Edited: 3/6/16

Chapter 31 – Scylla and Charybdis

"The place where you made your stand never mattered. Only that you were there…and still on your feet." - Stephen King, The Stand

The knife hung between them like a deadly exclamation point. With agonizing slowness, the terror eased and Pietro could move again. He stared dumbly at the blade, unable to comprehend what Zen meant by it.

A sigh escaped the tiny assassin as his other hand snapped out to capture Pietro's limp one. With care, he eased the handle into his grip.

Your life and death belong to your wielder. Yes, but he'd never been trained on what to do if his wielder refused to take them.

He had become obsolete. If Pietro's pain could be eased with his death, if that could heal the damage Zen caused the boy, then at least his death would have meaning.

"What?" Pietro choked out through the painful lump in his throat.

Zen took a step back before tilting his head up. Offering his throat to the teen as he'd once offered it to his original master when he'd believed himself too damaged to be of value to the man.

"I cannot restore your sister's life, but I can offer my life in payment for taking hers."

The words hung between them like the ghost of his lost sister, a promise of revenge. Pietro's grip tightened on the handle. Every fiber of his being demanded blood for blood. It was only fair Zen die by his hand after taking Wanda from him.

Only fair.

Pietro's hand lifted, halting and then rose again. The sharp edge of the knife glittered between them, hungry to free his blood. His breath shuddered in his lungs as the blade came to rest on the delicate skin of Zen's throat. His death would parallel Wanda's and bring closure to the agony that had taken the place of his heart.

Swallowing, Pietro's grip tightened on the handle. It felt slick in his trembling hand. Zen hadn't moved away. He's going to stand there and let me kill him. All he had to do was press a little harder, and he'd free the crimson tide of Zen's existence. Why is he doing this?

"Why?" the rough word startled Pietro, he hadn't meant to speak it out loud.

"Because I'm incapable of feeling anything for the lives I've taken, and my life is all I have to give to make amends."

Everything in him screamed to finish it, to apply that last bit of pressure, but his hand refused to follow the directing of his mind. No damn it! This is all I've wanted since her death, don't choke now when revenge is finally at hand, but no matter how fiercely he berated himself, he couldn't drag the blade through Zen's exposed throat.

Zen's words penetrated the haze of conflicting emotion, and Pietro almost fell over when he understood.

This was Zen's morbid attempt at an apology. Mere words hadn't been enough to placate Pietro, so now he offered his life instead. With understanding came shame that he'd even considered taking it. Closing his eyes, he pulled the knife away.

"Go back to bed."

Without offering another word, Zen crawled back into bed as if he hadn't almost committed suicide by angry teen.

The sound of Pietro's muffled sobs filled the darkness between them. While the noise didn't impact his digestive system the way Kitty's tears often did, it made his muscles tense with the urge to silence the sound. Instead, he slid his eyes shut and waited for his new roommate's crying to give way to sleep.

Working in Washington had taken on a new meaning as the town sprawled out over its borders. Now, anywhere inside the Capital Beltway was considered working in Washington. In Rockville, Maryland, a cluster of moderate high-rise buildings glittered like forgotten toys in the dying evening light. The hustle and bustle of the day had been replaced by a clutch of night guards and scurrying custodians. Even in a world where terrorism was the talk of the day, this location wasn't considered a viable target. Much of the surveillance was handled remotely, via a control office that watched through a plethora of cameras. The only human presence was a manned reception desk, and a couple of rent-a-cop guards who patrolled the floors. Aside from that, Big Brother was responsible for the rest.

When Yuriko Oyama stalked through the front door, the Officer at the desk barely glanced up from her Danielle Steel novel. Oyama's group were the sort who didn't conform to office hours. Instead they worked almost 24/7, doing audits, they said. The guard wasn't paid to nose in on the clients business, especially since all their paperwork was in order.

Yuriko flashed her badge at the woman, whose eyes flicked up before she waved a hand at the familiar figure as she walked by.

A mechanical ding marked her arrival at the top floor. Stepping out of the elevator, Yuriko strode past one of the night cleaners without offering a word of greeting. Her destination was located at the end of the bland hallway, behind an equally nondescript door. A hand scanner took the place of traditional locks or their more advanced cousins, pad coded locks. Pressing her right hand to the pad, the lock snicked open.

The door opened, revealing a suite of rooms that could have belonged to any midlevel worker, the only personality the room could boast was its utter lack of personality. It had the same passive look as a high end hotel room.

As she walked across the room and passed an opaque glass wall divider, her form shifted. In less than five steps, the figure's features melted like a wax figurine popped into a microwave. Then the features solidified into a new shape. The black hair grew in reverse as the shade lightened into a deep auburn, amber skin gave way to deepest blue, and features that had been distinctly Asian shifted to aristocratic Caucasian. Her features held a predatory cast akin to one of the great hunting birds yet still possessed a haunting beauty. The clothing melted into her skin until what remained was mostly nude save for a hand full of scales and ridges that provided some degree of protection and the illusion of propriety.

Her eyes were liquid gold, and she went by the name Mystique. Over her left breast, a hairs breath away from her heart, was a small dimple of scar tissue.

Settling in Stryker's chair, Mystique thumbed the computer monitor on. A dialog box appeared: VOICE PRINT IDENTIFICATION PLEASE.

Although her outer appearance remained the same, the structures inside her throat altered so that when she spoke, a perfect replication of Stryker's voice immerged. "Stryker, William."

ACCESS GRANTED, flashed once across the screen before the desktop appeared. Her fingers darted over keyboard, pulling up the directories and choosing Recent Items from the main menu of a folder labeled: 143. That led her to a series of documents: Floor Plans, Lehnsherr, Augmentation, Interrogation Summaries . . .

Mystique read through the data quickly while printing everything she could pull up. Each one revealed more damning details. Her lips thinned as she read, it was worse than she'd feared.

Downstairs, the shifts changed, and a man watched Yuriko approach the desk, his eyes blazed with interest but he knew better than to even try. Her icy gaze promised pain to any male foolish enough to leap into those waters. Without acknowledging him in any way, she stalked past his desk toward the elevators.

Another document slid into the printer tray when Mystique's head jerked up at the sound of the locks disengaging.

