A/N: I'm back!!! Finally, after nearly two months, I have returned with a new chapter! I'm really very sorry for the wait. Like I've said, I just got so busy that I didn't have time to work on this for a while. And to be honest, I don't know when the next chapter will be up. It won't be near as long as it took for this one, but I'm pretty sure it's a safe bet that the "new chapter each week" thing is over. I just don't have that kind of time right now. My best suggestion is to put me on your author alert list so you'll get an email every time I update. But I know that right now you're all more interested in the story than my excuses, so I'll let you get to it. ON WITH THE STORY!

Scott couldn't keep his thoughts from stampeding through his mind as he moved across the rooftops of Memphis. It was just after 8:00 pm, a mere 12 hours since Nate had asked him to meet with Ed Baker, or as Scott remembered him, Detective Ed Baker, the man who put him in jail back during a different life.

Scott remembered Baker vividly. He had been an intimidating man, large and gruff, but he had also seemed like a good man. Scott had thought at the time that Baker was the sort of man who would always make sure he had the right guy for a crime before he sent him to trial. But that's not to say Scott hadn't been scared of Baker at the time. He had been terrified of him, actually. But he always felt he could trust Baker to do the right thing.

And yet, Scott was completely aware of what Baker had occupied his time with for the last eight and a half years. After Scott ran away from Blackwall Detention Center, he had kept a close watch on the Bayville police force to make sure they never got too close to finding him. Though none of the police ever actually saw Scott after he left the prison that night, he had certainly seen them, and he had watched Baker closest. Det. Baker had taken it as his personal goal to find Scott Summers and bring him to justice. He had interviewed every member of the X-Men gruelingly. In fact, Scott happened to know that there were many times the X-Men feared Baker would uncover their secret. He had always been only one or two clues away from knowing everything, but somehow Xavier prevented it. Baker talked to more than just Scott's former teammates though. He had talked to Scott's teachers, classmates, mentors, acquaintances, and even doctors. He dug through Scott's history and found people Scott had long forgotten. Eventually, Baker was fired from the force. His superiors claimed he had let the Summers case get too personal to the point that it had become an obsession. His wife agreed and left him not long after his removal from the BPD. But still, Baker had pursued Scott's history in hopes for clues of finding his present location. He actually traveled to Juneau, Alaska, Scott's childhood home, in hopes of finding some sort of clue.

Scott was never really all that worried about Baker. He knew that his history would never lead the man to his present identity. Scott had traveled the globe throughout all this time and was now in Memphis, a city that had no ties to his childhood at all. So when Baker had completely disappeared from Scott's radar about three years ago, he hadn't worried about it. He just assumed that the man had finally given up. And yet, now he was in Memphis, Scott's city, and it had Scott worried. Had he been found? Had Baker finally caught up with him? Maybe he had finally realized that Scott had been watching him and so he intentionally disappeared so that he could search without Scott following his tracks. Frankly, Scott had no idea how he had been followed to Memphis, but Baker had done it somehow! And, perhaps foolishly, Scott was now racing across the rooftops of Memphis towards the man who had hunted him for years.

Scott soon found himself standing on the roof of a small apartment complex right next door to Nate's clinic. Two stories below him was Ed Baker. Scott crouched down for a moment and took a deep breath. Was he actually planning on going through with this? Why go to Baker? It could only lead to trouble. Who in their right mind would walk into a trap so willingly? Scott glanced around at the area and wondered aloud what he was doing there. Finally he stood up and prepared himself to go inside. Of course he was going to go through with this. Baker was an old man by this point and Scott was an incredibly agile and athletic specimen. If it was a trap, Baker would never be able to catch Oculus.

But the sound of a police siren moving towards him made Scott crouch right back down again. He peeked over the edge of the roof and watched one squad car pull into the apartment complex's parking lot. The siren cut off and two policemen climbed out of the car. As they walked towards an apartment two doors down from the one Nate had mentioned, Scott listened to their conversation.

"So is this the third or fourth time this week that this old lady's called us out here?" asked the driver.

His partner sighed and tried to remember. "I think it's the third," he said slowly. "What do ya think it'll be this time? A rapist? Murderer? Serial killer?"

