"Oh, Charles, are you STILL mad about that spot of unpleasantness in Laos?" Loki Odindottir said. "I told you before, I was TRYING to help you-"
"I am NOT getting into that debate with you again, Loki," Charles said in a cold manner as he approached. "What is your concern in all this?"
Loki leaned back in her seat as though insulted.
"Why Charles, I AM the sworn protector of Midgard! I have to take an interest when the lives of innocent mortals are at stake, no matter how small or how large the number. My duties do not stop just at my activities with Rogers and the Gang. I am very much a constantly active force all over this world, whether I am noticed or not." she replied casually, glancing at her nails as she spoke, which she knew irritated him.
"And when one of the most powerful Mutants in history finally chooses to make his debut in this plain of reality...it's kind of a big deal..." she added getting up and sauntering over to Scott, circling him.
"Especially when this version of...Cyclops..." she trailed playfully with a wink at him, all but saying she knew his real name.
"...is so much more powerful than most other versions..."
"OTHER versions?" Ororo asked skeptically, folding her arms, not trusting the golden-haired beauty.
"Yes...other versions...a whole Multiverse of them, in fact..." Loki said, twirling her spear in a one-handed manner as she circled him. "He's just beginning to test his potential."
"What's a multi-verse?" Mort asked.
Loki gave a petulant huff.
"Oh, they really MUST start teaching you Midgard children more quantum mechanics..." she complained. "There is not just ONE version of you, but many versions in an infinite number of parallel universes. In some you are good, others evil beyond all hope of redemption. This goes for all of us."
Scott did not react to this information, remaining like the very Sphinx of the country he had just been whisked away from into this golden throne room.
"Continue," Scott said calmly.
Loki raised an eyebrow. "Guess your time with Essex put some vinegar in you, eh kid?"
"I've been attacked by robots and men in powered armor. I've been tortured, experimented on, and brainwashed to do things against my will. One more fact of absolutely slobbering, insane reality after finding an ancient alien tech cave isn't going to do much at this point," Scott answered back dryly.
Loki shrugged. "I suppose not. Well, since you are a little more tough than I gave you credit for, I'll just dive right into it...soon, about eight months from now, you will face what is known as an Absolute Point on the island of Genosha."
This made Xavier start listening more, deep anxiety crossing his face.
"An Absolute Point? Are you sure?"
"As sure as the sun rises, Charles." Loki replied with a smug, knowing smile.
"In English, please," Scott requested.
Loki sighed, pacing a bit, heels of her golden stilettos clicking on the polished throne floor.
"An Absolute Point is a moment in history that needs to happen. That must happen. That WANTS to happen. It cannot be prevented from occurring. Nor can it be undone once it has occurred, lest you implode the universe you live in. The Absolute Point at Genosha will take the form of the first, full throated attempt to wipe out most of the mutant population of the world, which is currently at Genosha," Loki said, teleporting in a golden shimmer back to her throne, where she immediately sat down.
"What form will the attempt take?" Charles asked.
"That's for you to discover. I've told you all I can where that is concerned. I'm afraid you'll have to ask me something else," Loki replied in a regretful manner.
"Why can't you be more forthcoming?" Mort asked.
"There are rules even the All-Sorceress cannot break, my young friend," Loki replied with a gentle smile at Mort that put him at ease. "And telling you too much of the future is one of those rules. I can only give you the most general of answers in this matter, and the actual help I can provide, equally limited. I'm stretching the rules to their absolute limit of generous interpretation even doing what I am doing."
"If it can't be prevented, or undone, then what's the point of facing it?" Ororo asked.
"Because an Absolute Point's only true rule is that a certain event MUST occur at a certain moment. In this case, the Massacre at Genosha. But...if you are smart...and perhaps more than a little lucky..." She trailed, crossing her legs as she leaned back in her grand chair. "...perhaps a single, teeny tiny detail within that Absolute Point as it occurs might be changed..."
"A detail tiny enough to be worth trying to change isn't tiny," Mort pointed out.
Loki only smiled. "Quicker than your other versions..."
"Will we find Essex there?" Scott asked.
