Genosha: The Dawn of Liberation: Electrical Exoricism

[x-gambit.livejournal.com]

Many mutants, one monster, and only one will survive the meeting.



Despite their success, the wounded Moreau was still dangerous, and he howled in rage as he lashed at his attackers. The shattered ruins of the top three floors of the Citadel provided a dangerous perch, high over Hammer Bay and the Indian Ocean. Even battered him with all their powers, he remained on his feet and fighting, and unless they could end the conflict soon, any mistakes would leave bodies behind.

Terry ducked behind a chunk of ruined masonry and gulped down deep breaths, as much to ward off the tremors that threatened every time she stopped moving for very long as to replenish her air supply. Broad based sonic "punches" had proved ineffective at best. Okay, Cassidy. Brains over brawn, right? ...something something butterfly, sting like a bee, yeah? she thought to herself. She concentrated, peeling off the distractions of the fight around them long enough to focus her powers down to a narrow beam, then swung out and swiped at the behemoth that had been Moreau.

Tabitha hung back, packing heat and air into the bomb growing between her hands. "I just need an opening!" She shouted. "Or this is going to hurt us way more than him!"

Jack snarled, wrenching at the air with clawed fingers as if physically trying to peel away the armor. The organic plates were not only tough, but the molecular control stolen from Yvette made them almost impossible to grasp and detach -- and he hadn't managed to crack it even at full power.

"Haller doesn't have the juice to punch through this shit," he growled, abandoning his struggle to slam a piece of the Citadel into Moreau in frustration. "Any ideas . . . Phoenix?"


A faint, vaguely indulgent smile formed on Jean's lips. "I know what I'd like to do..." Her attention flickered up to the bomb Tabitha was amassing. "Shove Meltdown's bomb up Moreau's ass," she said, shaking her head as she helped Haller rip off the bits of the armor she could.

"Not quite sure he has one at this point though, so if we can find an opening...we could try to get her bomb inside."

A crevice. That was what they needed. Thinking quickly, Jack spun around.

"Callie! Any of that fungus shit still in Moreau?"

"Hmmm?" Callie turned to look at her former counselor with a quizzical expression. The chloropath had been too focused on keeping out of the way and not get herself killed to think of anything else. Especially not the fungus that she swore she had already killed off with Cammie's bodily secretions. But there was no harm in checking again, really, and so, vacant expression pasted on, Callie scanned the robot then slowly nodded.

"I missed some," she said. "There is some hiding under the metal. The poison couldn't reach them."

"Grow it," said Jack, unable to spare any more attention from Moreau. "Everything you can find, fast as you're able."

Callie took a deep breath and focused on pushing the plant life to grow and spread as fast as she could. She didn't quite understand why he wanted her to grow everything, but she didn't dare question the X-Man's plan; it was better than anything she had thought up, which was nothing. And part of her felt a seed of redemption by replacing the life she had killed.

Lichen is not by any means a complicated plant, so the chloropath knew that she could push its growth more than if it were something more intricate. Even so, she was uncertain as to how far she could sustain this use of her powers. She could feel the plant's need for sunlight; it would die if it could not breathe or use the sun's energy to feed itself.

Callie wasn't aware that she was holding her breath until she spotted the fungus pushing its head out from behind its metallic confines and let out a deep sigh of contentment.

Bomb tucked under her arm like a football, Tabs sprinted forward. She dropped under a flailing limb and slid the rest of the way on her hip. Lightning-like pain shot through that hip, but she grabbed hold of the edge of a metal plate to shove the bomb into the soft tissue underneath of it.

A blow from the side sent her flying, pain exploded in her ribs. She barely remembered to detonate the bomb.

"You're supposed to say go long." Bishop quipped as he caught Tabitha in bowed arms, cradling her so the impact of hitting him didn't cause much more damage. "Luckily, I have good reflexes."

Terry continued to lash out in short, slicing lances, aimed for the cracks and doing her best impression of a turkey carver. Until the cracks were obliterated by Tabitha's bomb. She turned and ducked back behind cover, her arms flying up to cover her head.

Jack threw up a shield to curtail the initial burst of shrapnel, then whipped it into a lance of force. He drove it into a crack in the biggest section of plate he could find, and pushed. And kept pushing until the plate separated from the body of Moreau. A plate equal in durability to all the others.

A grim smile spread across the telekinetic's face. Without a second of hesitation, he took the organic plate and stabbed it between the join of another. As the swelling lichen popped segment after artificial segment, Jack's telekinesis slammed on the loose end of his stolen plate like a hammer striking the end of a lever, and the dark plate tore free like the cork from a champagne bottle.

Jack's smile became fierce, and he moved the plate to do it again. And again, and again.

"Let me get one of those bombs tossed in to me." Bishop asked as he set Tabitha down onto her feet before sprinting in toward the open sections of armor quickly. He called out on the way,

"Someone keep the shrapnel off me."

"On it," Jean said, keeping a key eye on Tabitha and Bishop. Bits of debris bounced off an invisible shield as if Bishop were in a bubble as he ran.

Somehow, Tabs scraped energy from the dregs of her boots to form one last bomb. She packed it tightly, as small as she could fit. Then chucked it into Bishop's waiting hands.

Bishop caught the pass, shoulder checking his way in past the exposed joints that Haller had been targeting, and lodging himself in under one of the plates to get the most effect he could from the explosion. The smaller the space, the bigger the effect he could get. He used his body to help block in the explosion. He could always use a higher charge.



“Fred, John, Jubilee – get over here!” Remy ordered, as they reached him, he spread them into a defensive position. They were clustered by the remains of a massive steel support, which offered the best cover possible. When they were in position, he hobbled back over to where the telepaths had arranged everyone in a circle.

“We’ll cover you de best we can. You sure about dis?” He said quietly to Emma, trusting her to be honest about their chances.

Emma looked round at her, she had to admit it by this point, motley crew. She caught Jean's eye and the other telepath nodded firmly, both women aware of how important their experience and sheer telepathic strength would be in ensuring this construct would hold together long enough to trap Moreau's mind. "Absolutely," she said to Remy, and then reached out with her mind, gathering the consciousness of everyone tightly within her telepathic hands and then stepping into Moreau's version of the Astral Plane.

"Well, well," said Emma as she looked around her. "How perfectly appropriate."

