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1X00 – The X-Men – Act I
Emergency services were scattered about the parking lot of the research facility. Two fire trucks stood by as firemen made sweeps of the building. Almost half a dozen ambulances treated the guards, though most were given a clean bill of health by the paramedics. Marked and unmarked police cars were dotted between, everyone trying to figure out what exactly just happened.
Hovering at the edge of the scene, Scott watched as an older gentleman, blonde hair with a linebacker’s face, separated himself from a group of mixed police and federal agents to wander over to where the mutant was standing.
“Agent Duncan,” Scott greeted the man.
“Summers,” Federal Agent Frederick Duncan responded with a nod, checking no one was paying attention to them.
“What did you find out?” Scott had exchanged his visor for a set of ruby quartz, banded sunglasses, attempting to blend in, although the short feral man next to him and the beautiful white haired goddess at his other side made that near impossible.
“No real injuries, a few concussions,” Duncan gestured towards the complex, “mostly just damage from the sprinklers going off and whatever happened to the floor. Dominikos Petrakis’s work I take it?”
“The whole team was here,” he nodded.
The FBI agent frowned at that, “Third robbery in two weeks.”
“Noticed that ourselves,” Logan said gruffly, crossing his arms. “What they steal this time?”
“Dunno yet,” Duncan shrugged. “Seems the Section Chief is currently in what is described as a comatose state.”
“Rogue. It’ll wear off soon,” Scott said more for himself seeing as the agent had experience with the Brotherhood’s Acolytes. Duncan would have recognized the effects of Rogue’s mutation.
“Best guess at the moment,” the agent continued, “they took the same as before, data and hardcopy files on whatever black op military or DARPA project Bastion Industries was working on.”
“Any luck in figuring out what that is?” Storm asked.
“Hitting walls, Bastion, DARPA, NSA, Homeland, DoD… they keep pulling the ‘above your pay grade’ shtick,” he then gave her a curious glance, “any luck with your friend, Mr Silvercloud?”
The woman forced back a grimace, “He’s being… difficult.”
“Any word on the Acolytes?” Logan interrupted.
“The stolen cop car was found across town in a parking lot,” Duncan filled them in. “They probably stole another and by the time we figure out which, they’ll have moved on through three more, it’s their M.O.”
“The way Rogue drives,” the Wolverine gave a growl that was somewhere between annoyance and appreciation, “they could be three states over by now.”
“Probably,” Duncan frowned then tilted his head as he just thought of something. “Did you hear about last night?”
“No,” Scott didn’t like that tone, usually meant bad things.
“A lead computer scientist for Bastion Industries, Switzerland office, was found murdered,” he filled them in, “the wife looks good for it, but frankly, it has Mystique written all over it, not that it can be proved in court.”
“Metal Head’s little assassin,” Logan did not like that woman, at all, and Scott still wasn’t exactly sure what the root of that animosity was.
“I don’t know why he was targeted,” Duncan admitted, “but best guess he’s been working on whatever it is the Brotherhood has been stealing. If I find out more, I’ll pass it on.”
“Thank you, Fred,” Scott decided that there wasn’t much left for them now, “and you’ll see to it no one knows of our involvement here tonight?”
“As always,” the man gave a resigned smile and as the three turned to leave, he spoke up again, “Hey, you might want to remind Charles that the Brotherhood is stepping up their game, the Government is a tension line ready to snap in all directions… he can’t just wait around hoping everything will turn out okay on its own.”
Scott nodded to the man who returned the gesture and headed back into the fray of police and agents.
“He’s right, you know,” Storm spoke with a touch of sadness in her voice. “Magneto will continue to escalate until he’s given the government no choice but to declare war on the Brotherhood, and that war will spill over into non-combatants both mutant and human.”
“I know, Ororo,” Scott was beginning to feel like a broken record, “I know.”
…
“I said don’t stop, don’t stop, talking to me,” Rogue and Pryo sang loudly as their Ford Taurus sped down the highway, radio blaring. “Stop, don’t stop, don’t stop, giving me things.”
