X-Men Mission: Who You Gonna Call?

[x-dominion.livejournal.com]

The X-Men find their trapped teammates just as the real story behind M-Squad comes out.



The nullifier hummed and sparked occasionally, offering a slight hope that the technology keeping them powerless might cut out at any moment. Kane tried to flex his arms again, but the zip-strip handcuffs kept him from moving too far. It was bad enough to be caught by M-Squad, or more accurately, the special forces unit armed with M-Squad's technology that ambushed them. But adding insult to injury was the regular visits and questions from the various members of M-Squad. The scientists had their own 'unique' outlook on how life worked, and their approach was obnoxious.

"So, how is everyone?" Kane had almost forgotten 'Tony Masters'. The unctuous dark suited man had introduced himself as M-Squad's business manager, and he'd quickly gotten all the information he could from the scientists. Oddly, their treatment of him as a mere functionary never fazed the man, and he had waited politely for the scientists to leave before returning to the office they had been put near the nullifier. "It's funny how it works, you know. Go looking for one mutant, find a half dozen. And based on those snazzy leather uniforms, I'm going to take a guess that you're all one of those vigilante groups; people who read too many Batman comics as a kid, that sort of thing?"

"What do you want, Masters?" Garrison almost growled it, but the man just shrugged.

"A pile of money. A villa in Spain. Maybe an island of my own in the South Seas. You know, simple things." Despite his manner, Masters moved like a trained soldier, and Kane's instincts said to be wary of him. "Like a proper satellite signal to Poland would be great right about now." He shook his phone.

Paige gave him an offended look, her nose scrunching. "You have a secret lair with lousy reception and a team of super geniuses, and didn't think to maybe install a signal boost before hand? You can practically build them with old television dishes these days and no one would be the wiser. Well, except as to why you had satellite when there's Netflicks and torrenting, I guess."

"Banter. I recognize it." he shrugged. "This is more of a return on investment."

Jean-Phillipe's fingers twitched nervously as he tried to hide them between his back and the chair he'd been roughly seated in. He'd lost track of how long it had been since they'd come under the effect of the nullifier. His fingers were starting to tingle with numbness in much the same way they had after he'd used his powers so extensively in India and Canada, as well as the fracas at the graduation ceremony.

He remained abnormally silent in the face of Masters, partly due to Garrison's instructions at the beginning of the mission, and partly from rising worry at potential side effects of being under the nullifier for too long.

Yvette was just as nervous, for her own reasons - after all, this wasn't the first time she'd been inhibited. "What will you do to us?" she managed to quaver, aware of just how young she looked without her powers, her hands zip-locked in front of her. "We only came to help. We are not the threat to anyone."

"Yeah, I don't really care why you're here. Doesn't factor in. Your little firebug friend here," Masters nudged Ray with his foot. "is going to be delivered into the hands of the Chicago PD this evening. M-Squad will receive all the credit, and more jobs will flow in from grateful police departments all over the country. Now, since none of you were part of the police manhunt, you can be quietly delivered to a waiting cargo plane at O'Hare where you'll get to enjoy the lovely twelve hour flight to Symkaria before getting auctioned off to the highest bidder. Africa has a lot of demand for mercenary companies with top level mutant abilities on tap. Very fat profit margins."

"This isn't the first time you've done this." Kane said quietly.

"No, and I wish I had a lot more opportunities, to be honest. M-Squad is useful, but expensive to finance."

"So, let me see if I get this straight. You use these yahoos as a legitimate cover to hunt down mutants, and once you find them, you dispatch your mercenary team using their technology properly to capture them. Afterwards, you hand the target over to the authorities, and the others you ship off for sale to weaponize their powers." It was obvious that Garrison's summary was already composed for a judge. "What do the scientists get?"

"Them? They get funding and supplies. They get to pretend to be Ghostbusters or the Justice League or whatever it is they talk about. Most importantly, they get to study any of the mutants we accidentally catch with the targets before we 'release them' back to their families." Masters actually made the air-quotes, offering one more reason to punch him in the face.

Piotr struggled against his bonds again, but the metal pipe they were attached to just cut into his skin again. "Wait, you're saying that they have no idea that they are assisting in the kidnap and slavery of American citizens," Piotr said trying to sound as American as everybody else.

"I'm saying those eggheads barely know what planet they're on most of the time. Which is both operationally and financially useful for me." He snapped shut his phone and put it back in his pocket. "Well, this has been fun, but I have some work to do and I'm sure the good Doctors will want to start their tests. My men, the real mutant hunters, are ready to kill anyone trying to escape, so, you know, don't. It would hurt the profit margin." He turned and walked out the door.

