Sanctuary (25 page)

On the other hand, Trish wondered if her feelings, and the feelings of those so afraid of mutants, weren't really based on the fear that humanity was going to die out soon. If humanity was making its next evolutionary step, what did that mean for their comfortable little lives and lifestyles?

"God, I feel so guilty!" Trish said aloud.

Not only did it seem to her as though she had betrayed Hank and the X-Men in her heart, but she and Kevin had become Magneto's propaganda machine. Already they had sent half a dozen videotapes by mutant messenger to the network studio in Manhattan, where two producers and an anchor had apparently stayed on through the crisis.

Censored by Magneto, the material really was propaganda. They wouldn't be able to tell the real story until they were allowed to leave his presence. They had no choice. At least, that's what Trish tried to tell herself. In truth, she did have a choice. She could simply have said no.

"Hey, Trish, listen," Kevin said, trying to assuage her anguish over the events of the past few hours. "We're doing all we can to serve ourselves, our beliefs, and the public here. I know you're worried about your buddy McCoy, but he and the X-Men have been through worse than this. They'll be fine. And he would definitely understand ..."

The air buzzed with energy and the holographic image of the Acolyte called Scanner appeared in the middle of the office space they had appropriated.

"Lord Magneto has commanded that you appear on the street in one hour, prepared to document his victory over the X-Men, and his first state of the nation address to the citizens of Haven," Scanner said.

Then she was gone.

"Haven?" Kevin asked.

"Obviously where we live now," Trish answered.

But that wasn't the part that had piqued her attention, the part that had made her wince with painful regret. "Victory over the X-Men," Scanner had said.

"Hank," Trish whispered to herself. "Oh, God. It wasn't supposed to be like this."

• • •

Operation: Carthage was well under way. Surgical Ops Unit One made its way in stealth through the maintenance tunnel that ran parallel to the PATH train tracks. Several minutes had passed since they had moved directly under the invisible barrier set up around Manhattan island by the fleet of Sentinels at Magneto's command. Major Ivan Skolnick felt like he'd been holding his breath for an hour.

Skolnick held up a hand, halting SOU1's progress. They stood completely still, each of them listening for the mechanical whine that would signal a Sentinel's approach, the crumbling of pavement and tons of soil that would give way under its attack.

One hundred and twenty seconds ticked by without incident. For good measure, Skolnick waited twice that time before signalling the team to move forward again. Not long after that, they were hustling into the World Trade Center PATH station, up two sets of escalators, and then out to the street.

By the time they emerged from the World Trade Center building, the sun had risen. It was strange to Skolnick. Most covert operations took place under cover of night. This was different, however. The freedom of the world was at stake. The future of Major Ivan Skolnick, his children, and their children hung in the balance. He would do whatever was necessary to safeguard that future.

"Major," Sergeant Greenberg, the point-man, stepped up to report. "Firefight up ahead."

"It's time, then," Major Skolnick said, and sighed, steeling himself for what was to come. "Let's do it."

• • •

The Blob was considerably out of breath when he took the last step out of the subway station into the sunlight. It was warm on his face and neck, and he was already sweating. There was a light breeze, but it didn't help. He hated the summer.

There was a sudden flash in front of him, accompanied by a brief burst of sound that reminded him of one time when Pyro had torched an old wooden footbridge, just for fun. He lifted an arm to shield his eyes, but it was over as soon as it had begun. Where the flash had been, Amelia Voght now stood.

"Time to go, Mr. Dukes," Voght said. "I hope you're in the mood for a rematch."

Dukes grimaced.

"Am I in trouble?" he asked, knowing from experience just how much of a drag it could be to have Magneto pissed at him.

"In trouble?" Voght repeated, as if she had not understood the question. "Certainly not, Mr. Dukes. This is your country now, and it is your duty to defend it. You would only be in trouble if you did not do that. In any case, you are about to get another opportunity to beat the X-Men."

"Yeah," Dukes said, and nodded. "Yeah, I'm ready."

Before he realized it, the Blob was disappearing. Every inch of him.

• • •

"Y'know, this might just amount to the craziest thing we've ever done," Wolverine said grimly. "But I don't see as how we have much of a choice."

