Visyn
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BlueSky44
op2024
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Half Pint
TlalocSo you can find this adventure OG on the site I made specifically for it: X-Men Envisionings
Where you can read the Parts a few days earlier than I'll be posting here,
as well as xperience xclusive content like thought pieces and playlists.
(I have it formatted a touch better there, too, ngl).
Otherwise,
enjoy the adventure below!
Where you can read the Parts a few days earlier than I'll be posting here,
as well as xperience xclusive content like thought pieces and playlists.
(I have it formatted a touch better there, too, ngl).
Otherwise,
enjoy the adventure below!
🧬🌐🧬
Compelled by the realistic world building of the original X-Men movies and those versions of Cyclops & Jean Grey, X-Men Envisionings is one
fan's text adaptation of that iteration of the mutant world and its characters; riffing off from the events and continuity of the first two movies pluswith further inspiration drawn from the comics, The Animated Series, and their storytelling principles.
Ideally this will be a web comic, but as I don't have those skills, for now it's a text adaptation.
If the idea inspires you and you'd like to be the artist for it, shoot me a PM here or DM on Discord
(un: techtraplex | dn: 🎬TechtraPlex👓)
Taking a "never or now" approach, this series is a work-in-progress, releasing unfinalized drafts.
For your open mind and your time:
thX
🧬 Cychtra
fan's text adaptation of that iteration of the mutant world and its characters; riffing off from the events and continuity of the first two movies plus
So at an early point in my Envisionings journey, I came across an interview with Mike Dougherty, one of the credited writers for X2 on what the third X-Men movie may've been had he and the original director* worked on it.
Search for Slashfilm interview "Filmcast: After Dark - Ep. 73 - Making Tirck 'R Treat" and skip to timestamp 24:55 for that.
I also came across a concept, mentioned by X2 writer Dan Harris, for a version of Emma Frost.
Search "Sigourney Weaver Was Going to be Emma Frost - SuperHeroHype" for that.
I found that take on Emma interesting and Mike Dougherty's idea for X3 infinitely more captivating than X3: The Last Stand (not to mention smoother and more interesting to work off from).
This is what I've taken to calling "X3: Unseen" as a reference shorthand.
From there, inspiration filled in details to where I also have my take on X3:Unseen, which for reference to readers of Envisionings is as follows:
(Note: a video by youtube channel Bullets and Blockbusters describes additional details regarding Emma Frost's role in X3 Unseen. I'm not aware of what their source material
is on that and I actually find certain details less compelling, so considering them I would
also have the adjustments of:
With that explanation set, I hope you'll enjoy joining the ride of my Envisionings.
*I do not support abuse of any kind.
I'm just responding to the art. A movie is a work of many.
I'm just responding to the art. A movie is a work of many.
Search for Slashfilm interview "Filmcast: After Dark - Ep. 73 - Making Tirck 'R Treat" and skip to timestamp 24:55 for that.
I also came across a concept, mentioned by X2 writer Dan Harris, for a version of Emma Frost.
Search "Sigourney Weaver Was Going to be Emma Frost - SuperHeroHype" for that.
I found that take on Emma interesting and Mike Dougherty's idea for X3 infinitely more captivating than X3: The Last Stand (not to mention smoother and more interesting to work off from).
This is what I've taken to calling "X3: Unseen" as a reference shorthand.
From there, inspiration filled in details to where I also have my take on X3:Unseen, which for reference to readers of Envisionings is as follows:
- -Emma Frost is a (closeted mutant) therapist who uses her powers in her sessions, unbeknownst to her clients.
-Xavier, aware of her (though with a false idea of what her powers are) arranges for Cyclops to see her to help with his grief and guilt over the loss of Jean Grey.
-Cyclops is unreceptive to the therapy, until the end (with Emma Frost discovering
she can't even find his emotions to touch -a first for her- until that point)
(Note: a video by youtube channel Bullets and Blockbusters describes additional details regarding Emma Frost's role in X3 Unseen. I'm not aware of what their source material
is on that and I actually find certain details less compelling, so considering them I would
also have the adjustments of:
- -no romantic history between Xavier and Emma, placing her more in the age range of Cyclops
-any manipulation of Jean Grey by Ms. Frost it not realized by the X-Men).
With that explanation set, I hope you'll enjoy joining the ride of my Envisionings.
X
Ideally this will be a web comic, but as I don't have those skills, for now it's a text adaptation.
If the idea inspires you and you'd like to be the artist for it, shoot me a PM here or DM on Discord
(un: techtraplex | dn: 🎬TechtraPlex👓)
Taking a "never or now" approach, this series is a work-in-progress, releasing unfinalized drafts.
"...The creature will still go through a few more mutations ...
always adapting to new ideas in the hopes of making it better.
Stronger. The evolution continues.
Quote by Michael Dougherty & Dan Harris
on the script of X2, April 20th 2003.
always adapting to new ideas in the hopes of making it better.
Stronger. The evolution continues.
Quote by Michael Dougherty & Dan Harris
on the script of X2, April 20th 2003.
For your open mind and your time:
thX
🧬 Cychtra
🎼Cue X-Men Movie Theme🎼
☄️🔄
We see pockets of water and plant life, at once familiar and otherworldly.
Though also noxious and blighted -it's clear, despite the alien quality of this ecosystem,
that it isn't as it should be.
Then we watch as it gradually starts on fire.
Instead of everything burning, we see the vegetation and water anew,
-renewed, as the fire is swept -as though pulled- away.
The species of this planet look up towards a bright light in the sky, a light which appears closer than a sun.
Their faces represent a mix of emotions; gratitude, relief, humility, apology.
Then we hear the echo of a strong, compassionate voice:
"Remember. What's in the past can also be in the future. It's in your hands, now."
The sky turns suddenly dusky as the near light moves away. . . .
. . . .and we come to join it as it soars throughout the cosmos, from one galaxy to another, seeking out a familiar planet; the third from its sun.
We move in on a scene on the grounds of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.
Ororo Munroe A.K.A. Storm, is teaching an environmental class.
Utilizing her weather powers, Storm demonstrates two possible outcomes on a micro-scale: draining the moister from the air and earth to reduce a patch of grass to drought-like conditions, while with another she increases the agreeability of its immediate environment, eliciting rich growth.
A young First Nations girls can be seen clearly holding the information in her head, rather, her hands, as images of a healthy, wild patch of nature, and a desolate plot appear above her palms.
Her classmates observe the two scenes until Professor Munroe begins commenting.
We can't hear what's said, but the girl's projected imaginings disappear as soon as she comes to attention.
Far off on another part of the grounds, Marie A.K.A. Rogue and Bobby Drake A.K.A. Iceman are conditioning themselves with some basic training; running track. Like before, we don't have full sound on the scene, but some good natured teasing seems to be going on -Rogue, the mutant who can't safely touch another living person, pretends she's about to remove one glove and grab Iceman in a playful threat that he better run faster.
He does her one better, making an ice track in his lane that he now slides swiftly down.
In Professor Charles Xavier's office, Logan A.K.A. Wolverine, in a new X-Men uniform, and Kurt Wagner A.K.A. Nightcrawler in one of his own, seem to be finalizing details with Professor X on an impending mission. Each is wearing a pack.
Wolverine extends his adamantium claws from between his knuckles, breaking in his new gloves. Nightcrawler sets a three-fingered hand on his shoulder and the next moment,
*BAMFS* himself and Wolverine away.
And so too do we leave, to see glimpses of existences beyond this singular place-
Through the skylight of a New York apartment, a man with red lensed sunglasses
sitting on a couch, talking with a red-haired woman. The moment possibly intimate;
certainly amicable.
-we travel on, a star visible in the day-sky across these scenes,
though largely missed by the subjects:
Mutants,
Non-Mutants,
their interactions; such as they typically are.
Finally we circle back to look down on the man we saw before,
now treading towards a headstone. .
. .We see both by their shadows as, with the soft sound of crunching grass,
he comes to stand in front of it.
The shadow of his arm rises.
We hear a gentle kissing sound before seeing his hand come to lay on top of the stone.
". . .not a day will go by. . ."
We follow this man, Scott Summers A.K.A. Cyclops, as he returns to the school,
walking past a dedication to Jean Grey.
Later, in what had been their room, Scott stands, ready for bed, in front of the open wardrobe. On one side we can see his clothes. What's on the other side isn't visible to us.
He holds a book in his hands, where we see a more private dedication; an inscription in the front cover:
To my dear Jean.
I hope the words in this book will do in place of what I can't express.
Love Scott.
Scott gives the book of poetry pensive regard,
before placing it in, or returning it to, the unrevealed side of the wardrobe.
The close of a day. .
. .brings us back out to the cosmos, where a fantastic release of power takes place.
A celestial body descends on the Grounds like a meteor, yet there's no impact. Instead,
as it comes to land at a certain spot, the fiery tail drifts back towards space, like a cape
let go in the wind -or a bird taking flight.
From the perspective of an individual, we're now reentering the X Mansion.
We walk through the presently unoccupied halls, passing the dedication once again,
we know exactly where we're going, and come to stand outside a familiar door.
A female hand is placed on the knob. .
. .and once inside, gently rouses Scott.
He looks at her as if she's a dream. "You're on my mind a lot today, dear--!"
Having reached out, he comes suddenly to full alertness; sitting up. "-Jean?!"
His hand -both hands, move about her in gentle confirmation: this is no lucid dream.
"How?"
"It's, complicated to put into words. . ."
Though she manages to find some: "I left things unfinished."
Jean meets his "eyes".
". . but everything we went through. . .Why it had to happen. . -"
"We won't have to worry about that."
Scott's brows knit together. He's disturbed.
A figurative step back to explain: "You released me- . .released my power, from a place it couldn't be." Getting up from the bed, Jean moves towards the window.
Scott watches her until she continues: "I reclaimed that place. . ." Jean brushes her hand over her arm . . turning, after another moment, to definitively conclude:
"But nothing else is reversed."
"You're powerless?" he rises out of bed, taking a step closer.
"Not exactly. I still carry an active X-Gene. But my power is no where near the point it was,
or could ever come to again." A statement or a vow?
Both stand staring, as if reading each other.
Jean steps closer. "I wanted you to be the first to kn- the first I let know that I'm back. . .
I know this is a lot."
They don't come to close the distance between them completely;
assessing this new circumstance. . . .
[Caption Box (/Voiceover - Jean Grey)
"Across these past two years, I've experienced new life. Reconciliation of other beings;
it is possible. No matter how far I'd gone, I never stopped wanting this for my family. .]
Cont'd into our next scene, where we see Jean is now speaking not only to Cyclops,
but to the rest of the X-Men presently on-site -Colossus, Kitty, Iceman, Rogue, Storm,
and Professor X. All gathered in a Staff Room:
". .When I realized how I could return, it felt like ego not to. Like I would only be part of the problem if I stayed away. That being said I know what everyone went through because of me. . .I considered keeping away from this place. . .though I can't do what I intend to from behind the scenes, and I didn't want to add confusion to everything else once you found out I was back."
Storm: "You count as well, Jean. We no sooner can expect you to stay away from what is still your home."
Jean smiles like that means so much. "Thank you, Ororo," the smile fades. "Even still, as much as I'd like to do what I came to alongside all of you again, if it's too much for anyone," his eyes linger just a noticeable amount longer on Scott, "I'll make a fresh start of my
second chance."
Xavier: ". . .Well I don't think I need to be psychic to know the consensus of the room."
He smiles deeply. "Welcome back, Jean Grey."
Though also noxious and blighted -it's clear, despite the alien quality of this ecosystem,
that it isn't as it should be.
Then we watch as it gradually starts on fire.
Instead of everything burning, we see the vegetation and water anew,
-renewed, as the fire is swept -as though pulled- away.
The species of this planet look up towards a bright light in the sky, a light which appears closer than a sun.
Their faces represent a mix of emotions; gratitude, relief, humility, apology.
Then we hear the echo of a strong, compassionate voice:
"Remember. What's in the past can also be in the future. It's in your hands, now."
The sky turns suddenly dusky as the near light moves away. . . .
. . . .and we come to join it as it soars throughout the cosmos, from one galaxy to another, seeking out a familiar planet; the third from its sun.
[Caption Box (/Voiceover - Charles Xavier)
"As mutants, from the instant we discover who we truly are, impossible realities
become the way of our lives. . ]
"As mutants, from the instant we discover who we truly are, impossible realities
become the way of our lives. . ]
We move in on a scene on the grounds of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.
Ororo Munroe A.K.A. Storm, is teaching an environmental class.
Utilizing her weather powers, Storm demonstrates two possible outcomes on a micro-scale: draining the moister from the air and earth to reduce a patch of grass to drought-like conditions, while with another she increases the agreeability of its immediate environment, eliciting rich growth.
A young First Nations girls can be seen clearly holding the information in her head, rather, her hands, as images of a healthy, wild patch of nature, and a desolate plot appear above her palms.
Her classmates observe the two scenes until Professor Munroe begins commenting.
We can't hear what's said, but the girl's projected imaginings disappear as soon as she comes to attention.
Far off on another part of the grounds, Marie A.K.A. Rogue and Bobby Drake A.K.A. Iceman are conditioning themselves with some basic training; running track. Like before, we don't have full sound on the scene, but some good natured teasing seems to be going on -Rogue, the mutant who can't safely touch another living person, pretends she's about to remove one glove and grab Iceman in a playful threat that he better run faster.
He does her one better, making an ice track in his lane that he now slides swiftly down.
In Professor Charles Xavier's office, Logan A.K.A. Wolverine, in a new X-Men uniform, and Kurt Wagner A.K.A. Nightcrawler in one of his own, seem to be finalizing details with Professor X on an impending mission. Each is wearing a pack.
Wolverine extends his adamantium claws from between his knuckles, breaking in his new gloves. Nightcrawler sets a three-fingered hand on his shoulder and the next moment,
*BAMFS* himself and Wolverine away.
And so too do we leave, to see glimpses of existences beyond this singular place-
Through the skylight of a New York apartment, a man with red lensed sunglasses
sitting on a couch, talking with a red-haired woman. The moment possibly intimate;
certainly amicable.
-we travel on, a star visible in the day-sky across these scenes,
though largely missed by the subjects:
Mutants,
Non-Mutants,
their interactions; such as they typically are.
[Caption (V/O) CONT'D
. .Perhaps that is how we can go on in a world which feels, so often,
incompatible with us. .]
. .Perhaps that is how we can go on in a world which feels, so often,
incompatible with us. .]
Finally we circle back to look down on the man we saw before,
now treading towards a headstone. .
. .We see both by their shadows as, with the soft sound of crunching grass,
he comes to stand in front of it.
The shadow of his arm rises.
We hear a gentle kissing sound before seeing his hand come to lay on top of the stone.
". . .not a day will go by. . ."
We follow this man, Scott Summers A.K.A. Cyclops, as he returns to the school,
walking past a dedication to Jean Grey.
Later, in what had been their room, Scott stands, ready for bed, in front of the open wardrobe. On one side we can see his clothes. What's on the other side isn't visible to us.
He holds a book in his hands, where we see a more private dedication; an inscription in the front cover:
To my dear Jean.
I hope the words in this book will do in place of what I can't express.
Love Scott.
Scott gives the book of poetry pensive regard,
before placing it in, or returning it to, the unrevealed side of the wardrobe.
The close of a day. .
[Caption (V/O) CONT'D
". .As we understand that what we know to be reality,
is only what we know now."]
". .As we understand that what we know to be reality,
is only what we know now."]
. .brings us back out to the cosmos, where a fantastic release of power takes place.
A celestial body descends on the Grounds like a meteor, yet there's no impact. Instead,
as it comes to land at a certain spot, the fiery tail drifts back towards space, like a cape
let go in the wind -or a bird taking flight.
From the perspective of an individual, we're now reentering the X Mansion.
We walk through the presently unoccupied halls, passing the dedication once again,
we know exactly where we're going, and come to stand outside a familiar door.
A female hand is placed on the knob. .
. .and once inside, gently rouses Scott.
He looks at her as if she's a dream. "You're on my mind a lot today, dear--!"
Having reached out, he comes suddenly to full alertness; sitting up. "-Jean?!"
His hand -both hands, move about her in gentle confirmation: this is no lucid dream.
"How?"
"It's, complicated to put into words. . ."
Though she manages to find some: "I left things unfinished."
Jean meets his "eyes".
". . but everything we went through. . .Why it had to happen. . -"
"We won't have to worry about that."
Scott's brows knit together. He's disturbed.
A figurative step back to explain: "You released me- . .released my power, from a place it couldn't be." Getting up from the bed, Jean moves towards the window.
Scott watches her until she continues: "I reclaimed that place. . ." Jean brushes her hand over her arm . . turning, after another moment, to definitively conclude:
"But nothing else is reversed."
"You're powerless?" he rises out of bed, taking a step closer.
"Not exactly. I still carry an active X-Gene. But my power is no where near the point it was,
or could ever come to again." A statement or a vow?
Both stand staring, as if reading each other.
Jean steps closer. "I wanted you to be the first to kn- the first I let know that I'm back. . .
I know this is a lot."
They don't come to close the distance between them completely;
assessing this new circumstance. . . .
[Caption Box (/Voiceover - Jean Grey)
"Across these past two years, I've experienced new life. Reconciliation of other beings;
it is possible. No matter how far I'd gone, I never stopped wanting this for my family. .]
Cont'd into our next scene, where we see Jean is now speaking not only to Cyclops,
but to the rest of the X-Men presently on-site -Colossus, Kitty, Iceman, Rogue, Storm,
and Professor X. All gathered in a Staff Room:
". .When I realized how I could return, it felt like ego not to. Like I would only be part of the problem if I stayed away. That being said I know what everyone went through because of me. . .I considered keeping away from this place. . .though I can't do what I intend to from behind the scenes, and I didn't want to add confusion to everything else once you found out I was back."
Storm: "You count as well, Jean. We no sooner can expect you to stay away from what is still your home."
Jean smiles like that means so much. "Thank you, Ororo," the smile fades. "Even still, as much as I'd like to do what I came to alongside all of you again, if it's too much for anyone," his eyes linger just a noticeable amount longer on Scott, "I'll make a fresh start of my
second chance."
Xavier: ". . .Well I don't think I need to be psychic to know the consensus of the room."
He smiles deeply. "Welcome back, Jean Grey."
The following day.
Jean comes down a hallway to see the same First Nations girl we saw in Storm's
Environmental Studies class now watching her with polite interest.
Jean greets her warmly. "Hello."
"Hi."
"I have the feeling there's something specific on your mind?"
She's paused in front of her.
The girl smiles. "You could just tell without asking, couldn't you?"
"Yes, but I prefer to ask."
The girl seems to like that. "Did you really go to space, by yourself? I mean..."
she thinks of the correct question. "By your own powers?"
"Sort of." Jean seems reluctant to say more on this subject.
"What was it like out there?"
It's now Jean considering a correct answer.
"A lot of it. . .it would be hard to describe. And likely unbelievable."
"I have a good imagination." Smiling anew, the girl allows a projection to form
above her head. It's an outdoor scene, with all the living things appearing
at once familiar and other-worldly.
Jean watches the imagining for a moment, smiling herself. "I can see that.
So you must be Holo."
The imagining disappears as the girl is surprised, though her expression
soon turns to reflect self-awareness: "You've already heard about me?"
"About some of the new students."
"Yeah. . .I tend to leave impressions. I don't mean to mostly, but I also don't mind.
Mostly." She laughs a little. Then, seeing she still has Jean's attention, she resumes
her projected imagining of outer worlds.
Jean returns to that conversation: "If I'm being honest, since I've come back
a lot of what I experienced out there feels. . .more like a dream than a part
of this life. Not quite, though."
"Dreams are kind of like going out to other existences," Holo answers thoughtfully.
Gradually, the imagery evolves --no longer just above Holo's head, it seems to surround her and Jean, blending in a grotesque way with the hall. In fact, it's as though we're seeing this part of the Mansion through a kaleidoscope, yet with differences to the reflected image; more or less subtle depending on the section.
Jean closes her eyes. "That's a bit much now, Holo."
Holo: "Hm?"
Opening her eyes, Jean manages to discern the scenescape above Holo's head fading, though the distorted imagery remains. She squints, trying to bring the hall into correct focus
--then suddenly, it is.
"Dr. Grey?"
Her eyes still on the hall, Jean clarifies: "That wasn't all you?"
"Uhm. . ." Holo looks where Jean seems to be. "I was only focusing on the one spot. . .
I guess I might've spilled out." She doesn't seem sure what Jean's referring to.
Jean shakes her head after a moment.
"I think I'm having a case of intergalactic jet leg."
This makes Holo laugh again.
Jean: "I'll see you around."
Holo nods, happily watching Jean go.
While Jean's expression, obscured from Holo's view as she passes her,
reflects puzzlement and concern; Jean's eyes shifting as she continues,
as if watching for the halls to distort again. They don't in the least.
No time to give further thought to this, Jean has a meeting to get to.
We're back in the Staff Room, this time joined by one more individual.
Xavier: "I feel the need to reintroduce you to someone.
Jean, this is Dr. Henry McCoy."
Hank extends a large, blue-furred hand: "As last we knew each other was pre-acquisition
of my hirsute, savoy patina, I would agree with Charles."