***

Angel peered out through the window in the cockpit as she stood next to Jean. "We're here faster than I thought we'd get here," she said, "even in the 'Bird. How close are we to landing? And, uh, where are we going to land?" Landing the plane in a field she could understand. Landing it in Chicago was another matter entirely.

Jean smiled at Angel's barrage of questions. "Don't worry," she said as she turned on the Blackbird's stealth mode once the sprinkling of small towns and open expanses of fields started to become dense with houses and businesses. "We'll be fine, I promise."

The simplest option for most of the trip to conserve resources was to climb higher and use the higher altitude to lower the risk of being seen, but the closer they got to their destination and toward touching down meant it was time to go invisible. Nearing the outskirts of the area where Charles had located the team, Jean found an empty lot to touch down in and started to power down the Blackbird, save for the auxiliary and stealth mode. She had a sequence of numbers she could input in her communicator that allowed it to act as a 'remote' to turn the cloak off so that they'd actually be able to figure out where the door was once they got back.

They were in what appeared to be an industrial area, or at least what had been one at one time. The place wasn't as vibrant as some of the other parts of the city, with the occasional fading 'For sale' or 'For rent' signs stuck in the windows of large brick factories, but there was still life there. Shipping and receiving centers, paper manufacturers, and other businesses occupied every two or three buildings, along with a few fast food places, Mom and Pop resale shops, and cafes, converging around certain sections.

"Alright remember, two mile radius, two teams. Ask around, see if anyone's seen anything out of the ordinary, or even if they've seen the M-Squad lately. Since they're airing at least two commercial spots on the TV every day they shouldn't be too hard to recognize. Anyone asks why you're asking about them, get creative," Jean said as she unbuckled her seat belt. "These buildings are older, which means if M-Squad has done any outfitting on the inside to accommodate holding large numbers of people then nosy people are bound to know about some major construction project, loud noises, etc. Check in with me every ten minutes, even if you haven't found anything. Keep in sight of one another. They're close. We don't want anyone else captured."

Kurt glanced around at the buildings, nodding. "And remember, any sign of trouble, call for back-up. However far you have walked, I can be there in moments."

"As long as our leathers can pass for Halloween costumes I think we'll be ok." Bobby gave a small wink at his team members as he began towards the door of the Blackbird. "Now all I have to do is come up with a story as to why I'm looking for M-Squad..."

"Autographs." Kyle gave a shrug. "Won't work for me or Kurt but the rest of you can just play like you're huge fans. "

Angel sighed and headed towards the ramp. "Great. We're groupies. This day keeps getting better and better ..."

***

"Think they'll feed us soon?" Laurie asked from her position on the floor, hands and feet cuffed in front of her. They hadn't known quite what her power was, and so seemingly felt the need to take no chances. "I'm not feeling so good."

Her fingers and toes had started to itch and tingle a few moments ago, along with a seeming increase in her body temperature.

"You are not the only one." Jean-Phillipe grimaced. He would rather have given the impression that nothing was wrong, but he could practically feel his system rebelling at the lack of the usual low-grade energy that his powers supplied. "My fingers are beginning to go numb."

"I can't move my wings," Jan said, her wings hanging as useless dead weight on her back. Funny how they hadn't felt heavy before, but now that she couldn't use them she was acutely aware of their existence. At least they hadn't dropped off or anything because that would have been horrible and Jan wasn't sure they'd grow back if she lost them. Shrinking and flying went together in Jan's mind, and she doubted she'd be sitting here, pretending to be calm, if her wings were no longer attached to her body.

"I suppose a proper cell was considered beneath them to design, after the square yardage nullifier," Paige observed, irritated. "How hard is it, really. Bars."

"I am sure the rest of the team will come for us soon," Yvette suggested, although she sounded less than sure about that. "Right, Mr. K... Dominion?"

"Of course. We got the emergency signal off before they got us all." Kane sighed as the doors opened and M-Squad walked in.

"Good afternoon. I don't believe we've been formally introduced following the drubbed you took at the house. I'm Dr. Ira-"

"Wainsborough. Yeah, we know. That's Dr. Lutz, Dr. Liebowitz, Dr. Raghava, and the guy stuffing the Chinese food into his blow hole is Dr. Ben-Menahem. What do you want?" Kane shot back. The tall man bent slightly, to speak out of the side of his mouth to his teammate.

"Make a note, Sidney. Likely telepathic abilities as well." He ignored Kane's groan. "We'd like to take the time to study you before releasing you to the police. It's obvious none of you have issues with your powers control. Fashion sense, perhaps."

