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Bethany groaned when she couldn't use her powers to blind Cortez at all which was really annoying as she ignored Robert's yelling but she kept her eyes on the walls seeing that Mary was using her powers to manipulate the plants and keeping the walls in place. If Magneto's powers continued to go out of control she didn't want to end up being sucked out into space or something like that. Bethany decided to try another tactic on Cortez as she extended her hand outward towards him.

She tried to use her powers and bring him down to his knees only for nothing to happen, she wasn't sure if it was because of Cortez or not, but she tried again. It did work however her aim was off and instead she ended up targeting Max, and accidentally yanked him and dragged him across the floor slightly. "Sorry didn't mean to do that." Bethany said to Max, luckily he still seemed to have control over his power still.

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Carolina tried to possess Cortez she briefly had him for a second only for her to be forcefully ejected out of Cortez's body, normally she would have returned back to her body if someone managed to force her out. But something was off as Carolina found herself floating around the room. She watched as everyone continued to fight against Cortez, she winced slightly when Bethany accidentally used her powers on Max. She tried to swoop in and possess Cortez again however nothing happened at all.

She tried again and the same thing happened again as she flew through Cortez's body and how the other end and nothing happened again, she knew that he was most likely using his powers against her. She hoped that Guin would be able to try and take control of Cortez or someone else would be able to take him out as she floated there.

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They were getting nowhere fast - hardly anyone was even managing to land a hit on Cortez, and Magneto was still sending metal scraps rushing through the air in dangerous frenzies. Guin hadn't managed to get much of a hold of Cortez telepathically, and neither had Carolina it seemed. His powers weren't touch based, they seemed to be operating more on just a general proximity limitation, so Guin decided to do things somewhat differently. If she couldn't dive into his mind, she could sure as hell kick him in the head. After all, she'd been trained in self defense by Black Widow and then later as a SHIELD agent before ever becoming an X-Man.

Luckily, Guin didn't get too scraped up by the metal going around. She didn't notice the way metal pieces seemed to be dodging Pietro, as instead she was focusing on getting to Cortez. She didn't need her mutant powers to protect people and fight against assholes like him - she'd spent most of her life without them, being a late bloomer when it came to her mutation. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bethany drag Max with shadows instead of Cortez. She winced. They weren't doing great.

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Even as Neil tried to protect everyone, to use their powers as a shield, it just wasn't enough. It wasn't working. Cortez was hardly perturbed, acting like the cat who ate the canary. This was just a game to him - just some sick, twisted, messed up game. What was he getting out of this - did he have an agenda, a goal? Was this revenge on Magneto? Was there even a reason behind him doing this to people or was he just bored? Neil hated people like that. They had a few relatives who were like that, using their magic and rituals to behave cruelly and without remorse just because they could - because they had nothing else better to do.

So Neil decided to stop being a shield - they decided to be a sword. Instead of trying to use their telekinesis to redirect the shards and protect their friends, they decided to go on the offensive. They could grab the shards and fling them at Cortez, piercing him and gutting him like the asshole he was. It was what he deserved. And Neil always did like Cloud of Daggers.

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OfAll heard Perry's comment on more power use, not to mention Guin's "stick to the plan!" and snuffed a brief impulse to just go on the offensive with everyone. OfAll hadn't been among those selected for the "storm him" part of the plan, and as such she thought it more prudent to keep her attention open for where best she could fit -another look cast between the two situations.

Perhaps as most were further down the corridor with Cortez, the barrage of whirling metal wasn't causing as much damage as one would expect; minor cuts if it made contact at all. Didn't mean it would stay that way, and OfAll observed Edus try to use his powers to guard against it, though that wasn't working. Judging by the vibration of Neil's hands, however, and subsequent response in the metal, that defensive attempt was, at least some.

The situation of the walls was a growing concern, yet a moment later Marygold had that handled, at least for now, and managed to partially bind Cortez as well -a success among scarce few; he was proving a match for the X-Men.

All this being so, OfAll did wind up joining the fray of those fighting him, acting on Antoinette's suggestion to try and blind him so Annie could follow up with her own powers.

OfAll's first attempt to throw light into his eyes wasn't successful. The light just encased OfAll's own hands again, and increased like a bulb about to burst, before fading. On her second attempt, inspired by Edus' wrist action as he, too, pivoted focus and went on the offensive, OfAll decided to really put her arm(s) into it, and drew her elbows back before thrusting forward -the light releasing from her outstretched hands and hitting their optic target!

"Alright! Your go!" She said to Antoinette in a tone of measured hope.

Then, OfAll clicked her mind to a different point of interest.

While she had been observing things before, she managed to catch for the second time how the metal didn't seem to just happen to miss Pietro, but seemed more like it avoided him. This second time looked different than the first, and a separate theory was building in OfAll's mind.

Cortez's comment on how much the X-Men really knew played into it as well, along with the still unusual "absence" of Magneto, Miranda and, as OfAll realized now, Flynn.

I mean Magneto at least seemed to be there, and OfAll could reason Flynn and Miranda kept safe out of the action -possibly for Cortez reasons, or other- yet at the same time. . .

Though the Light powers were proving a good manifest so far, a part of OfAll wished she had tried taking Guin's telepathy, even though that was among the powers OfAll didn't feel comfortable going for. The plan she was building in her mind involved reading either Cortez's mind, or "Magneto's" again, though OfAll's observations had also caught Guin's bleeding nose; evidence of what this fight was costing her, so far.

