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James chucked at the story’s, putting his hand on Casper’s thigh under the table just to feel him, and stared adoringly at Casper as he spoke. The dinner table was set for four but James wasn’t sure who they were dining with. The scent of seafood made his stomach grumble but he ignored it, instead focusing on how Casper spoke with his whole body, hands flying and shifting in his seat, and James nted ho the candle light made him absolutely glow. He was totally in his element and James fell a little more in love. The rest of the world shrunk down to just Casper, their table and guests gone even though his boyfriend kept talking to them, and James leaned up to press a kiss to his cheek…”

Only to startle awake at a loud knocking. James lay there, frozen, hand under his pillow where his icer should be, and he panicked when he didn’t feel it. Someone was in his bed and he didn’t have a weapon, how could he be so stupid, he must have left it on the quinjet or something, fuck it must be the rebellion coming after him after the Hulk incident…

Casper’s voice finally got through the haze he woke up in and he felt his whole body relax. Right, they were at the Mutant Underground, they were safe for now, and Casper was the one in his bed, not some mystery person looking to gut him for all the times he flayed their allies alive. He gave a tired chuckle and flipped over in bed, sitting up just enough to snake his arms around Casper’s waist, and flopped back onto the mattress. He would like his mattress from that world though. He tangled his legs with Casper and snuggled close. “You tell him, babes.” He sleepily cheered his boyfriend on, even if Jack had already left.

Casper grinned at his boyfriend, wishing that James had snaked his arms around something a little lower than his waist, but c'est la vie. He hadn't even been thinking about having sex with James until Jack knocked on the door and insinuated it, and now, he couldn't help but think about it, sporting a boner. He then snuggled back down onto the bed with James, cupping James' butt with one hand and holding onto James' back with the other. He tried to entangle their legs even more, but it wasn't exactly humanly possible. "Go back to sleep, silly," he whispered gently, even as he was himself becoming more and more alert and awake.

Harrys heart dropped the second Callie had mentioned his twin and the others were in need of help. Why didn't he go with her? Why did he leave her alone? Suddenly he didn't care about the stupid bag, or the small fire. All he cared about was being there for his sister and making sure she was OK. Before he could ask any questions or say anything, Callie had already left the room in a hurry in search for others no doubt.

Max didn’t give himself any time to think, rushing before saying anything and plucking some hair from Harry. "Sorry need it to find Veil, can't open a portal if I don't know where she is and it's better to track her two ways than one." His words practically ran together as he spoke, rushing off towards James and Caspers room where Callie was calling out to them. He didn't care much for all the waiting and simply kicked the door open since there was no handle anymore.

"Hey James get up, we have an emergency. Casper you too, might actually need your powers here depending on how bad."

James barely had the time to mumble out a sleepy agreement and shut his eyes before yet another person came barging in. He opened one eye at Callie, grumbling but shifting so he could push himself up off Casper. Of course there were injuries. Not only was everyone in the Mutant Underground absurdly danger prone, they wouldn’t come running to find him if there weren’t injuries. It was a strange feeling being so annoyed at people when they needed help but he couldn’t stop himself. He was so tired and all he wanted was at least an hour to recharge.

He wanted to say something to Casper as he sat up but then yet another person barged in. He really thought the door handles weren’t a fucking priority but clearly they were. Did no one know how to knock anymore? James gave Max a deadpan look and sighed, finally pushing himself up. “I got it, I got it. I’m getting up.” James grumbled, pressing a quick kiss to Casper’s cheek as he got out of bed. “What’s going on?”

Casper sighed, forcing himself to sit up. He thought about shifting his legs to conceal his boner, in order to make it less awkward for Max, but then he realized he didn't care. He didn't want people to be hurt, but he was pouting anyways. Claiming to be Honey really was a poor move - her evening still got ruined by Frozone leaving to save the day. "Do you mean Ben's powers?" he asked Max. "And can it wait an hour? James was just about to hit that sweet dope REM sleep, weren't you babe?" Casper said, despite not even knowing what REM was.

"Don't make me hit you again," Ben threatened.

"Ben, why don't you go play tennis with Hitler and leave me alone?" Casper whined.

It took a moment for Max to even notice. Finally slowing down enough forcefully as the two other mutants got up sluggishly. He looked down at Caspers hard member, then back up at Casper, then back down before finally deciding to look away from the pair of them. "Oh I'm sure he was gonna get loads of sleep with that hanging around. And no I didn't mean Ben, I meant you Casper. If you can channel and speak to spirits, perhaps you can help if there's a bigger emergency than what we believe to be happening."

Truth be told Max had no idea what he even believed the emergency to be other than Callie seeming very pressed to save on time. If he had to guess lives were on the line, as they always tended to be. "No idea exactly what the situation is. I also don't know where it is we're going, I just know time seems to be of the essence." Max spared no time as he held up the hairs plucked from Harrys head.

His eyes began to glow as he started chanting words that seemed to just come to him. The air inside the room began to swirl as the sheets were kicked off the lazy pair and Maxs hair began to blow in the breeze. The strands started levitating into the air, dancing around in a circle until it revealed visuals on Veil and her location, as if watching her through a window.

The window began to crackle and spark in a similar manner to Strange's portals. Orange flecks paraded the visual until it became a doorway, Max continuing to chant the spell until it finally clicked into place. He could see Veils feet sticking out of rubble, and the voices of others not far away. He turned to face Casper and James, eyes still lit from magic as he held one hand outstretched towards the portal. "Oh fuck…"

“Yeah I was cause despite what you assholes all think, Casper’s a great fucking boyfriend. I was going to take care of that after the nap, jerk.” James snapped at Max. James watched Max do his magic, feeling like he was back in the other world and desperately waiting for Max to open a portal to Casper. He put his hand over Casper’s and squeezed.

"Aww, babe, you were?" Casper gushed.

“Oh shit, that is not good.” James launched himself out of bed when Max’s spell revealed the collapse, only Veil’s legs poking out. All thoughts of sleep were gone, adrenaline washing away the exhaustion, and he was through the portal without a second thought. “Guy, can you hear me? Is everyone in one piece?”

Casper didn't hesitate to follow after James - if it had been someone else going through the portal, like Spark Plug, he would have. It was incredibly dark and he coughed, feeling dust getting into his lungs. He didn't even realize they were looking at Veil at first, since all they could see were her feet, trapped underneath rubble like she was the Wicked Witch of the West. He could hear stones shifting and - was that a car alarm blaring? "Good news - I don't see the ghosts of our friends," Casper said, before he turned white as a sheet and stumbled backwards, tripping over some rocks, as he saw the angry spirits of a squad of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. "Uh, bad news... There's a fuck ton of dead agents down here, and I'm guessing that's a recent development."