Jean smiles: "You should've let me guess. I would've known it was you as soon as you spoke."
Hank's smile broadens: "'One superlatively important effect of wide reading is the enlargement of vocabulary which always accompanies it' -H.P. Lovecraft."
Jean's smile deepens. "It's great to see you here again, Hank.
I'm glad you'll be joining us for this."
"On that, by all means, let us commence."
He takes his seat around the long table.
Jean begins hesitantly -not out of lack of confidence on what she's saying,
but the intricacies and personalness of the subject matter- casting a reverential look to Xavier: "This school has always served its purpose well. A place for young mutants to learn about their powers safely, and about themselves away from judgement. A safe haven."
Xavier nods in reception of her feelings.
"You teach us the control we need to continue to live anonymously when we return to the wider world," Jean shifts to addressing the room in general, "but it remains a world that necessitates that anonymity. What's waiting for our students beyond these walls continues to be discrimination, and with seemingly few exceptions it's only us mutants who seem interested in building an equal life."
Her eyes close as she figuratively travels back to the unbelievable space she's been:
"As Phoenix, I saw many existences. . .As beings we're all still very young, with much to learn." Her eyes open. "I can no longer just witness what's still happening here, and it doesn't take Phoenix power to make change. We need to continue -to broaden digging up future issues before they take seed. Hatred runs deep. But it's taught, no one is born with it. I think we need to take steps to directly foster compassion and eventually comradery in the younger generation of non-mutants."
Hank: "'If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children' -Mahatma Gandhi."
A soft smile crosses Jean's lips. "Maybe I should've lead with that."
Storm: "Indeed it is a noble idea. What steps do you propose, Jean?"
Jean: "That's why we're all here. We need suggestions. Though focusing on youth
is only part of it. We'll also need someone to be our voice on the street. Many who
make their opinions about us do so from secondhand information at best. If a mutant
is involved in property damage for instance, it's never the mutant who is spoken to.
All anyone hears about is the result, not all of the factors involved in causing it."
Xavier: "I've thought the same for a long while. We may finally have such a connection through a friend of another graduate." He sports at once a telling yet unrevealing smile. "He had hoped to join us today though had to postpone."
By the looks exchanged across the table, most seem to know to whom Xavier is referring.
Jean is pleasantly intrigued, but lets that name go unsaid.
Living as an "all-knowing adjacent" being for the past while, a little mystery is welcomed.
Scott: "How about a camp? We could create an even ratio by having as many
of our students attend as non-mutants sign up."
Storm: "I like that too, though cannot see many parents wanting to sign their kids
up for a couple weeks with mutants."
"Well, we wouldn't advertise it so explicitly."
Jean: "I don't know, Scott. It's the right idea but it can't come off as deceptive."
Scott: "In general brochures don't state the type of campers that'll be there unless the camps are made for a specific demographic. Kids signed up for any camp could find themselves interacting with mutants, the difference with ours is it'll be by design and we'll actually care that those interactions are positive."
And so the meeting continues.
On its close, as everyone is filing out, Jean pauses, taken over by another strange sensation.
This time she sees no distortion, though the clarity of her vision is more dream-like; the edges of the room blurred, the room itself not so clear. Voices coming to her ears as
though Jean's not as present as they are --or are they coming from another place?
Jean brings her fingers to the side of her head.
Far off as they sound, the voices aren't foreign.
Beast, Iceman, Cyclops. . .that tracks. . .
"Jean?. .Jean?"
She finds Scott standing in front of her.
"Sorry, were you saying something else?"
"No. I noticed you weren't with us. Are you okay?"
". . .It's just a lot, I guess."
"Yeah, I guess it would be."
They both seem unsure.
Unsure regarding this present moment and for their own, additional reasons.
Jean lowers her hand, finding an explanation: "I didn't get much sleep last night.
I can't even remember if I've eaten anything."
"You did. At least I'm pretty sure. You came late to lunch but I saw you getting something."
"That's right. I saw you too, before you had to go. . ." Their unsurety persists.
"It's been strange," Jean confides. "I'm having to readjust to things I didn't
even think about -sleep, hunger. Even time."
Scott's brows raise like he hadn't thought of that.
He keeps focused on Jean with a listening look.
"I know I should try and resist, to get back to a regular schedule,
but I think I'll go see if I can catch up on some rest."
"Oh-" he quickly masks a dashed hope for more of a conversation,
"-I'll see you later, then."
She affirms and leaves.
Scott heads for the door a moment leader.
Later, Jean wakes in her room to the sound of voices.
Muffled though they are by the closed door, they're still loud enough,
sounding like they're coming from right outside it.
"C'mon guys. . ." she says in a low tone not likely to carry, while she gets up to cross the room to it, "if you need something just knock alr--"
No one is on the other side.
Jean glances down the hallways, but no one is sight, either.
In fact, only now do a small group of students turn down this way. A couple looking to her as they pass by. Though their lips seem to be forming familiar words, what comes out of them doesn't sound like real language to Jean. She stares uncomprehendingly, but they've already turned away; moved along.
Jean massages her head.
Checking the time, she decides to head to the kitchen to fix herself an early dinner.
Afterward, from the perspective of Cyclops coming down the hall,
we spy Jean getting into the elevator.
She's gone down to the Danger Room.
A new addition to the X Mansion since last she walked these halls.
In fact, an addition directly related to her departure.
She's in the Control Room portion, leafing through a manual when we hear Scott's voice: "Interested?"
"How could I not be," lowering the manual, she meets him with an impressed look,
"I almost can't believe you built this."
Scott smiles unpretentiously.
"I was going to see what it could do but I don't know the passcode."
"It's Five-U-R-V-One-V-Four-Seven."
Jean takes on an air of play: "So does knowing it mean I'm part of some elite few?"
"You already were. All the X-Men are told."
She grows subdued; looking down. "Then maybe I shouldn't. . ." she runs her hand across the control panel, "that part of me is in the past."
Scott doesn't think so. "You came back with a mission, benefitting human and
mutantkind. It's like what you said about change; you don't need awesome power
to be an X-Man."
A quiet smile crosses Jean's face, her voice to match: "That's true."
". . .If you'd like to see it in action, Danger Class is in session tomorrow."
"Danger Class?"
"Well after. . everything that happened before you ascended, many of the students expressed interest in wanting to learn how to use their powers proactively. If not to
graduate to be X-Men some day at least to feel less vulnerable in unpredictable
situations."
Jean looks understanding of that.
"At first I wasn't sure about it." Scott looks out through the control room window to the Danger Room proper, "this place came out of unhealthy obsession. . .But you know,
I actually agree with Logan on this one; it beats the old method."
Jean's smile broadens some. Their earlier awkwardness long given
way to a more comfortable presence. "How is he, by the way?"
"He's Logan."
Jean laughs somewhat.
"He's struck up an odd friendship with Kurt, though."
"Odd how?"
"Well if I were to bet on which person Logan would actually wanna'
spend his time with, Kurt would've been my forth choice, at best."
Jean looks like she's thinking over what his choices may be.
She eyes him. "So when does Danger Class start?"
Next Day - Danger Class
From the control room, Scott works the panel, programming a sim.
"This disengages it instantly if something goes awry," he points out. "The sim does function on select voice commands from inside, however there are situations which can fetter that.
Best to have a failsafe. Usually I'll assign someone. . ." He meets her eye with a small smile,
"I thought I'd give you the option of taking that position today."
Jean smiles. "I'd like to."
So, as Cyclops joins his class in the Danger Room proper, the sim gets underway.
Jean is able to watch via the observation window turned into multiple screens, covering
the action from different angles. Most display the fully simulated environment, though
a couple show the action without the virtual reality overlay.
While she takes in the action, Jean's fingers begin to move restlessly. The movement
is almost absentminded, though soon Jean is checking her level of engagement.
And soon after that, she has to check something hasn't malfunctioned with the display.
Suddenly everything is too high of contrast; the colours are unreal. Jean looks to the section of the control panel she was shown works the monitors, and realizes the control panel itself looks unreal.
The sensation has grown overwhelming -it's auditory as well as visual.
Jean's on the cusp of leaving when she thinks to disengage the sim before she does so.
Inside, everyone looks around as the sim arrests and fades around them.
Cyclops: "Wait here."
He walks back to the control room expecting to ask Jean what's up.
Well he sort of gets his answer: she's gone.
He goes to the door, but she isn't in the hallway either.
One of the students hasn't "waited there".
"Is class already over, Cyclops?"
". . .No. Go rejoin the others."
They do, while Cyclops returns to the control panel. He speaks to them over comm:
"Alright we're gonna' run this one from the top. And guys, take this one seriously."
We find Jean back upstairs on the dorm level, looking disturbed. More so as finds herself outside Scott's -formerly hers and Scott's- room, instead of the one she presently occupies; as if she's walked here without thinking.
From down the hall comes a voice. "Ah, there you are."
"Jean?"
She turns to find- "Oh- Ororo. Sorry. I had something on my mind. . ."
Storm acknowledges whose door they're outside. "Or someone?"
"Or something else."
"Well if you are looking for Scott, right now is his Danger Class-"
"-I know, actually I just came from watching some of it. . ."
"Well I am glad you did not linger. I wanted to ask if you would like to
talk about whatever we desire over a cup of tea, as we used to?"
At this, Jean's disturbance falls away.
"I'd love that."
Jean comes down a hallway to see the same First Nations girl we saw in Storm's
Environmental Studies class now watching her with polite interest.
Jean greets her warmly. "Hello."
"Hi."
"I have the feeling there's something specific on your mind?"
She's paused in front of her.
The girl smiles. "You could just tell without asking, couldn't you?"
"Yes, but I prefer to ask."
The girl seems to like that. "Did you really go to space, by yourself? I mean..."
she thinks of the correct question. "By your own powers?"
"Sort of." Jean seems reluctant to say more on this subject.
"What was it like out there?"
It's now Jean considering a correct answer.
"A lot of it. . .it would be hard to describe. And likely unbelievable."
"I have a good imagination." Smiling anew, the girl allows a projection to form
above her head. It's an outdoor scene, with all the living things appearing
at once familiar and other-worldly.
Jean watches the imagining for a moment, smiling herself. "I can see that.
So you must be Holo."
The imagining disappears as the girl is surprised, though her expression
soon turns to reflect self-awareness: "You've already heard about me?"
"About some of the new students."
"Yeah. . .I tend to leave impressions. I don't mean to mostly, but I also don't mind.
Mostly." She laughs a little. Then, seeing she still has Jean's attention, she resumes
her projected imagining of outer worlds.
Jean returns to that conversation: "If I'm being honest, since I've come back
a lot of what I experienced out there feels. . .more like a dream than a part
of this life. Not quite, though."
"Dreams are kind of like going out to other existences," Holo answers thoughtfully.
Gradually, the imagery evolves --no longer just above Holo's head, it seems to surround her and Jean, blending in a grotesque way with the hall. In fact, it's as though we're seeing this part of the Mansion through a kaleidoscope, yet with differences to the reflected image; more or less subtle depending on the section.
Jean closes her eyes. "That's a bit much now, Holo."
Holo: "Hm?"
Opening her eyes, Jean manages to discern the scenescape above Holo's head fading, though the distorted imagery remains. She squints, trying to bring the hall into correct focus
--then suddenly, it is.
"Dr. Grey?"
Her eyes still on the hall, Jean clarifies: "That wasn't all you?"
"Uhm. . ." Holo looks where Jean seems to be. "I was only focusing on the one spot. . .
I guess I might've spilled out." She doesn't seem sure what Jean's referring to.
Jean shakes her head after a moment.
"I think I'm having a case of intergalactic jet leg."
This makes Holo laugh again.
Jean: "I'll see you around."
Holo nods, happily watching Jean go.
While Jean's expression, obscured from Holo's view as she passes her,
reflects puzzlement and concern; Jean's eyes shifting as she continues,
as if watching for the halls to distort again. They don't in the least.
No time to give further thought to this, Jean has a meeting to get to.
We're back in the Staff Room, this time joined by one more individual.
Xavier: "I feel the need to reintroduce you to someone.
Jean, this is Dr. Henry McCoy."
Hank extends a large, blue-furred hand: "As last we knew each other was pre-acquisition
of my hirsute, savoy patina, I would agree with Charles."
Jean smiles: "You should've let me guess. I would've known it was you as soon as you spoke."
Hank's smile broadens: "'One superlatively important effect of wide reading is the enlargement of vocabulary which always accompanies it' -H.P. Lovecraft."
Jean's smile deepens. "It's great to see you here again, Hank.
I'm glad you'll be joining us for this."
"On that, by all means, let us commence."
He takes his seat around the long table.
Jean begins hesitantly -not out of lack of confidence on what she's saying,
but the intricacies and personalness of the subject matter- casting a reverential look to Xavier: "This school has always served its purpose well. A place for young mutants to learn about their powers safely, and about themselves away from judgement. A safe haven."
Xavier nods in reception of her feelings.
"You teach us the control we need to continue to live anonymously when we return to the wider world," Jean shifts to addressing the room in general, "but it remains a world that necessitates that anonymity. What's waiting for our students beyond these walls continues to be discrimination, and with seemingly few exceptions it's only us mutants who seem interested in building an equal life."
Her eyes close as she figuratively travels back to the unbelievable space she's been:
"As Phoenix, I saw many existences. . .As beings we're all still very young, with much to learn." Her eyes open. "I can no longer just witness what's still happening here, and it doesn't take Phoenix power to make change. We need to continue -to broaden digging up future issues before they take seed. Hatred runs deep. But it's taught, no one is born with it. I think we need to take steps to directly foster compassion and eventually comradery in the younger generation of non-mutants."
Hank: "'If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children' -Mahatma Gandhi."
A soft smile crosses Jean's lips. "Maybe I should've lead with that."
Storm: "Indeed it is a noble idea. What steps do you propose, Jean?"
Jean: "That's why we're all here. We need suggestions. Though focusing on youth
is only part of it. We'll also need someone to be our voice on the street. Many who
make their opinions about us do so from secondhand information at best. If a mutant
is involved in property damage for instance, it's never the mutant who is spoken to.
All anyone hears about is the result, not all of the factors involved in causing it."
Xavier: "I've thought the same for a long while. We may finally have such a connection through a friend of another graduate." He sports at once a telling yet unrevealing smile. "He had hoped to join us today though had to postpone."
By the looks exchanged across the table, most seem to know to whom Xavier is referring.
Jean is pleasantly intrigued, but lets that name go unsaid.
Living as an "all-knowing adjacent" being for the past while, a little mystery is welcomed.
Scott: "How about a camp? We could create an even ratio by having as many
of our students attend as non-mutants sign up."
Storm: "I like that too, though cannot see many parents wanting to sign their kids
up for a couple weeks with mutants."
"Well, we wouldn't advertise it so explicitly."
Jean: "I don't know, Scott. It's the right idea but it can't come off as deceptive."
Scott: "In general brochures don't state the type of campers that'll be there unless the camps are made for a specific demographic. Kids signed up for any camp could find themselves interacting with mutants, the difference with ours is it'll be by design and we'll actually care that those interactions are positive."
And so the meeting continues.
On its close, as everyone is filing out, Jean pauses, taken over by another strange sensation.
This time she sees no distortion, though the clarity of her vision is more dream-like; the edges of the room blurred, the room itself not so clear. Voices coming to her ears as
though Jean's not as present as they are --or are they coming from another place?
Jean brings her fingers to the side of her head.
Far off as they sound, the voices aren't foreign.
Beast, Iceman, Cyclops. . .that tracks. . .
"Jean?. .Jean?"
She finds Scott standing in front of her.
"Sorry, were you saying something else?"
"No. I noticed you weren't with us. Are you okay?"
". . .It's just a lot, I guess."
"Yeah, I guess it would be."
They both seem unsure.
Unsure regarding this present moment and for their own, additional reasons.
Jean lowers her hand, finding an explanation: "I didn't get much sleep last night.
I can't even remember if I've eaten anything."
"You did. At least I'm pretty sure. You came late to lunch but I saw you getting something."
"That's right. I saw you too, before you had to go. . ." Their unsurety persists.
"It's been strange," Jean confides. "I'm having to readjust to things I didn't
even think about -sleep, hunger. Even time."
Scott's brows raise like he hadn't thought of that.
He keeps focused on Jean with a listening look.
"I know I should try and resist, to get back to a regular schedule,
but I think I'll go see if I can catch up on some rest."
"Oh-" he quickly masks a dashed hope for more of a conversation,
"-I'll see you later, then."
She affirms and leaves.
Scott heads for the door a moment leader.
Later, Jean wakes in her room to the sound of voices.
Muffled though they are by the closed door, they're still loud enough,
sounding like they're coming from right outside it.
"C'mon guys. . ." she says in a low tone not likely to carry, while she gets up to cross the room to it, "if you need something just knock alr--"
No one is on the other side.
Jean glances down the hallways, but no one is sight, either.
In fact, only now do a small group of students turn down this way. A couple looking to her as they pass by. Though their lips seem to be forming familiar words, what comes out of them doesn't sound like real language to Jean. She stares uncomprehendingly, but they've already turned away; moved along.
Jean massages her head.
Checking the time, she decides to head to the kitchen to fix herself an early dinner.
Afterward, from the perspective of Cyclops coming down the hall,
we spy Jean getting into the elevator.
She's gone down to the Danger Room.
A new addition to the X Mansion since last she walked these halls.
In fact, an addition directly related to her departure.
She's in the Control Room portion, leafing through a manual when we hear Scott's voice: "Interested?"
"How could I not be," lowering the manual, she meets him with an impressed look,
"I almost can't believe you built this."
Scott smiles unpretentiously.
"I was going to see what it could do but I don't know the passcode."
"It's Five-U-R-V-One-V-Four-Seven."
Jean takes on an air of play: "So does knowing it mean I'm part of some elite few?"
"You already were. All the X-Men are told."
She grows subdued; looking down. "Then maybe I shouldn't. . ." she runs her hand across the control panel, "that part of me is in the past."
Scott doesn't think so. "You came back with a mission, benefitting human and
mutantkind. It's like what you said about change; you don't need awesome power
to be an X-Man."
A quiet smile crosses Jean's face, her voice to match: "That's true."
". . .If you'd like to see it in action, Danger Class is in session tomorrow."
"Danger Class?"
"Well after. . everything that happened before you ascended, many of the students expressed interest in wanting to learn how to use their powers proactively. If not to
graduate to be X-Men some day at least to feel less vulnerable in unpredictable
situations."
Jean looks understanding of that.
"At first I wasn't sure about it." Scott looks out through the control room window to the Danger Room proper, "this place came out of unhealthy obsession. . .But you know,
I actually agree with Logan on this one; it beats the old method."
Jean's smile broadens some. Their earlier awkwardness long given
way to a more comfortable presence. "How is he, by the way?"
"He's Logan."
Jean laughs somewhat.
"He's struck up an odd friendship with Kurt, though."
"Odd how?"
"Well if I were to bet on which person Logan would actually wanna'
spend his time with, Kurt would've been my forth choice, at best."
Jean looks like she's thinking over what his choices may be.
She eyes him. "So when does Danger Class start?"
Next Day - Danger Class
From the control room, Scott works the panel, programming a sim.
"This disengages it instantly if something goes awry," he points out. "The sim does function on select voice commands from inside, however there are situations which can fetter that.
Best to have a failsafe. Usually I'll assign someone. . ." He meets her eye with a small smile,
"I thought I'd give you the option of taking that position today."
Jean smiles. "I'd like to."
So, as Cyclops joins his class in the Danger Room proper, the sim gets underway.
Jean is able to watch via the observation window turned into multiple screens, covering
the action from different angles. Most display the fully simulated environment, though
a couple show the action without the virtual reality overlay.
While she takes in the action, Jean's fingers begin to move restlessly. The movement
is almost absentminded, though soon Jean is checking her level of engagement.
And soon after that, she has to check something hasn't malfunctioned with the display.
Suddenly everything is too high of contrast; the colours are unreal. Jean looks to the section of the control panel she was shown works the monitors, and realizes the control panel itself looks unreal.
The sensation has grown overwhelming -it's auditory as well as visual.
Jean's on the cusp of leaving when she thinks to disengage the sim before she does so.
Inside, everyone looks around as the sim arrests and fades around them.
Cyclops: "Wait here."
He walks back to the control room expecting to ask Jean what's up.
Well he sort of gets his answer: she's gone.
He goes to the door, but she isn't in the hallway either.
One of the students hasn't "waited there".
"Is class already over, Cyclops?"
". . .No. Go rejoin the others."
They do, while Cyclops returns to the control panel. He speaks to them over comm:
"Alright we're gonna' run this one from the top. And guys, take this one seriously."
We find Jean back upstairs on the dorm level, looking disturbed. More so as finds herself outside Scott's -formerly hers and Scott's- room, instead of the one she presently occupies; as if she's walked here without thinking.
From down the hall comes a voice. "Ah, there you are."
"Jean?"
She turns to find- "Oh- Ororo. Sorry. I had something on my mind. . ."
Storm acknowledges whose door they're outside. "Or someone?"
"Or something else."