OfAll didn't want to ask a potentially already spent mind to try straining again. Even if OfAll did think mind reading would be less of a strain than mind control -Guin herself seemed determined to leave mind games behind for the moment.

That being said, OfAll was a proponent of "don't decide what I'm capable of. Let me be the judge of that". Maybe she could run the idea by the her if she could first take some burden off -ensure Guin didn't have to worry about herself for a sec.

OfAll tried to throw her light powers again, this time to erect a shield around Guin similar to how Lance had around the three of them earlier, but OfAll couldn't seem to work that out. Casting out a shot of light was one thing, but casting out essentially a shroud of it that would have to be maintained proved to be another.

Not wanting to misfire and wind up protecting Cortez instead -like it seemed Bethany misfired and grabbed Max- OfAll decided on another tactic.

If you can't read someone's mind, act like you already know what's in it and let them spill the missing thoughts: hey, sometimes life played out like a movie.

"Cortez! Who says it's not the other way around?" OfAll asserted. "We seem to have your attention pretty well. That means you're missing other things."

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Antoinette breathed a sigh of relief when Jaclyn agreed to her plan. She crouched beside Jaclyn, ready to go on the offensive, but as she waited, something started to go wrong for Antoinette. Her eyes started to sparkle, and she panicked slightly before fireworks began to shoot off around her. Antoinette did her best to misfire her out-of-control powers to avoid hitting any of her companions. Antoinette was not a fan of having no control over her powers, but she knew remaining calm would be better than panicking and losing even more control. However, despite Anoinette’s best efforts, she couldn’t keep everyone safe.

As she started to lose more control, Antoinette’s fireworks veered off and hit Lance and Perry ”Watch out!” She cried too late. Antoinette watched in horror as both Lance and Perry were thrown back. They were covered in burns now as well.

Antoinette’s hands balled into fists in frustration. This wasn’t working. She put in her best effort to regain her control, but it still wasn’t good enough. Panicked, Antoinette scanned the room, looking for an exit. Maybe she would have a chance if she could remove herself from his line of sight. But they weren’t in a room; they were in a long corridor. Antoinette turned and faced Cortez. Fine. If he wanted to control her, she would just have to do her best to control what he saw. Luckily, at that moment, Guin was charging Cortez.

Antoinette's thoughts turned to Guin and her fighting patterns. She had been training with Guin for months. Antoinette knew how Guin moved; surely she could create the illusion of multiple Guins coming at him to confuse him. Right? Right! Antoinette created three other Guins, all charging Cortez in the same manner as the original Guin. Antoinette prayed Guin moved quickly, as Antoinette had no idea how long she could use two powers simultaneously. Curse Cortez and all he holds dear, Antoinette thought bitterly.

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Perry had taken a beating from those that were not the enemy. After being shredded and blasted, she was now thrown to the wall in what could only be described as a fire blast from hell. She felt herself get burned but she stood up. "Okay, maybe the onslaught of powers isn't working." If Cortez could influence all of them still despite them using everything they got, perhaps it was best not to use powers.

Perry had an idea and she hoped it would work. She called on Mary Ellen who sprang up and disrupted gravity around Cortez. He began to float for a bit and Perry took her chance. Dude needed another punch to the face. She came forward and reared her fist back, hitting Cortez, albeit not as hard as she would have hoped. She tried again but missed.

"If powers aren't working, perhaps a good old-fashioned butt-kicking is needed. I recommend the face. I speak from experience. It is very punchable."

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Mary seemed to join him by his side. Vines crawling along the walls as they prepared for damage control in the event that Erik couldn't get his powers in check. Max supposed he was lucky his powers were always chaotic. Always so unpredictable. It made it easier to manipulate the extra umph that Cortez was pumping through him. He was used to this feeling of helplessness and inability to control. A tangle of vines grasped the other hand Max hadn't managed to bind yet, noting the grin on Cortez's face. That couldn't be good. People only ever got that look when they were either going to be extremely reckless or…when everything was falling into place how they wanted. His words didn't make Max feel any better either about where they stood.

Max was about to ask Cortez what he was planning. To explain what it was they didn't understand. Oftentimes, those who believed to be on the high ground, love to monologue about their superiority and reveal their entire plan. Unfortunately all that escaped Max was a yelp as a shadowy mass wrapped around him and pulled him back. He gripped tight onto his spell ensnaring Cortez using it as a way to balance between the tug o war. It was enough of a distraction to help Max look at the field once more. Guin was coming up to fight Cortez, with Perry in the rear about to do the same, Cortez began to float seemingly out of nowhere and Annie was panicking, no doubt due to Cortez's influence. ”No time for a monologue Cortez, sorry. Pietro, Guin's, Perry, feel free to knock 'em out and fast.” Max looked towards Mary with concern in his eyes. ”What's the plan boss? If this doesn't pan out?” His free hand playing with magical wisps that fought hard to solidify at first before becoming two penguins dancing near Antoinette. ”Focus on them, it'll help you channel better. Keep your mind free from all else.”

