xp_logs | Kaiten: The Test (1/4)

Angelo's information leads the FBI to Devlin's apartment, and an arrest. Unfortunately, Devlin's proteges decide to intervene. The X-Men caught in the middle - Angelo with the junior Preservers, Garrison with the FBI - try to keep the situation from heading south as Ororo races to their location with backup.

There weren't many people who knew where he was right now, and most of those would come in through the window and/or announce themselves some other way. And "Miguel" hadn't done anything to bring the cops down on him, even if they a) could find him and b) wouldn't be warned off.

But the fact remained that someone had just woken Angelo up hammering on his door. So it was with a mixture of confusion and wariness that he went to look through the peephole.

It was Ash. A very upset-looking Ash, with Frost behind her and looking seriously perturbed himself, if in a less frantic sort of way. "They're searching Benedict's apartment," she said, without further ado, when Angelo opened the door. "The FBI, fucking feds! I'm afraid they're going to arrest him."

He was right to attention by the third word, all sleepiness vanished. "How long've they been there?"

"He called ten minutes ago," Frost put in, giving Angelo what could only be described as a black look. "I don't know why we needed to stop and get you-"

"Because some of us aren't so good at hand-to-hand stuff, and maybe we don't want to be running right in there and killing anyone," Ash growled. Her eyes were wild, rather alarmingly so, and there were sparks in her blonde hair. It didn't quite mesh with the stated desire to avoid lethal violence. "But I'm not letting them take Benedict to jail. I don't care what we have to do."

"Right," Angelo said grimly, focusing on Ash and ignoring Frost. It was Ash who seemed to need the most keeping calm. "Then let me grab some stuff, get dressed, an' we go."

"The others are waiting downstairs. Hurry!" Ash said forcefully after him. Her eyes seemed too bright - with tears, or with something else entirely, maybe. It was like the bedrock was being ripped out from underneath her, and the sparks in her hair and between her fingers were only growing brighter and more frequent. It wasn't a good sign.

Angelo didn't need much time - the image inducer was in a pocket of his shorts, as always, and in the safety of his room it went into a pants pocket. The coin went into another, and then... Professor? We've got trouble. Devlin called the Juniors, an' they're ragin' mad an' headin' to the rescue.

It took a moment for Xavier to answer - but only a moment. He had alerted Angelo late last night that he would be maintaining contact, with Nathan planning to be on the team that would be heading for Mexico today, once the Professor had pinned down the location of the Preserver safehouse Nathan had seen in Devlin's mind.

#I see,# the familiar voice said in Angelo's mind. #The situation may be salvageable. Garrison is with the team searching this man Devlin's apartment. I'll alert him, as well as Ororo. Accompany your new 'friends', Angelo - I'll ensure that Garrison knows you'll be among them.#

Angelo turned and headed for the door to rejoin the others, but didn't stop the conversation. On it. They don't really want to kill anyone - or Ash doesn't, anyway, an' I think the others might listen. But if it comes to that or lettin' Devlin get arrested...

#I think perhaps this is something we should not put to the test.#

--

#Garrison.# Xavier's mental presence was unmistakable - and rather sudden, coming in the middle of a visibly unhappy projective empath being read his rights. The search had been surprisingly fruitful, enough to warrant an immediate arrest. #I've heard from Angelo. Devlin made a phone call, early in your search of his apartment - it was to these young fanatics Angelo has infiltrated. They're on their way to the building.# A pause, the sense of Xavier's presence being divided, somehow. #They are only a few minutes away, I'm afraid. We're dispatching a team from the mansion, but they will not get there in time.#

"Fuck!" Garrison said, low and intense. The other agents turned to look at him with slightly puzzled expressions. He ignored them for the moment, ducking his head out the door. The apartment block was open and exposed. "Reiser, this is Kane. We're about to be hit." His call went out over the headset and the four other agents in the room started.

"What the hell is going on?"

"Zippy's buddies are on the way. Big guns too, Paul." The puzzled looks switched quickly through fear and into grim determination. They had read the breakdowns on the Preservers they knew about in the briefing, and no illusions to their ability to withstand an attack. "I've, uh, got some friends on the way. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes."

"It'll take that long for SWAT and the special weapons units to get into place." Special Agent Paul Yu had been in the Bureau for twelve years, and had never had to draw his weapon with the expectation of using it. Now that was about to change. "Reiser, this is Yu. The mutants coming are too powerful to move without full backup, and we can't get clear of the building first. Not without endangering a bunch of innocent people. We're going to hold here with the suspect for as long as we can."