The real Yuriko walked over to her desk and began rummaging through the main drawer. Then, without warning, she spun on her heel, a Glock 19 out and pointed at the intruder's startled face.

"Who are you?" she demanded. "Why are you here?"

A uniformed janitor held his hands up in the universal sign of 'don't shoot.'

"Lo siento, a puerta fui abierto!" he managed to say, fear making the words squeak on the way out.

Yuriko grabbed the worker's ID, hanging from a lanyard around his neck, and scrutinized the photo. Then she accessed the night crew roster from her handheld to ensure both were legitimate.

Letting the frightened man's badge drop, she waved him away and returned to her task, dismissing the custodian from her thoughts. It never occurred to her to question why he'd been in her office cleaning without his supply cart.

Mystique pondered that as she moved quickly down the hall, right past the man whose face she'd stolen. The real janitor stared at her in shocked disbelief before crossing himself. Mystique's thoughts returned to Yuriko. This venture had gone easier than she'd expected, giving her a hope she hadn't felt since Magneto's capture. Perhaps it wouldn't be long before Stryker was the one on the run, and it was his society in ruins.

Mount Haven wasn't a comfortable place for a telepath. They'd only been here a few minutes, and the low grade headache already throbbed in his temples. It was caused by the ultralow frequency harmonics pitched to inhibit any form of extrasensory perception. Xavier's power was great enough to overcome it, but it took more effort and had a greater cost. It was easier, while he was here, to keep his powers to himself.

What bothered him most about the whole setup was that the designers knew what they were doing. It hinted at an uncomfortable understanding of mutation. Once he'd learned where Magneto was housed, he'd made a number of subtle inquires in an effort to learn as much as he could about the government agency that developed the institution, but few of his leads offered concrete answers.

Following the established protocols, Xavier's chair was swapped out for one made entirely of plastic. Accompanied by an armed guard, he and Scott were led through the interior maze of the prison until they reached the unorthodox cage that held Magneto captive.

With the surly manner of a man accustomed to obedience, Laurio waved Scott away from the chair.

"I'll take it from here."

Scott didn't care for the man's tone, nor the cruel look in his eye, and he bristled over the command.

"Scott," Xavier said with quiet force, "It's all right, I won't be long."

With a hiss of escaping air, the hatch opened onto a small platform. The pair waited in silence for the plastic tunnel to unfold, bridging the gap between them and the cell. Moving through the translucent tube, Xavier could sense how vast the space around them was, and knew his life depended on the integrity of the rigs and cables holding the tunnel aloft. While most people picked up their speed on the walkway to escape that yawning emptiness, Laurio slowed. It was his way of emphasizing that he held all the control here.

Once they were across, Laurio pushed Xavier into position and left the two men alone in the clear cell.

Lehnsherr sat with his back to Xavier, and didn't turn around while he spoke. "Come to rescue me, Charles?"

"Not today, Erik. I'm sorry." Honest regret flavored the soft words, as if there might be a rescue . . . someday.

"If not to save me, why did you come?" Lehnsherr asked, unable to keep the amusement out of his tone.

"The assassination attempt on the president. What do you know of it?"

"Only what I've gleaned from the newspapers," Erik turned to face his old companion. "You shouldn't even have to ask."

Xavier couldn't hide the way he recoiled, and didn't try. Bruises painted the other man's face like a grotesque sunrise. Parchment yellow, mottled green, streaks of purple fading into darkest black. The way he held himself spoke of other injuries hidden beneath the thin material of his jumpsuit.

"What happened?" Xavier almost choked on the words.

"I . . . fell," Lehnsherr replied, an ironic smile quirking his lips. "In the shower."

"This isn't a joke!"

"No," Lehnsherr agreed, shaking his head.

"This is unconscionable."

"I'm a terrorist, Charles. An enemy of humanity. With a status like that, and the circumstances of my capture, I've been informed often that I should be grateful for my treatment."

"Informed by whom?" Charles demanded, already drafting his future protests to the authorities. "Who's responsible for this outrage?"

"You remember William Stryker, don't you?"

The name had come up recently in relation to a disappearance, and had been one of the few names he'd managed to dig up when he was trying to follow the back trail of the ones who'd created this facility.

"I recall him."

"In the past few months, I've been subject to a number of unpleasant visits with the man. His son, Jason was it, was once a student of yours I believe."

Xavier gave a low hum of agreement. "Indeed, though he was more patient than student I'm afraid. He was one of the few I couldn't help. At least not in the way Stryker wished."

Night fell like crushed black velvet, enfolding the slender jet in its silky folds as it approached Boston. The aircraft skimmed along the surface of the harbor as silent and agile as a dragonfly, targeting a small stretch of waterfront near the Marine Industrial Park. It didn't take Storm long to find a decent slip with enough depth for their needs, and with a deftness born of practice, she settled the jet onto the water. Then she engaged the autopilot to submerge after they'd disembarked. With over ten feet of water above the Jet, there was enough room for smaller boats that might come this way to clear it, and no chance of it being spotted by a casual observer.

Both women slid trench coats over their uniforms before making their way through the deserted streets.

Closing her eyes, Storm let her power mingle with the atmospheric balance around them to provide a soft swirl of mist over their location. She was careful not to turn it into a true fog, not wanting to be too conspicuous, just enough to allow them to slip away without being seen if they were forced to retreat.

They found a Church when they reached the coordinates Xavier gave.

Before this part of the city fell into disrepair, the Church would have been the crowning jewel of the neighborhood. It had been founded on the old tradition, built to last by stonemasons who'd been designing something that would serve the grandchildren of their grandchildren. The old construct still held an air of dignity that couldn't be erased by the blatant graffiti painted over its face.

Painted in crimson along one of its walls was the line: CLEAN THE GENE POOL! KILL MUTANT SCUM! Storm wrinkled her nose at the sentiments.

"We'll never be able to live our lives in peace," she said, anger burning in her tone. There were days she couldn't help thinking Magneto had a point. Her fists clinched as her gazed turned towards the Boston Harbor, and a thick slash of lightning cut at the night like a knife over the distant water.

"Come on," Jean whispered. Together, they circled the Church. To their shock, all the windows and doors Jean used her teke on proved to be locked.