Rob watched Magneto continue to lose further and further control. Well, trying to appeal for the good of his family sure as hell didn't seem to help. God damn his spine was hurting right now, the rubber insulation wasn't doing as much as he had hoped. He needed to push through further. If he didn't stop Magneto here and now, he was going to pull the station to pieces. He looked back to the others, he was close to the epicenter of Magneto's freak-out and with all of the metal bending and flexing around him, he couldn't hear a damn thing that was happening back there. Most of the others attempts to communicate that he should maybe try something else getting lost in the din. Think, Rob, think. Nothing to really do but try and get further through to him. Maybe... He tried pushing himself further, through the shards of metal, putting his hands up to his face to protect from the shrapnel that was starting to chip away at the aluminium outer shell on his body. He didn't want to absorb anything coming at him because that would make him even more susceptible to the magnetic forces. He pushed his way through to within arms reach of Magneto, but that's when his legs gave way... But he didn't fall to the ground. Instead he seemed to get caught up in the swirling vortex of metal around Magneto for a second, thrown against the wall. He landed and absorbed his feet into the ground to keep himself in one position for a second to think. No, his spine had too much Adamantium in it, he wasn't getting anywhere close to Magneto with that. He had been hoping to maybe absorb the helmet to make him open to the psionic attacks for the others, but that most certainly wasn't happening. "CAN SOMEO-" He called, but the sounds of battle and metal were too much. Nobody was going to hear him, also, his sentance was cut short by metal shards flying into his mouth. His tonsils might be aluminium, but when they got pinged by a shard of steel flying at them, it made his gag-reflex want to blow chunks everywhere. As plant vines sprang across the walls to try and keep them together, Rob threw Mary a thumbs up in gratitude, of course, she had other things to deal with, so he doubt she saw it.

Well, appealing to the visionary didn't work, appealing to the father still had no effect... Maybe it was time to appeal to the maniac? Getting up, his feet unfused with the floor and he pushed his way past through the debris field. He was starting to feel the nicks adding up, he was going to die to death by a thousand cuts at this rate. "MAGNETO!" He called through the cacophony of broken station. "IS THIS WHAT YOU'VE BEEN REDUCED TO. THE MASTER OF METAL NOW A PUPPET DANCING ON THE STRINGS OF A SNAKE-OIL SELLING RAT?! YOU ARE THE ONLY HOPE FOR MUTANT KIND!!! ONLY YOU CAN BRING US THE AGE OF MUTANT PEACE WE WANT... NO WE NEED THAT AGE. ASTEROID M WILL BE A NEW EDEN THAT WE CAN GROW FROM!!! YOU ARE MAGNETO!!! STOP PLAYING HIS GAME, SNAP OUT OF IT AND BE THE MAN WHO WILL SAVE US ALL!!! ASARI SAW THAT IN YOU!!! SHE SHOWED ME I WAS WRONG ABOUT YOU!!! I DESIGNED THIS PLACE FOR YOU AND ALL OF THOSE WHO RELY ON YOU!!!" He was hoping that in his addled state, Magneto wouldn't see through the lies about him having drank the Kool-Ade, but it was more about getting him to pull himself together, stroke his ego to the point where it can break out and assume full control. "WE ALL FOLLOWED YOU TO THE STARS BECAUSE WE BELIEVE IN YOU! YOU ARE THE UNDISPUTED MASTER OF MAGNITISM! THE GREY KING OF GENOSHA! THE HERALD OF THE AGE OF MUTANT KIND!!! NOW START ACTING LIKE IT!!!" He roared at Magneto. If not even the maniac that wanted human genocide could break through Cortez's control, then they abandoning M might be their only choice. He just REALLY hoped that his 5 years of planning wasn't going to just be undone by a drug dealer and a bunch of trigger-happy X-Men. He put his hands up to protect his face from the barrage of metal shards, regardless of what happened now, it was time for him to pull back.

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Something was off. This was not seemingly working out, not so much the fact that they were going against Cortez, but more of, the fact that he wasn't really fighting back. Something was seriously wrong with that. Why wasn't he actually trying to get away? Sure, he seemed intent on causing chaos, and was doing a really good job at that, but still. What was the point of all of this? There had to be a reason. The question is, what was it? "...Something is wrong. Sure he's causing chaos with powers but... He's up to something... Don't you think it's a bit odd that he hasn't really fought back? No... This is a distraction... But not entirely sure why or what even his actual plan is..." Mary said, though it was more of to herself than to anyone in particular.

Her attention shifted slightly towards Guin now as Guin would be able to hit Cortez in the face with her kick, giving him a decent black eye. "...This reminds me of back at the mansion, when Mesmero attacked. He turned everyone against each other, to serve as a distraction for something else. We learned why eventually but still, that didn't exactly work out... Something's definitely up with this, more then what meets the eye..."

Mary was half paying attention to anything as Neil would be able to cut Cortez up a little bit with metal shrapnel, causing him to bleed a bit with his attacks. His whole instant seemed to be trying to go for people who might have chaotic powers to cause destruction. Why? Well the easiest answer would be that he was trying to stall them to accomplish something. That once again led to the question of why would he do that? When they initially encountered Cortez, he had powered up her and Perry's powers. Perry was a newer member of the team, whereas Mary's powers were likely decently known but it'd also be known that her powers in space aren't as effective as they are on Earth, while Perry was a wild card, her powers unknown. Okay, that led to them eventually encountering the people from earlier, those who manipulated various elements. He probably had known of their powers or at least vaguely had.

Which led to the here and now, where Cortez had initially targeted Magneto and Max's powers.

That one was interesting, since Magneto is obviously well known, Max from what she knew was known partially because of the whole Genosha thing. So it was possible Cortez knew how chaotic his powers were... But then... Why was Cortez causing all of this to happen? Why now? There were so many questions with regards to it that she wasn't entirely sure. "There's just way too many variables and explanations... Way too many questions and I guess he's not going to just tell us. Guess we just punch him a bit more or something and figure it out..."

