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xp_logs2007-08-18 02:54 pm
x-cable.livejournal.com) wrote in xp_logs2007-08-18 02:54 pm
Alexander's Wall: Seven Trumpets
Nathan and Saidullayev go head-to-head. Haller covers the evacuation, but both inner and outer forces demand that he take on a more active role. Cooperation turns out to be a beautiful thing, but sometimes the fight doesn't end when it should.
He could feel it as he flew closer - the waves of telekinetic energy, backwash from the groundbursts. Nathan had followed instinct, using the exoskeleton, but now he was hellishly glad that he had. It would have been damned hard to get anywhere near Saidullayev without his own shields.
The Chechen telekinetic was a lone, unsteady figure at the heart of the chaos. Buildings exploded around him, the groundburst growing exponentially every time he cut loose. Concrete and steel and wood and metal, all of it just disintegrated on impact. Nathan didn't delude himself by thinking that just because there weren't any civilians around on the street, that they'd all gotten out. Flesh disintegrated under a telekinetic groundburst, just as swiftly and devastatingly as a building did. He knew. All too well.
... a flesh-and-bone weapon of mass destruction. Who needs a nuke? The self-satisfied voice that floated up out of his memory belonged to one of the Mistra directors, and Nathan shook his head angrily, banishing the thought.
He had to get Saidullayev to focus on him. To fight him. The Chechen would see him as one of the enemy, Jim had said. Nathan's eyes narrowed, his jaw setting in a determined line. Wasn't he, in fact and deed as well as hallucination? He'd been one of the ones who'd handed him over to the authorities, after all.
Use that. The firebird flipped end to end and came in hard, smashing through the telekinetic waves to land a hundred feet in front of Saidullayev, shaking the ground.
"~You shouldn't have done this, Ilyas,~" Nathan called out harshly in Russian, ignoring the brief twist of nausea. "~Now you're going to have to be punished.~" Look at me. See me as one of them. Come on...
At first it seemed as if the telekinetic hadn't heard him; no flicker of recognition stirred in Saidullayev's eyes, no acknowledgement that Nathan was even there. The gray-haired man could feel the waves of energy begin to build again in preparation for another groundburst as the Russian stalked forward, on a quest that could not be explained by logic or reason, only his own twisted sense of reality.
All right. Need to be more direct, I see. Nathan let his eyes unfocus, until he had as clear as possible a view of the lines of force exploding wildly around the other telekinetic. Teeth gritting, he let the exoskeleton collapse, and in the same moment sliced through the lines of force, redirecting the patterns of energy and forestalling the next groundburst.
There was collateral damage, of course. The thwarted shockwave exploded wildly, tearing up pavement, smashing buildings to either side of them into rubble. Saidullayev stumbled, and Nathan knew that it had to have been a shock to his system. Not enough to knock him unconscious, but enough to get his attention? I hope.
"~Look at me!~" he shouted, echoing it telepathically. "~Look at me, dammit! I'm going to pound you into the fucking pavement and then hand you RIGHT BACK TO THEM!~" The rage in his voice wasn't feigned. It also wasn't entirely directed at Saidullayev.
That did it.
Perhaps it was the physical shock, or the mental, or the anger in Nathan's voice that seemed to cut through the flying bits of rubble that rained down on them both. Whatever the cause, Saidullayev's eyes suddenly focused on Nathan, his gaze narrowing like a laser sight on the other telekinetic. On some silent signal the largest pieces of rubble rose up together and dashed themselves at the X-Man without warning.
There was... a hell of a lot of force behind the flying debris, and any relief Nathan had felt at finally getting Saidullayev to focus on him vanished instantly. There was no way he was stopping the chunks of rubble in mid-air, so he flung up a shield instead. It held as they slammed into it, but the shock of impact sent him reeling backwards and nearly to the ground.
Nathan recovered his balance, and sent a telekinetic shockwave through the ground, tearing up what was left of the pavement under Saidullayev's feet and simultaneously sending more debris flying at him from behind. If he could just knock him out, put an end to this...
Though the Chechen toppled to the ground like an unsteady building in an earthquake, he managed to shield himself against the debris well enough that a moment later found him crawling to his feet and stumbling unsteadily through the broken pavement towards Nathan. His gaze burned as he glared at the other man, and though it wasn't clear if he recognized Nathan as a foe he had fought before, it was clear he viewed him as an enemy.
And the world went mad around them. Nathan hadn't expected it, not even given the man's current mental state. There was nothing in the sudden explosion of telekinesis that bore any resemblance to the way Saidullayev had fought in their two previous encounters. No manipulation of the lines of force, no calculation. Just rage and power, smashing through Nathan's shields.
He found himself on the ground, a rather surprising distance from where he'd been. His head was spinning, the sound of his own heartbeat thundering in his ears. Ow... fuck.
He looked up in time to see the shattered wreck of a bus come flying at him. There was no stopping it, and no shielding, but Nathan managed to redirect it, flinging it to the left and into the remains of a building. Get up, he told himself, get up right now...
The ground blew up beneath him, and although he managed to trigger his exoskeleton, he didn't get airborne in time. The force of the explosion as the gas main ruptured sent him crashing into one of the few buildings on the block that was still semi-intact. The exoskeleton did a good job of demolishing it entirely.
Stunned, Nathan laid there for a moment. The air all around him and above him was seething with wild telekinetic energy, so strong that he could see it with unaltered vision.
I'm in trouble.
Through the chaos came the Chechen, still marching forward though his gait was a little more unsteady now, as was his gaze. As he neared Nathan the energy seemed to reach a boiling point, and if it hadn't been for the fact that he wanted to see the other man's destruction with his own eyes he would have unleashed it already.