Max took a breath and looked through the portal. Dead agents? Rubble everywhere, car alarms blaring. He wasn't fully sure where they were but he needed to help get them out. Max tried to entangle his magic into the rubble, redoing what he had done back at the Mutant Underground not but moments ago. His eyes still held their glow as strands of energy wrapped around the piles and warped them out of the area to a landfill. He'd considered how long it would take to move them by hand, and a single wrong move and they could collapse down onto Veil and the others. What he hadn't thought of was the street above collapsing down onto them from the shift in weight.

Rubble began to fall down, kicking up more dust into the air as debris fell all around them, missing everyone but separating the team from Veil. "Damn it! Can you guys see Veil? Are you ok?!" Max looked towards James and Casper, exasperation and dread filling him. "I don't know what to do. I can try to stabilize the street above us but...it may take some time. I just...I…"

Oh fuck, of course there were dead agents. James didn’t have time to try and figure out what happened with that, all he knew was it was bad. Dead agents meant vengeful agents and they did not have the resources or the skill to combat trained agents of any agency. They were going to have to move after this and fast. Casper’s New Orleans idea was sounding more and more like an immediate possibility.

Casper’s observation distracted him from Max, always a fatal mistake. He only snapped back to the crisis in front of them when he noticed strands of Max’s magic wrapping themselves around the rubble. “MAX, STO―” James’ scream cut off as the road above them groaned, unable to support itself as the rubble beneath it vanished in uncoordinated parts, and James all but tackled Casper back towards the portal as the ceiling came crashing down to fill the voids. James coughed and sputtered, dusting himself off as he took in the changes.

“Max, don’t do a goddamned thing. We have to get support in there before we move anything else or we risk killing them and anyone above us.” James popped up to his feet, reaching his hand out to help Casper up. “Just focus on the portal. No pressure but if you drop it, everyone is fucked.”

“Guys, we have a portal open at Veil’s location and we have a cave in. Need people who can help brace the ceiling before we can move anything!” James screamed back into the Mutant Underground before turning back to where the MU team was trapped. “If you can hear us under there, try not to do anything to disrupt the rubble! We’re gonna get you out but we’re going to need some time!”

Casper got back on up to his feet, trembling as the ghosts of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents surrounded them. He didn't know if all of them hated mutants, but the cave-in part 2 seemed to have only angered them, as they were screaming and shouting abuse. One of them rushed at Casper and went straight through him, making him feel naked and raw and violated - he yelped slightly. "B-B-Ben, I think th-they need you," Casper stammered.

"Yeah, come on, do the thing. I can brace and move," he offered. Unfortunately, as Casper tried to summon Ben to come out to play, the blue glow in his eyes kept on flickering. He felt like a dead battery. "Casper, you can do it!" Ben urged.

"Shut up, it's n-not cool to have expectations of me!" he whined, before giving one last try and his powers popped - his eyes turned blue, there was a blue aura around his hands, and Ben was visible. Ben's tentacles quickly went to work, bracing what remained of the ceiling.

"James, tell me what you need me to do next. And Max? Maybe cool it with the powers for a little while. Or start small. Little things first."

Harry had been pacing the floors in a worried fit as he waited to hear news about whether or not they had found his sister. When James called out to the Underground he bolted upstairs and saw the large glowing portal and the rubble that was before them. "Val? Val?! Are you ok? Can you hear me, talk to me sis!" Tears started streaming down his face as he cried out to her. He couldn't lose her.

“For now Ben, you and Casper and Max just keep being awesome. Hold everything tight and when we get some back up, we’ll see if we can stabilize more of this mess.” James told Ben, tuning Harry out for the moment. There were more important things to think about as James started figuring out the best place to start excavating.

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She wasn't even paying much attention to what was going on around her, like the fact that the ceiling had decided to cave in on them and they were more or less trapped in their little area. Nope, her mind was starting to wonder if she could make it snow in their little underground area. Snow would be fun, and pretty, and maybe they could build a snowman or something as they sat around doing nothing. This idea was staying in her head, and it wouldn't really go away. Of course given her powers, and despite where she was from, she loved the cold and snow. Winter was always the best time of year and sometimes she wished it would stay winter all year round.

"You know what would be fun?" she said out loud so that Andy and Havok could hear her, she was still speaking in a little sing song voice, clearly not all there in the head at the moment, "Snow!" With that word she pointed her hands up into the air, and suddenly the entire area in their little bubble would start lightly snowing. Sapphire was giggling like crazy with regards to this and she managed to sit up off of the ground as she looked up at the snow that was seemingly coming from nowhere. "It's always so pretty, I wished there was more snow, it's always so pretty. Plus making snow angels is fun..."

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Jack more or less just sort of blocked out anything that Casper might have yelled back at him in response since he had hurried away from the door and back to where everyone else was. Clearly there was a bunch of chaos going on around the area though based on what he was hearing. Chaos, that was something that he was used to with this life and all. It was a familiar thing, and he saw others head back the way that he had come from, and he instantly turned back around to see what exactly was going on, and he saw Max open up a portal, a bunch of shouting, and then people freaking out over trying to keep the ceiling up. "What the hell even happened?" he couldn't help but ask.

His mind started racing as they were clearly talking about Veil, and he decided to use his telepathic powers to try and figure out where she was, since based on the cracks in the rubble, he might be able to get over to where she was. "She's still alive, and I know exactly what direction to head, so you might want to move, I've got an idea that doesn't involve trying to blow everything up anymore," he said as he headed over towards the rubble, more or less ignoring everyone else as he examined the rubble, putting his hand up towards a few of the cracks in the rubble as he started using his powers to maneuver his hand into the rubble, "Don't blow anything up, cause I really don't need to get hit by a large rock in the head, this is already going to be unpleasant," he said, before he managed to get through the cracks in the wall of rocks, helped when his body could shift and shape into just about anything, and eventually he found a little nook of sorts where he could reform or whatever again. He instantly started shifting rubble, being rather careful as he did so, and eventually he managed to unbury Veil. "Found her!" he called through the wall of rock, not entirely sure if anyone could hear him. "Veil? Veil are you okay?" he asked her, trying to see if he could get her to wake up.

Meanwhile Zari wasn't paying much attention to everything, but she did glance up to look at Sunshine when she came over and more or less just asked if she was sad or something, aside from talking about the bomb or whatever. "I'm fine, it's nothing really," she responded to her. "Oh, the bomb right... And why do you think that has something to do with you? I heard what you said... Oh, wait, terrigen or whatever isn't really common what's so important about it right... Well Terrigen mist is what caused M-Pox, a whole lot of it got released and that's why so many people got sick to the point of potentially dying..."