The driver chuckled. "Judging from the last few times, I'm guessin' none of the above. Just another hallucination."

"Well, I'm just glad we were already busy when that last call came in."

"Yeah, another Sonance slaying. Those crime scenes are just too hard to work. They're creepy."

"I know what ya mean. He's picking up, too. This is the third attempt in the last few weeks."

"Yeah, but this time the news is gonna go national I bet. I mean, up until now all the victims have been Memphis folks. But this guy was an actor who toured the country. He was in town with that Les Miserables group."

"Really?"

"Yeah, I recognized the name. He played…oh, which part did he play?"

Finally, they reached the door and knocked on it. The one man was still rubbing his chin to remember what part Sonance's victim had played.

"Marius! That was it!" he said finally just a split-second before the old woman in the apartment opened the door.

Oculus stopped listening once they began talking to the woman. He reached down to his belt, pulled out his grappling hook, and fired it at a nearby building. Baker would have to wait. The Sonance case had just broken wide open!

----------

By the time Oculus reached Robert Wicks' office, it was empty. He started to shatter the window and enter anyway, but decided against it. If Wicks wasn't here, then Oculus knew of one other place to try.

It only took about five minutes for Oculus to make it from Wicks' office to Sonance's warehouse by the river. On a normal night it might have taken just over ten minutes, but Oculus was especially angry tonight.

When he arrived at the warehouse, he didn't bother with sneaking in. He knew he was expected anyway. So instead Oculus simply dove through a window near the top of the building and landed on the rail that he had watched from the last time he was here. The window shattered loudly as Oculus fell through and rolled to a stop on his feet. He immediately jumped off the rail and landed perfectly on the ground below. It was only at this time that he was able to take a good look at what surrounded him.

On the floor of the warehouse were about 30 men, all holding some sort of weapon in their hands and glaring at Oculus. Only about 15 feet from where Oculus stood were Lout and Prism, Sonance's right-hand men.

"Welcome to the party," said Lout in his gravelly voice. "We were startin' to think ya weren't coming."

Oculus' eyes traveled around the room slowly, gauging the situation. "What kind of party doesn't have someone around to make sure everyone has fun?" retorted Oculus. Finally his eyes fell on Lout. "Now that I'm here, I think we're gonna have loads of fun."

Prism chuckled to himself. "Do you even know why you're here?" he asked.

"To stop you," Oculus said simply. "And to find Wicks, of course." Oculus tilted his head up as he began yelling at the darkness of the warehouse's corners. "Where are you Robert? I know you're here! Come on out!"

There was a pause and then all the thugs in the room began laughing a little. Finally, Oculus heard a voice that seemed to echo from all around him. It was a deep voice, unfamiliar and eerie. It literally seemed to come at him from every angle. It was as if the building itself were speaking.

"So you think you've finally figured it all out? You think you finally know everything there is to know, right? Well let me explain something to you."

The figure of a man began to emerge from the darkness just to Oculus' right. Oculus turned to face the advancing man with his fists clenched and ready. He could see the man's legs first, then his torso as the darkness slipped away little by little from his body. He was wearing a black suit with a white shirt underneath and no tie. Finally, the man's head emerged and Oculus found himself facing a smirking and obviously satisfied Robert Wicks.

"You don't even know where to start to explain all of this," said Sonance, finishing his little speech.

"I know enough," said Oculus.

"That," said Wicks slowly, "I highly doubt." Then he turned to face his men. Oculus could see Sonance's mouth moving, but couldn't hear a word of what he was saying. But the other men in the room obviously could. They seemed to hang on every word Wicks said, or didn't say, or whatever he was doing. Finally, Wicks turned back to Oculus with a smile. "I'd get ready for a fight if I were you."

Suddenly Oculus heard a primal scream from Lout and turned just in time to see all 30 of Sonance's men except Prism and Lout come running towards him with all sorts of weapons ranging from 2x4's to guns.