He looked around at his teammates and saw that each of them wore the same expression: one of fierce determination and somewhat reckless abandon. Bishop was fidgety, could barely keep his fingers from his weapon. Storm's brow was creased, her voice firm, resolute.

"Whatever the odds," Storm said sternly, "we may well be the world's only hope against Magneto and the Sentinels. The job has fallen to us, as we have always known it would."

"Let us be off!" the Beast said, attempting to lighten the mood by quoting one of his favorite bad movies,
The Sword and the Sorcerer
, which Wolverine had seen with him half a dozen times. "There's a battle in the offing! We've got kingdoms to save and women to love!"

"Speak for yourself," Storm said, and her harsh countenance crumbled in favor of a small grin.

They moved fast, rounding a comer a block away from the Empire State Building and hugging close to shop windows as they ran for the glass doors of the lobby. Wolverine felt the wind kick up around him, and didn't have to turn around to know that Storm had taken to the air. He had point, with Beast and Bishop flanking him a few steps back and Storm above.

They expected opposition, and immediately. Like the Blob, most of that opposition would assume the X-Men were there for a fight. But they were there to take down Magneto, or remove him from Manhattan, and so draw the Sentinels away as well. Wolverine knew that the Beast and Storm would both hesitate to kill Magneto if the opportunity arose. Under any other circumstance, Bishop might have been undecided as well, but if it meant preventing the future holocaust, he would kill Magneto in a heartbeat.

And Wolverine? Hell, he'd been waiting for the opportunity to pop a claw through Magneto's skull for years. But they weren't there quite yet.

"Suddenly, I think of Dante," he heard the Beast mumble behind him as they hit the pavement and rushed toward the glass doors.

"You got it, bub," Wolverine growled. "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here."

"Shouldn't we have hit resistance already?" Bishop asked.

Nobody responded, but it was a thought Wolverine had already had. He imagined the others had as well. If this was indeed Magneto's' headquarters, Scanner, or some electronic surveillance, would surely have picked them up by now.

"It's a trap," he said, completely certain.

"Indeed," the Beast concurred.

They did not slow down.

"Bishop, the doors," Storm ordered from above.

In mid-stride, Bishop slung his weapon around front and let off a stream of concussive plasma bolts that shattered the long row of floor to ceiling windows and the revolving doors in a deafening crash that lingered like an infinite echo on the ear.

"There they are," Bishop snapped, and Wolverine scanned the lobby again, eyes fighting to adjust to the differential between daylight and the interior shadow of the building.

The enemy had been spotted, all right. And sure enough they had spotted them as well. Inside the lobby stood the Kleinstocks and Senyaka, along with half a dozen unarmed combatants who were unfamiliar to Wolverine. New recruits, no doubt. That meant mutants.

"This could be a problem," he snarled. "They got a bunch o' rookies over there. We're runnin' into this blind. We got no idea what we're up against."

"It won't be the first time," Bishop said.

"We shall merely have to hope it will not be the last," the Beast added.

Then they were inside, in the thick of it. Wolverine ducked a plasma blast from one of the Kleinstocks and dove at the man. Senyaka's whip snagged his ankle, and Wolverine fell short of his aim, claws tearing a ragged gash in Harlan Kleinstock's chest instead of ripping him open.

Logan lashed out, hacking through Senyaka's psionic whip and making the mutant cry out in pain. A young boy of not more than fourteen was tossing Bishop around off to one side, while a feral teenage girl with a mouth full of hundreds of needle-thin fangs faced off against the Beast.

Without warning, Storm drove a huge blast of cold air, damp with rain, into the lobby and knocked all of the combatants from their feet. Wolverine tried not to become disoriented as he was borne aloft and slammed into a marble column. A moment later, the wind died down and Wolverine leaped to his feet once more. Bishop and the Beast were pulling themselves free from the rookie mutants, and Wolverine knew they had to make quick work of the group or they would never reach Magneto.

"Enough o' this penny-ante crap," he snarled. "Let's move!"

Wolverine went for the stairwell, knowing the elevators would not be safe for them. Sven Kleinstock blocked his way, side by side with a muscle-bound guy who seemed to be sweating acid that ate into the marble floor wherever it dripped from his body.