There was a shared look; knowledge that holding out was nothing more than a slim chance. Devlin's smirk nearly earned him a punch from Kane, but he kept hold of himself. There were rules he had to live by here. Yu listened for a moment on his private line and waved at the hallway. "From this turd's bedroom, we've got a long, straight field of vision up the hall to the front door. That might limit their ability to use their powers effectively. We keep him with us, and it might buy us time for the backup to arrive."

Yu pulled his gun, the rest of the agents doing the same. "Weapons tight until either I give the order or you are directly attacked. Understood? Just because they're pieces of shit doesn't mean we get to stop being cops."

They frogmarched Benedict down the hall, and began to piled furniture to make a makeshift barrier to seek cover behind. Kane moved the heavy dressers effortlessly. "They teach you how to deal with a situation like this in training, Yu?"

"Yeah, Kane. They said don't get yourself stuck in it."

--

Outside, Ash stopped and peered up at the windows of Devlin's apartment. "I can see movement," she said tensely, her eyes darting to a dark van down the street. Her fingers twitched nervously, more sparks flying, but she made no aggressive moves. Yet. "Seabourn? Can you hear anything useful?"

The sonic-projector tilted his head, listening. Super-hearing was a common secondary mutation for those with that sort of primary ability, and Seabourn hadn't missed out. "Shit. They're not coming out," he said after a moment. "Holing up there... waiting for backup."

"Swell." There was a strange look on Ash's face, despite the apparent flippancy of her response. "Well. That limits our options, doesn't it?"

"They'll be out sooner or later," Angelo put in grimly. "You go in there powers blazin', Ash, a little place like that... there's a risk. An' even if you don't, if you kill cops..."

"Screw it," Rust put in restlessly. Alone of the five young Preservers, he didn't seem at all happy to be here. "Devlin can take care of himself-"

"No, he can't!" Ash snapped at him, sparks flying from her hair again. "What's the point of it all," she demanded wildly, "him finding us, teaching us, if we can't turn around and help him when he needs it?" Rowan nodded slowly, Seabourn's expression grew only more set, and even Frost looked to be in grim agreement. "Who the fuck cares if a flatscan's wearing a uniform or carrying a badge - they're still gene trash!" It was almost a snarl.

"An' they can still kill you," Angelo snapped back, taking a pace towards her. "You, me, all of us if they even think we might be dangerous. They shoot people, other flatscans, for carryin' replica guns, for carryin' table legs... what makes you think they wouldn't shoot us all down the second we step in there? We don't, though, we live. An' Devlin lives, an' maybe they can't make anythin' stick on him."

Her expression twisted, and Angelo was suddenly aware of Charles's presence in his mind again. #He's manipulating her empathically,# Charles said sharply, #from inside. He's done it before, many times, and it's made her vulnerable to it. Keep attempting to reason with her, Angelo. I'll do what I can.#

"Ash,"Angelo said urgently, with another half-step forward, "the moment will come, if we bide our time. But it's not now."

It turned out, in the end, that he was talking to the wrong person. Seabourn was watching them, an eyebrow raised. When Ash's shoulders slumped very slightly, her expression turning confused, his only became more set.

"Enough talking," he said, and extended both hands towards the apartment building. Every piece of glass in a six-block radius shattered under the impact of powerful sonic waves.

--

After the sonic assault came a wave of overwhelming cold, as if the inside of the apartment had just been plunged into the heart of an Antarctic night. Devlin was shivering, just like the rest of him, but he was smiling as well, a genuinely pleased smile - that faltered suddenly as the force of Charles Xavier's mind came down on his, turning into a rictus of pain. He sagged abruptly back against the makeshift barricade, gasping.

#Garrison,# Charles said, his mental 'voice' totally unstrained by what he'd just done, but still gravely worried, #he's manipulating these young people empathically, destabilizing their minds. I'm attempting to calm them-#

There was a crash, just outside the door - and then the door itself came flying down the hall and at the barricade, propelled telekinetically.

This was past the point of trying to talk them out of anything, Angelo knew, standing with the rest of the group at the end of the hall, just outside the now-empty doorway. And he didn't think he could take down all five of them at once. If it came to it, though, he could do two at a time. Ash and Rowan first. Then Seabourn and Frost. He didn't know if Rust even could hurt him directly, so he was last.

