"Huh."

"Ah. You ARE here."

"Yeah, and here I was just thinking the same thing," Pietro said, getting up off his seat and walking over to the edge of the cell. "Can't say I'm surprised, though. Well, about you being HERE, that is. I have to say I'm pretty surprised we're having this conversation."

"…Your legs are better."

"Eh," Pietro said, shrugging. "They were already starting to heal a bit when I was put in here. The muscles are still weak, but… yeah, the bones are healed. Finally."

A few moments of awkward silence passed before Pietro piped up again.

"So, why ARE you here?"

"I… wanted to see you myself. How your… situation?... is."

"I want to get out of this stinkin' cell, I've got a lot of pent-up energy…. But yeah, I'm fine. Certainly better than I was with the Brotherhood, if that's what you want to ask."

"So you are finished with Brotherhood? You are joining X-Men?"

"Yes, and heck no," Pietro said. "I mean, I'm done with Magneto, and I'm NEVER going back to Mystique again… though a little bird's told me she and the rest of the team you guys sent to Genosha are missing now. Poetic justice- if she's really dead, that is. If she isn't… well, she soon will be. My father isn't pulling any punches this time… as I've found out the hard way.

"But just because I'm out of the Brotherhood doesn't mean I'm with the X-Men. I mean, I wanna fight my father, get back at him for abandoning me… and they'll probably help me do that when everything really hits the fan. We don't have to necessarily PICK a faction, y'know. We can just not side with anybody and keep out of all this."

After another awkward pause, Pietro decided to change the subject.

"So… how come you're speaking to me in English, anyway?"

"I… it is a lengthy story," Hisako sighed.

"Like I've got anything better to do," Pietro said, sitting down against one side of his cell and stretching his legs.

"And this is… it?"

"Yes. I've already told you, the Professor did as thorough a scan as he thought conscionable just yesterday. Everything is on these drives."

"But this doesn't match up."

Hank sighed, taking off his glasses and massaging the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger. "Yes, I know."

"There's been over a hundred new Mutant sightings within the past six months—"

"I know."

"—and this only accounts for about a dozen or so of those."

"I. Know."

"So then where are the others?"

"We've already told the government. Multiple times."

The FBI agent that had been talking to Hank raised an eyebrow. "You… do realize how this sounds. Particularly without proof."

"I don't know how much more proof you need!" Hank said, his tone slowly getting louder and louder until he was shouting. "Magneto and his Acolytes have been missing since the Nimrod incident, and ever since then the Mutant population of the world has been in slow decline, and NOT because of deaths—they're being transported somewhere where Cerebro can't detect them. And the only people that are NOT X-Men in this world that know how this machine works are A, Forge—who is right here in Bayville and is registering tomorrow with the rest of us, mind you- and B, MAGNETO!"

Hank stopped as he heard the overly muscled FBI personnel on either side of him cock their assault rifles.

Growling, Hank ground his teeth together, closing his eyes. Come on, contain the Beast… control it…

After a few seconds, Hank just sighed and looked up at the FBI agent, who now was obviously a bit frightened, although trying fairly unsuccessfully to hide it.

"I'm sorry, it's just… it's a stressful time for everyone here, what with the Registration Act and… and the loss of part of our team, and everything."

"Look, Mr. McCoy, I'm not… accusing you of anything," the agent said as he started to power down the laptop he had connected to Cerebro's backup servers, motioning for the guards to ease off a bit. "I'm just here to collect this information on orders from my superiors. We're supposed to be cross-referencing all this data from Cerebro with the Mutants registering tomorrow to see if there's any discrepancies, so that we can figure out who's telling the truth and who's not."

"Which seems to me a pretty clear invasion of priv—"

"Mr. McCoy, I'm not here to debate the role of government with you," the FBI agent interrupted. "That debate has already been had regarding the Mutant Registration Act, by politicians. We're just following their orders and collecting the data so we can identify any Mutant criminals after Registration Day tomorrow. And the… indiscrepancy… of this data with real-world sightings and statistics is… well, you have to understand why we're suspicious."

