Chapter 20

Shalimar turned to Adam and said, "I remember you once told me Marlowe was more dangerous than Eckhart. Now, I believe you."

"What do you and your world offer us?" Marlowe looked to Adam with a smug expression on his face. "Nothing compared to what I offer to all New Mutants, even to your four little servants." He smiled at Emma, Shalimar, Jesse and Brennan. "Join me."

"You mean follow you. Now, let me tell you, all of you, what I offer—what my world offers." Adam's voice echoed through the hangar. "I offer freedom. I offer a world where you can live a normal life with a clear conscience." He addressed the Links as a whole. "Don't you see that if you are reliant on Charles Marlowe for your immortality, you are his slaves for eternity?" He tried to meet all of the eyes arrayed before him. "That's assuming his plan works. What if the virus does kill New Mutants? What if it only kills half of humanity and the rest come to tear you limb from limb? Many of you must have friends and family who would be killed. Could you really live with so much blood on your hands forever?"

The entire time Marlowe had been speaking and now as Adam gave his response, Emma monitored all of the minds of the Strand members. Most interesting were the thoughts of Julia Lechner. Perhaps, now that her mutation was stable, she was reconsidering her actions on Fasergen's behalf. Emma sensed a fury of conflicting thoughts in her skull. There was an old resentment toward Adam and a realization that he had saved her life. She felt a hatred of all those who had made her miserable, because she was different. She also blamed herself for those she had accidentally killed when her powers spun out of control. She never meant to kill, but she had aided and abetted a man who meant to slaughter billions. If she couldn't deal with her current guilt, how could she participate in Marlowe's plans? Julia seemed to be at a point where she might be turned without risking her mind. Emma just needed to push her in the right way. She studied Lechner carefully, trying to find a combination that would not only convert her, but could be applied to more of Marlowe's people as well.

"The blood of Normals is not as thick as our blood. We know it is beneath our consideration." Charles Marlowe approached Mutant X and gestured for his people to fall in behind him. "Adam, though I am grateful to you for assisting with Ms. Lechner, I cannot let you go. You will assist us with our research or be killed. Ms. DeLauro will return to interrogation and if we destroy her mind trying to break her, so be it. Ms. Fox, Mr. Kilmartin and Mr. Mulwray will have an opportunity to join us, or will remain locked up for the rest of their mortal lives."

"Enough," Emma said, a glow once again returning to her eyes. "You haven't attacked us, because you are still not sure if I have command of my expanded powers. Do not think that my failure to act thus far means that I do not have my abilities fully under control. If I so choose, I can kill every living think within a mile radius right now."

"I saw what happened to you the last time you went after a large force," Marlowe said. "I don't believe you can handle it again." Despite his words, what the Psionic had done with the bullets was impressive and she hadn't looked weak then at all.

"It is easier to kill than to disable. I consider all of the Links just as guilty as you, because they know what you plan and still stand with you." These words struck a chord with Lechner and Emma influenced everyone to compare themselves to the heartless Charles Marlowe, hoping to show them that they were not only witnesses to his evil, but part of it.

"You would murder your own kind to save genetic inferiors?" Marlowe charged.

"Yes," Emma answered and the rest of Mutant X echoed her response. She reached out to all of Marlowe's people. Using Julia Lechner's mind as a litmus test, she broadcast feelings intended to instill sympathy for the non-mutants who would die if a Fasergen virus targeting them were released. Julia was an important part of their group and what would turn her might turn the rest. As would be expected, the thought of those she knew best, especially family, dying touched her most. Emma made the entire Strand think about the non-mutants who mattered in their lives.

"Then maybe you aren't one of us after all. Once we have the information we need, all of your lives are forfeit." Marlowe declared. Things were coming to a head. Adam, Brennan, Jesse and Shalimar were waiting on what Emma might do. If she was working her way up to eliminating a large portion of Marlowe's force, they were ready to spring into action and take on the rest.

"Try to harm me or my friends and you all die." Emma felt power coursing through her veins. She longed for an excuse to use it. Lechner feared her and it did not hurt to amplify and transmit this fear into the minds of Marlowe's people.

"Let's get out of here, Emma," Adam said, seeing they had come to an impasse. If neither side was willing to act first, they might just be able to slip out without violence. "We have his plan. Remember what you promised me? You said you wouldn't do anything reckless."

"Reckless would be letting this monster go. He has to be stopped…now." Emma was slightly disheartened by how few of the Links were coming over to their side. She could not be sure any of them, even Lechner, would turn on Marlowe. At first she was distressed by her failure to accurately read how close they were to converting, but then she reached deep into their cerebrums and found an unnaturally strong hatred of Normals. Gabriel Ashlocke had imprinted this ingrained enmity on all of them before his death.