#Garrison, Angelo,# Charles sent, his presence suddenly more vivid in the minds of the two X-Men as he activated a switchboard with an ease that the X-Men's field telepaths could only have envied. #You can hear each other now.#

#Hang on.# Garrison reached over, and grabbed Benedict by the back of the head. The man convulsed for a second, before collapsing to the floor. The neural blast wouldn't leave more than a headache, and Kane almost regretted that. The other agents had their weapons up, and at the first sign of a body in the hallway, Yu held up his badge and called out.

"FBI! You are all under arrest! Put your hands behind your head and lay facedown on the floor, or you will be fired on!"

#Angelo, if you can't get them to listen, get them out of the goddamn field of fire. No one is fucking around here,# Garrison called over to the younger man, as he raised his own gun. There was no way he could tell the agents what he'd learned. Any one of those mutants could kill all four of them without breaking a sweat, and if he said something, it could cause hesitation and get an agent killed. #Charles, can't you slow them down? If they come down that hallway, it's us going to be us or them.#

Rowan shrieked suddenly, grasping at her skull, and every piece of furniture in the apartment went wild, smashing against walls in an uncontrolled telekinetic fit. Ash reached out to steady her friend, her own face twisted in panic. "Who's doing that?" she screamed. "Stop it - STOP!" One hand extended towards the FBI agents at the other end of the hall.

Angelo didn't even hesitate. He stretched out both hands, ribbons of skin shooting from his fingers to wrap around Rowan and Ash's arms, and proceeded to slam both girls into the walls. Just once, head-first.

They both fell, unconscious, and Seabourn swore, whirling on Angelo. "You son of a -"

#Angelo. Duck through the kitchen door. Now,# was Charles' crisp instruction, along with a telepathic 'suggestion' that had Angelo turning in that direction even as Seabourn raised his hands, the air around them shimmering and buzzing as the sonic waves built. Frost just grabbed Ash's shoulders and dragged her back out into the hall, leaving Rowan where she'd fallen.

Seabourn had always been slated as next if he had to be, and even if Frost was out of range, there was no reason that had to change. After Seabourn had thrown what he had at him, and Angelo ducked into the kitchen to wait it out.

The sonic blast put a sizeable hole in the wall. Thankfully, not where Angelo had been standing. "You son of a BITCH!" Seabourn screamed at him from out in the hallway, having retreated himself. "I knew it, I KNEW it!"

"Seabourn," Angelo muttered to himself, risking a careful glance out of the door, "you didn't know a damn thing."

"I knew there was something about you! Just showing up out of nowhere - Ash was cracked in the head, the stupid bitch-"

#If they're talking, Angelo,# the Professor sent encouragingly, #they're not at risk of harming others or themselves. It gives me more time to attempt to calm them, as well.#

"But you still let me come along with you, didn't you?" Angelo retorted. "Didn't hear you puttin' your foot down with Ash."

"Race traitor!" Another sonic blast came at him. It was half-hearted, though.

Sign that Seabourn was tiring, maybe. It didn't seem likely he'd been talked down so easily. Angelo straightened and looked through the door again. "I'm the race traitor? Do you even know who your friends with the bombmaker hit, Seabourn?"

"Flatscans! Flatscans and mutants who might as well have been!"

"Wrong," Angelo said, voice cold and harder than Seabourn had ever heard it. "There used to be a hospital in Switzerland, Seabourn. A mutant hospital - maybe it happened to have some baseline staff, but it was a hospital for mutants. It's not there anymore. Guess what happened to it? And there's an office buildin' in Tel Aviv bein' rebuilt, a place where a lot of good people died. People whose work, what they wanted to do with their lives, was help make mutants' lives better, all over the world. Your friends killed them, an' hurt others, an' tried to stop their work from goin' on." He stepped fully into the doorway, reaching up to turn off the image inducer. "Recognise me now?"

It was a risk. A major risk, but every minute he bought was one more minute for the team to get here. One minute closer to the point where there would be other mutants capable of stopping the young Preservers, of ending this without deaths on either side.

It turned out to be worth it. Seabourn stopped, staring at him in perplexed anger. "Recognize you? What the fuck are you-"

#Storm and the team have arrived,# the Professor reported to both Angelo and Garrison. #They're right outside.#

"Yu, back up is here." Garrison said, and the agents slowly edged towards the hallway, weapons out.

