Back to Gatefold#8 - "Children of a Lesser God - Part III"
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EDITOR'S NOTE: This story may contain scenes of graphic violence and sexual situations. It is recommended for mature readers.
In Case You're Just Joining Us: Several of the Angels are sent around the world to recruit old friends to Magneto's cause for an undisclosed purpose, meeting with different levels of success. Meanwhile, Shatterstar awakes as a prisoner of the human magistrate underground in Genosha.
Tiananmen Square. Beijing, China. 16 June. 1300L.
Twelve years since the massacre, Xi'an Coy Manh thought. Twelve years, and at least they've finally managed to scrub the blood out of the stones.
She felt like crying, but she'd cried most of the previous day, and if her life had taught her nothing else, it was that there was a time to put away the tears and do something... even if that something couldn't help the thing you wanted to cry about.
She stepped on a piece of wrapping paper someone had let escape them, picked it up daintily between two fingers and deposited it in a nearby trashcan. No sense washing the blood off the stones if you let the place get junked up in other ways.
In June 1989, a demonstration calling for democracy in China had disintegrated into a bloodbath in this very square. And even though Tiananmen was now, on the surface, the most tourist-friendly place in China -- there were snack and souvenir vendors all over, just like in New York's Central Park -- Karma could feel a pall hanging over this place, a darkness. Probably it was due to the telepathic nature of her mutant gift. In any case, it didn't make this the most pleasant place for Xi'an Coy Manh to be. But that was fine. The darkness suited her mood perfectly.
She hated this country. Coming here had been a mistake.
"Shan?"
She wheeled around, her frayed nerves and years of living the life of an American superhero putting her immediately on the defensive. But she knew the voice that had voiced her name, though she didn't realize it until she was facing its owner.
"Roberto!" she cried, flinging herself into the young Brazilian man's arms. "What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you, believe it or not," Roberto DaCosta replied, returning her embrace. He pushed her away a little, putting her at arm's length. "I stopped in Madripoor first, talked to your uncle's men. They said you'd come here to Beijing to see an old friend."
Xi'an laughed ruefully... a laugh that quickly deteriorated into a sob. Standing there before her former teammate, she put her face in her hands and began to weep.
"Shan?" He reached for her uncertainly. Xi'an Coy Manh was one of the steadiest people he knew, one of the strongest -- as a young teenager, she'd launched a misguided, but nearly-successful, assault on Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four in an attempt to free her younger siblings from bondage; shortly afterward, Charles Xavier had made her the first leader of the New Mutants. It wasn't that Shan was cold or unfeeling, or even that he'd never seen her cry, just that he'd never seen her dissolve so quickly and completely.
"Bobby... god, I'm sorry, Bobby. My world is just so... An old friend... an old girlfriend... I saw her yesterday and..."
Roberto put a hand on her shoulder. "Shan, look at me."
She did, and Roberto saw the shame in her eyes, the embarrassment at her weakness.
"I've got business to discuss with you, but it can wait. Why don't you tell me what's going on first? Maybe I can help..."
Avalon Towers. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 0820L.
Erik Lehnsherr, master of magnetism and ruler of the island nation of Genosha, entered his private office, and was not at all surprised to find Amelia Voght there.
"Why?" she demanded without preamble.
Lehnsherr cocked an eyebrow at her. Then he gestured. His helm and metal-topped cloak lifted away from him and landed gently on a nearby chair.
"Do not presume, Amelia," he said, moving around his desk and having a seat, "that just because you are the most trusted of my subordinates that gives you the right to question my judgment."
"Do you understand the damage you've done to yourself today, Erik?" she pressed. "The good will you've squandered? If your followers wish to worship you as a god, for Christ's sake, let them!"
"I am not a god, nor does it suit my purposes to be seen as one."
"You don't understand, damnit. This isn't about you... it's about them!" She stabbed a finger toward the window, indicating the expanse of Hammer Bay below. "You've just willfully disbanded the Acolytes, an organization brought together solely to serve you. And yet you allow the Fallen Angels, a group of Xavier dropouts, to continue along in your good graces. Can you comprehend what that says to your people?"
"I have explained my reasons. If you are not happy with my judgment, you are free to leave at any time."
"This isn't about me either, damn you!" She slammed a fist angrily down on the desktop, the blood-red of her sweat-drenched hair seeming to bleed into her livid eyes. "It's about how you're determined to turn yourself into a poor man's Charles Xav--"
Amelia Voght felt all the air explode from her lungs as she was flung across the office. Dazed, unable to erect a teleportal to save herself, she was spared a bruising encounter with the far wall by the same power that had thrown her -- the power of Magneto.
"You presume too much," Magneto hissed, moving quickly around his desk while Amelia hung in a purple-tinted magnetic field of his creation. "Charles Xavier was a misguided fool. And now he is a dead fool. His former students are presently useful to me, and that is all. If you question me on this matter again, Amelia... so help me, I'll use my power to toss you from here to the mainland."
"I... could... teleport your heart out of your... chest... before... you could..." she grunted.
"Perhaps," Magneto allowed. The field holding Amelia descended toward the floor, bringing her along with it. "But I don't believe that is what you want, Amelia." He reached a gloved hand out, stroked her cheek with the back of it. "Just as I have no desire to harm you."
"You'll... regret... what you've done today... Magnus."
"Perhaps," he repeated.
There was a flash of light, and Amelia Voght vanished, transported away by her own mutant powers. Magneto dropped the field that had held her, then sighed and turned back toward his desk.
There was much work to be done before he could even begin to deal with the repercussions of this morning's announcements.
Avalon Towers. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 0900L.
"Wait a minute... you're telling me there isn't a Mickey D's in this entire country? And you want us to live here?"
Tabitha Smith rolled her eyes and turned toward the girl who had spoken. "No, Chance. I don't want you to live here. Gomi, Bill, and Ariel" -- she gestured, respectively, at the boy, the blue-shelled lobster, and the tall girl standing behind Chance -- "they're welcome to stay. But you've got to go."
Chance took a pull on her cigarette, eyeing Tabitha through the trail of smoke. "Still a bitch, Boom-Boom."
"And you still dress like a dyke, Chance. Better a bitch in my world than a rug-muncher in yours."
Chance flicked her cigarette away. "Oh, that is it..."
"Oh, please don't fight," the musical voice of Ariel chirped from behind them.
"Butt out, Air," Chance said, moving deliberately toward Tabitha, pushing up the sleeves of her black leather jacket as she went. Tabitha scowled and ball of explosive plasma began to form in her hand.