As if right on cue, a green colored fist came out of nowhere and slammed right into Cortez throwing him backwards with tremendous amount of force and a bit of a crack. The restraints that Mary and Max had on him held, barely though and they did give ever so slightly from the strength, so at least the crack didn't seem to be his back snapping in half or something. But his arms seemed to be a bit loose, likely having somewhat gotten broken from the hit and he let out a scream of pain at this point. Mary turned to look over at Lance who was just shifting back to normal, but there was hints of green on his face as he did so. But now the burns he had seemed to be gone now. "I thought we said don't shift unless you have to?"

"...I was getting tired of him screwing with everything, burns hurt, and I heard someone say punch him so I did. Also the thought just crossed my mind... Do you think he could potentially cause that to go haywire because that would not end well."

"I'd prefer not to find out."

Unfortunately, knocking or severely injuring Cortez did not seem to stop the powers he already had messed with. As Carolina would still have a bit of a hard time going back to her body, but it did seem like she was starting to get the hang of it again, so that was something. Annie's powers were still sparking here or there, but didn't seem to zap anyone else, so yay for that.

Magneto's powers were finally starting to slow down a little bit, though the walls were still rattling a bit but at least he seemed to have figured out (somewhat anyway) how to control his abilities. Though maybe it isn't recommended to anger him. Something that Robert was probably going to figure out very quickly. "Don't you dare yell at me and speak of that which you know next to nothing about," Magneto had snapped at him instantly, as he did so the metal was starting to rattle even more.

"Erik just stop there is a whole lot more that needs to be dealt with you can try to use him as a pincushion later or something," Miranda spoke up. She had been relatively quiet during the encounter, as she wasn't exactly easily able to get to where Cortez was, and the trying to distract him with illusions for the plans didn't seem to pan out and work out that way. Flynn meanwhile had chosen to stay back as well, since his powers were not ones he wanted to use in an area with a lot of people in it, and getting up close also didn't exactly seem to be the best idea either.

"Yeah seriously just shut up about your damn ego no one right now cares, we mainly care about not letting Cortez try to kill everyone on board so thanks for the not skewering me with metal I guess for that. Makes you wonder if you had more control over that then what appeared."

"I do not know what you are referring to, aside from the fact that I manage to at least seemingly slow it down in it's trying to destroy the hallway we're all in."

"...Wait so the metal just magically shifted around me without much of a care in the world as if I wasn't really there?"

"I was trying to stop the metal entirely, that is all I did."

Pietro was insanely confused at this point, but paid no attention to that conversation anymore as he turned to actually look to see what was going on with those who had been dealing more specifically with Cortez. Honestly if his father hadn't managed to regain some control of his powers when he did, Pietro had been prepared to race through the metal and tackle him.

The gears were continuing to turn in Mary's head, before a sort of sinking feeling popped up, a lot stronger when she realized something and remembered a bit of a vital piece of information. "...His sister... Where is his sister?" she then asked out loud, looking at everyone around her.

"Whose sister and what do you mean by that?" Mira asked, a bit confused by what it was Mary was going on about.

"Cortez has a sister, she's on board. Cortez couldn't possibly seemingly take down this place by himself. He'd need some help and it was mentioned he has a sister here with him. He's distracting us from something. So where is she?" Mary finished her question right when another alarm started blaring.

"...Guessing from that sound she might have been the backup plan to if he couldn't get Magneto to rip this place apart by accident. I mean this is a space station, and as was proven earlier this place can get holes blasted into it fairly easily. The main thing powering it probably if it got damaged severely it might be able to blow everything... Kind of like the one weakness point on the Death Star in Star Wars, instead of just blowing holes in it, find the one spot to take everything out, probably a lot quicker."

"Yeah and we just walked right into Cortez's hand with that."

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Bethany stood there as she watched Guin going over to Cortez and managing to kick the guy in the face leaving him with a nasty looking blackeye which she winced slightly. Everything wasn't going very well for the group as everyone seemed to be either yelling at each other or trying to take out Cortez. And the Lance going Hulk briefly and punched Cortez as well slamming him into a wall, her eyes turned towards Mary as she asked where Cortez's sister was which she didn't know that he had one.

"If he was just distracting us then we need to actually try and find her wherever she is." Bethany said as she stared at Cortez wondering if he would tell them, but most likely he wouldn't really. Worse case scenario she could come up was that they wanted to control the asteroid and crash it into Earth or something. "What if their plan is to ram this thing into Earth?" She asked looking over at Mary.

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Carolina was still having a really hard time trying to get back into her body when she was finally able to she slowly started to stand up slightly her eyes turning towards Cortez who was laying on the floor after being punched by Lance briefly going into Hulk. Which probably wasn't the best thing when going up against Cortez.

They apparently needed to find where Cortez's sister was he was basically just distracting them all from what they were actually planning. Carolina turned to look at Max. "Do you have some kind of tracking spell or whatever to find her or something?" Carolina asked Max since he was more or less a magic user pretty much and he would try and track her down as quickly as possible.

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Hardly any sooner than the words leaving OfAll's mouth, bluffing that Cortez was missing something, that her attention was suddenly taken by fireworks erupting from Antoinette.

OfAll gasped --she'd had no idea Antoinette could even do that. Instinctively OfAll put her arms up guarding herself, though trying not to cover her face completely so she could still keep track of what was going on. Fully expecting to feel fresh burns on her arms -she was the closest to Antoinette- it was a refreshing surprise that the wayward sparks didn't make contact.

