Chapter Eighty- Six:
At the growling threat, nearly every occupant of the X-jet looked away from the glowering Wanda Maximoff, whose expression suggested that she wasn't even remotely bluffing.
Only Rogue ignored her, but then again, only Rogue could fly.
"Somebody sure got the family temperament," she muttered loudly, and Kurt looked at her in awed horror, stunned that his sister would say such a thing, now of all times, when the very reason that people kept glancing at Wanda was because of the fact that they were on their way to face down her father.
"Look who be talkin', chere," Remy LeBeau, the mutant thief and Rogue's husband, called from where he was strapped in two rows back. "I'd hate t' see de duex o' y' femmes go at it. Den again..." A sly look crossed his handsome features and he grinned. "Mebbe dat's not such a bad idea. Dere could be some kind o' oils involved, hahn?"
Judging by the murderous glares he received from the two women, that seemed highly unlikely.
Despite himself, Kurt glared, too, less than pleased to hear Remy speaking of Rogue in such a manner, even if they were married. There was only so much smug insinuation a brother could take before he'd have to resort to drastic measures.
Like choking Remy with his tail.
Of course, that would only irritate Rogue, and even during the early stages of her pregnancy, his sister had already demonstrated that her hormones were already at work, making her even more temperamental than usual.
And the mood onboard the jet was already tense enough as it was.
Breakfast that morning, which had started out pleasant enough with small talk about Kitty's upcoming wedding, had been interrupted by the Professor's sudden arrival in the doorway, his face grim as he announced that Magneto was once again causing trouble, this time in Paris.
There had been groans all around, but none of them had realized that there was more.
The Avengers, it seemed, were currently busy with some kind of secret mission down in the Antarctic, and as such were unable to handle the crisis.
Hence the reason that the X-men were now on their way to France.
Or rather, a select group of X-men and their associates, hand-chosen by the Professor for this mission based on not only their powers and experience, but their dealings with Magneto in the past. Scott, Jean, Kitty, Evan and Bobby had all faced off against Magneto alongside Kurt many times in the past. Hank was along mainly as an advisor to Scott, who was undeniably the leader of their ragtag mission team, and Mystique had been able to talk her way onto the day's roster by pointing out that she used to work for Magneto, just like Remy and Lance.
Piotr had once worked for the man, as well, but his metal powers, like Logan's adamantium bones, were a hindrance when fighting the Master of Magnetism, so Xavier had refused to allow either of them to come, much to Logan's ire. He had been most reluctant to stay behind while his pregnant daughter went on this mission, even if she was more than capable of taking care of herself, especially with her mother, husband and brother all accompanying her.
Besides, Rogue was an invaluable asset in a skirmish with Magneto, because she knew the man inside and out, having absorbed him enough over the years. That was the same reason that both Wanda and Alex were along, one having insight that only a daughter could have into her father, and the other having temporarily been allied with Magneto for a short while many years ago, back before the Summers brothers had been reunited.
And as for the final members of their team... well, Lucas and Tessa had refused to stay behind if Remy and Rogue went, so they'd been granted seats aboard the X-jet, and both Lorna and Carol had been allowed to board, as well, since their powers might come in handy during the coming fight. You could never, as Logan was so fond of pointing out, have too much firepower, and Carol's strength was now back at its fullest, making her as formidable as Rogue in the skies.
Lorna's single job would be to use her own magnetic powers, significantly weaker than Magneto's, to try and deflect whatever he threw their way.
Once the team had been assembled, they'd scrambled to get into their uniforms and stow their gear into the cargo hold of the jet, and they'd powered up the engines while Xavier was still arguing with Logan out in the hangar over why he couldn't come along.
It had been almost comical, really, to see Logan brandishing his claws at the cockpit of the jet, while Mystique just smirked out at him, waggling her blue fingers mockingly as she prepared for takeoff.
