The Trial of Jean Grey - Log 12

[x-gambit.livejournal.com]

Strike team three and four blast open a way to the LZ where Clarice is ferrying them out



"Time to be away on our toes!" Amanda yelled over the din of frying electronic equipment. "And we've got incoming!"

The battle with Oracle, Nightside and Magique had slowed them down more than they'd had time for and they'd barely made their objective of destroying the communications array for the base. Now with the alert that it was time to leave, Wanda and her small group found themselves having to fight their way back out of the wrecked section and to the landing zone, in various stages of physical fitness. Julian and Pixie were in the worst condition, the young telekinetic fighting through a concussion and a head injury, Pixie bruised and battered from her recent encounter with the wrong end of a baton. There wasn't a lot in the way of options for them to be able to get out. Except maybe the direct way.

"Wiccan!" Amanda waved to get her student's attention. "Feel like blowing something up?"

"I thought you'd never ask!" Billy was exhausted, but he still managed a small grin. "You probably want to stand back. And cover your ears," he added as an afterthought. He made his way to the other end of the hall, studying the concrete wall for a minute. Just one more thing standing in their way. He didn't have a lot of spells to blow things up--at least not intentionally--but a properly placed bolt should do the trick. He paced halfway back, turned and planted his staff on the floor, staring at it. The black wood began to glow faintly, and electricity began to crackle around it. He focused more intently,and the sparks stopped, drawn into the staff, which began to glow brighter, almost difficult to look at. With a sharp motion, he slammed the end into the ground, and a searing bolt of lightning arced down the hallway, hitting the wall with a sonic boom that rattled the building. Light from outside poured through a now gaping hole, reflecting off the settling dust.

"After you," he said, looking back to Wanda for direction. Wanda shoved herself up off the wall, brushing at the dust that started to settled from the explosion.

"Nice work," she said, giving him a tight grin despite the headache that thrummed through her. It was her sincere hope that Oracle had been injured or, better, killed, in the collapse. She knew she was in no condition to go another round with the telepath. Before stepping through the hole, she activated her powers, hex bolts glinting dangerously around her hands. She might not be able to go toe-to-toe with Oracle but she was prepared to meet whatever was on the other side head on.

Amanda followed, Julian's arm pulled over her shoulders as she half-supported his weight. "C'mon, Pixie," she called over her shoulder to her other student. "Stick close, yeah?"

"Here," Pixie replied. Her voice sounded far away to her own ears. She followed Amanda and Julian through the hole, their forms dark against the bright light coming from the other side. "I'm here," she repeated quietly, to herself. She looked down at her right hand and the Soul Dagger in her grasp. Whatever else she was, she was still Megan Gwynn and she was still alive.

Clint had started shooting at men and women in front of them rather than behind because he was running low on arrows and at least this way he could pick them up off the bodies he dropped. He'd shut his brain off, moving almost entirely on instinct. The explosion, though, had him wheeling in its direction, arrow nocked as the dust settled. He nearly released the shot, only his exceptional eyesight letting him see that it was Wanda's group.

"Scarlet Witch and company incoming," he called to Marie-Ange, shooting a man wielding a baton in the corridor behind Pixie in the chest to knock him backward into the other ISF soldiers. Billy was there. That was good.

"Keep them covered."

Well that was clearly unnecessary because young mister Barton was already notching another - and another arrow, and sending them flying.

"Rocky, Facade, keep close." Marie-Ange turned, pulled a plain playing card from her sleeve and its enormous twin slammed down on an ISF soldier, crushing his torso and head. "Rocky, as soon as Robin says go, run and give them close fighting support. Facade, blind anyone who gets near her. I will keep the crowds down."

"Will do," Clint answered, perhaps unnecessarily. "Facade, can you let them see us so they know where we are? I think the landing zone's due east and we could probably use the chaos people to get through. Next wave of ISF to our right in three - two - one - Rocky go."

"Rocket J. Squirrel is ON THE JOB," Dori said. She was more focused than usual, more intense. They just had to get through all of this, and then things would be okay again. Then there'd be time to deal with everything. Monkey Joe took a moment and rubbed his cheek against hers. It was a half a second movement, a quiet motion, "Yeah, I know. Thanks," she said to the squirrel.

"I got this!" Artie nodded and held up a hand, counting down to the moment he dropped their cover on his fingers. Five... four... three... two.... one and he let half the illusions he had covering the group go. There was some relief in the throbbing headache he had but pain spiked behind his eyes again as he turned to start flaring lights into the eyes of the people Dori was fighting, blinding them, one after another.

