Thirteen Days: There Can Be No Deals

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

An otherwise peaceful October day at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters is shattered when a presidential helicopter lands, bearing Val Cooper and some very bad news.


It was going to be one of those days. He could sense it already.

Scott didn't fool himself that many of the kids had missed the helicopter landing on the front lawn. Those who had would hear about it quickly enough via the gossip mill. It had actually triggered a brief security alert, until the pilot had identified himself and Charles had as quickly scanned and vouched for him. Scott hadn't been quite able to believe it himself until he'd actually seen the helicopter, and been unable to deny that yes, that was indeed one of the Presidential helicopters from the HMX-1 squadron.

He'd been rather unutterably relieved when the passenger had turned out to be a familiar blonde Secret Service agent, rather than that agent's boss. That would have been just a little bit too much to handle, all things considered. Relief had fled quickly at the grim expression on Val Cooper's face, however, and the realization that whatever had brought her here so quickly and indiscreetly was not going to be good.

Cooper had insisted that only he, Charles, and Ororo be present for the initial briefing. Once they were in Charles's office with the door safely closed, she didn't waste any time in telling them why she'd dropped in.

"It's Magneto," Cooper said without further ado as soon as she sat down; Charles had offered her a seat, but skipped the standard offer of tea. She looked like she could have used coffee; she was immaculately put together, as always, but the dark circles under her eyes suggested she'd gone without some significant sleep lately. "The Russians have done something phenomenally stupid-" She bit off the end of each word, almost savagely. "-and it's blown up in their faces. In all of our faces, when it comes right down to it."

Two words Ororo was quite sure she never wanted to hear in the same idea had just been uttered, practically within the same sentence, by the blonde woman sitting to her right. 'Magneto' and 'Russians' had an exceptionally bad ring to it, especially coupled with the expression Cooper was wearing as she said it. "What is it? What has happened?"

"I'll give you all the details we have. But the short version is that they tried to kill him," Cooper said bluntly. "With a satellite-based laser weapon."

"With a what?" Scott asked, straightening in his chair, unable to keep the note of incredulity out of his voice. Since when did any country have satellite weaponry? "You're not-" Of course she was serious, Scott told himself, biting off the rest of that sentence. This wasn't something anyone would joke about. Son of a bitch.

The slight rigidity of Charles's posture was the only outward sign of tension he betrayed at Cooper's words. But his gaze was very level and very bleak as he met her eyes. "'Tried'," he repeated. Despite his perfectly even tone, it was unmistakably a question.

Cooper gave a quick, tight nod. Her hands were tightly folded in her lap, the knuckles white. "They tried to set him up. It's something they've had in the works for a while, maybe even since San Diego. Apparently the FSB has a holding facility for mutant prisoners in Eastern Siberia. Top-secret, up until they inexplicably informed the Russian Justice Ministry that they were planning to execute the majority of the prisoners, because of-"

"What happened in Derbent," Scott said, his stomach sinking.

"Yes. The reasoning they gave in the official communique was that they could no longer justify the risk of trying to keep the ones with dangerous abilities in custody." Cooper stopped, took a breath. "The information got to Magneto somehow, through some contact of his. The Russians were a bit vague on how, but we're fairly sure the leak was deliberate. The information was enough to get him to the facility. Once he was there, they tried to take him out with one of these satellites - and missed."

Ororo waited a beat for Cooper to follow up - "he left the facility with the prisoners in tow" seemed to be a likely guess, as his actions with Saidulleyev had proven, but no such resolution came. "Did he liberate the prisoners?" she prompted, almost afraid to hear the answer, whatever it might be.

"Those who were uninjured and able to travel with him, yes. We don't have numbers or names on who is and isn't accounted for from the prison just yet." Oddly, Cooper's reply was almost cursory, as if it was a side issue. The quiet urgency returned to her voice as she continued. "He took them and the Brotherhood, and backtracked to the military installation serving as the control center for the satellites. Our assumption is that he got the information from one of the surviving soldiers at the prison, but we're not sure. The Russians were unhelpful on that point, too."

"He destroyed this installation, then," Charles said. He was looking pale. "The death toll?"

"Between the two locations, about a hundred. But this is all just background," Cooper said, leaning forward slightly in her chair. "The problem is, this installation also served as a top-secret space launch facility. We've known for some time that the Russians have maintained a small space station, based on the Mir design, as an orbital base for classified research."

Cooper hadn't dropped that tidbit into the conversation for nothing, Scott thought. The pieces were coming together - the whole picture wasn't clear just yet, but he suspected they weren't going to have to wait much longer. And certain connections, at least, were obvious.