"Gomi, stop them!" Ariel pleaded, seizing the boy's arm.
"Why?" Gomi asked mildly. "They'll just wait till I'm not here and go at it again."
"Gomi..."
The boy sighed. He was thin and bookish, with spiky blond hair and thick, thick glasses. The blue-shelled lobster perched on his shoulder -- Bill by name -- regarded the proceedings with unflinching irritation.
"Alright, but just the once." Gomi's eyes rotated toward the girls, who were still circling each other, and an invisible pillar of psychokinetic force drove from his skull. The impact blew Chance and Tabitha apart, sending them sprawling to opposite sides of the corridor.
"Gomi, you little shit!"
A rumbling chuckle, almost a growl, came from behind Gomi and Ariel, and the two of them looked around. Crouched on the corridor floor directly behind them was a young woman who looked more cat than human. Her body was covered in soft orange fur, and her hands and feet ended in claws. A tail that must have been three feet long extended from her hindquarters.
"You'll fit in just fine here, whitebread," the cat-woman prred with a faint Hispanic accent. "We all want to smack Tabby around sometimes." She approached Gomi, her head level with his throat, and sniffed at him. Bill the Lobster snapped his claws threateningly at this, but the cat-woman ignored it.
"Leave him alone, Feral," Meltdown warned. "These are my friends."
"Yeah, I can see that by the way he attacks y--" Feral flinched backwards suddenly, a look of distaste crossing her feline features. "Nice try stud, but I smell the wires and the metal. Have you told Mags you brought a flatscan into Avalon, Tabby?"
"My powers come from cybernetic implants," Gomi admitted, still cool under Feral's scrutiny. "If that makes me unwelcome here, I'll go..."
"Bullshit. No." Meltdown shoved herself in-between Feral and Gomi. "We'll tell Magneto, Feral. It's nothing for you to worry about."
Feral smirked. "I hope not. You can't be too careful about who you let in your house."
"Isn't there a ball of yarn somewhere waiting for you to come play with it?"
Feral's smirk dissolved into a snarl. "Shove it up your ass, Smith. As for you," she said, jabbing a finger at Gomi, "I've got my eye on you."
Gomi didn't reply. Bill was still snapping his claws, slowly and steadily, like a metronome, when Feral turned and loped off down the corridor. The five of them watched in silence until she turned down a bend and disappeared.
"Nice place you've brought us to here, Boom-Boom," Chance sighed, lighting another cigarette. "Very welcoming atmosphere."
"Chance," Gomi said, looking at her disapprovingly, "please put a sock in it. For once."
Chance blinked. Then she rolled her eyes and turned away, concentrating on her cigarette.
"Well," Ariel said, clapping her hands together after a moment of uncomfortable silence. "I'm famished. Please tell me there's some place to eat around here..."
Magda Gardens. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 1015L.
Julio Esteban Rictor had never been interested in Zen. The idea of sitting very still until you were at peace with yourself, probably with your legs twisted into a vaguely pretzel-like shape, had never appealed to him. He wasn't one to find happiness in inaction.
But something about the Magda Gardens, erected at the base of Avalon shortly after Magneto had come to power here, moved him, asked him to sit down and stay awhile. Begged him to relax. And he felt obliged to do so, surrounded by the scent of non-indigenous evergreens. The only other person who ever seemed to come here was the caretaker -- an aging mutant that Rictor knew only by the codename Chlorophyll. The old man never spoke to Julio, tho Julio had often spotted him speaking and cooing softly to the plants.
Today Julio sat on a stone bench, surrounded by the trees and flowers. His best friend -- Shatterstar -- had been missing for almost a week now, and the longer his absence dragged on, the more certain Julio became that it had something to do with Unuscione, the Acolyte who'd had it in so bad for 'Star before he vanished.
That possibility that a supposed ally may have killed a good friend didn't exactly sit well with Rictor, nor did it make it easy to concentrate on the weightier matters demanding his attention. Before Bobby had gone off on his leg of the recruitment drive, he'd met with the rest of the Angels and said something ominous about Magneto 'taking them to the next level'. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Julio already wasn't entirely comfortable with being one of Magneto's little tin soldiers. What more was the Master of Magnetism going to demand that they do? And would Julio be willing to do it when the time came?
As he sat in silence, he used his seismic powers to create a several foot-long trail between his bench and the opposite side of the path. It looked kind of like a speed bump to Rictor, and he was inordinately proud of it. He'd been working on his fine control of late, and he was seeing definite improvements. He'd always had the power to level cities, but the smaller things took more effort.
It occurred to him suddenly that the bump looked kind of like the burrow Bugs Bunny got around in. Smiling, Julio made the line of raised earth ripple, like something was traveling beneath it, then when the ripple reached the nearest point of the line, he tossed the dirt into the air, as if Bugs had popped out.
"I knew I shoulda taken that left toin at Albekoikie," Rictor smiled.
"Not bad. I was always more of a Thundercats fan, tho."
Rictor looked up to find Feral standing on the path several yards away.
"I can do Lion-O too, no sweat."
Feral approached. "What're you doing, Julio?"
"Thinking. I didn't know you came out here."
"I don't... usually. You worried about 'Star?"
"Yeah."
"Mm," Feral agreed. "Thought so. You didn't seem too happy when you came back from the States yesterday."
Rictor eyed her. It wasn't like Feral to be so conversational. Or so friendly. "I saw an old friend... and I think I upset her when I asked her to come live in Genosha. Worse than that, it was like she was... disappointed in me."
"Sounds like you got a lot on your mind."
"Huh."
Feral was suddenly sitting next to him on the bench. Her speed was incredible, but none of her body language was threatening. In fact, if he didn't know better, he'd think Feral was coming on to him. "Wanna drown your sorrows?"
Rictor looked at her suspiciously. Feral had ripped out a teammate's throat back before X-Force had disbanded... Siryn had barely survived the experience. The other Angels hadn't forgotten that, and were openly distrustful of her, but Julio wanted to believe in her. Hell, who was he to pass judgment? He'd almost leveled San Francisco once, himself.
"I've got some tequila..."
Julio's eyebrows wagged up in surprise. "Madre... how did you get that?"
"Slipped out for some late-night shopping when we were stuck in Buenos Aires," she replied. Her tail was whipping excitedly, and there was a... smell coming off of her. Something subtle... organic and musky. Not entirely unpleasant, but neither was it the minty scent of evergreens. "Whattaya say?"