The field they found themselves on first appeared to be an exposed circle of pavement roughly the circumference of a football field edged with bits of landscaping recognizable from the areas in and around the Citadel. Immediately, though, the wrongness of the scene settled in: what had first seemed to be concrete revealed itself to be almost microscopic accretions of circuitry, and the messy asymmetry of nature had been replaced with shining, perfectly formed creations of wire and plastic.

The real sight, however, lay beyond.

On every side stretched infinite copies of the Citadel. Each tower was spaced with geometric precision, pristine and impermeable with a silicon sheen, as if what remained of Moreau's humanity perceived the powerful computer processors that maintained his consciousness into an echo of the Genoshan seat of power. Streams of bald, faceless drones in mutate bodysuits streaked from one Citadel to another, anthropomorphic representations of subroutines and electronic impulses that moved so quickly the human mind could scarcely process them. A sun that provided no more warmth than a fluorescent light shone down on them from a dead-grey sky.

Shapes flickered among the spires.

The state of everything in this landscape reflected in Meggan’s constantly shifting astral form, iridescent as a soap bubble, as it picked up and reflected each emotion she was receiving. It soaked in instinctively, frequently causing her to return to a vibrant, angry shade of red in keeping with the state of affairs, and the atrocities that had been committed. The residual emotions of that leaked all over the place, it was impossible not to react. Not here.

It was similar what she had experienced when communing with New York City the other time she’d linked up, but on a grander scale. A sickeningly rancid scale, she knew, thanks to the corruption and pain inflicted. She turned to look around, trying not to stare at those utterly emotionally blank drones further off, and ignoring the uneasy feelings they made well up for all to see. Despite that, she was ready to be their emotional bridge to pinpoint just where in this landscape Moreau himself was camping out.

And not just his…empty, emotionless creations wandering, and marching left and right.

Jim barely allowed himself to register their surroundings; he had to establish the link before Moreau had time to react. But though he could establish it, he knew he wouldn't be able to maintain it. All his concentration was needed for Moreau.

Trailing ghost-images of his other selves, the telepath turned to the one he had been least comfortable involving in this.

"Maddie, watch me," he said, and turned to the three non-psis who had accompanied them.

First he reached for Doug. Jim reached out, and from the younger man's avatar unspooled a thread -- reflective, almost metallic, just like the sheen of his astral form. The one he pulled next pulsed with gentle, organic iridescence, like the wings of a dragonfly -- Meggan's contribution. These he held in one hand while he pulled the last.

The inclusion of Layla's thread, a strong orange of deepening and lightning hues, also caused him some concern. He'd been told others had discovered she had some sort of passive secondary mutation, perhaps predictive, but he couldn't be sure. He was unsure it would help, and he was worried what would happen if Moreau got to them, but the same necessity that had driven them to recruit Maddie had also lead them to take a chance on Layla.

With swift, sure movements Jim braided the threads into a tight rope. It was a metaphor for the link they were creating: Doug for his pattern recognition and processing abilities, Meggan for her empathy, and Layla for whatever assistance she could provide. With this link, they hoped to circumvent whatever defenses Moreau could muster.

Holding the end firm, Jim placed the rope in Maddie's hand.

"Keep it held tight," he told her, closing her fingers around the end. She was so young. "Unless someone holds it, it'll unravel. Can you do that?"

Maddie nodded. She knew she shouldn't be here, but now that she was, she was overwhelmed with the strange beauty of everything. It was wrong, and grotesque, with all those Mutates flying around against the shiny Citadels, but it was also beautiful.

"No letting go," she said after she had snapped out of her state of awe. Her grip on the strings tightened, as she looked up at Haller, eyes shifting as she tried to focus on the ghostly images that surrounded him. "I got it. Promise."

Jim nodded, and three other faces nodded with him. "And I promise that if anything happens, I'll be right here," he said. Her astral form was . . . solid, compared to the rest of the astral plane, almost as if she were being projected against a greenscreen. It was mildly unusual, and as such he filed it away for later. Instead he only gave Maddie one last faint smile before turning to Jean and giving her a much curter nod.

Jean studied the landscape. The dead sky, the city around them, and the mutates mulling about evoked a certain hint of familiar unease that she quickly shoved back. No, it was different. Decidedly more technological and less waterlogged ruin.

The air around her astral form shimmered like heat radiating off a sidewalk and her body had a slightly reddish-orange glow that was more pronounced in her hair, which seemed to have the translucence and fluidity of flame, billowing around her. She looked back to Haller with a blank expression, then glanced back to the students to check on them.

This was all really, really strange. Like a fucked up dream or what she sort of imagined an acid trip to be like. Layla looked down at herself, bright and orange. She was sort of spotty or pulsing or something. It was weird but it sort of seemed to fit. Like it was right. It didn't make logical sense out of her sort of gut instinct and it probably wouldn't ever because this was totally fucking weird. It was like being in an Escher drawing or a Dali painting or something. The teenager fingered the thread that had been drawn from her like an umbilical cord. It felt sturdy, sort of. Like it wasn't gonna snap. "Am I gonna drift off an get lost if this breaks?" There was genuine worry there but she didn't stay focused on it for very long. "Okay, so what exactly are we doing? Like, I know we're trying to find the psycho but, like, how?"

Suddenly, some of the mutates turned, and they could see that the bald, tattooed faces were all the same - Thomas Moreau, his blunt features twisted into a leering smile as they suddenly dove at the mutants. As they passed, whispers flocked around them, telling them to give up, to give in, that this was better. The waves broke around them, and then dissipated, returning to the orderly flocks of previous.

Dead sky, spires upon endless spires...it could have been a sequence from The Matrix, Doug decided. The mutates were like the pods - completely dehumanizing, driven by a need to enforce submission on the Other. A need to turn people into resources.

It was drastically different from the mindscape he had entered when confronting Mastermold, but it was still familiar ground, as it were. The rules of the environment would be defined by Moreau, and they were the invaders attempting to assert their wills in order to achieve an objective. And indeed, as a host of mutates turned their empty gazes on the seven astral forms and turned to surge forward, their invasion had clearly been noticed. Doug's thought shifted - the mutates weren't there to represent resources, they were the Agents - the antibodies of the system, featureless, numberless, relentless.

{{impossible:.:there is no resistance:.: inevitable:.:you will not stop me:.:long live the heroes of the revolution:.:}}

Doug hesitated, having been about to launch himself forward to do battle with the mutate horde, and somehow turn back the tide. But the memory...gave him pause.