Nathan forced himself to his feet, glaring right back at the other man. His exoskeleton had collapsed, but even so, the blue-white light surrounding Saidullayev was joined by light of another color, a blazing gold like sunlight. He could see the lines of force gathering around the other man. Knew precisely how to counter what was come. As power erupted yet again from the other telekinetic, Nathan lashed out at precisely the same moment.
The shockwave as the two telekinetic wavefronts impacted each other was localized, but intense. Shattered buildings disintegrated even further, blown away in fragments on the swirling winds. But even as their powers strained and pushed at each other, neither telekinetic moved.
Stalemate.
**********
"Do what you can," Nathan had said. As the only telekinetic on the team that had yet to master flight of any type but that ending in a short and violent manner, Jack thought of how much easier that would have been if Nathan had delayed his dramatic exit long enough to give his teammate a ride to ground-zero. While it was nice Nathan had finally learned to embrace the idea of a cavalry, Jack was going to have to talk to him about minor details like logistics. And, if he remembered, return the bicycle.
At least he hadn't had to worry about finding them. It was hard to miss two telekinetics tearing the shit out of a city.
Jack pulled up hard at the edge of the chaos, taking a few precious moments to catch his breath. Police and military personnel were swarming, too busy trying to evacuate the area or form some sort of plan to pay any mind to the gangly foreigner. Someone's car alarm was blaring. Coughing in the dust, Jack let the bike clatter to the pavement and drew out the scarf Jim had been given to loop around his nose and mouth.
At that point the gas main blew.
Rubble bounced harmlessly off Jack's shield. Vaguely, his spatial awareness told him that Nathan was likely wishing he could have that sort of luck with the building he'd just gone through.
As the last of the shower clattered to the ground someone jerked at his arm. It was a man in a dark, heavy coat, speaking in one of Dagestan's thousands of dialects and trying to make it his job to get the idiot foreigner away from the violence. A paramedic, Jack realized.
Prying the man's hand off his arm, the telekinetic stabbed one hand towards the telekinetic blaze in the distance. "Mutant," Jack growled, locking the man's eyes with his own, and lay the hand back on his own chest. "Mutant," he repeated. Hopefully enough dots would connect for the man to leave him alone.
Jack released the man's jacket and shoved hard. Before he could get even two steps the same repelled hands were seizing him again. The good samaritan was trying to perservere.
The small square they stood in had housed kiosks. A little street market where people went to buy their groceries. Now soldiers swarmed, either bringing guns to the front line or dragging people away from it. Ten feet away pulverized fish erupted from a shattered wooden stall to litter the cobbles. Somebody's lost livelihood. Six feet away was a single leg sticking from beneath a pile of rubble, dust soaking black around it. Somebody's lost life.
Explanations, Jack decided as Saidullayev punched a hole in the distant pavement hard enough to cause tremors, were just the top of the pile of shit he did not have time for.
The paramedic seemed quite startled by the punch, though since Jack chose the solar plexus the gasp might have been misleading. It was too bad, but when you didn't speak the local language you had to resort to universal communication. Jack stepped away, leaving the fallen paramedic wheezing in the dirt. Jim would try to apologize later.
The world was a skein of tension, motion, pressure; even the slightest exertion of force shivered that web. Dust choked everything, but he didn't need his eyes. And so when the massive chunk of masonry sheared from a building by Saidullayev's wild blow came screaming towards the tiny square Jack's arms were already rising in that instinctive physical crutch that Jean and Nathan were still trying to train him past.
Jack's hands stretched out, palms flat, and the ballistic rock hammered into his shield and crashed to the street on the other side. The barrier he snaked around buildings and across streets, invisible and unyielding. The portion of the city it shielded was pitifully small, but there were people behind him. The citizens of Derbent, Natalia and Gregoriy, the twin boys who'd watched them draw, the shy girl who'd given them the scarf -- even Gabrielle, and who even knew what their relationship was anymore -- they were all back there.
Jack had no illusions. Compared to Nathan and Saidullayev, he was nothing. Even now David's fear kept his power under tight rein, crippling himself for safety. Still, David always did try harder when other people were involved.
Saidullayev was launching volleys. At Nathan, at the city, at things that existed only in his own mind. Glass and rock and metal buffeted Jack's shield, each impact felt like a burst of hard wind. Debris piled around the border like snowdrifts. Jack, defender of David's own walls all those years ago, didn't even flinch.
The paramedic pulled himself to his knees. For an instant Jack feared he was going to have to find a way to simultaneously shield and cold-cock, but from the widening of the man's eyes it looked like he'd stumbled upon another sort of universal communication.
Gulping air, the paramedic lurched to his feet and staggered to the nearest soldier. The soldier had been staring at the empty air and the debris that could not pass it, his expression that of one expecting to die trying to comprehend why he didn't. His reverie was shaken by the paramedic's words; he spun towards Jack, his hand going to his holster.
The paramedic grabbed the soldier's arm and shook his head wildly, shouting something Jack could neither hear nor understand. Whatever it was, the soldier downgraded his priorities from holster to radio and began issuing what Jack hoped were orders to hurry up the goddamn evacuation. All Jack could do was hold the line. For anything more they were on their own.
Yet even as Jack strung his mind into a wall between the people of Derbent and the warring telekinetics, he wondered at the calm he felt. The . . . peace. The last time he'd felt this strange serenity they'd been standing on that beach in San Diego, David and all the rest of himselves. No conflict among them, no dissonance in their actions, just every part working in harmony. What was the common thread?
Then Jack smiled. Not the knife-thin slit of the lips it usually was, but something slow and slight. It was the smile of a man who suddenly realized the punchline of his own private joke. And it was Jim, of all people, providing the answer.
Purpose.
All right, Jack thought, that one I'll give you.
Necessity, mother of all. Behind his shield, pelted with ever-increasing volume of what had formerly been the outskirts of Derbent, Jack wondered what else it could provide -- and then, almost simultaneously, realized he knew the answer.