"But no matter what you do, Ms. DeLauro, you can never kill me," Marlowe said, raising his voice. He came toward her, followed by his people, but was stopped in his tracks telekinetically. The time for gentleness had passed. To overcome the deep rut of hatred Ashlocke had left in the minds of the Links, Emma would need to be more forceful. She would try not to damage them further, but she had to undo or at least offset Patient Zero's handiwork. The only alternative would be to kill every New Mutant there, aside from her teammates.

A white beam of light emanated from Emma's eyes and she met the gaze of a male Link opposite her. The light then left his eyes and linked him with Maria Raven who was standing near Emma. This continued around the room until every Strand mutant's eyes were connected by a Psionic ray of power to each other and ultimately to Emma, creating a web of bright light, filling the center of the hangar. She then expanded the web, reaching beyond the space they occupied to the Links Mutant X had fought after escaping from their cell as well as to the pilots of the stealth planes hovering above the complex and the perimeter guards who were patrolling in case any of the prisoners succeeded in making it outside. Keeping Marlowe restrained and immobile physically, Emma accessed the gateways to the souls of all his followers, while she held them mentally.

Every single Link had family or friends once who were Normals. Emma used memories of these non-mutant loved ones. She reached deep into their minds and communally they shared all of the happy moments, the intimate moments, the times of joy with these human beings. These people were not less important than New Mutants. They did not despise those who were different, but rather embraced them, because, after all, every human being was a distinct individual. It was just that some possessed abilities others did not have. Over and over again, Emma reinforced their shared positive experiences with non-mutants. She could feel a softening of the hatred as some slowly came to realize that those who had tormented them for their powers were a minority.

Though this tactic was effective on the Links who had been recruited since Ashlocke's passing, these were few. The majority had been programmed not to value the lives of non-mutants. Gabriel had managed to dehumanize Normals to the point where their value in the lives of the Strand was minimal. Emma saw that she would have to try another tactic to overcome this. As an empath, Emma knew that, while positive feelings were often fleeting and needed to be continuously reinforced, negative feelings left deep and long-lasting scars in the psyche. It was much easier for her to catalogue the pain she had felt in her life than the joy. This is why Ashlocke burned hatred of Normals into his Links, rather than love for New Mutants. Negative feelings were also more useful motivators. Hatred brought action to destroy what you hated, whereas joy brought only contentment with a situation.

The Strand's hatred of Normals was blind. Emma decided to change that. It is easy to hate what you do not know. The death of a thousand strangers is not as potent as the passing of a single loved one. Marlowe meant to kill six billion people. It was a number so large as to mean nothing. Emma reached out beyond the hangar, beyond the Fasergen complex and into the world. She contacted mind after mind in the city, the state, the country, and the continent.

Millions upon millions of distinct intellects were introduced to the minds of the Links. The great mass of humanity, seen each as individuals, overwhelmed them. It was an experience inexplicable in spoken language and was so effective that even Emma was overawed. They recognized every face, knew every fear hope and dream of every person on the Earth. Never had anyone ever been as at one with the world as the New Mutants linked to Emma were now. She could see in their minds Ashlocke's work disappearing. It was easy to hold onto an unreasoning hatred of the unknown, but to hold onto your hatred even when you knew it to be unreasonable and unjustified was something only the insane could maintain.

Of course, this euphoric experience of oneness with humanity might soon be forgotten. Emma wanted the Links to fully realize what they had nearly participated in. She wanted to burn it into their brains with a horror that would prevent their ever forgetting or considering something so monstrous again. She had shown them the vast diversity of mankind. Now they would know what it was like for six billion people to die. The bright light faded from Emma's eyes and was replaced by an abysmal darkness. The web of luminescence filling the hangar and extending out to the rest of Marlowe's people turned into a thick black mist. The souls that the Strand had gotten to know individually through the Psionic connection now began to be extinguished.

Emma drew upon the experiences of the world's population and projected the tragedy of every murder, every terminal disease, every sickness, every accident to the New Mutants she was linked with. They saw holocausts and genocides, wars and plagues rip through the lives they felt they knew so well. To have one person you know die was horrible, but death after death after death without the mercy of time to grieve was beyond the capacity of anyone to deal with. All around people began crying, collapsing to the floor, wailing in pain and grief. Outside, the pilots of the stealth planes were forced into emergency landings as black tentacles of Psionic energy brought them the ends of innumerable lives. Millions of deaths, coming fractions of a second apart, but experienced fully and completely through the connection with Emma, shredded the psyches of every Link. The scars this ordeal would leave guaranteed that not one of them would ever take the life of another human being lightly again.

Behind her, Emma sensed the pain of her friends. The dark Psionic forces she had unleashed had engulfed them as well. Adam and Jesse had both gone into shock. Shalimar and Brennan were on the ground holding one another and crying on each other's shoulders. Only the Psionic Mutant Xer and the leader of the Strand were still standing. From all around, the dark energy Emma had created swept in and concentrated on Charles Marlowe.