"Perhaps someone is taking care of the old place?" Storm offered.

"Maybe, I've been picking up a few though flashes from the bar up the street."

"From the guys we saw through the window," Storm asked, unable to mask her disgust at the way the men stared at them like half-starved dogs. "You're braver than me."

"Tell me about it," Jean agreed, her tone a twin to Storm's disgust. "Thing is, this church has a rep. It's supposed to be haunted by its very own demon."

"Get out."

"No lie. They believe it too. The gang members actually use the Church as one of the methods for jumping people in. Most of the thugs choose a physical beating instead of trying to tag it."

Storm shook her head at the stupidity of some people. "I've never met a demon before."

"After you, then."

Applying a creative use of telekinesis and a burst of wind, the bolts on the main doors popped, forcing the doors open wide to the two women. They boomed against the walls, echoing throughout the Church like a great bell.

From the rafters, a flock of pigeons exploded into the open space, startled awake by the noise. Both remained silent and watchful as they made their way down to the nave. The floor of the Church was mostly empty, the pews long gone from their traditional place. Above them, crouched in the shadows below the vaulted ceiling, a pair of chrome yellow eyes observed the invaders. And then, with the soft bamf of imploding air, they vanished.

Storm jerked to a halt, her head twisting up to stare into the darkness.

"What?" Jean asked.

"The air shifted."

"Movement?"

"No, it was more than that. There was a sudden vacuum over there." She pointed towards where the lurking figure had been. "And an outrushing of air from something popping into being." Turning, she directed her gaze towards the alter. "There."

"Gehen sie raus," a low ominous voice spoke from the deepest darkness ahead of them. A single candle lit the darkness, set beside an open Bible. Its fragile light flickered from a sudden breeze, and the top page fluttered.

"He's gone again," Storm said. Jean nodded her agreement.

In a balcony above their heads, the voice boomed again: "Ich bin die augheburt des Bosen."

"We're not here to harm you," Storm replied. "We just want to talk."

She turned before the last echo of her words died away to face the faint shift in air pressure.

"Ich bin ein Bote des Teufels!" The stranger's voice snapped back in a primal howl.

An awkward thought slid into Storm's mind. "You know . . . we're assuming he speaks English."

"Not a problem," Jean replied. "He's a teleporter."

"I noticed," Storm said.

"That's why the Professor had such a difficult time locking in on him with Cerebro."

"Will it be any easier for us to capture him?"

"Not a problem."

Another bamf of air sounded, this time much closer than the last, although neither woman was able to make out a shape in the oppressive gloom of the Church.

"Ich ben ein damon!" The voice shrieked out of the darkness.

Jean's eyes rolled at the mutant's dramatics. She shifted her stance into a perfect imitation of ValGal Barbie.

"Like, are you board yet?" she chirped.

"Totally," Storm replied in a deadpan voice.

"You want to bring him down, or shall I?"

Storm's lips corked in a wicked grin as her eyes narrowed. With a snap of her fingers, a small bolt of lightning erupted from her hand, shot out, and slammed into one of the rafters. A brilliant explosion of light and sound filled the enclosed space, rattling the building to its foundation.

A vague human shape appeared in their vision before it vanished. When it reappeared a second later above the alter, Jean was ready. Locking on his mental signature, she reached out with both telepathy and telekinesis to freeze both his body and mind. Though trapped, he continued to fight her grip, defiant to the end.

"Got him?"

"Yep, he's not going to be disappearing again any time soon." With a mental twitch, she drew her prey down for a closer look. Then, to Storm's surprise, she smiled a soft friendly smile and held out her other hand. "Are you?"

"Please don't kill me," he begged in English. The words swirled with undertones of German. Its mellow timber was an odd contrast to the monster he'd been attempting to play to drive them from his home. "I never meant to harm anyvon!"

"I wonder how anyone got that impression," Storm snorted. "What's your name?"

"Kurt. Kurt Wagner."

"I'm Ororo, but you may call me Storm." She said as he eyes cut sideways to Jean. This is our assassin?

Appearances are deceiving, Jean projected back. But – which way?

Your call.

With that final thought from Storm, Jean let her captive go. Like a cat, he twisted as he fell, landing neatly on the balls and toes of his odd shaped feet. His whole body was tensed to flee, but Jean took it as a good sign that he hadn't disappeared the second she'd released him. Still, she kept her hand held out for him to take.

"My name is Jean Grey. We're not here to harm you."

Kurt had taken a page out of Quasimodo's book, living up in the spire, one level below the belfry. Here the walls were solid, and he'd replaced the broken stained glass with hand carved pieces that matched the originals as closely as possible. Storm smiled, by day this room would be a blaze of mingled colors.

Instead of using electricity, he had a collection of stubby candles to keep the light from being spotted from the street. The height of the room afforded him a perfect panorama of the neighborhood below. In here, he had both privacy and a fair chance of spotting any intruders before they could get in. For a teleporting acrobat whose skin blended almost perfectly with the dark stone, it was an ideal home.

While the furnishings had a Spartan feel to them, they appeared to have been a deliberate choice rather than poverty. Yes, the pieces were mainly scavenged from the abandoned homes nearby, but they'd been restored with the same craft and care as the windows. A wooden bookshelf, a bed, a small table, chairs, and a pantry. The food stocks were mostly dry for easy storage and preparation. On the bookshelf, an eclectic mix of Religious texts as well as books like Rafael Sabatini's Captain Blood, and George MacDonald Frasier's classic pastiche, The Pyrates sat side by side.

A Catholic crucifix hung above the headboard and on the table rested a set of rosary beads that held the high polish of much handling. Scattered around the room were countless images of Christ and the Blessed Virgin. Beneath the rosary beads was a thin stack of newspapers, each with the attack of the President emblazoned in the headlines. The top of the stack included an artistic sketch of the assassin that was haunting accurate.

The far wall held a curiosity that didn't match the rest of the room. There were a series of circus posters, all from venues across Europe: Florence, Barcelona, Paris, Munich, Prague, Krakow. All were illustrations of Kurt on the trapeze, celebrating the various performances of the INCREDIABLE NIGHTCRAWLER! Along with these, were a few movie posters: Burt Lancaster in The Crimson Pirate, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., in Sinbad the Sailor, and in the center, Errol Flynn's film adaptation of Captain Blood, the roll which cemented his swashbuckling career.