He was fairly sure it was Jim who wanted to wince.
**********
At some point he'd wound up on his hands and knees. It wasn't so much the debris raining down on him, but the waves of pure force that hammered again and again at his shields, cracking them faster than he could put them back together. Nathan gritted his teeth, his vision going in and out of focus as he tried to see through the blazing patterns of force to the figure at their heart.
He had no idea how Saidullayev was keeping this up. He didn't seem to be tiring; each telekinetic shockwave was just as strong as the one that had preceded it. Burn yourself out already, you son of a bitch, Nathan thought weakly, coughing on the dust that seemed to fill the air around him, despite the shields.
He could feel someone else's power, somewhere behind them. Jim... no, Jack, shielding. Doing a much better job of it than he was, right now. Nathan seized on the flash of anger, seized on it and used it to force himself to his feet, push power through his shields until the exoskeleton took shape around him again. The firebird launched itself one more time at Saidullayev, doggedly. Nathan, dizzied and wearing down fast, had a very half-formed idea of just grabbing the man and slamming his head into the pavement a few times. Surely that would work.
Something grabbed the wing of his exoskeleton, clenched around the fabric of the shields that composed it like a giant hand squeezing hard enough to crush. Nathan managed a pained cry as he was slammed against the ground - once, then again, and sheer force of will was the only way he managed to keep the exoskeleton up.
A sending without the aid of telepathy, thought driven by force alone, clattered against Nathan's shields like a rock against a window.
Cable.
#A little busy right now, Jack...# Something came at him - a girder? Twisted, and twisting in the air like a snake as it shot downwards - and impaled the exoskeleton through its other wing. Feedback crackled through his mind, and Nathan snarled, half in pain, half in defiance, as he tried to hold the exoskeleton together and break free of Saidullayev's grip at the same time.
The rapport was weak and thready. Somewhere behind him Jack could feel his other part moving to grasp at it, firming it. The telekinetic squinted up at the burning figures. The force of them tugging at his senses like kites at the end of the string. The firebird writhed. #Take it you'd be open to the idea of wrapping this up about now,# he sent.
#If you've got an-# Idea, Nathan meant to say, but what came out was a scream, both aloud and telepathically, as Saidullayev held onto the girder with one invisible 'hand' and then pulled with the other.
The firebird was torn quite literally in half. The half still pinned to the ground exploded in a flickering wave of light and force. The other half collapsed inwards to much weaker, fainter shields - shields that nevertheless saved Nathan's life as Saidullayev smashed him back to the ground, creating yet another crater.
Shreds of telekinetic flame sprayed like debris from a falling comet. The impact almost tore the rapport out from under them. Standing there in David's body, Jack felt the pavement shudder beneath his feet.
Back in their hindbrain Jim snapped, Jack! For christ's sake!
For a flicker of an instant the telekinetic's grey eyes narrowed with the visceral reaction to challenge. But it was an instant -- only an instant. Some things mattered more.
Still holding the unseen barrier between the battling telekinetics and the military's efforts to evacuate the area, a thought snaked from Jack's mind across the fraying link.
#Here's what we need you to do.#
It was... crazy? Audacious? the part of Nathan's brain that wasn't reeling supplied helpfully. But now wasn't the time for reflection, now was the time for doing what Jack... Jim... Legion needed him to do, before he did something stupid and unhelpful like pass out. Groaning with the effort, he flung up the shield Haller wanted. It took nearly the last of his strength to do it, but he managed it. A near-perfect globe - surrounding Saidullayev.
The space of an eyeblink, no more. As Nathan's barrier went up, Jack's barrier went down -- and the air around Saidullayev boiled.
The shield became a miniature sun burning in ground zero as the flashburn chewed through the oxygen. The Chechen's instinctive shielding protected him from the worst of the flame. It did not, however, protect him from the other byproducts: sudden lack of oxygen, and the ensuing shockwave.
The fire winked out, fuel and energy expended, and Saidullayev toppled.
Back the collapsing square David Haller's body lowered its arms, grinning through the sweat streaming into green eyes.
"Surprise, Sadie," Cyndi gasped, slumping to her knees.
A string of weak Askani profanities came from Nathan's crater. He appeared a moment later, pulling himself up over the edge and then sagging to the ground, breathing hard. The broken concrete felt unnaturally cool against the side of his face. Rather nice. Maybe he'd just lie here for a while. Once he got the answer to one of those very, very important questions. "Is he out?" he rasped exhaustedly, pushing himself up to his hands and knees, just in case.
It wasn't enough that she had to flashburn some psycho with voices in his head, oh no. Now she had to move. With a groan Cyndi dragged herself back to her feet and staggered over to the older man, coughing beneath the scarf. Feeling stifled, she grabbed the edge of the cloth and yanked it down.
"Uh, yeah," she said, peering through the settling dust at the still figure. Her eyes were watering with all the crap floating around in the air. If she hadn't known any better, from how the guy was laying and how red his skin was she'd have thought he was dead. Fortunately her perception was a lot more sensative than Jack's, and she could tell there was definitely air going in and out of his lungs. That was good. She wasn't into killing anybody, and plus it wasn't like it was his fault the guy was as crazy as a macaroni elephant.
"My bad," Cyndi said, coughing again and wiping at her eyes. "I think that mighta been overkill."
"Yet highly effective," came an amused voice. Not Nathan's, but familiar enough to send Nathan scrambling to his feet and whirling around to face the source of the color commentary.
Son of a bitch. Nathan wiped away the blood running into gray eyes that were currently going wide with shock as his brain processed what he was seeing. Magneto. Here. Now. Magneto. Passing out was going to have to wait.