Loki nodded. "Yes. But I warn you...getting to that one will NOT be easy."
"Where the Witchdoctor goes, I pursue," Ororo vowed, bitter hate edging into her voice.
"I can tell you only one other thing in regard to your task..." Loki said. "Only by embracing what you are will you get what you want."
Scott didn't react to this.
"Now, about this help I can give you..." Loki said, teleporting next to Scott, plucking a golden ring from her wedding finger that had a strange black dragon symbol on it.
"I pried this from The Mandarin's cold, dead fingers..." Loki said, placing it into his waiting palm. "This ring is known as The Nightbringer. Creates a temporary field of darkness in a one-hundred-meter area around the user that only they can see through. All others shall be utterly blind, either organically, or sensor wise. Even Celestial technology cannot pierce the darkness it creates. Each use of the ring creates this darkness for up to a period of fifteen minutes before it needs a full day to recharge itself."
"The catch?" Scott asked.
"I do not want you growing too reliant on such things, so I have cast an enchantment upon this ring so that it will return to me after a single use..." Loki replied calmly, before striding over to Ororo.
"You my dear, will have need of my gifts as well," Loki said, golden light shimmering in her hand, producing a glossy black chalice with a mirror finish, handing it to a stunned Ororo.
"The Ebony Chalice. Pour water into it, and it will be converted into an elixir that grants you the solution to the most pressing question on your mind at the moment you drink it...but the side effects are toxic, debilitating...and become worse the more potent the question that vexes you," Loki explained.
"Could it kill me?" Ororo asked, brow furrowing.
Loki nodded without hesitating. "I will only allow you to use the chalice three times before the enchantment I have placed on it returns to me. And before you ask, the question of how to alter a minor detail of an Absolute Point will produce a magical elixir so lethal that drinking it would not only kill you, but everyone now tied to you in this room barring myself, of course."
"Huh..." Ororo muttered, clasping the chalice.
Mort only scratched his messy mop of a head at all this.
"How come Ororo gets to use her Chekhov's Gun three times and Cyclops only gets to use his once?" Mortimer asked.
"Because even if I didn't have concerns about you growing too reliant on these gifts, using them for anything but the most vital, desperate circumstances would create a bunch of runaway butterfly effects, and this particular timeline has enough of those as it is," Loki answered. "There must be balance in these matters, or the only result that shall occur from my attempt to do good here shall be no less than utter chaos, and as the All-Sorceress, I DESPISE chaos."
Loki then teleported to a frowning Charles Xavier.
"Well? What double edged sword having you chosen to give me this time?" Xavier pondered in sarcasm.
Loki smiled and held out her hands, conjuring a strange looking helmet that was spherical in shape, with the mark of a burning red X encircled by runes over the portion that covered the face.
"The Mercy Crown..." Loki said. "Crafted in Limbo. It allows you to detect Mutants by scanning for their Souls."
"What's the drawback?" Xavier asked immediately.
"Using it more than once will cost you the use of your legs. Forever. Upon using it twice, the helmet returns to me," Loki answered.
Charles went pale.
Mort started hopping up and down. "Me next! What do I get?"
Loki chuckled and sauntered over to him.
"Mortimer Tolansky Toynbee..." Loki said pleasantly. "You shall receive the most precious gift of any of those you travel with...my favor..."
Loki removed her horned Tiara and gave it to an awestruck Mortimer, flabbergasted to be giving anything personally owned by a member of The Avengers.
"Put that on your head or someone else in a moment of extreme danger and it will teleport the wearer back to this very throne room. Even if they were injured or near death, they will be perfectly healthy upon being transported here, at which point I shall send them to any place they wish to go. And because I admire your perceptiveness so much, I shall allow you to do this twice before reclaiming my Tiara."
"Any drawbacks?" Mort asked.
"You must be absolutely certain, more than even the others about exactly when to use this boon I have granted you..." Loki answered, blue eyes locking with his unnaturally large ones, placing a hand on his shoulder and squeezing.
"Remember, with Great Power comes Great Responsibility..."
