Chapter 16
"Emma, help me to deactivate these subdermal governors," Adam said. He took a step toward Shalimar who backed away from him.
"Tell us, Adam. Or do I have to tear the answers out of your brain," Emma said, approaching him threateningly.
Adam looked at them each in turn and said, "We don't really have time for this now," but he saw that they were intransigent in their need to hear his answer. "What are my goals? Why did I create Mutant X and the Mutant Underground?" He sighed. "I was reckless when I was young. I was so convinced of my brilliance and the rightness of my actions that I cut corners." Adam lowered himself to the ground and sat on the floor. "I wanted to help people and make the world a better place. Young and idealistic, I know. The mutations created by my work were unexpected. As you are well aware, they were reduced between the creation of Gabriel Ashlocke and the New Mutants such as yourselves, but the side effects of the genetic manipulations persisted no matter what I and my fellow researchers did. Moleculars, Ferals, Psionics, Elementals, four different paths of research, four different roads to failure, four legacies of ruined lives."
"You feel responsible for the work you did at Genomex. We know that," Shalimar said. "We understand your 'why', but we're a little fuzzy still on how you plan to fix things."
And you are still hiding some of the 'why', Emma thought at him. Adam looked sharply at her.
"I'm getting to that. Eckhart and Breedlove played their parts, but mostly, all of the innovation was mine. They used my techniques and theories not only to save lives, but also to create improved humans. When I found out what they were doing it was I who called an end to it. I stayed on for a time to try and right the wrongs done with my work, but I would not risk creating any more New Mutants. There was a falling out. I wiped Genomex's records and left with a database of every mutant we had created. My plan was simply to dedicate the rest of my life to helping them in any way I could. I grant you, it wasn't much of a plan. It was more penance."
"In other words, you don't have a plan, do you?" Brennan said. "You don't have an endgame."
"No, Brennan, no. There is an endgame. The mutations will not last more than three or four generations. In most cases, only two, and in some, powers will not be passed on to children at all. It is why Ashlocke's plan, and now Marlowe's, was ultimately doomed to failure. Eventually, New Mutants will dwindle away and become a thing of the past. The Mutant Underground is a way for the Children of Genomex to live lives as normal as possible and have a chance for families and children of their own."
The revelation was shocking to them all. "So, New Mutants are all doomed," Jesse said.
"No, you aren't doomed. You will live your life as will your children and grandchildren," Adam said, "but ultimately, a generation will come that will not have your powers. There are not great numbers of you now and those numbers will only decrease. No one has all of the pieces to create more mutants with even a semblance of stability."
"Do you think Marlowe knows this?" Shalimar asked.
"Probably. If not, I'm sure we're being monitored and he knows now. I doubt it matters to him. He is using the Strand as a ready-made force for whatever his true objective is. How can you guess at the motivations of someone who is immortal and has a death wish? Even when he was young, his mental state was unstable. Since then, he has lost his wife and his child and has risen from the dead. Who can know what he's thinking?"
I can, Emma thought to Adam. As for your own motivations and goals, you are telling the truth as far as it goes, but there are some omissions. You think you are protecting us by not telling us everything, but I know where to look if your secrets ever threaten this team. Be careful what you hide, because I will not hesitate to invade your mind if I have cause to do so.
You may find it more difficult than you expect. However, I do not know anything more about Charles Marlowe, Adam thought for Emma to read. I was as surprised as anyone to find him alive.
"But then how do we defeat Marlowe?" Jesse asked. "If he can't be killed, how can he be stopped?"
"He can be killed," Adam said. "He was killed. Eckhart disintegrated his remains, but he must have missed something. It might only take one cell for Marlowe to regenerate."
"How could he grow back from one cell? Do new Marlowes grow every time he gives a blood sample?" Brennan asked, mocking the sense of Adam's statement.
"Something must trigger the regeneration. There has to be some sort of communication between all of his New Mutant cells, no matter their distance from one another. Such an intercellular communication is probably a critical part of his ability to instantly and instinctively regenerate. The largest grouping of cells, in most cases, his body, is dominant and repairs itself, while instructing any detached cells not to. If a cell loses all contact with any larger biomass, it knows it is the last remaining piece of life and begins the process of restoring the whole."
