Chapter 17 Last Stand

Emma, Brennan, Frank, Helen and Chloe watched from their hidden positions as Tribunal soldiers hauled a struggling Adam into a metal chair that was positioned 2 feet away from the one that Lex was bound in. Lex watched with a bemused expression as it took three men to hold the struggling scientist in place and to force each arm and leg down against the chair in order to secure his limbs. Hidden in the background, Emma held a hand to her mouth, her eyes filled with concern as malevolent thoughts of the Tribunal and the audience filled her mind. She knew Adam was trying to buy more time for them by putting up a fight. Brennan touched her gently and motioned her to scan for Jesse's signal. Emma lifted her head; her eyes suddenly looked blank as she sent her mind outward. A moment later, she nodded toward the opposite side of the room. The other team consisting of Jesse, Shalimar, Mr. Queu, Clark and Lana had quietly phased through the wall and were waiting, spread across the back wall of the darkened room under the balcony seats.

The Tribunal Head Justice stood up; his face and hands stood out pale and deathlike in the altered lighting contrast against his black robes. "Dr. Adam Kane has formerly been tried and found guilty of the charge of altering human genetics for the purposes of creating an army and disrupting human society. Although he temporarily escaped his just sentencing with the aid of his genetically altered lab experiments, he has been secured again before us, along with his partners in crime. Adam Kane's sentencing will be carried out momentarily."

"At least I will have a clear conscience," Adam shouted rebelliously up at the robed figure. The soldier standing between him and Lex struck Adam's face. Adam took the blow silently, his expression a mixture of pride, anger and pain. Eckhart paced slowly past him, inspecting him silently with a triumphant look.

The Chief Justice continued. "It is also the consensus of the Tribunal that Mr. Lionel Luthor has been acquitted through the effort and substantial evidence of Defense Counsel, Mr. Warren." Mr. Eckhart stopped in mid-stride, his eyes burning with anger. He turned his attention suddenly from Adam and glared at the triumphant Defense Counsel while the Chief Justice droned on. "The Defense Counsel proved beyond reasonable doubt that the criminal activity was instigated and maintained instead, by his son, Mr. Alexander Luthor. Therefore, Mr. Alexander Luthor has been found guilty of the charge of interfering with human genetics and with incriminating possession of the mutagenic materials. The sentence for such activity is death."

Crouching in the darkness of the auditorium, Helen Bryce bit her lip and her eyes watered. Chloe placed a sympathetic hand on hers. Lana looked to Clark with alarm. Clark stared determinedly at Lex, and then glanced at Mr. Queu next to him. The grey-haired man was still standing watching the proceedings intently, his eyebrows furrowed. Across the room, Lionel Luthor couldn't help but feel a stab of alarm as he heard the death sentence passed on his son. Defense Counsel Warren was grinning broadly. Lionel looked around discretely for signs of Adam's people but couldn't see anything in the black background. Lionel noticed how his son sat calmly, almost regally, betraying no emotion and nodded in approval.

"Mr. Warren, how is Lex to be acquitted?"

The stocky man stared at Lionel in arrogant surprise. "I never promised an acquittal, Lionel. You were the one who told Lex to trust you, that you would take care of everything—or were you relying on your friend Adam Kane to bail you out," the man spat, his grey eyes filled with hatred. "I performed my end of the bargain and got you acquitted. Now it's time for you to pay up. It's your show now, Mr. Luthor," he said, contempt dripping from his voice.

Lionel stared at the Defense Counsel, carefully hiding his disbelief. A team of soldiers approached Lex and Adam with a portable IV apparatus. The bags of liquid dangled and swung on the IV rack were a murky yellow. Lex felt a shudder of revulsion run through his body. He had suspected that this was how the trial was going to end. The deck had been stacked against him by his father. Yeah, trust me on this, he had said. Lex shot a reproachful look at his father. He wondered if and how his father was planning to intervene on his behalf, and if his friends would escape their fate.

