap and lightning bolt came from literally out of the blue. Suddenly the steeple was in splinters. Manny instantly revised his opinion. It couldn't have been lightning; the trees around the church would have taken the brunt first. It must have been a bomb. A second later, another explosion tore a large hole in the top of the facade. Inside, Officer Manny saw flashes of light and heard gunshots.
"Jesus Christ on a crutch!" he yelled. "Dispatch, I'm seeing explosions! I'm hearing gunfire and I think I'm seeing laser scope dots! Half the damn church is gone!"
"325, this is dispatch, retreat to a safe distance," a voice calmly stated from the radio. "Drop back one mile to the roadblock. You are too close to the action. BATF is being advised of your position right now."
Officer Manny started his car as yet another explosion tore off more of the church facade. "Damn straight I'm gettin' out of here! 325 out and gone!"
He turned around as fast as he dared on the snowy road, then made his way back down the hill with all speed. He never saw Storm let loose one more lightning bolt, ripping away what was left of the facade, then run into the gaping maw behind.
The main hall of the Jesus Christ of Christ Identity church was an absolute war zone. On one side, Logan was tearing into the tall man. On the other side was the tall man himself and ten "disciples", all armed with rifles, all wearing the armbands of their faith: a cross with a drop of blood in the center. The disciples were kneeling behind the pews, using them for cover, as they pumped round after round in Logan's direction, apparently heedless of their leader. Logan was cutting into the man full force, but he couldn't seem to draw blood. The robes were torn, but there were no wounds, from bullets or claws.
The tall man, their false "angel", no doubt, gave Logan an open-handed blow to the chest. It lifted him off his feet, sending him flying over the pews and into the wall, tearing down an oversized swastika tapestry on top of him. The disciples turned their guns on the downed figure trying to get out from under the cloth.
Storm's fingers trembled. She'd already pulled down some serious lightning just to get into here. Worse, the underground room made her feel so trapped that her heart was pounding, and the tall man.... He turned his gaze to her and she felt a fist close around that frantically beating heart. She felt trapped like a rabbit in a snare. The walls were closing in. Frantic desperation fed into frantic need, and she pulled another bolt from the sky. It hit the tall man head on, staggering him. Storm could draw breath again, but her respite was all too brief. The tall man was getting up, and he was smiling.
The Klansmen were pumping round after round into Logan when something else got in their way. A blur of motion, the stench of brimstone, and Nightcrawler was everywhere at once, disappearing and reappearing so fast there seemed to be twenty of him. Logan's attackers may have been good shots, but they were all middle-aged at best and out of shape. It took only a few seconds to dispatch them. Logan ripped out of the blood-stained tapestry, dozens of holes in his shirt and pants, to see Nightcrawler drop the last man in the bunch. A jagged fork of lightning lit the hall. Both men turned to see Storm, shaking with exhaustion and fear, putting all she had into stopping the tall man as he moved her way. Her face was turning red. One of her hands gripped her throat, the other her chest. It looked like she couldn't breathe.
Nightcrawler teleported again, this time onto the back of the tall man, and clung fast. He grabbed him around the neck in a chokehold, his legs and tail curling around his enemy's chest. Storm dropped behind a remaining pew, gasping for air. The tall man gave a feral snarl and reached around to grab Nightcrawler by his shirt, when suddenly he screamed, arching his back in pain. The dreadful sound was hard enough to bear when outside. In the confined space, it was deafening, bringing Logan to his knees. As he looked up, hands over his ears, he saw wisps of smoke coming up from the side of the tall man's face. Then he saw Nightcrawler go flying again, but this time he seemed to be ready for it, absorbing the force as he bounced off the walls and into the rafters.
The tall man was shaking with rage, eyes literally aflame. From those eyes, something like twin lasers shot out, following Nightcrawler as he leapt from rafter to rafter. How many powers did this man have?