"That is the sound of...inevitability, Mr. Anderson. It is the sound of your death."

Doug looked down at the burnished steel of his hands. A form made of liquid metal, malleable, able to mimic any form and appearance. The T-1000. The corrupting touch of Agent Smith, reaching inside and converting everything into himself. A mimic, a mockingbird. That was all he would ever be. A mirror for others to see themselves reflected in. Another memory took hold, from a room deep inside the Citadel that repeated off into infinity. A memory of drowning, the same way he'd drowned inside of Mastermold. History repeating itself, again and again. Futility.

Before his eyes, moisture began to coat his metal hands, then spread up his arms, rust and tarnishing following in their wake, all pushed along by a single, grotesque thought.

~What if I only thought that I beat her?~

"Doug." Emma breathed the word, a whisper of sorrow. She would never regret what she had done to Doug so that he could stop Mastermold, but she wished that it hadn't left the pain behind. Then she frowned. Beyond pain. This wasn't just pain. This was a black hole in Doug's head, a hole she knew well, the hole she had fallen down so recently. Emma yearned to turn her mind fully to Doug, to catch him before he fell, but she was held back by duty. This gestalt had to hold together and Doug's mental health issues were not the most important thing to concentrate on right now. With a small sigh, Emma stopped herself from reaching out to her Knight.

She didn't even notice that her astral form's outfit shimmered around her and shifted into her White Queen's formal regalia.

Jean sucked in a breath and she snapped her head over as Doug's thought made her reflexively put up a mental shield that reflected in the astral world by the heat shimmer around her suddenly igniting into flames and radiating outward like a bubble. Something was wrong. She stared at Doug, keeping her voice calm, trying to shut away the helplessness that rolled off him as she saw the rust all over his astral form. She dodged a few of the mutates while telekinetically blasting a couple of them back.

"Cypher..." Jean said.

Emotions rained down on Maddie, sending a chill down her spine. She looked down at the braid in her hands, and glanced up at the three people tethered to her, suddenly very unsure of what to do. Her hands were shaking, her palms felt strangely sweaty, and her heart felt like it housed a hummingbird trying to escape. "I can't do this," she whispered, shaking her head. "No. I shouldn't be doing this."

"Hold on, Maddie," Jim said, but he could feel something going awry over the link. Blocked. Something was . . . blocked . . . but too much of something else was bleeding through, something that was making things in his head slide . . .

Gritting his teeth, Jim thrust out his arms. A pillar of water swirled around the seven mutants, leaving them for an instant in the eye of a hurricane before collapsing. It flooded the plane to sweep away the converging mutates, boiling where it passed before Jean.

"Focus!" he yelled, his voice echoing as if issuing from four throats. "Where is Moreau?"

Meggan looked over at the sound of multiple voices, shaken away from becoming swamped within the cascade of darker emotions. The feelings that were emanating from Doug’s part of the line, that had made her astral form look burnt around the edges for a moment as it flowed. She had assumed the ghosting from the man was just the astral plane playing tricks on them, like a faulty connection on an old television set, something caused by Moreau, and them being in the middle of everything, but now she wasn’t so confident of that theory. Pushing aside her many questions, she went back to her task.

Focus on now, not later. Ignore her curiosity, push aside all worry as best she could, get back to the task.

She looked at the spires again, head tilted, before she caught it. She had to be sure, and then she was. “There,” Meggan shouted, sounding more certain of that fact than she anticipated. “It’s there. It’s that one, the one in the middle. There’s more pouring from there than anywhere else in this place.” She pointed toward the spires, the tallest of them all, the one that pulsed the most like his emotional self. It felt hot, scalding, vulnerable to her, like his center. Thrumming away at such a steady pace that she had overlooked it at first, until she’d looked again. “That’s the real one,” she repeated. Close to where the Mutates were swarming like ants.

Layla was so fucking confused. She was so over being totally in over her head here. The mutate clones had rushed and then just vanished, Doug was possibly freaking out because everyone kept saying his name and what the hell was she doing in here? Out. of. my. league, the girl thought even as she turned to focus on where Meggan was staring. Right, they were after that guy and...they were supposed to do something about it. What, though?

The blonde reanimator focused on the spot, on the center of the replicating mutates. "OKay instincts, any time now," she whispered, wracking her brain. A movie-like series of blurs rushed past Layla, streaking off into the distance she was staring at. It was weird but it was all weird here. She didn't even realize those blurs had come from her. Her brain kicked in, but all she could think was bad plan. They could rush in and leave her and Meggan and Doug here but they would get torn apart. Someone could stay with them but Maddie was flipping out and whatever was going on with Doug would make it worse. Everything ended in failure there. New question, what didn't end in failure?

Several streaks came rushing back to where Layla and the others stood. They could deal with Doug, Layla realized as three streaks stopped around him and turned into three variously shaded orange Laylas who were inspecting him. They could deal with Maddie, which brought a fourth Layla standing next to her. But neither of those really seemed like good ideas. Suddenly all four Laylas disappeared and a single new streak came back from the epicenter Meggan had found.

"We can't all go there," Layla finally said, focus coming back to the people around her and the distant look on her face fading. "I mean, you guys can't." She pointed to Dr Grey, Haller and Ms Frost, then looked up at the sky as if it would help her explain herself. The newly arrived Layla was in front of Emma, trying to flag her down and point her at Doug. When she didn't move it tried the same thing with Meggan. It even resorted to trying to push the girl in his direction but while it looked like it made contact with her it had absolutely no effect on her at all. The second Layla tried to push her and ultimately fell through her. It picked itself up and tried again, this time with its back to Meggan's side but the illusion of it pushing dissolved when it fell through her again. So it resorted to flailing its arms at her and jumping up and down. "But if, like, Ms Frost and Meggan help," the real Layla gestured in Doug's general direction, "whatever's going on with him, and Mr Haller helps calm Maddie down then...well," the second Layla gave up on Meggan and tried for Jean. It went right through her shield and tried to pick up her hand and tug her toward the real Moreau. "Me and Dr Grey can deal with him. Until Doug and Maddie are okay again."

The second Layla was resorting to rather comical levels of exaggerated gesticulation at this point. She was trying for Jean but gave up and went to the real Layla who had finally looked back down from the sky. The real Layla jumped. "What the fuck is there another me for?"