Dom sat in the back seat, quite used to such an occurrence, but that not making it any better.
When Avalanche joined up with the Brotherhood two years ago, Rogue, Pyro and Quicksilver had already spent almost a decade together training under Mystique. They were like siblings, Quicksilver being the older brother who was apt to try and do everything himself because he found most people slow and inept, Pyro was quite possibly clinically insane but apparently his therapist as a teenager didn’t feel comfortable making that diagnoses. Rogue, well, she was the sister who managed to keep both of them in line, while also being borderline schizophrenic herself.
On more than one occasion Dom had to ask himself what the hell he got himself into the middle of, but generally the company was nice and the pay was excellent… if he could just convince them that neither could carry a tune.
“I run, they run, everybody run run,” they continued, “and we’re all just having fun!”
Salvation was had when Pyro’s phone rang. Rogue clicked the radio off with the steering wheel controls as the Australian answered, taking a moment before putting the device on speaker.
“Rogue,” Pietro’s voice came over the line, “been a change of plans. I’ve texted Pyro a new address for the drop off.”
“Why the change?” she asked as Pyro started to fiddle with the phone, pulling up the text and then feeding the information into the dashboard GPS.
“Magneto’s orders,” he answered and that put the end to it as neither was likely to question the leader of the Brotherhood.
“Alright,” she shrugged as she slid the car around a slow poke, the GPS screen showing the new route.
Dom leaned forward to see it himself and noted an extra hour added to their drive time… what fun.
“We should stop and switch cars,” she said after a moment’s musing.
“That’s fine,” Quicksilver said curtly, “just don’t take too long.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she rolled her eyes, for Pietro everything took too long, it was a personality trait that tended to grate on everyone’s nerves but seeing as it was a condition of his mutation, they just dealt with it.
“Ooo,” Pyro was fiddling with the GPS, “let’s stop here, they have a Burger King.”
“Seriously?” Rogue gave him one of her ‘looks’.
“I’m hungry!” he said unabashedly.
“Fine,” she sighed and turned her attention back to the road, “but what do I say?”
“I can torture all the politicians and hipsters I want,” the fire mutant replied systematically, “but don’t annoy the people who handle your food.”
“Exactly.”
…
It was late, not terribly so, but enough that the younger students of Xavier’s Institute of Higher Learning were bound to their rooms by curfew. The older kids and adult teachers were still up and watched quietly as the three mutants returned from their failed attempt at stopping the Brotherhood agents.
They all knew what Cyclops, Wolverine, and Storm had gone to do… to fight.
“Scott,” Jean Grey greeted the three in the foyer and it didn’t take a telepath to see the defeat on their faces, “I take it things didn’t go well.”
“No,” he sighed, taking the events hard, again.
Scott Summers was a dedicated person, he took everything onto his shoulders whether it was asked of him or not. It made him a strong leader but it also made every loss too personal to bear.
“The Professor still up?” he asked.
“In his study,” she actually just left him.
“Thanks, Jean,” he gave her a half smile and the three headed down the side hall towards Xavier’s study.
Jean wanted to reach out to him, physically, mentally, whatever he would accept, but she already knew that it was something of a lost cause. The man was tightly wound, keeping everyone close but at arm’s length.
“Isn’t it past curfew?” Jean asked Katherine ‘Kitty’ Pryde and Doug Ramsey who were watching from the rec-room door, the pair quickly scattering.
…
Come in, Charles sent the psychic message to the three individuals approaching just as they got to the door. Wordlessly they entered, Scott leading the way to stand in front of the Professor’s desk.
“Did you get there in time?” he asked, knowing full well he could easily pluck the answers from their minds but he learned long ago that this made even those closest to him a bit uneasy.
“Yes,” Scott nodded, “when you picked up on Rogue using her powers so close to a Bastion Industries facility, we were right to think they were going to hit the place.”
“Didn’t help much,” Wolverine growled as he leaned against a side table. “I wish you’d let me deal with those kids,” he emphasized the word with a snikt of his claws.
“As I have said many times, Logan,” Charles said sternly, “I will not let you be party to murder on my account,” then his words turned sympathetic, “and wasn’t that one of the reasons you left the Weapon X program?”