Storm dragged herself down the main aisle, trying to keep a low profile as she recovered her strength. Logan rushed in and stabbed the tall man with both sets of claws. This time the foe winced in pain, his eyebeams shutting down. This close, Logan could see an odd series of black lines burned into the tall man's ear.
The tall man gestured and flung Logan away again. By then there wasn't a solid pew left except for the rear row. The tall man was bleeding slightly from his six new wounds. It was easy to see, now that he had almost nothing left to cover him above the waist. Something fell down on Logan from up above, and he slashed it into ribbons before he realized what it was; Kurt's flannel shirt.
On an instinctive level, Nightcrawler had always known what to do. It was why he grappled with the being instead of punching or kicking. It wasn't until he accidentally brushed his cheek against the man's ear that he realized what was truly expected of him. And so, to that end, when he teleported again, he left his shirt behind. Once more he appeared on the tall man's back and clung fast, but this time he grabbed him completely around the chest and buried his face in his neck. The being screamed and twisted in agony, smoke rising from his entire body.
Storm watched the attack which something between horror and awe as she pushed herself up on her arms and legs. Logan was rushing in again.
"Logan!" Storm shouted. "Make sure he can't get Kurt off of him!"
"Already ahead of ya, Storm," he muttered as he slashed down.
He should have taken the tall man's right arm clean off. Instead, his claws passed through, ghostlike, for most of the way before connecting with muscle and blood. The man's arm hung down, disabled and bleeding profusely. It wasn't a kill, but it was better than he'd been able to do before. The tall man continued to howl, flailing around with his other arm in his attempts to tear Nightcrawler off. He leapt back and slammed Nightcrawler between himself and the wall. Nightcrawler lost his grip, his air, and nearly his consciousness. He fell. The tall man spun away, and both Logan and Storm could clearly see the lines of Nightcrawler's Enochian symbols burned into his back, neck, and around his chest. His skin seemed to crawl, twitching everywhere as if there were thousands of insects running around just underneath. His eyes had turned jet, pupilless black, as if they'd been gouged out and replaced by an empty void. His red blood was darkening to something more like reddish-black ink.
He wasn't a mutant. The evidence pointed...no, screamed...to a very different, more chilling conclusion, one that Logan immediately refused the second it entered his mind. He came after the tall man again. The tall man blocked his arms with skill that he had not shown before.
No more telekinesis, huh? Logan thought. Getting tired? Maybe losing too much blood?
As both of the tall man's arms were preoccupied with fending Logan off, Logan was taken utterly by surprise when another two arms picked him up by his wrists. In seconds, he was being restrained by his wrists and his ankles, by the tall man's two sets of inhumanly long arms. His grip bit into Logan's flesh, as if he had talons instead of nails.
Suddenly Nightcrawler was there again, this time latched onto the tall man's chest. Another howl, and Logan was dropped to the ground.
"Kurt!" Storm shouted, praying she'd be heard. "I need a clear shot!"
Kurt obligingly teleported away, and Logan dove to the side, as Storm called a lightning bolt into the hall. It hit the foe in his chest, as before, but he did not rise nearly so fast this time. More Enochian symbols smoked on his chest. The charred lines seemed to be bleeding gold glitter. His skin became brittle and started to flake away, revealing something sickly red underneath. It wasn't muscle.
It was clear that the more symbols Nightcrawler burned into their foe, the more effect Storm and Logan's attacks had. The trio got into a rhythm of battle. Nightcrawler teleported in, grabbed just long enough to imprint his symbols, then teleported away. Logan ran by, taking a chunk out of the tall man. Storm called in another bolt. Nightcrawler popped in again. They never gave their enemy a chance to focus on one of them at a time. The tall man's shape twisted into something foul and inhuman. The flaking skin exploded off of him, igniting whatever it touched. The final shape was something asymmetrical, the "skin" plated haphazardly with red chitin. The blood was black as tar. Four eyes, like an insect's. A tail like a dinosaur's. Talons. Some hands had six fingers, some only two, like pinschers. Kurt's symbols were everywhere, branded in as if by hot irons, and smoking.
