Atlanta, Georgia: September 9th, 2020 - 11:00 PM
The Mutant Underground had cells all over the country, located in just about each and every major city. So many of their leaders had been handpicked by the founders of the organization: Professor X, Erg, and Evangeline Whedon. The leadership of the Atlanta station had been selected by the only female founder. Her choice had been a bit controversial at first:
Lorna Dane, better known to the world at large as Polaris, Mistress of Magnetism, daughter of Magneto. Her second in command was the legendary Thunderbird.
Polaris sat in an empty booth of
Stan and Joan's Legendary Diner, not too far away from the outskirts of Atlanta. The locks on the door had been undone with her magnetic powers. She was dressed in primarily black, a leather jacket with metallic spikes that matched the cuffs she wore on her wrists. Her shocking natural green hair was complimented with a headband crafted from the very same material as Magneto's helmet, preventing telepaths from gaining access to Polaris' mind as long as she wore it.
The lights in the diner burst.
Polaris rolled her eyes slightly, seeing the menacing outline in the dark: a figure cloaked in scarlet, wearing his signature helmet.
"Must you always wear that stupid cape?" Polaris asked, not even flinching as the figure stepped out of the shadows. The lights of the parking lot just barely illuminated her father's
sinister face.
"You didn't call me here to criticize an old man's fashion choices, daughter." He took a seat across from her at the booth, setting his gloved hands down in front of him as he looked at her with curiosity.
"Of all my children... You are the only one I am truly proud of. Whereas Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and Plasma lack conviction, your soul is steel, forged in the fires of adversity." "Did you come alone?" Polaris asked, ignoring his compliments. She had fallen for her father's tricks before and she was not about to repeat those mistakes. Her headband was a precaution.
"Do you mean whether or not Mastermind is here?" he asked, a hint of amusement in his voice.
"Is he?" Polaris pressed.
He shook his head.
"No, he is not... You have nothing to fear from him, daughter. He would never dare to hurt you." She snorted, leaning back in the booth and then shifting, propping one of her legs up on the seat so that way she was in a partially crouched position. And despite her father's assurances, her headband remained firmly on her green locks.
"You mean he wouldn't dare to hurt me unless you ordered him to, Father. Or are you finally become so old even your memory has failed you?" "Enough games," Magneto commanded.
"Tell me why you asked me to come here, daughter." "And here I thought I was your favorite..." she muttered under her breath, but her eyes never left her father's face. Even though they were family, she didn't doubt that he would not hesitate to strike her down if he thought it would be advantageous. Every conversation with her father was a game of chess.
"I want you to offer me something, Father." He raised an eyebrow.
"And what would that be?" "A seat at the table of the Hellfire Club," she said succinctly.
"And then, I am going to help you build it." "Oh? And what is it we are supposedly building, my dear?" Polaris sighed.
"Don't play dumb - it's not a good look on you. You and I both know that the Hellfire Club purchased an island near Madagascar called Genosha." "...How do you know about Genosha, daughter?" Polaris smirked slightly.
"You're not the only one with spies, Father."
Washington D.C.: September 10th, 2020 - 8:50 AM
It was early in the morning and almost each leader of the Inner Circle was present - all except for the Black Queen, Reeva, who had to get an even earlier start to her day and handle some pressing matters for their plans. She had taken Sage and Fade with her, leaving the Three-in-One behind to assist Ethos, Jinx, and Requiem on their mission that day. Of course, there was one person who would stand out more than post. She was wearing a sleek black outfit, primarily crafted from leather, and a green metallic headband sat on top of her vibrant green locks.
"Erik - fancy seeing you around here," Shaw smirked, making himself a whiskey at the bar. The servants had managed to clean up and repair all of the damage overnight, leaving no indication as to the brawl that had happened before.
"And my oh my, just who is this little princess with you?" Magneto glared at Shaw slightly.
"This is my daughter, Sebastian," he warned.
"Oh, Lorna - what a divine pleasure it is to finally meet you. Your father has told us so much about you," Emma said, smiling like the Cheshire Cat at the young mutant.
"Right," Polaris said simply, her arms crossed defensively.
"I'll have to ask - what exactly did he tell you about me?" "Only good things, darling," Emma replied with a wink, a yogurt parfait in a crystal cup floating in the air in front of her as she ate her breakfast. The Three-in-One were behind their genetic template, smiling in unison at Polaris. The plan was that once Requiem, Ethos, and Jinx had gotten up for the day and eaten breakfast, they would discuss the strategy and head off on the mission. Emma would be coming along with them to coordinate things from the jet.
"Don't look so shocked, daughter," Magneto mused.
"With Quicksilver off playing X-Man, Plasma in S.H.I.E.L.D. custody, and the Scarlet Witch focusing more on her brother than the state of mutant affairs, you have to do very little to elicit praise from me." "Gee, thanks," Polaris muttered, rolling her eyes.
In the middle of the night, Sunspot and Cannonball finally returned to find the Mutant Underground station in a state of ruin and decay. They already had been on the road so long that they agreed to spend the night to rest up and then evacuate the children to the nearest Underground cell in the morning. It would give the adults time to relocate and tackle the problem of Sebastian Shaw and the Hounds. Sapphire's medical treatment had restored Veil largely, assisted by Veil's natural durability. It was difficult to understand, but her ability to manipulate invisible energy seemed to make the healing process go down a little easier - that or Sapphire was just a medical genius.
