Bobby regarded the device, his eyes glinting in the opalescent light. "Well," he said softly, "here we are."
Despite his attempt to keep his voice down, it echoed ominously. Eventually, it was lost in the vastness of the enclosure.
"Still no sign of anyone," Jean reported, adding to the echoes.
Hank cocked a pointed blue ear. “I don’t hear any gears moving," he remarked. “Always a good sign."
Scott eyed the place. It looked safe enough, but he knew from experience that appearances could be deceiving.
“Hank,” he said thoughtfully, "wait a couple of seconds before you make the swap. Jean, Bobby and I will take up positions at intervals, just in case we've missed a security feature. Warren, you go aloft for a bird's-eye perspective on the chamber."
His teammates followed his orders without comment. At the same time, Scott himself moved toward the curved wall on his left. He could hear the soft shoosh of Warren's wings, the sound of his own breathing, the scrape of his boots on the smooth, seamless floor.
"All right," he told Hank.
The mutant known to the world as Beast moved forward, the slap of his bare feet on the alien surface echoing hollowly. When he reached the communications cylinders, he zipped open his backpack and took out the professor's fake component. Then he laid it gently on the floor.
Next, he lifted the gold cylinder from its resting place and looked around. There was no alarm. The place was silent except for the whisper-like beating of Warren’s wings.
Obviously relieved, Hank placed the component in his yellow backpack and slung it over his shoulder. Finally, he retrieved the substitute cylinder from the floor and snugged it into place.
Taking a deep breath, the furry blue X-Man turned to
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Scott. "Mission accomplished,” he announced with a measure of satisfaction.
"Well done," said Scott. “Now let's get the-"
Before he could finish his imperative, he heard Warren cry out and looked up to see what was the matter. Suddenly, the winged mutant came swooping down from the heights of the chamber, followed by a dense, dark swarm of twitching, chittering spider-things.
They were even oilier and blacker than the labyrinthine circuitry on the walls, each of them boasting eight legs and two bright green, faceted eyes. As they got closer, Scott could see that the smallest of them was the size of a compact car.
The mutant didn't waste time trying to figure out what the things were or where they had come from. He just went into action as Professor X had trained him to do.
Opening his visor, he shot a ruby-red optical beam at the nearest of the spider-things. The shaft of destructive force hit it squarely and sent it pinwheeling wildly across the chamber. Taking aim at a second monster and then a third, he sent them spinning backwards as well.
But there were far too many of the things for Scott to knock them all out. Before he knew it, twenty-five or thirty of them had landed on the smooth, dark floor. As they hit the ground, deadly black claws emerged from the ends of their forelegs.
They skittered toward him with insect-like speed and determination, their eyes, blinking an eerie green. Fortunately, the X-Man called Cyclops wasn't on his own.
As he hammered away at one spider-thing after another, his teammates did their part too. Warren wove in and out of the swarm, keeping the eight-legged monsters occupied as
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Bobby encased them in heavy blocks of ice and Jean teleki-netically sent them smashing into each other.
Hank was the only one doing his best to avoid the things altogether. But then, he was the one who held the backpack with the Quistalian device in it. It was his job to get out of there and make sure the component got back to Salem Center.
Scott, Jean called to him, her thoughts flooding his brain. These things aren't alive. They're robots.
That explained her inability to detect their brain functions when the team was approaching the chamber. It also gave Scott a better idea of what he and the others were up against. Sensors instead of eyes and olfactory systems. Programs instead of instincts. Bodies a good deal more durable than the flesh and blood variety.
It was the first time the mutant had been forced to fight machines shaped like Terran arachnids. However, it was far from his first taste of Quistalian battle technology.
In fact, Scott had squared off against the aliens' robots on several different occasions-and he had taken away from these encounters one very valuable piece of intelligence. Like biological organisms, the Quistalians' creations had a single, central power generator. Once that generator was shut down, they would stop functioning.
As he responded to his wife's insight, he had that information very firmly in mind. Jean, he thought back at her, find their power conduits and start ripping them out.
Done, she assured him, then broke the link.
Next, Scott closed his visor and turned to Bobby, who was piling ice on top of another spider-thing. “We need a barrier across the midpoint of the chamber," he bellowed, his voice rebounding off the walls.
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“Gotcha," his crystalline teammate called back. At the same time, he began building a wall of ice at the appointed spot.
By then, Hank had leaped and vaulted his way to the vicinity of the chamber's exit. But the other X-Men were still in the thick of the fight, not far from where Bobby was piling up his barrier.
“Fall back, Jean," Scott told his wife. “We're going to seal up half of them behind an ice wall."
Good idea, she responded telepathically.
Next, Scott waved to get Warren's attention. As quickly as the winged X-Man was moving, it wasn't easy. Finally, as Warren emerged from a cluster of attacking spider-things, he noticed Scott's gesture.
"Talk to me," he yelled as he shot across the chamber, his voice echoing back on itself.
“Lure as many as you can to the far side of the room," Scott shouted. Then he pointed to Bobby.
