Green mist appeared from nowhere as Amelia Voght and Pietro Maximoff fell into the secured Acolyte portion of the citadel, deep within the fortress' confines.
"Medic! Bring supplies and a crash cart!" A well trained R.N., she wasn't going to sit around wringing her hands. She knew what to do, and she barked another order to get any Genoshan healers, no matter their ability, to this room immediately.
Scanner was nearby, and having heard the orders relayed them and came quickly with the requested supplies. She didn't gasp, seeing the damage Pietro had suffered, but she seemingly wanted to. Voght wanted to snap at her, but Scanner was really doing her best in a difficult situation. And goodness knows, the girl wasn't really made of the sternest stuff.
'Yet another reason we were absolute morons to trust that snake again!' she fumed to herself as she and Sarah worked to keep Quicksilver on this side of the mortal coil. The speedster rasped a painful breath after their first ministrations, once they had cut away his top to better access the damage done to him by the mob.
"Get…off…g…" he seemed to struggle to say. Amelia listened with an experienced ear; was there a lung deflated? It sounded like it.
'Traumatic Pneumothorax,' she thought to herself. An incomplete thought, but it seemingly opened a book in her mind to the right page she'd need to help Pietro survive this."Don't start, Avenger." Voght rapped out as she accepted more medical equipment from Scanner, snapping her old gloves off and rapidly pulling on a second pair. She wanted to wash her hands, she wanted to do a lot of things, really.
She didn't take that opportunity until two of the people the Genengineer had tried to torture into living medical equipment arrived. Their bodies were separated from the disgusting skinsuits the Genoshan government forced mutants into, but time would tell how many times they would need to undergo tattoo removal from their foreheads. Some mutates weren't interested, while others had already begun. Some had used more drastic measures, requiring the already overstrained healer services to mend what past hatred and current shame wrought.
Scanner moved back with Amelia as the other two Genoshan citizens managed to do more than even a trained nurse like Amelia could without science. Within a matter of seconds, his bleeding slowed, stopped, and his wounds wound themselves shut, lightened the contusions under the skin, restored fractured bone.
The other Acolyte left to handle some of the hovering attendants that buzzed outside of the room, and Amelia stayed focused on the scene before her as the mutant was pulled back safely from the Grim Reaper's grasp. While obviously still weak and looking near to death himself, his eyes snapped open as he struggled to sit up.
"Prince Pietr-" one of the attendants began to say.
"Don't call me that!" he snapped reflexively. He didn't look embarrassed to Amelia, but it was hard to tell with him, just as it often was with his father. But it seemed he was because he mumbled an apology.
"Please, ah…sir. Don't move just yet. The…healing?" the person who was rebuilding their sense of self still seemed to be surprised that someone found them of use, and that their assistance was asked instead of demanded. "The healing, yes…it um…it doesn't restore one to their full strength. Just what…what's needed."
"Not…good enough." Pietro grated as he forced himself to sit up. "Amelia." he said briskly, trying to wave off the two healers who fluttered nervously around him. "This is a coup." He ignored the gasps from those around the room at his bluntness.
'They're going to need to get with the program a little faster,' she thought to herself as she nodded. Aloud, she said,'Your father is fine, he's -"
Scanner's voice came in over Voght's earpiece. "-fzzt-eto, Ma-nus- feed was falsified - zzzzaaWRRktzz-Commander! You must get to Lord Magnet-"
That was all she needed to hear, Amelia rose to her feet. Tired or not, hurting or not. Sickened or not by the gore and viscera around her as the few followers of the Zealot that had only parts of them continue with her were scattered about them. Those that survived were quickly quelled by her allies upon arrival. It was good to have actual faithful people still within the citadel, allowing her the ability to focus on the real worries at hand.
Like Pietro. Like Magneto.
She started to teleport back to Magneto, but belatedly, she realized her arm was gripped tightly by the speedster, who used a burst of his energy to keep up with her.
'Clever, like his father,' she thought as they both teleported into Magneto's office.
And then bedlam cut loose.
Cortez was speaking into a large cellular device, something about a helicopter? Magneto was struggling to interrupt the waves; but it was so hard. He hated feeling this way; once he killed Cortez, he would work to set this to rights.
Cortez hung up his phone and tossed it on the ground, forgotten. He must have felt he had entered his end game. Blathering on about something, Magneto feigned attention. He wanted to kill him and be done with this, but no. Magneto was growing weaker, but his resolve was no less firm. He had spent the last few precious seconds distracting the upstart as he manipulated a pen ever so slowly. He'd have only one shot at this.
"-hat this is enough to stop me, you foolish usurper?" Magneto asked, doing his best to stall for time. It was hard to remain upright, and he allowed the strain to show on his face. His mind kept casting back to other concerns. To be perfectly frank, he was frantically wondering where his son was, where Rogue was. He knew she was out, amongst the city somewhere, and it chafed him to no end, knowing what that meant about either of their current status.