"Burn, dude." Dr Raghava started to laugh, but was cut off by Garrison's glare.

"Fashion sense insults? From a group that 'Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' would laugh at?" Jean-Phillipe replied weakly from his chair. He looked visibly pale, but he still was not about to let an insult like that pass.

"I don't understand the reference." Wainsborough said, and waved a hand. "Doesn't matter. In any case, we've got a few tests we're going to perform before releasing you. A little scientific inquiry, so to speak."

The members of M-Squad broke up, and it was Wainsborough who sat down near Kane. "You know, your exhibition of strength was most interesting. The weight of the object you lifted should have ripped the arms right out of your body, and yet, you didn't even strain. That's not scientifically possible, you know. I have problems with things that are not scientifically possible. Do you know why? Because they aren't possible, and you can't write a paper on impossible things."

"I'm deeply sorry."

"No, you see, you can help me. If you did it, it has to be possible, and the explanation lies in you. Tell me, would you strongly object to a little minor vivisection?"

"Yes."

"Drat. they always say no."

"You know, the more you guys speak, the stupider you appear," Laurie informed them, her voice croaky as she licked her lips. She was incredibly thirsty, and their prattling on was giving her a headache. "The fact that you call yourselves Scientists at all is laughable to begin with, you hacks."

"Was that sarcasm? Doctor Liebowitz?"

"No, Ira. That was a normal stage one pathological defensive mechanism via delusional projection. The subject, in this case a girl between the ages of 17 and 22, projects a falsity of content in order to avoid dealing with feelings of shame, loss or weakness. It could almost be a textbook Jasper's response. Not that interesting, scientifically. This, on the other hand-" She turned to Ray, who was looking miserable in the corner. "-is even less interesting."

"Leave the kid alone." Kane said. "He can't control his abilities."

"He can't?" The dark haired woman crouched down and struck on a lighter. As the little flame blossomed, the look in Maxwell's eyes changed, and they hungrily tracked the flame as she moved her hands.

"See why we're the experts here, beefcake?"

"Experts really, have you heard of the psychological addiction. A lot of people with destructive powers don't use it to cause chaos but because using their powers makes them feel good." Piotr said as calmly as he could while he could see two of his teammates were slowly dying. "He might not be able to control the powers yet still hunger for the feelings it gives him."

"What you'll find is that psychological addiction comes with a associated pattern of behaviour that has not been evident in the subject's psychological history or the pattern and execution of the arson. See, you'll learn all of this once you get past first year and into the real science."

"It's not real Sci--"

"Shut it, Ira." She put away the lighter. "Little man loves fire, comrade. Sometimes, it's that simple."

"You know, when she's says it's that simple, it's because she doesn't want to admit that the American Psychological Association was set up in 1892 by members of the Fraternal Lodge of the Golden Order, the very same group that has been responsible for the spread of mind conditioning techniques in the American Public School system to better prepare children to eventually accept mental slavery." Moshe sat down beside Jan. "You know the ABC song? Written by Charles Bardlee, whose son was a founding member of the APA and the Boston lodge. I, uh, ran a series of acoustic computer models on the tune and the specific morphophonemic selection of letter pronunciation versus other opinions. Turns out, only that specific sequence hyper stimulates the amygdala, generating a fear/obey response which is the first stage of mental conditioning. Cool, huh?"

"Oh yeah, totally cool," Jan said, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. She'd barely understood a word the guy had said. "Want to see what else is cool? Turn off this nullifier and I'll show you." Because zapping was extremely cool. And if he tried to so much as touch her he'd be really sorry.

"I told you he was going to talk about the alphabet song again. Every time. 'Oh, hello young woman. Would you like to know how the ABCs will take over your mind on the off chance it will impress you enough to take off your shirt?' Dude, really." Dr. Raghava said sarcastically.

"Jagdish, it's not like that." He turned back and grinned at Jan. "It's all just science baby."

***

"Are we heading in the right direction?" Angel asked. "So far, not much beyond Iceman having to defend my honor not once but three times because of guys asking me out. M-Squad attracts crowds, right? I think I may need to get skyborn for a bit but I'm worried about the attention ..."

Bobby turned his attention towards his communicator. "If it'll help for cover, I can create a bit of a Chicago snow flurry. It may draw a few eyebrows, but it wouldn't be too far outside the norm. Much less than a girl on fire flying overhead at least."

"I don't know, maybe the open mutation would attract the right kind of attention," Tabitha thought out loud.