Jean couldn't hide the gentle smile that curved her lips. Kurt was obviously a deeply religious man with a love of pirate stories. Nothing in the room fit with him as an assassin. Then again, no one would look at Zen and think him a killer either. She'd had plenty of experience with people who didn't fit the picture they presented.

Still, nothing about Kurt reminded her of Zen. He didn't have the same hardness about him, that cold strength which could only be developed through the taking of life.

Kurt picked up the rosary when Jean asked if she could tend his wound. Though she knew she was hurting him, the only sounds that escaped were almost silent prayers, "Our Father, Who art in Heaven, blessed be Thy Name . . ."

Exploring the wound, Jean found that the bullet had missed the bone as it passed through his shoulder, but still did a fair amount of damage. Kurt's first aid was decent. He'd managed to stop the blood flow, and applied enough antiseptic to save off infection. With proper treatment, he wouldn't lose mobility in the limb.

"No worries," she murmured as she finished up the last of the sutures and wrapped the wound in clean bandages. "The worst you'll have is a small scar."

Blinking up at her, he frowned. "You're not the authorities, are you?"

Storm laughed, "Not a chance."

"But you are verying uniforms."

Again Jean grinned at him. "We just like to look cool." The grin faded a little. "Sorry if I hurt you."

"It's all right, I know it can't be helped." Kurt shook his head in a mix of resignation and confusion. "I don't understand any of this. I could . . ." the words died away as he glanced over at the old newspapers. In vain, he attempted to reconcile the reports with his own jumbled memories. "I couldn't stop myself," he admitted, desperation making the words high. "It all happened to someone else, like a bad dream. That would be nice, but then – I move my arm and know it for a lie!" A shudder rippled through him. "It was real. It was me," he choked.

While he spoke, he twisted the rosary beads in his two fingered grip until the crucifix rested in his hand. Memories haunted his features.

"I fear He has left me," he whispered, loss like a bitter pill melting in his throat. "I've even found a mark, like that borne by Cain. See? Look here."

Shifting his head forward, he swept aside the deep indigo curls, revealing a circular mark at the base of his skill. Jean's finger traced a light circle around the skin, and she realized it was scar tissue akin to an insect bite or a welt left behind by a tropical irritant like poison ivy. The scar rested directly above the brain stem and formed a perfect circle.

"What do you think?" Storm asked Jean.

"We need to get him back to the Professor," she replied, concern and worry reflected in her green gaze.

His mind was lost, buried under the hypnotic hum of the helmet over his head. Beneath the buzzing hum, the monster raged, hungered, longed to feast on hot flesh torn from bone. But no matter how the monster howled, his flesh remained inactive, inaccessible to him. Though his feet shuffled forward, it wasn't him who moved them. Orders thrummed on the edge of that buzz, orders his flesh obeyed without input from his feral mind.

Then, the maddening sound cut out. Muscles jerked to life, and the helmet spun away to shatter against the wall. Snikt!

Unbreakable blades erupted from his flesh and tore into the two guards at his sides. Hot blood splashed over his night cool flesh like a blanket of liquid fire.

The hunt began . . .

Logan bellowed, jerking out of sleep only to find himself on the floor surrounded by the ruins of his bed. Sighing, he lifted his hand to brush the feathers out of his hair, only to pause and make sure the claws had retracted. He didn't want to end up putting out his own eye. Sure it would grow back, but cleaning up the feathers and blood would be a pain in the ass he didn't feel like dealing with.

A glance proved that he was safe, and the dull throb of healing tissue was the only reminder of their emergence. Spitting out a stray feather, he staggered out of the mess and flipped on the light. The bed was a littler of splinters punctuated by mounds of fluffy white feathers and long strips of shredded linen. It looked like a pack of vengeful St. Bernards attacked it.

For a second, he wondered why no one had come to investigate, and then remembered he was the only adult left in the mansion.

Rubbing his face, he examined the dream, memory. Before now, his sleep had been mostly dreamless. There was the random fragment that disappeared after he woke up, but nothing like this. And he'd never decimated his bed before.

As much as he hated to acknowledge it, the dream wasn't a dream at all. It was a memory. Worse, it wasn't his memory.

It was X's.

He could still feel the blood rain over his skin as claws drove through flesh, and feel X's savage delight in striking back at those who'd tried to control him.

"That's not right," he muttered to himself. They hadn't tried, they'd succeeded. Perhaps, but it looked like that success had been bought in lives and blood. How many people died to create X? Shaking his shaggy head, he shoved the thought out of his mind.

Logan didn't want to know. If he had his way, he'd never have to know. Even as he thought it, he recalled the Professor's words about integration. Could he remain two forever?

The dream tonight wasn't a great sign for remaining separate. Maybe integration wouldn't be a choice after all. "Damn it X, just stay in your cage and keep your bloody memories to yourself."

His clothes were on the other side of the room, and had thankfully been spared his nocturnal berserker outburst. Snatching a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt out of the closet, he padded into the bathroom for a shower. Blasting the water as hot as it would go, he let it wash the night sweat and memories from his skin.

In his mind's eye, he could almost see the red swirls of blood draining away with the water. No shower, hoses, they hosed him down after with a spray so hard it almost pealed his skin off. A low snarl slid from his lips as the half thought, half memory struck him.

Not him, not his, mine. My body they used and experimented on. My mind they tore apart. Mine.

Banishing the uncomfortable thoughts, Logan scrubbed his flesh until it felt raw. When he'd woken up, he knew the time. It was an instinct, brother to his uncanny sense of direction. It was impossible for him to get lost, and he knew whenever something in his intimate surroundings changed while he was unconscious.

A hair past 3:00 A.M.

Logan prowled the empty halls of the mansion, his tread silent in spite of his boots. Photographs, paintings, and antiques on casual display were each registered in turn before being dismissed. This process occurred on a subconscious level; if quizzed later, he could describe his environment in detail even if the objects held no meaning to him. Tools yes, he understood tools, but found little interest in ornamental artifacts.