"Alright, everyone stay tight. We're going to wait for our people to get around the buidling, and then close the net on them. Slowly, people. I don't want anyone caught out by one of these fucks." With Kane in the lead, they shifted to a position looking down the hall, covering the approach and waiting for their help.

Ash was suddenly upright and standing there in the doorway, glaring at Angelo -and past him, at Garrison and the FBI agents - with tears and rage in her eyes. Sparks were flying from her hair and her fingers, scorching the wall. "He told me," she shouted shakily. "Benedict told me he wouldn't want to ever be taken-" A hand came up, the sparks intensifying.

--

With Prof X guiding her mentally, Clarice teleported into the room, reading for anything. She didn't like teleporting 'blind' so to speak, even though she knew it wasn't actually since the Professor was guiding her. Chalk it up to neurotic tendencies. Oh. There was the firebug! Not good! Quickly, she opened another disk, teleporting them both outside to the street. "No burning people!" Clarice admonished.

Ash just screamed at her, incoherent, and fire billowed outwards, flowing at Clarice. There wasn't anything rational left in the pyrokinetic's eyes.

Oh great. She was mad. Stark raving mad. Carefully, Clarice circled Ash, wary of what she was about to happen. She did not want to strike first, but she was charged with keeping the other girl occupied and hopefully calmed. Calm was not possible, but perhaps knocked out was. It was a difficult problem.

Ash flung a hand out at her. That wasn't the problem; it was the fireball that shot outwards from that hand that was the issue.

"Hey!" Clarice cried, the fireball catching the ends of her ponytail and the back of her uniform. Good thing the uniforms were flame retardant. Bad thing was that they were not flame resistant. Following her first grade teacher's instructions, she dropped to the ground, rolling the fire out and rolling into Ash as well, knocking her down. "Bitch!"

Ash hit the ground hard, and the pavement started to steam and soften, the heat warping it. Stubbornly, she crawled towards Clarice, reaching out to try and grab her leg with fingers alight with flames.

Ash managed to grab at Clarice's leg without maintaining a hold. Clarice kicked at her, jumping back up into a crouch. Punching was out, but her boots were expendable. "Calm down!" she ordered, "Don't make me hit you!"

All of a sudden a gentle roll of thunder heralded the arrival of another X-Man, this one with the ability to not only subdue the fiery threat but to keep her from causing any more collateral damage. As Ororo touched down on the street yards away from Clarice and Ash the rain began to fall, hard enough to put out the lingering flames but not so much that they couldn't see.

Smiling smugly, Clarice appreciated teammates. Especially teammates who could put fires out, although the raindrops were making her back hurt and that wasn't supposed to happen. "Thanks, Storm!" she called, punching Ash squarely in the nose. "Stay down you stupid firebug!" Not that she really expected her to listen, she hadn't before, why would she now?

Ororo made a note to speak with Clarice later about necessary force, but the situation was under control for now and that was what counted.

#Ororo. Two of the youngsters are fleeing,# Charles projected to her, along with an image of Frost and Rust hurrying down the inside stairs, heading for the back door of the building. There were a couple of FBI agents pursuing, but Charles didn't need to say that help would probably be appreciated.

With a nod (though Charles couldn't see it), Ororo began to speak into her com, striding forward to check on Clarice at the same time. "Sunfire, Cannonball, two of the group are attempting to escape through the stairwell. They will emerge at the back of the building. Intercept and detain them and facilitate their apprehension. Keep it safe." There was no telling what the young mutants would do, but as long as the agents stayed out of the way she was confident that Sam and Shiro could take care of it.

"Are you injured?" she asked then, looking at Clarice with a concerned expression. The rain had tapered off by now to a light drizzle.

Taking inventory, Clarice started to make a joke about how she was copying Marie's burned hair look, until she reached her back. Oh ow. "I think I've been burned," she managed distantly. Oh now that she'd noticed it, it hurt. Turning she, showed Storm her back.

Ororo's expression didn't change; it was a bad burn, but the girl would be okay. "Come, let us get you medical attention. You have done well, Clarice."

#Yes, you have,# the Professor confirmed. #And the situation is nearly under control.#

--

Cryokinesis was a pretty useful ability, when you wanted to stop people from chasing you. All you did was create an ice wall, and bang, mission accomplished. Frost wasn't used to running flat-out like this, however, and he didn't even have enough breath to curse at Rust, who was half a block ahead of him and hadn't looked back since they'd fled Benedict's apartment building.