#Cyndi, DON'T DO ANYTHING.#
Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap. This was all kinds of confusing right here. For instance, while Cyndi was intellectually quite aware her last technical encounter with Magneto had transpired under the circumstances of a kidnapped mutant and a major disaster, there was another part of her that was acutely struck by the fact that the last time they'd actually seen him had been two years ago when this same man had, quite cordially, invited him for a coffee.
Like Haller's brain needed more conflict.
"Uh," Cyndi said, rapidly looking from Magneto to Nathan and back again and feeling like there was suddenly way too much pressure on her, "thanks?"
"You're quite welcome, David. Effective," Magneto went on, almost conversationally, "and impressive. All three of you, as a matter of fact. I've very rarely seen such a display of power." His gaze flickered backwards, towards the members of the military and the emergency crews who were still trying to evacuate the area. They didn't seem to have registered the cessation of active hostilities just yet.
"Still, nothing's resolved, is it? The humans will muster their courage soon," Magneto continued mildly, "and come in for a closer look. What do you plan to do then, Dayspring - hand him back to them?" He waved a hand at the prone Saidullayev, a edge of mockery entering his voice as he went on. "They are the legitimate authorities, after all."
Nathan didn't manage to hide the flinch at the question. "Go to hell," he said roughly, keeping his attention on Magneto even as he limped over to Saidullayev, bending down beside the unconscious Chechen and reaching out with his telepathy, to try and scan his memories. It was a hell of a risk with Magneto standing right there, but the older man wasn't making any aggressive moves, and before Nathan knew what the answer to that question was, he had to know what was actually going on here.
Oh, hell. Bile rose at the back of his throat, and he swallowed hard, rising. The memories weren't intact, not given the state Saidullayev's mind was in, but there was enough.
Magneto's attention had stayed locked on him the whole time, and Nathan found himself the recipient of a faint, cold smile as he rose. "I hardly imagine they'll provide him with proper treatment for his injuries," Magneto said, in a parody of gentleness. "Perhaps they'll do him the kindness of a bullet in the head. Put their former attack dog out of his misery, since what's left of this city would tend to suggest that he can't be retrained."
Cyndi looked at the sick look on Nathan's face, frowning. Okay, Magneto was scary, but just standing across from the guy wasn't enough to make you go that pale that fast, right? "Dude, what am I missing here?" the alter hissed out of the corner of her mouth.
#What do you think they've been doing to the poor bastard for the last seven months?# was the telepathic reply, fainter than it should have been. Nathan tottered slightly as he straightened. #He's right, damn him...# You didn't need psionic conditioning to reshape someone's mind, it just made it easier. There were plenty of more traditional methods. They just took longer.
Cyndi's jaw dropped as the significant elipses settled in. Oh my god, she thought between Jim's kneejerk horror and Jack's kneejerk rage, there is really not one single mutant on the continent who is not being conditioned to become a supersoldier by opportunistic douchebags.
"There are alternatives, of course," Magneto said, almost casually. "A more... palatable solution is simply enough achieved." That slight, cold smile lingered as he divided his attention between Nathan and Haller. "All you need to do is step aside. You've accomplished what you set out to do, gentlemen. Been the heroes of the day and saved the defenseless civilians. You can't want to see him returned to the hands of the people who brought this about."
"You have got to be fucking kidding me." There was no masking the rage in Nathan's gravelly voice. Unfortunately, there was no hiding the increasing unsteadiness of his stance, either. Exhaustion was catching up with him, and doing it fast. "What precisely makes you any better than the Russians? I mean, you've just been so hesitant about making use of the vulnerable in the past."
"Yo, Nate?" Cyndi muttered, "Might not wanna poke the megalomaniac. Just sayin'."
Magneto raised an eyebrow. "This isn't a negotiation. I can achieve the same end result with or without your cooperation," he pointed out, as if observing that the sky was blue. He sounded faintly disappointed, as if he had truly expected Nathan to listen to reason. "Stepping aside is merely simpler and less painful for you."
Nathan didn't bother responding. Not with words, at least. He was beyond exhausted, but the man in front of him was... a target. His jaw clenched, but that was the only physical clue to warn Magneto of what was coming. His anger took the shape of a foot-thick whip of debris that pulled itself together and slashed through the air at Magneto.
Who gave his head a tight, brief shake. "Too much metal, Nathan," he said, almost chidingly - and the snake-like cloud of debris tore itself apart. Nathan staggered backwards, stunned, and Magneto gave a quick, precise wave of one hand. A length of pipe tore itself free of another pile of debris behind Nathan and right at him. The impact against the back of his skull wasn't hard enough to kill, but it did knock him out. Very effectively.
Magneto turned his attention to Haller, raising an eyebrow.
Aw, shit, I totally called it. Cyndi scrambled to put her back to a piece of flaking masonry. Not that it was going to be much use, but if she was going to make a stand she might as well do it where nothing could slam her in the back of the head.
"That guy -- don't you think that guy's had enough of being used?" she managed, gesturing at Saidullayev. Flame started crawling across the ground by her foot in her nervousness, making the edges of her vision grey. "Plus, crazy! I mean, I know there's only X number of powerful mutants in the world and you can't be too picky, but the bats have totally vacated the belfry. Even as disposable minions go he's not going to be a lot of help. The professor'd at least have a shot at putting him back together."
"I'll make certain he gets the help he needs, David." It was thoroughly bizarre, but Magneto actually sounded as if he was trying to be reassuring, if in a casual sort of way. "And I can give him something Charles cannot - the chance to strike back against those who tried to use him." He raised a hand. "I am sorry for this," he said, sounding mildly regretful. The same piece of pipe he'd used to knock out Nathan came flying at Haller's head.
Just before the world exploded into pain and darkness Cyndi remembered thinking, Gee, thanks.