"Or the wrong kind," Jean said as they made their way through the streets. "I don't think it's a good idea. It might tell us where they came from if they take the bait but its too risky to start a fight out in the open with witnesses if the M-Squad decides to shoot first when they see a mutant right on their door step. It would be the fastest way for us to wind up on the news or draw the attention of the authorities." Jean opened her mind in the attempt to hone in on that glimmer of a mental signature from the others, hoping to see if the closer proximity would help.

As of right now she wasn't getting much other than the general feeling the Professor got hundreds of miles away while on Cerebro: they were in the area, but that was it. She didn't like the feeling of not knowing.

She rubbed her forehead, sighing. "But right now we're having not much luck so an eye in the sky might give us a better lead. Okay, Firestar, go up. Iceman keep her covered. Try to keep it quick. We're going for low key right now, at least as much as we can get. Everyone else, keep looking. If we don't find anything then we can go for the dangling worm tactic," she said.

"10-4" was Bobby's simple response into the communicator as he closed his eyes and began to focus in on his energy. Within a few seconds he had begun to slow the molecules from a few meters up, which soon became accompanied by a drop of slush hitting his face. As he opened his eyes again, he couldn't help the grin that pulled at the corner of his lips. With a wink, he turned towards his companion. "Looks like you're up Angel."

"Show off," Angel replied without heat as she took a few steps to gain momentum before blasting off. She spoke again into the comms. "Okay, I'm air born now. Wildchild, any luck on your end?"

"Not yet. Most of Team One's pretty low on scent so I'm trying to sniff out Wallflower and that's harder than you'd think." Kyle had felt all of about five seconds of guilt for using his master key to get into Laurie and Jean-Phillipe's suite and 'borrow' one of Laurie's socks. "As soon as I have a direction I'll comm in, I promise."

"I wonder", Kurt said slowly. "The M-Squad's selling point is that they capture mutants who have broken the law, yes? What if one of us, a young law-abiding socially responsible one of us - " this with a glance skyward "- was to approach them directly, with no obvious subterfuge, and say she would like to see what they do?"

From high above their heads, Angel had a much better view of the city, even with the screening Bobby was providing her with. Able to widen her search simply due to lack of physical constraints, she bobbed and weaved and ... then paused, hovering in the air. "Guys? I think I found something interesting." She carefully dropped closer so she could get her bearings and related the street address. "Some activity outside this warehouse that doesn't look like normal workers and, hey, warehouses are always sort of suspect."

Bobby turned towards his com once again. "Hey Nightcrawler, can you teleport close enough that you can tell us if there's any dark and sinister like activity going on at the warehouse?" Just in case there was trouble, Bobby turned his head and began moving in the direction he had spotted Angel hovering towards earlier.

"Phoenix", Kurt asked, "can you send me Firestar's impression of that warehouse? It will make things easier and safer."

Jean turned her head then nodded. "One moment, Nightcrawler," she said, her mind shifting from reaching its psionic "fingers" outward to upward toward Angel.

"Get ready to be woozy," Jean said as she quickly picked out the airborne image like a snapshot and "copied" it into Kurt's mind. The result would likely be a brief flash of vertigo from the idea of being up very high not quite matching up with one's feet on the ground before the image faded from sensation into memory, but the warehouse and the outlying grounds would be clear.

She glanced around and smiled. "Great job, Firestar and Iceman."

Kurt was already gone, reappearing - as Angel would no doubt see - in the street running down the side of the warehouse, back in the shadows the building itself cast. Cautiously, he moved forward to look around the corner.

Tabitha scanned the street around their own position, just in case of surprises. "See anything?" she asked in a low voice.

"I -smell- trouble." Kyle said quietly. "People, at least a couple, probably male and not drunk or sweaty like they were working in a warehouse. Still don't smell Wallflower though..." He wasn't hearing anything yet, but that didn't mean much. There were too many other noises around to hear anything clearly.

The building itself was a fairly non-descript brick rectangle; a row of loading docks in the back were closed, the doors streaked with rust down the paint. A faded sign said 'Wellwood Paper Products', but judging by the style and the damage from exposure, it hadn't been touched in at least five years. That exact reason led to an odd observation. All of the broken windows in the high multi-pained windows had been boarded up. If the building was five years abandoned, either whomever now held the title to the property was particular diligent about keeping out the elements in a way unlike any of the other buildings, or someone was or had been occupying it very recently. For a split second, a face passed one of the windows; just a dark glimpse but one that repeated in the other unbroken windows, like a guard walking a circuit.

Jean nodded. "It's the best lead we have. Let's go for it," she said quietly. All the signs seemed to point toward home base.

