Keep The Faith: Wreckage

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

When you need transportation, and fast, you'll grasp at the best possible candidate. Even if it's someone you'd rather not ask for a favor.


Scott tried not to grind his teeth as he glared at the scrap of paper with the phone number on it. He hadn't expected to use it. Hadn't wanted to use it, which had nothing to do with the fact that Alex had forced it on him with an oh-so-idle comment about 'Just in case you want to, you know, use it. Dude.'

Nothing to do with it at all. Okay, maybe a little.

But there were issues and there were issues. Currently, his critical lack of transportation was the only issue that mattered. Scott took a deep breath and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, dialing. Quickly, so that he didn't have a chance to start thinking about alternatives. Because that would mean further delay, and there was no time. He'd never realized just how much he'd come to depend on having the Blackbird at times like this.

The phone rang twice before someone picked it up at the other end. "Hello," the deep voice on the other end said amiably.

It still put Scott's teeth on edge. "It's Scott. Are you still in port?"

There was a brief, shocked-seeming silence. "Uhh... yes. Still sitting right here in New York. And hello, Scott," Christopher Summers said, his voice going wry. "It's good to hear from you."

If it had been any other day, Scott might have shared the sarcastic comment he'd made to Alex when they'd found out that their father had somehow managed to find himself in possession of a perfectly legitimate cargo bound for New York. Or the even more sarcastic comment about how business in Madripoor had to be slowing down, given that Chris had decided to make the trip himself. Thin. Very, very thin, he'd said to Alex at the end of that particular tirade, and gotten swatted - well, swatted at, for his pains. He was still faster than the brat.

"This isn't a social call," Scott said, trying not to sound quite so much like he was talking through gritted teeth. You are after all asking the man for a favor. "Alex said you had a cargo helicopter aboard ship?" Alex, of course, had already visited with their father. Twice.

A pause, but thankfully for Scott's patience, only a small one. "Yeah, we do. An Mi-17 - well, the civilian version. Well, it was a civilian version once we - nevermind." There was no shame in Chris's voice. Just a certain dry amusement at his own self-censorship.

I don't have time for this, an outraged part of Scott's brain thought, but didn't say. "I need to borrow it," he said instead, brusquely.

"... you need to borrow my helicopter? What happened to-"

"Please." Nothing at all from Chris, and Scott sighed angrily, running an unsteady hand through his hair. "Look, our plane went down. A bunch of my younger X-Men went out on a routine pick-up, and something happened, we're not sure what, except that the fucking Blackbird apparently crashed, all right, and are you even listening to me?"

"I was telling Badri to start her up for me, actually," Chris said, and went on before Scott could say a thing. "Look, all you had to do was ask. I'll see you as soon as we can get down there. She's even got a full tank of gas."

--


As Cyclops, Phoenix and Blink assess the situation at the crash site, it becomes obvious that this was more than a simple mechanical problem.


"Jesus Christ." There was something more than a little surreal about the sight of the Blackbird, but Scott knew that it was just shock. Inability to process the sight of his plane turned into so much wreckage. The Blackbird had crashed before, but the damage had never been this bad. It looked like it had been ripped apart from the inside. "Anything?" he asked Jean tightly, his hands clenching into fists to still their shaking. They'd already established that there were no X-Men - or bodies - anywhere in the immediate vicinity.

"Nothing," Jean said, voice distant. "If there's anyone out there in my range, they're not conscious..." Which, admittedly, given the damage to the plane, was entirely possible.

"Holy shit," Clarice breathed, the phrase wholly inadequate for the wreckage in front of them. At least no one was there, or well, conscious. She wouldn't want to be conscious after a crash like this. "Um...I'm really sorry for your plane, Scott."

"The plane's... not really an issue right now." Not entirely true. They couldn't leave it here, certainly. But it wasn't the issue. Not the priority. Scott swallowed, rubbing at the scars on his face for a moment. "All right," he finally said, and the words came out utterly level. "Let's see if we can get in there, find any sign of what happened." He started to move around the plane, figuring he could go in where the back wall of the passenger cabin had been.

Jean nodded, starting the other way around the wreckage, looking for alternate routes and occasionally applying a light telekinetic push to make sure things were more-or-less structurally sound. Wouldn't do for them to get inside only to have something come crashing down.

Clarice picked through the pieces carefully, trying not to rip her uniform. It was loose on her, this was the first time outside of the danger room she had worn it since coming back even on a limited basis and once again she felt like she was wearing a costume meant for someone else. That she wore a black do-rag instead of her customary braid wasn't helping, "I don't see anything," she reported, gingerly lifting a piece of panel, "Just debris."

The somewhat blank expression on Scott's face as he sized up the interior damage was deceptive. His mind was actually racing, raising and then rejecting possibilities for what could possibly have caused this. The kid they'd been picking up? Some sort of powers accident?

But then, where were they? "We need to secure this wreckage. Get more people here to do a proper search..." For bodies, he didn't say. But if Jean couldn't sense them and if Charles turned up nothing in the vicinity with Cerebro...

The unstated thought echoed Jean's own worries, but she kept her focus on the wreck. The wing, well, what was left of it, was definitely unstable and she could see how it was tugging down on the main cabin. A spare tree limb which had been snapped off during the impact provided an adequate prop. "Blink, radio back to the mansion and get... hell, get whoever's available." Gazing back at the trail of destruction the plane had left she sighed. "We're gonna need all the help we can get to do a proper search through all this."

Doing as she was told, Clarice kept the comment about needing more than just the people from the school to herself. There would be more people coming regardless, police, firefighters, where were the local groups? They had to be en route. That could be interesting. "If they're here....they're not alive," she said, more to herself than others. It was a sombering thought.

Scott shot her a look. "We don't know that," he said, not quite snapping at her - but almost. "Make the call." He turned his attention to Jean, his face close to expressionless if you didn't pay attention to the tightness of his jaw. "We need to establish the radius of the wreckage before we set up any sort of search pattern. You're best equipped to do that from the air."

Jean nodded, lips tight, and lifted into the air. She'd not gone more than a few yards, though, when she paused and glanced around. "The lack of bodies here is a good sign," she said quietly. A person could be thrown from the wreckage, even a few, but all of them? "Someone has to have been mobile enough to get all of them out." Who that someone was, though, was a glaringly large question mark.