Magneto eyed the three unconscious telekinetics for a moment, then made another small, precise gesture. The pile of debris where Saidullayev was lying shifted, the metal pieces rearranging themselves into a makeshift stretcher that levitated smoothly, bearing the Chechen psi along behind Magneto as he turned to leave.
He could feel it as he flew closer - the waves of telekinetic energy, backwash from the groundbursts. Nathan had followed instinct, using the exoskeleton, but now he was hellishly glad that he had. It would have been damned hard to get anywhere near Saidullayev without his own shields.
The Chechen telekinetic was a lone, unsteady figure at the heart of the chaos. Buildings exploded around him, the groundburst growing exponentially every time he cut loose. Concrete and steel and wood and metal, all of it just disintegrated on impact. Nathan didn't delude himself by thinking that just because there weren't any civilians around on the street, that they'd all gotten out. Flesh disintegrated under a telekinetic groundburst, just as swiftly and devastatingly as a building did. He knew. All too well.
... a flesh-and-bone weapon of mass destruction. Who needs a nuke? The self-satisfied voice that floated up out of his memory belonged to one of the Mistra directors, and Nathan shook his head angrily, banishing the thought.
He had to get Saidullayev to focus on him. To fight him. The Chechen would see him as one of the enemy, Jim had said. Nathan's eyes narrowed, his jaw setting in a determined line. Wasn't he, in fact and deed as well as hallucination? He'd been one of the ones who'd handed him over to the authorities, after all.
Use that. The firebird flipped end to end and came in hard, smashing through the telekinetic waves to land a hundred feet in front of Saidullayev, shaking the ground.
"~You shouldn't have done this, Ilyas,~" Nathan called out harshly in Russian, ignoring the brief twist of nausea. "~Now you're going to have to be punished.~" Look at me. See me as one of them. Come on...
At first it seemed as if the telekinetic hadn't heard him; no flicker of recognition stirred in Saidullayev's eyes, no acknowledgement that Nathan was even there. The gray-haired man could feel the waves of energy begin to build again in preparation for another groundburst as the Russian stalked forward, on a quest that could not be explained by logic or reason, only his own twisted sense of reality.
All right. Need to be more direct, I see. Nathan let his eyes unfocus, until he had as clear as possible a view of the lines of force exploding wildly around the other telekinetic. Teeth gritting, he let the exoskeleton collapse, and in the same moment sliced through the lines of force, redirecting the patterns of energy and forestalling the next groundburst.
There was collateral damage, of course. The thwarted shockwave exploded wildly, tearing up pavement, smashing buildings to either side of them into rubble. Saidullayev stumbled, and Nathan knew that it had to have been a shock to his system. Not enough to knock him unconscious, but enough to get his attention? I hope.
"~Look at me!~" he shouted, echoing it telepathically. "~Look at me, dammit! I'm going to pound you into the fucking pavement and then hand you RIGHT BACK TO THEM!~" The rage in his voice wasn't feigned. It also wasn't entirely directed at Saidullayev.
That did it.
Perhaps it was the physical shock, or the mental, or the anger in Nathan's voice that seemed to cut through the flying bits of rubble that rained down on them both. Whatever the cause, Saidullayev's eyes suddenly focused on Nathan, his gaze narrowing like a laser sight on the other telekinetic. On some silent signal the largest pieces of rubble rose up together and dashed themselves at the X-Man without warning.
There was... a hell of a lot of force behind the flying debris, and any relief Nathan had felt at finally getting Saidullayev to focus on him vanished instantly. There was no way he was stopping the chunks of rubble in mid-air, so he flung up a shield instead. It held as they slammed into it, but the shock of impact sent him reeling backwards and nearly to the ground.
Nathan recovered his balance, and sent a telekinetic shockwave through the ground, tearing up what was left of the pavement under Saidullayev's feet and simultaneously sending more debris flying at him from behind. If he could just knock him out, put an end to this...
Though the Chechen toppled to the ground like an unsteady building in an earthquake, he managed to shield himself against the debris well enough that a moment later found him crawling to his feet and stumbling unsteadily through the broken pavement towards Nathan. His gaze burned as he glared at the other man, and though it wasn't clear if he recognized Nathan as a foe he had fought before, it was clear he viewed him as an enemy.
And the world went mad around them. Nathan hadn't expected it, not even given the man's current mental state. There was nothing in the sudden explosion of telekinesis that bore any resemblance to the way Saidullayev had fought in their two previous encounters. No manipulation of the lines of force, no calculation. Just rage and power, smashing through Nathan's shields.
He found himself on the ground, a rather surprising distance from where he'd been. His head was spinning, the sound of his own heartbeat thundering in his ears. Ow... fuck.
He looked up in time to see the shattered wreck of a bus come flying at him. There was no stopping it, and no shielding, but Nathan managed to redirect it, flinging it to the left and into the remains of a building. Get up, he told himself, get up right now...
The ground blew up beneath him, and although he managed to trigger his exoskeleton, he didn't get airborne in time. The force of the explosion as the gas main ruptured sent him crashing into one of the few buildings on the block that was still semi-intact. The exoskeleton did a good job of demolishing it entirely.
Stunned, Nathan laid there for a moment. The air all around him and above him was seething with wild telekinetic energy, so strong that he could see it with unaltered vision.
I'm in trouble.
Through the chaos came the Chechen, still marching forward though his gait was a little more unsteady now, as was his gaze. As he neared Nathan the energy seemed to reach a boiling point, and if it hadn't been for the fact that he wanted to see the other man's destruction with his own eyes he would have unleashed it already.
Nathan forced himself to his feet, glaring right back at the other man. His exoskeleton had collapsed, but even so, the blue-white light surrounding Saidullayev was joined by light of another color, a blazing gold like sunlight. He could see the lines of force gathering around the other man. Knew precisely how to counter what was come. As power erupted yet again from the other telekinetic, Nathan lashed out at precisely the same moment.