"I wish to approach the bench," Eckhart said loudly in a strong voice.

"Request denied. The Tribunal has made its decision in all fairness and justice. The sentence will be carried out momentarily," the Chief Justice replied. Eckhart studied Lex's impassive face, and then glanced at the bored face of the Chief justice. He stepped toward the Chief Justice anyways.

"I was assigned to Prosecute Mr. Lionel Luthor, friend of Adam Kane. How much did he pay you out to rule against the incontrovertible evidence that I presented?" Eckhart thundered. Emma and Brennan looked at each other. Eckhart was putting himself in a precarious position with the fickle Tribunal by challenging them. Was Eckhart trying to defend Lex? What did he want with Lex Luthor?

"You are jeopardizing your standing, Mr. Prosecutor." The Justice warned.

"Your Honors are sentencing the wrong Luthor," Eckhart replied. The hidden audience murmured in surprise.

"Your opinion has been noted. Step down, Mr. Prosecutor." The pale face of the Chief Justice frowned down at the pale, white-haired man who was dressed as one of them. When Eckhart refused to move, two Tribunal soldiers approached from either side to escort him away. Lionel watched the scene unfold and raised an eyebrow. The white-haired man was creating a diversion! Wasn't he the enemy? Why was he trying to save Lex? Lionel stared at white-haired man thoughtfully while he worked to free himself from the handcuffs that bound his wrists together.

As the soldiers respectfully stood at either side of the Prosecutor, Mr. Eckhart suddenly stared across the room into the darkness where Jesse and Shalimar's group were positioned. The group crouched in the dark, hoping to remain undetected. Mr. Queu remained standing despite Clark's attempt to grab his arm and pull him back. The tall gray-haired man sedately walked out from under the balcony seats into the outer edge of the lit area, stopping about 10 feet away from Mr. Eckhart. Lex and Adam craned their heads to see what everyone was looking at. Eckhart inspected Queu with a deadpan expression. After a moment, he said "I wasn't expecting a visit from you, Brother."

"Security!" The Chief Justice called. Two additional guards instantly flanked Mr. Queu.

Lex studied the two men with interest. He could see almost no physical resemblance between the ruddy-faced Queu and the ghostly Mason Eckhart, but he knew beneath Queu's mask was a face that was very much Eckhart's. "Twins," he thought.

Adam's eyes widened with interest. He knew that Mason Eckhart had a twin brother who had died in childhood, but had never known the man to esteem another enough to openly address him as Brother. A look of realization and suspicion crossed Adam's face; his coal-black eyes glittered as he defocused them for a moment, and then directed his defocused gazed at the two men who stood a few feet away from him and Lex. He exclaimed softly, "I should have known. He's a hologram!"

Lex stared sharply at Adam. "For a hologram, Mr. Prosecutor is pretty substantial and sentient."

Adam smiled ruefully. "Eckhart undoubtedly 'borrowed' my technology in order to give substance to his holograms. I developed holograms with mass and substance for special combat and situational training for my people. I have to give credit to Eckhart's programmer. Whoever created his interactive program did an amazing job." Lex digested the information thoughtfully and looked questioningly at Adam.

"Hm. Substantial holograms and New Mutants- any chance that the charges trumped up against you were true- training up Mutants to fight sounds pretty aggressive," Lex commented.

Adam shook his head. "Mutants have to learn to defend themselves against the likes of Eckhart and the Tribunal."

"How can you tell he's a hologram?"

"It's something I built into my program, like a copyright mark," Adam answered evasively, glancing across the room at Lionel. Adam had built fractal images into his technology so that that if he defocused his eyes, he could see an 'x' superimposed on the hologram. He could see a huge 'X' superimposed over the images of both Eckhart and Mr. Queu. Adam shook his head gravely. He should have known. He wondered if Queu represented Eckhart's idea of what his twin brother would have looked like, had he lived. He wondered how much of Eckhart's twisted personality and dreams were built into the Queu character. If this image was aligned with the Eckhart hologram, there would be very little of their strategy that Eckhart didn't know by now. Eckhart was undoubtedly playing cat and mouse with him.