Oculus crouched low to the ground for a moment, then sprang into the air just as the first of the men reached him. He delivered two swift kicks to the heads of those first two thugs, then landed back on the ground just in time to perform a low sweeping kick that knocked 3 more thugs off their feet. Seconds later, Oculus was completely encircled by the crowd of men. He fought wildly, his anger at the whole situation growing by the second. He had trusted Wicks completely. He had sought the man's council and heeded his advice. Deep down he'd always known that so much trust could only lead to disaster, but he had been comforted by the knowledge that Wicks was a trustworthy man and an excellent citizen of Memphis. Now the knowledge that Wicks was in fact Sonance was driving Oculus into a frenzy as he kicked, punched, and just viciously attacked the crowd of men surrounding him.

Oculus threw punch after punch and kick after kick, each blow knocking men to the ground where they either crawled away only to get back up and try to work their way back to the middle or were crushed by the fury of motion around them. But as each thug fell, another stepped in to take his place. Oculus was soon ducking and dodging everywhere to avoid taking a hit from a wooden plank or a metal pipe.

He delivered a high kick to one man's chin and saw the man fly into the air and land about five feet away. When the man hit the floor, Oculus could actually hear bones crack from the impact with the concrete ground. But what he paid more attention to was that no one took the man's spot in the circle around him. He realized that he was actually holding his own against this onslaught and was now down to fighting just the few that remained. This knowledge gave Oculus all the motivation he needed as he grabbed another man's fist, blocking a punch, and then tossed the man into a group of three others. He turned around and found that there were only four men left. Oculus jumped into the air and kicked one in the head, sending him to the ground easily. Then he put his knee into another man's stomach and punched the side of the man's head, sending him reeling into a nearby wall.

Only two men were left now. There was a pause in the fight as all three combatants realized this. The two thugs smiled at one another and Oculus charged at them with a yell. As he rushed towards them, one of the men pulled a pistol from behind his back and fired it at Oculus. The bullet grazed his shoulder and Oculus dove at the man with the gun, spearing him to the ground. From his position on the floor, Oculus kicked the other man to the ground and lunged on top of him, delivering punch after punch to the man's face until he the thug passed out.

"Impressive," said Wicks as Oculus finally stood up. "I really wondered if you'd be able to handle all of them at once, but I figured it'd be fun to watch you try."

"Obviously you've underestimated me a lot lately," said Oculus angrily. "Did you really think I wouldn't hear about that actor being killed when you complained about him right in front of me?"

Wicks smiled. "Why do you think I even mentioned him in the first place?"

Oculus froze as more and more of the story began to click into place. His meetings with Wicks, the accusations of Driscoll, even this encounter in the warehouse had all been carefully constructed by Sonance himself. And to make matters worse, Oculus had thought he was catching up to Sonance the whole time!

"I believe you've met Lout and Prism," said Wicks with a smile. "I have to admit that I've been looking forward to seeing how you plan on defeating them. But tell me, have you figured out their powers yet?"

Oculus turned his attention to the two mutant henchmen. They were both grinning wide smiles as they prepared to fight. Oculus could tell they were strong and had a good hunch that Lout's power was simply superstrength. It would be a challenge, but Oculus wasn't worried about taking him down. Prism, on the other hand, was a mystery to Oculus. The man seemed to be made of glass, but Oculus was smart enough to know that there had to be more to his mutation than just physical appearances.

Wicks smirked. "I guess that's a 'no.' Well let me enlighten you. Lout, as you've probably guessed, has superhuman strength. I've actually seen him destroy a man with one well-placed punch. Prism's powers are a little more colorful though. He's nearly as strong as Lout here, but he also has an uncanny ability to transmit and refract light through his body. It's quite interesting, really. I think you'll like it when you see it."

"I don't care what he can do," said Oculus in a growl. In truth, he was glad to know exactly what he was in for, but intimidation was always key.

"I'm sure you don't," said Wicks with a smile as he motioned towards Oculus.

Lout and Prism started moving towards Scott with smiles on their faces. Oculus decided to wait and let them attack first. He needed to gauge how strong they actually were before charging at them.

Prism struck first with a downward punch from his right fist. Oculus put two hands up to block the punch. He grabbed Prism's hand and jumped simultaneously into the air using Prism's arm for leverage. Once high enough, Oculus kicked the man in the face, forcing Prism back a few feet.