She didn't know a whole lot about M-Pox. All she really knew about it was that her mother had gotten it before she was born, and she just knew that it was caused by the terrigen mists. "Anyway... Back to finding a bomb..." With those words, she closed her eyes and started going through several different channels to try and locate the bomb. Unfortunately she came up with a whole 9 total bombs. "I've found 9 possible bombs. 8 are moving around underground and zipping around in predictable patterns. The last one... I don't recognize where it is... A large white building of sorts, and in the front in the center of it is a large statue of a man in a nice suit with a beard sitting down... Any idea where that could be?" she asked Sunshine as she got up from where she had been sitting.

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Waves kept her eyes shut, waiting for Callie's confirmation that she'd give Professor X's phone a ring and the familiar feeling of radio waves emitting from the phone, but instead she felt something else, something...unexpected: a call coming in. Her eyes popped open in surprise, her eyebrows furrowing together as Callie answered it. Waverley practically jumped when Callie briskly walked passed her, handing off the phone like a baton in a relay race of bad news. She stiffened, quickly pulled the phone up to her ear, trying to piece together what was happening with the little bits of context she had. Obviously something was happening with the others, and it didn't sound good.

"Uh, hi, Waves here. We're gonna get to you, don't worry. Just stay on the line little while longer while I figure out where you are," as she spoke, her eyes drifted closed, letting the radio waves take her mind in the direction of Andy's phone. She quickly discovered that the other end of the call was somewhere far away, but also simultaneously...upstairs? "Uh..." as if to answer her unspoken question, James' voice rang out through the underground, shouting out even more bad news. She held onto the feeling of Andy's phone as she quickly ran up the stairs, in case they needed to find them once they were through the portal. She sprinted down the hall to James and Casper's room, where inside she saw a glowing fantastical portal. Without a moments hesitation, she leapt through, stumbling as her feet found purchase upon ground much more uneven than that of the headquarters she was leaving behind. What awaited her there was not what she'd expected: none of Veil's group was there, only James, Cas, Echo, and a glowing blue man with a mass of tentacles erupting from his stomach. Waverley had to do a double take when she saw that. It was Ben, she recognized him from his brief introduction in the van earlier, but with the slimy appendages reaching up and holding the ceiling aloft, she quickly recognized him from elsewhere.

"You're- shit, you were that superhero kid from that one super group! Cas never mentioned that!" Waverley exclaimed, unable to hold back her surprise at the realization. She quickly shook her head, shoving the revelation out of her head as she instead brought her mind back to the matter at hand. The rubble had separated them from the others, a fact made evident by Jack's voice ringing out from past one wall of rubble and by the feeling of Andy's phone just beyond another. Just as she was about to launch into motion, her eyes caught sight of a weeping Echo, a sight that caused her heart to sink. Part of her wanted to comfort him just as he so often did for her, but she stopped herself from doing so. It was more important to make sure everyone was safe. She was sure he'd understand. She quickly pointed her finger northeastward, looking to the others with a serious crease in her brow.

"Andy and the others are that way," she called out, before bringing Callie's phone, which she held onto with pale knuckles, back up to her lips. "We're in the tunnel...southwest from you I think. Ben and I are gonna do our best to minimize any further damage, and I think the others are gonna try to get you out safely," she explained to Andy, letting her mental grasp on the girl's phone lessen as she stepped up next to the apparition of Ben and turned her attention upward. She could feel the rumbling within the crumbling concrete, the waves ringing through them, quickening their destruction. She lifted her hand, gritting her teeth as she used her abilities to dampen those waves.

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"Uh, hey Waves. Yep, just trapped under this pile of rubble. Glad you guys found us because I do not want to die here. Veil saved us with her shield, but is she okay? I don't know what happened to her." It was pretty dark. She could tell that Saphire was alive at least, which explained why it was snowing. "So Stareyes, you know the other new person that joined with me. She got shot by a SHIELD agent and then Saphire froze her. I don't know if she survived that or not. But Saphire is wigging out like she's high or something now." Andy was babbling and she knew that, but Waves was a voice. A voice that promised hope.

"Who is Ben?" Andy asked very confusedly. She made her way over to where she hoped the rescue operation was being mounted and looked among the debris with the light from the phone trying to find something she could move to help. One looked promising, but it apparently was load-bearing. Quick as she could she shoved it back into place and the imminent death tumble of stone stopped. Right, she'd leave the digging-out rescue operation to people who could actually see what they were doing.

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@BlueSky44@Kirah@Nallore:

Havok's jaw dropped, staring at Sapphire. He had never seen her like this before - so... happy and carefree. "Well, she's clearly lost the plot," he commented. He didn't dare use his powers to blast them out of here. His powers had caused the cave-in, and while he had done it on purpose, he didn't want to replicate the experiment again. It had been a horrible decision, one done purely in an effort to keep them safe from a legion of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and buy time for them to get help for Stareyes.

"Ben's the ghost that hangs out with Casper, it's why he's always talking to himself," Havok explained to Andy. He was relieved to hear that help had arrived - although he wasn't super excited to know that Waverley was spearheading the operation apparently. She had a similar track record to Max in terms of efficiency as far as he was concerned.

@BlueSky44:

Veil was incredibly lucky. Her skull had been cracked and she was bleeding extensively, but she was still breathing. Her body was badly bruised, somehow avoiding more broken limbs. While her condition was serious, it was pretty much the best outcome that they could have hoped for. All they needed to do was either have someone stitch/glue her head back together or get James to heal her up. It seemed like her own hair had cushioned most of the blow to the back of the head she took.

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Casper's eyes were still glowing that alien blue, the same shade that was surrounding his hands like a mist - and the color that Ben's ghostly appearance was tinted. Ben's tentacles had mostly stabilized the structure, but the credit really had to go to Feedback, as she was keeping vibrations from causing more shifts. For the moment, they were going to be completely fine. Casper tried not to puke as he saw his brother change shape and go through a small gap in the rubble. "Ugh, Jackie, why are your powers so gross sometimes..." he complained.

"Wait, Ben, you were a superhero?!" Casper gasped. His best friend had never told him that. "What else have you been lying to me about? Are you even really dead?!"

Ben sighed. "...Yes, because I'm faking being dead, and I have the power to make everyone conveniently not see me unless you use your powers, way to go, Sherlock," he replied, rolling his eyes.

Casper perked up ever so slightly, hearing Jack's voice distantly call out that he had found Veil. He didn't see Veil's ghost, so he assumed that they were good. And he was doing his best to focus on keeping Ben front and center, rather than look at the swarms of S.H.I.E.L.D. agent ghosts who were shouting and yelling at them all. They clearly did not seem to like mutants. "H-hey Ben, any chance you could do this faster?" Casper called out.

"I'm not moving any rocks until James tells me to - he's the engineer, this seems like an engineering problem," Ben replied. He had all of his tentacles fully anyways just keeping the structure from caving in on them all.