It was just a little before nine in the morning when Veil had called everyone for a meeting - and to eat breakfast. Their food was not nearly as decadent as the Dairy Queen Sapphire's friend had purchased for them, with their options largely consisting of watered down coffee, water, and extremely bruised apples.
"Alright, we have a lot to discuss this morning and I have assignments for everyone," Veil began, her chest bandaged and she was leaning up against a column for some support. Her eyes flickered over towards Max.
"Sunspot, Cannonball, I'd like for you two to fill everyone in on the details of your mission." "Ran into assholes, dealt with assholes, that's pretty much it," Sunspot muttered, clearly on edge as his clothing was smoking constantly.
"Yeah, that's pretty much everything we really have to tell y'all," Cannonball agreed, a bit of a drawl coloring his words.
"We's gonna take the kids to the Providence cell after this. They've got space to handle them." Veil nodded, a bit relieved that they didn't have anything worse to share with her. Something heavy was weighing on her mind, but she knew that it would be better to leave it for last. Everyone was going to have questions and she needed to get everything covered before people were too distracted to think - Havok in particular.
"Colossus - updates on Magik and Vulcan, please," Veil then asked, going straight to the next business matter.
Colossus was without his sister at the moment, the first time they had really been apart for hours.
"Illyana is resting. She has shivers, fever... Vulcan is unconscious. No sign of anyone coming for them." "Good, I'd like to keep it that way. Sapphire, after this, I want you to go check on Magik - it sounds like withdrawal symptoms to me but you're the one with a medical degree, so take point there. Whatever we need to steal to help her, let's get it. You've got my permission to organize a run if needed to raid a hospital, just be careful." She didn't think that James would be able to do much for Colossus' sister. Withdrawal did have physical symptoms, but a lot of it was psychological. He had seemed pretty worn out from the night before and he was an unknown variable as well. Sapphire was someone she could trust and count on.
"Blink - I'd like for you to go scout for a new location for us to relocate to. I know you used to be part of the Atlanta Station, so you know what we're looking for. Take someone with you if you can." Blink was a bit surprised that Veil just... gave her a task like that, but she nodded.
"Got it, Boss Lady," she said. Veil reminded her so much of Polaris. She just hoped that Veil hadn't somehow gotten in touch with Thunderbird, that break up had been painful enough as it was. She didn't really want to revisit that.
There was still more information that needed to be discussed. Sunshine was uncharacteristically paying attention, even as she took bites out of her apple. She didn't care at all that it was bruised almost beyond recognition. It was food and she knew how unreliable food supplies could be. When there was food, she needed to eat as much as she could - who knew when she'd get to eat again, after all?
"Negasonic Teenage Warhead got a tip on where the Hounds are being made," Veil explained.
"Please go and fill everyone else in." Negasonic nodded, looking up from her phone. She had been reblogging things about her OTP on Tumblr.
"It's this dive bar called the Cherry Bomb. My girlfriend was working a missing's persons case, ended up discovering that her client was last seen there... It's owned by a subsidiary of Shaw Industries, which totally is just a coincidence that a missing mutant was in a sleazy bar this guy owns..." she finished, getting a little bit sarcastic. No one had mentioned yet Max's murder of the police officers from the previous night.
"I'm taking a team after this meeting to go and investigate the basement - if we find anyone, we free them and hopefully get one step closer to taking this asshole down. After last night, they know we're onto them, so we need to move fast," Veil added. Her eyes then flickered over to Havok. She couldn't avoid mentioning this much longer.
"Last night..." she paused, now looking at Max.
"There was an incident in which one of our own killed some human police officers. I'm not going to lie. It's bad. There isn't anything we can do to change what happened and while I know that mutants will survive this, it's entirely likely that not everyone in this room will be alive at the end of the year because of it," she told them frankly.
"If anyone wants to get out of Washington D.C., we can send you up north - Canada's got looser laws when it comes to mutants and the attitudes are better there." "Additionally, the Atlanta station called me half an hour ago - Polaris is in the wind. They're looking for new leadership, so if anyone here wants to take charge in this fight, let me know and I can tell them you're interested in the position." "WHAT?!" Havok snapped, his eyes wide as he looked at Veil accusingly.
"Lorna is missing and you're just telling me NOW?! What the hell, Valery?!" Sunshine frowned slightly, looking up from her food at Havok. She didn't really know him and she had no idea why he was so freaked out about another Mutant Underground leader running off. Maybe this Polaris was important to him or something - she didn't know, she'd never heard of a mutant named Polaris. She took a sip of her depressing coffee, not really liking the taste but she never cared about whether or not she liked the taste of something she had put in her mouth.
"Dude, calm down, she just told you..." Sunshine pointed out, butting into the conversation.
Veil was appreciative of the kid's comments.
"Havok, you're free to run after her if you want to - but we both know Polaris. She isn't fond of being tied down or followed." "This is bullshit!" Havok exclaimed.
Casper was sitting as far away from Max as was humanly possible. Every time he glanced over at him, he could see the ghosts of the police officers he had killed. One of the ghosts was the mother of Feedback, Waverley Watts. He was doing his very best not to look at them, not to respond to them, that way hopefully they wouldn't realize Casper
could communicate with them and start demanding that he pass on their angry messages to the living.
"You should tell her, Cassie... She's her daughter, it might help her to get some closure," Ben whispered in Casper's ear.
Casper just shook his head.
"It'll just cause her more pain, Ben..." he whispered back.