"…Yes," Hank admitted after a few seconds' pause. "But we're not working with Magneto. Professor Xavier himself has vowed that to you, in an official written statement."

"Where is the good Professor, anyways?" the agent said, standing up and stepping aside to let some entering agents into the Cerebro room so they could disconnect the backup drives from the computer and haul them away. "We need to get his signature on a few documents before we wrap all this up."

"He's down one more level," Hank said. "He's a bit… occupied right now, but I'm sure he'll be with us shortly."

"…And… and you're sure I'm ready for this?"

"Jamie, I understand your concern," Xavier said, putting his hand reassuringly on his student's shoulder. "But I've scanned your mind thoroughly, and there is nothing that you're attempting to block from me. If any more… alternate personalities… are waiting for you to use your powers again to 'get out', there would be small sections that would be resisting me—stray thoughts."

"I get it, and I feel fine. It's just—"

"—You're just back from a week's vacation with your parents and, after such a nice time, you don't want anything to ruin it again. Especially not something like the nightmare you were forced to deal with a few months ago."

Jamie raised an eyebrow at Xavier, who merely chuckled in response.

"Jamie, you have to realize I've just finished scanning your mind. I know exactly how you feel. But it's been a long time since you've been able to use your powers willingly, and quite frankly we're already going to be stretched thin tomorrow when we're overseeing so many Mutant Registration Centers across the country. Every state except Alaska and Hawaii are opening their centers at the same time. Using your powers will go a long ways towards helping to alleviate some of that stress, so I need to take out that mental block. Not just for the good of the X-Men, but for your own good—your ongoing fear about using your powers again is hampering your progress in dealing with your recent experiences."

"But if you detect anything weird, anything at all—"

"I'll immediately put the block back in place, yes," Xavier said, placing the tips of his fingers on Jamie's temples. "Now… are you ready?"

Jamie sighed, closing his eyes. "Alright. Do it."

After a few seconds, Xavier let his hands down and wheeled back a bit. "There. Done."

"Wait, really?" Jamie said, opening his eyes. "I don't…I don't feel any different."

"You shouldn't," Xavier said. "All I had done—in physical terms—was block your central nervous system from accessing the small portion of your brain that you use when you activate your powers. Now it's simply… free for you to access again."

"Okay… here goes nothing…" Jamie said, closing his eyes again.

With a grunt, he promptly split into two Jamies, both of whom opened their eyes slowly again.

"Hey… hey, it worked!" both said at the same time. "And… and I-we… we feel each other! The same connection in our brains that I've—uh- we've… always had!"

"Good, good," Xavier smiled. "Now, do it once more, just to make sure you've got the hang of it."

The two Jamies promptly split into four, though this time there was no closing of the eyes.

"Yes!" all four said simultaneously, giving each other high fives. "We're all aware of the others, as we oughta be! Our powers are back to normal!"

All four collapsed back into one Jamie, who had a huge grin on his face. "Thanks, Professor—it… it really feels good to be able to do this again without worrying about the 'others' ganging up on me or anything."

"Well, again, let me know if you feel anything off at all," Xavier said. "But I'm glad your powers are back to normal, Jamie. You showed great courage by allowing me to do this after everything you've been through."

"How? How do you—do you have the courage to go through with this?"

Ororo sighed and put her hand on Scott's shoulder, both of them looking out over his room's balcony at the sparkling bay below, the sunset making the water and sky seem orange.

"Scott, I… I wish I had a secret technique for you, some secret way to think, to fool yourself into thinking everything will be okay. But I don't. You just… you have to pull yourself up and move on."

Scott was about to say something, but looking down, he saw Cessily and Rahne coming around one corner of the Mansion outside, talking amongst themselves.

"Um, maybe—maybe we should go back inside my room," Scott murmured, going back inside even before he finished the sentence.

Ororo understood exactly what Scott was afraid of as she followed him inside and slid the glass doorway shut behind her.