The hall was on fire. Burning beams tumbled down, revealing rock above. The carpet burned and melted, releasing toxic fumes. Storm was utterly exhausted. The last lightning bolt took everything she had. She laid there, coughing weakly, as the smoke filled up the ill-ventilated hall. She felt Nightcrawler's distinctive grip as he held her close, felt a wrenching sensation, and inhaled cold, sweet air once again, the sounds of the fire much farther away.
Kurt knelt down and sat her up. He tenderly cupped her face in his hands. "Are you all right?"
She opened her eyes and looked back into the gentle, concerned face she knew so well. All of his scars glistened gold against his indigo skin, a gloriously beautiful combination. She coughed and nodded, her throat too raw to speak. He nodded, lightly kissed her forehead, and leaned her against a tree.
"Wait here."
He was gone. Seconds later, Logan ran up.
"Where's Kurt?" he asked, looking around.
Storm blinked in confusion. "You mean...he didn't go back for you?"
The inside of the hall was alight. That which had been the tall man was crawling back to the inner sanctum, where the flames had not yet reached. It still had a chance to recover. The branding had suppressed its power, but it still had a chance. Let the rest of the place come crashing down outside. Let it be buried under the rubble. It might take months, it might take years, but the hated symbols would fade. It would heal.
It made his way into the sanctum, half-crawling, half-slithering, and looked directly at a pair of wrapped, two-toed feet. It lifted its head to look up at man that had defiled its sanctum, the man that had sniffed it out wherever it tried to go. The anathema symbols glowed gold on his chest, arms, and face. Even his eyes glowed. His face was placid, his movements slow and graceful, as he knelt down. Hated words fell from his lips as he extended his right arm over its misshapen back. Horribly weakened as it was, the words paralyzed with pain.
For Kurt, every emotion was swept away by calm determination. It was all so clear, now. Everything lead up to this moment. His family taught him love. Stryker taught him to fight and kill. The X-men taught him teamwork. Even the nightmares, the flashbacks; it all had its place. It all had a purpose.
How much hate did these fools have in their hearts to be able to summon one such as you? he thought, looking at the immobilized enemy. How twisted could they be to pray for your arrival and believe you to be holy?
He clenched his fist around his rosary and cocked his arm back, still reciting prayers in his native tongue.
Logan might not consciously recognize you for what you are. He would not understand what needed to be done. Storm is too weak to finish you off. It's all up to me.
On the final phrase of his prayer, he punched clear through the fallen angel's heart.
A long gout of flame lashed out from the hole in the mountain that had been an Identity meeting hall. It subsided after two full seconds, melting snow for yards in any direction. It was only by chance that no trees were in the path of the blast. Without the snow, the other nearby pines would surely have caught fire. As it was, they were scorched black, sap crystallized into something rock hard. Before Logan and Ororo could register the implications, Kurt appeared beside them. His scars were no longer gold.
"You've got one hell of a flare for the dramatic," Logan said.
Kurt smiled and shrugged. "It comes with the territory."
"Is it gone?" Ororo coughed, standing up. "I mean...really gone?"
Kurt glanced down at his right hand, still balled into a fist. "Yes. Forever."
"You two mind telling me just what that was in there?" Logan asked.
Ororo and Kurt looked at him as if he was insane, incomprehensible, or just plain stupid. Sirens sounded down the road, drawing closer.
"Tell me later," Logan decided. "Let's just high-tail it out of here before the feds arrive."
Logan led the way, with Kurt walking in his footsteps to avoid leaving his distinctive tracks. Ororo leaned on Kurt for support.
"I'm almost glad you need the help," he whispered to her, something dancing behind his eyes.
"Are you flirting?" she asked, smiling weakly.
He shivered. "No, I'm freezing. I seem to have a bad track record with cold. Maybe next time we do this, we can convince Logan of the virtues of Fiji."
Finis
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