"Well if you are looking for Scott, right now is his Danger Class-"
"-I know, actually I just came from watching some of it. . ."
"Well I am glad you did not linger. I wanted to ask if you would like to
talk about whatever we desire over a cup of tea, as we used to?"
At this, Jean's disturbance falls away.
"I'd love that."
The weather master selects leaves from a particular plant. "I have recently cultivated this one. I think you will find the tea it produces somehow invigorating yet relaxing, like inviting
a fresh breeze in to clear out old air."
Jean: "Sounds like just the thing I need to clear my mind, right now. . .or anytime, I guess," she reflects. "Even when my telepathy's fully modulated, so often I still have more going
on in it than what's comfortable."
Ororo: "For that reason, I actually came to think of this as 'Jean's Plant'."
While Ororo goes about brewing the tea, Jean takes a closer look at the plant.
It's obviously been treated with tenderest care.
Ororo continues: "I would feel closer to you when I would tend it or drink its tea,
yet regretful. Could a simple thing have made any difference two years ago?
Was there something I missed."
Jean turns, laying a comforting hand on her friend's
arm, and giving a subtle, significant nod.
Ororo lays her hand over hers. "I know. But the mind goes where it will,
and it felt like an avenue not to avoid entirely."
"I can understand that."
Jean glances around the space. "A lot has grown since I've been away, hasn't it?"
Ororo watches while her soul sister takes in more of the plants, coming to pause
at a blighted one.
"One of the students brought that to me, hoping I could revive it. The blight is stubborn."
Jean moves her hand through the air around the leaves, as if trying to work magic.
Of course, the leaves remain in the state they were.
Ororo: "So what avenues has your mind taken you?"
Jean smiles somewhat: "Big question."
"Is home feeling like the alien plain?"
Jean has moved on to other plants, presently touching the leaves of one.
She smiles deeply. "No. Home feels just the same." Though gradually,
her expression shifts. "Mostly."
Ororo regards her with interest: "What is different?"
". . .I don't know -it's hard to explain.
Sometimes I think I'm not seeing what's really here."
Even as she says it, are the plants turning alien before her eyes?
"Wanting things to be more unchanged than you've found them?"
Jean comes back to attention.
"Silly, right? Considering I've come back to make change."
"So much about living exists outside of harmony," Ororo reflects as she goes
about pouring the tea, "which is why I try to cultivate it in any way I can."
Jean smiles again, stepping away from the plants to join her. "You've always had a good head, Ororo." She sits down opposite her with her tea: "So enough about me for a while. Spill it."
At the close of their visit.
Jean: "Thanks for this, Ororo. It was just what I needed."
Storm: "No matter what else may be going on in our lives,
let us not be strangers to such moments."
In complete agreement, Jean hugs her "sister" before heading for the staircase.
Back on the dormitory floor, Jean soon comes on Bobby and Rogue sharing a moment
-and a laugh- down one of the halls. She's about to move on another way when they do,
and Jean observes an odd sight as Bobby walks past a window in which sunlight streams.
It's as though his body's suddenly become made out of the light, or. . .
Some sort of trick of it off his ice powers? Had he even just used any?
Distortions of the hallways follow.
Down the hall Jean had been about to go, we see Scott now walking up.
Noticing her at the junction, he closes the distance. He's been looking for her.
"Jean. What happened before?"
Just ahead of his speech, Jean turns her head at the movement. She sees him yet
almost not recognizably -his appearance is off. When his voice comes, it's like an
auditory kaleidoscope, akin to the visual one from before -Split, yet not mirrored;
the patterns don't line up:
"Jean. 'Jean! What
is it?'
What happened before?" 'What's
happening to you, Jean?' 'Jean
-what's wrong?!'
When Jean makes the effort to speak through the mire,
her own voice rings in her ears likewise:
"I need to see Xavier." ' ... But I'm
afraid-' 'Scott- help me.
I can't stop it.'
Medical Bay
Jean is laying on the examination table while Xavier finishes his telepathic probe.
"We can all rest assured, no one else has been in your mind.
What you've been experiencing are a kind of sensory seizure."
Scott: "What's causing them?"
"At this time, I can't be certain. I suspect they're a side-effect of
Jean's return. Your mind needing to reacclimatize to living-"
Jean (air of irony): "-a regular life?"
She sighs. "So long as my mind isn't being infiltrated I can deal with this.
But if the seizures grow any more frequent I won't be able to function."
Xavier: "You've been back not even a week. Perhaps you'll only have to consider yourself
a convalescent for a few days for this to sort itself out. If not, you could try anti-seizure medication, though given the mutational origins that might not be effective."
By now sitting up on the exam table, Jean takes that in; perturbed.
"If I'm going to be convalescing, I think I'd prefer to in my own room."
She shifts off the table.
Scott: "I'll walk you there."
Jean seems about to decline, but accepts.
Outside Jean's room.
"Thanks."
She reaches for the handle of the door, but her hand pauses on it.
Jean sighs again; bothered. ". . .trouble is the last thing I wanted to bring back with me."
Scott regards her quietly for a moment,
before tentatively bringing his hand to hers.
Jean slips it into his with an appreciative squeeze,
and smile. "I'll see you later."
She lets go and heads in,
leaving Scott on the other side of the door with his own troubled look.
Following day, Ororo joins Jean in her room with breakfast.
Jean: "If I'm being honest, after how I've been living. . .free from the confines of any physical space. . .the thought of limiting myself to this room for even a few hours has me feeling stir crazy. Of course, I'll try anything to get on top of the seizures."
Ororo: "I have always thought 'recouping' should not involve being 'couped up'.
Why not free yourself of what confines you can?"
The remainder of their breakfast is taken on the grounds, where afterward a walk
is enjoyed. First together, then Jean on her own as Ororo goes off to her tasks for
the day. Spending nearly all of hers in the fresh air, and seizure free, Jean returns
to the Mansion at night feeling more optimistic, and quite ready for sleep.
However. . . .
She wakes in the night, seeming disoriented in her own room.
In Scott's, he's awoken by semi-distant sounds of clunking.
Instinctively, he goes to check on Jean.
Pausing outside her door, it takes less then a minute for him to hear something else
clearly coming from inside -something sounding like a collapse.
He goes in at once: "Jean?"
"Scott?"
He's found and turned on the light switch, though Jean -down on the floor next to
an overturned piece of furniture- looks around as though she can't see, speaking
in a moaning tone: "I don't know where I am -I don't know what's solid ground."
"I'm here, I've got you," he's gotten down with her, holding her openly.
Jean at once looks at and past him, eyes wide: ". . .What is this place. . ?"
Back in the Medical Bay
Once again Jean is laying on the exam table; eyes closed.
She opens them for only a second before shutting them again.
When she speaks, at least she sounds back to herself: "Every time I open my eyes it's
like I'm seeing through someone else's, though it's not like I'm not in another's mind. . .
what could be going on?"
Even before the question Xavier reacts as though something's been set into place for him.
Scott: "What are you thinking, Professor?"
"I have been building a theory. With your current experience, Jean,
I feel it has now been confirmed."
Xavier begins to explain:
"In going beyond this world, namely as a mutant rising to something celestial, your
mind was expanded across a vast space. . .far more worlds, more minds, even possibly,
more realities. . .You said you left your higher power behind, yet I believe you are
still connected, and that residual connection is causing a fragmentation."
Jean (still laying with eyes closed): "So how can I make my separation complete?
At least complete enough to stop this."
"I believe with the aid of Cerebro, I can go in and defragment your mind. In essence, untangle and collate the pieces of your proper reality, while pruning away the
branched awarenesses. But such a procedure will be intense. Less for my mind,
being only the operator, than for yours through which everything will run. Years
cycling through in moments, the contrast and volume of your life dialed up as
they go. . .It may well be too much for one mind to bear."
"Is there a chance it could still level off just with time?"
Jean tries opening her eyes again, though it's clear she's still working to see straight.
". . .there's more likely a chance, given it's pattern thus far, that time will result in
severing the connection to your singular awareness. . ."
Scott looks between them, heavily disturbed.
He grasps- "a chance, so waiting it out is still an option."
"It is. Though reinstalling would be a different matter than resetting.
The line between these matters could be crossed suddenly, and at full disclosure, Jean,
I feel less confident of success with the former."
Jean (frayed): "So I risk losing myself completely, meanwhile being
a disruption. No, Scott- I don't like those odds or circumstance.
I'll have to trust my mind can handle the reset procedure."
Some graveness giving way to encouragement, Xavier just starts to say
"If any mind can-"
when Scott -his own concern giving way to thought- cuts in:
"-what if you had a second mind to run the process through?"
Jean catches on: "Like a second engine."
"Exactly."
Xavier turns this idea over in his mind.
He sees the possibility (yes): "That could work."
"But wait- what would the risk be to Scott's mind?"
Scott looks like that isn't his priority, though he doesn't cut-in.
"Technically the same as to yours. In fact if it were almost anyone else, I wouldn't consider it. But given your history. . .your unique psychic rapport and what amount of your life you've shared, I feel strongly that risk would be negated."
So we begin.
A second exam table has been placed beside Jean's, on which Scott now lies.
Apparatus like electrodes on each of their temples.
Jean reaches across the short distance, finding Scott's hand.
Xavier has moved to where he'll be conducting the procedure - Cerebro.
We see the process as a splash panel.
We see Jean, her mind: there are "bubbles" of moments, events, timelines, of her past -their past, her present -theirs, the future? On Earth, in the cosmos, it's just as Xavier described: bold colours, some bubbles fade away while others come into sharper relief.
Focus-on/closer-on Jean in a series of inset panels
various micro expressions intermittently cross her face,
Discordant mixture of sounds -- flashes like electricity
gradually the sounds subside, the electrical activity falls into a natural rhythm,
until finally....
finally...
..Presentness
Jean opens her eyes.
Sitting up she looks around. Not like she's waiting for distortions to appear; she knows
she can trust the stillness now. Even in this limited space, she's seeing her world anew.
She shifts her attention to Scott, their hands still linked.
Scott (somewhat groggy): ". . .okay?"
"Are you?"
He sits up carefully. "Only a really bad headache. I've still had worse."
Xavier rolls in, smiling: "I have a tea that can help with that."
"Thanks. If no monitoring needs to happen, I'd just prefer to lie down-"
Jean: "-in your own room?" She sports a soft, knowing look.
Xavier: "No monitoring necessary. I observed no damage before I came out.
By all accounts the procedure was a success."
They remove the electrodes from the sides of their heads and get off the tables.
Jean reciprocates Scott's care from earlier: "I'll walk you there."
Unlike Jean had been, Scott isn't reluctant to accept.
As they pass Xavier, Jean bends down to embrace him.
"Thank you, Professor."
Hallway - Outside Scott's Room.
"I'm positive I'll be fine."
"That's a relief."
"I'm glad the procedure worked."
"It might've gone differently without you. . ." Jean looks at him directly, speaking in a soft,
meaningful tone of voice, "your devotion's always meant so much to me, Scott. I hope you've known that."
There's something in her disposition. She's treading carefully.
It takes Scott a moment to respond. Slowed perhaps by his headache, or something
else weighing on his mind. . .Then, only a small smile before he turns towards door.
Jean looks like she'd been anticipating something else.
Just as well. "Good night. Or good morning, I guess."
"Right. You too."
Jean turns to leave.
One step inside, his hand still on the handle, Scott's paused.
". . .Jean." He steps back to look at her.
"Later, when this headache's subsided, can we talk?"
". . .Sure.
I'll see you then."
On that, he goes in.
While Jean goes on.
The new dawn comes with a refreshing rain.
Taking up Xavier's offer of tea, we see Jean's joined him in his office.
"I returned by choice, but also from. . ."
Xavier (lightly): "A magnetic pull?"
Jean gives a hum of a laugh. "Maybe if I was Magneto."
She finds her wording: "In some way, I feel there's some purpose to my being here.
Beyond my own, I mean."
"I always knew you would become more than you ever saw yourself being."
Another hum, thinking back: "More than mutant?"
Xavier turns more sober: ". . .on a basic level, I can understand why so many fear us.
We are living reminders that anything is possible, and 'anything' can be intimidating."
"When I stop to think of our potential, even I feel afraid. . .I think most of us do."
Xavier (renewed content): "I would feel more afraid if you didn't."
Transition to. . .
Scott laying on his bed, the window partially opened to the cleansing air.
We ease-in on his ruby-quartz glasses. . .easing-out on his visor.
No longer do we see him laying in repose in a familiar room,
but suspended and enervated in one unseen --he, and us,
kept in the dark.
a fresh breeze in to clear out old air."
Jean: "Sounds like just the thing I need to clear my mind, right now. . .or anytime, I guess," she reflects. "Even when my telepathy's fully modulated, so often I still have more going
on in it than what's comfortable."
Ororo: "For that reason, I actually came to think of this as 'Jean's Plant'."
While Ororo goes about brewing the tea, Jean takes a closer look at the plant.
It's obviously been treated with tenderest care.
Ororo continues: "I would feel closer to you when I would tend it or drink its tea,
yet regretful. Could a simple thing have made any difference two years ago?
Was there something I missed."
Jean turns, laying a comforting hand on her friend's
arm, and giving a subtle, significant nod.
Ororo lays her hand over hers. "I know. But the mind goes where it will,
and it felt like an avenue not to avoid entirely."
"I can understand that."
Jean glances around the space. "A lot has grown since I've been away, hasn't it?"
Ororo watches while her soul sister takes in more of the plants, coming to pause
at a blighted one.
"One of the students brought that to me, hoping I could revive it. The blight is stubborn."
Jean moves her hand through the air around the leaves, as if trying to work magic.
Of course, the leaves remain in the state they were.
Ororo: "So what avenues has your mind taken you?"
Jean smiles somewhat: "Big question."
"Is home feeling like the alien plain?"
Jean has moved on to other plants, presently touching the leaves of one.
She smiles deeply. "No. Home feels just the same." Though gradually,
her expression shifts. "Mostly."
Ororo regards her with interest: "What is different?"
". . .I don't know -it's hard to explain.
Sometimes I think I'm not seeing what's really here."
Even as she says it, are the plants turning alien before her eyes?
"Wanting things to be more unchanged than you've found them?"
Jean comes back to attention.
"Silly, right? Considering I've come back to make change."
"So much about living exists outside of harmony," Ororo reflects as she goes
about pouring the tea, "which is why I try to cultivate it in any way I can."
Jean smiles again, stepping away from the plants to join her. "You've always had a good head, Ororo." She sits down opposite her with her tea: "So enough about me for a while. Spill it."
At the close of their visit.
Jean: "Thanks for this, Ororo. It was just what I needed."
Storm: "No matter what else may be going on in our lives,
let us not be strangers to such moments."
In complete agreement, Jean hugs her "sister" before heading for the staircase.
Back on the dormitory floor, Jean soon comes on Bobby and Rogue sharing a moment
-and a laugh- down one of the halls. She's about to move on another way when they do,
and Jean observes an odd sight as Bobby walks past a window in which sunlight streams.
It's as though his body's suddenly become made out of the light, or. . .
Some sort of trick of it off his ice powers? Had he even just used any?
Distortions of the hallways follow.
Down the hall Jean had been about to go, we see Scott now walking up.
Noticing her at the junction, he closes the distance. He's been looking for her.
"Jean. What happened before?"
Just ahead of his speech, Jean turns her head at the movement. She sees him yet
almost not recognizably -his appearance is off. When his voice comes, it's like an
auditory kaleidoscope, akin to the visual one from before -Split, yet not mirrored;
the patterns don't line up:
"Jean. 'Jean! What
is it?'
What happened before?" 'What's
happening to you, Jean?' 'Jean
-what's wrong?!'
When Jean makes the effort to speak through the mire,
her own voice rings in her ears likewise:
"I need to see Xavier." ' ... But I'm
afraid-' 'Scott- help me.
I can't stop it.'
Medical Bay
Jean is laying on the examination table while Xavier finishes his telepathic probe.
"We can all rest assured, no one else has been in your mind.
What you've been experiencing are a kind of sensory seizure."
Scott: "What's causing them?"
"At this time, I can't be certain. I suspect they're a side-effect of
Jean's return. Your mind needing to reacclimatize to living-"
Jean (air of irony): "-a regular life?"
She sighs. "So long as my mind isn't being infiltrated I can deal with this.
But if the seizures grow any more frequent I won't be able to function."
Xavier: "You've been back not even a week. Perhaps you'll only have to consider yourself
a convalescent for a few days for this to sort itself out. If not, you could try anti-seizure medication, though given the mutational origins that might not be effective."
By now sitting up on the exam table, Jean takes that in; perturbed.
"If I'm going to be convalescing, I think I'd prefer to in my own room."
She shifts off the table.
Scott: "I'll walk you there."
Jean seems about to decline, but accepts.
Outside Jean's room.
"Thanks."
She reaches for the handle of the door, but her hand pauses on it.
Jean sighs again; bothered. ". . .trouble is the last thing I wanted to bring back with me."
Scott regards her quietly for a moment,
before tentatively bringing his hand to hers.
Jean slips it into his with an appreciative squeeze,
and smile. "I'll see you later."
She lets go and heads in,
leaving Scott on the other side of the door with his own troubled look.
Following day, Ororo joins Jean in her room with breakfast.
Jean: "If I'm being honest, after how I've been living. . .free from the confines of any physical space. . .the thought of limiting myself to this room for even a few hours has me feeling stir crazy. Of course, I'll try anything to get on top of the seizures."
Ororo: "I have always thought 'recouping' should not involve being 'couped up'.
Why not free yourself of what confines you can?"
The remainder of their breakfast is taken on the grounds, where afterward a walk
is enjoyed. First together, then Jean on her own as Ororo goes off to her tasks for
the day. Spending nearly all of hers in the fresh air, and seizure free, Jean returns
to the Mansion at night feeling more optimistic, and quite ready for sleep.
However. . . .
She wakes in the night, seeming disoriented in her own room.
In Scott's, he's awoken by semi-distant sounds of clunking.
Instinctively, he goes to check on Jean.
Pausing outside her door, it takes less then a minute for him to hear something else
clearly coming from inside -something sounding like a collapse.
He goes in at once: "Jean?"
"Scott?"
He's found and turned on the light switch, though Jean -down on the floor next to
an overturned piece of furniture- looks around as though she can't see, speaking
in a moaning tone: "I don't know where I am -I don't know what's solid ground."
"I'm here, I've got you," he's gotten down with her, holding her openly.
Jean at once looks at and past him, eyes wide: ". . .What is this place. . ?"
Back in the Medical Bay
Once again Jean is laying on the exam table; eyes closed.
She opens them for only a second before shutting them again.
When she speaks, at least she sounds back to herself: "Every time I open my eyes it's
like I'm seeing through someone else's, though it's not like I'm not in another's mind. . .
what could be going on?"
Even before the question Xavier reacts as though something's been set into place for him.
Scott: "What are you thinking, Professor?"
"I have been building a theory. With your current experience, Jean,
I feel it has now been confirmed."
Xavier begins to explain:
"In going beyond this world, namely as a mutant rising to something celestial, your
mind was expanded across a vast space. . .far more worlds, more minds, even possibly,
more realities. . .You said you left your higher power behind, yet I believe you are
still connected, and that residual connection is causing a fragmentation."
Jean (still laying with eyes closed): "So how can I make my separation complete?
At least complete enough to stop this."
"I believe with the aid of Cerebro, I can go in and defragment your mind. In essence, untangle and collate the pieces of your proper reality, while pruning away the
branched awarenesses. But such a procedure will be intense. Less for my mind,
being only the operator, than for yours through which everything will run. Years
cycling through in moments, the contrast and volume of your life dialed up as
they go. . .It may well be too much for one mind to bear."
"Is there a chance it could still level off just with time?"
Jean tries opening her eyes again, though it's clear she's still working to see straight.
". . .there's more likely a chance, given it's pattern thus far, that time will result in
severing the connection to your singular awareness. . ."
Scott looks between them, heavily disturbed.
He grasps- "a chance, so waiting it out is still an option."
"It is. Though reinstalling would be a different matter than resetting.
The line between these matters could be crossed suddenly, and at full disclosure, Jean,
I feel less confident of success with the former."
Jean (frayed): "So I risk losing myself completely, meanwhile being
a disruption. No, Scott- I don't like those odds or circumstance.
I'll have to trust my mind can handle the reset procedure."
Some graveness giving way to encouragement, Xavier just starts to say
"If any mind can-"
when Scott -his own concern giving way to thought- cuts in:
"-what if you had a second mind to run the process through?"
Jean catches on: "Like a second engine."
"Exactly."
Xavier turns this idea over in his mind.
He sees the possibility (yes): "That could work."
"But wait- what would the risk be to Scott's mind?"
Scott looks like that isn't his priority, though he doesn't cut-in.
"Technically the same as to yours. In fact if it were almost anyone else, I wouldn't consider it. But given your history. . .your unique psychic rapport and what amount of your life you've shared, I feel strongly that risk would be negated."
So we begin.
A second exam table has been placed beside Jean's, on which Scott now lies.
Apparatus like electrodes on each of their temples.
Jean reaches across the short distance, finding Scott's hand.
Xavier has moved to where he'll be conducting the procedure - Cerebro.
We see the process as a splash panel.