Jean was taking deep breaths, and slowly opened her eyes as Layla spoke, then looked down at the hand in her own. Though not unusual, the vortex of water Haller had created to beat the mutates back was unexpected. And even if for a brief moment the sight of it threatened to rip her heart out of her chest. But she couldn't afford to do that...too much at stake.

Something about what Layla was saying seemed off. These were not just arbitrary guesses. She studied the apparitions Layla was throwing off. They weren't like Haller's. They seemed to have a specific purpose, like she were seeing what was and what could be. There was something more to it. Almost...guided.

She glanced up, toward where Meggan had pointed, then back to Layla, and finally up to the rest of the telepaths and those with them.

"I think there's something going on here. An ability. Something bigger than just random directions. We're going to go with Layla's plan. Emma, Meggan, stay with Doug. Try to get him up and running again. Haller, keep up with Maddie. I'll go with Layla," Jean said, taking a step forward toward Layla. She didn't much like the idea of what it entailed, but she had a feeling the girl was onto something.

She only hoped it worked. Blind faith was a powerful thing.

***

Jim turned to Maddie, cursing himself for putting her in this position. Her astral form was strangely blurred around the edges, and her face had gone so white her freckles stood out like spots of drying blood. Whatever bleed he was getting was only a fraction of what was really going on. As the link's conduit, Maddie felt it all.

The counselor swallowed his guilt and stepped forward. "Maddie, stay calm," he said. "I'm going to help you."

She was still clutching the braid, but her hands were shaking. Jim reached around her, close enough that she could feel the warmth of his astral body at her back, and rested his hands on her elbows.

"Listen to me," Jim continued. "These emotions aren't yours. We're going to separate them. That metallic thread, the one that comes from Doug -- keep the other two pinched in one hand, but pull Doug's thread from the rope."

The young telepath sat motionless on the grass-like wires, staring down at the threads in her hands. They looked so fragile, like the lines of a kite. If she let go of them, they would drift away, becoming lost in the endless mindscape of a true madman. No matter what, she had promised Mr. Haller, she would not let go.

"I-I can't," Maddie said quietly. "Something is not right. I can't leave them. I can't let them down. They need me." She looked up and back at the man behind her as best she could. "You told me they need me."

"You aren't abandoning anyone." Over her shoulder, the shape of Haller's face and tone of the voice changed. Now the hands on her arms were bigger, broader than they had been.

"You've done nothing wrong," said the telepath, but his voice was faint. The dominant strain now was deeper, mellowed by a faint Southern undertone. "I was the one who made a mistake. What we're going to do now isn't letting them down. It's making things right."

Was she hallucinating? Maddie swore that Mr. Haller had been right behind her a moment before, but the man behind her was not him. It was her father. Her tall, strong Army officer father. Her father who fell into a deep southern accent when he was mad or tired, though you could hear it when he said certain words. He had come to protect her, to keep her safe from this murderous man she was helping fight, and to make sure she made it home safely.

But this was not her father. His voice was too deep, and his face was too stubbly to be her father. She looked down at the hands; there were none of the faint scars she knew. These hands didn't belong to the man who made sure the monsters under her bed and in her closet were gone before he tucked her into bed. Maddie looked back at him once more. "You're not my father," she said, faintly. It wasn't accusatory, it was just a fact.

"You're not my father."

The face next to her dipped into a nod. "No. I'm not." The hands remained solid but loose on her arms, unflinching. "But I'm still here to help you."

The young girl looked down at the strings in her hand; he had created them, she had to trust him. "Okay." She nodded slowly. "Okay."

"All right." Her head was turned to the threads, but there was a smile in the man's reply. It was fleeting, however. "Take Doug's thread," Jim said. "As carefully as you can, start working it away from the other two. Try and keep the other two threads in your other hand as tight as you can."

Deep breaths, Maddie instructed herself. She closed her eyes for a few moments, trying to center herself and push the anxiety and fear out of the way. It didn't really work, as her hands were still shaking when she opened her eyes to focus on the task before her. All of the strings were in clenched tightly in her right hand, and with nimble fingers, she started picking at the metallic thread. She worked carefully to free the end, pinching it between the forefinger and thumb of her right hand as her left hand worked to unweave it; at no time was Doug's thread completely loose, she was careful about that.

When at last she managed to completely isolate the thread, she sighed in relief and looked up at Haller once more. "Now what?"

"Now I help." Jim removed one hand from Maddie's arm and stretched it over the thread. Liquid energy flowed from his hand to engulfing the thread like frozen water, and his astral form momentarily quadrupled as he took the brunt of the negative emotions before he could stabilize himself. For just an instant he got a flash of emotion, filtered through his own perceptions.

Boxes. A hall filled with boxes, neat and orderly, but the lids were bulging and the contents had begun to spill . . .

Jim squeezed his eyes shut and forced himself back to the task at hand. "Concentrate on the other two," he instructed. "While Doug is down, Jean needs to pull from Layla and Meggan. That is what those cords represent."

A cool wave of relief spread through her body, relaxing the tension Maddie didn't know she had been storing, clenched in every muscle. It was okay, she realized, it was going to be just fine, They were going to protect her, she only needed to do what she had been asked. It wasn't her responsibility to fix everything, to set things right, and she wasn't abandoning anyone, they were all still there. All she needed to do was keep Meggan and Layla connected for Jean.

But the strings in her hand were loose, and Maddie could feel the connection weakening.

"Hold Doug's thread for me, only for a moment," she explained to Haller. "Meggan and Layla... it's too weak. I'm going to knot them together."

Jim raised his eyebrows. Not only was the suggestion a surprise, it was a good one. Inexperienced though she was, she had not only perceived the weakness in the link, but intuitively guessed at a way to correct it. And he realized, too, that it wasn't his imagination -- her astral form was sharpening, like an image coming back into focus. That sense of solidarity, of that almost hyper-realness, was reasserting itself.

With a brisk nod, the telepath took the thread. "Do it," he said. "Follow your instincts."

She made quick work of tying the two ends together into a simple Fisherman's knot. "There." The knot held as Maddie gave the strings a sharp tug. "I will take back Doug's thread. This should hold them together nicely. Now, all they need to do is catch that bastard."