The electronic voice of the television lured him upstairs into one of the common rooms. He'd assumed the box had been left on by mistake, but when he approached, he noted the fresh young scent of an early adolescent male.

He recognized the scent, with its low undertones of electricity that was a far tamer version of Zen's blood. Jones. No first name, at least, not one he or anyone else used.

Long gangly legs were tossed over one of the arm rests, and a huge bowl of popcorn rested on the sprawled teen's chest. His eyes were glued to the screen, and every few seconds he'd blink, changing the channel and causing that electric odor to spike.

The lingering scent was familiar to him, not because of this boy but someone else . . . someone he couldn't quite recall.

Jones noticed Logan in the refection of the screen, but he didn't look up. Even though he didn't much care for what he was watching, he still refused to miss a second of it.

"Can't sleep?" he asked around a mouthful of popcorn.

"How could you tell?" Logan shot back.

"Cause you're awake."

A low snort met the words. No arguing with that infallible logic.

"Right, so what's your excuse?"

"I don't sleep."

"Figures." Without bothering to continue the conversation, he wandered into the kitchen for a late night drink. Too bad Baldy won't let me buy beer.

Digging into the pantry, he stole a six pack of Dr. Pepper stashed there. Logan recognized the chilled scent of the teen who'd entered the room before he saw him. Bobby Drake sat at the table, scooping out a chunk of cookie dough from the quart of Ben and Jerry's in front of him.

"Hey," Bobby said carefully before popping the bite into his mouth to keep from squeaking. While Logan had sensed him coming, it was clear Bobby hadn't realized he was in the room until he'd closed the pantry door, and now it was too late to flee without damaging his pride.

"Hey," Logan replied, taking the seat across from Bobby. He gestured at the boy with the bottle.

"Want one?" he asked. When Bobby nodded, he added "They're warm."

A smirk flashed over the kid's lips as he reached for the bottle. Between them, the air crackled and frost formed on his fingers and the glass. "Not anymore," he replied, letting his hand drop.

Logan popped the top and took a long swig of the now icy soda. Ah, just the way he liked it.

"Handy," he admitted.

Bobby nodded in acknowledgement as he frosted his own bottle.

"So," Logan asked bluntly, his eyes narrowing as he held up his right hand, and for show, popped the middle claw out with a low hiss, then back in. Soda erupted from Bobby's mouth and nose, followed by a desperate lunge for the paper towels. Throughout the humorous performance, Logan didn't move. Instead he eyed his fist, apparently engrossed in looking for signs of damage caused by the blade.

Once Bobby settled back into his chair, Logan gave him his most deadly look. "What's with you and Zen, hm?"

The sobbing died down to low snores hours ago, but Zen couldn't find sleep. Not with an enemy in the room. It didn't matter that the boy refused to kill him while he had the chance. He doubted he could have slept with Kitty in the room, let alone Pietro. If he had to sleep with anyone, he preferred X. Not one of the students who hated him.

Tiredness beat at him, but Zen ignored it easily. Instead of remaining in bed, he got up to walk the mansion. Now that he wasn't confined to his cell at night, he could ensure that the place remained secure. Either way, it was better than staring up at the dark ceiling waiting for sleep to come. Not bothering to change out of his pajamas, Zen ghosted through the empty halls.

Jones slid on a pair of Bode headphones and cranked the volume up. Every blink changed the channel of the TV so fast it was hard to tell what shows were on before they vanished into the next.

In the night darkened sky, the assault force closed in on the mansion from three directions. Two by silenced helicopters following a map-of-the-earth profile which had the wheels of their Sikorsky Blackhawks flirting with the treetops while the final unit used SCUBA sleds to approach from the lake. All the teams were handpicked by Stryker himself, culled from the finest special operations units the world had to offer: American SEALS and Army Rangers, Great Britain's Special Air Service, Russian Spetznats, German GSG-9, Israeli Pathfinders, and a handful of Vietnamese. The mixed group trained for this operation for months, familiarizing themselves with the land and lay out of the mansion, but also training extensively in how to defend themselves from the myriad of powers and abilities they would encounter during the attack. Now that all the adult staff were absent from the school, it was time to put their preparation to the test.

In smooth practiced succession, the first units rappelled from the hovering aircrafts, the team moved swiftly to neutralize the security network and take control of both power and communications into and out of the structure. Once they were finished, the school was completely isolated. Even cellular and radio communications were jammed. High overhead, an orbiting C-130 Hercules kept the estate under continual electronic surveillance, utilizing thermal imagery to mark where all the living bodies were in the mansion. Only a few of the marks were awake, for the rest, it was already too late.

Studying the bank of monitors in the observation booth, Scott noticed both the facial bruising and Xavier's reaction, but the show was all pantomime without sound.

Scott glanced irritably at the guard, who only shrugged in apology.

"Happens sometimes," he offered, commenting on the lack of sound instead of Magneto's condition.

"It happens here, with this prisoner?" Scott demanded, refusing to believe they'd be so careless.

"We got backups on top of backups," Laurio snapped. "You got nothing to worry about. Joey, put in a call for a techie. Let's get this fixed before Play Boy here makes a federal case."

Both guards laughed, and the hair along the back of Scott's neck prickled. Everything felt a little off, and he sent a sharp spear of thought towards Xavier. He shouted inside his head, but the figure on the screen failed to react in the slightest to his mental call.

Lehnsherr reached out with graceful fingers to snag a pawn from the plastic chess board. After a moment, he exchanged it for a knight.

"You shouldn't have come, Charles."

For a moment, Xavier didn't reply. His head was cocked to the side in an all too familiar listening pose. His brows furrowed as he tried to catch hold of the thought tickling the edge of his awareness, but the low thrum of the interference kept him from grasping it. The low throbbing headache had grown to head splitting proportions, forcing him to give up on the quest.

Although heightening his telepathic ability failed to give him the answers he sought, it clued him in on a more dire situation.

"Erik," he gasped, stunned by the memory fragments he caught through the edges of the headache. "What have you done?"

"I'm sorry, Charles," Lehnsherr replied, slashing his hand across the chess board, knocking down both kings at once. He was a man of pride, and long ago he'd vowed to never become a victim again. His utter failure was a hard bone to swallow. That he hadn't been able to keep his friend's secrets was harder to swallow still. "I . . . couldn't help myself."