Adam stared at the hologram of Mason Eckhart with a mixed expression of curiosity and defiance. This was Eckhart's proxy, his stand-in.

The Chief Justice pounded his gavel loudly. "Mr. Prosecutor, you have overstepped your bounds. Security, restrain Mr. Prosecutor and the intruder." As soldiers grasped their arms to usher them to the side, the Justice continued, "And begin administering the lethal injection to both Dr. Kane and Mr. Alexander Luthor."

Eckhart returned Adam's defiant gaze with a watchful, calculating expression as the guards ushered him away. "It's your move, ADam," he said.

Off to the side, he commented calmly to Mr. Queu, "so, Brother, it would appear that the Tribunal has failed to meet our objectives. We will have to permit Mutant X to carry out our sentence on the Tribunal."

"The younger Luthor should receive our legacy, if he is to prevail beyond us." Queu replied. Eckhart pulled the phone out of his pocket and examined it before handing it to Queu.

"It begins." Queu added matter of factly, jerking his head toward the execution chairs.

As Eckhart followed Queu's gaze, two sudden bolts of electricity blew the restraining bands off Lex and Adam's arms, followed by two more bolts that exploded the deadly bags of poison that dangled from the IV apparatus above them.

"They did that the last time," Eckhart said, stifling a yawn.

Chaos broke loose as the three Justices vacated their positions. Spectators and the Tribunal soldiers ran across the spectacle area. Chloe and Frank Thorne targeted the heaviest concentration of Tribunal troops and sent them flying against the walls, clearing the way as Brennan and Dr. Bryce raced to the center of the stage where Adam and Lex were trying to free their legs from the restraints. Helen savagely tore at the restraints that held Lex's ankles to the chair with her bare hands, while Brennan aimed a second bolt at Adam's restraints and blew them off.

"Lex, I can't remove them!" Helen gasped. "My powers are gone!"

"Allow me, Dr. Bryce," Mr. Queu suddenly appeared out of nowhere. He looked gravely at Lex then barehanded, ripped the restraints off. "You must have tapped out your reserve, saving Mr. Kent." The older man commented, brushing his wild, gray hair out of his face.

"I didn't know you could do that, Queu." Lex remarked, his blue eyes reassessing his Chief of Research.

"There's much to learn, young Mr. Luthor," Queu replied, straightening his lean, six foot frame as people ran helter-skelter past them. Gunfire made loud popping sounds nearby. "Don't you agree, ADam?"

Adam gave Queu an unfocused stare and saw the holographic mark on the white- clad man who now stood by Lex. Queu nodded gravely at Adam then looked back at Eckhart who stood alone a few feet away, watching them.

"I know what you are, Mr. Queu." Adam said softly.

"It certainly took you long enough," Queu gently chided. Turning to Lex, he said, "Sir, uh, Lex, I believe this belongs to you." Mr. Queu handed the phone to Lex. Lex looked appreciatively at Queu then at the device.

"Thanks, Queu." He said. Pocketing the small device he clapped the older man on the shoulder and prepared to head toward his father.

Just then, a Tribunal soldier aimed a bazooka at the ceiling and shot a massive energy blast. Half the ceiling above the would-be execution area broke away and started to drop on the party of six. Brennan glanced up and immediately dragged Adam, Helen and Lex down onto the floor next to the metal chairs and crouched over them, as the ceiling came down with a loud groan. Lex glanced up past Brennan's body in time to see Eckhart casually step beside Queu. Mr. Queu was holding up and examining his now- transparent hands as the power source that generated his holographic image silently waned. Both men shimmered for a moment then disappeared into thin air.

"Did you see that?" Lex exclaimed in amazement, looking up from his position on the floor, watching the ceiling collapse down on them.