***

Meggan almost wasn’t sure where to begin when it came to untangling the mass of negative feelings in Doug, she’d never done anything like this before. Certainly not in this place, so it was a whole new ballgame for her, so she was looking to Emma. She wasn’t sure if she should call her Miss Frost like her sister, but it probably didn’t matter. “So,” she began. “Do we just start with the deepest pain, and work our way down?” The biggest of the black knots was closest, and felt like the worst when it came to the scope of pain the closer she was to it. It was by far the darkest emotionally now that she was putting her undivided attention to it and not focusing more on Moreau, making her wince at the sharpness of it.

Until he’d thrown off the link, she hadn’t realized how much was there. She didn’t know the root cause, but hoped untangling alone worked, didn’t rip open anything else. If only there were combs on the astral plane--or scissors.

Emma looked down at the visual representation of Doug's pain and sighed. There were things she could do, could have done, if only... and if only got you nowhere. There was old, old pain here and she had made some of it happen and then there was shiny new pain overlaid on top of it in intricate patterns.

"We don't have time for what I could do, but I can make the things we need to do it quick and dirty," she replied to Meggan. "Doug," she leaned forward and captured his psychic face within her hands. "We need function. Just function. To do enough to stop the worst of what's happening inside your head destroying us while we try and take down Moreau. I can't deal with all of it now. I'm probably not the right person to deal with it at all, really." Being both cause and therapist was always a bad idea. "But anything you need after we get out of this, I will give to you. Just help us stabilise you, now."

"I've been -trying- to, Emma," Doug snapped back, unusually heated for him. The harder he tried to tamp down and box away everything, the more it seemed to be sabotaging things for everyone. Just another thing to chalk up as his fault. He was needed, and he couldn't even manage to be -useful-. His despair was a tangible thing, curling in on itself and bringing every thought back to the central concept that he was a failure. Not good enough. Useless.

Meggan wanted to beg him to try even harder, but that might just have the opposite effect and cause him to sink even more into the despair. She didn’t know and she didn’t want to be the one to dump even more pain on him. It wasn’t like they could just throw Doug down, sit on him, and start picking apart emotionally drama-filled knots in him. “Focus on something besides the pain, if that helps,” she started carefully as she crouched down closer to him. “Focus on the people that need you, that love you, friends…start from there, see if it helps with loosening any knots at all. Please.” She didn’t want to say it couldn’t be that bad, because she didn’t know what it was that had triggered this, and changed it into something like a mudslide. A mudslide with thick, cumbersome knots and intricate black patterns, but it still an emotional one in her opinion.

“Something that can get you to realize that you’re not an awful person. Good things, small things that could add up to feeling better. You’ve never been nasty and cruel willingly, you’ve always helped,” she finished as best she could, not knowing what else to tell him to get through to him. Meggan couldn’t help remembering all the times Doug had watched cartoons with her when she was small and fuzzy and new to everything, and she didn't like seeing him being pulled down by so much sadness and self-loathing.

The endless waves of mutates, all wearing the face of Thomas Moreau, still marched for the mental 'barricades' that had been placed against them. His attention fell on the form of Doug, curled in on itself and bent. Attack the weakest link, and the rest of the chain will split. "It's like I said, Junior. You can't stop me."

Reflections didn't have to be a bad thing, Doug realized, Meggan's pleas registering and taking hold. Sometimes what others saw in you was a thing even greater than what you were. His own perception of himself...what if that was the thing that was wrong? Trust.

Doug straightened, trusting the others within the link. "No," he said in response to Moreau's taunts, as they came from a hundred thousand mouths, a whisper against the cries from outside their bastion. He let the images of 'Doug' from the others flow into him, and repair the damage that doubt had wreaked on his form. A good man, a smart man. That was what they saw in him.

A knight.

Water - Haller's element, but soothing and healing, with the gentlest of touches, sluiced over him. Fire - Jean, cleansed and burned the water away. Earth - Emma, diamond skin filling into the rusted away gaps, making him whole again. Air - Madelyne, swirling around him and bringing a breath of fresh air amid the dead stink of Moreau. Heart - Meggan's empathic touch, calming and centering. Mind - Layla, and her ability to predict that was at once familiar and yet completely alien.

~By your powers combined...~ He couldn't resist the whimsical thought.

Where his form, and the thread in the bundle Maddie was responsible for maintaining, had previously been dull, rusting, it shone again. Armor sprang up around his body, the same armor that had settled around Marie-Ange's image just a short time before.

This was familiar ground. He remembered now, and he knew what needed to be done. His experience with Mastermold, rather than being the weakness that would ruin them all, would be the weapon he needed against Moreau. In the NYSE, he had needed too much attention to give to saving his own physical form, and Mastermold had used that window to escape into the ether. He would not let the same happen to Moreau.

Flickers of Moreau's 'true' consciousness scattered throughout the mindscape, now here, now there, now seemingly nowhere at all. But Meggan could spot the truth, the glimmers of his mind and emotions. Layla knew instinctively the correct actions. And Doug could predict what Moreau would do next. No matter how complex the mind, inevitably they would fall back into familiarity.

"I'm back," he said quietly to the rest of the link. "Let's take him down."

Emma grinned at her Knight, a flash of sheer delight that some part of him was back. "Ladies and gentlemen," she said, "time to start our collective engine. Meggan, Layla, Doug - finding Moreau is your job. The real Moreau. Not these duplicates. You've started well, Meggan, but having the others along should increase our success twenty-fold. Layla," Emma smiled as small ghost Laylas flittered past her, "let us know if anything else we're doing needs fixing. Jean, Haller, it looks like we're the heavy hitters here - we need to pen Moreau in one place. A lot easier, I suspect, with all of us doing it rather than just Jean. Maddie, help with the walls as much as you can, but keep an eye on those threads. We need to make sure we get the best information possible and keeping Meggan, Layla and Doug linked is crucial for that. From what I've read of his mind, Moreau's consciousness is incredibly fragmented. We need to make sure we get all of it, or there's a chance he'll escape even if his body is killed." She looked back at Doug again, smiling at his firm nod. "We will not be allowing that to happen again. Is everybody clear?"

"Clear," replied Jim, and gave Maddie's shoulder a squeeze. "Watch the threads," he murmured. "Trust your instincts."

"Threads and walls? I think I got it." The young girl nodded, having already started working on unknotting Layla and Meggan's threads so that Doug could be worked in once more. "You guys just do your things."