As soon as Oculus landed back on the ground in a crouch, Lout swung at him with a punch of his own. Oculus was ready though and sprang out of the way just in time, causing Lout's massive fist to slam into the ground and crack the concrete floor. Oculus spun around quickly and delivered a punch to Lout's jaw that knocked the man off his feet about half a foot before he fell back to the ground.

Suddenly, Prism's fist slammed down directly onto Oculus' spine, causing his head to fly back as his body fell to the ground. When his head followed suit, Oculus' jaw smacked against the concrete floor loudly and his head actually bounced back up an inch or two. By the time his head hit the ground again, Oculus was completely unconscious.

----------

Oculus' eyes opened groggily as he slowly rolled his head up to look around. His neck was sore, his head was thumping in pain, and his back was killing him, but other than that he felt all right. He was still in the warehouse, but he was standing up now. Finally, he realized that he had been strapped to the wall. Prism was in a chair about five feet in front of him. The glass man sneered when Oculus looked at him.

"He's up, boss."

Sonance answered promptly and soon arrived back in the main section of the warehouse. "Welcome back," he said with a grin. "I hope you aren't too banged up."

"Never felt better," said Oculus as he tried his best to suppress his raging headache.

"Good to hear. I suppose you're wondering why I haven't finished you off yet." Sonance began slowly walking towards Scott. He seemed calm and confident. It was clear he was completely in control of the situation.

"Not really," said Oculus.

"Let me explain it to you." Wicks leaned in close to Oculus' face. "You may not know it, but you and I have some history to sort out."

"Such as?"

Wicks leaned back with a smile and took a couple steps away from his prisoner. "Y'know, I knew you'd be trouble from the first day you showed up around here. I was careful to follow all of your movements. I had some of my men track you around the city for months. You even had a confrontation with one of them one night. I'm sure you remember it. He stabbed you in the leg."

Wicks stopped, hoping for a response, but Oculus didn't offer one. He shrugged slightly and went on with his story.

"The truth is I knew quite a bit about you before you ever started digging up dirt on me. A couple of my men witnessed your conversation with Perry Huber in the prison. That was when I knew you were just beginning to get fairly close to me. So I decided the easiest way to keep tabs on you would be to talk to you one-on-one. Incidentally, kudos to you for being so skeptical about Driscoll as Sonance. I don't think you ever fully believed that was the case. You do have some skills. It's really too bad you can't stick around any longer."

"I may be around longer than you think."

Wicks laughed. "I doubt it. I know far too much about you. Even if you did pull out a miracle escape, I could find you anywhere. Most superheroes try to keep their identities a little more secret, Mr. Fletcher."

Scott froze. Sonance knew who he was! Scott quickly pieced the information together and realized that Sonance's men must have seen him return home through his apartment window at some point.

"Actually, I don't think it's appropriate to call you Mr. Fletcher," said Wicks. "After all, we're having such an honest conversation with one another tonight. Why not be completely honest? I think the name Scott Summers will work just fine."

If Scott had been shocked to hear the name Fletcher come from Wicks' lips, then the name Summers absolutely terrified him.

"How do you know that name?" asked Scott after a brief moment of amazement.

"Oh come on. The whole country knows that name, Scott."

"But the whole country doesn't know where Scott Summers is."

"No, but only because the public has an average I.Q. of 5. Truth be told, I've known who you are since the first time you came into my office and I got to see you face to face. You've changed some since your mug shots were taken, but you still look basically the same."

"So what is this about then? Some sort of revenge for being the first mutant to go public?"

"Tell me, Scott," said Wicks, ignoring the question. "What do you know of my family?"

Scott was taken aback at first, but soon answered with what he had been told by Nate and what he had found on his own. "They were a rich family in Mississippi who made their money off of war profiteering in World Wars I and II. You denounced your family as a teenager and made it through life on your own without any help from them. You even refused to accept the inheritance when your father died. At least, that's the story. I highly doubt a word of it is true."

"Actually," said Wicks, "a lot of that was quite accurate. My family did make their money off war profiteering. But I certainly didn't denounce my family or my inheritance. I was disowned and written out of the will when they discovered I was a mutant, not that they got away with it. I returned home years later and personally killed them all."