"How is that even possible?" Jesse asked.
"There's so much about mutations that we don't know. So much that defies all of the laws of physics, chemistry and biology that we thought we knew. Where does Brennan's electricity come from? All bodies generate some, but only the merest fraction of what he is able to produce. How can you instantaneously change your body density? What makes a Feral's eyes glow? How can a Psionic project his own thoughts into someone else's mind? Science has no good explanation for any of this. Are New Mutants able to instinctually tap into an intersecting universe or draw power from dimensions of space not currently known to us? Maybe it has something to do with a higher power or is evidence that there is an intelligent design to our existence. Even I don't know why these powers work, but obviously they do. Somehow the genetic manipulations I performed tapped into these forces and created you—created mutants who are able to draw on this energy and bend the reality we had all taken for granted in specific ways at their will."
"Usually," Brennan said with a smirk, remembering misfires in his past. "Basically, to stop Marlowe, we must be sure to destroy every last cell."
"Yes," Adam said, "if you mean to kill."
"I think it is the preferred option," Emma said. "First, we have to get out of this prison." She walked over to Shalimar and pulled her hair to the side, revealing the modified subdermal governor with its explosive charge poised to send a slug into her brainstem.
The metal of the governor began scintillating. "Careful, Emma," Adam warned.
Emma stood at Shalimar's side. Her eyes were sparking like the governor. There was an explosion, but instead of the slug launching into Shalimar's neck, it stayed in place and the device backfired, sending the bullet casing and the back of the short barrel across the room to ricochet against the concrete wall. "Adam, it's disarmed. You do the rest."
She moved toward Brennan, who put up his hands and stepped back. "Hold on, what was that?" he asked.
"I just held the slug in place and triggered the explosive charge in the cap," Emma said.
"You're a telempath. You can't do that. I don't even think a telekinetic could do that," he said.
"Right now, Emma is supercharged, to put it simply. Unfortunately, I don't know how long it will last, so we have to move now," Adam told them. Emma quickly detonated the explosive devices in Brennan and Jesse's governors and Adam removed the remainder of the device. He also removed Emma's in case it began having an effect on her again. Alarms sounded and gas began pouring into their cell. Up above, the covers for the steel grating where slammed shut.
"Finally, it's time to get out of here," Jesse said. He went impervious and smashed through the bulletproof glass wall of their cell. It fractured and cracked, parts shattering, but most coming down in a wrinkled sheet, which Jesse stamped on and pulled out of the way.
Brennan let loose parallel streams of electricity at the two Links who had been waiting in the observation room. He then looked at Jesse. "You could've just phased us through," he said.
"Probably, but I've wanted to do that for weeks," Jesse responded.
Emma was choking a little. "Did you also want the gas to get into our lungs instead of staying in the cell?" she asked sarcastically.
"I'm sorry," Jesse said, a little embarrassed by his rashness. The weeks of inactivity had made him reckless. Adam rushed to the controls and turned off the gas before a potent amount had issued forth, but nevertheless, enough had flooded from the cell and into the observation room that they were forced to cover their mouths and noses with cloth and began feeling slightly groggy.
"We have to move," Adam shouted over the alarms and coughing, holding the collar of his shirt over his nose and mouth. He picked up a stun stick from one of the Links Brennan had taken out and led the way to the only door leading from the room.
Outside, the five members of Mutant X found themselves at a three-way intersection of wide corridors. A large group of Links, perhaps numbering twenty, was approaching from the widest corridor, wide enough for ten people to stand abreast, which was directly ahead of them. The hallways to the right and left were about two-thirds the size with another ten links in each.
"Surrender," called out an incredible bear of a man whose eyes glowed yellow as he spoke. Jesse and Emma recognized him from the ambush a few weeks earlier. The Links held their positions about ten yards from the escaped prisoners, waiting for an answer to their call for capitulation.
Adam looked to his left. Shalimar's eyes answered with their own glow and she let out a low growl, while Brennan passed one hand over the other, igniting fierce electric fires in both hands. Adam looked to his right. Jesse's skin turned into an impervious red-orange shell and a bright ball of pulsating white light emanated from Emma's forehead, hovering just above her eyes.
With a wry grin for the Strand Feral, Adam said simply: "No."