"I will, Queen Loki," Mortimer vowed, wanting to impress who he thought was the hottest female Avenger.
"I know you will, Mortimer," Loki assured kindly before turning to the rest of them.
"I have two more gifts for you all collectively...but unlike the ones I have just given you, these two I shall not reclaim. Once they are yours, they are yours...along with all the headaches that come with them."
Loki gestured for them to follow them to an adjacent chamber that was no less large than the throne itself, piled high with golden books and scrolls on polished shelves of an unknown black metal.
Scott beheld a globule of pulsing red flesh on one altar and another containing lumps of wet, Asgardian Clay.
"Cyclops, would you hand me the Love Stone you retrieved from Rama-Tut's private research lab?" Loki requested.
"What, this?" Scott asked, retrieving the glowing pink stone.
"Yes."
Scott handed it to her.
"How casually you surrender so precious a thing, Cyclops. Love doesn't register much to you, does it?"
"No. It doesn't. I don't mourn that," Scott said.
Loki shrugged. "Probably for the best then..."
Loki walked over to the globule of red tissue that constantly, disgustingly pulsed.
"This is a Mummudrai, a psionic entity capable of replicating DNA it encounters. This one arrived at Earth thirteen years ago and came into contact with shapeshifter DNA when it inhabited a certain body that happened to be pregnant with another Mutant's child." Loki said clinically, circling the pulsing mass.
"A struggle naturally ensued between Good and Evil...and Good lost, reduced to a mess of cells after being expelled from its host's body. It's spent all this time gestating in a sewer in Germany. And if left to its own devices, it would take another three years for it to finish building its body. I dunno about you, but frankly, I don't have that kind of patience..." Loki trailed, holding up the Love Stone.
"Pure, Selfless Love is the most powerful force in the Universe. It creates heroes, and heroism, and the Love Stone harnesses that Force to create good people on an active basis..." Loki said to them.
A pink blast of energy erupted in an almost blinding light from the stone Loki held, hitting the pulsing mass, and making it grow rapidly into someone elderly, naked and bald with crimson skin and yellow eyes. Her body was like that of a barbie doll, showing only shape and contour, but not going into the full detail like a normal female body. Despite its clear signs of advanced age, it was a taut, muscular form, albeit rather thin. Her wrinkled face finished forming and she yawned before looking around.
"Gutentag..." she called out in a pleasant but thick East German accent, somersaulting off the altar, and taking a bow, unconcerned at how unsettled everyone was by her.
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am Cassandra Nova Darkholme. You may refer to me as Mystique, for short," Mystique said, her voice very much that of a woman in her late eighties, as she teleported behind them in a puff of smoke, shocking them all. "It's wonderful to meet all of you."
"I...nice to meet you too, Mystique...you...don't seem curious about how you got here," Scott observed.
Mystique only chuckled. "I'm a Mummudrai, silly! I was fully aware of what was going on in that throne room. I would be more than happy to travel with you, as I owe you my ability to walk around."
"We're happy to have you aboard then," Ororo said, trying to be understanding.
"I thank you, Fraulein," Mystique said to her, "Just as I owe a debt of profound gratitude to her Majesty, Queen Loki, for speeding up my completion."
"I'm not done yet..." Loki said, standing over the pile of Asgardian Clay, naturally infused with the magic of the realm.
Loki placed the Stone amidst the pile of clay and began chanting in Asgardian until the Clay shuddered and piled together over the stone, forming another female humanoid shape.
Nearby, a sphere of golden metal broke down into a liquified state, forming a set of vambraces, a tiara and a golden chain, flying towards the now distinctly female looking clay body the vambraces clamping on its arm, the coiled chain slinking onto one of the shoulders as gray matter became fair skin and a black, t-shaped leotard of scales that resembled a much more revealing version of Loki's own armor appearing over the body whose scalp was rapidly growing midnight black hair in long curls in a golden shimmer, followed by matching black stilettos. The woman opened her eyes, a buxom, athletic masterpiece of female physique slightly under that of Loki herself.