Due to both his being the "non-adult" who had been at the Mansion the longest- and his general personality- Scott had become the de facto leader whenever the other instructors weren't around. As such, most of the other students had come to rely on him (and, to a lesser sense, Jean) as a sort of "relay point" between the student body and the instructions. Yes, Scott and Jean were still technically teenagers (though just barely, Ororo noted—she reminded herself Scott's twentieth birthday was in only three months, and Jean's wasn't far behind), and as such still a bit more approachable and relatable to by the general student body. But they had also been here longer than anyone else except Xavier and herself, so most of the students here tended to look up to Scott and Jean and rely on them to set an example, too.

So whenever Scott was having... problems like he was now, he tended to lock himself in his room. Not in a self-pitying, "get away from me" sort of attitude, but just so that the other students didn't see him like this, didn't think he was capable of feeling like this—and to be sure, it was a very rare occurrence that he was like this.

There were only three people he tended to reveal these feelings to—the Professor, Ororo herself, and, somewhat more recently, Jean.

Of course, that number had been knocked back down again to two recently.

"I mean, Ororo, you had to have dealt with something like this," Scott said in between sobs, sitting on the side of his bed. "You used in live in the middle of the wilderness in Kenya, but in all of five years you went from that to being an instructor here. And you had your… your family split, with one half staying in Kenya while the other half came here to America. After living your whole life in one place, how did you… how did you deal with the separation?"

"Honestly? I buried myself in my college work," Ororo said, shrugging slightly as she sat down on the bed next to Scott. "That might not seem like the most elegant solution, but that's what I did. And I still got along fine with the various members of my family, and… and, thankfully, until Sam and Logan died, I… I never had to deal with the loss of someone close to me."

"But to have your fiancé go missing…" Scott gritted out in between his teeth. "And that's the best case scenario…"

"Scott, look at me," Ororo said, taking his chin and turning his face towards hers. "I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that everything's going to be okay. That Jean and Rogue and Kurt and the others who went to Genosha are fine. By now, I'm sure something hasn't gone according to plan. But I'm also not going to lie to you and say that they're dead—because we simply don't know right now."

"Then when are we going to find out?!" Scott seethed. "That—that's almost worse to me than finding out that they're dead. The not knowing—that they could be… they could be worse than dead."

Ororo sat there, unresponding, a single tear falling down her cheek as her thoughts turned towards that possibility, too.

"And… and I mean, this is what really gets me," Scott said, his voice continuing to waver. "I realize I may be going down the wrong track with this, but just… just follow me for a second. Who were the original ones here—before all the so-called 'New Mutants' came along? And what's happened to us, huh? Jean, Rogue and Kurt are MIA. Evan couldn't take it anymore and joined the Morlocks. Kitty couldn't take it anymore and went back home, and we haven't heard from her since. Logan's dead. I mean, is this what the Xavier Institute is turning into? A meat grinder? Just a building with a constantly-changing cast? How long do I have left, do YOU have left? I can't believe it, but I'm starting to agree with Jubilee about the likely future of this place. JUBILEE! We've got hundreds of Mutants out there aligned with Magneto. We've got the Registration Act tomorrow on the 20th. It just looks… it looks like more than ever, the world's turning against us. And things can't go on like this for much longer."

"Well, that's the thing about situations that can't go on for much longer, Scott—they don't," Ororo said in response, slowly getting up. "One way or another, this will all end soon."

"And what if it turns out that we're the losing party—like it sure seems like it's going to?" Scott said.

"Well," Ororo said sadly, her hand on the door to Scott's room as she unlocked it, "Then we go down knowing that we fought for the right thing. That no matter what, we didn't waver—we stood for what was right, even when the world didn't. And, in the end, if you'd want anything written on your tombstone—isn't that what you'd want on it?"

Scott just sat there on his bed—his back to Ororo, his elbows on his knees, his head sunk low between his shoulders, staring at the ground, unresponsive.

