2
"I think we'll take option 3. X-Men, let him have it!"
On Cyclops's order, an optic blast hit the Sentinel in the eyes, a shell of ice formed around the torso cannons, and a crossbeam from the collapsed ceiling attempted to impale itself in the knee joint of the robot. It reeled backwards a bit from the combined attack, but did not fall.
"HOSTILE MUTANTS ENCOUNTERED. LETHAL FORCE AUTHORIZED IN EVENT OF CAPTURE FAILURE. KNOWN MUTANTS 5 AND 8 DETECTED AND IDENTIFIED. RECOMMENDED COUNTERMEASURES INITIATED. UNKNOWN MUTANT POWER SIGNATURE DETECTED. DATABASE ENTRY 35 CREATED. CAPTURE MUTANT 35 FOR FURTHER EXAMINATION."
"Man that guy is loud!" Iceman said as he fully iced up and fired another blast at the Sentinel, attempting to freeze more of its cannons. He could see a light glowing under the ice. A quick burst of energy shot out of the primary laser, vaporizing the ice and taking out more chunks of the ceiling. Bobby created a shield of ice above him to protect himself and Rogue, who had dove over towards him as the Sentinel crashed through the window.
"Ah need some power, you're closest!"
"Just don't knock me out," he said, unfreezing his hand for her to touch. She quickly brushed her bare hand over his and pulled away. His knees went weak for a moment but he soon recovered. The debris stopped falling and they left the shell.
"Nightcrawler, 'port Shadowcat, we'll cover you!" called out Cyclops over the roar of a just fired rocket. Jean quickly grabbed it out the air with some TK and sent it back at the attacker. It exploded and again the Sentinel flinched back.
"On it!" Nightcrawler grabbed Shadowcat's hand, and in a puff of smoke they disappeared. In an instance they were outside, twenty feet above the Sentinel. He dropped Kitty and teleported back into the kitchen. She flipped her body and plunged straight downward arms outstretched like a diver aimed towards the head of the Sentinel.
The robot, having heard Kurt's reentry, looked up, moving its head out of Kitty's path. It ignored another volley of optic blasts and ice and reached up in an attempt to grab her, but she had already phased and passed through its hand and part of its arm. Her descent continued and she dove into the ground. The Sentinel attempted to reach her before she passed through the ground, but its hand would not reopen.
"ERROR: ELECTRICAL DISRUPTION. RIGHT ARM SYSTEMS: DISABLED. KNOWN MUTANTS 6 AND 7 DETECTED AND IDENTIFIED. RECOMMENDED COUNTERMEASURES INITIATED."
Shadowcat's head came up out of the ground a few feet from where she dove in. "Okay, let's try that again." She phased fully out of the ground and jumped at the Sentinel, planning to phase her way up through its body to its head. Instead, she bounced off of its leg and landed sprawled out on the ground winded.
"COUNTERMEASURES FOR MUTANT 7 SUCCESSFULLY FIELD TESTED. CAPTURE MODE INITIATED."
The Sentinel's left arm opened up to reveal several types of weapons and it pointed them at the downed X-Men. Iceman was the only one to notice, as the Sentinel had also fired a volley of energy beams which the other members were attempting to dodge or deflect. "Kitty hang on!" With one hand outstretched, he made an ice slide and shot off towards her. With his other he fired an ice beam at the green holding gel the Sentinel shot at her, deflecting it towards the machine's foot where it pinned the metal to the ground. As he reached Shadowcat he scooped her up with his arm and slid back towards the hole in the kitchen.
The cold of his body stirred her out of her daze with a groan. "Ugghh. Remind me not to do that again, once was embarrassing and painful enough. It somehow blocked my phase!"
"Don't worry 'Cat, I've got—"
His words were cut off as rocket exploded right at his heels, shattering the ice slide and sending the two of them flying into the gap in the wall. He reached out to grab hold of Kitty, hoping she could phase them to break their fall but she had been thrown out of reach. He saw what was left of the kitchen table pass below him before he felt Jean's power grab him and set him down safely. He saw Jean had done the same for Kitty. Turning to try and launch another attack at the Sentinel he saw Rogue making an ice wall to plug the hole. Outside he could see the Sentinel spraying some sort of gas on the gel entrapping its foot. Bobby joined Rogue in sealing the hole, and in no time they had a thick wall of ice that ran the length of the room. A rocket smashed against it, followed by a beam, but it was thick enough to hold.
Cyclops gathered the team. "Alright, we don't have much time. Jean, where is everyone else?"
"Storm and Logan are fighting a Sentinel that's captured the Professor; I can't sense him or anyone else so I'm guessing there are more than these two Sentinels."