Wolverine grumbled and looked away. For years, longer than even Charles had been alive, Logan had known nothing but how to be a soldier, to kill on orders. It had cost him those he loved, and some of his memories. Logan wanted to take his life back… but he didn’t know where to start. Charles was not about to let him give up that goal so easily, especially with his own aversion to the killing of others on the line.
“Truth of the matter is, Professor,” Scott spoke with a released fervor, “we’re out-gunned. Magneto’s Acolytes, this is what they do, what they train for. One on one we have a chance but, well, we know Quicksilver, Rogue, and Pryo have been working together for nearly a decade, they know each other’s weaknesses, how their powers complement each other,” he sighed. “We’ll never be able to fight them as a team if we don’t provide the same conviction.”
Charles regarded the young man for a long moment, “What are you suggesting, Scott?”
“That we have a dedicated team as well,” he took a second before continuing. “We train together, learn how to work in-synch, how to contain the Acolytes. Otherwise why bother trying to go after them again?”
“And who would be on this team?” he asked cautiously.
“Logan, when he’s around,” Cyclops didn’t even try to hide the annoyance in his voice of the older man’s random disappearing act. Scott was a man of structure, Logan his polar opposite. “Ororo, when her headmistress duties don’t get in the way.”
“This school doesn’t run itself,” Ororo said wryly, but Charles was lucky to have her as his headmistress. There was no way he could be able to keep the school functioning without her. Born of a Kenyan princess and an American Journalist, Ororo grew up in Egypt until her parents were killed. Scott wasn’t very clear on her history between then and coming to Xavier’s, but he gathered it was a lot rougher than wrangling teenagers.
Scott gave Ororo an appreciative nod before turning back to Charles, “I was thinking maybe asking Jean, JP, and Bobby. Jean’s gone out with us on missions before when we’ve needed a telepath. Jean-Paul has the training and experience. Bobby, well, his maturity levels are somewhat lacking, but he’s always pulled through for us when we’ve needed him to.”
“You’re talking most of the teaching staff,” Charles frowned, he was very much lucky to have any teachers at all in a mutant school when the world at large didn’t even know mutants existed.
“Yes,” Scott admitted a tad reluctantly, “but it would be strictly volunteer.”
Charles steepled his fingers together as he considered what Cyclops was asking. He was right, Magneto only used the most highly trained individuals for his Acolytes and the Professor had personal experience with a few of them. They were not easy to handle.
“What do you think of all this, Ororo?” he asked of his colleague and friend.
“It feels like an arms race,” the regal looking woman said bluntly, “but the problem is, Magneto will continue his proliferation regardless of what we, or the government, do. At this point, war is inevitable. I don’t like it, but if we are to have any hope of protecting ourselves and maintaining some kind of peace, we have to be able to meet him head on.”
The Professor sighed, “I thought you might say that.”
…
Rogue pulled up outside a typical non-descript warehouse, the must-see destination for any clandestine meeting of a reported terrorist outfit. Might as well hang a sign that said ‘shady dealings inside’. Of course, she only thought that because over two dozen voices in her head pointed out the cliché.
They then started to argue over the best, worst, craziest, wildiest, places to do a drop off. She just tuned them out, she had gotten much better at doing that over the past few years. Used to be Rogue couldn’t hear herself think over the voices, now they were constant background noise, like a fan or running machinery.
Heading inside, they were met by Pietro who took the drive and hard copies. “Made decent time,” that was a high compliant from ‘oh speedy leader’, as opposed to ‘oh fearless leader’, not that they called him that to his face. Pietro was a good man, her friend, but she found his sense of humor somewhat lacking at times.
“Not much traffic,” she shrugged, ignoring the look on Pietro’s face when he realized Pyro was still wearing his Burger King crown.
Magneto, the leader of the Brotherhood of Mutants, stood in the center of the room, speaking to two of his lieutenants. He was an older man, well old enough to be her father actually, but his hair had already gone grey. Not that anyone could see the hair from under the helmet he often wore, one whose unique design would allow him immunity to the effects of any kind of telepathic scan or illusion. The helmet had been painted a very mute color of purple so Magneto had taken to wearing business suits with a similar color trim and tie to match.