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Sunshine frowned, her eyebrows scrunching together as she listened to the green haired kid explain that some sort of magic mist had been what made everyone sick. She didn't need three guesses to figure out who had to be responsible. It had to have been the humans. Probably some scientist in a creepy lab had come up with it and then thrown the mist up into the air - or tossed it out a plane or whatever. The finer details weren't important. The anger and blame, that was all that mattered. "Stupid flatscans. They should leave us alone or just die," Sunshine grumbled.

"Why would they be moving underground?" Sunshine asked, finding that really weird. The last bit of information made a lot more sense to her though. It was one of the most easily recognized places in D.C., she was surprised the green haired kid didn't recognize it, but she wasn't going to press the issue. Bombs were more important than insulting newbies. "That's the Lincoln Memorial, I think. Unless they made another statue of a dead white flatscan sitting on a big chair, but I doubt it. Lincoln did... something with slaves? So I guess it's on brand for them. They probably think it's ironic or something."

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As soon as Max opened a portal she stepped on through it and onto the other side, she looked around seeing all of the rubble, she thought for a moment that Max had gotten the location completely wrong. It seemed that both Ben and Waverly had everything secured for now, but she wasnt sure for how much longer that they could handle it. She turned to look over at James the only one who had any real experience with engineering, she was a mechanic and knew her way around a car engine but nothing when it came to structures. "Whats your play, is it safe to move anything?" Callie asked looking over at James for a moment, she knew that time was of the essence but they could end up killing the others or even end up trapping themselves.

From the sound of it Veil was still alive from what she heard from Jack as he shrunk down and managed to get into a few cracks in the rubble. Casper also confirming that he didnt see Veil's ghost at all yet which was a good thing then, she didnt really want to become the full time leader of the underground.

&Casper

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There was a chord of fear struck inside of Max. He had gone such a long way from his beginnings here at the Mutant Underground, and in a single spell he managed to mess up and get them separated again. There was a subdued panic bouncing inside his chest as his eyes darted from rubble to rubble and above them in search for an answer on how to fix this mess. That's when Ben said something that hadnt crossed Max’s mind. James was an engineer He would know where best to place supports, where they can and can't excavate, granted that usually took something they didn't have, time.

Max pushed back at the negative feelings, focusing on the here and now and how best he could be of aid. "James, you're at the helm here. Tell what to do and I can do it. I can try to build a concrete arch to help stabilize a small section just gotta know where." He wanted to do more, wanted to simply recreate the streets above them in hopes it would fix the situation but he didn't know if it could.

Saying James was out of his depth was a massive fucking understatement. Sure, he did have two engineering degrees and sure, he’d studied plenty of the necessary mathematical applications behind determining how this massive pile of bullshit would tumble down and kill everyone but frankly, even his worst nightmares hadn’t conjured up such a scenario. He studied mechanical and electrical engineering, not whatever horrible fuck shit this was. James could feel his hands shaking and he stuffed them in his pockets as he tried to concentrate, considering all the options.

Preferably, he’d love to get some equipment and the city blueprints to understand exactly how the rest of the street would be affected. Pull in some nice steel support beams and the machines that inflated massive bags to help lift objects off but the time it would take… No, no. He needed to make a priority list instead of dreaming about all the really helpful things he could use. He took a deep breath.

Priority one was stabilizing the ceiling. James wasn’t sure how long Casper could hold Ben out, how long BEn could hold an entire street, or how long Waverly could keep focused on keeping everything from falling apart so they needed another option. Plus, that would free Ben and Waverly to assist down below. They could focus on holding a section of rubble rather than everything and they could create controlled avalanches at the very worst.

Priority two was Veil. They needed her shields. If James wanted to slide rubble like that, Veil’s shields would make that 100% safer. Of course, that would depend if he could get her on her feet but he’d focus on that later. Priority three was evacing the rest of the team, hopefully using the group to safely open at least a crawl space for everyone to come out of.

But if that didn’t work…
James saw Plan B. He did not like Plan B. There was a large piece that looked safe enough to move and if someone lifted him, he could probably slip in to join Veil and Jack, get her up from inside, and use her shields to safely push a section off of them. Just thinking about it made James feel lightheaded and his throat threaten to shut but it wasn’t something he had to do now. It was just an option.

Why was Plan B always Plan Bad?

“Okay, here’s my plan. Max, if you can, make an arch that follows Ben’s tentacles. He’s covered all the major stress points and if you can support at least two thirds of them, the ceiling should hold for now. After that, we’ll use Ben and Waverly to stabilize this section of rubble and Callie, Harry, and I will create the opening. I’ll get Veil up and then we’ll use Ben and Waverly to stabilize sections as we go while the rest of us use Veil’s shields to create controlled collapses to create a window to the rest of the team. I’ll have to recalculate what we can move everytime we remove a section so only touch exactly what I say.” James explained, stressing the last point. This was such a delicate operation that literally one misstep would end everything.

“Max, the portal is priority one for you. If you are going to lose the portal, don’t do anything else. We can fashion some temporary supports from the furniture and stuff if we need to but we have to be able to get back to do that. Honey, if you think you’re going to lose Ben, tell me so we can get everything rearriagned okay? You’re doing great and I’m so fucking proud of you.” He nodded to himself and then gave Max a thumbs up.

“Okay, Max. Do your stuff.” James said, giving him the go ahead.

Max stood back, watching as James went to work. Anxiety creeping up inside of him with every moment that passed by in the silence. He could hear the slight shift of the rubble, the slips of sand that slithered between each crevice, and the sound of the world above them. His eyes were beginning to go wide until James finally spoke and snapped him back to the present, finally giving him an order at what he could do.

He gave James a nod before holding his hands out before him, left arm outstretched as the right was held half-way back. "Here goes something...I hope." Max muttered under his breath. His magic flowed around his forearms, spindling out and following the paths of Ben's tentacles. Each branch of magic transforming and creating a steel archway to help brace the structures above and keep the ceiling from collapsing any further.

James watched as metal sprouted from Max’s magic, giving an appreciative whistle as metal shimmered into existence. When Max’s powers went right, they were absolutely stunning. “Good job Max. Ben, Waves, we’re going to focus on excavating the area we last saw Veil. Ben, support everything above this section here as best you can.” James pointed out a five foot square at the base of the rubble. “Waves, keep suppressing the vibrations. Every little bit counts here. If you can focus on the rubble here rather than what is up above, that’d be even more helpful. Once those two have gotten into position, Harry, Callie, we’re on debris duty.”

Callie stood there as she watched James taking lead on the whole situation which was a good thing, she didn really have an idea what to actually do. If something ever did happen to her, Sapphire or James she could possibly see him running the Underground. She hoped that Veil was okay, so far Casper didn’t say that she was dead which was a good thing as well too. “Sounds good to me, just tell me when to do it.” Callie said to James.