"When a great evil threatens the Innocent, The Love Stone, on the rare occasions it's been found, have sometimes been used by various figures to craft a protector. A Princess of pure love, strength, and kindness. A paragon to fight evil directly and inspire others to take up the cause of fighting evil. It is not the first time the Power Princess has been reborn...and I doubt it shall be the last..." Loki said as Power Princess opened her eyes and a warmth and kindness spread into her gaze instantly.
"Hello, all of you," the muscular beauty said in an unusually soft, disarming voice as she levitated off the Altar on her own power.
"I understand Power Princess may become annoying to use for you repeatedly, so you may refer to me as Zarda, if you wish." Power Princess offered helpfully.
"A pleasure to meet you, Zarda..." Xavier said, aghast that Loki could create life so casually.
"I'm afraid I must send you on your way, but first, I would like for you to collect your friend, Mister Dukes, who has been just an absolute gentleman during his stay..." Loki stated politely.
Loki led the newly formed group to another chamber, this one a great dining hall, where they spotted Fred in all his massive girth, daintily dining on Asgardian cuisine while stupendously beautiful Asgardian women in long flowing gowns strummed golden lyres not far away, some fanning him. Charles turned even paler than he usually did.
"Hiya fellas!" Fred called out. "You wouldn't BELIEVE the menu they got here. I could eat several times a day here every day for a hundred years and never taste the same thing twice!"
"No kidding," Cyclops noted, watching the remains of what he had crammed down. The entire table, about a quarter of a mile long, was flush with the remains of large dishes, and goblets.
"Mein Gott in Himmel!" Mystique exclaimed, teleporting to him and surprising Fred. "Whoa!" he exclaimed.
"Mister Dukes, was it? Allow me to introduce myself. I am Cassandra Nova Darkholme. You may call me Mystique, for short."
"Fred Dukes. You can call me Blob!" Blob said enthusiastically. "Nice to meet you!"
"The feeling is mutual!" she said happily. "How are you able to devour so much?"
Fred chuckled sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head. "That's just me, I guess."
Ororo walked to him. "Hello, Fred, I'm Ororo."
"A pleasure, Ororo!" Fred replied. "I didn't know Scott and the Professor would be bringing back three new people!"
"Hello, Fred. I'm Zarda," Power Princess said enthusiastically, floating over to him.
Fred nodded. "So, I guess this means it's time to leave, right?"
"I'm afraid so, Fred. But you were an absolutely delightful guest," Loki assured. "Be careful out there."
Fred beamed and stood up from the table.
"Well let's get going!"
"Fred, you're over a thousand pounds. The Jet won't carry your weight!" Xavier exclaimed.
"Ahem...Fred and I worked on that while you were out in Egypt. Gave him a couple of pointers, hope you don't mind," Loki said to Charles.
Charles eye twitched but he ignored her. "If you feel you can do so, I of course, am eager to see," he said to Fred.
"You'll see. It was so simple; I'm actually embarrassed I didn't pick up on it myself..." Fred said with a wistful sigh.
"Mystique? A moment..." Loki called out. Mystique teleported to her.
"Ja?" Mystique asked.
Loki held out her hand, and a small, tiny medallion of a golden skull appeared in her palm.
"Oh, Fraulein, you've been much too kind simply helping me complete my body! I couldn't possibly accept-!" Mystique protested.
Loki smiled but shook her head.
"You're very humble to refuse, Cassandra, but I'm afraid I must insist in this one instance," Loki replied.
Mystique took it. "What is it?"
"It's an Asgardian Cybernetic Exodermal Implant," Loki explained. "Its primary purpose is to provide the head a form of semi-discrete protection in the form of an invisible force field that conforms to the shape of the face and head at all times. The field is strongest in the front and back, and weakest on the sides and neck. It only defends against solid, fast-moving projectiles and mild energy weapon attacks."
"How do I use it?" Mystique asked.
"Place it on your forehead," Loki answered.
Mystique placed it directly in the middle and two faint, bright lights appeared in the eye sockets of the skull design. Her wiry, aged body seemed to have its muscle tissue swell slightly.