"You hurt my brother," Sven Kleinstock said angrily. "You're gonna pay for that, wild-boy."

Wolverine lashed out at Sven Kleinstock before the Acolyte could even begin to formulate an attack out of the threats he had made. Rather than skewer the man, as he wished, he slashed Kleinstock's chest just as he had done to the man's brother.

"You guys are twins," Wolverine said, his voice a cynical drawl. "Figure you oughta have a matched set 0' scars, too. Don't want to make it too easy for people to tell you apart."

"You've made a mistake, X-Man," the acid-dripping brute said, his voice confident and menacing. "Magneto's will is law. I am called Acid, and you cannot touch me. The chemicals in my skin will instantly eat away your flesh if you try to harm me. Surrender, or I will be forced to attack."

Wolverine looked at the rookie in astonishment for a moment. The guy was either ignorant or stupid.

"Should'a made your move when you had a shot, bub," he said, and grabbed Acid's throat with his left hand even as he buried the claws of his right into the chest of the novice Acolyte. He didn't kill the guy, just perforated him a bit. With the neophytes, there was always a chance they'd come around to ol' Charlie Xavier's way of thinking.

"What are you ... aarrgh!" Acid shouted. "But you can't touch me! The acid ..."

Wolverine let go and Acid toppled to the marble floor. His adamantium claws were not even scratched or pitted from contact with Acid's skin, but the palm of his left glove had been eaten away, along with much of the flesh beneath. The knuckles of his right hand had suffered the same fate. They were already healing, and Wolverine steeled himself against the pain. There were times when the healing hurt more than the injury itself, and this was one of them.

Off to Wolverine's left, Senyaka attacked Bishop, which was foolish of the Acolyte if he knew anything of Bishop's powers. The force of his psionic whip was absorbed by the future X-Man, and Bishop shocked Senyaka with a blast of his own power. The Beast leaped above the needle-fanged girl and caused her to slam into the wall, where she howled in agony.

Harlan and Sven Kleinstock were concentrating their efforts on taking Storm down. She stood in a scatter of shattered glass where the revolving doors used to be. When they went for her, Storm raised her hands and out of nowhere came a massive bolt of lightning. The Kleinstock brothers were frozen in place as the electricity of the lightning coursed through their bodies, and then they slumped to the ground.

"Now, let's take Magneto!" Storm yelled, and they headed for the stairs. Already Wolverine could feel the wind swelling behind them, a wind Storm might be able to use to shoot them up toward the top of the stairwell. In other circumstances, moving all four of them would be difficult, but the stairwell was enclosed, and Storm would be able to focus her power.

They raced for the stairs, were about to pass the elevators when their doors exploded outward in a shriek of metal. Wolverine had only a moment to notice Magneto floating, in all his imperial grandeur, out of the elevator shaft. Then he and his teammates were thrown back by a wave of magnetic power. While he might move the other three X-Men by the iron in their blood, Magneto could simply grab mental hold of Wolverine's adamantium skeleton and push. He did.

The four X-Men tumbled to the ground in front of the shattered face of the Empire State Building. The Beast was first to his feet, but the rest quickly followed. Wolverine's claws had retracted during Magneto's attack, but they slid out once again, gleaming in the sunshine.

"You can bring on as many toy soldiers as you like, Magneto," Wolverine snarled. "But at the end of the day, it's us against you. And like always, you're gonna lose!"

"Surrender, Magneto," Storm urged. "Do not push this insanity any further."

"You X-Men are either brave or very stupid," a female voice said, and Wolverine spun to see Amelia Voght, and a few unwelcome friends.

Voght stood at the center of the street, with the Blob, Pyro, Cargil, Unuscione, Scanner, and a whole bunch of other mutants that Wolverine would have called losers any other day. He recognized Hairbag and Slab, a couple of super-strong stooges who once worked for Mr. Sinister. There were other faces he recognized as well, and none of them friendly.

Emerging from the Empire State Building were Magneto, Senyaka, half a dozen rookies and a pair of angry, bleeding Kleinstocks.

"You are hopelessly outmatched, X-Men," Magneto said calmly. "I don't think I will even need to can any Sentinels in to subdue you. In fact, I believe I can say with confidence that you are as good as defeated already."