The students had all lined the windows and doors, craning their necks to catch a glimpse of the jet as it rose up out of the hidden hangar beneath the tennis courts. It seemed that anytime they got to watch the X-men leave on 'X-business' as Bobby so jovially coined it, it became an event, because there were even students out by the pool cheering as the jet passed overhead.
Zey think it's all fun and games, being a superhero, Kurt thought wryly. Zey don't realize zat life isn't a comic book, ze good guys don't alvays vin.
And fighting the good fight most certainly wasn't always fun. More often than not, it was exhausting work with little recognition for their efforts, or for the fact that they were constantly risking their lives in the line of duty. Sometimes he had to wonder if what they were doing even made a difference anymore, because no matter how many times they saved the world, there was always another crisis on the horizon, and there were always people trying to destroy them.
Still, he couldn't deny that the adrenaline rush could be pretty sweet.
"How much longer till we're there?" Rogue called up to Hank in the cockpit. "Ah'm afraid if Ah don' get the chance t' unload mah aggression on somethin' soon, Ah might hafta take it out on mah husband."
"I might have to help," Wanda said, glowering in Remy's direction, who sent her his most charming smile, which only served to irritate her even further. "I'll hex him if you zap him," she offered to Rogue.
"Sounds like a plan t' me, sugah," Rogue agreed.
It was hard to tell if they were joking or not.
"As much as I understand the urge to do him bodily harm," Mystique called from the pilot's chair. "I have to ask that you girls don't kill him until we touch down. Can you wait about five minutes?"
"Ah s'pose," Rogue sighed dramatically, folding her arms over her chest.
"Aww, chere, y' wound Remy."
"Keep it up, swamp rat, an' Ah'll do more than wound ya," Rogue snapped.
Remy muttered something under his breath in French that Kurt didn't understand, but it drew a chuckle from Lucas, and Rogue shot them both a nasty look that would have made lesser men whimper and cower in fear.
"Watch it, Gumbo," Carol advised Remy with a smirk. "Or else she might kick you to the couch tonight."
"That's not a bad idea," Rogue replied.
"Whose side are y' on anyway, p'tite?" Remy grumbled, earning a raised eyebrow from Carol. "Never mind, don' answer dat."
Rogue's hormones are already getting the best of her, Kurt observed with a grimace, feeling sorry for Remy. He caught himself a second later and groaned. He was not feeling sympathetic towards the man who had gotten his sister pregnant in the first place, it went against everything in the Brother Code.
Instead, he told himself that he was just anticipating the next time Rogue bit his head off over something trivial, that's all.
And every time she did, he consoled himself with the thought that once her child was born, he was going to spoil it rotten.
It was, after all, his duty as an uncle.
I vonder if it will be a girl or a boy, he mused with a small smile. After witnessing several of Rogue and Remy's daily debates over the sex of their baby, he had decided it was probably safer to agree with his sister, seeing as how she was the one without of control hormones and super strength, but a part of him hoped that she was wrong.
A little girl with brown hair and fluffy white bangs would be nice to have around.
Of course, he was probably more than a little biased, having missed out on growing up with Rogue, he supposed it was only natural to want to see a miniature version of her in her daughter.
Maybe that was Remy's motivation for wanting it to be a girl, too.
"Ah knew there was a reason Ah was glad ya came along, sugah," Rogue told Carol with a friendly grin. "Ah'd forgotten how nice it was t' have ya around t' back me up."
"Nice isn't exactly de word dat Remy would use," Remy muttered.
Instead of looking insulted, Carol laughed, giving him a teasing smile. "This from the guy who brought me flowers in the med-lab after I woke up?"
"He brought you flowers?" Lucas echoed, completely deadpan. "Why don't you ever bring me flowers when I'm injured, LeBeau?"
"Shut up, homme," Remy retorted, shoving him in the arm.
"You, like, really brought her flowers?" Kitty asked, turning around in her seat to look at Remy with a smile. "That is so sweet!"