"Firestar, can you see any obvious entrances from where you are?" Jean said. Hopefully ones not blocked by guards. She tried to reach her mind out toward the two people in question, a bit of a tentative dabbing of her toe in the water as it were, not quite sure what safeguards they had against telepaths.

"I'll take a quick look around," Angel responded back. Keeping high enough that she wouldn't be spotted but low enough that she could see, Angel completed a quick skyborne circuit around the building. "Right. From what I can see, all the doors and windows are pretty evenly covered. They're not keeping one door more covered than the others but there's no easy access, either. And, for the record, there's a fair amount of hot spots in that building, too, so plenty of bodies."

Skating around the corner, Drake did his best to focus on keeping the snow falling around the building to keep the cover for Angel. Meanwhile, he leaned around the corner to gain his own perspective of the building down the street. "So what do we do next? Should Kyle and I knock on the door, say Trick or Treat, and see if M-Squad answers?"

"At this point I'm pretty convinced they're our bad guys," Jean said. And if they weren't then it would be interestingly awkward. Thank you, Firestar, you can come back down now. Everyone meet up closest to the North entrance of the building. I think it's the most visible from where all of us are. We'll go in together. If they're just a bunch of warehouse workers then we'll figure out a plan B. If they aren't then we get in, grab our guys, and go demolition derby on the equipment if we can," she said.

Once they all met up again together, looking like they were prepared for a bikers convention, Jean nodded to the building. "Be careful and stay sharp. We're going in."

Tabitha followed Jean, making several small flash-bangs to stick in a belt-pouch along the way. Better prepared... "I was rather fond of the Trick or Treat approach," she said very quietly. She checked the lock on the door and tried to be as silent as possible when opening it. She stepped aside. "Now who wants to go first?"

"That depends if we are still trying for any kind of subterfuge", Kurt said. "If so, perhaps it should be one of us who does not immediately give away what they are."

Angel blinked as everyone seemed to swivel their heads and look at her. "Oh all right, send the cute red head to play the innocent," she sighed as she made shooing motions with her hands so everyone else could duck out of sight. If this went badly, Jean would have her covered in a seconds thought on top of Angel's own shielding. Taking a deep breath, she beamed as she knocked loudly on the door.

The door opened slightly, and a man stuck his head out. "Private property, kid. Go away."

"But I got lost and I was hoping to go trick or treating see, I'm awesome in costume! - and maybe you could give me directions and ..." Angel poked towards Jean. Getting anything that says 'bad guys r us' on them?

Closer in proximity to the would-be bad folk, Jean tentatively reached out her mind again, tip toeing around to see if she could get any impressions of their people or any other tell tale less than comforting signs. The minds inside were disciplined; the best comparison she could make were those of soldiers and military men she'd met. Certainly not your average security guard for an empty building.

There was also a 'hole' in the mental space in the warehouse; a radius where the mental glow simply disappeared. She could follow one man moving into the space, and pick him up again coming out the other side.

Every mind I can pick up seems to have a military-style mindset. If it were one or two that'd be one thing, but not all of them. Quite suspicious. There's also some sort of....psychic black hole further in the warehouse. That shouldn't happen without some sort of interference. Jean thought to Angel, opening it up to where the rest of the group could get a mental listen into what she was saying.

Okay, then, the black hole of no brain wave patterns is probably a huge clue. I'll distract this guy and then, you know, let Wildchild do his thing with the jumping. And closing your eyes would be good - now! And with that, Angel went from normal looking girl to brilliant blue flames in a matter of seconds - essentially, a living flash bomb. And with no sunglasses on, the man who had opened up the door was more than a little blinded. As quickly as she'd flamed up it was gone and Angel hit the ground with her hands covering her head to give the people behind her a clear shot in through the door.

Angel barely felt Kyle's hand on her back as he vaulted himself over her, crashing feet and sharp claws first into the man who had opened the door. His body armor took the entirety of the damage from the claws to his chest. Kyle landed lightly on his feet, and dove for the now stunned man. From the outside, he appeared to be all elbows and knees, hitting hard and fast as many times as he could before the man could react.

As Bobby quickly slid forward, he was half gliding on the ice patches that his makeshift snowstorm had created on the ground leading up to the building. As he was about to reach the door, he couldn't help but pass his voice over the comm. "So do you think the flash of light and sudden attack may have given us away Nightcrawler?"

Kurt snorted, coming rapidly around the corner from his hiding place. "Everything in its good time, Iceman."

Kyle's assault had carried him through the door, but his first glimpses were not of an empty space. Instead, the inside of the warehouse held crates, equipment, and an ominous set of shipping containers meant for live cargo. It also held men in black fatigues, who were swarming to stations even as he checked his rush.