"So where do I come into this?" asked Scott to cut to the chase. He wasn't particularly interested in the grit of the Wicks family history.

"You," sneered Wicks, "made mutants public. Do you have any idea how hard it was to keep this secret after you came along? I don't know how many people I had to kill to keep the truth about me from becoming public. Thanks to you, mutants are persecuted on a daily basis around the world, and we hate you for it. The whole mutant community despises you. I dare say there's not a mutant in this country that hasn't had the desire to wring the breath from your throat."

Scott tried not to show any sort of outward response to Wicks' rant, but he knew every word of it was true.

"When I got into the crime business a little over a year ago," continued Wicks, "it was just for the thrill of it. I was bored with life in general and wanted to feel strong again. I remembered the night that I killed my family and decided that was where my new power would come from. But I had no idea that it'd eventually lead me to you. Now I'm gonna do what every mutant who's been pushed to the ground in the last nine years has wanted to do. I'm going to see you suffer and die tonight in this warehouse. And I can promise you that I'm going to enjoy it immensely."

Just then, Lout came back into the room and joined Prism about ten feet behind Wicks. Scott knew that if he was going to pull a miracle out of his hat, now was the time. Slowly and as inconspicuously as possible, he began stretching his right hand down his thigh. His fingers could just barely trace the belt on his right leg.

Wicks leaned in close to Scott's face. Scott stared right back into his eyes in an effort not to look guilty.

"Anything more you'd like to add before your torture starts?" asked Sonance.

"Bring it on," said Scott with an arrogant smirk.

Wicks frowned and turned away with a huff. As he walked away from Scott, the two large thugs began moving towards their prisoner with smiles on their faces.

Finally, Scott managed to slide a finger into the small pocket on his belt. He could almost reach it.

"One more thing," said Wicks with his back to Scott. "My power, if you're wondering, is the ability to control sound waves. You should know that I have every intention of making sure your screams echo through this room. But don't worry about anyone bothering us. No one outside of the warehouse will ever hear a thing."

"We'll see about that," said Scott. He finally pushed the button on the small device inside his leg belt. Immediately, his visor opened up and let a pure blast of raw red energy fire out of his eyes. Lout, who was standing just half a foot away from Scott, was hit at head level and thrown across the room like a rag doll. He was dead before he hit the ground 80 feet away.

Prism, however, posed an interesting problem to Scott's attack. When the beam hit him, he was knocked back by it but he was quickly able to refract the beam through his body and direct it across the room, thus saving both himself and Wicks.

Scott quickly realized he'd have to try something else. He moved his head so that the beam pointed at the ground, allowing the edge of the beam to cut away the bonds holding Scott to the wall. Once free, he hit the small button again and his visor returned to its place over his eyes.

"In all the talk about everyone's powers, I can't believe you forgot about mine, Wicks," said Scott once his feet were back on the ground again.

Wicks sneered as his hand gripped his right arm, which had been injured by the initial blast. He hadn't forgotten about Scott's powers, but simply hadn't been aware of Scott's remote trigger. Without a word, he pulled a gun from underneath his jacket and pointed it at Scott.

Scott dove to his left just in time to avoid the first shot. He rolled to his feet and immediately leapt again to avoid the second as well. When he returned to the ground, he fired a quick blast from his eyes that knocked the gun out of Wicks' hands.

With that danger taken care of, at least for the time being, Scott turned his attention back to Prism, who just happened to be running directly towards Scott at full speed. Scott fired a blast at him, but it passed straight through his body. As Prism grew closer, Scott clenched his fists and bent his knees to prepare to jump over the glass mutant.

Prism saw what was happening and raised his hands to get ready to catch Scott's body in the air. But when he got within two feet of his target, Scott suddenly ducked to the ground. Prism wasn't prepared for this and ended up stumbling over Scott's body and falling into the wall. Scott turned and shot a blast into the wall above Prism, causing the bricks to crumble and bury the thug in mortar.