As Cortez ranted on and on about some nonsense that he had clearly practiced, Magneto recalled how he met Rogue in the Savage Land so long ago, almost at as great a loss then as now. She survived a jungle that few outlanders could consider with assistance from others. And for weeks she did it alone. He would trust in her, as he always had. Wherever she was, she would find a way to survive and be safe until he could arrive. And his son was more than resilient. He would survive.
So too did Magneto, and to do that, for now, he needed to buy more time. Craftily, he acted as if one of his legs wavered, and the desk moved under his stumble. It got the small pen in a better spot, he could launch it with another moment or two, if he needed it. Cortez was looking at him, expecting him to respond. Magneto didn't care, he was going to find a way-
ZRAK
A loud, strange noise. Reality was rent asunder as Vanisher appeared with two towheaded youths, clad in harsh black, red, and yellow. The bald-headed mutant teleported out just as swiftly, somewhat shamefully. Perhaps he didn't want to be associated with the pair he just ferried here. Magnus knew them well, after all.
"Ah. There we go. You're late, von Struckers." Cortez sneered at them. The two seemed to ignore it, to begin their practiced speech.
"We are Fenris!" the boy boomed and they gripped hands in triumph. "The Great Wolf!"
"Come now, dear brother!" Andrea crowed with delight. "Today marks the day we slay Magnet-oh!"
When Amelia and Quicksilver teleported in, Pietro assessed the situation, then acted swiftly, decisively. Everything everyone complained he was and wasn't all at the same time seemed to happen here. All too often he was describes as being too impetuous to be a leader, too fast to be considered a dullard to shove into a faceless uniform for the back. That was the common assessment of every file he had ever filched, peeked, or was even offered to review by those who thought it would help him grow. He never really wanted to lead, and he never really wanted to let anyone know his full potential because of those snap of the moment, cursory understandings of him. Thanks to that, Pietro decided to be everything he hid and held back day in and out.
Today, he put all of that to shame with his actions and oh, it felt so good.
The world moved like it was a clock caught with stripped gears. He slid through the world, feeling more like he swam in the space between. It was like gliding in a way; it always felt that way for him. Much more natural than the normal pace he had to force himself to maintain, day in, day out. It was normally so nice to let loose.
This time, however, there was so much pain.
He didn't care; he barely needed that fraction of a second between their arrival, and the room's reaction. It was nice that everyone else couldn't react so quickly, because it was nearly immediate that he was off like a shot. He recognized those two; Andrea and Andreas. Those sick twins, a disgusting mirror of himself and his own sister, practically made as if to contrast against the Maximoffs. He saw Cortez. And in that momentary pause as the group around them reacted to his and Voght's appearance, and he processed it, then acted faster than all else in the room.
It hurt so badly! But he moved with as much speed as possible, gripping Cortez by the head and snapping his neck. Before the Acolyte's body could react any further than that, Pietro twisted his entire body at the waist, throwing Fabian with enough torque that he barreled the red-haired man into the twins who went down with a sprawl. Pietro wanted to move further, faster, but he couldn't, he felt something twist and crack inside of him.
'No, not quite that. Burst,' he thought with clinical detachment as he dropped to his knees, then onto one side. He wanted to lie in the recovery position, but that would take too much energy to turn over onto his other side. Furthermore, if he did, he wouldn't be able to see what happened next.
Magneto rose up, power welling back into him once more as Cortez's concentration and power broke with a snap that all in the room heard. Someone gasped, not Magneto, but he wasn't certain who. It didn't matter, especially as he witnessed his son fall to the ground in clear agony. He rose into the air, rage incarnate as he lifted the slowly dying Acolyte off of the twins and flung him to one side. The two bounded to their feet, but it was too little too late.
The twins reached for each other as Magneto closed the hand he extended before him. The metal in the room reacted, forming a multihued set of spears from the various types of material within. The unerring accuracy of the Master of Magnetism struck out, pinioning both of the twins through the chest at opposing angles.
The Fenris Twins died with blood spilling from their mouths, their eyes on each other, hands outstretched. Before their fingers could intertwine, the light faded from their eyes and their bodies went limp. Andreas tried to gasp out a word, but whatever it was passed with him. The Fenris Twins died as they lived. Together.
The weapons of their death formed an X. How very fitting. Magneto allowed himself a moment of satisfaction before turning away from them and Fabian. The room was deathly silent except the strangled gasping wheezes of Cortez dying. Then Amelia spoke up, from where she was kneeling by his son, capturing his attention.
"Pietro? Hold on, just keep your eyes on me - Pietro!" she exclaimed.