”Oh, you know me babe, I can keep him up all night without blowing this load,” Casper said cheekily, to Ben’s immediate disgust. Despite his talk and swagger, Casper really was doing a decent job of tapping into a power he could barely control. Every limb of his body was shaking from the strain and his eyes were glowing brightly enough to have been suitable decor for a rave, but he was doing it!

”Casper, now is not the time!” Ben scolded, before moving his tentacles slowly and methodically. He kept some behind to brace the area they already had been out of anxiety and fear, whereas the majority shifted to where James had directed him. He did so with ease, making it look like the carefree act of some eldritch god - and not at all the death defying struggle they were focused on.

”Ben, stop bullying me for my amazing sense of humor!” Casper whined.

Harry’s panic hadn't subsided any until Jack had called out that his sister was fine. Caspers lack of speech on the subject confirmed her life was stable...for now. James had begun to take charge, everyone was moving in a fluid motion as if he was composing a symphony for the rescue, each note playing perfectly. Harry began to push away the sounds of everyone around him, focusing on Waverly, focusing on the music that played in her heart and feeling the vibrations she was pushing out in order to match and nullify the ones above.

He matched her pitch with ease, finding the momentum he needed in order to move himself from the light spectrum over towards sound. There was already a lot of help coming from Waverly’s end, Harry filling in the gaps to reduce the vibrations down so there was nothing more than what they needed to keep the structure from reaching absolute zero. "Ready when you need me James."

James chuckled at Casper’s joke with a fond shake of his head, some of the tension leaving him. Trust his boyfriend to make light in a life or death situation. He gave a sigh of relief as everyone moved and everything held. Hopefully, it would all stay like that. James waited until everyone stilled again, pausing to eye the new stress spots, and nodded. This should work just like he planned.

“Good job guys. You all make this look easy.” James laughed, stepping forward to the spot he’d pointed out before. “Once we get Veil and Jack out, we’re two-thirds of the way there. Callie and Harry, let’s get moving.” With Callie and Harry digging their way through with him, they managed to get Veil and Jack uncovered. It took longer than he liked but slow and steady kept people alive. James stepped into the pocket around the pair and knelt down. James reached out and focused, fighting through the initial wave of dizziness, as he managed to get Veil healed. Everything in him protested the decision, his little ten minute nap nowhere near enough for James to have recuperated, but James gritted his teeth and powered through it. Hopefully, most of the others were still okay too.

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Havok's explanation made sense. Casper had seemed super unhinged, but if he could see a ghost that explained it. She shivered at the idea...and the snow. Andy had had way too many nightmares of the ghosts in her past she hated that this meant ghosts were real. Her stomach twisted and she tried to pace.

Andy couldn't really pace. The space was too small and too unstable. She also couldn't shake her leg. Her two main nervous habits. She could only listen through the phone. Her lifeline to what was happening on the other side of the rubble. Extraction was happening. They were getting Veil out first, which was good. She was okay with that.

She wished she could help. Wished there was anything she could do, but so far all she had done was make it worse. She could have killed them all if she hadn't gotten the debris that she had tried to move back in place fast enough. There was some irony that Stareyes was the safest since she was a frozen block at the moment.

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Sapphire giggled slightly again before glancing over at Havok, "I'm fiiiiiiiiiiine, you need to lighten uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuppppppppppppppp a bit," she commented still giggling. Her mind was wandering a bit, and she was definitely enjoying the snow that was surrounding them. There was so much that you could do with snow. Build a snowman, make snow angels, oooooooh. An idea came to her mind that would be entertaining definitely, and she picked up some snow and started to clearly form a snowball out of it in her hand, still giggling as she did so. Despite what the others thought, she had never felt better and figured she was perfectly fine.

"You know you are kind of cute Havok," she mused slightly. Yeah no, she was definitely not acting like her normal self, even in her clearly loopy state she knew that, but this way was waaaaaaay more fun then her typical mindset. She shouldn't be all sad or angry all the time anyway. Sapphire sort of tossed the snowball in her hand a bit, and she ended up throwing it directly at Havok, managing to hit him with it. Maybe she could get the other two to participate in a snowball fight. They were all stuck in the area and couldn't do anything anyway, might as well have some fun with it.

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"...Actually as far as I know it was a different group of enhanced individuals who did it, the Inhumans I think? I don't know... I do know it technically wasn't the humans who had caused the mists to appear out of nowhere that's for sure..." Zari said with a bit of a shrug to Sunshine when she clearly was grumbling about normal humans. Of course she personally knew what it felt to sort of be an outcast, especially with this group. Here she was definitely the odd one out, everyone else was just a mutant, she was part Asgardian.

"...The Lincoln Memorial?" she asked, a bit confused at first, but then her mind reached back and she remembered a few things about history her mother had mentioned to her. "Oh, as in President Lincoln, he was the president of the US during the Civil War and is part of the reason that slavery was abolished..." she responded, before nodding her head a bit. "Since the explosive things that are Underground might be harder to track, we might want to see about investigating the other one, the one at what you say is the Lincoln Memorial..."

Jack was glad to hear somewhat the voices, though his brother was more then a bit ridiculous with his comment regarding his powers being gross or something. In truth he knew that sort of thing already, wasn't something he needed pointed out. "I know that Casper, why do you think I don't usually do that sort of thing?" he called back to his brother as he looked over Veil's injuries. Thankfully she had somehow gotten the best outcome, as far as he could tell. Her curly hair proved to be an asset in this sort of situation, so now there wasn't much he could do but wait for the others.

The sounds of the others doing something to get to them made it so that the situation was hopeful, that they would get through eventually and James would be able to heal Veil. Then they needed to get the others freed from where they were more or less trapped. Watching the rubble towards the sound of the voices, he watched as eventually he saw the others break through the wall of rubble and James instantly went over to start healing Veil. "Well that's one person fixed up, we should see about getting through to the others and get them out, since we have a whole lot of issues to deal with," he said, as he got out of the area where he and Veil had been in the rubble.

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The Tunnels - Open Area

Veil coughed, before opening her eyes. Her head was pounding like she had been slamming margaritas the night before without stopping, and it took her brain a moment to process everything that was going on. Her first feeling was guilt - she had been taken out and wasn't able to help everyone - but after that, it was followed by pride. Her family was working together to accomplish something, their powers combined more than the sum of their parts. "How can I help?" Veil asked, deferring to those already awake and consciousness for leadership. They had a better understanding of everything going on than she did.

"H-h-h-hey guys... I-I-I can't keep this up," Casper stammered out, his legs like jelly as Ben flickered in and out of visibility. Max's arch took on all of the weight now, as Ben's tentacles were no longer present. The arch buckled in on itself, clearly under a great amount of strain and pressure but it hadn't collapsed just yet. Either way, it was a sign that they were going to need to move quickly. They were lucky Ben had been taken out of commission with the arch already in place, and that he had cleared the rubble blocking them from Jack and Veil to the side already.