"That's mah Cajun," Rogue agreed, gazing at Remy adoringly. "Ya should have heard some o' the things he said t' me on the island, Kit. We tol' him the story 'bout the ruined dance where Kurt's teleportin' brought all those dinosaur creatures back wit' him-"
"Those things were ugly," Bobby piped up with a grimace.
Groaning, Kurt buried his face in his furry hands. "Vhy can't you ever let zat go?"
Rogue went right on with her story, ignoring him, and he marveled at how quickly her moods could change these days, now fully understanding why they called them 'mood swings', of all things.
"Ah said somethin' 'bout how Ah never had the chance t' dance, 'cause o' mah powers, an' later that night Remy woke me up an' dragged me out onto the beach-"
"At an ungodly hour," Carol added.
"An' he asked me t' dance right there on the beach, wit' the moon overhead an' the waves crashin' at our ankles."
Every female occupant on the jet sighed, except for Wanda, but even she was looking at Remy with a significantly softer expression now. As for Mystique up front, Kurt couldn't see her face in the cockpit, but he imagined there was a very satisfied smile on her lips right about now.
"I'd forgotten how whipped you were, man," Evan said, shaking his head in amusement. "St. John and I used to get our laughs listening to you spout off sappy lines about comparing her eyes to the Mississippi."
"Ah forgot that one," Rogue sighed happily.
Zis has been such a strange day, Kurt groaned to himself. As if having to cut breakfast short wasn't bad enough, he'd only gotten a pop-tart on the way to the hangar, now his sister was alternating between grouchy Rogue and saccharine sweet Rogue, and the sad thing was, he rather thought he preferred grouchy Rogue.
At least then he didn't have to listen to her gushing over what a romantic, wonderful man Remy was.
Apparently, he wasn't the only one feeling that way.
"Enough with the chatter, people, we're approaching the target zone," Scott ordered from his seat right behind the cockpit. "This is serious, so let's focus here, all right? Jean, what's the status of the situation on the ground?"
Her eyes closed in concentration, Jean's brow furrowed slightly. "No civilians in the area, they all fled when things started to go down."
"And the military?"
"They're putting up a halfhearted effort," she answered. "But they know they can't really do much good against the Acolytes, so they're hedging away. We need to get down there if we're going to stop Magneto from escaping with all those missiles."
"That's what he's after?" Carol asked incredulously. "Missiles?"
"With that big of an arsenal, he could hold half the world hostage," Scott observed grimly. "And with some of the idiots he's got working for him, an accident could prove catastrophic."
"Good help is hard t' find dese days," Remy quipped. "Dey don' make Acolytes de way dey used t', mon ami."
Scott glanced back at him with a serious expression. "Don't underestimate them," he advised. "They may be a lot less impressive than your team was, but they're still dangerous."
"Unlike you guys, some of them, like, wouldn't mind 'accidentally' killing one or two of us," Kitty added darkly.
"I want you to stay away from Senyaka, Kitty," Scott said sharply, and Kurt shivered, remembering how pale she had been lying on that stretcher in the back of the X-jet after the last time they faced the Acolytes, when the fierce Senyaka had nearly killed her with his energy whip.
In some ways, he wished that Remy and Piotr and the others were still working for Magneto, because they certainly hadn't ever tried to kill any of the X-men in battle. Neither had Magneto, come to think of it, and despite the fact that it had been he who prevented Senyaka from delivering the killing blow to the downed Shadowcat when none of her teammates could reach her in time, Kurt found himself wary about turning his back on the Master of Magnetism these days.
After all, Senyaka was one of his most trusted Acolytes, and that didn't speak too highly for Magneto.
A low growl sounded from Rogue, and Kurt blinked, looking from her to Jean and back, noticing that the two women had locked gazes. Kitty, figuring out what their silent communication was about, gave Rogue a weak smile. "Don't worry," she said, trying to sound unconcerned. "I don't let anyone, like, get the drop on me twice."