"What have you told Stryker?" About my school, my X-men, he thought desperately at the other man. Now he recognized the source of the burr in his awareness that had been bothering him since he'd arrived. Martialing his strength, he sent a desperate mental call to Scott.

"Everything," Lehnsherr whispered with the cold finality of a death sentence.

A low ominous hiss sounded from the walls around them. Colorless mist began filling the enclosure.

Xavier had time for a final mental shout: SCOTT! – before oblivion took him.

Erik watched his old friend fall. The gas invading the cell had been designed for Xavier's genetic signature. It would affect Erik too, but not as quickly.

He coughed, recalling how the white clouds would pour from the vents of the "showers" that claimed so many at Auschwitz. He remembered the feel of lifeless flesh in his grip, still warm as he and the other Sonderkommando dragged the bodies from the gas chambers to the crematoria. Every head was sheered of hair, and had the gold pried from their teeth. Anything of value was taken from them, both before and after the slaughter. Especially their dignity.

Never again, he'd sworn to himself back then. Though his captors thought it the most hollow of boasts, he knew he'd live long enough to make them regret it.

"I'm sorry, Charles," he whispered with his last conscious breath. "You should have killed me when you had the chance." Then his eyes trailed towards the distant observation booth, but the face that slipped into his mind was Stryker. "So should you," he finished before the last of his thoughts melted into nothingness.

On the monitors, Scott watched Xavier lunge forward in his chair before collapsing forward at the same time Magneto fell from his chair. The echo of his mentor's final cry resonated in his mind.

"What the hell," he shouted.

His head jerked up to locate the guards, when he heard a soft pop and felt the dull impact of something striking him in the chest. Scott didn't know what it was, but his body reacted of its own volition to the sudden ambush.

Spotting a new person in the room, a young Asian in a uniform holding a dart pistol, his mind leapt nimbly forward. The dart gun indicated they wanted him alive, and the fact that he wasn't unconscious yet proved its ineffectiveness. Perhaps the needle wasn't long enough to penetrate his coat. It didn't matter, what did was the fact that they wouldn't make the same mistake twice. He'd have to act first.

All those thoughts raced through his mind in the second it took for him to complete the turn and register the woman as the primary threat. He wasn't gentle with his response. Tapping a control on the wing of his visor, the ruby quartz depolarized, and a beam of crimson light shot through the lenses.

The woman flew back as if she'd been hit square in the chest by a battering ram. It lifted her bodily off the ground and slammed her into the wall behind her, causing her head to whiplash back against the unforgiving surface. She crumpled into a heap on the ground, knocked unconscious and bloody from a nasty scalp wound. The blow also shattered the pistol and knocked her shaded glasses off.

One of the guards made a grab at him from behind, but Scott buried his elbow in the man's gut, spun on his heel and slammed his fist into the side of the guard's face. That left Laurio and his partner.

A quick shot from his optics took out the partner, but Laurio was faster than he'd anticipated for a man of his bulk. The large man tackled Scott before he could bring his eyes to bear. Laurio might not be the most intelligent man around, but he was good in a fight, and he learned quickly. He'd seen how Scott had to manually manipulate the beam, and he tackled the mutant to keep his hands away from the controls. Without the power, Laurio figured it would be an easy win.

Now it was Laurio's turn to be surprised. Scott's slim rangy figure was as deceptive in its own way as Laurio's. His wiry strength was a match for the guard's, and he possessed a willing ability to take punishment. When Laurio slammed Scott with a couple of heavy body shots that took the fight out of most, the mutant merely winced with the shock and hit back just as hard.

Unnoticed by the two combatants, the woman – Yuriko Oyama – sat up. Beneath the blood, her scalp wound was gone, smoothed over in fresh skin.

Scott slammed a knee into Laurio's side to lever the larger man off of him before rolling the other way to snatch the nightstick from the guard's belt. The pair sprang to their feet like stray dogs, circling, but now Scott had the advantage as he lashed out with the stick, sending the handle into the pit of the larger man's gut. Laurio staggered, gasping for breath, and Scott followed that attack up with a roundhouse swing to the jaw, drawing a fountain of blood from both nose and mouth as he was thrown into the wall by the force of the blow.

Senses honed by countless hours spent in the Danger Room jerked Scott around to face the new threat, but as quick as he was, he was no match for Yuriko. She struck like a cobra, and the nightstick went spinning. Scott hissed in pain, it felt like he'd been hit by a steel bar. With mind numbing speed, she lashed out, hitting his hands, forearms, and mid body, leaving him incapable of defending himself.

How had this happened? He knew how hard he'd blasted her, and she should have been down for the count, not up and attacking more fiercely than before.

Without halting, she launched herself forward in a flying kick aimed for his head. He saw it coming, and tried to dodge, but watched in stunned disbelieve as she corrected midair before a massive jolt of agony slammed into the side of his skull as her booted foot made contact. On the way down she kicked him again for good measure.

Reaching down, she checked his pulse to ensure he survived before checking the monitor for Xavier. A smile of triumph flitted across her lips as she threaded her fingers together and cracked her knuckles. Mission accomplished.

Back at the mansion, the cascading images flashing in front of Jones's eyes froze, something else had caught his attention, an image on the screen, but not one that belonged to the show. Jones leaned forward slightly, before he clambered up the back of the couch to see who'd entered the room.

For a second, his mind couldn't comprehend what he was seeing. It was a man, dressed just like the commandos in the shows he watched. Dressed in black from head to toe, his face painted in camouflage paint and a knit wool balaclava, battle fatigues, combat boots, weapons and equipment harness, night-vision goggles finished out the ensemble. His name, though Jones didn't know it, was Lyman. He was the leader of the assault force.

The sight of a boy who barely looked like a teenager made the soldier wavier.

Wondering if this was a weird prank, or test that the teachers set up, Jones swung his legs over the back of the couch and padded bare foot towards the stranger.

"Hi," he said, unafraid. Jones knew he had nothing to fear in the mansion.

His eyes widened in stunned disbelief when, without a single word spoken, Lyman pulled his pistol from its holster and fired.