"Hey, hey, you did great," Ben reassured Casper. Casper was too exhausted and drained to even be freaked out about the swarm of dead S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. He was panting like he had just run a mile in high heels in the rain, trying desperately to catch his breath. He really did want to help more. Despite being very self involved and selfish, he didn't want to see his family and friends die - and the fewer injuries people had, the less tired James would be later, which meant he'd have more energy for sexy times.

Veil could hear sound coming from near them - it sounded like Sapphire was drunk? She had no idea how that happened and was partially wondering how long she had been knocked out for. But even then, Sapphire wasn't the type to bring alcohol along on a mission. And she didn't think that there would have been booze lying around in the sewer. Maybe Stareyes... Veil's stomach dropped. Had Stareyes survived the collapse? Was her body shattered in pieces? Had her force field been fast enough to help?

The Tunnels - Caved In Area

Havok recognized that the two conscious people stuck in this place with him weren't really doing all that well mentally. The kid was really quiet, a coping mechanism he had seen during his brief time in an orphanage. Sapphire, on the other hand, had apparently regressed to a mental age of Disney princess. With a choice between comforting the quiet one and the crazy one, he ended up deciding to focus on Sapphire. Unless Andy was about to start foaming at the mouth, he had to trust that she was fine without a pep talk for now.

Especially since she hit him with a snowball in the face. Havok spit out some of the snow, forcing his eyes open after wiping the rest of it off of his face. "I know I'm god's gift to women, but I am spoken for," he quipped with a smirk, before the smirk fell. Things between him and Polaris felt done now - done for good. "Or, I was..."

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Sunshine hadn't gone to help the others, for two reasons: first, Zarina was going on about bombs and second, she didn't have the power set to help. She could only hurt people. She felt a little bit guilty that she wasn't there with the others, but she didn't want to get in the way of things - or accidentally make people sick and cause them to die. She didn't want to be a plague bringer. She shook her head slightly as Zarina mentioned something called an inhuman, she had no idea what that was, but the name sounded pretty stupid to her. What was next - nonhumans? Human-lite?

"Yeah, he's the guy on the penny, he wasn't able to tell a lie without exploding," Sunshine confirmed, being completely serious. The education system in juvi hadn't exactly been the best. She hadn't learned how to read, so it was a bit of a miracle she knew anything about Lincoln to begin with. "When everyone gets back, we should go... Do you think you could use your powers to turn bombs off, beyond just sniffing them out?"

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"Don't worry, Veil's made of stronger stuff than that. She'll...she'll live," Waverley said into the receiver, though her voice was admittedly distracted. So much of her attention was focused on nullifying the waves that could send the rubble of the crumbling sewers down on them that her attempts to offer emotional refuge for Andy were somewhat inattentive. When Andy explained the situation, though, she found herself with the energy to repeat the words back to her, though that was more to inform the others what was going on than anything else. "Stareyes has been shot and Sapphire's...wigging out? Okay, just, do me a favor and make sure she doesn't hurt anyone, herself included." She let the cellphone fall away from her ear, and made a note to apologize to Ben for revealing his past; she hadn't realized it was something he kept secret. But for the moment, she let the cellphone fall a few inches away from her ear as she kept her mind on canceling out the waves above. She could feel the strain beginning to weigh on her mind, the soft prickling of an oncoming headache beginning to dig into her brain. It wasn't anything she couldn't handle, not for the moment at least.

"Fuck yes!" Waverley exclaimed as the iron arch materialized in front of them. With the chaos of the situation, she didn't have time to process that it was Max, and even if she did, she wouldn't have the wherewithal to care. Those two words would perhaps be the closest thing to a compliment she ever gave him. She then gave a small nod to James when he started dealing out roles for them to play in their excavation of their leader, and she kept at it, dulling the waves that wanted to thrum through the debris. She could feel the weight on her mind getting heavier, and it was visible on her face. Her forehead shined with a thin layer of sweat as a vein bulged on the side of her forehead. But just as the strain was about to become a problem, she felt her mind burden become lighter. It took her a moment to realize the cause: Echo, soundwaves radiating from him that matched her own. It freed up her mind enough to let out a breath that she hadn't had the time or energy to exhale, and she gave him a grateful nod. Then, she watched as a number of her friends dug Veil out of the rocky pile, pulling her to safety as James stitched her back together. Waverley watched with anticipation, waiting for some sign of life. She almost let go of her hold on the vibrations in pure relief when the woman opened her eyes, but luckily she didn't. "Veil's alive and well, mostly! You guys are next!" she exclaimed into the receiver to Andy, before looking back over to James, gesturing over to where she had sensed the others earlier. "What's the plan for the others, James?"

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Callie went in and helped removing some of the rubble that was covering Veil and Jack, she let out a sigh of relife seeing that Veil was okay and slowly emerging from the wreckage. And James quickly went in and patched her up, she went over and gave Veil a quick hug, glad that her friend was okay now. "James wants you to use your forcefields to try and make an opening or something big enough for the others to get through, hopefully." Callie said to Veil, hoping that she had gotten his instructions right turning to look at James for a moment before going to Waverly seeing that she was straining a bit and took her phone back.

"Hey, Andy can you put the phone on speaker that way we can give you instructions on your end?" She asked turning to James and handed her the phone to him putting it on speaker to, sounds like the others werent in good shape at the moment and Havok was the only one who seemed to be lucid enough right now. She hoped that this way they could work together and get out sooner rather than later, she turned to look at Casper and gently patted her friend on the shoulder. "You and Ben did great."

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James' response died as Ben flicked out and the metal arch groaned ominously beneath the weight of the ceiling. Healing Veil already had him stretched thin, already purposely ignoring the faint tremble of overexertion in his legs as he pushed himself up, and the threat of further collapse made him feel nauseous. It took a few moments for his brain to recover from the flash of fight or flight mode and he sent Casper what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “You did great, sweetheart. Thank you.” He chose to focus on that for now rather than Veil’s question because he was struggling to put a thought together past the overwhelming need to run.

He cast a calculating eye over the rubble ahead of them. The original plan was out the window. Without Ben, they couldn’t reach the original areas James planned to use to ease the pressure of the trapped group. They would just have to do what they could to build a relatively sound opening further in before… No, James couldn't focus on the cracks in the ceiling or the creaking of the metal right now. They were counting on him to find a way out of this shit and he'd fuckong do that.

Max's smile didn't last long as he watched Ben flicker out of existence causing the metallic supports he had created moments ago to begin to groan and creak from the immense amount of pressure now placed on them. His hands twitched, as if about to cast a spell, wanting to reactively save the situation by creating support beams to help distribute the weight. But Max stopped himself, remembering that James told him not to be so reactive. He waited for James to finish his calculations and would help as needed.