Now Scott looked back to Wicks, who was reaching down to pick his gun up off the floor. Just as he grabbed and pointed the weapon again, Scott shot another blast at the gun and knocked it from Wicks' hands once more.

"No weapons, Wicks," he said angrily. "We're the only ones left here. Let's take care of this the old-fashioned way."

Wicks stood up and turned to face Scott. They were about twenty feet apart from one another. "Sorry," he said. "But the old-fashioned way included weapons."

As Scott reached for his temple, Wicks opened his mouth and began screaming. The noise was immediately so loud that it echoed through Scott's head so much that he couldn't focus on anything but the noise. The hand that had been moving for the visor switch on his temple instead found its way to Scott's ear in an effort to block out the noise. Slowly, he began to make out a voice just underneath the scream. It was Wicks' voice talking slowly and deliberately to him.

"This could have been easy on you, Summers. But because you made it difficult, I won't stop with you. I'm going after your doctor friend next. And then I'll hunt down the X-Men. I believe they're friends of yours. I'll find everyone you've ever known and kill them. But don't worry. I'll gladly send them your regards before they die."

Scott looked up. Wicks was right above him with the gun to his head. There was a huge grin plastered on the man's face. With the scream still bouncing across Scott's head, he reached up and pushed Wicks' arm away just as Wicks pulled the trigger, sending the bullet just over Scott's shoulder. He kept his grip on Wicks arm as he stood up, then with his free hand delivered a punch right into Wicks' stomach. As Wicks bent over from having the air knocked out of him, Scott brought his fist upwards into the man's face, knocking his head back again so he was looking up at Scott with a bloody nose. The scream finally stopped echoing through Scott's ears as he whirled around and threw Wicks across the room where he skidded to a stop on the concrete floor.

Wicks slowly sat up and glanced towards the pile of rubble that housed Prism. He knew that if Prism were alive, he'd be out of that rubble by now. He also knew that he couldn't defeat Scott on his own. And then there was one more piece of information he was aware of. The gun he had been using was dropped by one of his thugs when the group of them attacked Oculus. He had been keeping a careful count of how many bullets he had fired from the small gun.

"So this is it," he said almost to himself. He picked the gun up and placed it against his own head. He grinned a bloody smile at Scott. "Yet another death on your conscience."

Scott quickly pulled his hand to the switch on his temple to fire a quick shot that would knock the gun from Wicks' hands again. But this time Wicks was expecting it. He leaned to his right just in time for Scott's blast to slam into his face. Wicks' upper body instantly fell to the ground as the force of the blast knocked him a few feet across the floor. Horrified, Scott ran to the body as fast as he could. When he got there, he saw all he needed to see. The right half of Wicks' face was gone, replaced by a dark hole in his head. The other half was still easily recognizable as Robert Wicks, District Attorney for Shelby County. Scott picked up the gun from the floor and looked at it. A sinking feeling washed over him. He held the gun out from his body and pointed it across the room.

Click.

No bullets left. Scott dropped the gun and began moving for the front door of the warehouse. When he opened the door, he found the building surrounded by Memphis Police.

"Freeze!" shouted the voice of Commissioner Driscoll over a loudspeaker. "We've got you surrounded, Oculus. Put your hands above your head and come peacefully."

Scott raised his hands into the air as commanded, then fired his grappling hook from his right hand and let himself be pulled into the air and away from the scene of the crime. Wicks must have sent in an anonymous tip to the police while Scott was unconscious. Scott thought about the grisly scene that awaited the police once they entered the warehouse. For the first time, he realized that Oculus would never be accepted by the city of Memphis.

Scott stopped and sat down on the roof of the building he was now on. He spent a couple minutes trying to figure out how all this had happened. How could he have let things get so bad? He unbuckled the belt that traveled over his chest and held it in his hand. He turned it so that he could see the small Oculus emblem on the front of the belt and let out a long sigh. Oculus hadn't been near as successful as he'd hoped. Memphis hated him and now he had killed three men in one night. He dropped the belt to the floor and stood up to go. He still intended to talk to Ed Baker before the night was over. As he walked to the edge of the building and reached for his grappling hook, a realization hit him. In a roundabout way, Sonance had actually been successful. As of this night, Oculus was dead.