xp_logs | Malice Aforethought: Wednesday morning

While folks back at the mansion are coming to realize Forge has disappeared, he wakes up and attempts to discern his whereabouts. Upon meeting his host, however, the last thing he expects to be offered is... a job?

The first thing that came to Forge's mind was that he desperately needed a shave. Running his hand over his jaw, he guessed he'd been out, two days? Maybe not quite. The second was that it was incredibly bright out, with the sun spearing right into his half-opened eyes. Sitting up on the small bed, he blinked a few times, glancing around. No TV or computer in the room, but a bed, a dresser, and a large window looking out onto a lawn dotted with palm trees and... a beach in the distance?

"Where in the hell AM I?" he croaked, voice raspy with sleep and thick phlegm. Coughing, he spat once into a nearby wastebasket, then opened his eyes once before emptying the contents of his stomach as well. Wiping his mouth, he moaned and lay back on the bed, beginning to feel the aftereffects of whatever sedative Lorna had given him in the van.

"I think you'll find, Mr. Forge," said a calm, cultured voice from the other side of the room, "that the pertinent question is not 'where am I?' but rather 'why am I here?'" The owner of the voice stood, looking down at Forge with a proprietary sort of smile: an older man, greying and distinguished, with an almost supernatural force of presence.

Sitting up sharply, Forge instinctively found himself holding his breath once he recognized the man before him. Countless shots on television had him in his almost-military uniform, greying hair hidden beneath a helmet that had become more of a feared symbol than the man himself.

Forge knew better. This was Erik Lensherr. Magneto. Probably the mostterrifying man on the planet, to anyone who could comprehend what he was capable of.

Swallowing hard and trying to find his voice, Forge managed to speak. "So... why am I here?"

"Your unique abilities place you in a position to render great service to your race, young man. Mutantkind needs your help . . . in more immediate and tangible ways than your studies at Charles' school allow." His smile warmed. "Lorna tells me you've read some of my work."

Forge found himself nodding, oddly... reassured? This man couldn't be the maniacal terrorist that everyone had warned him about. He was more like... well, like the Professor, if anything.

"Your manifesto," Forge explained, "it's been passed around a lot. I don't... I mean, I can help? What do you mean?" His head was swimming, had to be the residual effects of the drug.

"For all our power, the brotherhood of mutants is, at best, an endangered species. We are vastly outnumbered, beset on every side by those who would deny us any place in this world." Magneto's lips twisted slightly. "Charles would have us believe that education is the answer. As if ignorance and prejudice walked hand in hand, and to dispel one you need merely eliminate the other."

He shook his head. "I believe you've spoken with some of these people, these 'friends of humanity.' Tell me, did they seem ignorant to you? Some of the most intelligent men I have ever known have been steeped in bigotry as in the very air they breathe. I wish Charles were right--truly I do. But I know better, and I think you do as well, in your heart."

"I..." Forge stammered, unused to hearing such sentiments spoken so plainly. Then again, this was the man who wrote most of those sentiments. "I think that people fear what they don't understand. And I want to think that everyone has the capability to understand."

"I hear Charles in your voice. He always has been a great believer in hope." Magneto shook his head. "I hear reports of mutants dying every day, Mr. Forge, here and around the globe: unique and wondeful gifts snuffed out forever. How many more lives will be lost if we wait for hope, that we could save by acting now? Your gift, Mr. Forge, the devices you can build, could be the salvation of mutantkind."

They call you a terrorist," Forge said, quietly but firmly. "Lunatic, zealot, fanatic. I... I don't know." He slumped, looking down at his hands. "I don't want to hurt anyone, and... I know you're no stranger to technology. I've worked off some of your designs that the Professor and Dr. McCoy have shared. So... why this?" Forge spread a hand, indicating the small, comfortable room that could easily be a thinly-disguised prison for all he knew. "Why me?"

"Because I know my limitations. My own mutation gives me a particular insight into electronics, metallurgy, physics . . . but I am not ashamed to say that you surpass me in the technological arena." He chuckled. "And you may ask Lorna, when you see her next, how often she has heard me acknowledge someone my better. If you are uncomfortable with anything I will ask you to do, I will do my utmost to set your mind at rest."

Forge thought for a while. "You need my help," he said slowly. "Obviously there's something you want that you can't get on your own. You need me." Sitting up fully, Forge held his head high, an odd sort of confidence coming over him. "I'm not going to pretend I'm not terrified. I'd be an idiot if I wasn't. If I say no, you could kill me easier than you could blink. So are we going to pretend this is a choice here? That I have an option that isn't just giving you what you want?"

"You are an intelligent young man, Forge. I would not have requested your presence here if you weren't. And I believe that anything less than the truth would be an insult to that intelligence. You do have a choice." Magneto held Forge's eyes with his own cool regard. "You can give me what I want willingly, because you believe that I believe I have the best interest of mutantkind at heart--and therefore your best interest as well. Or you can give me what I want because you believe I am everything Charles and his disciples claim I am, and therefore you fear me. I didn't bring you here to waste my time, but our work together need not be unpleasant for you."

"Then it looks like the choice is simple," Forge decided. Rising slowly off the bed, he looked past Magneto to the world outside, where a storm seemed to be moving in. "I am afraid of you, but if this really is an opportunity like you say - to help my people without having to hold back? Then I say yes."

"An excellent decision," Magneto replied, offering Forge his hand with a genuine smile. "I look forward to working with you."