“No stairs this time?”
“We’re in a rush,” Caroline answered. “Plus you need to conserve your strength. Lord knows who they’ve left to guard the X-Men, but you can be sure it’s somebody with a bit more brains than Mr. Magoo back there. Whatever your plan is ..
She stopped. Looked at Trish. Then Kevin. Then back at Trish.
“You don’t have a plan at all, do you?” Caroline gasped.
Trish stood, trying to think of a reply that would make any kind of sense. She failed miserably.
“Sure we have a plan,” she finally said. “We’re going to break out the X-Men. Whatever it takes to get that accomplished, that’s our plan.”
“Jesus,” Caroline hissed, and Trish couldn’t tell whether the look on the woman’s face was one of horror or admiration.
“All right, look,” she continued. “I’ve been working a little on my narcopathy, and—”
“Narcopathy?” Trish asked.
“You know what telepathy is? You know what narcolepsy is? You know what I can do? Figure it out, Trish, we’re almost there!” Caroline said, her patience obviously wearing thin.
Trish was appropriately chagrined. Here was a woman she had thought of, until a couple of minutes earlier, as pretty much a dim bulb, making her feel like a moron.
“I think I can get someone to sleep if I concentrate enough,” she said. “But I need time, and if there’s more than one of them, well...”
Ping!
The elevator slid to a stop, the doors began to roll back. Trish braced herself and Caroline squinted with intense concentration. After a moment, Kevin peeked out into the hall, then turned back to them.
“Nothing,” he said.
“Real smooth, Mr. Bond,” Trish cracked.
Kevin smiled, and the mood lightened for all three of them. What they were doing was insane. As far as Trish was concerned, when you were going over the abyss into bananaland, angst just wasn’t acceptable.
As quietly as possible, they moved down the hall toward the L-turn that led to the room where the X-Men were being held. As they approached, Trish had the nearly overwhelming urge to turn tail and run. She had been joking with herself about the mission: impossible they were on, even running the old theme song through her brain. But suddenly it wasn’t funny anymore. It was just her and Kevin, and Caroline, two frail humans and a ... narcopath, whose power worked so slowly that Ted Koppel put people to sleep faster.
Eyes wide with horror at her own thoughts, Trish clamped a hand over her mouth to keep a Woody Woodpecker, maniacal cackle from coming out.
Kevin was first. He paused at the comer and looked around, just barely inching his head forward to get a look at whoever was guarding the captive mutants.
He pulled back fast.
“Good news and bad news,” he whispered. “Bad news first: it’s Frenzy.”
“Who?” Caroline asked in the same tone.
“Joanna Cargil. She was called Frenzy before she joined Magneto’s cause,” Trish explained, then turned to Kevin. “You did say there was also good news, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yeah.” He smiled. “We don’t have to worry about Caroline’s power working. She’s already asleep.”
Trish wanted to laugh. There just wasn’t time.
“More good news,” Kevin added, lowering his whisper even more. “She left the door open. Probably wanted to keep an eye on the hallway and the X-Men.”
Trish nodded. Hushing Kevin and Caroline, she slipped around the corner and began to move as rapidly and quietly as possible toward the steel door. On the other side of that door, four X-Men were shackled to a wall. A moment later, the others fell into line behind her.
Immediately upon seeing her, Hank and the other X-Men began to make facial motions, to mouth words, to try to warn her off. They couldn’t move their arms or legs, but they were doing their best to get her to turn back without actually calling out.
She would have been hurt, would have been angry at them for being so foolish, but they could not have known just how bad things had become in so short a time. Trish knew she was doing the only thing she could do. It was a risk, certainly. But there was so much at stake, it was a risk she had to take.
As Trish passed the slumbering Cargil, Hank’s face crinkled like the mug of one of those ugly dogs as he tried to use exaggerated lip movements to warn her off. Trish ignored him. All she had to do was look around for whatever device would bypass the X-Men’s bonds, and they’d be home free. Cargil wouldn’t last half a second against four X-Men.
