“Hmm,” Deathbird mused, not rising to respond formally. “I had forgotten how strictly you adhered to official convention. I suppose when I was Majestrix I had other things on my mind.”
Gladiator lowered his head in appropriate respect, eyes never losing their focus though all they could see was the crimson and sable of his uniform and the dim light reflected off the hard floor. Deathbird’s words suggested many things, not the least of which was nostalgia for her days as Majestrix. She would not dare say something treasonous in Gladiator’s presence, though. He would take her into custody immediately, and he was certain she knew it.
Still …
“Ah, such a pity,” Deathbird sighed and finally rose to stand half a dozen feet from Gladiator, arms crossed and wings blocking his view of her gossamer clothing. “What is your message, then, honored envoy?”
“You have no doubt received word from the Majestrix that the executions of the prisoners Candide, Mademoiselle Hepzibah, and Corsair, was to be delayed until the arrival of this envoy,” he said. “The Majestrix, your loving sister, respectfully requests that you be absolutely certain of the charges against the condemned prisoners before they are executed. To allow you time to consider this request, the Majestrix orders a stay of the executions for one standard day.”
“Don’t you think I know what is going on here?” Deathbird laughed. “My sister has a soft spot for the pirates, particularly Corsair. After all, it was they who came to her aid when she was an excommunicant from the empire. She thinks she will discover a way to stop their deaths without the empire seeing her actions as a weakness.”
Gladiator did not respond as Deathbird moved closer to him. She touched his cheek, lifted his chin and looked him in the eye.
“It’s not going to happen, Gladiator,” she said. “They are going to die. Oh, don’t be overly concerned. I will wait the day as instructed, and so will you and the rest of the envoy, and stay to be witnesses to the execution. I order it, an instruction you cannot deny unless you have previous orders from the Majestrix?”
Gladiator nodded, once.
“I thought not. Therefore you will stay, and watch, and report back to the Majestrix all you have seen. These are criminals, likely involved with a planned rebellion in which the Kree hope to have their revenge on the Shi’ar Empire. I do the Majestrix a great service in their execution, as I’m sure you will soon see.”
She turned away from him and picked up her glass again. Gladiator did not move. He stood, hands crossed at his back, his face gravely serious. After a moment, Deathbird faced him again, sighed in contempt, and barked: “Dismissed!”
Gladiator turned on his heel and left her chambers, trying his best not to think about politics, diplomacy, and their consequences. He was a soldier, after all. He had never wanted to be more.
* * *
CYCLOPS sat silently in the back of the Starjammer’s cockpit, mind lost in the nebulous space outside the ship’s view shields. The infinite stars glowed pink to his ruby-covered eyes. Ch’od and Archangel sat at the controls and their technical conversation was little more than a drone to his ears. They would be approaching the stargate shortly, and he tried not to consider the possibility that he was endangering faceless billions, and many of his loved ones, for the life of one man.
That was foolishness, he knew. If they thought the stargate’s destabilizing effect would blossom out of control because of the random passage of a vessel as small as the Starjammer, they wouldn’t be going at all. His father would be left to die.
“Scott,” a voice came at his ear, startling him.
“I’m sorry,” Rogue said, clearly surprised at his reaction. “I was just hopin’ you could be of some assistance back here. Jean an’ I don’t seem to be havin’ much luck.”
“What’s the problem?” he asked.
“Testosterone’s the problem, if ya ask me,” she said, frustrated. “Gambit an’ Raza haven’t really been gettin’ along since we took off. It’s only gettin’ worse.”
Cyclops left his uncomfortable perch in the cockpit and followed Rogue back into the main cabin. Jean sat at a holo deck studying the layout of Kree-Lar and its new capitol building. She caught his eye, and there was a question there, but he ignored it for the moment.
“Thou wouldst dare question the honor and integrity of the Starjammers? Thou art a fool, Terran!” Raza roared, poking a finger into Gambit’s chest. “Countless times have we have aided the X-Men in battle.”
