Blix: Apocalypse indeed! It wasn't just the sentinels they were hiding out there. Of course, my story is likely to take it on a different course in comparison to how the comics wrote him – but bear with me. This is after all the movie section.

Natural: Saving Gambit for a little moment later. You are scarily thinking as I am though. So shush. It makes more sense for Scott to rush in though, recklessly like that. It's not normally his style, but he's now constantly scared of leaving his team to dead. He's done it before, and hated himself for it.

Racetrack's Goil: Thank you! Another action chapter coming, as well as a bit of a sob-fest. Bring some tissues.

Chapter 52

With the sounds of the horrendous fighting in the distance, Scott could direct his way to Logan. He quickly ran up the metal staircase, his feet clanging rhythmically as he ascended. He wrenched back the door that led him from the hangar to the lab, and began running down the second staircase that led him across the dark cold floor. Looking rather worried for a moment, Scott allowed his eyes to travel around the long laboratory he had just entered. A few feet to his right was one of the tables – uncovered since Logan's hasty retreat. Scott didn't need to go any closer to realise what it was. That, and Magneto's information spinning around his head, it was all too easy to put two together. A ghastly representation of what this place was. As his eyes met the horrible disfigurement of a woman, who's bloody mechanic eyes stared at the ceiling, he let out a shaky cry of surprise, shooting back with a lurch of sickness in his gut. He hit a tall metal set of shelves behind him, which rattled displeasingly to the collision.

Scott quickly moved away, as if scared the noise may have alerted Sentinels. He pulled his eyes from the rows of tables that stretched across the lab, trying to contend with keeping the contents of his stomach where they should be. Just then, behind him he could hear the clang of footsteps running up the stairs on the other side of the door he had just come through. With his initial thoughts landing upon Sentinels, Scott quickly burst into a run, sprinting to a lone door along the side of the lab. Only hoping he had a good enough head start, Scott pulled the door shut behind him before he made his way quickly down the corridor that lay ahead.

Upon running in this direction, he realised he was actually getting closer to the sounds of the fight. Hearing Logan's occasional pained growls and angered snarls only made Scott's worries increase, and his run speeded. As he turned one of many corners, a scene of horrendous destruction stopped him. The effects of a bomb were all too apparent - the evidence was quite literally splattered over the blackened walls as though some child had tumbled scarlet paint clumsily. The force of the explosion had blown out some portions of the corridor leaving crumbling holes and some weak looking foundations. In the centre of this corridor was a circle of Sentinel – in quick count, about ten. Scott assumed they had not been present when the blast went off because their clothes were unmarked (he knew their skin would have healed.)

However, Scott's arrival had triggered their attention, and eerily, every Sentinel raised their heads as one and turned their hidden eyes at him. The pause caused the lone figure in the middle to stumble to his feet, giving a gasp of thorough exhaustion. Scott noticed the mane of unruly hair through the shoulders of two Sentinels. Logan was not only severely burnt and blackened, but he was cut and bruised, with one blood soaked eye squinting weakly. The Sentinels had rounded upon him like bullies in a playground.

"Scott!" he cried, coughing quietly as he spat up blood. He wiped the blood from his eyes, blinking slowly as he staggered back slightly, "What are you doing here!" He swayed on the spot for a moment, blood coated body glistening, "Get the hell outta here! You'll be killed!"

"So will you!"

"I'm alright," said Logan in a slurred voice before he stepped to the side again with his poor balance, "Just peachy."

The Sentinels had moved out of their silent stance, beginning a stiff robotic walk towards Scott who had suddenly took a few quick steps back, "Logan.. duck!" Seeing his team member's head disappeared southwards, Scott's hand flew to his visor and opened the front. A beam of red laser shot forth, his head moving left to right to eliminate the row of Sentinels heading for him. The blast – put purposely high – knocked them several feet down the corridor and left them immobilised for the time being. "Come on! We're leaving together! He ran towards his grounded team mate, his hands grabbing the destroyed uniform and hoisting Logan to his feet – which was a achievement considering the man's weight.

But Logan shook his head pitifully, "No, you don't understand Scott. I've got to get these files for Magneto, some secret documents that hold some information about Government activities. He wants them, and it's in exchange for Madeline – if I don't get them, he'll kill her."

