Two years ago, Scott changed. The past year had been an odd one for Scott. He was becoming the man he had always wanted to become, his team was fiercely loyal, and everyone had accepted him as Scott Summers the person with all his faults and fumbles along with it. They had all grown up too fast since that battle with the Phoenix.

All the originals had moved on , unable to escape the ghosts of the mansion. Kitty and Kurt left to join Excalibur in England, a clean slate together. Ororo was being courted by an Avenger and nobody knew until she became the first lady of Wakanda. Hank was given the opportunity to become a mutant relations liaison on an international scale and even Scott said he would be stupid if he gave it up.

Emma Frost, Alex, Lorna Dane, and Amara filled their places. Their skills were a compliment to the team and they fit in quite well, minus a few snobby outbursts by Emma.

His relationship with Wanda, it was friendly but strained . He hadn't known what possessed him to try to kiss her but it had happened and now he paid for it everyday . She was friendly but nervous around him . They never spent anytime just the two of them and Scott missed it more than he ever thought he would. If he had one complaint or regret , it was that he wished he could take that kiss back to have his friend back.

Then Nimrod had come. The X-Men responded when it came over the police radio , a huge over-powered robot was destroying the mall. Little did they know, this fight would change them forever.

They fought the thing to a standstill. It took all of their power combined but they never once let up. Beating the mechanical beast with every last ounce of will they had left . When it reached for it's arm and the arm started glowing Scott immediately thought "BOMB" and dove towards it . Alex , Lorna and Wanda had jumped after to him to pull him away and all of them were blinded by a bright light.

What greeted them next would be the stuff of their nightmares. A landscape so choked in fire and ash it could only be described as Hell. Nimrod had taken them straight into Hell. Even before they got their bearings the alarms screaming in their ears. "MUTANTS DETECTED SECTOR B12" was all it said in a loud dead mechanical voice as Scott prayed with little hope that they weren't in that sector. The metal titans slammed down into the earth and the four started fighting , these robots went down easily but when one did , three more seem to take its place. They were fighting like their lives were depending on in and as the metal bodies raised the hours ticked away and sheer exhaustion was overtaking them as this flood of Metal Death seemed to flow towards them like a running faucet. They were caked in their own blood and oil as one by one they collapsed. The last thing Scott felt was a huge metal hand gripping him as unconsciousness overtook him.

Scott felt like he had been out for a year as he awoke. His body felt like a raw nerve as he couldn't even suppress an agonizing groan. It was pitch black where he was and he wasn't dead but he feared he soon might welcome it. He still felt his visor was on but the firing mechanism seemed disabled and felt like it was almost fused to his head. He felt around the pitch black room when he happened upon another unconscious form. He felt hurriedly around her for any life -ending injuries and sighed as he felt her groan and twist. She reached out for his face and touched his visor.

"Scott, is that you?" the groggy voice squeaked out. "Wanda" he croaked and he couldn't help himself as he enveloped her in his arms. Even though she did grunt a little in pain he soon found he was enveloped in ours too. "Can you use your powers ?" he asked as he let her go. He felt that familiar static electricity tingle fill the room and saw a flickering spark and then her cursing under her breath. "No" she replied. And the rest descended into the darkness between them.

The hours stretched into days and those in turn stretched into weeks. The only constant was their voices in the dark, one keeping the other from going mad . He knew they were being scanned and listened to constantly by whoever or whatever was keeping them captive. After a while they eventually felt resigned to the fact that they were going to die and there was nothing to do about it.

She laughed when he told her the thing he missed most was the sting of a good shower with enough water pressure to strip paint, and he was taken back when she said it was popcorn and movies. They filled the hours talking of everything under the sun and childhood memories both good and bad.

That's when the experiments began.