To Save a Rogue
By:
C.D. Lamarr
April 19, 2008
Chapter 5
Mystique backed away ducking and dodging closed ranged strikes! Wolverine stays right with her! She blocked and parried, overleaping ankle sweeps, then she flipped backward into a triple somersault in order to avoid what would have been a disabling kick!
Jean and Wanda continue to trade back and forth! The Mutant known as Zero-G had tried intervening by erasing the gravity out from underneath Wanda's feet causing them to fly right out from under her. But Wanda had soon put a stop to that—cutting him short with a force wave that sends him rolling backwards across the Square thus severing his link with earth's gravity!
And now there was only the two of them!
Mystique—fending off a shower of blows—caught all the action from the corner of one the large yellow eyes that saw everything and missed even less! Wanda pressed Jean backwards across the Square towards the Brooklyn Bridge and park beyond, and Jean seemed to be giving way; but Mystique saw enough to understand what Wanda never would: Strategy! Phoenix was Xavier's prize student and she was well trained!
Oh she seemed to be giving way before the impossibly powerful telekinetic bursts that Wanda was unleashing upon her, but Mystique—as she turns a backwards flip in the air to deliver a solid thump to the chest that sends Wolverine flying hard into a garbage bin—she catches just how thoroughly the girl was dominating the contest—drawing Wanda's attacks to her parries, and leading her on to a place of her own choosing—a place where she'd already decided that the contest would end—for one of them at least!
It was inevitable and Mystique knew it!
In the realms of Telekinesis few—including Jean—could match the raw power generated by Wanda—especially when her temper was roused. But there was a second aspect of Jean's mutant ability that decided the outcome even before it began:
Whereas Wanda was a head blind Telekine, Jean was not!
And as any Telepath would know: Simply switch of the mind—and you switch off the power!
Jean backs her way across and underneath the Bridge and into the surrounding Park—flowing on wings of Telekinesis—drawing Wanda's strikes to her parries and Wanda stalked forward hands whipping and striking—unleashing blossoms of Telekinetic power that shake the ground as they detonate!
But the instant she crossed into the Park Jean hit her with her Telepathy! Wanda staggers backwards as though physically struck! Her thoughts splinter off, her visual acuity shatters, and her control evaporates as Jean severs every link between will and execution!
Five seconds later Wanda lay stretched insensible on the ground!
"Fall back", Wolverine thundered as Mystique—now in the form of a Boa Constrictor—enwraps him in a deadly embrace! Pinioning arms and legs, the shape shifter made certain that those claws were well out of range! And as she squeezed breath from him causing him to cough and gasp, she mused gleefully: Now isn't this fun!
The X-Men obey, falling back from before the Brotherhood of Mutants as the contest began to spill over into the Park beyond the Bridge! And between the new Mutants Terra, Hot Streak, and Melodia (Mystique's latest acquisitions), along with Lance and the others, the X-Men seemed to have met their match!
Waves of seismic energy rolled across the Square buckling concrete, oversetting cars, trucks, big rigs, phone booths, telephone poles and power lines! Brooklyn Bridge and its suspension cables rattle in concert with Melodia's Acoustical Blasts that she unleashes upon the X-Men—causing eardrums to ring and setting nerves on fire! Lance and Terra advance their formidable powers sending cars tumbling into the park like torpedoes as the X-Men scatter from before them!
"You're simply allowing them to brawl in the streets like this!"
"Take a look for yourself Stabler! That convict is simply too powerful even for our military—let along the NYPD."
"But Captain Kraigan--
"The X-Men took him down before—I believe they can do it again!"
"I disagree Sir!"
"You may disagree", retorted the Captain tightly, "But you dare not disobey! We are going to stand down and let the X-Men handle the situation!"
"Sir I must protest--
"And you're more than welcome to make a formal complaint to that effect. For the present why waste fire power or risk lives unnecessarily—simply because you don't like Mutants I might add—when we can simply allow Xavier's Students handle them! I've known Charles for a long time! He's always used his power responsibly. Those are supposed to be his students. I believe they'll do the same! Now tell your men to stand down and fall back!"
Stabler activated his COM link and says sourly.
"Alright boys—we gotta to stand down!"
Inside the Cerebro Chamber as the View Screen flickered away to static again, Storm regarded her friend with a good deal of unease.
"How long can you hold him inside that illusion—and from this distance too?"
"As long as I have to."
"And the officers in Soho—you're still keeping them offline??"
Xavier nodded affirmative.
"Is that wise?"