Never had Amanda been so glad to see anyone in a black leather uniform. "Support's here!" she called to the rest of the group with her, pulling Julian's arm tighter over her shoulder and straightening up. They could make it now. Especially since... were those arrows? She looked around, half-expecting to see Laurie, despite knowing Laurie was back at the mansion in medlab with only one arm, and instead realised it was one of the new trainees. Clint, that was his name.

Her wounded comrade struggled along, the world ringing loudly, in a muted sort of way which he couldn't really process, in his ears. Julian struggled to put one foot before the other, whomever was helping him along, he made a note to buy them something nice when they got back from this forsaken pimple on the ass end of no where...unless it was Clint. He was, strangely, acutely aware of his surroundings in a way, as random waves and lines of force washed out from him like a shirt off sonar. He couldn't do anything about the guards that were rushing them, the pressure behind his eyes was seeing to that. Something changed above them, new fliers, but they didn't feel right...unfamiliar, not that he was an expert, but the blind folded exercises he'd done at the temple taught him to recognize hostile posturing. "Incoming," he muttered weakly, unsure if the words were coming out right, "a-above...us."

Amanda caught the half-coherent words and looked up. "Fuck. Fucking fuckity fuckweasels."

A wash of flame rained down on the mutants. The Imperial Guard had flanked them, coming in from a different direction than anticipated and as a result, were on them before they could regroup properly. When the flame hit, the ground itself seemed to burst into flame, raging curtains of it cutting off the different groups of X-Men.

Marie-Ange had hit the ground, arms covering her head when the flames rolled over her. She could smell her hair burning and the heat cooking her skin - but no pain, except the familiar deep stab of a migraine behind her eye. She was up faster than she'd dropped, not even fully aware of how she got her feet under her.

Around her, the fire crawled away, literally, growing flaming legs and arms, making a clear circle of perfect calm about Marie-Ange. A ring of it rolled itself up, sprouting wings and eyes by the hundreds, and impossibly, took flight.

There was a cry over to Marie-Ange's left and Magique abruptly appeared, shocked out of her invisibility illusion by the hijacking of her fire. "How...?" she stuttered, looking wide-eyed at the fiery apparition. Then her eyes narrowed - if it was to be showdown between two illusionists, so be it. And she had other weapons - her hand dropped to the pistol on her belt.

The wheel of flame zipped past Magique, clipping her shoulder, making it clear this was no illusion. The flames spluttered briefly, leading the Guardswoman spattered in ooze and then it sped off - and made a sharp U-turn to return back, smaller but speedier as it buzzed past her head.

It was... sorta possible to see the difference between Magique's illusions and reality. If you had the time and leisure to focus down on them. If you knew that there was no possibility of there being a pyrokinetic here. Artie didn't have those luxuries. He was too tired, his head ached too much to manage full invisibility once he moved away from the wall and he couldn't get a clean shot at Magique. He dropped the seeming of the wall he'd hidden behind, and began to move, covering her eyes and face in a globe of impenetrable blackness for the few seconds it took to cover the distance between them. Artie hit her from behind, slamming the butt of his pistol into her temple.

Pixie glanced back towards the corridor from which they'd emerged as the illusionary fire disappeared. They were still ahead of the ISF soldiers there. She was still going to make it out of here. She focused again on her path forward, determined that she wouldn't let Amanda and Julian out of her sight. But what she saw next stopped her dead in her tracks. There he was - the Guard with the body made of fire. She felt sick, suddenly flooded with the raw memory of Namor burning alive.

"It's him! HE KILLED NAMOR!" Her voice collapsed into a sound halfway between yelling and crying.

An arrow already nocked, Clint felt something very tenuous in his chest snap at Pixie's words as he wheeled around to see the figure she'd seen. The world around him seemed to slow as he sighted down the shaft, past the arrowhead, and at the flaming figure of the man who'd killed his friend. It wasn't a conscious decision to note his direction and speed, the wind and the fight around them, to know that shooting the arrow at that angle right then would mean the other man would fly right into it.

It was a good shot.

The flames surrounding Starbolt's body went out and he plummeted, dead long before he hit the ground, Clint's arrow embedded in his eye.

A white-topped blur shot out of the breach in the wall. "Murderer!" screamed Oracle, physically and mentally, her psionic screech drilling into the minds of everyone there. Propelled by her telekinesis, she slammed into Clint, her momentum throwing him violently back into the ruins of the security building. The Guard stopped, hanging in mid-air, and extended her hand, slowly pulling her fingers into a fist. At the same time, reflected in the movement, the building collapsing in on itself, until it was nothing more than a ball of rubble, suspended in the air.
Then with a note of finality, the mass dropped to the ground with a thump, pieces of brick and metal and plaster falling to the ground.