Gambit held a ragged paperback book in his right hand, and even as Cyclops entered the cabin, it began to glow with explosive power. He wondered a moment if Gambit was even aware of it, and was disturbed when he concluded that the Cajun was completely in control of his powers.
“I tell you how I dare, me,” Gambit said angrily, his Cajun patois heavier than ever. “De Starjammers been pirates from de beginnin’, sellin’ to de highest bidder. Maybe you backed up de X-Men a coupla times, but don’ you try to claim you always on de right side, ’cause we all know it just ain’t true.”
Raza looked prepared to tear Gambit’s head off, but before he could open his mouth, Gambit held the charged up book next to Raza’s neck.
“You put dat hand near me again, cyborg, an’ you gonna draw back a bloody stump!” he said.
That was it. Raza leaped at him, knocking the book to the floor of the cabin as the two tumbled to the ground.
“Jean!” Scott shouted, all that was necessary for her to pick up on his instincts. The paperback exploded at the center of the cabin, but Jean had to have surrounded it with a telekinetic shield in time because it did no damage other than to shred itself into fine confetti.
As a young man, Scott Summers was called “Slim.” While in excellent physical condition, muscles finely honed, he still looked relatively wiry. Appearances are often deceptive, however. With Rogue at his side, he strode over to where Gambit and Raza were about to truly get into it, and his anger was only matched by his concern at what might happen when Gambit’s powers and Raza’s cyborg strength were turned to a pitched battle in the heart of a spacecraft.
“You idiots!” he shouted, as he pulled Gambit away from Raza and lifted him off the floor. Despite his cyborg enhancements, Raza was no match for Rogue’s sheer power.
“What in God’s name is the matter with you?” he asked. “This childishness endangers our mission and the lives of everyone aboard this craft. If we all make it out of this alive, you two can tear each other apart if you like. Until then, this feud is over or you’ll both answer to me. Let’s not forget that we’re all here for the same reason.”
He caught Gambit giving him a sidelong glance that spoke of wounded pride and eventual payback. He moved close, so that only the Cajun would hear, and said, “I’m a rational man, Remy. But trust me, it’s a mistake you don’t want to make.”
Gambit smiled disarmingly, showing off the charm that was just another weapon in his arsenal.
“Don’t worry ’bout me, Scotty,” he said warmly. “You know I de president of de Cyclops fan club. I jus’ don’ like gettin’ my toes stepped on, mon ami. You understand, eh?”
Raza tried to shake loose of Rogue, but could not and began to curse her instead. With a look, Scott signaled her to let go, and he pushed away in anger.
“Thou art a man of honor, Cyclops,” he said through half a sneer. “Thy father, scoundrel though he may be, is also honorable. Mine loyalty is to him. Thou wouldst be wise to ensure that those whom thou doth lead are equally loyal.”
Raza headed for the cockpit while Rogue spoke quietly yet sharply to Gambit. Cyclops sighed, grateful that he’d averted the crisis. Gambit had always been a bit of a problem; a lifelong loner thrust into a team situation. Often, Scott wondered why he stayed. He supposed it was partly due to loyalty to Storm, who brought him to the team, not to mention his obvious affection for Rogue.
His ruminations were interrupted by Archangel, who came in from the cockpit, leaving Raza and Ch’od to their usual copil
ot status. “Approaching stargate,” he said. “Everyone get strapped in. Ch’od says we’re in for a rocky ride.”
“You seemed to be doing pretty well up there, Warren,” Jean said, and Archangel smiled. Despite the shocking contrast between his blonde hair and eyebrows and his blue skin, he was still as handsome as the day he first joined the X-Men. He’d been through a lot, Cyclops knew. They all had. And they’d stuck together. He was lucky to have them.
The five X-Men in the Starjammer’s main cabin strapped themselves into form-fitting seats, all of which faced forward, toward the closed door of the cockpit. Just as Cyclops snapped his belt in place, the ship seemed to pause a moment, as if it had been thrown straight up and was waiting that heartbeat before gravity took hold and brought it crashing down again. It was an eerie, almost nauseating feeling, but not nearly as bad as what came next.