"Zulu Zulu Zulu!" One of the men was heard screaming over the headset, and three soldiers broke off, charging Kyle. Instead of closing to attack, they instead fanned out, dropping masks over their faces with one hand, and rolling hissing gas grenades with the other.

Kyle scrambled to grab the grenades, he recognized them as tear gas immediately. He grabbed two, throwing them back into the group of masked men, but he simply wasn't fast enough to get to the second before it popped. Even though they'd trained in scenarios with tear gas, Kyle had never managed to function through it. The burning overwhelmed his senses, and he staggered around, coughing and trying to clear his eyes.

***

"That's enough. Dr. Wainborough, you're not aware of this, but your financial backer is planning to sell us on the open weapons market as trainable mutant assets. Those soldiers out there are not your research assistants or whatever you want to call them. They are a hit squad designed to bring down mutants and your inventions are getting weaponized to do just that." Garrison broke in, using his cop voice.

"Don't be ridiculous. Mister Masters is an investor, and takes care of the less interesting numbers, like the balance sheet."

"Really? So what happened to the other mutants you picked up along with your last few targets?"

"They were returned to their families."

"And did Masters tell you this? Dr. Raghava, you're the computer whiz. Plug any of their names into Google and tell me if you find them listed as missing."

"Now this is preposterous." Ira exclaimed, but made no move to stop Jagdish as he sat down at his laptop. "Why would anyone think such a thing? We've helped mutants control their powers, stopped them from hurting themselves and their friends, and all we've asked in return is a few hours of study on their powers."

"Uh, Ira?"

"What, Jagdish?"

"I think you might want to see this." He said, looking very pale as he pushed back from the computer. Wainsborough stormed over and looked at the screen.

"Oh, sugar, you just realized you can be wrong, didn't you?" Paige asked, a hint of her drawl coming through. "Just let me out of this zip tie and I'll give you an encouraging pat on the shoulder. Ignore it if it feels like a boot up your ass, that's just the humiliation." -

Despite herself, Yvette felt a giggle bubbling up and bit her lip. "We understand wanting to help mutants," she offered. "That is what we try to do also. But you have been tricked by this Masters and he is not what you think he is."

"This can't be right."

"It's right, Doctor. You sent people to be sold."

Ira Wainsborough straightened up, and walked deliberately over to the nullifier. "We did not invent these things to hunt mutants for sale. That's completely against our scientific integrity, and besides, my mother wouldn't stand for it." He tapped the off button and the machine ground to a halt. Kane flexed his wrists and snapped the ties like they were cobwebs.

"Good call, Doctor." The sounds of battle were obvious now. The X-Men had heard their message. "X-Men, let's move. We've got friends in combat."

"Yeah, Beat them the big lay down!"

"Close enough, Doctor Lutz. Close enough."

***

Once the melee started, Jean ran in behind the others. She attempted lock in on as many of the opposing psi signatures of the men throwing the gas grenades as she could and tried to knock them backwards using her telekinesis.

The men moved with almost sinister efficiency, ignoring the gas grenades hurled back towards them. Their masks and outfits protected them, while the helmet-less X-Men were forced to advance into the wall of gas. One of the men was knocked back fifteen feet, only stopped when he slammed into a crate.

"The redhead is a TK. Repeat, red is a TK."

"Acknowledged." The man hoisted a mortar like tube on his shoulder. He fired, and the large shell screamed out. It tumbled as it flew, erratic and almost impossible to track. It exploded a good fifteen feet from Jean, but the air around her was suddenly filled with chaff. There was no way to tell what the chaff was, but it seemed that each particle was fragmenting smaller and smaller, the innumerable objects becoming a fog of dust that surrounded her, obscuring her vision and too small to simply sweep away with the telekinetics.

Tabitha dove at the knees of one of the psi-disabled men, breath held, eyes squeezed to slits. She reached for his mask and kept a tight mental hold on her bombs. She clutched the mask to her chest and rolled out of the way. She hit a wall and pulled the mask over her face, wheezing through the filter. She looked up to see what to do next.

When there are things on the ground, go up. Angel blasted through the doorway and up towards the roof to escape any of the gas on the ground. She hoped it would also allow her to get a clearer view of the whole mess and allow her to relay it to the team.

"Go to thermals." The voices were punctuated with clicks from the radio, as if they were insects instead of men. Several noticed Angel, and weapons were trained on her. One of the men came forward with a huge tank on his back, and a staff with what looked like a vacuum nozzle at the end. It began to belch fire retardant form in great gouts at Angel, trying to smother her.