We see Jean, her mind: there are "bubbles" of moments, events, timelines, of her past -their past, her present -theirs, the future? On Earth, in the cosmos, it's just as Xavier described: bold colours, some bubbles fade away while others come into sharper relief.
Focus-on/closer-on Jean in a series of inset panels
various micro expressions intermittently cross her face,
Discordant mixture of sounds -- flashes like electricity
gradually the sounds subside, the electrical activity falls into a natural rhythm,
until finally....
finally...
..Presentness
Jean opens her eyes.
Sitting up she looks around. Not like she's waiting for distortions to appear; she knows
she can trust the stillness now. Even in this limited space, she's seeing her world anew.
She shifts her attention to Scott, their hands still linked.
Scott (somewhat groggy): ". . .okay?"
"Are you?"
He sits up carefully. "Only a really bad headache. I've still had worse."
Xavier rolls in, smiling: "I have a tea that can help with that."
"Thanks. If no monitoring needs to happen, I'd just prefer to lie down-"
Jean: "-in your own room?" She sports a soft, knowing look.
Xavier: "No monitoring necessary. I observed no damage before I came out.
By all accounts the procedure was a success."
They remove the electrodes from the sides of their heads and get off the tables.
Jean reciprocates Scott's care from earlier: "I'll walk you there."
Unlike Jean had been, Scott isn't reluctant to accept.
As they pass Xavier, Jean bends down to embrace him.
"Thank you, Professor."
Hallway - Outside Scott's Room.
"I'm positive I'll be fine."
"That's a relief."
"I'm glad the procedure worked."
"It might've gone differently without you. . ." Jean looks at him directly, speaking in a soft,
meaningful tone of voice, "your devotion's always meant so much to me, Scott. I hope you've known that."
There's something in her disposition. She's treading carefully.
It takes Scott a moment to respond. Slowed perhaps by his headache, or something
else weighing on his mind. . .Then, only a small smile before he turns towards door.
Jean looks like she'd been anticipating something else.
Just as well. "Good night. Or good morning, I guess."
"Right. You too."
Jean turns to leave.
One step inside, his hand still on the handle, Scott's paused.
". . .Jean." He steps back to look at her.
"Later, when this headache's subsided, can we talk?"
". . .Sure.
I'll see you then."
On that, he goes in.
While Jean goes on.
The new dawn comes with a refreshing rain.
Taking up Xavier's offer of tea, we see Jean's joined him in his office.
"I returned by choice, but also from. . ."
Xavier (lightly): "A magnetic pull?"
Jean gives a hum of a laugh. "Maybe if I was Magneto."
She finds her wording: "In some way, I feel there's some purpose to my being here.
Beyond my own, I mean."
"I always knew you would become more than you ever saw yourself being."
Another hum, thinking back: "More than mutant?"
Xavier turns more sober: ". . .on a basic level, I can understand why so many fear us.
We are living reminders that anything is possible, and 'anything' can be intimidating."
"When I stop to think of our potential, even I feel afraid. . .I think most of us do."
Xavier (renewed content): "I would feel more afraid if you didn't."
Transition to. . .
Scott laying on his bed, the window partially opened to the cleansing air.
We ease-in on his ruby-quartz glasses. . .easing-out on his visor.
No longer do we see him laying in repose in a familiar room,
but suspended and enervated in one unseen --he, and us,
kept in the dark.
⛓👁
Flashes
A family in a cockpit,
Cyclops and Jean Grey in one.
The mother instructs her sons:
"Hold onto each other!"
Cyclops: "Hold tight!"
The parachute fails, young Scott slows their descent
surprisingly, by blasting for the first time in his life.
Jean's telekinesis failing, adult Cyclops
blasts measuredly to slow their descent.
blasts measuredly to slow their descent.
But the landing doesn't go as planned
if the plane's destruction hadn't lit the parachute....
If the jet's destruction hadn't knocked them apart....
"ALEX!"
A brother lost.
"JEAN!"
...."Scott...."
...."Scott...."
Blackout.
. . . .when Cyclops comes back to full consciousness, he's still in darkness.
Is it the room or his eyes? He can't tell. It doesn't feel like anything but his
visor is over his eyes.
Though something is off him --the jacket of his uniform.
Feels like the arm of his undershirt has also been torn or cut away.
In fact, something's off --the jacket of his uniform.
Feels like the arm of his undershirt has also been torn or cut away.
He realizes he's on his knees; his hands are shackled behind him,
and the shackles seem connected to chains in the wall behind him.
Gradually, he tries to stand.
He's actually not restricted so much that he can't, though he learns the extent of his restraints when he's arrested within the distance of one stride. By the way he felt the pull on his wrists he can tell he's in a corner --and the chains seem crisscrossed, his left hand connected to the wall to his right and vice-versa.
Suddenly he becomes cognizant of nearing footsteps.
The sliding-open of some mechanized door answers one question for him:
it lets in just enough light to see.
Whether from some trick of the light itself or the oxidation of time,
his metal contained chamber is revealed to have an eerie green patina.
A figure stands shadowed in the threshold.
Cyclops fixes them with a glare: "Where's Jean?"
"Hold that thought."
The voice sounds like it's coming from a point further back than the visible figure,
who presently closes the short distance between himself and Cyclops and forces
him back down onto his knees by way of force applied to one of his shoulders.
Another figure has come in, clad identically to the first in what appears to be a black lab coat.
Cyclops notices the pockets of this one are bulging.
He tries to see with what as the second figure comes to stand behind him,
but the first forces him to face front. He can just discern the shadow of someone else
still standing outside the room. The enigmatic figure speaks again:
"Best not try to seek anyone while your eyes must hide."
Cyclops feels his visor being removed.
Keeping his eyes shut, he listens.
There's a sound like the door opening, except smaller and closer-by.
Something else is set around his head, over his eyes. It feels like a construct of thin metal. The front part actually sits right over his eyelids.
Enigmatic Voice: "Now, what was your question?"
". .What have you done with Jean?"
"Would you like to see?"
Horror sets in--"NO-!"--no use--
--KKZK-ZHOOOOOM!!!!
The contraption has forced his eyes to open--at the same time his handler has forced his head down--
--he's blasting into a hole roughly 10x10" that's been revealed in the floor--
--though all Cyclops can make out of what's inside is a screen which appears
to be absorbing his blast.
It isn't another containment room.
It isn't Jean.
After a decided length of time, the contraption is reversed; forcing his eyes closed.
Cyclops breathes in a settling way.
Enigmatic Voice (enjoying this): "Baseline established.
Time for Test # 1. Perish?"
Cyclops hears someone else enter the room, but only just; unlike the others
this one seems to have stopped some distance in front of him.
Then things get strange.
. . his body slackens as it feels like the power to his muscles has been shut off.
"Uhn--" he feels the scientists holding his body in a certain position, then he
feels next-to-nothing at all--only extremely dulled, residual sensations where
the scientists have their hold on him.
He even can't hear--some foggy, wavering tone being all he can discern of the
Enigmatic Voice speaking again.
Has his positioning changed? It's hard to tell.
Now he's blasting again--evidenced only by a rushing that sounds more like it's coming from inside his own head than from the greater discharge of his blast--which he also can't see, save for a distant wavering light.
Like watching a light show through closed eyes, except less vivid.
That tone of the Enigmatic Voice again; some different kind of nearly-lost sensation concentrated at a minute spot in Cyclops' arm, tone again.
What gradually follows. . .
. . .is the return of his muscle function.
One of the scientists eases off as Cyclops regains the ability to hold his own body up.
His senses soon follow--
--in almost blinding and deafening relief as he's kept blasting for a moment or so more.
Then,
Enigmatic Voice: "That will do-"
-as it will for our current scene as we transition to one far away in distance,
and a littler earlier in time-
and a littler earlier in time-
Professor Xavier: "-do for now."
From the Danger's Room's Control Bay, he watches as the members of the X-Men involved in the day's training filter out, until only their leader remains.
Xavier moves to join him in the main room.
"You seemed somewhat unfocused, Scott. Most unlike you."
Cyclops turns to him: "In a real situation, I wouldn't have divided the team that way."
Xavier (matter-of-fact): "Circumstances don't always allow for such choice,
which you've undertaken enough real missions to know. . .Is there something else?"
Xavier checks in, "perhaps we scheduled this session too soon*?"
*Too soon after what, you may be
smartly asking yourself? Stay turned
and such details will be filled in! -EffeX
smartly asking yourself? Stay turned
and such details will be filled in! -EffeX
Cyclops sighs. "No. . .I'm feeling optimum." Though Cyclops' tone of voice and stance
-hands on his sides, staring down- belies optimal feelings. As if he were standing
in question to himself: 'That being true, why didn't this go better?'
Xavier eyes perspicaciously a moment, then: "In any case, I'll expect to read what
was the principal factor against your success in your after-action report."
Repositioning himself in the direction of the door, Professor X wheels out.
Cyclops broods a little longer.
Meanwhile, away from Westchester Country, a meeting is underway between the
New York Police Department and The Association for the Betterment of Mutant Citizens.
In attendance, NYPD's Chief Grymholt, ABMC's Warren Worthington III A.K.A. Angel,
Dr. Hank McCoy A.K.A. Beast, and Jean Grey, who presently address the chief:
"The way your department's new focus on getting mutant criminals off the streets
is being presented, makes it sound as though criminals are exclusively mutants."
"Have you been on the streets lately, Ms. Grey? The demographic has certainly become mutant heavy. Mutant youth in particular continue to prove themselves to be degenerates!"
"Isn't it more accurate to say, Chief Grymholt, that these mutants continue to exemplify
the environment in which they presently live? Their powers manifest and more often
than not they become ostracized. Some even by their own families. Their educational
paths become compromised while any prospect to make a decent living vanishes,
if they're not also thrown out of their homes."
"Isn't it more accurate to say, Chief Grymholt, that these mutants continue to exemplify the environment in which they presently live? Their powers manifest and more often than not they become ostracized. Some even by their own families, and nearly all of them by their schools and potential places of work. Their educational path becomes compromised while any prospect to make a decent living vanishes, if they're not also thrown out of their homes."
"So they have the right to commit these crimes?"
"That's not what I'm saying. But when the rights they should have are denied them,
how else are they to live?"
Warren: "I've been able to review the case files of your recent detainees,
Chief Grymholt, and their crimes are petty in nature.
Beast: "If I may share my two cents on the matter, hard time hardly seems the rational response to purloined provisions."
"I understand your sympathies," -Beast and Warren, both obvious mutants, exchange a look- "but," the chief gives a mirthless chuckle, "try telling the storekeeper who's dealing with structural and inventory damages that the crime was 'petty'."
Jean: "In any case, these are people who require help, not incarceration.
If that can be provided it'll be shown these are members of society, not menaces.
He fixes her with a rather skeptical stare: "So exactly what are you proposing, Dr. Grey?"
"A halfway house for mutants," -there's that mirthless chuckle again; the chief shakes
his head while Jean continues- "with resources in place to redirect them away from
criminal activity."
Beast (you know...): "With opportunity for gainful employment, reimbursement
can begin on those damages you mentioned before."
Fixing a stare on Beast, then shifting it between them with all the personality of a driver
reluctant to yield to coming traffic, Chief Grymholt turns this over in his mind a minute.
"I'll concede to reasonable points. Yet just where and how would you propose getting
such a facility? There are many other, more well-founded places the city has to put
its money, and space doesn't grow on trees."
Warren smiles like he was waiting for this question: "The money and space are already taken care of. My family owns a vacant building, purchased some time back as an investment which was given over to me. It's already adequate enough, requiring only a few modifications which can be completed concurrent with occupancy."
Well they seem to have thought of everything, haven't they?
"...Very well. The responsibility of the mutant detainees will be considered yours.
Assuming you can keep them under control long enough to see reason; they can
keep the collars for transport but after that, well, Trask Industries' contract is only
with law enforcement for the present."
For the first time all meeting, Beast, Warren and Jean are thrown.
Warren: "What do you mean 'the collars'?"
The chief is surprised: "How do you think we've come to collar all these mutants?
By literally collaring them. Trask Industries latest technology -Power-Inhibiting."
Beast: "My stars! We're not animals."
Off Jean's disconcerted face,
we cut-back-to the Mansion.
Scott is now on his way to a certain location, papers in hand, when a familiar
young voice pauses him: "Professor Summers. Hi. Are you busy?"
"Well that depends." He glances from Holo to down the hall,
where the door to Professor Xavier's office is presently closed.
She gets it. "Oh- I just want to ask you something."
"Then you've got me."
He holds his hands behind his back in an unhurried manner.
Smiling, Holo tries not to delay even so: "I was just wondering some things about your powers? If you don't mind answering. After -well -you know. Everything*..." she hurries past that, "I kind of got really interested in learning how everyone's mutation works for them. You know Dr. Grey's been showing me some of her X-gene work.."
*Now what is Holo referencing?
Different question, same answer:
You'll find out if you stick with the adventure! ~EffeX
Different question, same answer:
You'll find out if you stick with the adventure! ~EffeX
Scott nods, indeed aware of this fact.
"Well she told me about yours, after I asked," Holo seems a little embarrassed to admit that, but goes on, "and so, you absorb energy from the sun like a plant? I mean Dr. Grey didn't say it THAT way."
Scott smiles a little at Holo's manner. "Well I suppose it's something of a similar process to photosynthesis, though more like an engine with the fuel being certain photons; not strictly sunlight."
"Right," her embarrassment returns, "Dr. Grey said that. I think it's fascinating anyway how you absorb stuff that gives heat, but your blasts don't. And so um, behind your glasses or visor you're like, shooting all the time, right?"
(unfortunately) "Yes."
"So then, aren't you like, spending more energy than you're getting? Since there's less of that photon stuff in the dark, right?" Her brow furrows, like she doesn't understand 100% about "that photon stuff", but in any case- "Or even if there isn't and you're getting something all the time, you're also shooting all the time, so shouldn't that balance out into no blasts?
"Smart question. Presumably it isn't a 1-to-1 ratio. Simplified, think of it
like every one particle supplying me with enough energy for ten blasts.
Holo nods, looking like she understands that much.
Scott adds: "We're also not sure if my mutation developed all at once. The absorbing
part of it might've occurred well ahead of the blast part, giving me a head start."
"Oh yeah! Like you had -or have some, um, what is it called...."
"Energy reserves?"
"Yeah, in reserve."
While we hear a door open, Scott smiles at Holo. "You have a good head for this."
Holo beams. "Professor Grey said we'll start figuring out my powers soon."
"Good," he starts to shift towards Xavier's office,
"a deeper understanding of your own powers is a good thing to have."
Pleased, Holo departs with a wave.
And turning properly, Scott finds who just exited Xavier's office-
"Hi, Emma."
"Goodbye, Scott."
"You're leaving early today?"
"I'm leaving full stop. We'll have to take our sessions up back at my practice. That is,"
she glances back at Xavier, "if you still trust them after your professor fills you in."
Reverting attention to Scott, she seems contented by his 'why wouldn't I?' expression.
She strides off towards the entryway before he can verbalize the question,
if he was going to, and Scott walks up to Xavier; now also out of his office
observing the departure. "What just happened, Professor?"
"Emma Frost's empath abilities not only allow her to read others' emotions but to manipulate them.
She was doing so on some of the students -innocuously, if that can be said, though any such practice
can not be tolerated."
Staring towards the door, Scott's both in complete agreement and disbelief.
"I'm positive she never tried that in any of our sessions."
Xavier gives a "hm" as though making a note of that, or merely finding it interesting.
On her way out, Emma almost collides with Jean on her way in.
Jean: "Oh- excuse me."
"Telepathy on the fritz today?" the blonde quips.
"What?"
"Well, Scott knows where to find me if you ever do require a mind adjustment."
She suddenly seems discomfited--though only for a second. Mysteriously smiling in the next.
"Maybe a couples session? Until then."
"Goodbye, Emma." Jean's not sure what to make of her.
More so, Jean's still affected by the events of the meeting.
Scott (as she walks up): "Let me guess, it didn't go well."
"Worse."
The trio reconvenes in Xavier's Office.
"...we told him we definitely won't be making use of the collars.
We're trying to remove restrictions on mutants, not introduce more."
These new developments have them all disturbed.
Scott: "How do the collars inhibit mutant powers?"
Jean: "Right now only Trask Industries has that answer. Warren wants to meet
with them, while Hank is seeing if he can borrow one from the police to analyze.
We're not even sure how many they have."
Scott: "I knew there had to be something behind NYPD's latest enterprise."
Xavier: "Addressing this is certainly a priority.
However, there exists another matter I was hoping you two would undertake."
They're all ears.
"There is a new anomaly I've noticed through Cerebro. An area with curious mutant signatures, though also a recurrent psychic disruption that is preventing me from getting a clear read. I know you're still tentative* towards standard missions, Jean, but your telepathy will be necessary for pinpointing the sources of each."
*For reasons relating to no longer wishing to use her
powers in combative situations. At least not typically. ~EffeX
powers in combative situations. At least not typically. ~EffeX
Jean nods. "That's fine."
"When do we head out?"
Cut-to Cyclops & Jean Grey in the cockpit of the X-Jet,
soaring through the skies.
"Jean?"
"Oh -sorry." Having suddenly been inattentive to her co-piloting duties,
Jean brings herself back to them.
Cyclops finishes something on his side before setting his attention back on her.
"You're nervous?"
Drawing a breath, she looks out the window, not really seeing:
"Things that seem straightforward can turn out to be the opposite. .
. .I just don't want to be caught in another compromised position."
Scott is silent at first, thinking everything over. . .
"We'll do what we can."
Not missing his use of "we", Jean "meets" his gaze; finding reassurance in both.
A soft smile crosses her lips ahead of a recomposing breath being drawn.
A few moments pass before Cyclops hears her state: "I've missed this."
Glancing over again, he finds her actually looking out the window.
"Still compares to views you've seen?"
She turns another smile his way. "I couldn't see those with you."
Getting it now, Cyclops smiles back before turning his own attention out the window;
sharing the view. . .But soon, his face goes solemn.
". . .what was it like, knowing you could 'look in', anywhere, anytime. . ?
I can't think there was too much you missed." His attention seems divided, and not just by piloting.
It's as if he's bringing Jean into some conversation he's been having with himself.
Jean: ". . .It wasn't how you're thinking. I wasn't all-seeing. I still needed to know where to look, and focus."
To illustrate this point, the shot, depicting Jean staring out the cockpit window from a perspective as if we're looking at her from the other side, will first have Jean in focus and Cyclops, in the background, out of it.
Then, the focus will shift, and we'll be able to see how intently Cyclops seems to be taking this in;
staring a moment before his head shifts somewhat downward, as if back to his own thoughts.
And the silence brings Jean's focus back to him.
Regarding him concernedly before speaking:
". . .I haven't asked you how the training session went?"
Cyclops' answer comes at length.
". . .it was different -difficult. .using the Danger Room as intended again.
It-" his voice catches. He swallows. ". . .I wish it'd happened almost anywhere else."
He wishes more than that.
Jean looks down at her hands, turning one over.
"If I had the power. . ."
He knows.
. . .Jean reaches her hand across the aisle.
He moves his to meet it.
Though shortly, she shifts as though distracted by something.
This doesn't go unnoticed by him. "What is it?"
". . I think we're here."
That doesn't sound right; Cyclops checks the dash.
"We shouldn't be coming up on the coordinates yet for another--"
--Suddenly they hit turbulence
--worse!
"We've been hit by something!"
He doesn't mean physically -all of the electronics of the Jet have shut down,
--as though by an EMP!
"Manual controls are also down--" their attempts to still pilot are met with futility;
including Jean's try at telekinetically operating the system.
She shifts power concentration to outside the jet, trying to lift it in order to slow
their now rapid descent "--I don't have it!"
Cyclops attention has whipped to the altimetre "--forget it--we're ejecting!"
Jean looks to him, knowing how he means--
--VZHOOOM--KRRSSSHHHH!!!!
--Cyclops blasts them a calculated exit,
then reaches across to Jean with one arm while preparing to disconnect
his seatbelt with the other.
Jean does the same; reaching towards him.
With a nod, they perform the action in sync--and Jean manages at least to
use her powers to ensure they don't lose each other as they're sucked clear
out into the sky.
Holding fast to each other, Jean now concentrates on trying to use her powers to slow
their own descent--little difference --it's telekinetic turbulence!
"Hold tight!" Cyclops holds tighter with one arm at the same time he brings a hand
to his visor, countering their rate of descent with his blast; his plan from the get-go
--but it's not over yet!
Shrapnel from the now crashed jet takes them off guard --and out of each other's arms!
Separately they go down.
Blackout.
Blackness. . . .except for a domed, grey web. In the near distance, shapeshifting flashes,
like what goes on when you close your eyes after looking at light. The flashes move
further away, begin to dissipate, until all that remains is a reddish fizzle.
The red floods the space behind closed eyes,
and Jean Grey opens hers to the sun, promptly having to reclose them.
She turns her head away before trying again; trying to get her bearings.
Awareness floods her mind as sound does her ears.
They were fortunate to have all but landed before they were hit apart.
"Scott?" She starts to push herself up. One arm is injured,
so she shifts most of the effort to the other.
