At that moment, Gemini's voice suddenly came through the communicators in their ears, "It's Gemini. We've searched almost the entire place. No sign of anyone. But there's fire damage in one of the bedroom wings! I think my dad must have done it! I don't know why, he must have come under attack! Do you guys know what happened yet?"

"Chronos here," came another voice. "I've looked at the security recordings. I think I know what happened. You guys should come and take a look."

"On our way," said Helios.

A few minutes later and the five of them were down in the underground base, in the security room, as Chronos played back the recording he had watched earlier. They saw Melody running for her life up the stairs as spikes were fired at her, one impaling her hand, but she was able to pull herself free.

"So it was Melody who was attacked!" Gemini said in wide-eyed horror.

"That confirms what we found," said Cassandra. "The blood we found on the spike was human, and we compared it with Athena's – definite relation."

"Athena's? Why didn't you just compare it with mine?" asked Gemini.

Helios said smoothly, "Mother-daughter comparisons are far more reliable than sibling ones."

Any response Gemini might have made was quickly forgotten from her mind as she continued to watch the recording of her sister's flight. They saw Melody reach the top of the stairs, followed closely by four attackers, they saw her grab little Athena, and then they saw her approach Pyro. The recording cut out at the very second Pyro's fireball engulfed the two fleeing figures.

"Whoa!" Atlas gasped. "Rewind that! What on earth happened?"

"He killed them," said Chronos. "Just like that. In cold blood."

"He wouldn't do that!" Gemini snapped. "Play it again!"

"Look, I've already watched it five times to make sure. That's what happened."

She exploded, "My dad did not just kill them! There must be some other explanation!"

Chronos lost his patience, and for once didn't care what Gemini thought, "Come on, it's not that hard to figure out! We all know he hates humans! We all know you guys would restart the Brotherhood at a moment's notice!"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Gemini shouted. "Don't you dare say anything about my dad! Who do you think you are?"

"Who do I think I am?" he yelled back. "Well, I think I'm the only one in this room, apart from Helios, who's never been part of a mutant terrorist organisation dedicated to destroying every human life on the planet!"

"You don't know what you're talking about," she spat. "You have no idea what any of us were going through! Don't ever pretend like you understand!"

"Guys!" Cassandra interrupted. "This doesn't help!"

Chronos turned his angry gaze on her, "Oh, I'm so sorry, I forgot you had better things to be doing, like getting back to your old ways of killing humans!"

"Shut up, all of you!" Helios roared.

Gemini snapped at him, "Hey, who said you could give orders?"

Helios tried to keep his cool, "I'm the most senior X-Man here."

"Technically, you're the only X-Man here," she retorted.

"And me!" said Cassandra indignantly. "Listen, can we stop arguing?"

"No, we can't!" Gemini cried heatedly. "Not while people are accusing my dad of murdering my sister and my niece!"

"Oh, come on, there's no other explanation!" Chronos shouted impatiently. "Look, I know you guys think Pyro is some sort of infallible Messiah figure – but just open your eyes for once!"

"Shut up!" Gemini shrieked. "Don't you ever, ever, talk about my dad that way!"

The two of them glared at each other furiously, until Atlas suddenly interrupted, "Who were those other guys?"

"What other guys?" Gemini snapped.

"The four guys going after your sister. I recognise at least two of them. Chronos, can you play it again?"

Chronos typed a few keys, and the recording started once more. The five of them watched, the tension between them still hot and simmering, but nevertheless temporarily prevented from reaching boiling point.

"Freeze it," said Atlas, as the four attackers appeared on screen. "Look. That's Scarab."

"Who's Scarab?" said Chronos.

"He used to be in the Brotherhood, when we were. And so did that guy beside him."

"That's Mole," said Cassandra. "Scarab and Mole. I remember them. They left immediately after we destroyed the Horsemen and started living here."

"Yeah, they were creeps," said Gemini.

"They were all right," Atlas said.

"Easy for you to say – you didn't have them watching you and lusting after you twenty four hours a day."

Helios threw up his hands, "But what were they doing here? Why are they attacking us? And who are those other two?"

"Well, that's Mr Spikes," said Chronos, pointing to the tall figure on screen with the strange weapon on his arm. "We fought him just earlier. We know what he can do."

"Why are Scarab and Mole working with these people?" said Cassandra. "They never liked the X-Men, but why are they coming after us now? What do they want?"

"They're some mutant supremacist group," said Gemini. "That's the way they were talking earlier."

"Who's the fourth?" said Atlas, pointing at the screen, where a young man with dark glasses was standing alongside Scarab, Mole and 'Mr Spikes'.

"Dunno. Never seen him before."

Helios frowned, "Hold on – I recognise him. I saw him today!"