"No wonder ya were so adamant 'bout comin' along, sugah," Rogue said to Lance, who nodded grimly, his dark eyes narrowed at the thought of the mutant who had nearly cost him his fiancé.
A loud beep came from the consoles in the cockpit, and Kurt heard his mother curse under her breath.
"They've spotted us," Hank informed them evenly. "We'll have to let you bail out, then Raven and I will try to find a place to land so we can join you."
"How many can you port to the ground, Kurt?" Scott asked.
"Four or five," Kurt answered hesitantly. "Preferably four, so zat I still have ze energy to fight, ja?"
"Okay, you take Lance, Wanda, Bobby and Kitty with you, then," Scott instructed, and they all began to unbuckle their crash-webbing. "Rogue, Carol, do you think you can both manage to fly two down?"
"Piece of cake," Carol replied.
"Not a problem, Cyke," Rogue agreed.
"Jean?"
"I can take Alex and Lorna with us," she responded calmly. "But you and Alex will need to keep the Acolytes away from us on the way down, I can't afford any distractions or I might drop us."
"We've got you covered, Jean," Alex promised.
As Bobby and Lance placed their hands on his shoulders, Kurt offered his arms to Wanda and Kitty, who both smiled at him, and then they blinked out of the jet in a cloud of brimstone and smoke, reappearing on the ground half a mile below, conveniently just around the corner from the action, the building he'd aimed for giving them cover from Magneto and his lackeys.
"Thanks for the ride, man," Bobby said, icing up.
"Ready to rumble?" Lance asked, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
Their headsets crackled, and Scott's voice filled Kurt's ears. "We're on our way down to you now, Kurt. Can you get the positions on the Acolytes for us?"
"Ja," Kurt agreed. "Sure thing."
"The roof," Wanda suggested.
Kurt nodded and teleported himself up there, dropping to his stomach and crawling to the ledge in order to peer down at the fray below. "I see Neophyte and Cargill by ze overturned tank," he alerted the others via his headset. "Cortez is about thirty yards behind them and to ze right, I think zat Milan is with him, but it's hard to tell... he's keeping to ze shadows."
"I've got him," Jean said calmly. "He hasn't sensed us yet, but I'm going to try and jam his telepathy anyway, just to be on the safe side."
"Any sign of Magneto?" Scott demanded.
"Nein," Kurt replied. "Not yet."
"Look for Voght, then," Mystique advised, presumably off somewhere landing the jet, but listening in from her own comm-link. "Amelia is never far from his side."
"Ja," Kurt agreed. "I'll keep an eye out for her zen."
Craning his neck, he turned his head in the other direction, scanning the swarm of soldiers futilely trying to hold the Acolytes at bay. "I found ze Kleinstocks," he said with a grunt, eyeing the towering brothers with irritation as they fired plasma blasts at the feet of the soldiers, laughing cruelly as if it was some form of entertainment to see them dancing about as they tried to keep their legs intact.
Of course, knowing the Kleinstock brothers, it probably was entertainment for them.
"I've got a lock on Unuscione," he heard Evan call over the headset, and in the distance he spotted Carol and Rogue landing, with Remy, Lucas, Evan and Tessa in hand. None of the Acolytes had seen them yet, but it was only a matter of time. "Want me to fire a flaming spike and see if I can pierce her psionic exoskeleton?"
"Not yet," Scott answered. "We've still got a few unaccounted for. Let's try and find them before they find us. If we move on the Acolytes now, the ones we haven't spotted yet will ambush us."
"How many are we missing?" Kitty inquired.
"Four," Tessa answered evenly. "Kamal, Senyaka, Magneto and Voght."
There was a slight pause of surprise, and then Scott chuckled. "Read the files, did you?"
"That is a fact," the mutant thief confirmed, and Kurt was impressed, she really didn't forget anything she read. "And I suspect that if we wish to locate Senyaka, all we need to do is follow the sounds of the screaming."