He's nowhere in sight. "Scott!"
Her resonant call isn't returned by even so much as a discernable stir.
Jean's attention shifts to the burning remains of their aircraft,
though not panicked. She at least knows Scott isn't there.
It still has to be addressed.
Looking down at her hands, Jean turns them over -only so far on her injured side.
She looks up to some of the broken metal and, aiming with her good arm,
makes an attempt to telekinetically move it.
She can do so smoothly. Nothing shorting-out her powers like before.
This seems to give Jean a thought, but there's business to attend to first.
Using her telekinesis she finds and deploys the jet's fire extinguishers.
Afterward, for good measure, she makes use of a small body of water, namely to dampen the surrounding environment; a telekinetic forcefield acting like a basin to transport the
water through mid-air.
Jean's strength almost falls with the release of her last catch of water,
like lowering a heavy box and dropping more than setting it down.
Flexing her hands again, Jean draws a collecting breath. Working with reduced*
power is challenging when she needs it, yet a challenge she chose.
She can work with this power.
Raising her hand now to her head, Jean shifts concentration to her other power.
If nothing is interfering with her telekinesis,
nothing should get in the way of her telepathy, either.
. . .yet all she can detect of Scott is a residual mental signature.
It's aside unfamiliar ones, but stands out clearly; a path she can follow. . .
. . .While we follow the story back to the X-Mansion, where someone else
is having a less-than-direct experience finding what they seek.
Young Female: "Come on -which one of these actually turns this thing on..."
The voice of Storm is suddenly heard:
"It won't engage without a passcode given only to X-Men."
We see we're in the Danger Room's Control Bay, where Jubilee now
promptly turns around, caught, yet presses on with youthful energy:
"See that's why I'm here! I thought I could be the newest member!"
Storm smiles. "You are not yet through with your academic studies."
"A junior" -the word seems disagreeable to her- "reserve member, then! I've been thinking
of it since* Cyclops and Iceman were down --before that, but especially then since without them you guys were missing some of your long-range punching power!"
She's spread her fists out down beside herself, intending to emit just a few controlled
sparks in an emphasizing gesture --but in her enthusiasm the pyrotechnic energy-maker
accidentally shoots out a few.
One finds its way to the Control Panel.
"Oh no! I didn't just short it out, did I?!"
"Given its surge protection developed with mutants in mind, I should think not."
Exhaling with relief, Jubilee rushes to finish her case before she does anything else:
"So anyway -with Iceman and Rogue away visiting their folks right now and Cyclops off on a mission with Jean, not to mention Wolverine and Nightcrawler back to theirs, the X-Men are down quite a few numbers! So I thought I'd get some practice in in case something comes up before any of them get back!"
"Do you not already get practice through Cyclops' Danger Class?"
Jubilee roles her eyes: "Sure, but that class is for kids. I say it's time I advance
from class to the real thing! -Or well, the next thing closest to the real thing."
Storm almost laughs at Jubilee's endearing drive:
"The X-Men's numbers are still fine," -Jubilee's face falls, thinking Storm will disregard her wish- "but one so eager ought to have an opportunity to test themselves. If it is 'real' practice you want, you can have some with me. To blow off some of that excess energy," she adds, not critically, pointing to Jubilee's hands, "if nothing else."
"Score!" She punches the air, this time successful in distributing only a few, superficial accent sparks. "Thanks, Storm!"
"Go in ahead," Storm directs, while she moves to program the sim.
And while an X-Man hopeful enters the unreal expanse of the Danger Room,
we return to the very real, close quarters of the X-Men's leader's Confinement Room.
While the chains didn't allow for him to lie down, Cyclops can at least sit back.
Take further burden off himself by leaning against the walls, which he presently
does. Letting his body recover from the latest session.
As he did so, he participated in one of his "alone-time" activities: active listening.
It had yet to amount to much. The only sounds that really told him anything,
the only ones that ever rewarded his dedication, were the echoing tread
of his captors' footsteps as they neared his cell for another go.
The sessions were frequent -how frequent, he didn't know. How long had he been in this place, already?- and always involved the mutant called Perish affecting his body in some way. Not always did his muscles falter or his senses disconnect. That "full body experience" seemed to be a one-off. All times afterward the affects were more concentrated, systematic. In fact feeling more like a scale, where between depletion and
ill-feeling excess was this strange middle ground where he actually felt sharper in specific respects;
more conditioned. Even amped, like his body was suddenly firing on all cylinders.
By each session's close the state of his body would be returned to how it was before
they started, technically, though he never felt exactly the same then as he did at the
onset. His body was being put through the wringer.
For science.
That much he did know.
Though besides the physiological variations, the sessions followed the same pattern exactly:
Enter; Force him down (he just assumed the position himself; save himself the man-handling);
Swap out his visor for their contraption; Affect his body; Force him to blast; Pause Blasting;
Inject him with something; Affect his body again while blasting resumes; Cease blasting;
Replace his visor (why not just keep their contraption on and save themselves that step?);
Return his body to pre-session state; Leave.
As soon as he'd learned the pattern Cyclops started planning;
another of his alone-time activities.
The next time they came, he was ready.
"Tell me what you're doin' with Jean?"
He demanded. If things went right he'd find out for himself,
though he couldn't give them any indication of this.
The third beat to the sequence -swapping out his visor- was about to occur.
He would have only a fraction of a chance to act before the contraption was
placed, and working within that fraction of time the X-Man known as Cyclops
did what he typically must never do--opened his eyes unguarded--
--with a precision tilt of his head Cyclops focused his wild, untrammeled blast
--ricocheting it back and past the two startled scientists --shattering the cross-section
of his chains!
He turns his eyes on Perish, then-- having felt it when it dropped from the startled
scientist's hand --grabs his visor, slipping it over his presently closed eyes while
he shoves the scientists back with his other arm --blasting them now he has
full control.
For all he knows they're not mutants; an unmitigated blast
would've hit them differently than it hit Perish.
A beam comes through the door hitting him squarely in the back--
--Cyclops is thrown head-on into the back wall,
and the Enigmatic Voice can be heard again:
"Perish! Reverse your disadvantage. . ."
The heap on the floor that is now Perish manages still to reach out a gaunt hand,
and the pained shake of it gradually steadies as Cyclops now falters; his mind
suddenly running slow. . .his muscles, once again, failing to do what he needs
them to, if he could even think through the descending mental fog on what
that is; his vision fading away. . .
The Enigmatic Figure steps into the room.
He surveys the two knocked-out scientists and the one fallen X-Man,
looking from the former -"Fools"- to the latter. .
"A few simple adjustments won't have that happening again."
. .yet he seems to have enjoyed that little show;
a sadistic grin forming across his shadowed jaw.
"We'll give these two time to recover," he states with mild derision,
"then continue on our regular schedule."
He strides out. . . and so too do we leave the X-Men's unconscious leader,
to reconvene with Jean Grey; trying to reach that very consciousness.
Day has long given way to night as Jean finally comes up on a road,
while the vestiges of Cyclops' residual psychic signature finally fade
completely from her detection.
Even as they do, Jean is overcome with a sense of more.
Her face reflecting some torment as she knows something is happening
to him, though not what, and not where.
'Scott!' She calls out psychically, urgently.
'Where are you?'
While he hadn't heard the mention of "simple adjustments", Cyclops -rechained-
became cognizant of one upon waking. Something was now stuck in his arm
where they usually injected him, except in this case, in the opposite arm.
Cognizance of the second adjustment would come in the pattern of the next session:
ahead of their swapping out his visor, Perish now placed him in a depleted state.
Though it seemed he would still be returned to baseline in between sessions,
Cyclops was smarter than to attribute that to mercy.
It was the same reason he now understood why they always returned his visor to him.
Even with strength in his body -diminishing though it was to attrition-
he had no power; they wanted him to see, even with his visor,
he had no control.
He reasoned they kept his mind clear, as well, so he could adequately take in this dismal state of affairs. . .
But a mind had more agency than a body bound. . .
'Jean. . .If you are in here, I think I'd know given what we have. . .
So then where? . . and are you safe. . .'
He concentrated. Trying to see if he could tap into their psychic rapport; find the hallway between their minds. . .like he did unconsciously the last time* things were dire. . .
. . .but he didn't feel anything.
Save for a growing anxiety.
No control.
'What's happening while I'm here. . ?
. .and what's the cost gonna' be. . ?'
In the emptiness of this answer-less thought,
the silence closed in on him. . .
Meanwhile, it was about to be anything but silent for Jean Grey.
It was as though her question, uttered into the astral ether, was a drop of water in a pond
of similar questions, rippling out to touch the others, and causing them to echo back to her:
'He's gone!'
'They don't care."
'She didn't just run away!'
"-What will it take?!'
'Another one--"
"--just another one missing.'
There are no souls in sight, not that Jean expected there to be; she can feel a distance
to these calls. As though what she's picking up is the anguish of loved ones searching
for their missing -and the apathy of others- that has suffused the "psychic air" of this highway:
'Why won't you help?!'
'When will they give up -accept the truth already.'
'They're not runaways!'
'Why can't these mutants stop getting into trouble?
Like it's in their genes or something.'
'When are these mutants gonna' learn to take care of their kids?'
'If my parents were mutants, I'd runaway too.'
--and Jean goes from inundated to stunned by the picture these echoes bring into focus:
all exclusively to do with missing mutants.
'Jean! . .'
Somewhere in the tumult she hears it.
She's certain of this, though the voice is so faint-
-it gets lost in the mire.
Back with Cyclops, he's in a position indicative of having come to attention.
Had he really heard her voice or had he been dreaming?
He was met with only a contradictory silence. .
. .until other voices echoed through his mind.
Though unlike Jean's experiences, these were voices he knew;
voices from his own past; one of them his own: '--I would never have stopped
if I'd known you were still out there!'
Echos: 'You were still out there.'
Another male voice echoes back: 'How hard did you even try?'
'Did you even try?'
Pained, Cyclops overwrites these memories with a concentrated thought:
'Jean. . !
I won't stop.'
We come to find Jean Grey as she arrives at a truck stop.
With a couple more disturbing pieces of hearsay, the voices ebb away:
'It's a conspiracy-'
'-They're taken in the trucks.'
Was that all of them? Or have they subsided from Jean having also arrived at a physical point for their pleas: missing persons posters dotting the space. However, they seem
about as heeded as the hanging voices: old, weather-worn copies written over with
graffiti. New ones carelessly obscured by other means; one literally right under
someone's feet.
They kick at it before, on a second thought, they commit to doing better --picking up the "litter" to deposit into a trash can. It's unclear whether they even saw what it actually was,
and if it would've made any difference.
A nightshift employee comes out of the convenience store a little ways
on, joined by one from the hotel. They share a smoke break and a little
conversation which we can just overhear:
"Hear that big sound today?"
"Yeah. Sounded like one of our planes crashed,
but I haven't heard anything about it."
"My aunt said all the planes here are accounted for.
UFO, I guess."
Jean doesn't have to wonder what they're talking about -in any respect.
She'd already noticed it: the recognizable lights of an airport tower in the distance.
Before their X-Jet went down, she and Cyclops hadn't yet
arrived at the coordinates provided to them by Xavier.
Scott's signal from before. . .there was something affecting it;
like a valley does to radio waves.
Jean knows where she has to go.
Though first there's something she has to do.
No one around now to pay attention, Jean raises her hand towards the trash can.
With her telekinesis she extracts the poster, uncrumples it, and secures it in prominent
view by tucking the edge of it underneath some other paper pasted on the side
of a vending machine.
With a pained look, she then turns away from the road.
Whatever's going on here will have to wait. Or maybe, hopefully,
where she's going will hold the answers for all.
A vow is made the desperate voices:
'I won't stop.'
like what goes on when you close your eyes after looking at light. The flashes move
further away, begin to dissipate, until all that remains is a reddish fizzle.
The red floods the space behind closed eyes,
and Jean Grey opens hers to the sun, promptly having to reclose them.
She turns her head away before trying again; trying to get her bearings.
Awareness floods her mind as sound does her ears.
They were fortunate to have all but landed before they were hit apart.
"Scott?" She starts to push herself up. One arm is injured,
so she shifts most of the effort to the other.
He's nowhere in sight. "Scott!"
Her resonant call isn't returned by even so much as a discernable stir.
Jean's attention shifts to the burning remains of their aircraft,
though not panicked. She at least knows Scott isn't there.
It still has to be addressed.
Looking down at her hands, Jean turns them over -only so far on her injured side.
She looks up to some of the broken metal and, aiming with her good arm,
makes an attempt to telekinetically move it.
She can do so smoothly. Nothing shorting-out her powers like before.
This seems to give Jean a thought, but there's business to attend to first.
Using her telekinesis she finds and deploys the jet's fire extinguishers.
Afterward, for good measure, she makes use of a small body of water, namely to dampen the surrounding environment; a telekinetic forcefield acting like a basin to transport the
water through mid-air.
Jean's strength almost falls with the release of her last catch of water,
like lowering a heavy box and dropping more than setting it down.
Flexing her hands again, Jean draws a collecting breath. Working with reduced*
power is challenging when she needs it, yet a challenge she chose.
She can work with this power.
*Jean detached herself from her higher power when she
descended back to Earth, after her time as a cosmic entity.
This is explained in Envisionings (2nd Edition) Part 1-
-as if you X-Fans needed the reminder! ~EffeX
descended back to Earth, after her time as a cosmic entity.
This is explained in Envisionings (2nd Edition) Part 1-
-as if you X-Fans needed the reminder! ~EffeX
Raising her hand now to her head, Jean shifts concentration to her other power.
If nothing is interfering with her telekinesis,
nothing should get in the way of her telepathy, either.
. . .yet all she can detect of Scott is a residual mental signature.
It's aside unfamiliar ones, but stands out clearly; a path she can follow. . .
. . .While we follow the story back to the X-Mansion, where someone else
is having a less-than-direct experience finding what they seek.
Young Female: "Come on -which one of these actually turns this thing on..."
The voice of Storm is suddenly heard:
"It won't engage without a passcode given only to X-Men."
We see we're in the Danger Room's Control Bay, where Jubilee now
promptly turns around, caught, yet presses on with youthful energy:
"See that's why I'm here! I thought I could be the newest member!"
Storm smiles. "You are not yet through with your academic studies."
"A junior" -the word seems disagreeable to her- "reserve member, then! I've been thinking
of it since* Cyclops and Iceman were down --before that, but especially then since without them you guys were missing some of your long-range punching power!"
*For you, dear reader, the situation Jubilee
references hasn't happened yet. For her and
the X-Men, it happened a short while ago. Stay
with our adventure and all will be revealed! ~EffeX
references hasn't happened yet. For her and
the X-Men, it happened a short while ago. Stay
with our adventure and all will be revealed! ~EffeX
She's spread her fists out down beside herself, intending to emit just a few controlled
sparks in an emphasizing gesture --but in her enthusiasm the pyrotechnic energy-maker
accidentally shoots out a few.
One finds its way to the Control Panel.
"Oh no! I didn't just short it out, did I?!"
"Given its surge protection developed with mutants in mind, I should think not."
Exhaling with relief, Jubilee rushes to finish her case before she does anything else:
"So anyway -with Iceman and Rogue away visiting their folks right now and Cyclops off on a mission with Jean, not to mention Wolverine and Nightcrawler back to theirs, the X-Men are down quite a few numbers! So I thought I'd get some practice in in case something comes up before any of them get back!"
"Do you not already get practice through Cyclops' Danger Class?"
Jubilee roles her eyes: "Sure, but that class is for kids. I say it's time I advance
from class to the real thing! -Or well, the next thing closest to the real thing."
Storm almost laughs at Jubilee's endearing drive:
"The X-Men's numbers are still fine," -Jubilee's face falls, thinking Storm will disregard her wish- "but one so eager ought to have an opportunity to test themselves. If it is 'real' practice you want, you can have some with me. To blow off some of that excess energy," she adds, not critically, pointing to Jubilee's hands, "if nothing else."
"Score!" She punches the air, this time successful in distributing only a few, superficial accent sparks. "Thanks, Storm!"
"Go in ahead," Storm directs, while she moves to program the sim.
And while an X-Man hopeful enters the unreal expanse of the Danger Room,
we return to the very real, close quarters of the X-Men's leader's Confinement Room.
While the chains didn't allow for him to lie down, Cyclops can at least sit back.
Take further burden off himself by leaning against the walls, which he presently
does. Letting his body recover from the latest session.
As he did so, he participated in one of his "alone-time" activities: active listening.
It had yet to amount to much. The only sounds that really told him anything,
the only ones that ever rewarded his dedication, were the echoing tread
of his captors' footsteps as they neared his cell for another go.
The sessions were frequent -how frequent, he didn't know. How long had he been in this place, already?- and always involved the mutant called Perish affecting his body in some way. Not always did his muscles falter or his senses disconnect. That "full body experience" seemed to be a one-off. All times afterward the affects were more concentrated, systematic. In fact feeling more like a scale, where between depletion and
ill-feeling excess was this strange middle ground where he actually felt sharper in specific respects;
more conditioned. Even amped, like his body was suddenly firing on all cylinders.
By each session's close the state of his body would be returned to how it was before
they started, technically, though he never felt exactly the same then as he did at the
onset. His body was being put through the wringer.
For science.
That much he did know.
Though besides the physiological variations, the sessions followed the same pattern exactly:
Enter; Force him down (he just assumed the position himself; save himself the man-handling);
Swap out his visor for their contraption; Affect his body; Force him to blast; Pause Blasting;
Inject him with something; Affect his body again while blasting resumes; Cease blasting;
Replace his visor (why not just keep their contraption on and save themselves that step?);
Return his body to pre-session state; Leave.
As soon as he'd learned the pattern Cyclops started planning;
another of his alone-time activities.
The next time they came, he was ready.
"Tell me what you're doin' with Jean?"
He demanded. If things went right he'd find out for himself,
though he couldn't give them any indication of this.
The third beat to the sequence -swapping out his visor- was about to occur.
He would have only a fraction of a chance to act before the contraption was
placed, and working within that fraction of time the X-Man known as Cyclops
did what he typically must never do--opened his eyes unguarded--
--KKZK-ZHOOOOOOMM!!!!!--
--with a precision tilt of his head Cyclops focused his wild, untrammeled blast
--ricocheting it back and past the two startled scientists --shattering the cross-section
of his chains!
He turns his eyes on Perish, then-- having felt it when it dropped from the startled
scientist's hand --grabs his visor, slipping it over his presently closed eyes while
he shoves the scientists back with his other arm --blasting them now he has
full control.
For all he knows they're not mutants; an unmitigated blast
would've hit them differently than it hit Perish.
Suddenly--
CHOOOOHHM
A beam comes through the door hitting him squarely in the back--
--Cyclops is thrown head-on into the back wall,
and the Enigmatic Voice can be heard again:
"Perish! Reverse your disadvantage. . ."
The heap on the floor that is now Perish manages still to reach out a gaunt hand,
and the pained shake of it gradually steadies as Cyclops now falters; his mind
suddenly running slow. . .his muscles, once again, failing to do what he needs
them to, if he could even think through the descending mental fog on what
that is; his vision fading away. . .
. . .this time ahead of his consciousness.
The Enigmatic Figure steps into the room.
He surveys the two knocked-out scientists and the one fallen X-Man,
looking from the former -"Fools"- to the latter. .
"A few simple adjustments won't have that happening again."
. .yet he seems to have enjoyed that little show;
a sadistic grin forming across his shadowed jaw.
"We'll give these two time to recover," he states with mild derision,
"then continue on our regular schedule."
He strides out. . . and so too do we leave the X-Men's unconscious leader,
to reconvene with Jean Grey; trying to reach that very consciousness.
Day has long given way to night as Jean finally comes up on a road,
while the vestiges of Cyclops' residual psychic signature finally fade
completely from her detection.
Even as they do, Jean is overcome with a sense of more.
Her face reflecting some torment as she knows something is happening
to him, though not what, and not where.
'Scott!' She calls out psychically, urgently.
'Where are you?'
While he hadn't heard the mention of "simple adjustments", Cyclops -rechained-
became cognizant of one upon waking. Something was now stuck in his arm
where they usually injected him, except in this case, in the opposite arm.
Cognizance of the second adjustment would come in the pattern of the next session:
ahead of their swapping out his visor, Perish now placed him in a depleted state.
Though it seemed he would still be returned to baseline in between sessions,
Cyclops was smarter than to attribute that to mercy.
It was the same reason he now understood why they always returned his visor to him.
Even with strength in his body -diminishing though it was to attrition-
he had no power; they wanted him to see, even with his visor,
he had no control.
He reasoned they kept his mind clear, as well, so he could adequately take in this dismal state of affairs. . .
But a mind had more agency than a body bound. . .
'Jean. . .If you are in here, I think I'd know given what we have. . .
So then where? . . and are you safe. . .'
He concentrated. Trying to see if he could tap into their psychic rapport; find the hallway between their minds. . .like he did unconsciously the last time* things were dire. . .
*For you readers, that time's still to come.
Stay tuned! -EffeX
Stay tuned! -EffeX
. . .but he didn't feel anything.
Save for a growing anxiety.
No control.
'What's happening while I'm here. . ?