In fact, the only ones they did hit seemed to be Perry and Lance, as far as a cursory scan of the room informed.
Burns. The injury of the day it seemed.

OfAll could see Antoinette was panicking now, yet shortly, she seemed to make the choice to channel her panic. OfAll turned her head in the direction Antoinette was focusing, and saw duplicates of Guin. She also saw some apparition of Perry's do something that caused Cortez to float.

They seemed to have Cortez more on the ropes now, and OfAll wanted to help both Antoinette and Robert, who she could hear continuing his impassioned plea though she couldn't make out all the words. She felt badly he was essentially the only one left with Magneto. She should hung back and tried some Light-shielding, although she might not've managed it there either.

OfAll did agree focusing on Cortez seemed the better solution -a way of stopping Magneto indirectly.
Except now she was realizing Cortez's boosting must've had a timeclock on them than be related to his attention. Magneto's wayward powers didn't seem interrupted in the least even while Cortez was getting pummeled. That meant taking him down wouldn't necessarily be the end-all to this calamity.

--Penguins?!

OfAll at first thought she was seeing things -the oddest, and adoreable things- before she heard Max speaking to Antoinette.
Certainly an imaginative way to calm a teammate! OfAll smiled, somewhat. Sparing a hope that those penguins were 100% magic and not like, transported here from somewhere. She'd hate for some innocent animals to be caught up in this.

OfAll then heard -following the crack of Guin's kick on Cortez's face- Mary speaking of that time things went awry at the Mansion.
A distraction. . . .OfAll was suspecting something of the same. Why hadn't she responded more actively? Maybe just jetted out of this corridor all together to do some sleuthing of her own?

An even louder sound of impact snapped OfAll's attention effectively back to the action, where Cortez was certainly paying for being the distractor.
And OfAll was more heavily feeling the potential seriousness of the situation even as the immediate pressures seemed to be subsiding; Magneto's powers were leveling off. Antoinette's seemed to be as well.

Perhaps knocking Cortez senseless did work to dial down his doings.

OfAll now realized where Miranda was as well, and figured or at least hoped Flynn was still with her, though OfAll couldn't see him from her present position.

She thought Pietro could've held back some attitude, being Magneto had just been spun out of control by one of his own nearly to the extent of destroying what he'd worked so hard to build. But then, Pietro was having his own worst day, so that probably was an exercise in maturity compared to what he might be feeling like doing.

The two's exchange was interesting.

When Marygold, then, began talking about "his sister", OfAll at first thought she meant Pietro's.
She'd had no idea, either, that Cortez had one.

Listening, the gears started to turn in OfAll's mind. The surmising of some Death Star explosion point was unsettling, though OfAll wasn't too concerned about such a thing. As she pointed out: "If they wanted to blow up the place or slam it into Earth, they could do that any time. The one they'd ultimately need to distract would be Magneto,", she gestured to him, as if to say 'and that was already accomplished'. "We were brought here today," OfAll went on, "that has to play into this."

Now she looked at Magneto. "How many on here can create illusions? We could be being framed," she added to the team.

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A lot happened very quickly.

The tides of the battle had started to turn, only for Mary to voice an unsettling truth - that Cortez had wanted them here, distracted, so that way something else could happen. If his plan was to crash the asteroid into the Earth... assuming that it didn't all just burn up on reentry... the death toll would be catastrophic. "That won't happen. We won't let that happen. And even if we fail, there's other groups on the planet that'll destroy this hunk of junk before it would hit the surface." They'd die, of course. SHIELD or the Avengers or the Fantastic Four would have to kill them to save the world.

As for Cortez's sister... Guin pushed, doing a quick telepathic scan of the asteroid. She found her pretty quickly. "Got her." She was in one of the main computer hubs. Guin took off at a sprint, trusting that the others had Cortez handled - or at least, Lance certainly seemed to. It wasn't too far to the sister's location, and as Guin got near, she could hear the sound of computer equipment being smashed and destroyed. Great. If there was one thing she loved, it was fixing machinery on a deadline. She much preferred fixing up Pietro's computer so he could play Phasmaphobia. That was relaxing, low stakes.

This... this could be about saving millions - or at least, about saving everyone aboard the asteroid.

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Too much was happening, Neil's brain unable to process all of it. It reminded him of some D&D games they'd played sometimes, where the DM just keeps on rolling die after die, rattling off an insane amount of damage and effects to the extent that Neil couldn't keep it all straight. That was part of what it was like being on the X-Men though - they fought in groups, often times against just a few opponents, meaning that everyone was sort of going all at once. But at least, it seemed to be working. Cortez was losing.

They paled though as the theory came out that it might have all been a trick, that Cortez was distracting them so someone else could enact their evil plan. Just as things had started to turn in their favor, they were right back where they'd started - and it might even be too late. Guin exclaimed that she knew where Cortez's ally was and took off at a sprint - and Neil decided to rush after her, to do what they could to help.

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Perry felt herself grow a headache. Was that a thing? Could one grow a headache in their own mind? She felt the slow pain develop as the others spoke, all hashing it out, screaming, realizing that they were probably being played by this douchebag and his douchebagette of a sister. "Just....stop." She said this to no one though, mainly to herself and her brain working overtime.