Most couldn’t pull the look off, but for him it strangely worked.
Standing next to Magento was Sabretooth, a tall man with shaggy blonde hair, a healing factor to rival Wolverine’s, and a blood-thirstiness unmatched by anyone. He was one of the most feared members of the Brotherhood because he had no compulsion against killing, she knew for a fact Sabretooth loved it.
Off to the side, guarding some guy trussed up in a chair, stood a blue skinned woman named Raven Darkholme, otherwise known as Mystique, the Brotherhood’s elite assassin.
“Heard there was trouble,” Mystique commented as she walked over to the group.
“Nothing we couldn’t handle, momma,” she played it off, after all, it was the truth, so what if she got punched in the gut and could feel the bruises forming.
“Good,” and that was all her adopted mother would have to say on the subject.
“Ah,” Magneto’s attention was finally on them and he frowned when his eyes fell on Pyro, “St John, some decorum, please, we have an esteemed guest,” he gestured to the prisoner.
Reluctantly, Pyro slipped the crown off of his head, rolling his eyes and making semi-rude hand gestures at Magneto when he didn’t think the man was looking. Pyro was the only person crazy enough to do such a thing… which is why he got away with it. Still, Rogue reached over and grabbed his hands to still them before they discovered how far Pyro could cross the line.
“Rogue,” Magneto looked back to her, “find out where the last piece to our puzzle lies. Mr. Donovan here has proven most resilient to more… traditional methods of information extraction.”
So that’s why he changed the drop off, Magneto wanted her to use her ability on this man. Rogue hated absorbing victims of recent torture, she always had to fight through a lot of pain in order to get what she needed. If she refused, her mother would accuse her of being weak, of letting her mutation rule her life instead of taking this opportunity to practice better control.
With a sigh she attempted to cover, Rogue walked over to the unconscious prisoner, seeing the welts, bruises, and cuts that were her mother’s handy work. Slipping off a glove, she reluctantly reached out and touched his face, blue lines forming on his skin as his blood vessels reacted to the draw of the man’s life force into her body.
Rogue only held on for a few seconds, but that was long enough. First came the recent memories of getting beaten within an inch of his life by Mystique, and before that, being caught by Sabretooth who never handled any captured prisoner daintily. She could feel his pain, it echoing across her skin like a phantom illness.
Pitching to the side, Rogue threw up what was left of her Baconator before taking deep, calming breaths, shuffling away the pain to find what she needed underneath.
“You get it?” her mother asked.
“Yeah,” Rogue coughed and cleared her throat, “I got it.”
“Well then,” Magneto was pleased, “seems you four have your next assignment.”
“Yes, sir,” Pietro replied as team leader.
…
Scott looked up as Robert ‘Bobby’ Drake was the last one to enter the study, Jean and Jean-Paul having already arrived. The cyro mutant was barely an adult, twenty one all of two months, but he had stayed behind after graduating from the Institute in order to help out with the ever increasing student population. He still had a lot of growing to do, but as Scott told the Professor, Bobby pulled through when it counted.
“Sup?” he asked when he realized the office was busy at this time of night.
“You hear about what went down earlier this evening?” Scott asked the young man.
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “You went after Magneto’s crew, they won, again.”
Logan gave a bit of a growl at the use of the word ‘again’ and Scott chose to ignore it. “They’re stepping up their attacks, Magneto keeps continues this line of action and no mutant will be safe from retaliation from the government or military.”
“Not to mention what it will do for our image once the world learns of our existence,” Jean added.
“We can’t let them believe they have to fear all of us,” Ororo agreed.
“Exactly,” Scott nodded to the two women. “We can’t sit idly by when we have a chance to do something to protect ourselves and our kind. That’s why I propose we create a dedicated response team to deal with any threats that Magneto’s Brotherhood present.”