. .and what's the cost gonna' be. . ?'
In the emptiness of this answer-less thought,
the silence closed in on him. . .
Meanwhile, it was about to be anything but silent for Jean Grey.
It was as though her question, uttered into the astral ether, was a drop of water in a pond
of similar questions, rippling out to touch the others, and causing them to echo back to her:
'He's gone!'
'They don't care."
'She didn't just run away!'
"-What will it take?!'
'Another one--"
"--just another one missing.'
There are no souls in sight, not that Jean expected there to be; she can feel a distance
to these calls. As though what she's picking up is the anguish of loved ones searching
for their missing -and the apathy of others- that has suffused the "psychic air" of this highway:
'Why won't you help?!'
'When will they give up -accept the truth already.'
'They're not runaways!'
'Why can't these mutants stop getting into trouble?
Like it's in their genes or something.'
'When are these mutants gonna' learn to take care of their kids?'
'If my parents were mutants, I'd runaway too.'
--and Jean goes from inundated to stunned by the picture these echoes bring into focus:
all exclusively to do with missing mutants.
'Jean! . .'
Somewhere in the tumult she hears it.
She's certain of this, though the voice is so faint-
-it gets lost in the mire.
Back with Cyclops, he's in a position indicative of having come to attention.
Had he really heard her voice or had he been dreaming?
He was met with only a contradictory silence. .
. .until other voices echoed through his mind.
Though unlike Jean's experiences, these were voices he knew;
voices from his own past; one of them his own: '--I would never have stopped
if I'd known you were still out there!'
Echos: 'You were still out there.'
Another male voice echoes back: 'How hard did you even try?'
'Did you even try?'
Pained, Cyclops overwrites these memories with a concentrated thought:
'Jean. . !
I won't stop.'
We come to find Jean Grey as she arrives at a truck stop.
With a couple more disturbing pieces of hearsay, the voices ebb away:
'It's a conspiracy-'
'-They're taken in the trucks.'
Was that all of them? Or have they subsided from Jean having also arrived at a physical point for their pleas: missing persons posters dotting the space. However, they seem
about as heeded as the hanging voices: old, weather-worn copies written over with
graffiti. New ones carelessly obscured by other means; one literally right under
someone's feet.
They kick at it before, on a second thought, they commit to doing better --picking up the "litter" to deposit into a trash can. It's unclear whether they even saw what it actually was,
and if it would've made any difference.
A nightshift employee comes out of the convenience store a little ways
on, joined by one from the hotel. They share a smoke break and a little
conversation which we can just overhear:
"Hear that big sound today?"
"Yeah. Sounded like one of our planes crashed,
but I haven't heard anything about it."
"My aunt said all the planes here are accounted for.
UFO, I guess."
Jean doesn't have to wonder what they're talking about -in any respect.
She'd already noticed it: the recognizable lights of an airport tower in the distance.
Before their X-Jet went down, she and Cyclops hadn't yet
arrived at the coordinates provided to them by Xavier.
Scott's signal from before. . .there was something affecting it;
like a valley does to radio waves.
Jean knows where she has to go.
Though first there's something she has to do.
No one around now to pay attention, Jean raises her hand towards the trash can.
With her telekinesis she extracts the poster, uncrumples it, and secures it in prominent
view by tucking the edge of it underneath some other paper pasted on the side
of a vending machine.
With a pained look, she then turns away from the road.
Whatever's going on here will have to wait. Or maybe, hopefully,
where she's going will hold the answers for all.
A vow is made the desperate voices:
'I won't stop.'
X-Mansion - Cerebro
Professor X uses the device to concentrate on a specific location.
After several minutes, he ceases his search.
Ororo is there to meet him in the hallway outside.
Xavier: "The field which has been restricting my telepathy still exists, though the size is
now reduced. I had thought Scott and Jean would be on their way back by now or if not,
that having Jean at the location might allow me to at least reach through to her mind. . .
In any case, I'm going to take this development as a sign things are going alright. . .
Remind me though, Ororo, to finally look into obtaining a secondary aircraft.
I am reminded at times like these how prudent that would be."
"Not a problem. I will join Hank and Warren in getting the mutant detainees settled."
As we now do, with a bus driven by Hank heading for a NYC Police Station.
"Nearly there."
Ororo is seated in one of the front-most seats, and they're about to be joined
by someone else, who presently gets out from beneath a back seat.
"Am I ever glad to hear you say that!"
Hank nearly misses the traffic light: "Egads! The sudden announcement
of a girl stowed away." He turns his head as Ororo exclaims: "Jubilee!"
"Sorry! I didn't want to delay the trip explaining why I thought I should come along-"
Ororo: "-and didn't want to hear a 'no' following a request of permission."
Hank: "With an appearance timed at the perfect juncture to negate turning back."
Jubilee's expression says it all: guilty-as-charged.
"I'll stay out of the way, and in the bus while you guys are collecting everyone, I promise!"
Ororo: "You will be held to that."
Though her disposition is forgiving.
Hank: "Light's about to turn. No standing passengers in a moving motor vehicle."
Jubilee takes the seat behind Ororo's.
Upon pulling up at the station, Ororo goes in to get the process going while Jubilee,
true to her word so far, stays back in the bus, with Hank.
Now leaning over the seatback in front of her, Jubilee questions:
"What've all these mutants we're picking up been arrested for, anyway?"
"In three words? Trying to live."
Jubilee's face reflects disconcertion.
Inside the station
Ororo (firm): "It is time those collars came off."
The escorting officers comply, getting the keys to the Power-Dampener collars outfitted to them by Trask Industries, albeit with looks of skepticism and/or eyes of 'I just dare you to
try something'.
While at least one of the detainees seem spurred by that, none break form;
recognizing the chance the ABMC* is giving them.
Escorting Officer # 1: "The cuffs will be removed at the destination."
"They, too, will be removed now."
Escorting Officer # 2: "Listen, ma'am. We won't tell you how to do your job over there.
The cuffs stay."
Ororo concedes, though is sure to meet each of the detainee's eyes who will raise
them to hers; in them they are people.
Just as Ororo is about to head out to the bus with everyone, a careworn woman
approaches her: "You're the ones giving the mutants a second chance?"
"We are."
"Please, can you arrange to take my son, too? They're trying to charge him with arson!"
An officer has strode over to join the conversation.
1st Arresting Officer: "Now listen, the agreement with your association was to give you the supposed hard luck cases, but this one isn't." He gestures with a flat hand towards the mother, "they're a well-enough off family whose kid nearly burned down their condo complex."
Mother: "I've been trying to explain! His X-Gene just turned on! We never knew--"
she turns back to Ororo, "he didn't know what he was doing or how to stop it!"
1st Arresting Officer: "So they say."
Ororo addresses the officer: "We cannot know how any one X-Gene will manifest
until it does, but in all cases control comes with time. What makes you think the
fire was on purpose?"
1st Arresting Officer: "Because fake news comes from both sides, and you can't convince me being a mutant
is natural then tell me they need to work at controlling themselves. Pick a lane."
Ororo looks over to where a young teen is seated, clearly the boy in question by the collar he wears
if not the singed sleeves. Foil can be seen sticking out of the pocket of his pants.
"He is of the average age mutantcy first makes itself known,
and I see no malcontent in his face."
A 2nd Arresting Officer scoffs: "Walk our beat for a week, lady.
You'll see all kinds of crocodile tears."
Mother: "Please!"
Ororo looks squarely back at the officers: "If I must pick a lane, I choose the one
our bus is in. Remove the collar as you did with the others, and we will take him."
The Mother breathes with relief.
The 2nd Arresting Officer folds his arms, unconvinced.
The 1st Arresting Officer concedes: "If you're so sure you can handle 'em,
be my guest. But I've gotta' clear this first."
Afterward.
1st Arresting Officer: "Alright kid, you got lucky. Let's go-" he practically pulls the boy
out of the chair. The mother is quick to place her hands protectively on her son,
waiting to be rid of these officers while this one goes about removing the collar.
1st Arresting Officer (to Ororo):
"That Worthington can stay a lawsuit if the kid proves you wrong, huh?"
"We will be fine."
Collar removed, the officer smirks at how the mother is now taking the foil from her son's pockets and replacing it on his hands; their makeshift protective gear, it seems.
Ororo and the small family then leave to join the bus.
Outside the boy, looking actually more nervous,
holds his cuffed and covered hands together,
Ororo gently touches them: "You can breathe easier.
I have powers of my own that can quench any wayward flames."
The boy looks into her eyes, finding some relief in the truth he sees there,
though he doesn't remove his foil gloves.
Ororo lets that be, making only an ushering gesture towards the bus.
Hank: "Oh, salutations young man. Welcome aboard the mutant express."
He gives an 'and you' nod and smile towards the mother,
who takes in his beastly appearance before turning to question Ororo:
"Have you been to this facility already? Can it help my son?"
Hank closes the doors of the bus but waits to pull away from the curb
until everyone is seated.
Ororo: "Actually, what would fit better is a school I know of for youngsters like him.
You will have to ride with us to the other facility first, but then he can come back with me."
Jubilee has come to meet them in the aisle: "With us, actually!
I go there myself and it's great! Of course you'll fit in!"
The boy seems happy to see another young mutant face, and his Mother seems
like a large load she's been carrying has been lightened. "Oh- thank you!"
She turns back to her son as he asks in a low voice:
"Don't you have to get back to work?"
She responds in kind: "Do you think you'll be alright with them?"
He rubs his foiled hands together a little, looks into Storm's eyes again,
then at Jubilee -who gives a fresh smile- and answers quietly: "Yeah, I think so."
Storm: "If he has a phone he can call as he likes.
We'll at least make sure he does when we arrive."
The family of two hug ahead of the Mother's departure.
Jubilee takes over after that: "Sit with me, if you want.
What's your name, anyway?"
Boy: "Branden."
"I'm Jubilee."
Over at the Halfway House
Warren: "Thanks for these contacts, Jacilon*," he indicates the piece of paper in his hand.
Jacilon: "As I understand, something like this had been in the plans for a while.
Or plan purgatory, given the Outreach Centre's limited resources."
Warren: "Trust a Summers to have a plan."
A sympathetic silence precedes a light comment:
"Or an Angel to answer a need?"
Warren laughs. "I'll keep doing what I can."
He places the paper in his pocket before movement out a window catches his eye.
Warren sighs, "and looks like I better get on that if Hank is going to be able to park."
Jacilon follows his eye, mildly surprised: "Downside of up-to-the-minute news."
They head outside to where a news crew is gathered, though that isn't what
they're referring to; the crew has permission to be here.
The anti-mutant protesters don't.
Warren: "This is private property. Removes yourselves or I will have you removed."
"Yeah right-
"-show us the deed, mutie!"
"No one would sell to the likes of you!"
"He's a criminal about to house more!"
"Not in our neighborhood!"
Warren spreads his wings, standing for an intimidating second before he takes to the skies,
coming to meet the approaching bus at the end of the block instead of by the front entrance.
"There's another door we can use," he explains to Hank and company,
while the officers that were on board disembark to deal with the crowd.
Hank: "Indeed, let the rest of us circumvent this unpleasantness."
Mutant Detainee # 1: "No way! We should fight back against it!"
Mutant Detainee # 2: "You want to get collared again? They're just waiting for us to mess up."
Mutant Detainee # 3: "They're provoking us!"
Mutant Detainee # 4: "Probably for that reason! I bet it's all staged!"
Ororo raises her hands and, just enough, her voice: "Let's not let our emotions grow
as heated as theirs. Focus on the purpose you are here, and leave the rest to us."
They're pressed to maintain this focus as they're ushered out, able to hear more jeers:
"We don't want you here!"
"Let them stay in jail!"
With the detainees in the background of their shot, the news crew
captures what else the detracting crowd has to say:
"I'm not hirin' no mutant!" one individual states to the camera. "Their plan's to assimilate them into society-" he turns to where Warren is just touching back down next to Jacilon "-You can't get this to work!"
"This is a waste!"
"I'm not paying taxes for this!"
Apparently this protestor's grapevine was lacking in the financial details department.
Several of the detainees haven't moved towards the other door, causing
the others to pause as well. "Is his how it's gonna' be everyday, here?"
"I thought we were getting a break!"
Then more trouble comes down.
"Have they actually lead you to expect one with this little. . .cooperation project of theirs?"
Ororo: "Magneto!"
Maintaining a certain distance from the ground -for a statement, not from fear- the levitating master of magnetism turns his head as though he's taking in the look of the building. "Not a bad facility, despite
its representation of the problem with Xavier's teachings: they only ever take you half way."
Branden: "Who's he?"
Jubilee: "Bad news!"
She brings up her sparking fists.
Magneto smiles: "I suppose that's something we can let them be the judges of,"
he nods to the news crew down below before growing serious, attention back
on the X-Men as he launches into a speech: "You try to engender sympathy
from them by saying what choice did we have? They made us this way.
No- we came this way. And we have all the choices."
He reverts focus to the camera, the crowd: "To you inferior humans the first solution to a problem is always to remove it. Now across the globe you're dealing with the consequences as ecosystems crash from having had key species removed. Oh yes, you have learned you must live with us, but unsurprisingly you have learned the wrong lesson, creating those collars." He nearly spits the word.
Magneto's attention then shifts to Ororo: "Surely you must see how this projects? When
else in history have people been looked at as animals? Lesser beings to be owned."
Back to his audience at large: "The intent is transparent! Contain the mutants' powers and you contain the mutant! Instill what is and what isn't acceptable behaviour, remove what makes us what we are. Next comes dictation on where we can be. 'Mutant reserves'."
He gives that a moment, meeting the eyes of Jacilon who is of First Nations descent.
Magneto continues: "I'm pleased to see you X-Men have it right in one respect:
we will not be collared. Nor will we have our freedoms restricted in any way!"
All of the detainees' handcuffs suddenly snap open.
"We will not become society's domesticated pets; house cats to be declawed. We are tigers! And what they must learn is to respect the power we hold in our hands!"
And Magneto raises his--
--causing all cars in sight to become airborne. parking metres to be ripped
from the pavement--
--Storm is ready with her wind against the cars, though their bodies are merely a distraction as, with one hand, Magneto is tearing pieces from them, bringing them where the parking metres have been held aloft, bending and soon welding pieces onto each other as another of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants, Pyro, wearing a flame-throwing suit, makes his appearance.
Branden: "What's he doing?!"
Jubilee: "I don't know and it's too far for me to reach- but if he throws it!"
She takes up a protective stance in front of Branden,
while Angel takes to the wing again to face their foes--but comes only to face himself!?
A tell-tale flicker of the eyes reveals his doppelganger to be Mystique!
Hank is trying to usher everyone inside when chain link fencing is suddenly thrown
and held against the doors. At the same time the objects Magneto has been crafting
with Pyro are sent the way of the non-mutants --becoming makeshift shackles and, yes, collars.
Then the bus can be seen rising a few inches off the ground.
While Storm -and Jubilee- seem ready for it to be thrown, Magneto's only interested in using it for what it is; a vehicle: "Anyone who prefers a full mutant life over compromise, climb back on." He adds to his associate, "I believe you'll find a friend in the boy over there, Pyro."
Pyro turns his attention to Branden, who Magneto presently addresses:
"The fire in your hands is outside of your control. I'm sure they've told
you of a school that can help? Pyro here is something of a graduate."
Jubilee: "Try drop-out!"
Magneto smiles, unperturbed: "He found the environment lacking after a while,
which is when I approached him with an alternative. I now offer the same to you.
I happen to know no other at the school is exactly like you, where as you and
Pyro would compliment each other. You see, though he doesn't create his
own fire, he has full control over any in his vicinity."
Branden seems intrigued by this.
Storm: "Your mother entrusted you to us."
Magneto: "She didn't have all the facts."
Jubilee (to Branden): "Look at these facts!" She gestures to the bound non-mutants.
"You don't wanna' go with the type of guys who do that, do you?"
Magneto counters: "On the contrary, that represents the level
of precise control you may attain with your own gift, lad."
Branden seems uncertain -but more about how the others will react than about his own decision; he steps back towards the bus.
Magneto smiles.
Storm places her hand on Branden's shoulder, on the cusp of talking sense back into him when Magneto's voice rings out again: "I'm afraid you won't have time to argue with the capriciousness of youth."
Pyro makes quick work creating a literal fire wall around the metal-bound captives,
igniting what's left of the cars before starting to set fire to the buildings when Storm's
powers rain down-- --though soon her it's her winds that are needed again, forced
to redirect the course of Magneto's latest metal projectiles --ripping them from the
halfway house's very structure.
Jubilee tries to balance the match-up by getting in on it, but- "the X-Men can also throw fire!"
-she doesn't get her trajectory right the first time, and now that Magneto is alerted to her,
he deflects her following sparks with another piece of chainlink fence he promptly sends
her way.
Aware of how his audience may be figuratively on the fence if he goes too far, he aims not
to hurt Jubilee --the fence being met by a rod of metal from behind her, which Magneto bends through the fence in front of her to "tie" her in place; which is now on the ground
as Jubilee loses balance.
Magneto then recalls previously thrown chunks of metal to use again against Storm,
launching a multi-directional attack. With Pyro still doing his part --at his best as he
shows off in front of Branden-- Storm, despite a skillful dual-execution of deflecting
and extinguishing, is essentially restrained by the fight itself.
Angel is still occupied with Mystique.
Hank: "There are times when a pacifist must engage in ceasing others' fire-"
-turning his attention from the half dozen detainees who seem poised to do something
themselves, the X-Man known as The Beast launches himself onto the top of the bus,
then towards the floating leader of the Brotherhood. But Magneto is ready for this as well
--meeting Beast with another section of fence that he uses to push and then bind the
X-Man back against the building.
A growl escapes the now caged Beast: "You expound the fact we're human beings,
then subject me to this?!"
Magneto corrects: "Superior to humans," smirking, "some more than others."
Jacilon A.K.A. OfAll has gotten in on the action, seemingly trying to counteract Magneto's powers with her own display of ferrokinesis --concentrating on freeing Beast, Jubilee
and the others.
Magneto: "Keep trying, novice."
He needs only exert a touch of influence to completely negate hers.
And whether it be from his words, his show, or some other factor,
Magneto gets what he came for: new recruits. Though not all of
the detainees file back onto the bus, many do -including Brenden.
in the latest smokescreen caused by the meeting of water and a final,
awesome display of fire, the Brotherhood make their departure.
Professor X uses the device to concentrate on a specific location.
After several minutes, he ceases his search.
Ororo is there to meet him in the hallway outside.
Xavier: "The field which has been restricting my telepathy still exists, though the size is
now reduced. I had thought Scott and Jean would be on their way back by now or if not,
that having Jean at the location might allow me to at least reach through to her mind. . .
In any case, I'm going to take this development as a sign things are going alright. . .
Remind me though, Ororo, to finally look into obtaining a secondary aircraft.
I am reminded at times like these how prudent that would be."
"Not a problem. I will join Hank and Warren in getting the mutant detainees settled."
As we now do, with a bus driven by Hank heading for a NYC Police Station.
"Nearly there."
Ororo is seated in one of the front-most seats, and they're about to be joined
by someone else, who presently gets out from beneath a back seat.
"Am I ever glad to hear you say that!"
Hank nearly misses the traffic light: "Egads! The sudden announcement
of a girl stowed away." He turns his head as Ororo exclaims: "Jubilee!"
"Sorry! I didn't want to delay the trip explaining why I thought I should come along-"
Ororo: "-and didn't want to hear a 'no' following a request of permission."
Hank: "With an appearance timed at the perfect juncture to negate turning back."
Jubilee's expression says it all: guilty-as-charged.
"I'll stay out of the way, and in the bus while you guys are collecting everyone, I promise!"
Ororo: "You will be held to that."
Though her disposition is forgiving.
Hank: "Light's about to turn. No standing passengers in a moving motor vehicle."
Jubilee takes the seat behind Ororo's.
Upon pulling up at the station, Ororo goes in to get the process going while Jubilee,
true to her word so far, stays back in the bus, with Hank.
Now leaning over the seatback in front of her, Jubilee questions:
"What've all these mutants we're picking up been arrested for, anyway?"
"In three words? Trying to live."
Jubilee's face reflects disconcertion.
Inside the station
Ororo (firm): "It is time those collars came off."
The escorting officers comply, getting the keys to the Power-Dampener collars outfitted to them by Trask Industries, albeit with looks of skepticism and/or eyes of 'I just dare you to
try something'.
While at least one of the detainees seem spurred by that, none break form;
recognizing the chance the ABMC* is giving them.
*Association for the Betterment of Mutant Citizens
--by any other name, the X-Men!
-Acronym-Decryptor-EffeX
--by any other name, the X-Men!
-Acronym-Decryptor-EffeX
Escorting Officer # 1: "The cuffs will be removed at the destination."
"They, too, will be removed now."
Escorting Officer # 2: "Listen, ma'am. We won't tell you how to do your job over there.
The cuffs stay."
Ororo concedes, though is sure to meet each of the detainee's eyes who will raise
them to hers; in them they are people.
Just as Ororo is about to head out to the bus with everyone, a careworn woman
approaches her: "You're the ones giving the mutants a second chance?"
"We are."