Another volley of attacks hit the ice wall, shaking more debris from the ceiling. Jean protected them with a TK shield. Cyclops continued. "Okay, here's the plan, I'm going to blast us a hole out before the whole building comes down around us. We'll attack it in open ground and try to lure it to the training course. The weapons might not take it down by themselves but they might give us some openings. Nightcrawler, 'port Shadowcat over there and you two get things ready. Rogue, you're going to need to take some more powers. Iceman, you, Rogue and I are going to try and take that thing apart as we lead it to the training course. Jean, you give us some cover. Let's get moving people!"
Rogue brushed her hand against Jean's face, the equally quickly against Cyclops's. When the momentary weakness left him, he dialed his visor to full and blasted a hole into the wall adjacent to the iced one just as the Sentinel used it disabled hand as a battering ram through the ice. The X-Men ran outside, the Sentinel pulling itself out of what was left of the kitchen and facing the regrouped team. Nightcrawler and Shadowcat disappeared once again in a burst of smoke just as another glob of green gel landed where they had been standing.
"Lead it to the course!" shouted Cyclops, firing mostly minor blasts at the towering robot as he backed up towards the training course. He blasted a few more rockets out of the air as Jean continued to deflect them back at the Sentinel. Rogue and Bobby would freeze the balls of holding gel, the extra weight causing them to land short of the targets. The Sentinel itself continued to walk slow, ground shaking steps towards them.
Kurt and Kitty teleported back to Cyclops's side. "Ve are ready to rock und roll!"
"Kurt, you and Kitty get out of here," he said, turning to point back towards the course. "You can't do any more right now—" he was cut off as a ball of capture gel hit and surrounded him. He tried to blast it away but it was too late. It closed over his head and hardened.
Shadowcat tried to phase through to get him out but her hand just pressed against it. "Oh no, it's countering my phase too!"
Jean stepped between the path of the coming Sentinel and Cyclops. "You are not taking him from here!" She launched a full telekinetic attack, bombarding the Sentinel with shards of frozen gel, debris from the mansion, and pure mind power. Iceman joined in the attack, creating more blocks of ice for Jean to launch while Rogue attempted to use her optic blasts to free Scott. The maelstrom swirled around the machine, dents forming in its armor as more and more objects were flung at it by Jean.
"OVERWHELMING FORCES ENCOUNTERED, ACTIVATING PRIMARY WEAPON SYSTEMS."
The Sentinel's main beam weapon powered up, firing a concentrated energy blast at her. Just in time Jean focused her power in front of her, creating a shield to hold off the laser. Hands outstretched, the force pushing against her actually forced her backwards, her boots digging into the ground as she started to slide. Beads of sweat formed on Jean's brow as the Sentinel maintained the beam, but her shield held against it. Iceman attempted to freeze part of the robot to distract it, but the heat emanating for the weapon in its chest melted the ice before it ever reached metal.
"Jean watch out!" she heard Kitty cry out, but before she could react the Sentinel's beam shut off and a batch of green gel lobbed above Jean's head hit her and knocked her to the ground. Kitty, who had been attempting to reach Jean and phase her into the ground, was also hit by the gel. It quickly covered both girls and hardened.
"We're taking too many losses here, we need to put this thing down!" Iceman called out. "Rogue—"
"Ah'm on it," she said, picking enough out of his head with Jean's powers. "Let's see how this bucket of bolts lahkes a piece of me!"
As her formed ice armor around her body, Rogue rose off the ground with telekinesis, coming to eye level with the Sentinel. She threw out her hands, ice daggers forming and flying to strike the Sentinel in the shoulders and neck. Her eyes glowed red and an optic blast that would stumble the Juggernaut struck the head of the giant robot.
It reeled backwards, pieces of its armor peeling away under the stress, but planted its feet in a stance to withstand the attack.
"UNKNOWN MUTANT POWER SIGNATURE DETECTED. DATABASE ENTRY 36 CREATED. CAPTURE MUTANT 36 FOR FURTHER EXAMINATION."
"Hate ta burst your bubble sugah, but you ain't taking no one no where!"
She renewed her attack, forcing more power out of her eyes and hands, but this time the Sentinel slipped on the ground and fell over a large block of ice. It came down hard on a second piece of ice, a large spike jutting upwards. Part of the spike shattered under the weight, but the stronger base broke through the armor on the robot's back and punctured its inner systems. While Rogue had been attacking, Bobby had created the ice structures behind the Sentinel and frozen the ground under it. Rogue used her telekinesis to keep the disorientated robot down and began to freeze it to the ground from above while Iceman worked on it from below.