"The secondary purpose is to provide you with something near Captain America like stamina. From what my magic senses of the Love Stone's effects on your tissue, you do not have the same type of shapeshifting as the creature you copied your DNA from...and by default your strength and resistance to damage is only that of an ordinary, eighty-year-old human woman who eats and exercises regularly, though you have acquired the teleportation capability of her son-"
"My son," Mystique corrected. "He's my son, not hers. She threw him into the river because he couldn't blend in, and she couldn't be bothered. All I could do was watch."
Loki nodded. "Of course, Cassandra. Forgive me...now as I was saying...you have the capability to regenerate from catastrophic damage to a degree far greater than your genetic source could ever hope for...but despite being able to heal from damage that would kill Raven permanently...you heal far, far slower than she does, despite her ability at regeneration technically being weaker than yours. It could take you hours, days even, to come back from a truly vicious attack. You'll also tire quicker in hand to hand, at least without the implant. The rest I leave to you to discover."
"Thank you, Queen Loki," Mystique said with a bow.
"What's Zarda's powers?" Mort asked Loki.
"Asgardian strength, speed, and stamina..." Loki answered, teleporting next to the Princess. "With vambraces, a chain weapon and a tiara made of enchanted Uru, which is unbreakable to mortal weapons, and tied to the Love Stone which powers her very being. She can emit psionic blasts from her mouth that temporarily drive away all desire to fight. You must learn the rest."
"You've certainly given me a great deal to think about, Loki..." Xavier trailed. "Bereft of leads, I see no alternative but to accept your aid."
"I'm glad you finally decided I was telling the truth," Loki replied wryly.
Xavier shrugged. "You are...for the moment."
"Well, I'd say it's time for a shakedown run of you all," Loki said with an enthusiastic smirk. "I'll put you close to the entrance you came in through Charles. But you'll all have to book for the Jet...they'll be hot on your heels."
"And Cyclops..." she said, looking directly at him. "Do be sure not to forget the Ruby Quartz, would you?"
Cyclops nodded.
With a final, playful wink at them all, Loki snapped her fingers.
The whole group all found themselves back in the golden chamber that Xavier, Mort, and Scott had first come upon.
"Verwunderlich!" Mystique exclaimed as she beheld the golden environment and its alcoves of Ruby Quartz.
"This is the Ruby Quartz, ja?" Mystique asked, teleporting to one alcove. "Allow me, Herr Zyklop..."
She held out her hand and her flesh morphed a single, curving claw of red tissue from her hand, slicing clean through a large chunk. Her other hand caught it.
"One problem, how are we gonna carry all this AND run for our lives?" Mort asked, still holding the golden upgrade box they had taken from Rama-Tut's lab, in addition to Loki's Tiara.
"Allow me..." Power Princess said gently, her eyes glowing pink as the objects they had acquired glowed pink.
"I'll meet you all at the Jet," She promised, floating the objects with her mind as she flew out with all of their prizes trailing behind her. Xavier soon broke into a run behind her and when they reached the cave entrance, he spotted helicopters. Four, armed with machineguns in the distance.
"Damn it she would drop us into the frying pan!" Xavier cursed. "Run! Run, all of you!"
The group broke into a run through black sands.
"Hey Wrinkles! You can teleport right? Why don't you just teleport us to the Jet?!" Mort asked of Mystique in a panic as he hopped for his life.
"I have to see where I am going, wenig heuschrecke..." Mystique replied as she ran, occasionally teleporting ahead. "and besides, I've only technically been alive about ten minutes."
"Well, those choppers are gonna catch us before we reach the Jet, and I got the feeling that ain't the Egyptian Government raring for us!" Mortimer said. "And the name is Toad!"
"Ja! Good one! It fits!" Mystique complimented as she ran and teleported ahead.
Then she perked up. "Perhaps I can buy us some time..."
Mystique turned, looked at the helicopters and teleported repeatedly to them, getting inside the troop section of one of the transport choppers.