"Please, can you arrange to take my son, too? They're trying to charge him with arson!"
An officer has strode over to join the conversation.
1st Arresting Officer: "Now listen, the agreement with your association was to give you the supposed hard luck cases, but this one isn't." He gestures with a flat hand towards the mother, "they're a well-enough off family whose kid nearly burned down their condo complex."
Mother: "I've been trying to explain! His X-Gene just turned on! We never knew--"
she turns back to Ororo, "he didn't know what he was doing or how to stop it!"
1st Arresting Officer: "So they say."
Ororo addresses the officer: "We cannot know how any one X-Gene will manifest
until it does, but in all cases control comes with time. What makes you think the
fire was on purpose?"
1st Arresting Officer: "Because fake news comes from both sides, and you can't convince me being a mutant
is natural then tell me they need to work at controlling themselves. Pick a lane."
Ororo looks over to where a young teen is seated, clearly the boy in question by the collar he wears
if not the singed sleeves. Foil can be seen sticking out of the pocket of his pants.
"He is of the average age mutantcy first makes itself known,
and I see no malcontent in his face."
A 2nd Arresting Officer scoffs: "Walk our beat for a week, lady.
You'll see all kinds of crocodile tears."
Mother: "Please!"
Ororo looks squarely back at the officers: "If I must pick a lane, I choose the one
our bus is in. Remove the collar as you did with the others, and we will take him."
The Mother breathes with relief.
The 2nd Arresting Officer folds his arms, unconvinced.
The 1st Arresting Officer concedes: "If you're so sure you can handle 'em,
be my guest. But I've gotta' clear this first."
Afterward.
1st Arresting Officer: "Alright kid, you got lucky. Let's go-" he practically pulls the boy
out of the chair. The mother is quick to place her hands protectively on her son,
waiting to be rid of these officers while this one goes about removing the collar.
1st Arresting Officer (to Ororo):
"That Worthington can stay a lawsuit if the kid proves you wrong, huh?"
"We will be fine."
Collar removed, the officer smirks at how the mother is now taking the foil from her son's pockets and replacing it on his hands; their makeshift protective gear, it seems.
Ororo and the small family then leave to join the bus.
Outside the boy, looking actually more nervous,
holds his cuffed and covered hands together,
Ororo gently touches them: "You can breathe easier.
I have powers of my own that can quench any wayward flames."
The boy looks into her eyes, finding some relief in the truth he sees there,
though he doesn't remove his foil gloves.
Ororo lets that be, making only an ushering gesture towards the bus.
Hank: "Oh, salutations young man. Welcome aboard the mutant express."
He gives an 'and you' nod and smile towards the mother,
who takes in his beastly appearance before turning to question Ororo:
"Have you been to this facility already? Can it help my son?"
Hank closes the doors of the bus but waits to pull away from the curb
until everyone is seated.
Ororo: "Actually, what would fit better is a school I know of for youngsters like him.
You will have to ride with us to the other facility first, but then he can come back with me."
Jubilee has come to meet them in the aisle: "With us, actually!
I go there myself and it's great! Of course you'll fit in!"
The boy seems happy to see another young mutant face, and his Mother seems
like a large load she's been carrying has been lightened. "Oh- thank you!"
She turns back to her son as he asks in a low voice:
"Don't you have to get back to work?"
She responds in kind: "Do you think you'll be alright with them?"
He rubs his foiled hands together a little, looks into Storm's eyes again,
then at Jubilee -who gives a fresh smile- and answers quietly: "Yeah, I think so."
Storm: "If he has a phone he can call as he likes.
We'll at least make sure he does when we arrive."
The family of two hug ahead of the Mother's departure.
Jubilee takes over after that: "Sit with me, if you want.
What's your name, anyway?"
Boy: "Branden."
"I'm Jubilee."
Over at the Halfway House
Warren: "Thanks for these contacts, Jacilon*," he indicates the piece of paper in his hand.
Jacilon: "As I understand, something like this had been in the plans for a while.
Or plan purgatory, given the Outreach Centre's limited resources."
*Jacilon is another of Envisionings' original characters, and
the older sister of Holo. She works at a Mutant Outreach
Centre erected by a certain other mutant's sibling.
You'll be seeing more of both, soon! -EffeX
the older sister of Holo. She works at a Mutant Outreach
Centre erected by a certain other mutant's sibling.
You'll be seeing more of both, soon! -EffeX
Warren: "Trust a Summers to have a plan."
A sympathetic silence precedes a light comment:
"Or an Angel to answer a need?"
Warren laughs. "I'll keep doing what I can."
He places the paper in his pocket before movement out a window catches his eye.
Warren sighs, "and looks like I better get on that if Hank is going to be able to park."
Jacilon follows his eye, mildly surprised: "Downside of up-to-the-minute news."
They head outside to where a news crew is gathered, though that isn't what
they're referring to; the crew has permission to be here.
The anti-mutant protesters don't.
Warren: "This is private property. Removes yourselves or I will have you removed."
"Yeah right-
"-show us the deed, mutie!"
"No one would sell to the likes of you!"
"He's a criminal about to house more!"
"Not in our neighborhood!"
Warren spreads his wings, standing for an intimidating second before he takes to the skies,
coming to meet the approaching bus at the end of the block instead of by the front entrance.
"There's another door we can use," he explains to Hank and company,
while the officers that were on board disembark to deal with the crowd.
Hank: "Indeed, let the rest of us circumvent this unpleasantness."
Mutant Detainee # 1: "No way! We should fight back against it!"
Mutant Detainee # 2: "You want to get collared again? They're just waiting for us to mess up."
Mutant Detainee # 3: "They're provoking us!"
Mutant Detainee # 4: "Probably for that reason! I bet it's all staged!"
Ororo raises her hands and, just enough, her voice: "Let's not let our emotions grow
as heated as theirs. Focus on the purpose you are here, and leave the rest to us."
They're pressed to maintain this focus as they're ushered out, able to hear more jeers:
"We don't want you here!"
"Let them stay in jail!"
With the detainees in the background of their shot, the news crew
captures what else the detracting crowd has to say:
"I'm not hirin' no mutant!" one individual states to the camera. "Their plan's to assimilate them into society-" he turns to where Warren is just touching back down next to Jacilon "-You can't get this to work!"
"This is a waste!"
"I'm not paying taxes for this!"
Apparently this protestor's grapevine was lacking in the financial details department.
Several of the detainees haven't moved towards the other door, causing
the others to pause as well. "Is his how it's gonna' be everyday, here?"
"I thought we were getting a break!"
Then more trouble comes down.
"Have they actually lead you to expect one with this little. . .cooperation project of theirs?"
Ororo: "Magneto!"
Maintaining a certain distance from the ground -for a statement, not from fear- the levitating master of magnetism turns his head as though he's taking in the look of the building. "Not a bad facility, despite
its representation of the problem with Xavier's teachings: they only ever take you half way."
Branden: "Who's he?"
Jubilee: "Bad news!"
She brings up her sparking fists.
Magneto smiles: "I suppose that's something we can let them be the judges of,"
he nods to the news crew down below before growing serious, attention back
on the X-Men as he launches into a speech: "You try to engender sympathy
from them by saying what choice did we have? They made us this way.
No- we came this way. And we have all the choices."
He reverts focus to the camera, the crowd: "To you inferior humans the first solution to a problem is always to remove it. Now across the globe you're dealing with the consequences as ecosystems crash from having had key species removed. Oh yes, you have learned you must live with us, but unsurprisingly you have learned the wrong lesson, creating those collars." He nearly spits the word.
Magneto's attention then shifts to Ororo: "Surely you must see how this projects? When
else in history have people been looked at as animals? Lesser beings to be owned."
Back to his audience at large: "The intent is transparent! Contain the mutants' powers and you contain the mutant! Instill what is and what isn't acceptable behaviour, remove what makes us what we are. Next comes dictation on where we can be. 'Mutant reserves'."
He gives that a moment, meeting the eyes of Jacilon who is of First Nations descent.
Magneto continues: "I'm pleased to see you X-Men have it right in one respect:
we will not be collared. Nor will we have our freedoms restricted in any way!"
All of the detainees' handcuffs suddenly snap open.
"We will not become society's domesticated pets; house cats to be declawed. We are tigers! And what they must learn is to respect the power we hold in our hands!"
And Magneto raises his--
--causing all cars in sight to become airborne. parking metres to be ripped
from the pavement--
--Storm is ready with her wind against the cars, though their bodies are merely a distraction as, with one hand, Magneto is tearing pieces from them, bringing them where the parking metres have been held aloft, bending and soon welding pieces onto each other as another of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants, Pyro, wearing a flame-throwing suit, makes his appearance.
Branden: "What's he doing?!"
Jubilee: "I don't know and it's too far for me to reach- but if he throws it!"
She takes up a protective stance in front of Branden,
while Angel takes to the wing again to face their foes--but comes only to face himself!?
A tell-tale flicker of the eyes reveals his doppelganger to be Mystique!
Hank is trying to usher everyone inside when chain link fencing is suddenly thrown
and held against the doors. At the same time the objects Magneto has been crafting
with Pyro are sent the way of the non-mutants --becoming makeshift shackles and, yes, collars.
Then the bus can be seen rising a few inches off the ground.
While Storm -and Jubilee- seem ready for it to be thrown, Magneto's only interested in using it for what it is; a vehicle: "Anyone who prefers a full mutant life over compromise, climb back on." He adds to his associate, "I believe you'll find a friend in the boy over there, Pyro."
Pyro turns his attention to Branden, who Magneto presently addresses:
"The fire in your hands is outside of your control. I'm sure they've told
you of a school that can help? Pyro here is something of a graduate."
Jubilee: "Try drop-out!"
Magneto smiles, unperturbed: "He found the environment lacking after a while,
which is when I approached him with an alternative. I now offer the same to you.
I happen to know no other at the school is exactly like you, where as you and
Pyro would compliment each other. You see, though he doesn't create his
own fire, he has full control over any in his vicinity."
Branden seems intrigued by this.
Storm: "Your mother entrusted you to us."
Magneto: "She didn't have all the facts."
Jubilee (to Branden): "Look at these facts!" She gestures to the bound non-mutants.
"You don't wanna' go with the type of guys who do that, do you?"
Magneto counters: "On the contrary, that represents the level
of precise control you may attain with your own gift, lad."
Branden seems uncertain -but more about how the others will react than about his own decision; he steps back towards the bus.
Magneto smiles.
Storm places her hand on Branden's shoulder, on the cusp of talking sense back into him when Magneto's voice rings out again: "I'm afraid you won't have time to argue with the capriciousness of youth."
Pyro makes quick work creating a literal fire wall around the metal-bound captives,
igniting what's left of the cars before starting to set fire to the buildings when Storm's
powers rain down-- --though soon her it's her winds that are needed again, forced
to redirect the course of Magneto's latest metal projectiles --ripping them from the
halfway house's very structure.
Jubilee tries to balance the match-up by getting in on it, but- "the X-Men can also throw fire!"
-she doesn't get her trajectory right the first time, and now that Magneto is alerted to her,
he deflects her following sparks with another piece of chainlink fence he promptly sends
her way.
Aware of how his audience may be figuratively on the fence if he goes too far, he aims not
to hurt Jubilee --the fence being met by a rod of metal from behind her, which Magneto bends through the fence in front of her to "tie" her in place; which is now on the ground
as Jubilee loses balance.
Magneto then recalls previously thrown chunks of metal to use again against Storm,
launching a multi-directional attack. With Pyro still doing his part --at his best as he
shows off in front of Branden-- Storm, despite a skillful dual-execution of deflecting
and extinguishing, is essentially restrained by the fight itself.
Angel is still occupied with Mystique.
Hank: "There are times when a pacifist must engage in ceasing others' fire-"
-turning his attention from the half dozen detainees who seem poised to do something
themselves, the X-Man known as The Beast launches himself onto the top of the bus,
then towards the floating leader of the Brotherhood. But Magneto is ready for this as well
--meeting Beast with another section of fence that he uses to push and then bind the
X-Man back against the building.
A growl escapes the now caged Beast: "You expound the fact we're human beings,
then subject me to this?!"
Magneto corrects: "Superior to humans," smirking, "some more than others."
Jacilon A.K.A. OfAll has gotten in on the action, seemingly trying to counteract Magneto's powers with her own display of ferrokinesis --concentrating on freeing Beast, Jubilee
and the others.
Magneto: "Keep trying, novice."
He needs only exert a touch of influence to completely negate hers.
And whether it be from his words, his show, or some other factor,
Magneto gets what he came for: new recruits. Though not all of
the detainees file back onto the bus, many do -including Brenden.
in the latest smokescreen caused by the meeting of water and a final,
awesome display of fire, the Brotherhood make their departure.
The fray at its end, Jacilon turns her borrowed ferrokinesis to freeing those Magneto had encaged.
Warren (landing): "Those of you still here, thanks for still giving us a chance. And don't worry. Our intentions won't be halted by a little structural damage. We'll make things work while the halfway house undergoes repairs."
The news crew are quick to get back up and running, soliciting comment.
Warren gets in their way: "You'll get your comments, just not now." Turning away while keeping his wings out in a blocking fashion -moving as needed- Warren speed-dials a number on the phone he's just taken from his belt: "Gonna' need you down here A.S.A.P."
Later, after the would-be-occupants have been taken care of, and the X-Men have started back to the Mansion, Warren and Jacilon -now sporting wings identical to his- finish setting some tarps in place to seal off the damaged sections of the building for the time being.
Jacilon (landing): "I should've manifested your mutation in the fight than to've tried countering Magneto with his own power."
Warren (doing the same): "It came in handy at the end. Anyway I wouldn't be hard on yourself,
it takes time and training to be able to react properly. Just ask Scott next time you see him."
"I might ask him for the training if I'm going to be in more scrapes like this."
Warren smiles teasingly. "Lookin' to be the next X-Man?"
Smoothing the hair back from her face, Jacilon smiles fleetingly. "No. I like where I am.
But it's always smart to be prepared."
"Yet with Magneto, it seems we can never be prepared enough."
Cut-To
Newscaster: "Some are questioning if the entire transfer of the criminal mutants from local law enforcement into custody of the ABMC wasn't a ploy, with the real transfer intended all along for the one called Magneto. Cameron Hodge, PR rep for the ABMC, had this to say. . ."
Jubilee: "That questioning doesn't make any sense! Not all of the arrested mutants
even went with Magneto. I wish I'd thought to blow out the camera!"
She and others are gathered around the TV in the X Mansion's rec room.
Hank: "Clever of Magneto to ensure the recording device remained functional and at an ideal vantage point
even while its operator was detained." Footage of the event being replayed, Hank shakes his head at his own detainment, "and there it is, my own slip of cleverness preserved in digital eternity. It may've been
a dog's day since last I engaged in non-simulated combat, though never would I have expected such a trouncing!"
He turns to Ororo: "At least you and Warren can say you held your own."
Ororo: "Even if we had succeeded against Magneto, we failed where it counted.
Branden's mother trusted us with her son."
Jubilee: "Once he realizes the truth about being on Magneto's side, Branden will
want to come back to ours. We just have to be there when he changes his mind.
But as Ororo watches the broadcast for a few more moments, she seems to be of a different mind herself.
She speaks it as she turns off the TV: "The truth, is Magneto's words were not wrong.
The direction the idea of mutants is taking in other minds is unsettling."
Jubilee: "Even bad guys say things that sound good! It's not everyone's idea of us."
Storm: "No, but it does not have to be. Only the idea of those with power."
Beast: "Indeed. 'All struggles are power struggles. Who will define, refine, confine?
Who will dominate?' Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower."
. . .Meanwhile
By use of mild psychic suggestion, Jean had been able to get herself on a plane under the guise of skydiving, and have the pilot head towards the same coordinates she and Cyclops had been headed for.
She knew her hunch was correct once she felt a familiar psychic distortion
at a point in the air; this was the place.
Releasing the pilot and dive instructor from psychic suggestion as she jumped out, they would return to the hanger thinking they had taken a test flight to scope out new landing zones, while Jean would be in a controlled fall.
She saw it on her way down - a large satellite dish in the distance.
Jean had a strong sense the satellite she now saw was related to the disturbance Xavier sent them here to understand.
She hoped solving that would also bring her to Scott, and at that thought, another voice entered her mind.
Though not his.
This was an Enigmatic Voice: 'No clemency.'
Jean began to blink as if her eyes were suddenly irritated.
Enigmatic Voice (CONT'D):
'Take his eyes to their limit.'
And then Jean was seeing through them
--the light of Scott's optic blast streaking down into the designated section in the floor.
But beyond the blast itself Jean could see a bit of the surrounding area. . .the cold metal,
the bottom portion of a distinct silhouette standing in the doorway. . .--
Then Jean was back to seeing through her own eyes --her sense of bodily awareness alerting her to the fact that she was still falling --and past the point her parachute should've
been deployed!
Acting at once she deploys it and -thankfully- is able to use her telekinesis to slow herself down enough to counter the delay. She lands only slightly heavier than she should've
though no worse for wear.
The second close call she's had. . .
. . .and speaking of close encounters of the second kind, a certain master of magnetism
is about to have one with the other X-Men. . .
Nighttime - after-hours at a Grocery Store.
Access is gained by manipulation of the metal doors.
An alarm is set off.
Magneto: "Take what you can.
Remember, our purpose here is not to destroy."
So in go the new recruits, lead by Pyro.
Branden is reluctant to steal, but Pyro, grabbing a package of Texas-style bread in
front of him, points out: "It's their doing we can't be 'productive members of society'.
Gonna' let them starve you, too?" He grabs another package.
The fire-controller already seems to have influence over the fire-starter, and Branden goes for something on another shelf --by fluke or by nerves, however, fire blows out from his hands. Branden gasps and steps back.
"Whoa! Way to go, Scorch," though Pyro's voice is one of amusement not critique,
as he uses his powers to lift the fire from anywhere it caught, "disobeying Magneto
your first time out."
"I wasn't!"
"Doesn't matter." He gives Branden a little show, moving the wisps around in the air, molding the fire into small shapes, rings etc. before bringing them down as regular flames in front of his own hands. He then looks squarely at Branden. "If you ask me, the only one in control of you now is yourself." He moves the flames towards Branden's tightly closed hands, "don't be afraid of it."
Branden's eyes shift between the flames and Pyro's steady gaze.
Gradually relaxing his hands, he touches the wisps before closing his fingers around them.
Pyro smiles.
Then, at the sound of approaching sirens: "Showtime."
Outside, Magneto can be seen gliding to the roof of the store to greet his arriving audience
--including the X-Men, presently comprised of Storm, Piotr Rasputin A.K.A. Colossus and Kitty Pryde A.K.A. Shadowcat.
Shadowcat: "Isn't stealing from a grocery store a little petty for you?"
Magneto: "Everyone needs to eat, child. And it's called making a point."
At this, he turns his attention to the homo sapiens, smiling at the arrival
of another news crew as though he was expecting such.
Shadowcat to Colossus: "He's not looking -quick, throw me--"
Storm holds out her hand: "No. I want to hear what Magneto has come to say. You two
find where the others have gone," it's clear part of her mind is on recovering Branden.
Magneto: "Several years back, the question was posed of what was stopping a mutant who could walk through walls," he smiles at Shadowcat's departing form, "from walking into the vault of a bank? What is stopping
any of us from using our gifts to their fullest height?" He sneers, "I could cripple this city's infrastructure in a day. This is not power I came into only recently. So what is stopping us? Simple, decidedly uncommon sense: what would be the point? Because we can?" he raises his brows,
offering up what historically is homo sapiens' answer.
"No. We are superior in all ways."
He nods down towards the grocery, "inside this building you will not find the shelves ransacked bare. We came to take only what we require for the time being. Because
WE know restraint. We know it from you," he states with contempt,
"and we know it better than you! You, who cut into the lungs of the earth so that you
may breathe easy, living on excess while far away from your minds, others starve. You know not
how to make use of your so-called gifts. Only to reach for the top of the heap you call the
'next big thing'. Well look upon it," he smiles superiorly "we mutants know how to
use our gifts, and we were not made to become obsolete!"
At this the time for words is over -- all vehicles are sent careening away,
though as he makes to grab the weapons of the police, he finds he cannot.
"We know who we're dealing with, mutant! There's not a stitch of metal on us!"
They start to fire up at him but Magneto is already moving out of their visual field,
completely unperturbed as literal fire now starts their way.
The two nearest officers gasp and curse, dropping their specialty plastic guns which have
begun melting from two narrow streams of fire coming from Pyro's flame-throwing suit.
One of the new recruits uses their power to lift up a section of pavement,
protecting Pyro from the other officers' bullets.
Colossus, however, charges right through -bullets and all- and grabs the surprised
new recruit; he X-Man now also doing the job of the shattered pavement shield,
protecting the two members of The Brotherhood from subsequent gunfire.
But the police are saving what's left of their rounds, now observing the mutant-on-mutant scene before them; waiting for their time to move back in.
Pyro turns up his flamethrowers, shooting fire up into an "X" shape before using his powers to contort it into two fire serpents he sends around Colossus, toward the police --intent on shifting the X-Man's attention that way.