Rictor licked his lips. What the hell? "Yeah, let's go."
Feral leapt off the bench, and Julio followed her out of the Gardens.
Xavier Institute. Greenwich, Upstate New York. 16 June. 0600L.
Danielle Moonstar shielded her eyes from the sun as she watched her friend, Sam Guthrie, shoot by overhead. Sam, also known as Cannonball, had the ability to generate a force field around himself, and to fire himself through the air at high speeds -- hence the codename. He was currently getting an early morning workout, racing back and forth across the grounds, pressing himself to greater and greater speeds.
She waited for him to notice her -- there wasn't much chance of being able to shout loud enough for him to hear, after all. Still, it didn't take long.
"Dani!" Sam exclaimed, dropping to the Earth beside her. He whipped her up into his arms and spun her around.
"Whoa there, cowboy!" she laughed as he set her down. "Don't sound so surprised. You called, I came."
Sam rubbed his neck and cast his eyes downward. "Truth is, I half didn't expect you to come. Didn't think you'd be too keen on coming back, considering X-Force didn't break up that long ago."
"This will always be a home to me, Sam. I don't mind coming back, especially to see friends. Besides, Dr. McCoy tells me someone else is using the X-Force name these days..."
They had started walking across the field, back toward the house. Now Sam stopped. "He told you that? Hell, he probably shouldn't've."
"Why? What's the big deal?"
"SHIELD asked to use the X-Force name, and we sent Terry to make sure they weren't misusin' it. But we haven't heard much from her, just enough to know she's getting on well, and they're not doing anythin' to make us look bad."
"I've worked for SHIELD before, Sam. I know how to keep my mouth shut."
"Yeah, I suppose you do." He grinned, that same 'aw-shucks' grin that had been his trademark since they were New Mutants, when Sam was a tall, gawky southern boy -- straight out of a coalmining town, no less. Now he was the leader of the X-Men. The X-Men, for pity's sake. Oh, how things did change.
"Look, I don't wanna waste your time. I got a call from Skids..."
"Sandy? How's she doing? Still going to school in California?"
"Ayuh. In fact, she got a visit in her dorm room yesterday from a mutual friend. Julio."
Dani blinked. "Oh no."
"Oh yeah. Seems like Magneto's on a recruitin' drive."
"I take it she turned him down?"
Sam nodded. "I've put out the word to a bunch of our old friends, asking them to call us if they're contacted by Bobby or any o' the others."
"Good. But that still leaves the question of why you brought me back."
Sam sighed. "Well... I want to be ready if Bobby makes a move again. I want to be ready to go at a second's notice and take the lot of 'em down. Tabby, Julio, Feral -- damn, I stillcan't believe they recruited Feral -- and 'Star."
"You're the leader of the X-Men, Sam..."
"But this is X-Force business. Hell, if they're going after old guards like Sandy, it might even be New Mutants business. There ain't too many people left around who fit that bill, Dani. I figured you'd wanna be in on it."
She was quiet for a moment, pondering. Then she grinned. "You know me too well, Sam Guthrie."
Sam smiled in return, obviously relieved. "Great. Now let's go see if any of the others have got back t'me yet."
Beijing, China. 16 June. 1900L.
Mei answered her front door with a smile, fully expecting it to be her husband. The smile dissolved immediately when she saw Xi'an standing on the landing outside her apartment, one step behind a young Brazilian man.
<"Xi'an? Oh, I'm so happy to see you! I'm sorry about the other day, but if you'll just listen to me...">
"English, please," the Brazilian said.
Mei paused, looking uncertainly at Xi'an. Xi'an met her eyes long enough to nod her assent, then returned her gaze to the floor tiles.
"Who are you?" Mei asked.
"Mei, this is Roberto DaCosta. An old friend."
"Old..." Mei's face fell. <"You called one of your superhero friends on me?">
<"No, he found me.">
"Ladies, please," Roberto cut in. "English."
"Can we come in, Mei?"
"No!"
"I'm going to have to insist," Roberto said, and stepped forward. Mei fell back as he pushed through the doorway, pausing to take his shoes off.
"I'll call the police!" Mei said, turning to go for the phone.
"Mei," Xi'an said from behind her. "Listen to us for just a moment. I don't want to possess you and make you listen, but I will if I have to."
Mei rounded on her, a look of hurt and betrayal making her beautiful face ugly. Xi'an felt her heart break.
"Are you going to kill me? Is that it? Will you kill me for wanting to abort this monster?"
Bobby's face darkened momentarily before returning to its former calm sternness.
"No one's going to kill anybody, ma'am," Roberto said, putting his hands up, palms out to show her he meant no harm. He stepped up out of the entry alcove. "We just want to talk."
"My husband will be home at any moment!"
"Than we'll be quick. I understand you're planning on aborting your child because there's a high possibility it might be a mutant. There's even a clinic here in Beijing that specializes in this type of thing, right?"
"Yes."
"I'd like to offer you an alternative."
"What? See the pregnancy thru and take the chance that it won't kill me with its laser eyes?"
That darkness passed over Roberto's face again, disappearing more slowly this time, and Xi'an marveled at her friend's self-control. She wanted to beat Mei senseless herself -- the only thing stopping her was the fact that this was Bobby's show.
"Actually, the chances of your child manifesting any mutation before puberty are very, very low, ma'am. There's a greater chance of dying in childbirth with a normal child than there is of a mutant manifesting in the womb."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"
"No, not at all. It's just a fact."
Mei crossed her arms. She had positioned herself so that the phone was only a brief lunge away, gambling that Xi'an wouldn't be able to possess her quickly enough to prevent her from dialing the police, should it come down to that. "Say what you came here to say. Then get out."
"I'm from an island off the southeastern coast of Africa, called Genosha. Have you heard of it?"
"Yes, of course. Magneto's country."
"Right. We have people who can help you, who can use their gifts to ensure your safety through pregnancy and childbirth. Then, once you've given birth, we'll gladly take the child off your hands, raise him or her in Genosha."
"And am I supposed to just let these 'people' in my home?"
Roberto shared a look with Xi'an. "No. You'd have to come live in Genosha until the child is born. Then we could take you anywhere, maybe even get you set up with a new name, a new life."