"Anyone else feeling like they are just little cogs in a machine? I mean think about it. Half of us were brought here because we won some contest, but yet were not expected to want to stay here. The other half doing all they could to come find us, which is obvious they wouldn't have just let us stay here, forgotten. When we do finally meet up we come across this douchebag who can enhance powers to the point of sheer chaos, but yet we have the actual asteroid base crumbling around us. It's like a comedy of errors. And now we have his sister being the one we need to find?"

Perry shook it off visibly. She noticed the others were probably on her same level of frustrated. Guin had at least seemed to find the sister. "I'm coming with because if anyone else deserves a punch in the face it's his sister." She followed Guin to where the sister would be, ready to unleash hell. She wanted off this damn rock.

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Max felt the weight shift as the arm he was tethered to popped out if it's socket. ”Oh grooossss.” Cortez seemed to be out, but as the chaos continued to unfurl, Mary was have equations dance around her head trying to figure out what the angle was here. She was right, Cortez wasn't fighting back. Max had assumed it was because his powerset didn't allow for it, using it mainly as a way to change the field rather than truly get an upper hand. But then he could've been physical at any point. Something must've given, because suddenly Mary was asking about his sister, hypothesizing that perhaps she was the true villain. The one he was meant to distract from so that she could get a handle on what was needed. Bethany added on that they may have been attempting to ram the station into Earth. That would have catastrophic effects, not just leveling areas, but also potentially starting a mutant human war. Blaming Erik for an attempt on humanity he wasn't even responsible for.

It didn't sit right with him. The feeling in his stomach as his hands gripped tighter in the chains tied to Cortez. Carolina wanted a tracking spell, Guin had found the sister but she didn't mention where and simply ran off. Max let out a huff of air in annoyance. ”Sure. I'll locate his sister and send you on her way with something to follow.” Magic flowed out of his hands and encircled one of the penguins that was dancing. The magic seeping in as it began to waddle quickly towards the culprit. ”Follow that Penguin. It'll lead you to Cortez's sister. I'll catch up. But for now...” Max went to make his way towards Magneto, skipping the whole path to him before halting a small distance away. ”While Guin may feel safe putting her trust in other groups on Earth to deal with a falling Station, I'm not so quick to do so and condemn those on it. Magneto, Erik, Sir, uh right. How many mutants are currently on the station? Is there an evacuation procedure or a safety room that everyone can make their way towards. In the event of failure, we need contingencies, if we can gather every mutant together I can attempt a circuit like what was used to save Genosha, to open a portal into Earth to safeguard all the mutants here. I'll…have to stay behind. To make one other portal to move the falling debris to another location in space away from Earth and outside from endangering other planets or systems. Can we safely get every mutant to a singular destination for emergency evacuation if needed?”

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Guin managed to land a kick on Cortez, followed by a punch by Lance. Antoinette relaxed a little more, releasing the illusions she had created in time for penguins to pop up in front of her. Antoinette looked at the creatures curiously, wondering if she had unconsciously done that when Max spoke up. Antoinette snapped her head up at Max, blinking at his words. She looked back at the waddling penguins and smiled, even giggling a little.

Antoinette felt the stress of the chaotic moment and losing control of her powers ease from her mind and shoulders. Everyone here was fighting the same fight. They would all get through this. She could hug Max for this, but that would have to wait.

Cortez seemed restrained for now, which was good considering Mary's scenario. Guin quickly found Cortez’s sister and raced off, Neil and Perry close behind. Antoinette opted to stay and refocus on the task at hand. They needed to knock Cortez out somehow. Antoinette’s powers still sparked at her hands and crackled over her forearms. She didn’t want to push her mental abilities, but they needed to close in on him. Antoinette looked to Mary, the leader of their group. With the party split and numbers lower, they really needed to work as a team.

”What do you need us to do, Mary?” Antoinette monitored Cortez, ready to physically attack him if he made a move.

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"Will staying behind mean no return for you?" Ed asked Max. Now was not the time to ask Max more direct questions like 'how did you know me before now and how do I die? Don't lie I saw my grave summoned by you', however, the idea of Max dying before Ed could ask those questions was unsettling.

Guin took off and Max had summoned a penguin that was leading the way to wherever Cortez's sister was. While Ed wanted answers, there were injuries among the group. Lance had healed when he had gone green, but Perry had still taken a blast into a wall and had burns on her. Those needed attending too. Others had scrapes, those could wait. He reached for the unlabeled jar of Perry's hair, he hadn't gotten around to labeling it like he hadn't for Jaclyn.

Orange light glowed and instead of the cooling healing effect pain wracked Perry's body. He dropped the spell quickly. "I apologize that should not have happened." He took a slow breathe. The stress and irritation of this all had gotten to him. He calmed his nerves down and tried again. This time the orange light that covered Perry's burns soothed rather than hurt.

A part of him filed away the incident. He had never thought that his healing could be used for pain instead. And he didn't like the implications.

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"I don't think they plan on crashing us into Earth. We should have maybe noticed that by now considering we've been able to see outside of here multiple times, and have been in control rooms and at computers fairly recently so we should have potentially been able to spot that, and plus that would then kill them potentially too, which wouldn't make sense. It'd be harder to leave too if we were going that way because obviously re-entering the atmosphere probably would not be good," Mary started to say, shaking her head as everyone started rattling off a few possibilities. There were way too many variables to be able to predict what exactly the end result was that they were hoping for.

"Well I'm going to follow after Guin," Lance said instantly as he took off after Guin and in that direction.