At the same time, Frank Thorne and Chloe, positioned at the left wing, focused their powers and stopped the huge collapsing mass so that it hovered just a few feet above the ground.

"GO, GO!" Brennan hustled the group out from the suspended mass of stone, steel, wood and plaster.

A Tribunal soldier dropped kicked Frank and broke his concentration. The ceiling dropped a foot lower and stopped its descent as Chloe struggled to hold it up with her telekinetic powers.

"QUEU!" Lex shouted, looking back.

"He's gone," Adam replied. "Lex you've got to move NOW!" Adam pushed Lex toward the outer boundary of the cave-in, looking wildly to the side as he thought he heard Mason Eckhart's voice close by say, "I will prevail, Adam."

Adam, Lex, Brennan and Helen made piteously slow progress toward safety through a rainfall of pipes, beams, and plaster. The ceiling dropped another foot with a metallic groan. The fleeing party crouched as they dropped on all fours and crawled for their lives under the ever dropping mass of rubble.

"GET OUT OF THERE!" Chloe shouted over the noisy ruckus. "I CAN'T HOLD THIS UP ANY MORE!" The young blond strained to hold the massive conglomerate suspended in air and whimpered when she felt her mental control slip away. There was a rumble and screech as tons of metal, stone and debris dropped down on her friends. Chloe could do nothing to stop it. Dust rose up over the pile of rubble. Chloe stared, eyes filled with tears at the spectacle.

"They're OK," Frank Thorne's gravelly voice rasped in her ear. He pointed in the semi-blackness at the small disheveled group of four that were picking themselves off the ground. Frank had sent a telekinetic pulse that swept the fleeing party out from under the collapsing ceiling, just before Chloe's powers gave out. Chloe sniffed and blinked the tears out of her eyes and nodded in gratitude at Frank.

"You did good, kid." He said.

Adam's eyes gleamed as he looked toward Lionel and Mr. Warren watching from the witness section. He clapped Brennan and Lex on the shoulders and looked at Helen.

"Shall we?" He asked. They ran toward Lionel.

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Lana and Jesse fought side by side in the midst of the rush of Tribunal soldiers. Jesse alternately massed and phased his body mass to throw their assailants off balance; Lana tossed the soldiers who thought her to be easy prey across the room like dolls.

"I could get to like this," she commented to Jesse.

Jesse looked at her, massing momentarily as a fist connected with his face. A cry of pain emanated from the aggressor. A fist plowed into Jesse's stomach as he exhaled and he doubled over in pain. Lana squeaked as she found that she was unable to shed the pair of arms that held her now. Eyes wild with fear, Lana instinctively stomped on the man's foot, her narrow heel crushing the small bones connecting the ankle with the foot. The arms loosened as the military man pulled his booted leg up in pain. Lana whirled. She grabbed the man by the collar and using her body as leverage, threw him against the wall, head first. The man twitched then lay still.

"Nice move, Lana," Jesse commented, using his attacker's forward momentum to drive him into the nearby wall next to his fallen comrades.

The pretty, Asian girl considered the compliment. "Lex taught me that." She answered as she followed Jesse to meet up with Adam.

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Emma wandered around the periphery of the collapsed ceiling, looking ghostly in the haze of dust and soot. She cautiously opened her mind, afraid that her mind would quantum leap into the future again when she needed to be here now. She focused, checking specifically for reassurances that her teammates were alive. There were only two, no, three people that she couldn't account for. Eckhart, she concluded must have been in holographic form here as well as during his visitation with them in the cell, so she couldn't get a hit off him. Mr. Queu was not here either. She had heard Lex's anguished cry as the ceiling came down and could only guess that the unthinkable had happened. She could feel mixed complex emotions coming off Lex. He was so much like Adam, Emma thought. Where was Clark, she wondered. Emma could feel Adam's anger mixed with feelings of loyalty and nearby she could sense incredible evil and cunning. Emma shivered. Even Eckhart didn't give off vibes like that, she thought.