She looked back to the prisoners. Each of them was making a strange face at her now, but still none of them would speak for fear of alerting the sleeping Cargil. Storm and Bishop were mouthing words as well, but Trish never claimed to be able to read lips.
Then she saw Wolverine. His face wasn’t moving. Only his eyes. First he would stare at Trish, then his eyes would glance past her, behind her, with obvious purpose. He wanted her to turn around.
Frowning in confusion, she turned slowly to see Cargil, wide awake, standing with one hand clutching Kevin’s throat, and the other wrapped firmly around Caroline’s neck.
* * #
The first sounds of large-weapons fire had stunned them all. So much for our window, Cyclops had thought. The clock was no longer ticking on their mission, it had stopped. They were working within that silent moment between the last second ticking away, and the explosion that would end it all. In this case, maybe literally.
Even if they found and defeated Magneto, he had thought as the sound of far-off explosions increased in frequency, it all still depended upon Gambit, Archangel, and Cooper taking the Sentinels out of play.
That had been several minutes ago. The sounds of battle and destruction continued, but Cyclops ignored them now, concentrating only on the goal at hand. He stood in the recessed doorway of a deli on the corner of Sixth Avenue and Thirtieth Street. Across the street. Jean and Rogue hugged the front of a discount music store. The Juggernaut was barely concealed by a massive brown box that would have been a newsstand if its owner hadn’t fled in the great Manhattan exodus.
The Juggernaut. It was still difficult for Scott to deal with the fact that they were working with one of their greatest enemies. But he reminded himself of what Cain Marko had said earlier. He was a career criminal, not some menace looking to take over the world. The Juggernaut had just as much of a stake in stopping Magneto as any of them. After all, he wasn’t a mutant.
With a rapid gesture, Cyclops signalled for Rogue to take
to the air. He flattened out his hand so she knew to fly close to the tops of buildings.
Now you, Jean, he thought, certain that the psychic rapport they shared would carry the words to her. Time to cross the street.
Cyclops smiled. The situation was as tense and dangerous as any he had ever found himself in, but he was not beyond being amused when the idea of crossing the street became ominous. As they neared the Empire State Building, the atmosphere among them, even the air around them, seemed weighted with the expectation of conflict, of consequence, of death.
The smile disappeared from Scott’s face.
Jean sprinted across the street. Scott wanted to watch her move, watch her lithe form, wrapped in the snug, practical combat uniform they all wore some version of. But the time for such luxuries was past. He poked his head out from the doorway and glanced around for any sign of attack, any hint of the enemy. Like the laser sighting on many modern weapons, anything Cyclops laid eyes upon was a potential target.
No targets, though. Not this time.
He signaled Juggernaut, and the two of them moved out together, taking it slow and hugging the opposite sides of the street. Cyclops didn’t figure they had much chance of sneaking in and breaking out the other X-Men. But it would have been foolish to just charge down the street. It was impossible to predict what they might find when they reached the building. There might be a way in other than the lobby, or they might be able to bluff
their way in, using Jean’s telepathy as a mask.
No real plan could be instituted until he had seen the building’s setup.
Jean moved ahead, with the Juggernaut close behind, and Scott watched them both and monitored his own surroundings. He sped across the street and they all continued up Sixth Avenue. It wouldn’t be long now, he thought.
Scott, we’ve got—Jean’s telepathic voice filled his head.
“Cyclops, hang back!” Rogue’s voice came over the comm-link. “It’s an—”
—company!
“—ambush!”
“Hell, it’s about time,” the Juggernaut cried joyously from across the street. “This sneakin’ around crap was gettin’ real old real fast!”
Hairbag and Slab came around the comer of Thirty-first Street. They weren’t alone. Cowards they might have been, and none too bright. But in some ways, they were far from stupid. At least a dozen other people backed them up, male and female. Mutants, obviously. Most of them looked relatively normal, but there were two figures so gone over into the feral stage common to many mutants that they could no longer stand upright. A strikingly tall woman with tentacles growing out of her face and a dark-skinned man with a massive, scorpionlike tail in back were other standouts.
Then there was the big guy. Forty feet high if he was an inch.