Sure enough, if Kurt strained his ears, he could hear muffled howls of pain in the distance.
"Wanda?" Scott called. "Take Tessa and Alex, go neutralize Senyaka."
There was only a moment of pause before Wanda agreed, and Kurt knew that she had hesitated not because she feared Senyaka, but because she had assumed her place would be directly confronting her father. Despite the bad blood between them, she still considered Magneto her responsibility, no matter how many times Xavier told her otherwise.
"If you need backup, call us," Lance could be hear instructing Wanda, and Kurt suspected that he was disappointed he wouldn't be getting a crack at Senyaka himself, which was probably precisely why Scott hadn't assigned him the job in the first place.
"I will," Wanda promised, and her team followed her off in that direction without complaint.
Between Wanda's hexing abilities, Tessa's minor telepathy and her computerized brain scanning for weaknesses, and Alex's plasma blasts, they would be able to deal with Senyaka easily enough, but Kurt winced at the thought of that energy whip wrapping around one of their throats.
"Evan, Bobby, I need you to find Kamal," Scott told them. "He's too dangerous for us to let him sneak up on us with our backs turned."
"Got it, boss," Bobby said, with a mock salute that Scott couldn't see, but Kurt caught it from his vantage point on the roof.
"Kitty, I'll let you and Lance deal with Neophyte," Scott continued. "Since you know the weaknesses of his powers better than any of us. Either Rogue or Carol needs to go with you to handle Cargill, she's got super strength that will flatten the rest of us."
"I'll go, Rogue," Carol offered immediately.
"Ya sure, sugah?"
"Yeah, I'm sure," Carol replied. "Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. You should find Magneto anyway."
"She's right, Rogue," Scott agreed somberly. "Lorna, go with Jean. The two of you can take Cortez together, and it shouldn't be too hard to get Milan out of the fight. Just keep him from distracting us with his psionic images, alright?"
"That won't be a problem," Jean assured him, and in the distance Kurt saw her lean over to kiss her husband quickly before gesturing for Lorna to follow her around the corner.
"What about us?" Mystique's voice crackled over the headset.
"Are you on the ground yet?" Scott asked, and when he got an affirmative, he nodded to himself. "Alright, then, Hank, feel up to a bruising with the Kleinstocks?"
"Why not?" Hank retorted dryly.
"Lucas, can you absorb plasma blasts?" Scott inquired of the dark-skinned mutant thief who had accompanied Rogue and Remy from New Orleans.
"Yes."
"Good, I need you with Hank, then. The Kleinstocks can pack a mean punch, it'd serve them right to get a dose of their own powers turned back on them."
"I will see it done," Lucas replied evenly.
"I take it that leaves Unuscione for me?" Mystique concluded, and there was a distinctive pleasure in her silky voice, as if she had been anticipating a rematch with the vile woman ever since learning of the mission.
"Just put her out of commission, Raven," Scott ordered, using her name to show that he was serious. "Nothing more."
"She'll live," Mystique grunted sharply. "I won't promise much more than that."
"Fine," Scott replied shortly. "Gambit, try to keep her in line."
Remy shot Scott a less then pleasant look. "Dat's askin' a bit much, non?"
"Do your best," Scott retorted. "The two of you just take Unuscione down before she can do our team any damage."
"Oui, mon capitone."
As Remy gave Rogue a wry bow before heading off in Unuscione's direction, Kurt spotted a hawk flying overhead, and he realized that Mystique was probably going to dive-bomb Unuscione and rake the woman's eyes out if she could before taking a form more suited for combat.
Poor Remy was going to have his hands full.
"Ah reckon that leaves ya, me an' Kurt t' tangle wit' Magneto?" Rogue asked Scott knowingly.
"Just as soon as we can find-"
"Acolytes!" As the deep booming voice filled the air, Kurt's fur stood on end of its own accord. "We have visitors."