The stargate had offered a moment of resistance, stalling the ship in place despite its thrusters. When that moment ended, the ship was not thrown but yanked forward with impossible strength and speed. The material of his seat seemed to fold around his back and shoulders, his neck and the back of his head, nearly bursting with the raw force of the stargate’s pull against the gravity of real space they were exiting.
For a moment, he couldn’t breathe. The lights in the Starjammer dimmed, then went out. A moment later auxiliary running lights cast a ghostly gloom across the cabin. The pressure relaxed gradually, though the sensation of speed did not lessen at all. It wasn’t the first time Cyclops had passed through a stargate, but he didn’t think he would ever be used to it. The speed was at once almost unnoticeable and terrifyingly disorienting.
“I don’t know ’bout y’all,” Rogue said with a nervous laugh, “but this ain’t the kind of thing I’d like to do every day.”
“You’re not kidding,” Archangel added. “At least we can be grateful that getting out isn’t as hard as getting in.”
“I hope that’s true of this mission as a whole,” Jean said. “With what Raza told us about an armada waiting in space around Hala, I’m not exactly feeling confident about our chances here.”
The Starjammer’s engines began to whine loudly as Ch’od fired the backward thrusters and the ship started to fight the stargate’s natural velocity. Cyclops planted his feet firmly on the floor and held on tight, every muscle fighting the shattered momentum caused by the vessel’s braking. They were getting ready to exit the stargate. It all seemed to have happened much faster than he remembered. Or perhaps the trip to Hala was simply shorter than the one to Chandilar, the Shi’ar throneworld.
“I wouldn’t worry much about our arrival, Jean,” Archangel said haltingly, the pressure of braking getting to him as much as it was the others. “After all, Ch’od’s rigged the ship so that the moment we exit the stargate and enter Hala’s orbit, we’ll be cloaked from all detection. I think we’re going to sail right through this mission and make it home in time for The X-Files.” Then the ship was traveling normally again. They began to unbuckle themselves as Raza emerged from the cockpit.
“Prepare thyselves, X-Men!” he said. “Ch’od shall place the Starjammer in cloaked, autonomous orbit, thus can we all teleport down without fear that she’ll be discovered. But yon planet awaits, and whither …”
A thundering crash boomed up the companionway from the cargo hold, and the auxiliary lights flickered several times.
“Shields!” Raza yelled, then turned back toward the cockpit.
“What was dat you say ’bout cloaking, angel?” Gambit asked sourly.
And with good reason. The Starjammer was under attack.
FIVE
MILES of green slipped by beneath the dark whisper of a plane that was the X-Men’s Blackbird (so named because it was modeled after the SR-71 Blackbird jets). From the pilot’s seat, the ground looked like nothing so much as a great quilt of brown, yellow, and green squares, with the occasional string of river, highway or mountain range snaking over its surface. The American Midwest held an extraordinary majesty from the air, where one could forget that the poisons of city industry and city life had long since begun to seep into rural life.
Where Dr. Henry P. McCoy could forget, just for a moment, that he was a member of that elite race known as homo sapiens superior, a mutant. With the claws, fangs and indisguisable blue fur that were the hallmarks of his mutation, of the genetic x-factor that made him the Beast, Hank McCoy would not have been able to walk a block in the Midwest without being the object of fear, revulsion, and hatred.
The same might be true of New York or L.A., he realized, but somehow it seemed worse when the magnificence of nature surrounded him. Perhaps because in the city there were so many other eccentric and frightful things happening at all times, while in the country, he could almost understand the feelings of so-called “normal” people toward mutants. Almost. If he ever reached the moment when he could completely comprehend their bigotry, that would be the day he retired from society all together.
A red light popped into life on the control panel, accompanied by a high-pitched beep, alerting him to an incoming call on the Blackbird’s vid-comm unit. While the Blackbird was loaded with as much high-tech as they could fit into her innards, the size of his hands and length of his claws made Hank’s preferences for the control panel decidedly low-tech. To answer the call, he flipped a green toggle switch just to the left of the vid-comm screen. The picture snapped to life: a split-screen view with Professor Xavier on one side and Valerie Cooper on the other. A three way link-up that Hank hadn’t been expecting.