“They call me Humongous!” he bellowed, shattering every window for half a biock. “Surrender now, or I’m going to have to crush you.”
afeaa
Chapter 9
JjJUjloy, are you flatscans dumb,” Cargil sneered, then gpltossed Kevin and Caroline to the floor in a tumble of BsHimbs. “You didn’t think Fd hear the ding of the elevator arriving on this floor?”
“You weren’t asleep?” Trish asked, still confused.
“Are you dense?” Cargil snapped. “I heard the elevator. 1 pretended to be sleeping.”
She spun on Caroline, who lay on the floor, eyes slitted in concentration as she stared at Cargil.
“You stop that, girl,” Cargil snapped. “I know you’re that little sleep-witch, but if you don’t quit playing sandman with me, I’m going to have to kill you just to stay awake.”
Caroline looked at Trish, then at Kevin. Her eyes opened, her face relaxed, and she began to rise to her feet. She had not abandoned them, at least not as far as Trish could tell. But she wasn’t going to throw her life away either.
“Sorry, Kevin,” Caroline said. “I did my best.”
“We’ll be okay, hon,” Kevin answered. “Don’t worry.” “I wouldn’t be so quick to make any promises, flatscan,” Cargil said. “I’m just trying to figure out what to do with the three of you.”
“Let them go, Joanna,” the Beast said. “They’ve done nothing, really, it’s not as if they have a chance of defeating you. Just let them leave.”
“No, I’m sorry,” Cargil said. “I’ll have to think of something just a little better than that.”
“I have an idea,” Kevin said happily. “Why don’t you bleed!”
He leaped at Cargil and landed a solid kick to her face. Then he fell on his butt.
Cargil had barely flinched, Trish knew the woman had scarcely felt Kevin’s attack, and a more even-tempered person might have simply ignored it. Or laughed. Nobody had ever accused Joanna Cargil of being even tempered.
“Well, I guess that decides that,” she growled. “I’m just going to have to kill you.”
“Don’t do it, Frenzy!” Storm spoke up, and Cargil turned to stare at her. It occurred to Trish that the women were polar opposites, Cargil a twisted mirror image of the nobility and purity of Storm’s African features. But Cargil was twisted, by hate and rage and lust for murder and power. She was Hyde to Storm’s Jekyll.
“Back off, Cargil, or I’ll spill your guts all over the floor as soon as we’re down from here!” Wolverine warned.
Bishop remained silent, his eyes revealing him to have been a witness to far too many hopeless conflicts.
Kevin hopped to his feet and into a kickboxing stance. Trish knew he’d done a little kickboxing, but wasn’t sure how good he was. One thing she was certain of, though. Not good enough.
“Go release the X-Men, Trish,” Kevin said.
“I’m not leaving you,” she said.
“Neither am 1,” Caroline added, moving closer to him.
With a flurry of blows to the face and body, Kevin did the best he could to slow Cargil down. Caroline frowned again, trying despite Cargil’s threats to force the muscular black woman to sleep. They had nothing left to lose, Trish knew. Caroline obviously knew it too.
Kevin threw a haymaker with a lot of power behind it. Cargil blocked it with the side of her hand. She reached in, grabbed him by the throat again, and snapped his neck with a crack so loud it echoed off the tile floor.
“Kevin!” Caroline and Trish screamed in unison.
“Cargil, no!” Storm shouted, and all four X-Men pulled at their restraints.
“And as for you!” Cargil shouted, turning 011 Caroline. “First you sell out the emperor to a weakling flatscan genetrash loser, then you actually try to use your teeny tiny power on meT ’
“Oh, my God ...” Trish said, in a small voice choked with tears and heartache. She and Kevin hadn’t been the best of friends, but friends they had been. He had been there because of her, and she felt more than a bit responsible for his death.
She lifted the chair Cargil had been sitting on. Cargil shoved Caroline hard against the wall. Trish shattered the wooden chair on CargiPs head. The Acolyte’s head swung
around as if she were some kind of mechanical thing.
“Don’t worry,” she hissed, glaring at Trish. “You’re next.”