After a few more moments of silence, Ororo sighed sadly and quietly left the room, closing the door behind her.

"This will all end soon," Scott repeated softly to himself as he looked up at the quickly-vanishing sun behind the horizon through his balcony door. "One way or another…."

His expression abruptly hardened as the last bit of the sun disappeared behind the ocean line.

"And I hope to God it all ends with Magneto dead and gone."

"I'm going to kill her. I'm going to kill her. I'm going to kill h….. HUUUUUAAAGGGHHH…. ugh… uh…. HUUUUAAAAGGGHHH…"

Todd winced at the sound of Wanda's vomit filling her toilet filtering outside of the bathroom door.

After waiting a few moments for the heaving sounds to stop, he gingerly tapped on the door.

"Uh… sweetums…. Y-you okay in there?"

"I swear, Toad, I am not in the mood. Go away."

"I just wanted to make sure—"

"GO AWAY!"

Todd reflexively hopped straight across the room in fright as the doorknob abruptly cracked off the bathroom door from a stray hex field, nearly crashing into Lance as he did so.

"Hey! Watch it!" Lance said, managing to side-step out of the way into Wanda's bedroom at the last second before Todd landed on the wall behind him. "What the heck's wrong with you?!"

"Dang, Wanda's in a really bad mood. I mean, I know she's usually a bit on the sour side, but—"

"You can't tell me you wouldn't feel the same way if Mystique drugged you and took your place on a mission against your worst enemy in the world."

"Eh," Todd shrugged, hopping down to the floor and standing up as he did so. "I've kinda gotten used to stuff like that over the years. Granted, I ain't ever been poisoned, but—"

"So she's still recovering from that stuff, huh?" Lance interrupted. "I kinda figured she'd have it out of her system by now. Do you know what Mystique drugged her with?"

"I ain't no doctor," Todd said, shrugging again. "Apparently somethin' that kept her in a deep sleep for five days straight and the next couple days throwing up. She seems better than yesterday, though. Figuratively speakin', a' course."

As Todd hopped out of the room, Lance followed him out and closed the door behind them, both of them making their way down a hallway to the main room in their base's living quarters. "She's not gonna be happy tomorrow even if she IS feeling better, though," Lance said. "None of us are. I can't believe we're actually being forced to register."

"Yeah," Todd agreed. "I'd say this is the end of the Brothahood, but… eh, we've come back from worse."

"Really?" Lance asked, quirking an eyebrow. "Let's see, John's missing and probably dead—burnt to death by his own flames, knowing him; Mystique's also missing, but knowing her probably NOT dead, just holed up somewhere on Genosha; Wanda's PO-ed as all get out and probably hates Mystique almost as much as her father now; we all have to register with the government tomorrow and probably within a few more weeks be transferred to some Mutant-proof jail or something; and hey, let's not forget the X-Men now know where our 'secret' base is and are keeping us under house arrest until they figure out what to do with us."

"Ooo, I forgot about the house arrest thing," Todd said, hopping into his favorite chair in the common area, where Fred and Noriko were also sitting and watching television. "Yeah, okay, we screwed."

"How could you FORGET about being under house arrest?" Noriko asked, turning the volume on the TV down.

"What can I say? I'm a home body," Todd replied sheepishly. "And with Wanda bein' sick and all, I wasn't gonna leave here until she was all better anyways. …What we watchin'?"

"Just flippin' channels," Fred said. "Most of the main ones have stupid all-day coverage of the Registration Act tomorrow with a buncha 'experts' on. Not really much on."

"I got it!" Todd said excitedly as Lance plopped down on the couch next to Fred. "I know how we can make a living! Well, after we do our jail time, that is… we'll become experts in… Mutantology! We're Mutants, right? We're already experts! We can appear on all these stupid talk shows and gab about stuff that seems obvious and make a tonna money!"

"We are NOT going to jail," Noriko said.

"What, you think we're gonna get the death sentence?" Todd asked, scratching his head. "Not in New York."