The shockwave as the two telekinetic wavefronts impacted each other was localized, but intense. Shattered buildings disintegrated even further, blown away in fragments on the swirling winds. But even as their powers strained and pushed at each other, neither telekinetic moved.
Stalemate.
**********
"Do what you can," Nathan had said. As the only telekinetic on the team that had yet to master flight of any type but that ending in a short and violent manner, Jack thought of how much easier that would have been if Nathan had delayed his dramatic exit long enough to give his teammate a ride to ground-zero. While it was nice Nathan had finally learned to embrace the idea of a cavalry, Jack was going to have to talk to him about minor details like logistics. And, if he remembered, return the bicycle.
At least he hadn't had to worry about finding them. It was hard to miss two telekinetics tearing the shit out of a city.
Jack pulled up hard at the edge of the chaos, taking a few precious moments to catch his breath. Police and military personnel were swarming, too busy trying to evacuate the area or form some sort of plan to pay any mind to the gangly foreigner. Someone's car alarm was blaring. Coughing in the dust, Jack let the bike clatter to the pavement and drew out the scarf Jim had been given to loop around his nose and mouth.
At that point the gas main blew.
Rubble bounced harmlessly off Jack's shield. Vaguely, his spatial awareness told him that Nathan was likely wishing he could have that sort of luck with the building he'd just gone through.
As the last of the shower clattered to the ground someone jerked at his arm. It was a man in a dark, heavy coat, speaking in one of Dagestan's thousands of dialects and trying to make it his job to get the idiot foreigner away from the violence. A paramedic, Jack realized.
Prying the man's hand off his arm, the telekinetic stabbed one hand towards the telekinetic blaze in the distance. "Mutant," Jack growled, locking the man's eyes with his own, and lay the hand back on his own chest. "Mutant," he repeated. Hopefully enough dots would connect for the man to leave him alone.
Jack released the man's jacket and shoved hard. Before he could get even two steps the same repelled hands were seizing him again. The good samaritan was trying to perservere.
The small square they stood in had housed kiosks. A little street market where people went to buy their groceries. Now soldiers swarmed, either bringing guns to the front line or dragging people away from it. Ten feet away pulverized fish erupted from a shattered wooden stall to litter the cobbles. Somebody's lost livelihood. Six feet away was a single leg sticking from beneath a pile of rubble, dust soaking black around it. Somebody's lost life.
Explanations, Jack decided as Saidullayev punched a hole in the distant pavement hard enough to cause tremors, were just the top of the pile of shit he did not have time for.
The paramedic seemed quite startled by the punch, though since Jack chose the solar plexus the gasp might have been misleading. It was too bad, but when you didn't speak the local language you had to resort to universal communication. Jack stepped away, leaving the fallen paramedic wheezing in the dirt. Jim would try to apologize later.
The world was a skein of tension, motion, pressure; even the slightest exertion of force shivered that web. Dust choked everything, but he didn't need his eyes. And so when the massive chunk of masonry sheared from a building by Saidullayev's wild blow came screaming towards the tiny square Jack's arms were already rising in that instinctive physical crutch that Jean and Nathan were still trying to train him past.
Jack's hands stretched out, palms flat, and the ballistic rock hammered into his shield and crashed to the street on the other side. The barrier he snaked around buildings and across streets, invisible and unyielding. The portion of the city it shielded was pitifully small, but there were people behind him. The citizens of Derbent, Natalia and Gregoriy, the twin boys who'd watched them draw, the shy girl who'd given them the scarf -- even Gabrielle, and who even knew what their relationship was anymore -- they were all back there.
Jack had no illusions. Compared to Nathan and Saidullayev, he was nothing. Even now David's fear kept his power under tight rein, crippling himself for safety. Still, David always did try harder when other people were involved.
Saidullayev was launching volleys. At Nathan, at the city, at things that existed only in his own mind. Glass and rock and metal buffeted Jack's shield, each impact felt like a burst of hard wind. Debris piled around the border like snowdrifts. Jack, defender of David's own walls all those years ago, didn't even flinch.
The paramedic pulled himself to his knees. For an instant Jack feared he was going to have to find a way to simultaneously shield and cold-cock, but from the widening of the man's eyes it looked like he'd stumbled upon another sort of universal communication.
Gulping air, the paramedic lurched to his feet and staggered to the nearest soldier. The soldier had been staring at the empty air and the debris that could not pass it, his expression that of one expecting to die trying to comprehend why he didn't. His reverie was shaken by the paramedic's words; he spun towards Jack, his hand going to his holster.
The paramedic grabbed the soldier's arm and shook his head wildly, shouting something Jack could neither hear nor understand. Whatever it was, the soldier downgraded his priorities from holster to radio and began issuing what Jack hoped were orders to hurry up the goddamn evacuation. All Jack could do was hold the line. For anything more they were on their own.
Yet even as Jack strung his mind into a wall between the people of Derbent and the warring telekinetics, he wondered at the calm he felt. The . . . peace. The last time he'd felt this strange serenity they'd been standing on that beach in San Diego, David and all the rest of himselves. No conflict among them, no dissonance in their actions, just every part working in harmony. What was the common thread?
Then Jack smiled. Not the knife-thin slit of the lips it usually was, but something slow and slight. It was the smile of a man who suddenly realized the punchline of his own private joke. And it was Jim, of all people, providing the answer.
Purpose.
All right, Jack thought, that one I'll give you.
Necessity, mother of all. Behind his shield, pelted with ever-increasing volume of what had formerly been the outskirts of Derbent, Jack wondered what else it could provide -- and then, almost simultaneously, realized he knew the answer.
He was fairly sure it was Jim who wanted to wince.