"Ya were saying, sugah?" Rogue snickered.
"Never mind," Scott muttered. "Kurt?"
"Ja, I see him," Kurt confirmed, eyeing the magenta-clothed form approaching from one of the buildings, hovering in midair thanks to the nature of his powers, using the electromagnetic molecules in the air to float across the sky, his gloved hands outstretched. "Kitty, vatch your back, zat power converter is about to come off ze ground."
"Whoa!" Kitty cried in surprise, going intangible just in time. "Like, thanks, Kurt."
More metallic equipment began to tremble, rising into the air, and Kurt's eyes widened as he realized where one heavy block was headed.
Teleporting, he appeared just behind his mother as she was shifting from hawk-form to her own body and grabbed her by the shoulder, porting out again only seconds before the machinery crashed into the ground where she had been standing.
"Careful, Muzzer," he advised grimly, letting go of her a few feet away.
"You do the same," Mystique snapped before morphing into a tiger and lunging for Unuscione.
The familiar sound of Scott's optic blasts filled the air, and Kurt turned to see him blasting a tank as it dropped down towards his head. It ripped the tank in two, but one of the pieces continued on a path straight for him, and Scott didn't have time to move.
Luckily for him, Rogue had rocketed into the air, and now drove her fists up into the bottom of the chunk of metal.
Within seconds, she had shredded it into shrapnel.
Kurt, who had teleported over to Scott in those few seconds, watched in awe as he witnessed his sister's newfound powers for the first time. "Vow," he whistled under his breath.
"Not bad," Scott agreed, but Kurt could tell he was impressed, too.
"Be right back," Rogue shouted down to them. "Ah'm gonna drop this on Unuscione's head, see if Ah can' crack her exoskeleton a bit t' help Remy an' Mystique."
"Roger," Scott said curtly into his headset, and Rogue took off with the massive ball of metal in hand. "Kurt, do you- duck!"
Instinctively, Kurt teleported out, reappearing a few feet away, and he was relieved to find that Scott had been able to dive out of the way of the incoming metal generator which was now shattered upon the ground.
"Was that really necessary?" Scott demanded, glaring up at Magneto, one hand going to the side of his visor.
"Ah, young Cyclops," Magneto called with equal parts amusement and respect. "I see Charles has sent his boy scouts to save the day once more."
"We can do this the easy way or the hard way, Magneto," Scott warned. "Either way, you're not walking out of here with those missiles."
"Indeed," Magneto agreed wryly. "I intend to fly out of here with them."
Gritting his teeth, Scott's fingers tensed on his visor.
"Ve can't let you do zat," Kurt insisted, baring his fangs.
"You're more than welcome to try and stop me, then, children," Magneto chuckled, spreading his arms as screws and bolts began to be torn up from the crumpled sheets of metal strewn about on the ground.
Scheiße, Kurt thought with a groan, preparing himself to dodge the onslaught of metal rain.
Scott, however, was not so content to endure that particular fate, which wouldn't be deadly, but it would still hurt like hell. With surprising speed, he pressed down on his visor, firing a powerful optic blast directly at the Master of Magnetism before the man could erect a magnetic shield around himself.
Magneto went tumbling back through the air, but managed to straighten after only a few seconds, and when he turned back to face them, his expression was no longer one of amusement.
"Zat might have been a bad idea, mein freund," Kurt informed Scott grimly.
"You may be right," Scott conceded, bending his knees slightly, ready to dive for cover if need be.
And there might very well have been need for just that, since Magneto began to lift a mangled military jeep into the air, presumably to crush them with, but he never got the chance.
Because at that moment, he was hit by a black and brown missile, with a streak of white.
Watching as Rogue plowed into Magneto, soaring up higher into the air and taking the man with her, Kurt once again whistled.
"Yeah," Scott agreed, and actually cracked a faint smile. "Wow."
Translations:
mon capitone- my captain
Scheiße- shit (German)
mein freund- my friend (German)