--but a strong and sudden gust of wind counters the serpents' forward movement, and they soon snuff out altogether as their wielder grows distracted --his flame-throwing suit being disconnected from his body
by the phasing Shadowcat. "What?! YOU!" He manages to turn in time to grab her arm, but of course she
phases out of his grasp, taunting: "Not so hot, are you!"
Colossus, keeping the other Brotherhood member in check with one arm,
grabs Pyro with the other when suddenly his whole body is arrested.
We see Magneto is behind this.
Branden (alerting): "Pyro!" Though looking indecisive, the youth doesn't hesitate after his call, shooting out his own fire for Pyro to manipulate.
One of Pyro's hands isn't restrained. We see him begin working his power while
we hear Branden again: "Just don't hurt anyone! Get that metal guy to let you go!"
Colossus: "Your fire will do neither to me."
And emphasizing Colossus' statement, this fire, and any more that may come,
is extinguished by the rain of Storm, who now sends lightning Magneto's way.
"AHHH!!" His hold on Colossus is dropped.
Shadowcat: "Open your eyes, Branden! Magneto's not the one to side with!"
Storm: "This is not what your mother meant for you."
Branden stares, conflicted, while--
--Police Officer: "Quick! Get the collars!" They reach for them on their belts.
But neither X-Men nor Brotherhood are as distracted as the police think.
Storm turns to cast strong winds their way, blowing the collars out of their hands-
-to say the least.
Magneto, recovered, commands the vehicles again, this time launching them back towards their would-be drivers. Storm's winds must be directed that way now, while Colossus, no longer under Magneto's restraint, releases his hold on the Brotherhood members in favour of catching cars.
Shadowcat does her protective-part by phasing anyone out of harm's way.
This, however, proved to be yet another distraction more than a proper assault, as while the X-Men are focused on the public, The Brotherhood make their escape once more --Magneto using his powers to collect Pyro's suit
so the youth can get away unencumbered by it -or so he doesn't decide to heat things back up- and Branden, conflicted though he still is, still going along with them. . .
Breaking News
Newscaster # 1: "...both times issuing a speech, followed by mass
destruction of city property. Just what is this 'Magneto' trying to prove?"
Newscaster # 2: "Well it sounds like he's trying to rule the world! That's what it sounds like."
Next channel:
Newscaster # 3: "With an election year on the horizon, could we be looking at the first Mutant candidate? And what would the public have to say about that?"
cut-to interviews:
Youth: "Like, he's got some good stuff to say, about the environment and greed. I mean would we really have a choice in voting for him, though? He could just throw a car on us."
Senior Gentleman: "I think all kinds should be given a chance. Who knows? Maybe
a mutant's just what this country needs! Couldn't be any worse than the last guy."
Next Channel:
Newscaster # 4: "...the X-Men, who proclaim to be our protectors against adversarial mutants, failed to keep the so-called Brotherhood from escaping for a second time.
Are they truly our protectors, or will mutants stand by mutants every time?
Were such proclamations merely a ruse for some, ulterior purpose?"
Newscaster # 5: "Leaving in a shroud of fog before police could
question or detain them makes you question everything."
Pulling back from the screen, we see this time it isn't the X-Men taking in this newscast,
but Pyro and a few of the new recruits, in the Brotherhood's base.
Cut-to another room, where Magneto is using his powers to do some kind of redesigning of a Blackhawk helicopter. "Excellent. Our message will not be diluted by any counterpoints from the X-Men if the humans believe we're 'all in this together'." He shakes his head. "To think that's what Xavier still works towards with them."
Pyro, who it's clear had just come in and informed Magneto of the latest televised news,
smirks. "Doesn't look like the X-Men have any counters."
Magneto looks at him. "It's always wise to think moves ahead. Remember that one."
He continues his adjustments on the Blackhawk.
X Mansion - Same Time
The X-Men have just finished watching the newscasts themselves.
Xavier: "Magneto is clearly building up to something. We must make it our priority
to figure out what that is before it happens."
Kitty: "How are Jean and Cyclops doing on their mission? Are they headed back yet?"
"No. I've been checking regularly but the distortion field is still up."
Piotr: "Do we think Magneto is behind that too? Purposely separating us?"
"I don't believe so. Though the coincidence does give him slight advantage. . .
We know the powersets of the mutants who have become his new recruits.
Train yourselves with them in mind. We must leave no move unchecked."
His eyes shift to a chess board,
and we transition from one of the black squares to the unlit room
where one X-Man has been held in checkmate.
He was breathing in a way indicative of some degree of exertion or
affected health. . .It was taking longer to recover between sessions,
and he was beginning to feel at once inert, and like he was slipping
farther and farther away. . .
Memory of Xavier's Voice: '
...There's something rather important I would like to trust you with. . .'
Memories transition into a dream: Cyclops observing scenes he can't
influence; only a shadow on the periphery. . .and he can't know how
it's going to turn out.
Footsteps were approaching.
But someone else was missing from these sequences. . .where was Jean?
He had to find her. . .
Cyclops was roused as the door opened. He steadied his breathing,
not inclined to let them know how much they were affecting him.
". . back already?"
Lost though time was to him, it hadn't felt like that long since last session.
Something else was different.
Enigmatic Voice: "Someone is coming to join you."
Cyclops looked up--they couldn't--!
Enigmatic Voice (CONT'D): "This presents a change to our schedule."
The motions are gone through, and after replacing his visor with their contraption,
Cyclops can hear something else being done. Then they're lining his forced-shut
eyes up against something else while he hears the faint squelching of bags filled
with liquid -that sensation he can place, they're the bags of whatever
they've been forcing his body to assimilate via the IV in his arm.
Though why does it sound like so many--?
Enigmatic Voice: "It's time to run the gamut."
Back with Jean Grey, this time she's overcome by the sense of whatever's happening to-
-"Scott!"
Though the call goes out both verbally and mentally, only the latter form has a chance
of reaching him--Jean still apart from where ever he is--
--until she isn't--seeing through his eyes, again, though this time there's nothing to see
but the intense force of his optic blast--
Yet there's the sound of a door closing, accompanied by the echoing, Enigmatic Voice:
"Now we finish him."
Warren (landing): "Those of you still here, thanks for still giving us a chance. And don't worry. Our intentions won't be halted by a little structural damage. We'll make things work while the halfway house undergoes repairs."
The news crew are quick to get back up and running, soliciting comment.
Warren gets in their way: "You'll get your comments, just not now." Turning away while keeping his wings out in a blocking fashion -moving as needed- Warren speed-dials a number on the phone he's just taken from his belt: "Gonna' need you down here A.S.A.P."
Later, after the would-be-occupants have been taken care of, and the X-Men have started back to the Mansion, Warren and Jacilon -now sporting wings identical to his- finish setting some tarps in place to seal off the damaged sections of the building for the time being.
Jacilon (landing): "I should've manifested your mutation in the fight than to've tried countering Magneto with his own power."
Warren (doing the same): "It came in handy at the end. Anyway I wouldn't be hard on yourself,
it takes time and training to be able to react properly. Just ask Scott next time you see him."
"I might ask him for the training if I'm going to be in more scrapes like this."
Warren smiles teasingly. "Lookin' to be the next X-Man?"
Smoothing the hair back from her face, Jacilon smiles fleetingly. "No. I like where I am.
But it's always smart to be prepared."
"Yet with Magneto, it seems we can never be prepared enough."
Cut-To
Newscaster: "Some are questioning if the entire transfer of the criminal mutants from local law enforcement into custody of the ABMC wasn't a ploy, with the real transfer intended all along for the one called Magneto. Cameron Hodge, PR rep for the ABMC, had this to say. . ."
Jubilee: "That questioning doesn't make any sense! Not all of the arrested mutants
even went with Magneto. I wish I'd thought to blow out the camera!"
She and others are gathered around the TV in the X Mansion's rec room.
Hank: "Clever of Magneto to ensure the recording device remained functional and at an ideal vantage point
even while its operator was detained." Footage of the event being replayed, Hank shakes his head at his own detainment, "and there it is, my own slip of cleverness preserved in digital eternity. It may've been
a dog's day since last I engaged in non-simulated combat, though never would I have expected such a trouncing!"
He turns to Ororo: "At least you and Warren can say you held your own."
Ororo: "Even if we had succeeded against Magneto, we failed where it counted.
Branden's mother trusted us with her son."
Jubilee: "Once he realizes the truth about being on Magneto's side, Branden will
want to come back to ours. We just have to be there when he changes his mind.
But as Ororo watches the broadcast for a few more moments, she seems to be of a different mind herself.
She speaks it as she turns off the TV: "The truth, is Magneto's words were not wrong.
The direction the idea of mutants is taking in other minds is unsettling."
Jubilee: "Even bad guys say things that sound good! It's not everyone's idea of us."
Storm: "No, but it does not have to be. Only the idea of those with power."
Beast: "Indeed. 'All struggles are power struggles. Who will define, refine, confine?
Who will dominate?' Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower."
. . .Meanwhile
By use of mild psychic suggestion, Jean had been able to get herself on a plane under the guise of skydiving, and have the pilot head towards the same coordinates she and Cyclops had been headed for.
She knew her hunch was correct once she felt a familiar psychic distortion
at a point in the air; this was the place.
Releasing the pilot and dive instructor from psychic suggestion as she jumped out, they would return to the hanger thinking they had taken a test flight to scope out new landing zones, while Jean would be in a controlled fall.
She saw it on her way down - a large satellite dish in the distance.
Flashback
At the hanger by the truck stop, Jean had experienced a barrier to her psychic reach
-an inability to feel the minds or telekinetically interact with anything beyond a certain physical point. When she passed that point herself, the area she could connect to
and the one she couldn't swapped.
The hanger's navigation tower was that point, and Jean had found a peculiar device on one of the satellite dishes. Once it was removed, the barrier to her psychic powers was as well.
Flashback ends
At the hanger by the truck stop, Jean had experienced a barrier to her psychic reach
-an inability to feel the minds or telekinetically interact with anything beyond a certain physical point. When she passed that point herself, the area she could connect to
and the one she couldn't swapped.
The hanger's navigation tower was that point, and Jean had found a peculiar device on one of the satellite dishes. Once it was removed, the barrier to her psychic powers was as well.
Flashback ends
Jean had a strong sense the satellite she now saw was related to the disturbance Xavier sent them here to understand.
She hoped solving that would also bring her to Scott, and at that thought, another voice entered her mind.
Though not his.
This was an Enigmatic Voice: 'No clemency.'
Jean began to blink as if her eyes were suddenly irritated.
Enigmatic Voice (CONT'D):
'Take his eyes to their limit.'
And then Jean was seeing through them
--the light of Scott's optic blast streaking down into the designated section in the floor.
But beyond the blast itself Jean could see a bit of the surrounding area. . .the cold metal,
the bottom portion of a distinct silhouette standing in the doorway. . .--
Then Jean was back to seeing through her own eyes --her sense of bodily awareness alerting her to the fact that she was still falling --and past the point her parachute should've
been deployed!
Acting at once she deploys it and -thankfully- is able to use her telekinesis to slow herself down enough to counter the delay. She lands only slightly heavier than she should've
though no worse for wear.
The second close call she's had. . .
. . .and speaking of close encounters of the second kind, a certain master of magnetism
is about to have one with the other X-Men. . .
Nighttime - after-hours at a Grocery Store.
Access is gained by manipulation of the metal doors.
An alarm is set off.
Magneto: "Take what you can.
Remember, our purpose here is not to destroy."
So in go the new recruits, lead by Pyro.
Branden is reluctant to steal, but Pyro, grabbing a package of Texas-style bread in
front of him, points out: "It's their doing we can't be 'productive members of society'.
Gonna' let them starve you, too?" He grabs another package.
The fire-controller already seems to have influence over the fire-starter, and Branden goes for something on another shelf --by fluke or by nerves, however, fire blows out from his hands. Branden gasps and steps back.
"Whoa! Way to go, Scorch," though Pyro's voice is one of amusement not critique,
as he uses his powers to lift the fire from anywhere it caught, "disobeying Magneto
your first time out."
"I wasn't!"
"Doesn't matter." He gives Branden a little show, moving the wisps around in the air, molding the fire into small shapes, rings etc. before bringing them down as regular flames in front of his own hands. He then looks squarely at Branden. "If you ask me, the only one in control of you now is yourself." He moves the flames towards Branden's tightly closed hands, "don't be afraid of it."
Branden's eyes shift between the flames and Pyro's steady gaze.
Gradually relaxing his hands, he touches the wisps before closing his fingers around them.
Pyro smiles.
Then, at the sound of approaching sirens: "Showtime."
Outside, Magneto can be seen gliding to the roof of the store to greet his arriving audience
--including the X-Men, presently comprised of Storm, Piotr Rasputin A.K.A. Colossus and Kitty Pryde A.K.A. Shadowcat.
Shadowcat: "Isn't stealing from a grocery store a little petty for you?"
Magneto: "Everyone needs to eat, child. And it's called making a point."
At this, he turns his attention to the homo sapiens, smiling at the arrival
of another news crew as though he was expecting such.
Shadowcat to Colossus: "He's not looking -quick, throw me--"
Storm holds out her hand: "No. I want to hear what Magneto has come to say. You two
find where the others have gone," it's clear part of her mind is on recovering Branden.
Magneto: "Several years back, the question was posed of what was stopping a mutant who could walk through walls," he smiles at Shadowcat's departing form, "from walking into the vault of a bank? What is stopping
any of us from using our gifts to their fullest height?" He sneers, "I could cripple this city's infrastructure in a day. This is not power I came into only recently. So what is stopping us? Simple, decidedly uncommon sense: what would be the point? Because we can?" he raises his brows,
offering up what historically is homo sapiens' answer.
"No. We are superior in all ways."
He nods down towards the grocery, "inside this building you will not find the shelves ransacked bare. We came to take only what we require for the time being. Because
WE know restraint. We know it from you," he states with contempt,
"and we know it better than you! You, who cut into the lungs of the earth so that you
may breathe easy, living on excess while far away from your minds, others starve. You know not
how to make use of your so-called gifts. Only to reach for the top of the heap you call the
'next big thing'. Well look upon it," he smiles superiorly "we mutants know how to
use our gifts, and we were not made to become obsolete!"
At this the time for words is over -- all vehicles are sent careening away,
though as he makes to grab the weapons of the police, he finds he cannot.
"We know who we're dealing with, mutant! There's not a stitch of metal on us!"
They start to fire up at him but Magneto is already moving out of their visual field,
completely unperturbed as literal fire now starts their way.
The two nearest officers gasp and curse, dropping their specialty plastic guns which have
begun melting from two narrow streams of fire coming from Pyro's flame-throwing suit.
One of the new recruits uses their power to lift up a section of pavement,
protecting Pyro from the other officers' bullets.
Colossus, however, charges right through -bullets and all- and grabs the surprised
new recruit; he X-Man now also doing the job of the shattered pavement shield,
protecting the two members of The Brotherhood from subsequent gunfire.
But the police are saving what's left of their rounds, now observing the mutant-on-mutant scene before them; waiting for their time to move back in.
Pyro turns up his flamethrowers, shooting fire up into an "X" shape before using his powers to contort it into two fire serpents he sends around Colossus, toward the police --intent on shifting the X-Man's attention that way.
--but a strong and sudden gust of wind counters the serpents' forward movement, and they soon snuff out altogether as their wielder grows distracted --his flame-throwing suit being disconnected from his body
by the phasing Shadowcat. "What?! YOU!" He manages to turn in time to grab her arm, but of course she
phases out of his grasp, taunting: "Not so hot, are you!"
Colossus, keeping the other Brotherhood member in check with one arm,
grabs Pyro with the other when suddenly his whole body is arrested.
We see Magneto is behind this.
Branden (alerting): "Pyro!" Though looking indecisive, the youth doesn't hesitate after his call, shooting out his own fire for Pyro to manipulate.
One of Pyro's hands isn't restrained. We see him begin working his power while
we hear Branden again: "Just don't hurt anyone! Get that metal guy to let you go!"
Colossus: "Your fire will do neither to me."
And emphasizing Colossus' statement, this fire, and any more that may come,
is extinguished by the rain of Storm, who now sends lightning Magneto's way.
"AHHH!!" His hold on Colossus is dropped.
Shadowcat: "Open your eyes, Branden! Magneto's not the one to side with!"
Storm: "This is not what your mother meant for you."
Branden stares, conflicted, while--
--Police Officer: "Quick! Get the collars!" They reach for them on their belts.
But neither X-Men nor Brotherhood are as distracted as the police think.
Storm turns to cast strong winds their way, blowing the collars out of their hands-
-to say the least.
Magneto, recovered, commands the vehicles again, this time launching them back towards their would-be drivers. Storm's winds must be directed that way now, while Colossus, no longer under Magneto's restraint, releases his hold on the Brotherhood members in favour of catching cars.
Shadowcat does her protective-part by phasing anyone out of harm's way.
This, however, proved to be yet another distraction more than a proper assault, as while the X-Men are focused on the public, The Brotherhood make their escape once more --Magneto using his powers to collect Pyro's suit
so the youth can get away unencumbered by it -or so he doesn't decide to heat things back up- and Branden, conflicted though he still is, still going along with them. . .
Breaking News
Newscaster # 1: "...both times issuing a speech, followed by mass
destruction of city property. Just what is this 'Magneto' trying to prove?"
Newscaster # 2: "Well it sounds like he's trying to rule the world! That's what it sounds like."
Next channel:
Newscaster # 3: "With an election year on the horizon, could we be looking at the first Mutant candidate? And what would the public have to say about that?"
cut-to interviews:
Youth: "Like, he's got some good stuff to say, about the environment and greed. I mean would we really have a choice in voting for him, though? He could just throw a car on us."
Senior Gentleman: "I think all kinds should be given a chance. Who knows? Maybe
a mutant's just what this country needs! Couldn't be any worse than the last guy."
Next Channel:
Newscaster # 4: "...the X-Men, who proclaim to be our protectors against adversarial mutants, failed to keep the so-called Brotherhood from escaping for a second time.
Are they truly our protectors, or will mutants stand by mutants every time?
Were such proclamations merely a ruse for some, ulterior purpose?"
Newscaster # 5: "Leaving in a shroud of fog before police could
question or detain them makes you question everything."
Pulling back from the screen, we see this time it isn't the X-Men taking in this newscast,
but Pyro and a few of the new recruits, in the Brotherhood's base.
Cut-to another room, where Magneto is using his powers to do some kind of redesigning of a Blackhawk helicopter. "Excellent. Our message will not be diluted by any counterpoints from the X-Men if the humans believe we're 'all in this together'." He shakes his head. "To think that's what Xavier still works towards with them."
Pyro, who it's clear had just come in and informed Magneto of the latest televised news,
smirks. "Doesn't look like the X-Men have any counters."
Magneto looks at him. "It's always wise to think moves ahead. Remember that one."
He continues his adjustments on the Blackhawk.
X Mansion - Same Time
The X-Men have just finished watching the newscasts themselves.
Xavier: "Magneto is clearly building up to something. We must make it our priority
to figure out what that is before it happens."
Kitty: "How are Jean and Cyclops doing on their mission? Are they headed back yet?"
"No. I've been checking regularly but the distortion field is still up."
Piotr: "Do we think Magneto is behind that too? Purposely separating us?"
"I don't believe so. Though the coincidence does give him slight advantage. . .
We know the powersets of the mutants who have become his new recruits.
Train yourselves with them in mind. We must leave no move unchecked."
His eyes shift to a chess board,
and we transition from one of the black squares to the unlit room
where one X-Man has been held in checkmate.
He was breathing in a way indicative of some degree of exertion or
affected health. . .It was taking longer to recover between sessions,
and he was beginning to feel at once inert, and like he was slipping
farther and farther away. . .
Memory of Xavier's Voice: '
...There's something rather important I would like to trust you with. . .'
Memories transition into a dream: Cyclops observing scenes he can't
influence; only a shadow on the periphery. . .and he can't know how
it's going to turn out.
Footsteps were approaching.
But someone else was missing from these sequences. . .where was Jean?
He had to find her. . .
Cyclops was roused as the door opened. He steadied his breathing,
not inclined to let them know how much they were affecting him.
". . back already?"
Lost though time was to him, it hadn't felt like that long since last session.
Something else was different.
Enigmatic Voice: "Someone is coming to join you."
Cyclops looked up--they couldn't--!
Enigmatic Voice (CONT'D): "This presents a change to our schedule."
The motions are gone through, and after replacing his visor with their contraption,
Cyclops can hear something else being done. Then they're lining his forced-shut
eyes up against something else while he hears the faint squelching of bags filled
with liquid -that sensation he can place, they're the bags of whatever
they've been forcing his body to assimilate via the IV in his arm.
Though why does it sound like so many--?
Enigmatic Voice: "It's time to run the gamut."
Back with Jean Grey, this time she's overcome by the sense of whatever's happening to-
-"Scott!"
Though the call goes out both verbally and mentally, only the latter form has a chance
of reaching him--Jean still apart from where ever he is--
--until she isn't--seeing through his eyes, again, though this time there's nothing to see
but the intense force of his optic blast--
Yet there's the sound of a door closing, accompanied by the echoing, Enigmatic Voice:
"Now we finish him."
. . . . . . .then the light goes out.