"Any interference on their part would only complicate matters. They'd be doing more harm than good—and to themselves I might add!"
"And Mystique?"
"That's a different matter entirely", the Professor said with a sigh, "I could only introduce the thought into her mind. I could do no more than that. I had no way of foreseeing that she would start a brawl in the streets!"
"This is Mystique we're dealing with."
"True and her mental shields are the very devil to get past. You know as much as I hate playing the puppet master I certainly would have prevented her from causing all this if I could have!"
Flash! Flash! Flash!
"Arggggh!"
Lance Alvers' black eyes rolled up in his head like window shades!
His hands convulsed, his legs buckled beneath him and he dropped like a stone to the ground!
Rogue withdrew her hand from off him, placed her glove back on and turned away………………………
…………………..and walked right in Pietro's huge fists!
The impact was like a blast of dizzying white fire!
Quick Silver danced forward—danced to and fro—weaving right and left with bewildering speed! He was impossible to touch—and he knew it! He pressed Rogue backwards! Rogue backed away as fast as she dared—but not fast enough! Pietro comes on—fists of duristeel hammering left and right—they were everywhere!
In her encounters with the Brotherhood Rogue had faced Pietro several times and on at least two occasions she'd managed to latch on and to imprint his abilities. So that even after the effects of the Transference had worn off, aspects of the Pietro's personality remained with her and she knew enough of the nature of his power!
Enough to know that one of the weakness of super speed was its inflexibility, its lack of imagination, of the ability to improvise! He was fast and he knew it. He knew that few Mutants could catch him and was vain enough to believe that Rogue never would!
The problem wasn't that he lacked other abilities—exactly. But that he tended to rely to heavily on his super speed—his ability to sprint away from danger, completely disregarding the need to cultivate other talents so that in case his primary gift failed him—which it did—he could have other resources to fall back on!
The thing about Speedsters like Pietro, or the Flash, or the other Mutant known as Light Speed, is that whenever they gained momentum it was difficult to pivot or to turn or to veer suddenly—not impossible just difficult. Because one wrong move and an ankle or even worse a vertebrae could be snapped, or other serious injuries could result.
Rogue knew this. And she'd imprinted this particular power enough times to know all of its weaknesses and its limitations—a fact which Pietro seemed to have forgotten! He'd settled Cyclops—faster than he'd anticipated—and Spyke with even quicker dispatch—two down and one more to go—his victory made him just a little too sure of himself—in fact it had made him rather arrogant—and careless!
So that when Pietro assailed her—fists shooting out impossibly fast dealing out terrible punishment— Rogue's took his next strikes and turned them into a weapon and used it against him!
He lashed out with a sneer because with Mystique's prohibition on touching Rogue firmly in mind, Pietro had taken the precaution of donning on gloves which meant no physical contact—well at least where she was concerned any way! As long as he kept her at arms length she couldn't touch him and his gloves formed a protective barrier around his hand so that he could dish out as much punishment as he liked without receiving any in return!
Rogue takes the next blow and allows its momentum to roll her backwards through the air! Quick Silver—moving too fast to stop never saw it coming!
Earlier and unbeknownst to him, she had Imprinted Toad's power so that when he struck her and knocked her back she instantly pivoted in the air, latched onto a stop sign and swung back round to meet him. And in this instance his momentum proved to be a liability as Rogue comes right back at him—feet first!
Quick Silver's eyes went wide as his line of vision became suddenly filled with the sole of two steeled toed boots as Rogue lands him a solid thump to the chest!
The impact is like a blast of white fire!
A plate glass window explodes and collapses as he slams right into it! He hits the floor with a crash goes sliding hard across oversetting several shelves into the bargain!
Jean's Mental Energy Bolts stung more that Mystique had thought! She could only imagine what it must have been like for Wanda when she'd hit her with it!
They delivered a nasty jolt that sizzled all the way down through her toes like one of Storm's lightning bolts!
They were almost as potent as Xavier's!
In any event the shockwave had been just enough to convince her to release the hold she'd established over Wolverine and had spoilt all her fun into the bargain.
He'd just started turning blue when the though blast struck her and forced her to let go!
It'd also disrupted her concentration! She'd lost her shift and reverted involuntarily back to her baseline form and Wolverine had shrugged her off and she'd hit the ground hard!
That had been several moments ago!
And now the man even in the midst of one of those healings of his was still coming after her!
He pounces!
She rolls hard right and flows quickly to her feet as he comes down with a crash that sends up an explosion of debris high into the air!
She retaliates launching a vicious assault!