A haze of steam and flame seemed nestled around Jean as she stepped into view. Tendrils of water were being burned away. Wet hair and clothing sizzled as it turned into flame. "Let's take the bastard down," Jean said.

***

And they did, all of them doing their 'things' together. It was like the mental link with Marie-Ange and Artie that Doug and Emma had been part of to find the computer controlling Moreau's gunnery. Only much bigger, with the 'horsepower' of each of their individual powers behind it.

Layla's 'ghosts' were seemingly everywhere, her ability to examine multiple courses of action amplified by the increased bandwidth of the link. And each time one of the Moreau mutates turned to try and chase one of them, it stuck out its tongue and vanished, the other six members of the link practically hearing a 'meep meep' from her. One of the ghosts stopped behind a mutate, jumping up and down, waving her arms over her head, giving it elaborate 'bunny ears' and 'moose antlers' with her hands.

"There," Doug murmured, the word almost unnecessary, as the sevenfold link was moving together at peak efficiency. A reinforced cage dropped over the fragment of Moreau, the bars and reinforced concrete hearkening to the cell that Doug and Haller had shared within the Citadel. A flash flood washed away the other, false Moreaus, and cleared a path for the cage to be pulled back toward the psionic strong point the Xavier's contingent occupied. Offense shifted fluidly to defense, and guns appeared instantaneously in both Doug's and Haller's hands, and they gunned down a set of mutates that were trying to sneak around and flank them.

Meggan's empathic 'sight' overlaid the link, and the group perceived the mindscape as she saw it. Unerringly, she pointed at another mutate, and all of them could feel the 'wrongness', the oily film of hatred and smug self-righteous superiority that Thomas Moreau had displayed at every turn. Emma took the lead, gesturing imperiously, as befit a Queen. The mutates cowered, split apart by glittering crystalline walls, and Emma sauntered between them, as if she were striding the catwalk or the halls of the Hellfire Club, rather than a battlefield. A riding crop appeared in her hand, and she drove the second fragment before her viciously, back to the cage, where she unceremoniously picked him up and tossed him in, dusting her hands as if the mere touching of him had soiled her.

"There's still one more," Doug murmured, feeling agreement from the others. Without all of the pieces gathered together, they couldn't complete the trapping of his consciousness. Each of them scanned the field, but neither Layla's ghosts nor Meggan's sight identified anything.

~Predict. See the pattern,~ Doug told himself. What did he know of Thomas Moreau? The kind of man he was, the way he reacted... "Ah." Doug's eyes narrowed, scanning not the horde of mutates, but the endlessly repeating copies of the Genoshan Citadel. Scanning...scanning... "That one," he cried, pointing at one that looked just like all the others. But he was sure. "Jean!"

A flaming bird sprang into being, a shrill raptor shriek echoing over the field, and causing the mutates nearest the building Doug had pointed out to stagger, clutching their ears. The bird reared back and stooped upon the Citadel, slicing a gigantic piece off the top and letting it fall ponderously to the ground, crushing a score of the mutate throng. Revealed within the remains of the tower, where the President's office would have been in the real world, was a desk where Thomas Moreau, a true copy of his former body rather than the shaved and suited body of a mutate, sat. Hate twisted his face, then disbelief, then panic. The firebird came back around, snatching him up neatly in a claw and turning back for the cage. Moreau twisted and struggled, but it was futile, and he fell like the others into the cage.

But even though they had all the pieces, they still had to keep them trapped, anchored while they withdrew. Doug turned to the final member of the team and nodded.

As the last Moreau fell into the cage, Emma smiled in triumph as the enclosed Moreaus alternatively snarled, clawed at the bars of the cage and threw itself against them in panic. “Oh no, you see,” she said, conversationally. “We can’t have three of you. Just in case one of you gets away. It’s one in, all in for you, I’m afraid, Dr Moreau. And dear Maddie has given me a most excellent idea.” Between her hands a rope appeared, an odd mixture of crystalline white-blue and something almost greenish-grey with rot. “I found this in Kyle’s head a while ago. I was keeping it to look at, but I think it’ll do nicely for you. It’s hate, you know. Old hate. Killing rage. It would eat your face if I gave it the chance, but I’ve got different plans for it now.”

With a swift movement, the crystalline rope snaked between the bars and around the three Moreaus, binding them all into a lasso as the rope met and wound around itself. As it tightened the bars melted away and Emma stepped close to the struggling Moreaus. “This is my world,” she said, gesturing around them. “And you will do what I want.” The lasso began to tighten, strangely hungry for what should have been an inanimate object. It looped up again until it bound around the three necks, and down again around ankles, pulling tighter all the time so the three Moreaus inched closer and closer together until finally they began to overlap. “That’s it,” encouraged Emma and the rope snaked tighter again until, with a last angry scream from three mouths, the Moreaus merged.

One man stood in front of Emma then and glared at her, bound as he was within ropes. It seemed nothing but furiously angry now and opened its mouth to rage, an action unfulfilled as a ball gag suddenly appeared within its mouth. “Oh no,” said Emma, “you don’t get any say in this anymore.” She snapped her wrist and the greenish-grey disappeared from the rope, leaving it pure crystalline blue. “This is between you and me now. And I’ve already won.” Another rope appeared in Emma’s hands and she began to wrap it around Moreau’s body, a slow and sinuous weave that drifted her hands across his avatar in seductive violation. His hands were bound first, then between his thighs and down to his feet, Emma tightening the bonds until Moreau’s avatar was driven to its knees. Through his feet, back through the knots at his hands and then up and around his neck, a practised sequence of moves that Emma knew well. She tied the final knot and stepped back in satisfaction, leaving Moreau abjectly on her knees in front of her.

“Every time you struggle, every time you move, the knots tighten,” she said. “Every time you try and escape, the noose gets tighter, each breath shallower, each breath closer to your last. It can be,” Emma’s breath hissed in over her teeth, “exquisite.” She looked down at the man at her feet. “But not for you. Not ever for you. And don’t think the rope will break. Here, I’m stronger than you will ever be, and that rope is a part of me. You will stay here and you will not move until we are done with you, Thomas Moreau.”

She leaned down, her last words breathed into his ears only. “Be thankful the children are here, petty king. Or I would do things to you that would make you wish that you had never been born. Be grateful that all you’re going to get is an easy death.”

Emma straightened up. “He won’t be moving,” she said. “Not at all. I think our job here is done.”