A sharp sting bit into Jones's neck, and he grabbed at it reflexively, pulling the dart out soon enough to recognize what it was, but not fast enough to halt the effects. He sank to the floor, eyes fluttering as the TV channels flickered so fast behind him that the screen almost looked like static.

Lyman used hand signals to direct the rest of the team forward. With wraithlike silence, they dispersed throughout the mansion.

Zen stepped back into a deeper shadow as one of the soldiers passed his position, unaware of the tiny assassin's observation. His first instinct was to kill the intruder, but he stayed his hand.

The man was familiar to him, not as an individual he'd met before, but his bearing, his weapons . . . his purpose. It was the same purpose that once drove him. Stryker, or some other shadow organizational head, had become aware of this enclave of mutants.

A glance at the stranger told Zen all he needed to know. Trank guns, smash and grab then. Good in some ways, worse in others. For an enclave of this size, they would have sent no fewer than three units, with air support on top of that. He could kill them, but the process would take too much time. Each soldier that failed to report in would be tallied, and he knew the tipping point would be reached before his task was finished.

Then the operation would shift from Smash and Grab, to Slash and Burn. The students would die, and the mansion would be burned to the ground. In the news, it would be a tragic fire, perhaps sparked by a gas leak. None of the reports would comment on the fact that each of the victims of the tragic fire had a bullet in their heads.

If Zen tried to take them down, the students would be slaughtered. This sort of operation was limited in scope. The students who got away from the property would be safe, what Zen had to focus on were the ones who didn't escape.

Closing his eyes, he took a slow breath and made his choice.

Zen's eyes widened, and his stance took on the pose of a curious child. "Hello?" The soldier spun on his heel, raising his weapon in the same instant. Zen forced his body to remain still, his face puzzled, as the dart bit into flesh. His last act was to suppress his power, allowing the drug to take effect.

Back in the kitchen, Logan struggled to fight off his growing fatigue. Even without X fighting every second for escape, the strain of being 'out' all the time wore on him. Pride kept him from going to Chuck and admitting the old bastard was right. Mostly because he understood what the next step was.

He'd have to let X out. Willingly let the monster out of the box. No matter how he tried, he couldn't get his mind around how that could be a good thing. That's because it isn't a good idea, it's a fucking terrible idea, I might as well light myself on fire while I'm at it. I'm sure it'll be just as healthy for me.

The thought made his skin twitch with phantom pain, and he fought back a snarl at the sensation. Like the dream, he knew it didn't come from him. Just another phantom memory of a time Logan wanted to keep in the blackness of forgetting. None of these little flashes were of good things, no eating steak or boffing Zen. Of course not, they were all lingering nightmares, like the odor of shallowly buried corpses. I don't want to know! He shouted into his mind at the feral. Keep your shitty memories to yourself.

Exhaustion dragged at his mind so that he appeared to be awake and carrying on a conversation, but he was mostly in a state of torpor. Even though his senses were exquisite, the mind interpreting the information was on auto piolet, limiting the input to the room around him and the stuttering boy across from him.

Together the pair drained the six pack, Logan downing four in a vain effort to wake up, and Bobby sipping on his second while picking through the remains of his ice cream for the last elusive chunks of cookie dough.

"My parents' think this is a prep school," Bobby blurted out to break the silence.

"Hey," Logan replied, amused that he was able to sound coherent since he was speaking through a mental haze that resembled a bank of pea-soup thick fog. "You know, lots of Prep schools have their own dorms, kitchens, and campus."

Bobby arched an eyebrow, an expression he'd recently perfected after hours spent practicing in front of a mirror. "Harrier jets? The Blackbird?"

"So your school takes the right to bear arms to the extreme, it's a free country."

Stretching, Logan tilted his chair back until he'd established a balance so precarious Bobby thought he'd fall any second. He thought of saying something and then thought better of it. Logan was the sort who always knew what they were doing.

"So," Logan said, his eyes sharpening like a predator about to pounce. "Let's get back to you and Zen."

Bobby winced, he'd hoped Logan wouldn't bring it up again.

"It's not what you think." Logan's stony gaze made the next words come out in a rush. "You see, Kitty needed some help with Zen cause she asked him about, er, well guy stuff. And of course, she wasn't equipped to deal with it. She came to me, and Zen and I had a talk about . . . stuff. Then he, well . . ." Bobby's words trailed off, not sure how to approach the next part of the story without getting cut to pieces by those terrifying claws.

"Well?" The low growl in the word made Bobby's legs tingle with the urge to flee for his life.

"Well, Zen had a boner, and he couldn't get rid of it, and I told him about masturbation. He couldn't figure it out, and he made me teach him, but I didn't touch him. I promise!" The words came out in a rush, so fast they were almost one, and almost impossible for Logan to follow.

Zen . . . boner . . . masturbation . . . didn't touch . . .

The words came together slowly in his exhausted mind, and his claws popped out without conscious thought. Bobby squeaked and held his hands up for mercy.

Then Logan froze, his eyes sharpened as all thoughts of Zen and the boy vanished from his mind. He wasn't listening to the boy anymore, nor were his wits dulled by exhaustion. He knew exactly what was happening, and was furious with himself for permitting it.

There was a small green dot on Bobby's forehead.

Bobby cried out in terror and leapt back as Logan's claws slashed out an inch from his face. A tiny ping sounded, and two halves of a dart fell into the abandoned ice cream.

The dot shifted targets as Logan erupted from his chair, too late for the intruder to realize his mistake. He'd been deceived by Logan's hunched form, assuming he was dealing with a pair of students.

He had a submachine gun, a Heckler & Koch MP5, and managed to squeeze off a round before Logan reached him. The bullet cut a burning path through the muscle of Logan's shoulder. The wound healed in the time it took him to reach the man and wrench the barrel upward as the intruder squeezed the trigger on full auto. Like a swarm of angry bees, the bullets punctured walls and ceiling. Bobby dove beneath the table, and the temperature in the room dropped painfully.

Without realizing it, Bobby released a cold so intense it obliterated all heat signatures in the room. High above, the remote observers were blind to the action.