"Fuck!" Angel yelped, twisting in mid-air in an attempt to dodge the foam. At first she was successful but the men knew the layout of the warehouse better than she did and, thus, it didn't matter how fast she was because they eventually managed to hit part of her. Not only did it make it hard to regenerate flames, it also broke her concentration and made it hellishly hard to stay in the air.

Kurt was already in the warehouse, doing what he did best - spinning, twisting and teleporting from person to person, trying to take out their opponents with the sheer speed and confusion of his attacks, and making good use of his sulfur gas into the bargain.

"Crap!" As soon as he burst through the door of the building himself, the first thing Bobby saw was Angel falling down towards the ground. Instinctively, he turned his hand backwards, shooting a stream of ice from it, and creating a chute underneath his feet. As he shot upwards into the air, he reached out with his free hand, squinting against the gas and hoping to catch Angel before it was too late.

Bobby's timely rescue was hampered when one of them men slammed a phosphorous grenade into Bobby's slide, ten feet behind him. He was already out of the blast radius, but his chute was shattered under him in the wake of the ferocious heat of the incendiary munitions.

Unable to fly and disoriented, Angel wrapped herself up in as much of a fire shield as she could before she hit the ground. She bounced several times on the hard concrete floor until she finally came to rest on her side several feet away. The leathers had saved her from broken ribs but Angel hurt as she shoved herself up to her feet - at least she'd been able to wrap her head in the fire. The air around her crackled with the heat as she faced the armed men since, after all, she didn't just generate fire around herself.

Several small boxes near the men caught fire from the manipulation of microwave energy, flaring brightly near the men's flank.

Pieces of debris around the battle area began lifting off the ground and the walls themselves on the ground floor area suddenly trembled as if there were an earthquake. Windows rattled and doors flew open and shut. Screws ripped themselves out of the boarded up windows and shot around the room.

Jean lay curled up on the floor, not too far from where the shell hit near her, her body shaking uncontrollably as she fought to regain control. Voices screamed in her head, thoughts of panic from the others, thoughts of people from down the block and around the city, as well as voices that should not have been there. She could not open her eyes.

With his ice chute shattered behind him, and losing his grip on Angel, Bobby didn't have time to readjust and attempt to make a new one before his body was sent flailing forward into the side of the building. He was just able to twist his body enough so his back slammed into the wall instead of his head. As his body crumpled to the ground, his eyes were too busy darting around the room in a daze to realize where he was, let alone put forward some sort of offensive to protect himself.

The complete break-down had taken only seconds. Tabitha knew she was a bit wild-eyed. She ducked the larger debris, but felt several small objects ping against her suit. Iceman hit the wall several feet from her own position. Limited visibility from all the crap flying through the air kept her from seeing anybody else, so she crouched to work her way toward him. Two black boots stepped right into her path.

Laurie offered a hand to Tabitha to help the older woman up, eyes scanning the warehouse to take in the rest of the battlefield. The wide open area meant her powers were going to be less then effective except at close range, and for that she’d need to put herself in danger’s way. Best she stay with one of the more offensively powered X-men till she could see something useful to do. “The rescue party didn’t go quite to plan, I see.”

Paige grinned tiredly, her voice, hilariously, gravelly. "If it makes you feel any better, our grab and go went pretty shirty, too. Want some help? I really want to punch these guys."

"I" Kyle croaked. "like the way you think." With his eyes having squeezed shut under the assault of the gas, he had scrambled towards the nearest source of clearer air. It had put him through literal blind luck near the returning first team. Now that his vision was finally clearing, seeing Paige and the rest was a sight for sore eyes.

There was a crash as Kane picked up one of the massive cargo boxes and used it to scatter two men. The X-Men coming from both sides had disoriented the men, and now they were fighting defensively, looking for targets and more importantly, a way out. He obliged them by slamming a second crate through the side of the building, opening up a huge hole that started to vent the room. "Colossus, get JP out of the building! Now!" He said, loping over to scoop up Jean. He didn't know who all was here trying to get them out, and he didn't want to risk crossing up their plans.

Jean-Phillipe was staggering weakly behind the group, clearly the worse for wear after his exposure to the nullifier. His stubborn French pride wanted to make it out of the building on his own two feet, but his body screamed otherwise. It was all he could do to keep from vomiting every few steps. He stumbled against Colossus, murmuring nonsensically in French.

Colossus nodded Kane and grabbed the small French man throwing himover his shoulder and moving for the exit in steel form. "Now, no powers, Sparky, metal conducts" said the Russian but he realized that he wasn't going to be thinking about his powers until he had fully recovered from the effects of the nullifier.