"ERROR: SYSTEMS FAILING. CENTRAL MEMORY CORE DAMASCRZZZZ!"
"Finally the damn thing shuts up!" shouted Iceman as he finished piling some more ice onto the Sentinel.
"I can't believe zhat worked!" Nightcrawler said as he teleported next to Bobby. "It vas like a cartoon, I could almost hear zhe banana peel sounds!"
Bobby laughed. "Saturday Morning Cartoons, now a required training session!"
"Enough jokes you two, we gotta fahnd out what happened to everyone else," Rogue said as she landed next to them. "Ah could see smoke from the other sahde of the mansion from up there, we should head—"
An energy beam shot out of the block of ice on the ground. "Oh man, guess it didn't work zhat much. Vhat do ve do now?"
"Keep hittin' it until it stay down!" she answered, and she and Iceman began to once again fire ice beams at the machine.
The Sentinel lifted its arms, sending the ice flying in every direction. Smaller weapon systems blasted more of the ice off of it, uncovering most of its body. The three mutants hit the ground, with Rogue only avoiding a larger shard of flying ice by wildly flinging it away with telekinesis.
"Ahm getting really sick of this gah," she said as she pulled herself off the ground. The Sentinel was also pushing itself up, and was almost off of the ice spike when the X-Men heard a ferocious roar from the rooftop.
Wolverine launched himself at the rising robot, claws outstretched. He imbedded them into the Sentinel's exposed chest, the weight of his adamantium bones forcing it back to the ground. Wolverine dug his claws deeper and swept them out to the side, ripping open most of the chest cavity and destroying most of the weapons there. The three mutants on the ground could see the front of his uniform had been destroyed, and the revealed flesh was burned but healing. He had various other burns on his body that looked mostly healed compared to his chest. Despite any pain he felt, his berserker nature had taken over.
"You messed with the wrong mutants bub!" Wolverine growled as he continued to claw apart the Sentinel's chest.
"ERROR: SYSTEMS FAI—"
Wolverine had pounced off the chest onto the head, again ripping the metal open with a sweeping motion. "Shut! Up!" he said, stabbing downward with each syllable. A few more swipes of his claws and the robot went limp below him.
After pausing to catch his breath and calm himself, Logan sheathed his claws and looked down at the three below. "Sentinels took the others up to some sort of carrier 'bot. We're going to need a way to get in there and GRAAARRRRRRRR!"
Logan suddenly arched forward as two cables shot from the sky into his back. Above them, two Sentinels hovered, and they could see the electrical current running from the Sentinels down into Wolverine. They both raised their other arms and launched a volley of capture gel at the X-Men.
"Look out!" Nightcrawler said, grabbing Bobby and teleporting out. Rogue attempted to blast those coming for her but there were too many. She eventually was covered and captured like the rest. Wolverine was captured without a fight, helpless after the shock.
Bobby and Kurt appeared in the woods some distance away from the battlefield. They ran to the tree line and looked out. The two Sentinels were loading the captured mutants into what looked like a Sentinel mixed with a C-130, while a third was removing what was left of the head of the Sentinel Wolverine had slashed apart. As the machines worked the boys could here a conversation between them.
"MUTANTS 6 AND 35 ESCAPED THE CONTAINMENT AREA," one said.
"MUTANT 2 AND THE MAJORITY OF THE TARGETS ARE CONTAINED, LOSSES DEEMED ACCEPTABLE. RETURN TO BASE ORDER RECEIVED," said another.
When everything was loaded, the Sentinels lifted in the air and formed a perimeter around the Carrier, which was slowly lifting off the ground.
"Oh man, vhat are ve going to do? Zhey captured everyone but us! Vell never find zhe Sentinel base! Maybe if ve found General Fury he could help. He vas probably here to warn zhe Professor about zhe Sentinels."
"We don't have time for that Kurt, we have to get into that transport and get them now or who knows what they're going to do to our friends. Who knows where Fury is now. I don't think S.H.I.E.L.D.'s number is listed."
"You're right. So vhat do ve do? How do ve get in there?"
"You've got to bamf us in there and we figure it out how to free everyone from there."
"Are you crazy! I have no idea vhat it's like in zhere. I could get us stuck in a vall or something if I don't know vhere to go. It's too risky, ve should find another vay."
By now the transport was a story off the ground. "No other way Kurt, those Sentinels would see me sliding up to the transport and toast us. But I'm not going to let them be taken like this! We're X-Men, we watch out for our own. We gotta move now."
"Okay, fine, but if ve die it's all your fault."
Kurt grabbed hold of Bobby's shoulder and began praying under his breath. Then with a flare of smoke the two were gone.