"Okay, so this is going to take a little more work but it's the best available option." James said after a deep breath in some vain attempt to calm himself. He could hear his heartbeat in his ears. "We're going to, um… Waves, Echo you guys are going to have to double down on this vibrations. We're about to make a lot. Max, I need little section of this area in front of me gone. Little by little, not the massive attempt you made earlier. Casper if you can get Ben back after you regain your breath, he can help move rubble. If not, don't worry about it." James explained. [color=mediumspringreen] "We can't avoid disrupting stuff at this point so Veil, you're going to need to put up a dome or an umbrella of some sort so the falling rubble slides around the space that opens up. The bigger the better but if they gotta crawl, they gotta crawl. Jack and Callie, be on stand by. You two are in charge of extraction. As soon as Veil confirms her shields are steady, you guys go in and get the injuries parties out."[/color]

"You got it." Max had to hold himself back once more, having wanted to remove the rubble all at once like before until James specified that it had to be done over time. He began to glance over the fallen debris and it was as of his other self was with him now. Suddenly memories of expeditious retreats, and forgotten digs now rushed into his mind as he looked on with a more critical gaze and watched for the best way to remove the blockage. All signs pointed to his earlier thought, finding a way to combine the two.

Echo watched Waverly, seeing as the strain she was bearing was beginning to lift and shift to a manageable weight as they split the load between them. There was sweat forming in the creases of her forehead as she concentrated on what it is they were doing. Such conviction in her eyes that it sent a pang through Harrys heart, a reminder of two things. As he looked about watching how everyone was working together, in unison free of bickering or infighting, all for a common cause; he could see why his sister left. Why she chose this life and why it was so important to her.

This was something worth saving, worth keeping. The other reminder however came from a mournful place. There were two very strong women in his life, Veil, and his late fiancé. The conviction he saw in Waverlys eyes was much the same he saw in hers. The way she would get and the crinkle of her nose. Waverly’s purple hair almost seemed to blurr and meld in Harrys mind with her eyes. Showing the same colored hue she had. Those beautiful violet eyes.

He closed his eyes, listening as Waverly took a breathe and he matched his with her. Pressing forth and offering enough strength for he and Fae combined. His powers held, and the vibrations stayed as they were, just enough to keep them stable without hitting zero. "Ceilings kept stable. You're clear to start excavating."

"Actually...I may have a better way, something...a thought or memory gnawing at the back of my mind from another life. I'm gonna just…" His voice was distant, almost as if he was speaking only to himself, thinking aloud as his hands stretched out before him and his magic instinctually flowed out from him. It was as if he was back in that world, that reality, where words needn't be spoken and it all felt so much more innate. The cosmic tendrils seeped into the rubble before them, changing their color to match his magic and then having them slowly change as they flowed up and made braces for the arches made before.

As the structures became more reinforced, the groaning began to stop. The pathway before them now cleared for Jack and Callie or whoever, to go on through. Sapphire and the rest were now freed from the cave-in, the snow show visible to all with Havok comforting them and Andy on the phone. "There's a portal back to the MU behind me, go, fast."

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It was relieving to hear that Veil was alive and okay. That meant they had a chance. She was the leader, right? So with her, they could get them out. Andy wanted out of there. She had never been claustrophobic. But she needed to know there were exits. Needed to know there was a way out of the situation she was in. Without the group, there was no way out. Though if she hadn't been with them she wouldn't have gotten into the situation in the first place.

Andy switched Veil's phone on speaker, per Callie's instructions. "Yeah, you're on speaker now." She said. Andy waited for instructions not wanting to risk pulling the wrong rock again. An opening appeared and she almost started crying in relief. Instead, she grabbed Stareyes and tried to drag her. Andy didn't have a lot of strength. Most of her skill was in punching the right spot or kicking it. That required different muscles than pulling. Also, Stareyes was literally a block of ice at the moment making her pure dead weight.

"I can't get her." She said, her voice strained with trying to pull the older girl. She gave up and climbed through the hole out of the collapsed area making room for someone who could carry Stareyes to safety.

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Sapphire just giggled slightly when she had hit Havok in the face with the snowball, and at the moment she was fine, at least she kept saying that she was fine. In reality something clearly had gone wrong with her brain or something like that to cause her to act the way that she is, but she couldn't care less about that. Nope she was just super happy at the moment, and she noticed Havok's face fall for a split second with regards to him apparently not having a girlfriend or something anymore. "Eh, her loss, not sure why she'd leave yoooooou. To me that just seems dumb."

Her attention instantly turned towards the opening that seemed to pop up out of nowhere, and Sapphire got up for a split second before she ended up sitting on the ground again, still incredibly dizzy. "Hiiiiiiiiiii everyone," she said with a slight wave, she managed to stand up again this time and stay standing, but she was pretty unsteady on her feet. "How are you all doing?" Yup she was definitely high out of her mind, but hey, at least she was still alive and kicking, though at the moment she was definitely not like herself.

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Yeah this situation was definitely not looking too good, at least at the moment. The ceiling was holding, at least for the most part, so that was good, and Jack glanced over at his brother as he lost his grip on the ceiling (thanks to Ben and all). A part of him wanted to go check on his brother to make sure that he was at least somewhat okay, but at the moment they had a few other things to deal with. Namely the group that opened up a portal of sorts into the other area, which allowed them to get to where they were thankfully. Hopefully this wasn't going to end too horribly for them.

"Don't worry kid, I've got her," Jack said to Andy as he went through the portal and over to where Kristina was. She was mainly just a big block of ice, a popsicle, though that probably had been helpful with the injuries that she might have had. He managed to pick her up somewhat and get her through the portal and back into the main part of the Underground. "Alright, guessing we need to thaw the popsicle out before she can be healed," he commented, before he found a spot to lay her down for the moment until James could help her.

"Eh maybe, I honestly don't know too much about the history here or how things work or whatever," she said in response to Sunshine. Yeah, that was the problem with where she was from, her knowledge of US history wasn't much better then Sunshine's. So if she said something like that about Lincoln, she wasn't really able to tell if that was the truth or not. She just sort of rolled with it though, since for all she knew that could be the truth, or it could not be. Who really knew? This wasn't even her home reality, so it was a miracle she knew that much, then again she hadn't mention the second civil war that caused the split into the Iron and the Blue...

Her attention was drawn away again when Sunshine asked if she might be able to deactivate the bombs or not. That was a thought that hadn't really occurred to her, but one thing was for certain, she wasn't confident in being able to do it from this distance. "I mean I could try. Just would have to be a lot closer for me to feel comfortable doing it... Reason why bomb defusal is kind of a special sort of thing where people are trained in how to do it... Cross a wire the wrong way and the bomb goes kaboom."