"Not too many here can create illusions," Magneto responded to Jaclyn, "As to how many mutants there are in this facility, there are around 100 people, that would be including all of us right here. They are somewhat scattered around the place, and it might take some time to round everyone up into one place to evacuate, never truly imagined there would be so much danger in here from one of our own." he then added, directing that towards Max.

"Max, you aren't staying here or doing anything reckless I'll kick you off this station myself if you try," Mary added, looking at him and shaking her head. "I might be able to get a decent amount of people transported somewhere else, plus we've got the Blackbird to get the remaining stragglers, and the pods that got us up here to begin with. So that's probably about plan F if we get to that point." She wasn't going to mention the added fact that the odds of them being able to coordinate 100 people to do anything or manage to get them all to one spot for a transport was not very high. Meaning the odds of them saving everyone on the station... That wasn't something she really wanted to think about right now.

"...Wait a second..." she muttered, an idea popping into her head, before walking right up to Miranda. "Ok, so I don't know enough about your powers and how they fully worked, but you had some form of telepathic ability involving memories or something aside from your illusions right?"

"It's called Retrocognition, it allows me to see the memories of others, and occasionally when that's popped up I've used me illusions to show others what is seen. Why?"

"Think that might work on him? At least enough to figure out what's going on?"

"Perhaps, I can certainly try but a lot of people tend to try and have some form of mental defenses against anything like that," she said, before walking forward to where Cortez was who still wasn't really moving and put her hand on his arm.

The hallway suddenly had a bit of an illusion summon up around those there. They'd easily recognize Cortez and a woman who were talking about something.

"So the goal is to try and destroy the place once the pods or whatever gets up here?" the woman said to Cortez.

"Just think how many points all of this will be worth though, all those deaths. We'll definitely win the game. Everyone else will probably give up Anne just think of it."

"I mean we don't even fully know what the prize is, but alright, what's the plan?"

The illusions disappeared and Miranda stepped back, but Mary was instantly thinking of what the hell was going on. "...It's all a game..." she said rather slowly, trying to think of what else to do. Annie had asked what the plan was, but she very much did not have one. They had to deal with this sort of thing sooner rather then later. Though one easy thing they could do would rely a bit on needing everyone to get into one place. "I'd say send the speedster to try and find everyone around here and get them all in one place, but odds are most people might not react too well to him being around. Which means we need there to be a way for us to let them all know without Pietro playing messenger."

"Could have JAclyn copy my power, but then you'd run into the problem of burning through too many calories and potentially passing out. Hence why I always carry food around," Pietro said with a shrug, before adding, "I'm going to go catch up with them,", and then he took off in a gust of wind.

"This is way too screwed up and way too many moving parts... Because all of these ideas to evacuate are pointless unless we can let the others here know to get to one place. Jaclyn if you want to try playing a speedster for a little bit or something go for it, since that's currently the best potential idea on how to do it, unless anyone else has other suggestions."

Before reaching the room with the crashing and what sounded like destruction, Guin would get a telepathic message from Mary, Apparently this whole thing is a game. Literally. They are trying to gather points in some stupid game, and in this instance the more people who die apparently on this asteroid the more points they get or something like that. Really messed up.

Mira had also decided to go along with the group going after Cortez's sister, and as that group entered the room, they would see a lot of fire. Computers were smashed and the room had small fires surrounding the area. What had been left of the main console had been destroyed and alarms were blaring even more as the base was starting to shake a bit, but it was difficult to tell whether that was from the destruction they came across in the room, or something else. A woman was there with a weapon in her hand and was just blasting away at a bunch of the stuff still in the room.

"...Well this looks not so great..." Mira said, not entirely sure what to do, but the woman didn't seem to notice the group there.

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They needed to stop Cortez's sister from doing anything else she watched as Guin quickly ran off in the direction, she wasn't sure where she was headed now, however Max was nice enough and he was able to use his magic to create a penguin illusion. Bethany quickly ran after it and started to follow it down the hallway. Luckily it wasn't that far from where they were as she could hear somethings being smashed and alarms were going off.

She noticed that the room was on fire and various computers and displays were all smashed and destroyed. Bethany quickly extended her hand outward and tried to use her powers to try and bind the woman. Only for her power to not work, so Beth tried again and on her second try she was able to bind the woman. "I think thats enough of that." Bethany said, hoping that the others would be able to take her out.

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Carolina decided to stay behind to see if there was anymore information that they could get out of Cortez as she looked at Miranda as Mary asked to use her powers, she remembered her ability pretty well when she met her back in the House of M reality. She listened to Cortez and his sister as they went over the plan and mentioned that all of this was a game to them which was really messed up. Though she took notice that they mentioned others.

"There might be more from what the memory said can you get some more information from him?" Carolina asked, hopefully there was some more information that they could go on. There were so many other things going on that Carolina wasn't sure really why were they playing this as a sick and twisted game anyway?

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OfAll listened to Guin make a decisive, even impassioned statement before seeming to immediately use her powers to lock onto where Cortez's sister was.

She left, joined by Neil, Lance, Mira and -following the pleasurable penguin guide- Bethany.

OfAll was among those who hung back, keen for the information Magneto could supply to both her question, and the one Max posed after -skipping?!- over to him. Not knowing Guin enough to have any suspicion that she might've done something telepathic earlier -not even aware telepathy could be used in that way- OfAll couldn't fathom what Max was doing, except to suspect, given the previous penguins, he was the type to go for an absurd laugh in the face of a heavy situation.

And heavier it grew by what Max was proposing. OfAll's expression immediately creased with concern and opposition to the idea. Certainly that couldn't be the viable plan in that instance?