Mei stared at him, dumbfounded, for a moment, and her eyes slowly drifted back toward Xi'an. <"This was your idea, wasn't it? Your plan to get us back together again.">
<"What? No, of course not.">
<"You can't stand the fact that I've found somebody else. A man, no less. You just can't stand the thought of me being more happy with a cock in me instead of your tongue!">
Roberto had no idea what they were saying, but Xi'an looked like she'd been slapped. "Okay, look... let's all calm down..."
"Fuck! You!" Mei said in perfect English, and then she leapt for the phone.
Roberto didn't wait for Xi'an to pick up the ball. His forearm went obsidian, black energy bubbling up off his skin. He raised his arm and fired, the blast of solar energy slicing past Mei and obliterating the telephone. The woman screamed and fell back from it.
"Mei?"
Roberto and Xi'an turned. A new arrival stood in the doorway, a Chinese man nearing middle age. Mei's husband. Both Xi'an and Roberto understood this instantly.
<"What's going on here?"> the man demanded, tossing his military coat aside and stepping up into the livingroom without removing his shoes. His eyes went from the interlopers to his young wife to Roberto's forearm, where the black energy effect he got his codename from was still bubbling. The Chinese man's eyes widened, and Xi'an guessed he understood at least part of what was going on here.
<"Get out of my home!"> He stomped across the floor towards Roberto.
"Xi'an, tell him we're not here to hurt any--"
Roberto was cut off by a vicious and surprisingly quick uppercut, driving him backward with his nose spouting blood. However much older than Mei her husband was, he certainly knew how to throw a punch.
<"You!"> The man grabbed Xi'an by the arm. <"Get out of my home, you mutant scum!">
Xi'an was about to do something -- wrench her arm free, possess the man, something -- but in the next moment, Mei's husband was flying across the livingroom. He hit a nearby door, and it splintered to pieces at the impact, leaving him to hurtle bodily through it and into the bedroom. He hit the opposite wall hard enough to make the entire apartment shake.
Roberto followed him in, his entire body now covered in the black Sunspot effect, his fists clenched.
"Bobby! No!"
Ignoring her, Roberto flung the bed aside and lifted the dazed man up by the collar of his shirt.
"I don't know much Chinese, but I know racial slurs for mutants in just about every language on this planet, you sunuvabitch." He slammed the man against the thin wall, felt ribs crack beneath his grasp, and didn't care in the slightest. The man's face was a wreck where Roberto had tagged him a moment earlier, but he still managed to scowl defiantly as Sunspot drew his fist back.
"Bobby, no!" Xi'an seized the killing arm at the elbow, as if she had a chance in hell of stopping him when his powers were active.
"He called us scum, Xi'an. I heard it! He's a fucking bigot, a baby-killing bigot!"
"I know that... but this isn't the way, Bobby."
"The hell it isn't!" Roberto flung the man back across the room and into the adjacent wall, then rounded on his friend. "If you really thought that, you would have possessed me! You would have just stopped me!"
Xi'an had no answer for that. But she didn't drop her eyes from his.
"Come on." Roberto grabbed her arm roughly, and she allowed herself to be dragged back into the livingroom, where Mei was still kneeling on the floor, weeping in fright. Xi'an paused to look at her former lover, but Mei never looked her way, not before Bobby tugged Xi'an the rest of the way out of the apartment and into the streets of Beijing.
Mother of Hope Medical Center. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 17 June. 0115L.
"Sweet thing," Sonny DiSantos breathed in the ear of the comatose girl. He flicked his tongue out, licking at her earlobe, and dragging his tongue down her soft, soft neck to the base of her throat. If you was awake, you'd be lovin' it, he thought.
He'd been trying to get alone with this sweet piece of ass since they'd dragged her in here nearly two weeks ago. That had turned out to be not quite so easy as it sounded, even though Sonny was the sole night janitor for this wing of the med center. For the first week, there'd been a guard at the bitch's door morning, noon, and night. But when it became clear she wasn't going to come out of the coma anytime soon, the security had started to slack off. The last shift had left ten minutes ago, and judging by previous patterns, Sonny figured he had at least twenty more to do his business and get out of the room before the next shift arrived. More than enough time. Hell, the anticipation was so high by this point, he'd be lucky if he got it in at all.
He climbed onto the bed, trailing a hand up the inside of the patient's thigh. Short, spiky bleached hair... pale -- perfect skin. She wouldn't mind if Sonny stole some time with her. Not like she was using her body for anything at the moment...
And it wasn't like it was his fault he had to do things like this. It wasn't his fault he hadn't been gifted with beautiful wings or the power to shape magnetic fields or anything else that might put him in a position to bag a girl like this. No, Sonny's sole mutation was his hairy, black skinned skull, with the eight eyes scattered across the forehead. The other custodians had started calling him 'Spider-Man' behind his back, even though he didn't really look like a spider. Hideous and hard to look at, sure, but not like a spider.
No, it wasn't Sonny's fault that he had to do things like this to occasionally lay some pipe. But since fate and genetics had left him no choice, he was damn well going to make the best of it.
Sonny pulled the girl's nightdress up and climbed on top of her, unzipping himself as he did so. Here was a part of him that was still just like a real man -- hell, bigger than most -- and it sucked that it had to go to waste just because he was ugly from the neck up.
He pushed into her roughly and began rocking in and out, moving faster, his climax beginning to build almost immediately.
"Yeah, you like that, don't you bitch," he clicked breathlessly. "Like it -- like it, don't you..."
His body tensed as he let go inside of her, gasping, pincers near his mouth clicking. Heaven... god this was heaven. Forget about Genosha and the mutant paradise they were supposedly building here. Forget about all of it. Just him and this hole, and he could be happy for the rest of time...
A hoarse gasp escaped the girl beneath him. Sonny looked up, and found himself staring straight into the wide-open, completely aware eyes of the girl he'd just raped.
Her own eyes bulged even wider when she got a good look at his face. "No!" she cried in a voice nearly inaudible from lack of use. Veins stood out on her forehead, and Sonny scrambled to get off of her, his mind racing, one hand reaching to close his pants. Could he explain this? Could he squeak out somehow? The girl was distraught... maybe they wouldn't believe her...
"Listen," Sonny said, "just listen for a sec--"
The girl opened her mouth and screamed in that cracking whisper of a voice, and the last thing her rapist saw was a great white light that flashed out from her, consuming the room and the floor and the entire wing of the med center. Less than a heartbeat after he'd finished zipping his pants up, Sonny DiSantos was blasted to his component atoms.
Inside what was left of Genosha's Mother of Hope Medical Center, Siena Blaze was finally awake.
