In a world that hates and fears them, the X-men are preparing for a mission that has got even higher stakes than their first. After having saved the life of Senator Edward Kelly almost a month prior, the prodigies of Tony Stark and Charles Xavier became known to the media as the X-men.

Recently, they have learned from Warren Worthington III's father that Cameron Hodge and Obadiah Stane are planning to illegally experiment Warren Jr.'s Legacy Cure out on young mutants being held prisoner on the island of Genosha.

As if things are not treacherous enough for the X-men, Obadiah Stane is keeping the Sentinel robots on the island to keep the mutant prisoners in line. Additionally, Cameron has taken Candy Southern, Warren's girlfriend, as a hostage, torturing her as he made a phone call to his former friend to harass and taunt Warren and the X-men into coming to Genosha.

Issue 17: Genosha Part 2

Genosha – Cameron's Lab

Candy sat there, restrained in the chair as she let out a series of restricted yells of pain. She felt her head jerking to the side as Cameron bitch-slapped her over and over. She still had a gag in her mouth as Cameron continued to torture her for the past twenty-five minutes. So far, Cameron had tormented her with what appeared to be electrical shocks from the chair, had slapped her and punched her, and had burned her with cigarettes all down one arm. Tears soaked Candy's cheeks as her whole entire body trembled in fear.

Cameron pressed down on the remote again, sending more waves of shocks through her body. She screamed again. Her throat hurt from screaming so much.

"I always knew you were a traitor to humanity, Candy," Cameron said, spitting in her face. He grabbed an empty bottle and smashed it over her head, causing the glass to break over her. Candy could feel her scalp bleeding profusely.

"Candy, Candy, Candy, I was truly hoping you were going to get it," whispered Cameron. "But clearly, you haven't!"

Suddenly, that was when Candy could hear the familiar sound of the Blackbird overhead.

"Oh, I'm assuming our guests are arriving. What a perfectly good opportunity to test out the Sentinels?" Cameron asked. "This is gonna be fun, and you're going to get a front row seat!"

Candy shook her head, tears flooding her eyes as Cameron grinned callously, grabbing her face with his hand, his fingers hard on her cheeks and bruising her. She attempted to speak so she could curse him out, but it was useless. She was forced to sit there and watch as Cameron nodded for Obadiah to unleash the fifteen Sentinels that were on the island to attack the Blackbird.

The Skies over Genosha – The Blackbird

In the Blackbird, Angel felt tense as he pulled his mask over his face. He felt so worried for Candy that his heart was beating five-hundred. He stared out the window of the jet, hoping and praying to whatever higher power there was that they were not too late.

"Warren, relax. You're not going to do Candy any good if you're this tense," said Iceman.

"Iceman, in case you hadn't noticed, we're about to enter an island where we are unwelcome and my girlfriend has been kidnapped by my former friend!" Angel yelled.

"Angel, don't worry. We're over Genosha right now. We're going to free the prisoners and get Candy out of there," Cyclops said.

"Cyclops," Warren started to say.

"Scott's right, Warren; we're here now, I'm taking the jet down," said Beast as he prepared to land down on the shores of Genosha. However, that was the moment they felt something rock the jet, and the X-men looked out the window to see the Sentinels were firing. The Sentinels looked exactly how they looked on the news: giant, towering purple robots with more weapons in their arsenal than the X-men.

"Jeannie, now I think would be a really great time to do something!" shouted Angel.

"Lower the ramp!" shouted Marvel Girl. "I need a clear view! Iceman, Cyclops!"

"On it, Marvel Girl!" Cyclops said. He lowered the ramp to the jet down. "Angel, fly out there and try to divert the Sentinels! We'll need a clear shot!"

"Okay, I've got this!" Angel said. He proceeded to run out of the jet and he flew out into the open, catching the attention of the Sentinels. Marvel Girl, Iceman and Cyclops went to take their positions.

"Alright, Logan . . . let's hope your Danger Room sessions with us paid off," whispered Marvel Girl as she readied her psychic powers for what she was about to do.