“No!” Trish shouted. “Please, don’t—”
Caroline’s spine shattered under Joanna Cargil’s blows. The life went out of her eyes. Trish couldn’t help but think of the ancient TV in her parents’ home, and the way the old picture tube seemed to fade away before winking out for good.
The X-Men shouted, screamed for Cargil’s attention, trying desperately to distract her. They all cursed her for the coldblooded murders they had just witnessed. Wolverine and the Beast strained against their bonds. Either of them could easily have ripped the restraints from the wall if their mutant abilities had not been inhibited.
Then Cargil turned toward Trish.
“You’re not running,” she said. “Why aren’t you running, flatscan? I know you’re afraid.”
Trish said nothing. Her mind was too numb to reply, body too frightened to move.
“Oh, man,” someone said softly, just at the end of the hall.
“Well, well, well, a challenge, finally,” Cargil said, looking toward the source of the voice.
Iceman.
“Good God, Frenzy, what have you done?” Bobby Drake said.
A lunatic would have laughed, then, grinned and kept on trying to kill. Cargil didn’t laugh. She didn’t smile. She took a deep breath, shrugged her shoulders with some semblance of regret.
“They pissed me off,” she said. “Couldn’t be helped.”
She wasn’t insane. She had killed Kevin and Caroline with full knowledge of her actions, the murders nothing more than petty, immature revenge, committed for lack of a better idea what to do with three unwanted visitors.
Insanity would have made it so much easier to take. Or at least, that’s what Trish thought. That she’d done it out of malevolence and immaturity, that was worse. But Iceman had come, to stop Cargil from a third murder. Trish’s heart cried out in glee that she was saved, but in the part of her mind
m
where guilt lay waiting, she couldn’t shake the idea that it wasn’t right. That it was her fault the others were dead, and it wasn’t fair that Iceman should have come in time to save her, but too late for them.
“Take her down hard, Drake!” Wolverine growled down the hall.
“Trish!” Bobby yelled. “Move!”
Then there was no more time
for regrets. Cargil was reaching for her, hoping, more than likely, to use her as a hostage. Which would be a major handicap for Iceman. Even if he had been the kind of person who would ignore a life in jeopardy, he and Trish knew each other. She and Hank had double-dated with Bobby and several of his girlfriends.
They were friends. She couldn’t compromise the fight, she had to get out of the way.
She wasn’t fast enough. Cargil snagged her by the hair and started to pull her back.
“No!” Iceman shouted. “No more, you crazy—”
Trish felt cold on the back of her neck, then heard a crackling noise and fell free of Cargil’s grip, sprawling to the floor. She scrambled to turn around, to back away. When she looked at Iceman and Cargil, when she understood what had happened, she stopped moving and just stared.
She blinked, then reached around to the back of her head to feel the ragged, ice-flecked edges of the hair that Cargil had clutched. Bobby had frozen Trish’s hair on her head, supercooled it to such a low temperature that it had simply shattered in Cargil’s grip.
“Trish, you okay?” Bobby asked.
Trish nodded. Iceman turned back to Cargil, who was encased in a block of ice so thick it barely left room to pass by her in the doorway. Only CargiFs head was free, and she was cussing loud and long.
“Shut up,” Iceman snapped. “I don’t know what happened to you, Joanna. You were never this bloodthirsty before.”
“I was never in a war before,” Cargil snapped. “You got lucky, Drake. Your problem is, you’re not willing to finish it. There will always be a next time, and next time I see you.
there won’t be any flinching. You’re already dead, Iceman. You just don’t know it yet.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard it before,” Iceman said.
Trish waited for the characteristic sarcasm, one of the jokes that invariably found its way out of Bobby’s mouth. It never came. He took her by the hand, and led her quietly down to where the X-Men were being held.
They looked at one another, all of them: Trish Tilby, Iceman, Storm, Beast, Bishop, and Wolverine. They spoke quietly, gravely, among themselves. They were pleased to know that Bobby was still alive. There was none of the telltale levity that was usually so common, particularly between Iceman and the Beast.
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