“You want us on that team?” Jean asked and he wasn’t sure if she came up with that on her own or skimmed it from his mind, it was hard to tell with her. As a high level telepath, Jean found it difficult sometimes not to accidently soak in surface thoughts from those around her, but she wasn’t stupid either, her mind was as sharp as her hair was red.
“Yes,” he gave her a light smile, knowing that she would agree to join, but with the Professor sitting behind him he had to add, “and this is volunteer only. We would practice outside of our normal school duties.”
“The children will always come first,” Xavier joined the conversation, “their safety and their education.”
“I think I can manage that,” Jean returned Scott’s smile, “and you know you’ve only ever had to ask, I’m more than willing to help.”
“I know, Jean,” he always found it hard to keep eye contact with the beautiful woman, “thank you.”
“So,” Bobby scratched at his head, “you’re offering us the chance to actually use our mutation for something purposeful outside of the school? I’m in.”
“I don’t think you quite understand what Scott’s asking,” Jean-Paul said dryly, of the three he was the most reserved about the situation, “he’s wanting you to fight,” his eyes flicked over to Scott’s, “to be a soldier.”
Scott winced at the word, “More like a policeman, or a fireman.”
“Ain’t much of a difference from where I stand,” the speed mutant would be the one to know. Canadian born, like Logan, Jean-Paul ‘JP’ Beaubier and his twin sister, Jeanne-Marie, had joined the military in hopes of being able to better understand their gifts. They got their wish… and more than they bargained for.
“I have no interest in creating an army, Jean-Paul,” Scott assured him, “but Magneto needs to be stopped, for everyone’s sake.”
“I’m a bit new around here,” Jean-Paul glanced around at everyone, “and I heard of Magneto and his Brotherhood while serving under Department H, but I’ve been getting the feeling you all know this guy on a bit more of a… personal basis.”
“Yes,” Xavier said sadly, Scott already knowing the story he was about to tell. “Magneto, or Erik as I knew him long ago, was a friend of mine. He helped me to found this school and to build the Cerebro device which allows me to track mutants when they use their powers.”
“Okay,” Jean-Paul didn’t bat an eye at the revelation that Xavier was once friends with a known terrorist, but then what really could phase a man who was once part of a Canadian government weapons program that spawned the likes of Wolverine? “So what happened?”
“We had a disagreement of philosophy,” was the Professor’s simplest answer. “We both knew we would see the day when mutant-kind would become known to the world, I believe that when this happens we can live along side humans, peacefully co-exist. Erik… he has seen the evils that man can do to others different from themselves and believes that this will be their only response.”
“He’s beating them to the punch then,” the mutant nodded his understanding, “retaliating before he’s even been attacked.”
“JP,” Scott wasn’t surprised at the man’s reluctance, “I know you came South to get away from all this and after what you’ve been through, no one would think less of you for not wanting to get involved.”
“I never said anything about not wanting to get involved,” he gave a bit of a chuckle, “I just wanted to make sure we were all on the same page.”
Scott was a little thrown, “So you’ll join?”
“Men like Magneto are exactly why Department H decided to go the way of the Weapon X program,” his eyes flitted over to Wolverine who visibly snarled at the mention of that little footnote in the feral mutant’s long history, “and why I had to get Jeanne-Marie away from them before they did any more damage. I’m in, just as long as we don’t lose sight of what we’re fighting for here.”
“I won’t,” Scott nodded to the older man.
“Well,” Bobby piped up, “I’m still in.”
Logan gave out a snort, “Sure you can handle it, Iceboy?”
“Iceman,” he corrected him, “and yeah. If not, I can always back out, right?”
“Of course,” Scott quickly assured him.
“Then it’s settled,” Bobby clapped his hands together, “when do we start?”
Scott looked around at the group assembled, part of him wondering if this was indeed the right thing to do. But not fighting back at all would be just as bad as Magneto would carry on completely unchecked. Someone had to stand up for mutants and equality, not supremacy.
“First thing in the morning, at breakfast” he decided the sooner the better, “we’ll talk and decide how best to start, because from here on out… this is going to be an uphill battle.”
X-Men: The (fan fic) Series 
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