TO BE CONTINUED...
In Case You're Just Joining Us: Several of the Angels are sent around the world to recruit old friends to Magneto's cause for an undisclosed purpose, meeting with different levels of success. Meanwhile, Shatterstar awakes as a prisoner of the human magistrate underground in Genosha.
Tiananmen Square. Beijing, China. 16 June. 1300L.
Twelve years since the massacre, Xi'an Coy Manh thought. Twelve years, and at least they've finally managed to scrub the blood out of the stones.
She felt like crying, but she'd cried most of the previous day, and if her life had taught her nothing else, it was that there was a time to put away the tears and do something... even if that something couldn't help the thing you wanted to cry about.
She stepped on a piece of wrapping paper someone had let escape them, picked it up daintily between two fingers and deposited it in a nearby trashcan. No sense washing the blood off the stones if you let the place get junked up in other ways.
In June 1989, a demonstration calling for democracy in China had disintegrated into a bloodbath in this very square. And even though Tiananmen was now, on the surface, the most tourist-friendly place in China -- there were snack and souvenir vendors all over, just like in New York's Central Park -- Karma could feel a pall hanging over this place, a darkness. Probably it was due to the telepathic nature of her mutant gift. In any case, it didn't make this the most pleasant place for Xi'an Coy Manh to be. But that was fine. The darkness suited her mood perfectly.
She hated this country. Coming here had been a mistake.
"Shan?"
She wheeled around, her frayed nerves and years of living the life of an American superhero putting her immediately on the defensive. But she knew the voice that had voiced her name, though she didn't realize it until she was facing its owner.
"Roberto!" she cried, flinging herself into the young Brazilian man's arms. "What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you, believe it or not," Roberto DaCosta replied, returning her embrace. He pushed her away a little, putting her at arm's length. "I stopped in Madripoor first, talked to your uncle's men. They said you'd come here to Beijing to see an old friend."
Xi'an laughed ruefully... a laugh that quickly deteriorated into a sob. Standing there before her former teammate, she put her face in her hands and began to weep.
"Shan?" He reached for her uncertainly. Xi'an Coy Manh was one of the steadiest people he knew, one of the strongest -- as a young teenager, she'd launched a misguided, but nearly-successful, assault on Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four in an attempt to free her younger siblings from bondage; shortly afterward, Charles Xavier had made her the first leader of the New Mutants. It wasn't that Shan was cold or unfeeling, or even that he'd never seen her cry, just that he'd never seen her dissolve so quickly and completely.
"Bobby... god, I'm sorry, Bobby. My world is just so... An old friend... an old girlfriend... I saw her yesterday and..."
Roberto put a hand on her shoulder. "Shan, look at me."
She did, and Roberto saw the shame in her eyes, the embarrassment at her weakness.
"I've got business to discuss with you, but it can wait. Why don't you tell me what's going on first? Maybe I can help..."
Avalon Towers. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 0820L.
Erik Lehnsherr, master of magnetism and ruler of the island nation of Genosha, entered his private office, and was not at all surprised to find Amelia Voght there.
"Why?" she demanded without preamble.
Lehnsherr cocked an eyebrow at her. Then he gestured. His helm and metal-topped cloak lifted away from him and landed gently on a nearby chair.
"Do not presume, Amelia," he said, moving around his desk and having a seat, "that just because you are the most trusted of my subordinates that gives you the right to question my judgment."
"Do you understand the damage you've done to yourself today, Erik?" she pressed. "The good will you've squandered? If your followers wish to worship you as a god, for Christ's sake, let them!"
"I am not a god, nor does it suit my purposes to be seen as one."
"You don't understand, damnit. This isn't about you... it's about them!" She stabbed a finger toward the window, indicating the expanse of Hammer Bay below. "You've just willfully disbanded the Acolytes, an organization brought together solely to serve you. And yet you allow the Fallen Angels, a group of Xavier dropouts, to continue along in your good graces. Can you comprehend what that says to your people?"
"I have explained my reasons. If you are not happy with my judgment, you are free to leave at any time."
"This isn't about me either, damn you!" She slammed a fist angrily down on the desktop, the blood-red of her sweat-drenched hair seeming to bleed into her livid eyes. "It's about how you're determined to turn yourself into a poor man's Charles Xav--"
Amelia Voght felt all the air explode from her lungs as she was flung across the office. Dazed, unable to erect a teleportal to save herself, she was spared a bruising encounter with the far wall by the same power that had thrown her -- the power of Magneto.
"You presume too much," Magneto hissed, moving quickly around his desk while Amelia hung in a purple-tinted magnetic field of his creation. "Charles Xavier was a misguided fool. And now he is a dead fool. His former students are presently useful to me, and that is all. If you question me on this matter again, Amelia... so help me, I'll use my power to toss you from here to the mainland."
"I... could... teleport your heart out of your... chest... before... you could..." she grunted.
"Perhaps," Magneto allowed. The field holding Amelia descended toward the floor, bringing her along with it. "But I don't believe that is what you want, Amelia." He reached a gloved hand out, stroked her cheek with the back of it. "Just as I have no desire to harm you."
"You'll... regret... what you've done today... Magnus."
"Perhaps," he repeated.
There was a flash of light, and Amelia Voght vanished, transported away by her own mutant powers. Magneto dropped the field that had held her, then sighed and turned back toward his desk.
There was much work to be done before he could even begin to deal with the repercussions of this morning's announcements.
Avalon Towers. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 0900L.
"Wait a minute... you're telling me there isn't a Mickey D's in this entire country? And you want us to live here?"
Tabitha Smith rolled her eyes and turned toward the girl who had spoken. "No, Chance. I don't want you to live here. Gomi, Bill, and Ariel" -- she gestured, respectively, at the boy, the blue-shelled lobster, and the tall girl standing behind Chance -- "they're welcome to stay. But you've got to go."
Chance took a pull on her cigarette, eyeing Tabitha through the trail of smoke. "Still a bitch, Boom-Boom."
"And you still dress like a dyke, Chance. Better a bitch in my world than a rug-muncher in yours."
Chance flicked her cigarette away. "Oh, that is it..."
"Oh, please don't fight," the musical voice of Ariel chirped from behind them.
"Butt out, Air," Chance said, moving deliberately toward Tabitha, pushing up the sleeves of her black leather jacket as she went. Tabitha scowled and ball of explosive plasma began to form in her hand.