"Magneto is here now. He's with the X-Men and – "

"Is Madeline there!"

"Yes – and you don't really think we're going to let him hurt her do you? Storm will have blasted him to high heaven before he lays a finger upon a child."

Before Logan could reply to this, he froze, eyes staring worriedly before he looked slowly behind him and over his shoulder to stare at the end of the corridor. "Are they stirring?" asked Scott, obviously meaning the Sentinels he had attacked.

But Logan shook his head, "No.. No, it's not them. They are coming up the stairs from underground. Sentinels.. and soldiers." He turned and looked slowly to Scott, "There are all around us.. I don't think I can handle any more blood loss.. my healing is already slowing down. They'll kill us."

"Then we won't fight. We'll get back outside to the others!"

"Jesus, we can't go out the way we came! They are coming from all directions!"

"Up then!" snapped Scott, finding the argument developing seriously pathetic at a time like this.

Logan stared, "The roof? And be trapped?"

"Any more ideas?"

Behind Scott, the door he had earlier entered through burst open. "No time now," growled Logan, grabbing Scott by the upper arm and pulling him along as the pair sprinted down another corridor to head for a staircase leading upwards. The staircase led them to a door, which was swiftly burst through by Logan's shoulder ramming it. The pair staggered out onto the flat roof to be greeted by the torrential downpour of rain from the dark heavens. The rain fell vertically, sharp and fast, leaving the air muggy and damp. But the roof was not empty. Snipers were positioned on one edge of the roof, shooting down in the dispersing battle scene below. Some lay dead with obvious marks of mutant work. At the mutant's arrival, the snipers turned, fixing their guns on the pair.

"Just one more fight Logan," said Scott softly, "You can do this."

"Who'd ever thought I'd get sick of fighting?" quipped Logan as he straightened, wiping the blood that stained his face, "Ain't too many, this should be alright.. if no Sentinels come."

"Yeah.." agreed Scott quietly before he raised his hand to his visor, "Let's go," with a simple twist of a finger the familiar red beam burst forth from the visor and already several of the humans toppled backwards with cries. Some were thrown right off the flat roof and down into the battle scene below. Logan had run on ahead with his claws being released, to slice and stab down the men who got distracted by the red laser. Typically, bullets fired, jarring the air with their sudden sputtering shoots that echoed in the air. With Logan hardly noticed, most of the bullets were not aimed at him. They were directed to Scott. Logan had driven down several more shooters with his claws that left only a small group of three shooting their rounds desperately at the mutant who fired back with laser.

One woman collapsed back with an ear-splitting shriek when laser erupted into her chest, before she lay still. Just as Logan raised to the last two snipers and sunk his long claws deep into their chests, he heard their cries mingle with another's, and abruptly spun his head to see Scott collapsing backwards on the edge of the roof. The humans impaled on Logan's claws were thrown off and Logan staggered to his feet, holding his side where bullets had penetrated.

The rain still tumbled down with hisses of delight from the dark skies. The blood that stained the roof rain in murky puddles with spirals of crimson stains spinning dreamily along the slight current. Scott had fallen. His head and left arm were hung back off the roof, the direct drop right below his head. He was lucky to have not being thrown clear off the roof by the force of the bullets. Logan slowly made his way over to Scott, continuing to grunt with every odd step as he limped. He roughly dropped besides Scott, who lay with a relaxed face as the rain pattering across his face, wiping the blood stains clean off his face. Logan looked down to the bullets that had riddled the mutant's chest. Feeling a sudden clench of terror and anger inside his gut Logan looked down and regretfully bowed his head. A hand rests almost comfortingly on Scott's shoulder.

But just then, Logan's eyes rose to watch the scene below, the battle since finished. He could see the X-Men gathering together again besides Magneto. Siren was running out of the building, apparently having ran inside then back out upon reflection or upon meeting Sentinels. She staggered round to stare up at the roof through the rain, as if she already knew of the attacks there. Her eyes met with Logan's before she saw the limp body of Scott hung partially off the flat edge of the roof.

Her scream made Logan's blood run cold.

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