***

"Hey guys!" Maddie jumped up and flailed excitedly. "Guys guys look!" She held up the astral threads, now neatly held together by a series of knots, creating a thin strip of fabric flecked with orange, silver, and a changing iridescent color. Throughout the fight, she had been furiously knotting the threads together, maintaining and strengthening the connection of the different powers. "I made a friendship bracelet, and it helped you guys to defeat Moreau!"

"Guys, we defeated him with the magic of friendship!"

***

The quartet of telepaths and the three who were assisting them stood motionless in the lee of the steel support. Beyond the scant shelter the lessening bulk of Moreau thrashed under the continued assault, but not even the impact of something huge and unseen striking the ground just beyond the support elicited a response from the linked. As long as their consciousnesses occupied the accelerated relative time of the astral plane, they were beyond the reach of outside stimuli.

Only the faintest of physiological changes gave any sign of what might be occurring within. A prickling of sweat, the whitening of the face . . . and that was all.

The air around Jean suddenly flickered, like fireflies in summer. The flickers soon erupted into a blinding light as tendrils of flame poured from her and the shape of a bird made of fire shook itself into being like a lit match striking gasoline. Its wings curled around Jean's arms and spread themselves outward as its head reared back and let out a soundless cry toward the sky, mimicking Jean's own mouth as she let out a gasp.

Jubilee swore mentally, raising her hands to send a stream of plasma fireworks at the fiery bird. "Mutate attack!"

It hurt, like razor blades down her face but she wasn't about to let Jean get hurt.

As she lashed out, Remy grabbed her by the collar and wrenched her back, sending the plasma charges upwards and erratic. He quieted her with a tight grip.

"Relax, petite," He said, watching the firebird with an expression half way between fear and wonder. "Dat's no mutate."

Jubilee had cut off her powers as soon as Remy grabbed her, and now she stood loosely, and didn't try to break his grip as the firebird stretched outward, awestruck by the physical manifestation of Jean's will and determination.

As if on some unseen cue, fourteen joined hands tightened in unison.

Heatless flame scattered across the circle as the apparition swirled away. Color returned to faces, rapid breathing slowed, and for an instant what remained of Jean's power settled over the group like a golden mist. A handful of seconds passed. Only a handful, but on the astral plane even a handful could be an eternity.

Then through all present rippled a single thought:

~We have him.~



Moreau was staggering, a lashing blow nearly killing Nico as she dove out of the way. Remy pushed them forward hard, sensing the vulnerability. Moreau’s mind was under attack, his weapons and armor compromised and his reactions slowed. But his massive bulk still made him frighteningly effective in absorbing damage, and he could kill instantly – as deadly as a cornered bear facing a dog pack.

They'd been fighting for awhile now, and Warren was starting to feel exhaustion creeping in slowly. But he chose to ignore, instead pushing himself beyond the point of tired. He could sleep once they'd won. He'd grabbed Fred by the back of the neck of his uniform, and was pushing himself to the limit to get them both airborne.

Fred grunted as Warren carried him. He was trying to keep his weight as low as possible while being carried. He resisted the urge to adjust himself in Warren's grip, and just focused on what he was going to do to when he landed...

Angelo was looking around for something, anything, he could do to help without getting himself killed on the spot - and then he saw it. "Hey, Matt. There's some jet fuel over here, grab yourself something sharp and let's make us some Molotovs."

Matt held up his knife and grinned. This entire thing was absolutely terrifying and exhilarating at the same time. If they got out of Genosha alive the crash would be brutal. That was not Matt's concern right now. "You know how to make it?" He asked joining Angelo. He'd never gotten into that sort of thing during his delinquent days.

"I do", he said with a grin in return. "It's not so hard, you just need fuel and a wick. And in this case, we've got a pyrokinetic so we won't even need the wick. You make the holes", and he guided Matt's hand to the first of the barrels, "I'll do the rest. John! We need you ready."

The three were soon working together on a sort of production line, Matt punching holes in the barrels with his knife, Angelo flinging them at Moreau with a slingshot made from his fingers, and John sending ribbons of fire into the barrels to ignite the fuel just as they struck the carapace.

"Petite," Remy said, limping worse now as he came up beside Sooraya. "You think you can get you sand form inside de armor." He waited for her to consider and nod. "Do it, but leave a tendril for me to reach. Think dat we can help shut him down."

Sooraya eyed the man, still a little hesitant and not quite knowing what his plans were. But she'd agreed and she'd do anything to take out this... creature. "We can do that." With another nod, she dissolved and using the cracks the guys had made, she sought her way through the various systems of the armor. When she'd spread out as much as possible, she kinda waved the tendril she had left for Mr. LeBeau to reach and waited for what was gonna happen next...

Charing Paige had already weakened him considerably, but Remy reached out and touched the sand. It glowed deep purple as the kinetic charge leapt from particle to particle, racing through out the sensitive internal systems that Sooraya was flowing through. When it could hold no more, the charge went off; a snake of destructive energy that blew about joints, tore holes in the housing and slagged internal systems. Smoke poured from Moreau's body as he screamed.

He snapped out a spike, and before LeBeau could move, impaled him on his left side, through his stomach and hip. Remy gasped at the white hot pain as Moreau lifted him up like a skewered insect, until they were face to face.

"Yoouuu huuurrtt meee." His speech was starting to slur as the damage systems overwhelmed his cognitive centres for a moment. Remy wasted no time, fighting down the pain and reaching out, slapping his hand across Moreau's teeth.

"I haven't even gotten started yet, batard!" Moreau's teeth started to glow and he whipped Remy away as his mouth exploded, shredding and mangling the bottom half of his face. Remy hit hard, and pulled himself up weakly, dragging his body away from Moreau.

"Jubilee. Could use a distraction 'bout now." He grasped out past the pain.

Jubilee didn't answer in words but in actions, pumping out masses of plasma sparks even as she moved to help drag Remy back from Moreau.

It wasn't quite far enough as the explosions set off in the exposed part of Moreau blew both her and Remy briefly into the air, only to land hard at a distance beyond.

Fred had never tried expanding himself so quickly. Then again, he'd never been stranded on an island nation battling racists, brainwashed friends, and monsters. And now...now he got to take out every iota of anger and resentment and frustration that had been building since the protest.