“Professor. Valerie. Has our strategy been modified?” the Beast asked, concern creasing his furred brow.
“Hank, Valerie and I have been talking and I know how cautious you and Ororo are, but I just wanted to emphasize how delicately this must be played,” Xavier said.
The Beast watched the image of Xavier onscreen. They had known one another for a long time, and Hank had learned to read the man fairly well.
“What is it, Charles?” he finally asked. “I appreciate that we’re confronted with a lot of unknowns here, but that isn’t what’s perturbing you, is it?”
“I’m afraid the knowns are more my concern at the moment, Hank,” Xavier answered. “Valerie, will you tell Hank what you told me, please?”
The woman was all business as she told him of her concerns, of the immediate problems they would face even before the one they had set off to confront. Hank appreciated Valerie’s directness, especially in this time of crisis.
“What I’m really getting at,” Valerie said, “is that you can almost certainly expect federal troops at the scene when you arrive. I’d hoped you would get there first but that doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. I’ve no idea how they’ll react to your presence, so just watch your step.”
“I don’t comprehend, Valerie,” the Beast replied. “If the government sanctioned your preliminary contact with the Professor, why can’t we merely say that he apprised us of the predicament?”
“That would be the logical thing to do, Hank,” she said grimly. “But we’re not dealing with logic, or rationality here. We’re dealing with a man to whom hate is sustenance. Or have you forgotten how much Gyrich hates you all?”
“Gyrich,” the Beast repeated, lips curling back in distaste. “The man simply can’t wait to be king. Who expired and left him in dominion?”
“The director has placed him in charge of this operation,” Valerie said with obvious remorse.
“Valerie,” Xavier interjected, her name itself a question, “you have still yet to tell me who the director of Operation: Wideawake is.”
There was a silence on the three way call, which was quickly interrupted by the cockpit door clanking open behind Hank. The Iceman, Bobby Drake, poked his head in and, as was his way, started jabbering immediately.
“Hey, Hank, any room up here?” he asked. “A few more minutes with Mr. Depressing Bishop and I think I’ll …”
“Just a moment, Robert,
” the Beast said quietly, and Iceman fell silent.
“I’m sorry, Charles,” Valerie said at last. “There are some things that just aren’t worth the price that is put on them. This is one of those things. Believe me when I say you don’t need to know. It isn’t important who the figurehead is, only the arms and weapons are your concern.”
“Do you truly fear for your mortality, Val?” Hank asked before he could stop himself.
“There was a time, when I first gained high-level clearance, that I basked in the glory of secrets, and thought how silly and paranoid people were about the government,” she said. “I’ve grown up a lot since then.”
“Thank you for your help, Valerie,” Xavier said.
“I do what I can, Charles. Always,” she said. “As for you and your team, Hank, all I can say is watch your asses out there. Just because the dog never bit before, doesn’t mean it won’t.”
In a blip, Valerie disappeared from the screen and all they could see was the chiseled features and gleaming bald pate of Charles Xavier.
“Keep me posted, Hank,” Xavier said.
“Roger that,” the Beast replied, and signed off, leaning back in the pilot’s seat and letting out a heavy sigh with a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding.
“Duuuuuude!” Bobby said in his best surfer-speak. “That Cooper babe is such a downer, man.”
“Utterly,” Hank agreed, smiling again at his old friend’s ability to make light of anything and get away with it.
“Seriously, Hank, what’s up with that?” Bobby asked as he dropped down into the copilot’s seat, strapped in and ran a finger over the instruments, checking that they were all functioning correctly. “What’s got the Prof and Val so spooked?”
“It appears as though we have unfortunately entered into a contest to see who can best resolve the developing situation with the Sentinels. A contest that may forthwith evolve into a conflict, as the other contestant is none other than Henry Peter Gyrich,” the Beast said unhappily.
“Oh, great!” Bobby said, holding a hand to his belly. “There goes my lunch. Just talking about that guy could ruin anybody’s day.”
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