"Gomi, stop them!" Ariel pleaded, seizing the boy's arm.
"Why?" Gomi asked mildly. "They'll just wait till I'm not here and go at it again."
"Gomi..."
The boy sighed. He was thin and bookish, with spiky blond hair and thick, thick glasses. The blue-shelled lobster perched on his shoulder -- Bill by name -- regarded the proceedings with unflinching irritation.
"Alright, but just the once." Gomi's eyes rotated toward the girls, who were still circling each other, and an invisible pillar of psychokinetic force drove from his skull. The impact blew Chance and Tabitha apart, sending them sprawling to opposite sides of the corridor.
"Gomi, you little shit!"
A rumbling chuckle, almost a growl, came from behind Gomi and Ariel, and the two of them looked around. Crouched on the corridor floor directly behind them was a young woman who looked more cat than human. Her body was covered in soft orange fur, and her hands and feet ended in claws. A tail that must have been three feet long extended from her hindquarters.
"You'll fit in just fine here, whitebread," the cat-woman prred with a faint Hispanic accent. "We all want to smack Tabby around sometimes." She approached Gomi, her head level with his throat, and sniffed at him. Bill the Lobster snapped his claws threateningly at this, but the cat-woman ignored it.
"Leave him alone, Feral," Meltdown warned. "These are my friends."
"Yeah, I can see that by the way he attacks y--" Feral flinched backwards suddenly, a look of distaste crossing her feline features. "Nice try stud, but I smell the wires and the metal. Have you told Mags you brought a flatscan into Avalon, Tabby?"
"My powers come from cybernetic implants," Gomi admitted, still cool under Feral's scrutiny. "If that makes me unwelcome here, I'll go..."
"Bullshit. No." Meltdown shoved herself in-between Feral and Gomi. "We'll tell Magneto, Feral. It's nothing for you to worry about."
Feral smirked. "I hope not. You can't be too careful about who you let in your house."
"Isn't there a ball of yarn somewhere waiting for you to come play with it?"
Feral's smirk dissolved into a snarl. "Shove it up your ass, Smith. As for you," she said, jabbing a finger at Gomi, "I've got my eye on you."
Gomi didn't reply. Bill was still snapping his claws, slowly and steadily, like a metronome, when Feral turned and loped off down the corridor. The five of them watched in silence until she turned down a bend and disappeared.
"Nice place you've brought us to here, Boom-Boom," Chance sighed, lighting another cigarette. "Very welcoming atmosphere."
"Chance," Gomi said, looking at her disapprovingly, "please put a sock in it. For once."
Chance blinked. Then she rolled her eyes and turned away, concentrating on her cigarette.
"Well," Ariel said, clapping her hands together after a moment of uncomfortable silence. "I'm famished. Please tell me there's some place to eat around here..."
Magda Gardens. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 16 June. 1015L.
Julio Esteban Rictor had never been interested in Zen. The idea of sitting very still until you were at peace with yourself, probably with your legs twisted into a vaguely pretzel-like shape, had never appealed to him. He wasn't one to find happiness in inaction.
But something about the Magda Gardens, erected at the base of Avalon shortly after Magneto had come to power here, moved him, asked him to sit down and stay awhile. Begged him to relax. And he felt obliged to do so, surrounded by the scent of non-indigenous evergreens. The only other person who ever seemed to come here was the caretaker -- an aging mutant that Rictor knew only by the codename Chlorophyll. The old man never spoke to Julio, tho Julio had often spotted him speaking and cooing softly to the plants.
Today Julio sat on a stone bench, surrounded by the trees and flowers. His best friend -- Shatterstar -- had been missing for almost a week now, and the longer his absence dragged on, the more certain Julio became that it had something to do with Unuscione, the Acolyte who'd had it in so bad for 'Star before he vanished.
That possibility that a supposed ally may have killed a good friend didn't exactly sit well with Rictor, nor did it make it easy to concentrate on the weightier matters demanding his attention. Before Bobby had gone off on his leg of the recruitment drive, he'd met with the rest of the Angels and said something ominous about Magneto 'taking them to the next level'. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Julio already wasn't entirely comfortable with being one of Magneto's little tin soldiers. What more was the Master of Magnetism going to demand that they do? And would Julio be willing to do it when the time came?
As he sat in silence, he used his seismic powers to create a several foot-long trail between his bench and the opposite side of the path. It looked kind of like a speed bump to Rictor, and he was inordinately proud of it. He'd been working on his fine control of late, and he was seeing definite improvements. He'd always had the power to level cities, but the smaller things took more effort.
It occurred to him suddenly that the bump looked kind of like the burrow Bugs Bunny got around in. Smiling, Julio made the line of raised earth ripple, like something was traveling beneath it, then when the ripple reached the nearest point of the line, he tossed the dirt into the air, as if Bugs had popped out.
"I knew I shoulda taken that left toin at Albekoikie," Rictor smiled.
"Not bad. I was always more of a Thundercats fan, tho."
Rictor looked up to find Feral standing on the path several yards away.
"I can do Lion-O too, no sweat."
Feral approached. "What're you doing, Julio?"
"Thinking. I didn't know you came out here."
"I don't... usually. You worried about 'Star?"
"Yeah."
"Mm," Feral agreed. "Thought so. You didn't seem too happy when you came back from the States yesterday."
Rictor eyed her. It wasn't like Feral to be so conversational. Or so friendly. "I saw an old friend... and I think I upset her when I asked her to come live in Genosha. Worse than that, it was like she was... disappointed in me."
"Sounds like you got a lot on your mind."
"Huh."
Feral was suddenly sitting next to him on the bench. Her speed was incredible, but none of her body language was threatening. In fact, if he didn't know better, he'd think Feral was coming on to him. "Wanna drown your sorrows?"
Rictor looked at her suspiciously. Feral had ripped out a teammate's throat back before X-Force had disbanded... Siryn had barely survived the experience. The other Angels hadn't forgotten that, and were openly distrustful of her, but Julio wanted to believe in her. Hell, who was he to pass judgment? He'd almost leveled San Francisco once, himself.
"I've got some tequila..."
Julio's eyebrows wagged up in surprise. "Madre... how did you get that?"
"Slipped out for some late-night shopping when we were stuck in Buenos Aires," she replied. Her tail was whipping excitedly, and there was a... smell coming off of her. Something subtle... organic and musky. Not entirely unpleasant, but neither was it the minty scent of evergreens. "Whattaya say?"