"We've got this, Jean," Iceman said.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Bobby," Marvel Girl said as she watched Iceman take on his organic ice form.

That was the moment the Sentinels came into their view, courtesy of Angel who was flying at high speeds to get the Sentinels into their line of vision.

"CYCLOPS, NOW!" Angel shouted.

"I've got this!" Cyclops adjusted the settings on his visor and fired a single optic blast beam at a Sentinel, managing to take its arm off. Iceman fired a blast of ice at another Sentinel while Marvel Girl telekinetically attacked another.

"Alright, X-men, see if you can take out the rest of these Sentinels until Wolverine and Ms. Marvel arrive! Alpha Flight is on their way!" Tony said into the comms system.

"Alright guys, let's do this again!" Angel called out to them.

"X-men, time to work for a living!" Cyclops said as he fired another optic blast beam at another Sentinel.

Iceman and Marvel Girl nodded as they proceeded to take out more Sentinels, their combined efforts proving to work against the Sentinels.

"Nice shooting, Iceman," Cyclops commented.

"Thanks, Slim," Iceman replied as he fired again.

"Alright, guys, I think that's all of them!" Angel announced after they took down at least fifteen Sentinels.

"Okay, good!" said Marvel Girl, letting out a heavy sigh as she rubbed her aching temples.

"Hank, take the jet down!" Cyclops ordered.

"Alright boss, we're going down," said Beast as he prepared to land the jet. The jet's ramp closed up, allowing Angel to fly down to the ground. The jet landed down on the sands and they all exited the plane.

"Alright, first thing that we have to do is split up and look for the prison," Cyclops said. "Iceman, Beast, you're with me. Angel, Marvel Girl, you both go and find Candy, now."

"Okay, let's do this," said Marvel Girl.

Beaches of Genosha – South Side

Cyclops, Beast and Iceman found themselves scouring the beaches of Genosha as they looked for the mutant prison. So far, for the first couple of miles and trudging along the sands, the island looked like any ordinary beach. However, Cyclops, Beast and Iceman knew that they shouldn't allow anything to deceive them. They knew that anything that looked normal about this place was just a cover-up for the real operation that was going on.

As Cyclops walked along the beach, his thoughts drifted to his little brother, Alex. He knew that Alex hadn't contacted him for the past day or so, which was odd, considering that his brother always called or emailed him first.

"A penny for your thoughts, Cyclops?" asked Beast.

"Yeah, yeah, Hank, it's just I'm worried about my brother. He hasn't called me the past day or so, and he usually calls first," Cyclops explained.

"I'm sure he's alright, Scott," said Iceman, keeping himself in his organic ice form as a precaution. The intense amount of moisture in the air thanks to the sea surrounding them was an advantage for the ice-controlling mutant.

"Yeah, you know, it's just I worry Bobby. He's your age, after all," said Cyclops as they continued to trudge along in the sand.

The three continued to walk along for about fifteen minutes, until finally; they saw something that looked suspicious to them. It appeared to be a makeshift prison of sorts on the island, guards with stun guns outside the building.

"I think we found the place," said Iceman.

"Yeah, no kidding, Bobby; but, we're going to have to find a way to get inside the building and past the guards, so unless you guys suddenly developed a mutant power of turning invisible . . ." Cyclops said with a heavy sigh.

"I think I can arrange something, my friend," Beast said with a smile. He proceeded to just simply walk up to the two guards. He was wearing a trench coat and hat to disguise him despite the fact that he was also wearing his mask and costume.

"What the hell is he doing?" asked Cyclops.

"I have got no clue, Cyke, but, hopefully, he knows what he's doing," said Iceman.

"Well, Beast is level-headed, thank God for that," said Cyclops as he observed what was going on. Beast simply walked up to the guards, who seemed to freeze up upon seeing him.