After letting his feet slide down next to his body, Drake slammed his feet down onto the floor. Pushing his way up to a standing base once again. As he staggered back against the wall, he shook his head from side to side, trying to refocus. Immediately, he slowed the molecules around his skin, shifting it into his ice form. As he stepped forward, attempting to find someone to hit, hopefully the joker with the heat grenades, he squinted against the smoke. Slowly, he was able to calm himself down to think things through, at least a bit. "Dominion, what are we looking at?"

"Trained soldiers with a bunch of anti-mutant gadgets." Kane yelled. They could tell the opposition was starting to crack. It would just take another hard push to send them running.

"Then it is a good thing I mostly cannot be nullified", Kurt said over his shoulder with a grin. "Wildchild, if you are recovered enough, to me."

Kyle had just enough time to cover his nose and mouth with one hand before Kurt grabbed both his shoulders and ported. The acrobatic blue man and his clawed teammate appeared in mid-air in a paff of sulfourous smoke, and then Kurt let go, dropping Kyle from a area very near the ceiling, and then teleporting away into the fray of men. They'd practiced this. Kyle knew he had enough time to recover from the teleport, and then land on one of the men, feet in the mercenary's chest, knees in his face, and claws doing their best to shred anything that looked vulnerable. Cloth, leather, skin...

Men around Angel were suddenly cursing as they flung or dropped their weapons in a hurry. She was standing with her hands slightly stretched out as she concentrated on exciting the microwaves surrounding the metal that she could see. Guns, belt buckles and parts of shoes suddenly became unbearably hot to the touch. Things melted and warped while others popped or burst.

The floor under her feet was starting to scorch as her fire shield flickered on and off as it tried to work around the sections of her that were covered in the flame retardant foam. Angel edged forward and, with her, a giant wall of heat that forced several people to back off.

"Everyone okay?" she asked over the comms, slightly out of breath from the pain in her side.

"It seems to be so," came Yvette's distinctive accent over the comms. The small red girl was covering their retreat from the other side in tandem with Paige, keeping the guards from blocking their impromptu exit. "But I do not ever want to see the nullifier again, thank you."

Garrison stepped out of the warehouse, getting Jean down behind a van and peering around the side. The figures in black were like phantoms, appearing and disappearing in the haze and smoke. More was billowing out of the upper office space, and he could hear glass smashing at the back of the warehouse.

"I think they're bugging out, X-Men. Whoop!" Kane said, snaking out an arm and catching Ray Maxwell back his collar as he tried to escape past him. "Not so fast, Ray. There's some men in blue that want to talk to you." There was no doubt that the arsons were intentional, and he had no intention of letting the firebug slip past him. The problem was how to get him to the police safely and with their involvement hidden.

"Hey, anyone see if M-Squad is still in the back? If they are, get them out the front."

Tabitha tossed her stolen mask to the side and paused at Garrison's words. "Wait, what?"

“Our erstwhile kidnappers, not really time for the whole story,” Laurie replied before turning and sprinting off to drag out the rest of M-Squad. “I’ve got it, Dominion.”

Garrison waited calmly, while Laurie slowly emerged with the blinking members of M-Squad. During the fight, they'd been smart enough to hide in the offices, and looked no worse for wear. Dr. Wainsborough looked around, blinking.

"My word, you have raised property destruction to an art form, haven't you?"

"Thank you, Docter Wainsborough. Not what I wanted to talk to you about. I'm assuming your association with Masters is done?"

"Of course. We're not slavers, unless you happen to ask the TAs, of course. No, it looks like we're out of business now. So much still to discover." He looked woebegone.

"Maybe not. Ray Maxwell here is going to need to be taken into custody. He needs treatment and the case needs to be closed. We can turn him over, but it would raise too many questions. If we turn him over to you, can you promise that you'll bring him to the police and that he'll be safely and humanely contained until SHIELD can take custody of him?" Kane said. He was a cop, and as tempting as it was to simply pluck Ray out of Chicago and to the mansion, the young man was sick. Better to have an example of a mutant facing the same responsibility as any other person.

"Why certainly."

"Your word, Doctor."

"Yes, my word. You're as distrustful enough to be a police officer, you know that?"

"I've been told. We will be keeping an eye on this, Doctor. Don't make us regret it."

The rest of M-Squad took over with Maxwell, Liebowitz speaking quietly to him while Lutz attached a small device that hummed lightly. "Ultra-sonic field. Makes it almost impossible to generate flame but has no side-effects beyond the occasional nose bleed." Kane nodded as they led him away. It was time for them to disappear as well.