"Are you about to tell us that Magneto is currently in orbit?" Scott asked. A very tiny part of him wanted very much to do something to recognize the absurdity of that statement. This was so very much not the time, though.

Cooper shot him an unreadable look. "That's precisely what I'm about to tell you, Summers. Magneto and his people destroyed the facility," she went on, "and forced two pilots about to launch on a supply run to take them aboard." She paused, just for a moment, and her listeners knew that they'd finally gotten to it. This was the crux of what had brought her here, what made the situation such a desperate one. "Aboard the station is the secondary control system for the satellites."

Charles made a small, involuntary movement that Scott only barely caught in his peripheral vision. When he looked in that direction, he felt a jolt of alarm at how gray the Professor looked. Before he could open his mouth to ask him if he was all right, if he needed anything, Charles spoke, his voice shaking very slightly.

"He's aboard this station. In control of these satellites." Again, not a question, and Cooper just nodded, her expression tightening. But she was almost as pale as Charles, as if the briefing had finally driven it home to her as well.

Oh sweet Goddess. It took a moment for Ororo to realize she was gripping the arms of her chair with vice-like fingers, and forced herself to relax before speaking. "Has he made any demands?" she asked, hoping that at least they had a timeframe to work with.

Cooper nodded, and laid the situation out for them, her voice tight and controlled. Some of the demands were obvious, Scott reflected: the release of prisoners, the cessation of all mutant-related research programs run by the Russian and American governments.

The demand for a mutant homeland, however, was something else entirely. New, Scott thought, reeling inwardly. That one is definitely new. What was Magneto thinking? How angry was he over being lured into a trap - how rational was he, to think that the US and Russia would ever grant a demand like that?

"The one blessing is that he communicated only with the Russian and American governments. We can keep this under wraps, at least for the time being. We have to," Cooper said almost fiercely. "Can you imagine the panic if this got out? The man responsible for the destruction of one city is sitting in orbit in command of a weapons system that could destroy countless more?" She shifted in her chair, shaking her head slightly, almost in frustration. "He's made a 'concession', he called it. Knowing that there's no way we could comply with all his demands at once, we're 'allowed' to fulfill them one at at a time. But if we and the Russians don't release every mutant we have in custody within a week, he's going to launch laser strikes on Washington and Moscow."

"There's a reason you're here, speaking to us. The Russians have no way to address the situation, do they?" Charles asked. Cooper nodded, to confirm it, and Charles's eyes shifted downwards, to his hands. "Have they tried?" he asked, after a long, pensive moment.

Scott almost gasped. "Baikonur," he said, stunned as more of the pieces fell into place. It had been noted in the logs from the past week's newsfeed monitoring, but as there hadn't been any apparent mutant involvement, he hadn't paid much attention. "That wasn't a terrorist bombing."

Cooper gave a brief bark of laughter that lacked anything resembling amusement. "Not hardly. They were trying to launch a mission to the station - to destroy it, apparently, although we don't know the details of their plan. What we do know is that Magneto must have kept at least some of the station's crew alive. The station commander if no one else, because he had access codes to some of the Russians' more conventional satellites. Spy satellites. They saw them preparing to launch, and... took steps." She took a slightly shaky breath.

As shocking and upsetting as the realization was - many people had died, and from the sounds of it this was only the first wave - Ororo's mind seized upon another, even more worrisome revelation. "He retaliated against those who moved against him. He must know the X-Men will try to do the same," she murmured, almost to herself. "What is stopping him from hitting us before we do?"

"Nothing." It was Scott who said it, straightening in his chair. "Absolutely nothing," he said, almost snapping the words out, briefly heedless of the effect that the conversation might be having on Charles. The look Scott gave Cooper was close to glacial. "And if he's watching us, you didn't arrive in the most discreet method possible, Cooper."

She met his eyes without flinching. "There's no time, Summers," she said forcefully. "We can talk about how to minimize the risk to your school, but we need your help. If we try to launch anything from Florida, we risk losing Canaveral the way the Russians did Baikonur, and who knows what he might do if he's provoked."

Can we possibly provoke him more? Scott wanted to ask, but didn't.

Cooper leaned forward, dividing the intense blue gaze between the three of them. "You all know perfectly well that neither our government nor the Russians will agree to his demands. One week," she said, more softly, "and he follows through and kills two cities. We can't let that happen either. So either we find a way to get up there and take him out, or..."

Long afterwards, when there was time for post-mortems of every conversation and every event in that remarkably hectic week, Scott would reflect that of everything Val Cooper said in the next half-minute or so, her detailed description of the Russians' proposed last resort, there was only one word he registered clearly.

Nukes.