There was a furtive movement to her right. Emma stared. Her grey eyes darkened as she probed. A Tribunal Justice staggered out from his hiding place and stood before Emma. Emma herded the man toward Adam.

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Shalimar and Clark jumped two of the three Tribunal Justices in the balcony as they tried to escape and hide.

"Going anywhere?" Clark asked his expression dark and forbidding as he blocked their every attempt to escape at super speed. Shalimar kicked a hapless Tribunal soldier who was aiming his rifle at Clark's back, into oblivion.

Shalimar's lips curled back, all her teeth showing in a Feral smile. She knocked the heads of the two justices together. They fell senseless at her feet.

"Much easier to handle when they're not struggling." Shalimar commented, slinging one Justice over her shoulder. Clark slung the other Justice over his shoulder and grinned. They headed over to Adam.

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"I think I owe you this," Adam told the astonished Defense Counsel. He delivered a bone-crushing blow to the stocky man's jaw. Mr. Warren's head snapped back and he collapsed in a senseless heap.

"Adam, I see you've gotten physical in your old age," Lionel was all smiles.

Adam drew within inches of Lionel's face. "You almost got us all killed," he rasped, his coal black eyes intense.

"Almost Adam? You know my philosophy on Almosts," Lionel replied good- naturedly. Adam stared a moment longer at his old associate. It had been 20 years. He doubted that the man had changed at all. Lionel continued, "I received your information, Adam. I knew I could count on you. Adam, if you ever need to disappear for a season, you know how to reach me."

Adam towered menacingly over Lionel for a moment then smiled. He nodded at Brennan. A bolt of electricity shot from Brennan's hands and flowed over the restraints that held Lionel's hands. The restraints clattered on the floor.

Lionel studied his freed hands then looked up at Lex. "See? I told you that I'd take care of you."

Lana and Jesse came running up at the same time Shalimar and Clark dropped the two Tribunal Justices in front of Adam and Lionel. Lana smiled up at Clark. Clark stared starry eyed at Lana for a moment then came to his senses. Shalimar, noticing the chemistry, smirked. Chloe and Frank Thorne joined them.

"Great job," Adam, Lex, Helen and Brennan exchanged heartfelt thanks and congratulations with the tele-kinetics. Chloe sneaked a look at Clark and her expression saddened as she saw him staring soulfully at Lana. Then she jumped at the hand holding hers and looked up into Brennan's fiery brown eyes.

"What you did today took great self control and inner strength. You might not obtain what your heart desires most today, but you will." The handsome Elemental told the blond teenager as he squeezed her hand and flashed a dazzling smile as he let her go.

"Adam couldn't have said that better," Jesse quipped.

Clark glanced over at Chloe and saw Brennan holding her hand. His brow furrowed thoughtfully and a look of disapproval crossed his face. Chloe looked back at Clark in time to catch his look and to see Shalimar rest her golden mane on Clark's shoulder. Chloe frowned thoughtfully.

The Feral smiled and told Clark, "Hon, you can't have everything, but you can certainly try."

The Justices groaned as they came to and looked up defiantly at Adam and Lionel.

"Does this belong to you?" Emma asked Adam as she guided the third Justice toward his cohorts. "He seems to be lost."

"You won't escape your sentence, Dr. Kane," the bedraggled Chief Justice threatened. "You too, Mr. Luthor. You may have deceived or compromised your Counsel, but we will sentence you as well." He added.

"I'm afraid you're badly mistaken, as to who is sentencing whom," Lionel replied; he looked coolly at Adam, who shrugged.

"Wipe their ID's?" Adam mused.

"Replace them with criminal records?" Lionel suggested.

"Re-channel all their assets?" Lex added. Adam exchanged looks with Lionel who smiled evilly.

"You can't do that!" One of the Justices protested.

"Just watch us." Adam replied, eyes flashing.

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