**********
At some point he'd wound up on his hands and knees. It wasn't so much the debris raining down on him, but the waves of pure force that hammered again and again at his shields, cracking them faster than he could put them back together. Nathan gritted his teeth, his vision going in and out of focus as he tried to see through the blazing patterns of force to the figure at their heart.
He had no idea how Saidullayev was keeping this up. He didn't seem to be tiring; each telekinetic shockwave was just as strong as the one that had preceded it. Burn yourself out already, you son of a bitch, Nathan thought weakly, coughing on the dust that seemed to fill the air around him, despite the shields.
He could feel someone else's power, somewhere behind them. Jim... no, Jack, shielding. Doing a much better job of it than he was, right now. Nathan seized on the flash of anger, seized on it and used it to force himself to his feet, push power through his shields until the exoskeleton took shape around him again. The firebird launched itself one more time at Saidullayev, doggedly. Nathan, dizzied and wearing down fast, had a very half-formed idea of just grabbing the man and slamming his head into the pavement a few times. Surely that would work.
Something grabbed the wing of his exoskeleton, clenched around the fabric of the shields that composed it like a giant hand squeezing hard enough to crush. Nathan managed a pained cry as he was slammed against the ground - once, then again, and sheer force of will was the only way he managed to keep the exoskeleton up.
A sending without the aid of telepathy, thought driven by force alone, clattered against Nathan's shields like a rock against a window.
Cable.
#A little busy right now, Jack...# Something came at him - a girder? Twisted, and twisting in the air like a snake as it shot downwards - and impaled the exoskeleton through its other wing. Feedback crackled through his mind, and Nathan snarled, half in pain, half in defiance, as he tried to hold the exoskeleton together and break free of Saidullayev's grip at the same time.
The rapport was weak and thready. Somewhere behind him Jack could feel his other part moving to grasp at it, firming it. The telekinetic squinted up at the burning figures. The force of them tugging at his senses like kites at the end of the string. The firebird writhed. #Take it you'd be open to the idea of wrapping this up about now,# he sent.
#If you've got an-# Idea, Nathan meant to say, but what came out was a scream, both aloud and telepathically, as Saidullayev held onto the girder with one invisible 'hand' and then pulled with the other.
The firebird was torn quite literally in half. The half still pinned to the ground exploded in a flickering wave of light and force. The other half collapsed inwards to much weaker, fainter shields - shields that nevertheless saved Nathan's life as Saidullayev smashed him back to the ground, creating yet another crater.
Shreds of telekinetic flame sprayed like debris from a falling comet. The impact almost tore the rapport out from under them. Standing there in David's body, Jack felt the pavement shudder beneath his feet.
Back in their hindbrain Jim snapped, Jack! For christ's sake!
For a flicker of an instant the telekinetic's grey eyes narrowed with the visceral reaction to challenge. But it was an instant -- only an instant. Some things mattered more.
Still holding the unseen barrier between the battling telekinetics and the military's efforts to evacuate the area, a thought snaked from Jack's mind across the fraying link.
#Here's what we need you to do.#
It was... crazy? Audacious? the part of Nathan's brain that wasn't reeling supplied helpfully. But now wasn't the time for reflection, now was the time for doing what Jack... Jim... Legion needed him to do, before he did something stupid and unhelpful like pass out. Groaning with the effort, he flung up the shield Haller wanted. It took nearly the last of his strength to do it, but he managed it. A near-perfect globe - surrounding Saidullayev.
The space of an eyeblink, no more. As Nathan's barrier went up, Jack's barrier went down -- and the air around Saidullayev boiled.
The shield became a miniature sun burning in ground zero as the flashburn chewed through the oxygen. The Chechen's instinctive shielding protected him from the worst of the flame. It did not, however, protect him from the other byproducts: sudden lack of oxygen, and the ensuing shockwave.
The fire winked out, fuel and energy expended, and Saidullayev toppled.
Back the collapsing square David Haller's body lowered its arms, grinning through the sweat streaming into green eyes.
"Surprise, Sadie," Cyndi gasped, slumping to her knees.
A string of weak Askani profanities came from Nathan's crater. He appeared a moment later, pulling himself up over the edge and then sagging to the ground, breathing hard. The broken concrete felt unnaturally cool against the side of his face. Rather nice. Maybe he'd just lie here for a while. Once he got the answer to one of those very, very important questions. "Is he out?" he rasped exhaustedly, pushing himself up to his hands and knees, just in case.
It wasn't enough that she had to flashburn some psycho with voices in his head, oh no. Now she had to move. With a groan Cyndi dragged herself back to her feet and staggered over to the older man, coughing beneath the scarf. Feeling stifled, she grabbed the edge of the cloth and yanked it down.
"Uh, yeah," she said, peering through the settling dust at the still figure. Her eyes were watering with all the crap floating around in the air. If she hadn't known any better, from how the guy was laying and how red his skin was she'd have thought he was dead. Fortunately her perception was a lot more sensative than Jack's, and she could tell there was definitely air going in and out of his lungs. That was good. She wasn't into killing anybody, and plus it wasn't like it was his fault the guy was as crazy as a macaroni elephant.
"My bad," Cyndi said, coughing again and wiping at her eyes. "I think that mighta been overkill."
"Yet highly effective," came an amused voice. Not Nathan's, but familiar enough to send Nathan scrambling to his feet and whirling around to face the source of the color commentary.
Son of a bitch. Nathan wiped away the blood running into gray eyes that were currently going wide with shock as his brain processed what he was seeing. Magneto. Here. Now. Magneto. Passing out was going to have to wait.
#Cyndi, DON'T DO ANYTHING.#
Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap. This was all kinds of confusing right here. For instance, while Cyndi was intellectually quite aware her last technical encounter with Magneto had transpired under the circumstances of a kidnapped mutant and a major disaster, there was another part of her that was acutely struck by the fact that the last time they'd actually seen him had been two years ago when this same man had, quite cordially, invited him for a coffee.