Rictor licked his lips. What the hell? "Yeah, let's go."
Feral leapt off the bench, and Julio followed her out of the Gardens.
Xavier Institute. Greenwich, Upstate New York. 16 June. 0600L.
Danielle Moonstar shielded her eyes from the sun as she watched her friend, Sam Guthrie, shoot by overhead. Sam, also known as Cannonball, had the ability to generate a force field around himself, and to fire himself through the air at high speeds -- hence the codename. He was currently getting an early morning workout, racing back and forth across the grounds, pressing himself to greater and greater speeds.
She waited for him to notice her -- there wasn't much chance of being able to shout loud enough for him to hear, after all. Still, it didn't take long.
"Dani!" Sam exclaimed, dropping to the Earth beside her. He whipped her up into his arms and spun her around.
"Whoa there, cowboy!" she laughed as he set her down. "Don't sound so surprised. You called, I came."
Sam rubbed his neck and cast his eyes downward. "Truth is, I half didn't expect you to come. Didn't think you'd be too keen on coming back, considering X-Force didn't break up that long ago."
"This will always be a home to me, Sam. I don't mind coming back, especially to see friends. Besides, Dr. McCoy tells me someone else is using the X-Force name these days..."
They had started walking across the field, back toward the house. Now Sam stopped. "He told you that? Hell, he probably shouldn't've."
"Why? What's the big deal?"
"SHIELD asked to use the X-Force name, and we sent Terry to make sure they weren't misusin' it. But we haven't heard much from her, just enough to know she's getting on well, and they're not doing anythin' to make us look bad."
"I've worked for SHIELD before, Sam. I know how to keep my mouth shut."
"Yeah, I suppose you do." He grinned, that same 'aw-shucks' grin that had been his trademark since they were New Mutants, when Sam was a tall, gawky southern boy -- straight out of a coalmining town, no less. Now he was the leader of the X-Men. The X-Men, for pity's sake. Oh, how things did change.
"Look, I don't wanna waste your time. I got a call from Skids..."
"Sandy? How's she doing? Still going to school in California?"
"Ayuh. In fact, she got a visit in her dorm room yesterday from a mutual friend. Julio."
Dani blinked. "Oh no."
"Oh yeah. Seems like Magneto's on a recruitin' drive."
"I take it she turned him down?"
Sam nodded. "I've put out the word to a bunch of our old friends, asking them to call us if they're contacted by Bobby or any o' the others."
"Good. But that still leaves the question of why you brought me back."
Sam sighed. "Well... I want to be ready if Bobby makes a move again. I want to be ready to go at a second's notice and take the lot of 'em down. Tabby, Julio, Feral -- damn, I stillcan't believe they recruited Feral -- and 'Star."
"You're the leader of the X-Men, Sam..."
"But this is X-Force business. Hell, if they're going after old guards like Sandy, it might even be New Mutants business. There ain't too many people left around who fit that bill, Dani. I figured you'd wanna be in on it."
She was quiet for a moment, pondering. Then she grinned. "You know me too well, Sam Guthrie."
Sam smiled in return, obviously relieved. "Great. Now let's go see if any of the others have got back t'me yet."
Beijing, China. 16 June. 1900L.
Mei answered her front door with a smile, fully expecting it to be her husband. The smile dissolved immediately when she saw Xi'an standing on the landing outside her apartment, one step behind a young Brazilian man.
<"Xi'an? Oh, I'm so happy to see you! I'm sorry about the other day, but if you'll just listen to me...">
"English, please," the Brazilian said.
Mei paused, looking uncertainly at Xi'an. Xi'an met her eyes long enough to nod her assent, then returned her gaze to the floor tiles.
"Who are you?" Mei asked.
"Mei, this is Roberto DaCosta. An old friend."
"Old..." Mei's face fell. <"You called one of your superhero friends on me?">
<"No, he found me.">
"Ladies, please," Roberto cut in. "English."
"Can we come in, Mei?"
"No!"
"I'm going to have to insist," Roberto said, and stepped forward. Mei fell back as he pushed through the doorway, pausing to take his shoes off.
"I'll call the police!" Mei said, turning to go for the phone.
"Mei," Xi'an said from behind her. "Listen to us for just a moment. I don't want to possess you and make you listen, but I will if I have to."
Mei rounded on her, a look of hurt and betrayal making her beautiful face ugly. Xi'an felt her heart break.
"Are you going to kill me? Is that it? Will you kill me for wanting to abort this monster?"
Bobby's face darkened momentarily before returning to its former calm sternness.
"No one's going to kill anybody, ma'am," Roberto said, putting his hands up, palms out to show her he meant no harm. He stepped up out of the entry alcove. "We just want to talk."
"My husband will be home at any moment!"
"Than we'll be quick. I understand you're planning on aborting your child because there's a high possibility it might be a mutant. There's even a clinic here in Beijing that specializes in this type of thing, right?"
"Yes."
"I'd like to offer you an alternative."
"What? See the pregnancy thru and take the chance that it won't kill me with its laser eyes?"
That darkness passed over Roberto's face again, disappearing more slowly this time, and Xi'an marveled at her friend's self-control. She wanted to beat Mei senseless herself -- the only thing stopping her was the fact that this was Bobby's show.
"Actually, the chances of your child manifesting any mutation before puberty are very, very low, ma'am. There's a greater chance of dying in childbirth with a normal child than there is of a mutant manifesting in the womb."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"
"No, not at all. It's just a fact."
Mei crossed her arms. She had positioned herself so that the phone was only a brief lunge away, gambling that Xi'an wouldn't be able to possess her quickly enough to prevent her from dialing the police, should it come down to that. "Say what you came here to say. Then get out."
"I'm from an island off the southeastern coast of Africa, called Genosha. Have you heard of it?"
"Yes, of course. Magneto's country."
"Right. We have people who can help you, who can use their gifts to ensure your safety through pregnancy and childbirth. Then, once you've given birth, we'll gladly take the child off your hands, raise him or her in Genosha."
"And am I supposed to just let these 'people' in my home?"
Roberto shared a look with Xi'an. "No. You'd have to come live in Genosha until the child is born. Then we could take you anywhere, maybe even get you set up with a new name, a new life."
Mei stared at him, dumbfounded, for a moment, and her eyes slowly drifted back toward Xi'an. <"This was your idea, wasn't it? Your plan to get us back together again.">
<"What? No, of course not.">
<"You can't stand the fact that I've found somebody else. A man, no less. You just can't stand the thought of me being more happy with a cock in me instead of your tongue!">
Roberto had no idea what they were saying, but Xi'an looked like she'd been slapped. "Okay, look... let's all calm down..."