Studying their Iceman for a moment, Warren seemed to understand what Scott had in mind. Once more he wove his way in among the spider-things, daring them to snatch him out of the air-but when he eluded them this time, he drew them further away from the exit.
Satisfied that everyone was doing his or her part, Scott turned his attention to Hank again-and saw that his friend needed some help. Despite Hank's remarkable speed and agility, his path to the exit had been blocked by a knot of chittering robots.
Opening his visor again, Scott drove his optical beam into the midst of the spider-things, sending one and then another skidding across the floor of the chamber. A couple of them forgot about Hank and came after him instead, and he punished them as well.
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But try as he might, he eouidn't clear an adequate path for his teammate. Hank looked frustrated as he bounded from one spot to the other, seeking something resembling an opening.
Obviously, the furry X-Man didn't like the idea of failing back-not when he had come so close to getting away with his stolen component. But in the end, he had to clutch his yellow backpack to his chest and retreat from the monsters' grasping claws.
Fortunately, Scott wasn't the only one who had been hard at work. As he closed his visor to scan the chamber, he saw Bobby complete a glistening, fifteen-foot-high ice wall. A moment later, Warren came surging over the top of it, wings spread imposingly, leaving almost half the enemy’s forces trapped behind him.
Jean had done her share as well. Four of the Quistalian spider-things lay crumpled around her on the chamber floor, their internal workings hopelessly mangled and disrupted.
Another four were still trying to crack the ice blocks with which Bobby had burdened them. That left fewer than a dozen of the robots still functioning, most of them clustered near the exit. Scott had to admit he liked those odds a good deal better.
Still, they had to capitalize on the situation quickly. Bobby’s frozen barrier wouldn't remain intact forever.
"Clear them out!" Scott roared to his teammates, pointing to the spider-things blocking their exit. Then he opened his visor again and leveled a crimson blast at one of them, sending it tumbling end over end.
Bobby encased two more in a block of ice. Jean took the fight out of a third one. And on it went, victory by hard-fought victory until-at least for a moment-the way out was unobstructed.
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"Let's go!" Scott bellowed, his voice joined by an army of echoes.
“Onward and outward!” Hank replied, launching himself out of the chamber and into the passageway beyond.
Warren was right behind him, cradling Jean in his arms as he flew. Then came Bobby, laying down a savage barrage of ice pellets as he backpedaled. Scott placed a few last shots among the robots who came pouring after them like a black tide, then took off down the corridor as well.
As soon as he was clear of the chamber, Bobby clogged up the opening with as much ice as he could muster. But he had already taxed his powers to their limits. He was fatigued and it showed.
That’s enough!” Scott told him as the spider-things began breaking through the ice. “We're out of here!”
Closing his visor and grabbing his friend's arm, he pulled Bobby down the corridor. They ran as quickly as they could, following the dark, serpentine curve of the passage as their pursuers punched through the obstacle Bobby had left behind.
But Scott could tell they weren't moving fast enough. The clacking of the robots began to grow louder in their ears, telling him the things were narrowing the gap between them.
One of the mutants would have to stay behind and cover their escape. Scott already knew who it would be.
“Keep going!" he told Bobby as they negotiated a bend in the corridor—and thrust him in the direction of freedom.
The other X-Man whirled. “No way!" he shot back.
“That's an order!” Scott told him.
Bobby hesitated, pain and anger etched into his icy features.
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"Go!" Scott insisted.
With obvious reluctance, Bobby turned away from him. Then he pelted down the hallway as quickly as he could, leaving the team's leader to confront the horde by himself.
Bracing himself, Scott faced his adversaries. Then he opened his visor and unleashed his optical beam, pounding the first eight-legged thing that came around the bend. As it caromed off the wall in back of it, another filled the breach. It received the same rough treatment.
But pretty soon, the pace picked up. The monsters began coming at him in pairs, then crowding the corridor three at a time. It got harder and harder to figure out which one was closest to nailing him, more and more difficult to keep the robots at bay.
Still, Scott didn't panic. Even when his head started to swim with the intensity of his effort, he stood his ground and kept at it-and not because he was thrilled about dying there like some mutant Horatio.
There was another reason he was able to maintain his position. As the robots got closer to him, close enough almost to reach out and slice him with their claws, he heard the approach of that reason.
At first, it sounded like a gentle surf, hissing softly over the sand. Then it became louder, like a bellows. And louder still, like the beat of a strong, insistent pulse in his ears.
Just as Scott was about to go down under the press of the robot spiders, he felt himself grabbed under the armpits and swung away.
Closing his visor, he looked up-and saw Warren's blueskinned face above him. It showed the sweat and strain of carrying a hundred and eighty-pound burden through the narrow, snaking corridor.
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"Cut it a little close, did we?" Scott asked evenly.
Warren looked down at him, the slightest gleam of amusement in his eyes. “Sorry. I had to tie my shoelaces."
“You don’t have any shoelaces," Scott pointed out.
Warren feigned exasperation. “Now you tell me.”
In a matter of seconds, they reached the opening and emerged into the heat of the outside world. With a flourish of his wings, Warren slowed their progress and descended to the plateau below them.