Like Haller's brain needed more conflict.
"Uh," Cyndi said, rapidly looking from Magneto to Nathan and back again and feeling like there was suddenly way too much pressure on her, "thanks?"
"You're quite welcome, David. Effective," Magneto went on, almost conversationally, "and impressive. All three of you, as a matter of fact. I've very rarely seen such a display of power." His gaze flickered backwards, towards the members of the military and the emergency crews who were still trying to evacuate the area. They didn't seem to have registered the cessation of active hostilities just yet.
"Still, nothing's resolved, is it? The humans will muster their courage soon," Magneto continued mildly, "and come in for a closer look. What do you plan to do then, Dayspring - hand him back to them?" He waved a hand at the prone Saidullayev, a edge of mockery entering his voice as he went on. "They are the legitimate authorities, after all."
Nathan didn't manage to hide the flinch at the question. "Go to hell," he said roughly, keeping his attention on Magneto even as he limped over to Saidullayev, bending down beside the unconscious Chechen and reaching out with his telepathy, to try and scan his memories. It was a hell of a risk with Magneto standing right there, but the older man wasn't making any aggressive moves, and before Nathan knew what the answer to that question was, he had to know what was actually going on here.
Oh, hell. Bile rose at the back of his throat, and he swallowed hard, rising. The memories weren't intact, not given the state Saidullayev's mind was in, but there was enough.
Magneto's attention had stayed locked on him the whole time, and Nathan found himself the recipient of a faint, cold smile as he rose. "I hardly imagine they'll provide him with proper treatment for his injuries," Magneto said, in a parody of gentleness. "Perhaps they'll do him the kindness of a bullet in the head. Put their former attack dog out of his misery, since what's left of this city would tend to suggest that he can't be retrained."
Cyndi looked at the sick look on Nathan's face, frowning. Okay, Magneto was scary, but just standing across from the guy wasn't enough to make you go that pale that fast, right? "Dude, what am I missing here?" the alter hissed out of the corner of her mouth.
#What do you think they've been doing to the poor bastard for the last seven months?# was the telepathic reply, fainter than it should have been. Nathan tottered slightly as he straightened. #He's right, damn him...# You didn't need psionic conditioning to reshape someone's mind, it just made it easier. There were plenty of more traditional methods. They just took longer.
Cyndi's jaw dropped as the significant elipses settled in. Oh my god, she thought between Jim's kneejerk horror and Jack's kneejerk rage, there is really not one single mutant on the continent who is not being conditioned to become a supersoldier by opportunistic douchebags.
"There are alternatives, of course," Magneto said, almost casually. "A more... palatable solution is simply enough achieved." That slight, cold smile lingered as he divided his attention between Nathan and Haller. "All you need to do is step aside. You've accomplished what you set out to do, gentlemen. Been the heroes of the day and saved the defenseless civilians. You can't want to see him returned to the hands of the people who brought this about."
"You have got to be fucking kidding me." There was no masking the rage in Nathan's gravelly voice. Unfortunately, there was no hiding the increasing unsteadiness of his stance, either. Exhaustion was catching up with him, and doing it fast. "What precisely makes you any better than the Russians? I mean, you've just been so hesitant about making use of the vulnerable in the past."
"Yo, Nate?" Cyndi muttered, "Might not wanna poke the megalomaniac. Just sayin'."
Magneto raised an eyebrow. "This isn't a negotiation. I can achieve the same end result with or without your cooperation," he pointed out, as if observing that the sky was blue. He sounded faintly disappointed, as if he had truly expected Nathan to listen to reason. "Stepping aside is merely simpler and less painful for you."
Nathan didn't bother responding. Not with words, at least. He was beyond exhausted, but the man in front of him was... a target. His jaw clenched, but that was the only physical clue to warn Magneto of what was coming. His anger took the shape of a foot-thick whip of debris that pulled itself together and slashed through the air at Magneto.
Who gave his head a tight, brief shake. "Too much metal, Nathan," he said, almost chidingly - and the snake-like cloud of debris tore itself apart. Nathan staggered backwards, stunned, and Magneto gave a quick, precise wave of one hand. A length of pipe tore itself free of another pile of debris behind Nathan and right at him. The impact against the back of his skull wasn't hard enough to kill, but it did knock him out. Very effectively.
Magneto turned his attention to Haller, raising an eyebrow.
Aw, shit, I totally called it. Cyndi scrambled to put her back to a piece of flaking masonry. Not that it was going to be much use, but if she was going to make a stand she might as well do it where nothing could slam her in the back of the head.
"That guy -- don't you think that guy's had enough of being used?" she managed, gesturing at Saidullayev. Flame started crawling across the ground by her foot in her nervousness, making the edges of her vision grey. "Plus, crazy! I mean, I know there's only X number of powerful mutants in the world and you can't be too picky, but the bats have totally vacated the belfry. Even as disposable minions go he's not going to be a lot of help. The professor'd at least have a shot at putting him back together."
"I'll make certain he gets the help he needs, David." It was thoroughly bizarre, but Magneto actually sounded as if he was trying to be reassuring, if in a casual sort of way. "And I can give him something Charles cannot - the chance to strike back against those who tried to use him." He raised a hand. "I am sorry for this," he said, sounding mildly regretful. The same piece of pipe he'd used to knock out Nathan came flying at Haller's head.
Just before the world exploded into pain and darkness Cyndi remembered thinking, Gee, thanks.
Magneto eyed the three unconscious telekinetics for a moment, then made another small, precise gesture. The pile of debris where Saidullayev was lying shifted, the metal pieces rearranging themselves into a makeshift stretcher that levitated smoothly, bearing the Chechen psi along behind Magneto as he turned to leave.
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