"Fuck! You!" Mei said in perfect English, and then she leapt for the phone.
Roberto didn't wait for Xi'an to pick up the ball. His forearm went obsidian, black energy bubbling up off his skin. He raised his arm and fired, the blast of solar energy slicing past Mei and obliterating the telephone. The woman screamed and fell back from it.
"Mei?"
Roberto and Xi'an turned. A new arrival stood in the doorway, a Chinese man nearing middle age. Mei's husband. Both Xi'an and Roberto understood this instantly.
<"What's going on here?"> the man demanded, tossing his military coat aside and stepping up into the livingroom without removing his shoes. His eyes went from the interlopers to his young wife to Roberto's forearm, where the black energy effect he got his codename from was still bubbling. The Chinese man's eyes widened, and Xi'an guessed he understood at least part of what was going on here.
<"Get out of my home!"> He stomped across the floor towards Roberto.
"Xi'an, tell him we're not here to hurt any--"
Roberto was cut off by a vicious and surprisingly quick uppercut, driving him backward with his nose spouting blood. However much older than Mei her husband was, he certainly knew how to throw a punch.
<"You!"> The man grabbed Xi'an by the arm. <"Get out of my home, you mutant scum!">
Xi'an was about to do something -- wrench her arm free, possess the man, something -- but in the next moment, Mei's husband was flying across the livingroom. He hit a nearby door, and it splintered to pieces at the impact, leaving him to hurtle bodily through it and into the bedroom. He hit the opposite wall hard enough to make the entire apartment shake.
Roberto followed him in, his entire body now covered in the black Sunspot effect, his fists clenched.
"Bobby! No!"
Ignoring her, Roberto flung the bed aside and lifted the dazed man up by the collar of his shirt.
"I don't know much Chinese, but I know racial slurs for mutants in just about every language on this planet, you sunuvabitch." He slammed the man against the thin wall, felt ribs crack beneath his grasp, and didn't care in the slightest. The man's face was a wreck where Roberto had tagged him a moment earlier, but he still managed to scowl defiantly as Sunspot drew his fist back.
"Bobby, no!" Xi'an seized the killing arm at the elbow, as if she had a chance in hell of stopping him when his powers were active.
"He called us scum, Xi'an. I heard it! He's a fucking bigot, a baby-killing bigot!"
"I know that... but this isn't the way, Bobby."
"The hell it isn't!" Roberto flung the man back across the room and into the adjacent wall, then rounded on his friend. "If you really thought that, you would have possessed me! You would have just stopped me!"
Xi'an had no answer for that. But she didn't drop her eyes from his.
"Come on." Roberto grabbed her arm roughly, and she allowed herself to be dragged back into the livingroom, where Mei was still kneeling on the floor, weeping in fright. Xi'an paused to look at her former lover, but Mei never looked her way, not before Bobby tugged Xi'an the rest of the way out of the apartment and into the streets of Beijing.
Mother of Hope Medical Center. Hammer Bay, Genosha. 17 June. 0115L.
"Sweet thing," Sonny DiSantos breathed in the ear of the comatose girl. He flicked his tongue out, licking at her earlobe, and dragging his tongue down her soft, soft neck to the base of her throat. If you was awake, you'd be lovin' it, he thought.
He'd been trying to get alone with this sweet piece of ass since they'd dragged her in here nearly two weeks ago. That had turned out to be not quite so easy as it sounded, even though Sonny was the sole night janitor for this wing of the med center. For the first week, there'd been a guard at the bitch's door morning, noon, and night. But when it became clear she wasn't going to come out of the coma anytime soon, the security had started to slack off. The last shift had left ten minutes ago, and judging by previous patterns, Sonny figured he had at least twenty more to do his business and get out of the room before the next shift arrived. More than enough time. Hell, the anticipation was so high by this point, he'd be lucky if he got it in at all.
He climbed onto the bed, trailing a hand up the inside of the patient's thigh. Short, spiky bleached hair... pale -- perfect skin. She wouldn't mind if Sonny stole some time with her. Not like she was using her body for anything at the moment...
And it wasn't like it was his fault he had to do things like this. It wasn't his fault he hadn't been gifted with beautiful wings or the power to shape magnetic fields or anything else that might put him in a position to bag a girl like this. No, Sonny's sole mutation was his hairy, black skinned skull, with the eight eyes scattered across the forehead. The other custodians had started calling him 'Spider-Man' behind his back, even though he didn't really look like a spider. Hideous and hard to look at, sure, but not like a spider.
No, it wasn't Sonny's fault that he had to do things like this to occasionally lay some pipe. But since fate and genetics had left him no choice, he was damn well going to make the best of it.
Sonny pulled the girl's nightdress up and climbed on top of her, unzipping himself as he did so. Here was a part of him that was still just like a real man -- hell, bigger than most -- and it sucked that it had to go to waste just because he was ugly from the neck up.
He pushed into her roughly and began rocking in and out, moving faster, his climax beginning to build almost immediately.
"Yeah, you like that, don't you bitch," he clicked breathlessly. "Like it -- like it, don't you..."
His body tensed as he let go inside of her, gasping, pincers near his mouth clicking. Heaven... god this was heaven. Forget about Genosha and the mutant paradise they were supposedly building here. Forget about all of it. Just him and this hole, and he could be happy for the rest of time...
A hoarse gasp escaped the girl beneath him. Sonny looked up, and found himself staring straight into the wide-open, completely aware eyes of the girl he'd just raped.
Her own eyes bulged even wider when she got a good look at his face. "No!" she cried in a voice nearly inaudible from lack of use. Veins stood out on her forehead, and Sonny scrambled to get off of her, his mind racing, one hand reaching to close his pants. Could he explain this? Could he squeak out somehow? The girl was distraught... maybe they wouldn't believe her...
"Listen," Sonny said, "just listen for a sec--"
The girl opened her mouth and screamed in that cracking whisper of a voice, and the last thing her rapist saw was a great white light that flashed out from her, consuming the room and the floor and the entire wing of the med center. Less than a heartbeat after he'd finished zipping his pants up, Sonny DiSantos was blasted to his component atoms.
Inside what was left of Genosha's Mother of Hope Medical Center, Siena Blaze was finally awake.
TO BE CONTINUED...