Son of a bitch- Rust wouldn't have gotten out of there at all, without him, and now he was all 'every man for himself'?

Bang, mission accomplished might work against people running after the pair, but it did absolutely nothing to impede Sam and Shiro, who merely went over the wall and continued in their pursuit. Given how fast the two mutants could fly, the pursuit was something like shooting fish in a barrel. There was no way the two mutants were going to outrun them, unless they suddenly manifested super-speed as a second power.

Becoming fireproof might help, too. Shiro, following closely behind Sam, focused a narrow blast of plasma at the ground a few meters ahead of the lagging Preserver to stun him long enough to subdue him. Sam, as the faster flyer, could go on for the one in the lead.

Frost nearly fell, he backtracked so fast. "Son of a bitch!" he screamed, his voice alarmingly high-pitched, and waves of cold exploded away from him, the brickwork in the alley icing over.

The omnidirectional burst of Frost's powers muted their intensity, and so Sam was able to fly right through the wave of cold without it completely extinguishing his blast field. Cannonball swooped in for a landing and cocked his head at the youth. "One chance," he said quietly. "Give it up, you're not getting away, you don't have to get hurt too."

The look he got was first furious, then rebellious, then almost... petulant, for a moment, before it resolved into something closer to resignation, the emotions chasing each other across his face far too quickly for it to be precisely 'normal'. Frost swore, bitterly, and sank to his knees. "Fuck you," he muttered.

Change of plans, then. When Sam moved to land, Shiro picked up speed and went after the other himself. He was in full fire form by the time he caught up with him, and tossed another mild blast in the same manner he had against Frost.

Rust stopped, turning slowly and glaring in hate at Shiro. He didn't make an aggressive move, however; apparently Devlin's empathic manipulation hadn't been enough to make him forget that he had a touch-based ability, and not one that could affect the fiery figure in front of him.

"Race traitor," he said, under his breath.

Shiro's fire form turned a coppery red color, a scowl clearly visible beneath the flames. "Don't," he warned the other mutant. "That's not an argument that you can win. So just raise your hands and stop, understood?"

Still glowering, Rust did as he was told. There was a sigh in Shiro and Sam's mind from the Professor, one of profound relief.

--

The Junior Preservers were shockingly docile, all things considered, as they were secured for transport. Ash and Rowan, of course, had excuses, having been knocked unconscious earlier in the fight - Ash twice, technically - but still, their silence was a bit eerie. All of the fight had gone out of them, undoubtedly helped along by the Professor's more benign influence.

But there was something else at work here as well, a sense of defeated shock that came off all five of them. Their 'race traitor' rhetoric aside, few of them had encountered other mutants who were their polar opposites and willing to fight for what they believed. They had met the 'enemy' - and lost. Only time would tell how that would affect their ideology.

Angelo had emerged from the building and made his way over, standing not far off and watching them silently.

"I know who you are," Frost said suddenly, looking back over his shoulder. The FBI agent guiding him towards the van visibly tensed, not relaxing even when Frost didn't make a move to use his powers or even pull away. Just because they weren't resisting now didn't change who they were and what they could do. "I remember now. The guy from Tel Aviv, the one they talked about in the papers. Espinosa. Right?" He sneered. "You were some sort of hero, they said. Dug some woman out of the rubble."

Angelo's head snapped towards him, eyes suddenly very, very cold. "She's my sister, Frost. Or as good as. Not 'some woman'."

"Present tense, huh? What a pity. They should've sent someone stronger to blow up that building. Killed the lot of you," Frost said as he was forced into the back of a police van. "How does it feel to be a race traitor, Espinosa?"

Angelo stepped up right to the van doors, looking Frost in the face. "You don't get to use that name. To you, it's Dienekes. An' it feels... just fine."

"Don't make me fucking laugh," Frost said bitterly, sitting down on the bench inside the van and not resisting as the FBI agent adjusted his restraints. "You're no Spartan. You're not ready to fight and die for what really matters."

"No," Angelo contradicted. "I'm not ready to fight or die for what you think matters." He got the last word on that, as it turned out, the van doors closing firmly before Frost could respond.

He looked at them for a long moment, then down at his closed right hand... and opened it slowly to reveal the coin inside, next to his collar pin. Not a Spartan, huh? Like hell.