Snarling, Logan ripped the gun from the other man's grasp. In the back of his mind, X demanded blood for the audacity of the intruder invading his territory. Logan fought the urge to tear into the soldier, not wanting to give into the blood lust. They traded punches, to no effect. During the scuffle, the man jerked a combat knife from its scabbard on his vest. He was bigger than Logan, and possibly stronger. The struggle gave the stranger the advantage of height and leverage, and he used both to push the gleaming blade towards Logan's left eye. The man's eyes flicked to the healed gash on Logan's shoulder, but he focused on the task: Kill the enemy.

Then the enemy's eyes shifted, reflecting the same flat, utterly merciless expression in Logan's eyes, and he know in that terrible moment it was over. He'd never had a chance, up until now, Logan had been trying to take him alive.

He heard a sharp snikt from the hand he couldn't see and felt an awful, ripping pain in his chest that reached all the way to his heart . . .

. . . and felt no more.

In the dream, sunlight baked her hair in warmth. She was in the stands and the Cubs were sweeping the Yankees for the World Series in straight shut outs. Sammy Sota made people forget Babe Ruth ever existed, and her mom and dad were there with her in front-row field – level seats. They were a family again, back the way she wanted. Kitty watched Derek Jetter whiff a fastball straight up into the air. The second the bat struck, she knew this one was for her, and she leapt to her feet, eyes on the ball, her glove poised to grab it.

But then she lost it in the glare of the sun. She squinted, like she'd been taught, but she couldn't filter out the vicious glare. For some reason, the sunlight had turned an alien green. Then she started to choke as a gloved hand clamped over the lower half of her face. Kitty lashed out at the fan, determined to catch the ball, but the emerald glare brightened unbearably, and high in the sky, next to the green and larger than she'd ever seen, was a gun.

Like a gum bubble blown too far, the dream popped and she came instantly awake, one part of her mind cataloging everything around her while her active consciousness came up to speed.

Kitty was in the room she shared with Theresa at Xavier's. It was still night time, and the lights were out, save for right around the pair of girls. They were no longer alone. Two huge men loomed over each girl. They wore combat gear, like in the war movies the boys liked to watch sometimes. Their guns had laser sights, not the red ones from the movies, but brilliant green. She recognized the light from her dream.

Her heart skittered in her chest when the two men brought their pistols up to shoot.

Theresa screamed.

In terms of raw decibels, a military jet on full afterburners would have been quieter. The nightmarish sound covered the full range of the ultra-high frequency spectrum, and it slashed through surrounding ear drums like flaming shards of metal.

Glass shattered throughout the room. Not just mirrors and lightbulbs, but the lenses of the soldiers' lasers and their night vision goggles. Siryn lived up to her name, and beyond, generating a sound so powerful it overwhelmed the anechoic buffers built into the walls of the room to pretest the rest of the school from this eventuality.

Down the hall, along the boy's corridor, John flailed wildly against unseen enemies, flinging himself onto the floor. The same went for Marie and every other student in the school.

Anger flared in the groggy teens, unaware of the danger her cry heralded. Sure, the girl sounded terrified, but what else was new? Her room was soundproofed for a reason. It was also the reason Kitty was her roommate. With her phasing power, she could protect her delicate eardrums from the assault.

As for the assault team, they knew they'd lost the element of surprise. No more time for subtlety. It was time to shift into overdrive and use brute force to down the kids before they could gather their wits long enough to resist. The trouble was, even with their advanced ear protection, they were almost debilitated by the sound as their targets.

The difference was only a matter of moments, but those moments proved crucial.

As suddenly as the sound began, it cut out – Siryn ran out of breath. Before she could draw another lung full of air, the soldier snap-fired his dart gun. The effect of the drug was instantaneous, and she was unconscious before her body began to fall back into the warm nest of blankets.

Both men turned towards Kitty, who slammed her eyes shut as she pitched herself through the bed in a rushed dive that sent her staggering towards and through the floor and nearest wall. They couldn't target a mutant who no longer existed on this plane, and then it became mote as the door to the room slammed open, revealing the bare-chested Peter Rasputin.

Peter's elder brother served in the Russian Air Force, part of the Federation space program, and many of the neighbors' sons served their tour in Afghanistan. He knew a soldier when he saw one, and he knew how to handle himself when trouble came knocking.

Spotting the soldiers turning their guns toward him, Peter triggered his own mutation. In the doorway, before their disbelieving eyes, the teen grew, becoming too massive for the opening. His pajama shorts, which were stretchy for this reason, stretched to the breaking point to accommodate the growth. The wooden floor beneath his feet groaned as his mass increased to match his new size. Along with the size shift, his skin changed both texture and color, taking on the sheen of chrome. More importantly, his flesh took on the density of metal, transforming completely into organic armor that possessed the tensile strength of steel.

Gun metal eyes flashed as they took in the sight of Siryn sprawled out on her bed. He turned that frightening stare to the commandos, who reflexively grabbed their machine guns.

No one heard the shots, muffled by silencers and the soundproofing of Siryn's room. The doctored walls also protected the other students from stray fire, stopping the bullets.

Peter's code name was Colossus, and with strength that could rival his namesake, he put both men right through the wall and out into the hallway.

Colossus exited a second later with Siryn cradled in his steely grip. Voices echoed up and down the hallways, a confused jumble of students and commandos, then he heard the pounding of feet, bare, not booted. He turned down another corridor and found a pair of young students cowering in one of the alcoves. Painful light speared the window beyond them, and the glass exploded inward under the force of the downdraft form the rotors of a Sikorsky AH-64 Apache attack helicopter as it took position right outside the building.

The students were pinned under the light, frozen by its frightening glare, unsure if the light would be followed by a hail of bullets. Colossus reacted first, leaping forward to insert his heavy frame between the window and the children. Briefly, he wondered if his tough flesh would be a match the impact of depleted-uranium "tank buster" shells from the Apache's fearsome 30mm chain gun. That monster could shoot right through the mansion, punching holes as big as he was as if it were made of rice paper.

"Come on!" he shouted, and cursed himself when the kids looked at him without understanding. In all the excitement, he forgot to speak English.

"Come on!" he repeated, gesturing for the nearest set of stairs. "Go, go, go!"

Behind them, the light didn't move, but that provided little solace. Peter spotted at least three more from directions that told him the mansion was surrounded.

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