Professor X’s sleek, black jet awaited them there, its idling engines already warmed up. Scott could see Hank sitting in the pilot's seat with Bobby beside him. But Jean was standing outside the plane, clearly refusing to get in until she was certain her husband was safe.
Had their positions been reversed, Scott would have done the same thing. He couldn't imagine a time, place or circumstance when he would even contemplate leaving Jean behind.
Warren let Scott down beside her. Relieved, Jean brushed Scott's face with her fingertips. Then she got into the jet and he followed her. Folding his wings, Warren came last and pulled the door closed behind him.
Then, with Hank at the controls, they took off.
"Not too bad," the furry X-Man said, patting the new bulge in his yellow backpack. “That is, for an assemblage of diverse talents that hasn't worked together in a while."
Bobby, who was in the process of de-icing, turned to his friend. "Of course, there was one weak link. I'm not mentioning any names, mind you... but his initials are Hank McCoy."
Hank cast a sidelong look at him. "Droll, Robert. Very droll." "
"Hey,” said Bobby, grinning at him, “it's nothing a couple hundred hours in the professor's Danger Room won't cure,"
Jean leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. "We did pretty well at that," she remarked, “didn't we?"
Scott slipped his fingers into hers and squeezed. "No complaints here," he assured her.
He couldn't help but take pride in the way the five of them had meshed their efforts. They had certainly come a long way since their struggle against Magneto all those years ago. Now there wasn't a collection of costumed heroes alive-mutants or otherwise-who could put them to shame.
"One Quistalian base down and two to go," Warren announced.
Hank cast a glance over his muscular shoulder. "Your grasp of mathematics is impeccable, Mr. Worthington."
Warren couldn't help chuckling a little at the comment. “Just shut up and fly the plane, okay?"
"Your wish," said Hank, “is my command."
As they climbed into a cloudless sky, he set the controls for their next destination.
ore than anything else on Earth or in the heavens, Charles Xavier hated feeling helpless.
When Lucifer stole his ability to walk in a Tibetan cavern many years earlier, he had made it his business to be as selfsufficient as anyone with two good legs. In addition, despite his physical handicap, he had launched a one-man offensive against hatred and oppression. He had mobilized a squad of young mutants and showed them how to take care of themselves in any situation.
But even Professor Xavier could make mistakes, it seemed. Even he could allow his vigilance to lapse. After all, he had left himself open to an attack by one of his oldest adversaries... and now he found himself paying the awful price.
Still, Xavier hadn't given up. It wasn't his nature to do so-especially when the lives of those he loved hung in the balance. All along, as he floated in the awful silence of the Nameless Dimension, he had been working on a plan to turn the tables on his captor and free himself.
And now, at long last, he believed he had come up with something.
True, the professor hadn't had a great deal of success trying to communicate with Hank or Jean. But then, as he had learned to his chagrin, their minds were too complicated, too full of competing thoughts for him to make his presence known.
But there were simpler minds on Earth's side of the dimensional barrier. Considerably simpler. And of all of them, there was one with which Xavier had established a rapport not so long ago-a consciousness that happened to reside in a remarkably capable and dexterous body, making it even more useful for the professor's purposes.
What's more, Xavier knew where this body would be. All he had to do was push his tendril of thought through the dimensional barrier and send it to Westminster Hous
e.
That was where Jeffrey Saunders lived.
As Professor X willed his thought-tendril over the wooded autumn hill country that stretched northwest of Salem Center, the early morning sun casting long shadows on the land, he hoped fervently that his plan would work this time. If it didn't—if his friend Jeremiah's grandson proved as unreceptive to his psychic overtures as Hank and Jean had been-he didn't know what he would do.
But he wasn't going to focus on failure. He was simply going to find Jeffrey and hope for the best.
Fortunately, the professor had visited Westminster House once before, in the days when it was the estate of a wealthy philanthropist. It was only in the last several years that the place had been converted into an institution for the mentally challenged.
Before too long, he caught sight of Westminster's main
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edifice, a stately red brick structure with green shutters and a great deal of ivy covering its southern exposure. He extended his tendril toward the manicured grounds behind the building, where several of the home's residents were sitting or strolling with the help of escorts.
Jeffrey didn't appear to be among them.
Where is he? Xavier asked himself. Then he heard the tinny sound of a ball bouncing and he was able to fashion a guess. Making his way around the red brick building, he found an asphalt basketball court with a single figure moving across it.
It was Jeffrey, of course. He was dribbling in remarkably precise circles, first clockwise and then counterclockwise, with his right hand and then with his left.
Unfortunately, he looked as if he was having some trouble. After a moment or two, the professor realized what the problem was. The basketball, a bright orange specimen with a colorful team logo emblazoned on it, didn't look as if it had been completely inflated.
Jeffrey's brow was creased. Clearly, he knew there was something wrong. He just didn't know what to do about it.
Professor X carefully extended his thought tendril into Jeffrey's mind, seeking the kind of purchase there that he had been denied on earlier occasions.
Shadow of the Past Page 10