Oracle turned to the rest of the group, eyes wild with grief. "Your turn," she hissed. Around her, the ISF soldiers and remaining Guard had rallied, and were circling the group, intent on hemming them in.

Billy finally spotted Clint and gave a sigh of relief. His eyes followed the last arrow's path, and he let out a loud "Yes," as it hit its mark. He was just beginning to spin back and give Clint a thumbs up, when he heard Oracle's screech. Time slowed to a crawl. He tried to call lightning to his already outstretched arm, but it was like moving through syrup, with as little success. Seconds stretched into hours, and he tried to call up a spell to save him. Like a night terror, though, he had no voice, no sound came, and he watched helplessly as the building imploded. His staff clattered to the ground, all the strength fleeing his arms and hands as he stood there in shock.

Red blazing light tore around the ground and slammed into the ground between the remaining Guard and the others scrambling in the direction of what was hopefully a way out. Wanda had reached the last obstacle first, her height having allowed her to sprint to the high ground. She let loose a few more hex bolts, adding in the other attempts to keep the attackers at bay. A well placed hex bolt chewed through a few ISF soldiers but Wanda knew it was a losing battle.

Turning sharply, Wanda slammed her hands against the surface of the wall at the same time she raked aside all the lethargic lines that normally were attached to something that solid. The end result was a loud explosion as the bricks blasted away from her, leaving a large, jagged hole.

"Go! Now!" Wanda directed, stepping aside to cover their retreat.

Except there was a crazed telepath/telekinetic on their tails, way too close for comfort. Amanda slipped out from under Julian's arm, holding him steady while she beckoned Dori over. "Oi, Rocky, get pretty boy here through," she instructed, passing the concussed teek over to his long-term friend. "Facade, keep 'em covered. Tarot, grab Wiccan and Pixie, make sure they keep moving, yeah?" The witch rattled off directions quickly, not waiting for responses or questions. Instead, she was turning back towards Oracle, reaching over her shoulder and pulling a short stick out of her pack, a stick any regular visitor would have recognised as the one that sat on a particular shelf in her apartment, along with a framed sketch of a young Amanda and a dark-haired young man rubbing his nose meditatively.

At her mentor's words, Pixie lurched into movement, shaking, nudging the others forward as she limped towards the hole. "C'mon, though here," she said, while she could only think, "He's dead. He's dead." No, no time to think about that now. She had to focus on moving, or she would be dead. Like Namor. And Clint. And... "We have to go."

Marie-Ange had already grabbed Billy's arm, and was pulling him along. "Oui, yes, move, quickly." She said - unnecessarily to Pixie, the Welsh young woman was already moving as fast as she could. "Facade, I need rough terrain!" She hadn't finished the request when Artie flashed illusionary spikes of rock at her, and the stones duplicated themselves in Marie-Ange's wake, creating a treacherous path for anyone who tried to follow.

Oracle blocked one of Wanda's hex bolts with a TK shield and in turn raised a chunk of the building debris to hurl back at her. But before she could act, Amanda stepped up in front of her.

"Sorry, blondie. But I can't let you do that." Amanda had the wych clutched in one hand, but made no attempt to raise it. Oracle sneered at the short blonde.

"I remember you. It's a pity Dacoit isn't here to see me exact his revenge on you. But I won't kill you. That would be too easy. Better I send you back to your murdering friends a blithering idiot." And with that, Oracle plunged into Amanda's defenseless mind, intent on shredding it to pieces with her telepathy.

To those watching, the two stood motionless only for half a minute. The stick in the witch's hand glowed a variety of neon colours, echoing briefly in her eyes before Oracle suddenly stiffened. The telepath shuddered, a small whining noise escaping her lips, and then she dropped soundlessly to the ground, twitching slightly.

Amanda didn't waste time - taking advantage of the stunned shock of the troops, she ran back towards the hole in the wall, Wanda following as she ducked through.

Counting the bodies as people emerged, Clarice paused, realizing they were missing some and why. She was getting too adept at reading the body language. More death certificates. "This all?" she confirmed, opening a portal.

Wanda stared into the portal as the others gathered to finally leave. "All that are left," she confirmed softly, unwilling to look back towards the battlefield. "Get us out of here, Clarice," Wanda continued, shoulders slumped in exhaustion as she stepped towards the portal. They were leaving one graveyard behind but God only knew what they were heading into next.