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The Tunnels

Casper held up a finger as if to ask for a moment, still breathing so heavily it was like he had just run a mile hungover in less than ten minutes. He wasn't even super aware of his surroundings, so it was really lucky that the rubble was all taken care of for the most part, although things were still shifting ever so slightly and threatening to crumble down on them all. The sooner everyone got through Max's portal, the better. "Oh god, it's like my lungs went up my ass," Casper wheezed, after Spark Plug put a hand on his shoulder. He was drenched in sweat, so her hand was going to be wet now.

"Yeah, you're fine," Ben scoffed, rolling his eyes.

Casper forced himself to look James in the eye, as much as just moving his neck made every muscle in his body ache and groan. "You're doing amazing too, babes," he said. He knew that James may not have needed compliments and praise the way Casper did, but he still wanted to make sure he knew anyways.

Waverley was beginning to feel the strain of dampening all of those vibrations (3), even with Echo's assistance. Her trembling limbs would release the vibrations in one wave, with the outcome not being decidedly terrible, but it easily could have been better. The vibrations caused a new crack in the road above them to form, sending fresh rubble falling down. The rubble wasn't stopped entirely by Max's new support arches, and Veil's force fields caught the rubble just in time, a gigantic clump of it suspended just inches away from Spark Plug's face. If Veil hadn't had her force field up, Spark Plug would've been instantly killed.

"Hey, take it easy," Veil cautioned. She was incredibly proud of how well everyone was working together. She knew from her time at Xavier's that there were mutants who could use their powers to allow groups to work better in sync, in harmony really - and right now, she didn't think that the Mutant Underground needed anything like that. Everyone was working together and listening. No one was bickering or squabbling. It made her tear up slightly, feeling like a mother whose children no longer needed them.

Havok hesitated for a moment. The kid was through and Jack had gotten their popsicle. That left him with the loopy one. A little bit worried that Sapphire might freeze him for this, Havok took Sapphire's hand and guided her on out, leading her to the others and then through the portal to safety. "Once James fixes Stareyes, Sapphire's got a screw loose. She's gone all baby Elsa." Casper walked through the portal as well, and Veil would walk through once everyone else more or less had gone.

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Sunshine could hear the echo of voices coming from upstairs - they must have been back now from the retrieval operation. Her heart throbbed with pain, remembering how Magik used to be the one who bent space and time in order to relocate them, not Max. The wound was raw and fresh still. She raised a slight eyebrow at Zarina mentioning here - maybe she was from Europe or something. "Where are you from, again?" Sunshine asked. She figured it was another piece of information she had missed, where Greenie was actually from.

"Well duh, figured you'd need to be able to see it or whatever," Sunshine murmured. "Maybe Max can zip you around town to all of the bombs and have you do your thing. Then no one else has to get sick or whatever. Can't believe some asshole is trying to take out the mutants... Oh wait, I can believe it, because all flatscans are evil."

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Callie heard something cracking and looked up seeing the ceiling was cracking again and then started to do another cave in, she closed her eyes just as a large chunk was about to fall on her. Luckily Veil had her forcefields up, sighing slightly as it fell harmlessly off of it, and turned to look at the others. She was glad that Max did his thing as an opening came up and Jack went to help out with Kristina and pulled her out of the mess.

"Lets get out of here now." Callie said as soon as everyone was out she quickly went through the portal, and noticed that Glimpse wasnt with them, and turned to look at Veil. "Where's Glimpse and happened out there?" Callie asked, seeing that Kris was in a literal block of ice, hopefully they would be able to bring her back. They still had the problem with the bombs as well to, and hoped that they had a location for where they were to.

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James’s ears distinctly didn’t burn at the compliment from Casper and the grateful smile he sent wasn’t in bashful but he did appreciate it. He didn’t really feel like he’d done much so far; compared to the rest of them, he felt pretty helpless in the face of this disaster. After all, what could he do besides just shift rubble around? Max’s declaration snapped him out of that line of thought and he tried to tell MAx to stop but it all happened before he could get a word out.

James’ jaw hung open as Max’s magic pulled and pushed the rubble into a supportive form. That wasn’t anything close to what was happening though. It was like his magic melted the rubble into a cosmic whirlpool before Max just restructured everything. It was terrifying and beautiful all at the same time and suddenly, James felt very, very small in the face of such a tremendous force of nature. Thank fuck Max came back to the Mutant Underground because frankly, someone with that much power could literally wipe any of them off the face of the planet. He’d never really appreciated the vastness of Max’s abilities but he did now. The sound of the fresh crack and plummeting rubble broke him out of his awe struck stupor.

“Yeah, definitely a better idea.” James agreed shakily. He’d ducked instinctively as rubble came tumbling down, heart hammering at a thousand miles an hour. His breaths came out short and labored, a pain in his chest as he struggled to draw in breath. His vision swam in and out as he felt the floor shift and the rubble around them swim in his vision. With the situation coming to a close, his focus shattered and the pure terror of the situation came crashing into him, the reality that they’d been within inches of being crushed under a fucking street, and he stumbled back through the portal into his room, barely missing the bed and crashing to the floor, a loud sob tearing out of him as he curled up on the floor.

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Waverley's entire body trembled from the strain, as if it was what had taken the burden of holding the ceiling up along with her mind. She gritted her teeth, her body slumping forward a bit as she tried to keep her mind focused on the waves above them. She could feel the tension spread throughout every inch of her, getting worse and worse until she couldn't handle it anymore. With a pained grunt, the upper half of her body went limp, and she only just barely managed to keep her feet solid on the ground. She watched with wide eyes as more rubble began to fall from above, one that would've hit Spark Plug right in the head were it not for Veil.

"Shit, sorry! It was too much!" Waverley exclaimed, taking a step towards Callie. As soon as she did, though, Callie called out for the crew to file back through the portal, to which Waverley responded with a nod. She stumbled backwards, slipping through the portal, and back into the Underground. Practically as soon as her feet found solid ground, her legs, having barely been holding her up for the past minute, crumbled under her, sending her onto her rear next to James. She leaned her head back for a moment, before limply forcing it forward as she began to count the members of the Underground filing through. She furrowed her eyebrows together in confusion.

"We're...we're one short..." then as soon as Callie spoke, she realized just who was gone. Her eyes went wide, and she pushed herself up off the ground. Her legs still weren't working as they should've been, so she immediately fell forward, catching herself on the wall. She slid across the wall, using it for support, shuffling as close to the portal before calling out to Veil, "Is Glimpse still in there?! We need to get her out!"

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Andy watched as Max's magic changed the debris. That was impressive and honestly terrifying. She had been around other mutants in her life but had never seen anything like that before.

Andy joined the others through the portal. She had never traveled like that before and was a bit disorientated. She looked around and took a few slow deep breaths. She looked at Waverly as she asked about Glimps. Andy didn't know how to tell her.

She looked around for Zari. Andy wanted to tell her what happened but didn't see her right away. Zari at least was like her and brand new. Everyone else knew each other. It was her and Stareyes that got wrapped up in this the same day.