By the time he landed with a massive, thunderous cracking sound, Fred was a massive, rolling mound of stomping feet and swinging fists, digging and kicking and actually biting at anything he could reach. Those close enough could see him screaming between disgusting, massive bites at Moreau's softer exposed flesh, "FUGGIN' GO'DAM SUMBITCH...!!!"

Nico waited. Waited, and focused on the hatred she had been harboring for everything related to this situation since she trashed her room back home. It all condensed on the spot, and when she knew it was safe, she approached. It was a short run, and soon enough she was just next to the massive creature. She spared a single look at the thing that had been a man not too long enough. "Rot in hell", muttered as her eyes darkened. Lifting the Staff of One -which she had been holding since before the fight had started-, it started to shine as white, oddly thick light bathed the insides, immediately disintegrating them. "Just fucking die already."



Moreau’s robot structure lay inert, shattered by the last attack. But his arms and neck still moved, his ruined face screaming that he’d kill them all. Despite the damage, the man was still alive, and they could see how his deeply stacked powers were healing and repairing the damage already. It was as if he couldn’t be killed.

Yvette surveyed their foe from where she was crouched, ready for another attack. It was hard to tell her expression from underneath the armoured crags of skin protecting her eyes, but from her posture, she seemed to be considering something. A plan.

"Enough," she said quietly, almost too quietly to be heard. "This is ending. Now."

And with that she launched forward towards Moreau, leaping over useless tentacles and metal carapace until she reached his head.

“Come on, you mutie trash! You think you have it! I swear, I will give you back whatever you do a thousand-fold!”

Long claws came down , slashing through the long neck that connected Moreau's head to his crippled cyborg body. She didn't make it through the first cut, reinforced as the metal was with her own powers, but there was little that could stand up to Yvette's talons when she was determined. She hacked away until at last the head came free, trailing wires and dribbling black fluid. With an expression of distaste twisting even her hardened features, Yvette picked up the head by the hair.

"Nightcrawler?"

Kurt appeared next to her, trailing his usual cloud with Bishop in tow and stared Moreau straight in the still-aware eyes. "Mr Moreau, prepare to meet your maker. This is for Rachel Kinross."

Bishop took the head from Yvette, tucking it under his right arm like a football, face up so he couldn't be bit. "I've been thinking about this plan and there's a really important part I want to remind you of Kurt... you have to come catch me at the end." He reminded the other man with a very serious face.

"I caught one of my sisters once when she fell out of the Blackbird", Kurt told him. "You can trust me." He reached for Bishop's free arm, and then they were several hundred feet up, and a moment later again Bishop was alone.

"So... last conversation ever. Want to pick the topic?" Bishop looked down as Moreau's head, their view upside down to each other. "You'll have to yell, it's about to get windy." He offered as the fall began to gain speed.

“You think this is the end, mutant? Let me make you a promise.” The head said, voice now wholly digital. “When I come back, you won’t know until you find yourself standing in a pile of your own dead. And I will come back. I will come back.”

As Kurt materialised back on the ground Ororo looked upwards; Bishop was just a speck above the Citadel, plummeting rapidly towards the ground. Stretching a hand upwards she called upon the vast field of clouds above, hot white lightning lancing towards the falling figure.

Lex felt the charge in the air and used it as a tracer for his own blast. He channeled the ambient energy in the air bleeding from Ororo's lightning and channeled it back into her strike. At the same time, he started to draw energy directly from the power grid, through the citadel and formed his mind an image of connecting the two systems. He would need someone else's help to create the arc for him to trace it along. "Sparky, I need you to stand over there, by that conduit." He found that he was smiling as he spoke, "I think I'm about to give you one hell of a boost."

"Mine does not work as yours," Jean-Phillipe replied. "I think that it is better that we go in the other direction." He had no hope of reaching the falling Bishop on his own. His power had nothing like that in terms of range. And besides, he could only generate his own power. But Lex could redirect it. And with the Frenchman's natural immunity, he could provide a feedback loop that would massively amplify the output past whatever either of them could create on their own. He felt a tingling in his feet as Lex reached down to pull from the conduit through him, and he opened the channels of his own power wide to add to it.

He simply hoped that Monsieur Bishop was up to the task.

"Just find the lightning and reach toward it," he instructed Lex. "Nature will do the rest."

Lex concentrated on his teammate, they had toyed with this idea in training - even tried it on a much smaller scale once or twice. I'm glad I'm not him, even if he is immune, it was all he could think as he tore the electricity out of the conduit and funneled it into Jean-Phillipe. He let the power feed on itself for a handful of seconds, redoubling every two or three until Sparky appeared to exhibit the features his call sign implied. Then, with an even focus and a great deal of will, Lex directed the blast straight towards the head, using the white hot lightning as a guide.

The results were magnificent, together they had turned Sparky into a human plasma cannon. The blast reached through the air, exciting the particles along the way and ionizing everything in it's path, as it approached the lightning it fed off the already charged air and two separate attacks became superheated. Lex had not expected it to be quite so intense, but his smile grew wider as he watched. He had the distinct feeling that nothing could survive that, not even a bio-engineered-super-mutant-cyborg-douchebag named Moreau.

Or, Bishop.

As the feed began, Bishop focused on absorption alone. He hadn't pressed his storage to the limit but this time he had too. Residual energy pulsed off him in red concussive waves before his charge was sustained by the electricity alone. He bottled it, condensed it, almost focused on protecting his payload from it.

Once Bishop's cells felt like they were tingling with electricity, all the way into the backs of his eyes, he tried something he never had; he relaxed. He hadn't been entirely without a charge for quite some time and he wasn't exactly sure how he made it happen. Bright was the focus. Relaxation and a very bright, white light. Maybe he was dead. It was his last thought as the sky flashed almost brightly enough to blind onlookers.

When the flash faded enough for Kurt to get a fix on Bishop, he teleported straight upward to grab the other man. A moment later, both were gone to the safety of the ground.
The mechanical body was still, and they were all still standing. Jean-Phillipe staggered over to where Yvette had sliced Moreau's head off. He licked his lips, gathering moisture, then spat. Right into the stump.

"Told you."

As they landed safely on the ground, the head bounced away from the unconscious Bishop’s grip, bouncing along the ground Ororo carefully collected it. It would need to be examined, to make sure that Moreau was truly gone. But for now, at this moment, to the backdrop of fires and wild winds, it was finally over.