"Did you?" Cassandra asked. "When? I don't remember him."

"He was the one chucking grenades at us. He disappeared into the crowd before we could follow him. He must have run with the others."

"So," said Chronos, folding his arms and looking at Gemini. "A mutant supremacist group, determined to destroy peace between mutants and humans, and now attacking the X-Men. And who's right in middle of it? Pyro."

"No!" she said angrily, shaking her head. "He has nothing to do with this! OK, he doesn't like humans much, and yes, he fought the X-Men in the past, but that's the point: in the past. He doesn't want to fight any more. He – he just wants to be left alone, and to help me rebuild my life."

"All right, then explain to me what's going on in that video. What's he doing? Why is he throwing fire at a defenceless woman and child?"

"He was saving our lives," came a voice from the doorway.

They all whirled round in surprise.

"Melody!" Gemini shrieked.

She ran to the door and flung her arms round the woman, "Oh, I'm so glad you're all right! What happened? Where were you?"

Behind her stood Logan and Pyro. Relief spread visibly across Helios' face when he saw them, "Blimey, Logan, am I glad to see you..."

"Dad!" an overjoyed Gemini cried, releasing Melody and flinging herself towards Pyro, squeezing him as hard as she could.

Relief was on Pyro's face too as he cuddled his adopted daughter, his fears that harm had come to her at the conference centre proving to be unfounded.

"Helios. Sit-rep. Now," Logan growled.

"We were attacked," said Helios. "Some group of mutant supremacists targeted the conference, and here too. We fought them at the conference but they got away."

"Where are Rogue and the others?"

"We don't know. There was no sign of them."

"Where are the children? And Vertigo?"

"He got them away to safety – we think. We've heard nothing from him."

Logan bit back a curse. Things were far worse than he had expected.

"Do we know who we're dealing with?" he asked.

"Some of them. We were just looking at this recording. We've identified Scarab and Mole, who used to be in the Brotherhood."

"Oh, I remember them," Logan said grimly. "I never forget a scumbag."

"Then there are others whose names we don't know," said Helios. "This tall guy who fires spikes. This guy in the dark glasses who was throwing grenades – we don't know what his powers are."

"And two others we fought at the conference," said Atlas. "A whirling guy with swords, and a female assassin – the one you fought at the hotel."

"The one who just didn't know how to die," Logan snarled. "Is that all?"

"All that we know of. But that's all we have to go on. We have no names and very little idea of what their powers could be."

A voice said, "Oh, I can help you there. I know all of them."

Everyone turned to look at Pyro.

"Oh yeah?" Logan said, his suspicions rising once more despite what had happened earlier. "And just how do you know these people?"

"Well, Scarab and Mole used to work for me. We all know them. And these others are all people I recognise. I tried to recruit them as young mutants to join the Brotherhood."

"The Brotherhood?" Melody gasped. "The mutant terrorist organisation? The one that started the Plague? You were in the Brotherhood?"

He looked at her, and with a sinking heart suddenly realised Melody had no idea that Pyro and Gemini were two of the people most directly responsible for her husband's death.

"Long story," he said quickly. "Which we don't have time for right now. I'll explain another time. But anyway – yeah, these are all people I tried to recruit years ago."

"They turned you down?" Logan smirked.

"Or I reconsidered. Anyway, I can tell you about each of them."

"Go ahead."

Pyro pointed at the screen, "OK. Spike guy here – his name's Sagittarius. His arm has mutated into some sort of weapon. He can fire two-foot-long metal spikes at a distance of up to a hundred feet."

"I think we're all familiar with what he can do, thank you very much."

"Next – dark glasses guy. He calls himself Sonar Pulse. The dark glasses are because he doesn't have any eyes."

"Huh?" someone said.

"He doesn't need them. His sense of hearing is so powerful he can use echo-location to get a perfect image of his surroundings for a mile radius. Makes him the perfect ballistics expert."

"Hence the grenades," Helios muttered.

"Your sword guy sounds like a guy I tried to recruit shortly after Magneto died. His real name was something in Arabic I can't remember, but he preferred to be known as Dervish. His swords are reinforced with adamantium – I've no idea where he got hold of them, but he's probably the most dangerous sword fighter in the world. He can spin fast enough to cut through six feet of solid steel in seconds."

"How the hell do you know all this?" asked an astonished Chronos.

Pyro looked at him and raised his eyebrows, "I did my homework on the people I tried to recruit. Anyway, that's all of them. Now you know as much as I know."

"Wait a minute, you missed one out," said Logan. "The assassin girl, in the black cat-suit, the one who was immune to my claws and apparently also to falling out of a building."

Pyro shrugged, "Can't help you there. Never met her or seen her before in my life."