Mystique smirked with her strange all yellow eyes, the tips of her fingers growing into long claws before she rammed those finger claws upward into the cabin just as they opened fire with their assault rifles, tearing open her chest, blasting open chunks of crimson tissue yet there was no blood as Mystique lunged, her clawed fingers slicing through the rifle of the blue and purple garbed troops, though Mystique did not kill, instead taking advantage of the smoke and her natural reflexes to non-fatally wound them with punches and kicks delivered at a blistering speed, even withing the confines of the cabin via her feet mostly, getting one with a sleeper hold grabbing one of their pistols and shooting one in the knee before diving out the side, teleporting to the front of another attack chopper, chest still blasted open with the exit wounds big enough to push a soda can through, yet no blood or gore leaked out.
She morphed her arm into a sword and plunged it into the nose section of the chopper, teleporting to behind the copilot seat and sticking her sword arm into the dashboard of the cockpit, creating smoke instantly as she elbowed the pilot and teleported out as the cabin started to fill with smoke, reappearing above the third helicopter, firing with extreme accuracy at the part where the blades actually met the rotor, getting into the interior parts and doing critical damage as she teleported just before she would have hit the blades and re appeared holding onto the tail of the last helicopter, and she morphed her free arm into an axe head this time and sliced clean through the tail, Causing it to spin violently as she teleported away and to the ground, watching all four make crash landings, one exploding in the back.
Mystique looked down, her exposed, anatomically lacking crimson torso bubbling disgustingly all over the front and back as it finally sealed the wounds.
"I'm coming for you, Raven," she vowed, before teleporting to rejoin the others, particularly checking up on Scott, Xavier, and Fred, who were lagging behind the rest.
"Hold on to me!" she called out, and they all linked hands with her as she teleported them ahead, having gotten a birds eye view of the desert, spotting the tell-tale glow of Power Princess waiting by the jet.
Soon she teleported them all to the Jet.
"Nice work, Mystique. Who would have thought a grandma could be so useful in battle?" Scott mused as he watched a bunch of desert trucks pulling up around them.
"Oh, dear. I guess Loki wasn't kidding when she said shakedown," Mystique ruefully admitted.
"Loki's idea of a shakedown run and a human's idea of one tend to be very, very different things..." Xavier muttered darkly.
The group watched as instead of standard human soldiers, tall, regal looking people in full silvery armor with red hieroglphics floated up out of the cloth covers of the truck.
"You have all dared to attack the property of Clan Akkaba. Your lives are forfeit in the name of En Sabah Nur..." the armored man whose face was covered by a blue hood said before he morphed his arm into some sort of cannon somehow along with the others.
Zarda's eyes glowed, and Professor Xavier, herself and the Jet was protected by a pink bubble of energy as white energy beams smacked into it violently, forcing the others to scramble as they were fired on as well. Cyclops blinked, watching all the armored foes seemed to triple in height and size...
Cyclops grimaced, pressed the discharge button on his visor, its default setting shot out, punching right through one, yet he did not die, instead he returned fire, forcing Scott to get out of the way from the white blast, firing at the face and this finally made the warrior who flew float away quickly rather than be hit, but they all towered over them now.
Blob launched himself with his deceptively powerful legs at one, tackling it and pummeling the warrior with his fists until he didn't move again, moving to others, chuckling as he withstood their energy blasts, Mystique teleporting behind one and sinking the claws she formed from her fingers into the warriors head, which didn't kill him, but made him double over in pain before throwing her off...only for her to teleport back in front of him, slicing both his arms and legs off in a surprisingly fast motion with her grown claws, Mort blinding them with his mucus to open up attacks from Scott, who hit them in their legs and arms, sometimes blasting them off. Poer Princess at last decided to get in the fight once she was sure she could divide her attention and unleashing a powerful blast of purple light from her mouth which hit one and... just made him fly away. She hit two more before they all were driven off, even the one who had lost all his limbs by levitating away under his own power.
Everybody was panting from the obvious adrenaline...
"Come friends, we must flee before more come!" Mystique said as she ran up the ramp, body riddled with bloodless holes and tears in most parts of her body, save the head.
"No arguments there..." Scott grumbled, taking one of the armor pieces from the battle to examine it on the flight back...