"Why, gentlemen, I mean no harm to you. We can talk this through civilly. After all, I am a pacifist by nature. So, we can do this the easy way, or the hard way," Beast said in a tone that sounded so simple. The way he was speaking was enough to make Cyclops want to laugh. It was more entertaining than an episode of The Office.

"I guess we should do it the hard way." Beast simply grabbed the stun guns from the two guards. "I do not know if you are both aware, but, these are rather dangerous weapons." He then proceeded to jump on the both of them, taking them out easily. Cyclops and Iceman walked over.

"What? I did give them a choice," Beast said around a toothy smile.

"Beast, I swear to God! That was probably the best part of this whole mission, you claiming things are going to be civilized!" Iceman leaned over, laughing his ass off. "When you're jumping on top of these guys, taking their weapons away, and you're saying we're going to be civilized!"

"Hank McCoy you son of a bitch," Cyclops said with a chuckle, unable to contain his laughter.

"Oh, you kiss your mother with that mouth, Slim?" asked Beast.

Cyclops shook his head, snickering. He couldn't help himself. Beast entertained the crap out of him and cracked him because while the blue mutant appeared to be feral, deep down, he was a huge teddy bear with quite a big heart. It was like dealing with the Cookie Monster.

"Alright, let's rock and roll," Iceman suggested. "Because if Angelica's in there, I want to get her out of there."

"Agreed," Beast said, and he proceeded to get the doors of the prison open. Upon entering, they saw dozens of mutant prisoners residing there, all ranging in age, however, it mostly consisted of children. It was definitely something that they all feared was a possibility. Obviously, all the mutant prisoners were wearing power-dampening handcuffs preventing them from using their powers. Cyclops shook his head. He could still hardly believe that Hodge and Stane had gotten away with kidnapping mutant children to experiment on them against their will. However, when he looked further into the prison, he saw one mutant prisoner who looked exactly like his brother.

"Alex!" Cyclops shouted, rushing to his brother's cell.

"Scott?" asked Alex. "What are you doing here?"

"Saving your ass," Cyclops said, noticing the lock pad on the cell door. It obviously had a code that needed to be broken. "Alex, do you know the access code?"

"Yeah, yeah, it sounds like one of a phone dial tone. Umm . . . 015-341-1716," Alex said, clearly remembering.

Cyclops punched in the code, and sure enough, the door to Alex and Lorna's cell opened, and the two mutants got out, more than happy to be freed from there. That was the moment Iceman noticed Angelica in her own cell.

"Angelica!" Iceman gasped out.

"Bobby!" Angelica cried her hands on the bars of her cell door.

"You alright?" Bobby asked.

"Yeah, yeah, Bobby I'm okay. They-They were about to test the cure on us in about an hour. Stane claimed they were making some last-minute preparations," said Angelica quickly.

"Alright, we're gonna get all of you the hell out of here," Iceman told her. "What's the code for your cell?"

"237-1362-1991," Clarice said.

Iceman punched the code in, and the cell doors rose open. He noticed the cuffs on Angelica's wrists. "Do you have a clue on how to get those off?" he asked her as he eyed the handcuffs.

"No, no not really," Angelica said softly. "But, I want out of these as soon as possible. I-I miss feeling my powers."

"I don't blame you there, girl," Iceman whispered to her as he watched the rest of the mutant prisoners get freed from their cells, including other mutants like Sammy Paré who had a very fish-like appearance and red scales on his body, as well as the ability to breathe under water.

"How exactly are we getting off the island?" asked Jubilation Lee.

"Alpha Flight is on their way; they're bringing private planes to transport you all out of here, immediately," said Beast.

"Alright, that's good," Cyclops said as he stood at his younger brother's side, keeping Alex within his sight. "Let's just hope and pray Angel and Marvel Girl are making progress with finding Candy."

"Alright, let's move out everyone!" Beast said as he led the way out of the prison. As they all followed Beast out and onto the beaches, Cyclops and Iceman couldn't help but wonder about their two other teammates who were out looking for Angel's girlfriend. Cyclops could only hope and pray that Candy was okay.

Up next: Genosha Part 3