She looked to Edus as he asked what seemed to be the implication.

Clearly all this was weighing on him, too, as a following attempt to heal Perry before she left to join Guin, surprisingly resulted in damage, instead. OfAll could see how seriously Edus took this setback. At least his healing worked after that.

Additional relief came from Mary's reasonable assertion that crashing this place into Earth wasn't likely to be the plan, and furthermore, that she wouldn't allow Max to carry out such a plan as he'd suggested. She brought up the BlackBird as another escape option as well.

OfAll's respect for Marygold's leadership was reaffirmed. She seemed to know how to keep her head amidst chaos, and communicated her thoughts effectively.

Following her with her eyes as Mary brought Miranda into the conversation, Miranda's powerset being confirmed, OfAll was highly interested to learn of Retrocognition and that Miranda could project what she saw; similar to Holo's powers in that one respect.

Unlike her little sister's projections, however, which were usually good for a positive vibe -even when she hadn't meant to display them- the ones Miranda presented only served to solidify the disturbance of this situation.

A game? These were two adults, one who honestly looked like she was fresh out of some first-person-shooter, treating life up here like some game? Killing actual people worth points? Going for some uncertain prize?

OfAll was turning this over in her mind while Marygold answered Antoinette.

"They're still not the masterminds-" she started to say at the same time Pietro happened to start speaking, such that her words probably got lost. His caught her attention anyway, "-what?" Her question didn't actually require an answer, and soon Mary was seconding the thought of OfAll manifesting Pietro's powers next.

She didn't want to flat out say 'no', but..."I can try, but part of my manifestation requires I can wrap my head around it, and there are some questions I have about superspeed." She gestured in the direction Pietro went, as if to say 'and my answers just jetted off'. "But maybe I could. . .Maybe telepathy?"

Though she would still come off confidently enough, it would be clear OfAll wasn't completely set on that option, either. Telepathy was one of those powers which were on OfAll's 'Prefer Not' list. The ones she understood well enough to manifest, but had concerns about that made her uncomfortable about doing so. Instead of disclosing that, however, OfAll continued: "If it would be safe, maybe Max could create a circuit with us," she said to Marygold, "maybe including Guin remotely in that," she reasoned a remote circuit may work since it was telepathy they were talking about, "and we could speak into the minds of everyone at once? Or," OfAll now looked towards Magneto, "have you speak to them through our link?"

Relatively calmly though she spoke, OfAll's discomfort was actually betraying her as she grew just a little flushed and had that hot feeling one gets with growing nerves. It wasn't just the prospect of telepathy, but it was bringing up a mutant circuit, bringing chaos powers into this...Did she just share a good idea or a stupid one?

Those who knew the powers in question better than she, could answer that.

OfAll only knew she was willing to do her part even if it meant striding outside of her comfort zone.

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As Perry followed the others down the hall, she suddenly felt pain through her body, enough to cause her to stop. What the hell was this now? She nearly dropped to her knees from the pain until it subsided and she felt cool, like her burns were being treated. It seemed Ed had attempted to heal her and failed the first time around, but at least he got it the second time. She felt better. She'd have to thank him later.

She eventually met up with the others in time to see Cortez's sister shooting up the room in what she felt was like an adult temper tantrum. Thankfully, Bethany had used her super cool abilities to tie her up some. Perry sent out Barry like a pokemon and he shot his taser, hitting its mark. The zap didn't do the job of knocking her out, but at least it hurt her. Perhaps she would stop. Perry noticed she dropped her gun. Perry ran over and picked it up, pointing it at his sister. "Why don't we stop now? Or I'll send my friend out to shock you again." She did not intend to shoot her, but it was better to have firepower on your side than on your enemy's side.

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Guin received Mary's message and her eyes widened. It was all for a game? There wasn't even a good reason behind it - it was just a game?! As repulsive and disgusting as that was, it then prompted another question - who was running the game? Who was awarding the points? And who else was playing? It sent a shiver down her spine, imagining people going around killing mutants for sport. There was something callous about it, something that made her want to wretch. She'd rather face off against the villains with convictions than ones like these.

They'd need to find that out - they'd need to find out who was running this. But for now, they had to save everyone they could. Finding this game master would have to wait.

"It's a game. They're killing everyone for points," Guin muttered to her companions, filling them in as they reached Anne Cortez.

The room was wrecked - Cortez's sister was blasting everything in sight, and the equipment was ruined, up in flames. Even Guin, with all of her talents when it came to technology, couldn't help but be nervous that they'd manage to salvage any of this. Bethany restrained Sister Cortez and Peregrine made a ghostly apparition ready to attack should she not comply. "I'll see if there's anything I can do. But we might... ugh... we might need Magneto on this."

Systems are trashed. Doing what I can. Magneto might need to fly the station to safety - maybe park on the moon?

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The situation had gone from okay to worse. Everything in the room was destroyed, and they were having a hard time believing that any of it could be fixed. Even Guin and Mira probably couldn't do it. And then Cortez's sister, Bethany and Perry had her under control, but was it already too late? Was this station bound to explode, to crash into the Earth? How many were going to die?

And then there was what Guin said - that this was just a game to them, that their motivations were solely around winning points. It was horrifying. Neil had never fought against people like this before, people who had such a disregard for life that it was just a game, just something to pass the time with. Even the murderers in their family had more respect for life, honoring it in their own twisted ways.

They didn't know what they were going to do.

They didn't know how to fix this.