"No, I mean it in the literal sense," Noriko answered. "Mystique's not going to just abandon us like that. She's got a plan. She's always got a plan."

"Ummm…" Fred said, beginning to tap his fingers on the couch in an uncomfortable manner. "I, uh, don't know about that…"

"'Riko, I know you're relatively new to the Brotherhood," Lance said, "But you need to realize something. Yeah, Mystique always has a plan—for her life. We're just along for the ride."

"Oh come on," Noriko said. "I realize what she did to Wanda was… kinda cruel, but I'm sure she had her reasons. If you'll remember correctly, she wanted to go on the Genosha mission initially. If was only after Professor X said no that she was forced to take Wanda's place. I mean…. Come on, guys, she saved me from being locked up in a Japanese prison cell."

"Uh-huh," Lance said, cocking an eyebrow.

Todd laughed.

Fred fidgeted nervously.

Noriko's eyes widened slightly in surprise at their response, then narrowed as she stood up. "Wait… you guys really are serious? All of you? Fred?"

"I get where you're comin' from, 'Riko," Fred said sheepishly, his eyes cast down at the floor. "I mean, I believed in Mystique like you do—once. But, I mean… yeah, Lance is kinda… right on this one. She just uses us all to help get done what she wants."

"…Okay, let's just pretend for a minute that you're right. You're okay with this?!" Noriko asked.

"What else are we gonna do?" Fred shrugged, managing to turn his gaze up to finally look Noriko in the eyes. "I mean, Todd was livin' on the streets before Mystique singled him out, Lance was thought dead in some kinda building collapse at his school, I was a freak show in some Texas rodeo, Pietro was in jail, Wanda was in some asylum, John didn't wanna work for Magneto no more, Hisako was either gonna get killed or put in jail when all was said and done… She took advantage of our predicate- preditate-"

"Predicament," Todd supplied.

"Yeah, our predicament," Fred nodded. "She's left us, more'n once, without any notice, and came back whenever she felt she could use us again. I mean, yeah we're used, but at least we got a group 'a Mutant friends here who ain't Xavier's lapdogs."

Noriko just stood there in disbelief for a moment before responding.

"You… you're wrong. ALL of you… you think you may know Mystique, but you don't. Yeah she can be cold sometimes, distant, but she saved me, even gave me these gauntlets to help me control my powers! There is no way she would do that for someone she didn't care about!"

"Hey, I know how you feel," Lance said. "I totally felt the same way when she recruited me. But, uh… yeah, she DOES do that to people she doesn't care about, 'Riko. So long as we're useful to her, that is."

"Oh, screw you, Lance," Noriko sneered. "You hate everyone."

"And you don't?" Lance asked. "Isn't hating everyone—well, everyone who isn't here—practically a requirement for joining the Brotherhood?"

"Yup, I hate everyone who ain't in the base right now," Todd said, raising his hand.

"Butt out, Toad!" Noriko yelled, charging up one of her gauntlets.

"Yes, ma'am."

"What, you wanna go?" Lance said, getting up and giving Noriko a "come at me" gesture with his hands as the ground started to rumble slightly. "You know we're right."

Noriko looked at Lance, her eyes narrowing, both her gauntlets now charging up—until finally she sighed, her shoulders sagging as she reabsorbed the electricity back into her body. "I'm still not giving up on Mystique. Not yet, anyways."

"Give it time," Lance yelled at Noriko as she left the room, headed towards Hisako's quarters.

"Yo Lance, calm down with the tremors, man," Todd said. "That ain't too smart what with us bein' underground."

"Like I need YOU lecturing me on being smart," Lance sneered, though the tremors did come to a stop as he sat back down again.

After a few uncomfortable moments of silence, Fred turned the volume back up on the television set, the three's attention refocusing on it as he began flipping channels again.

Noriko knocked on Hisako's door. Her cousin had been even quieter than usual today—she hadn't heard a peep out of Hisako's room all day. Granted, Hisako usually kept to herself, but she had lightened up a bit after it was discovered that Mystique had gone on the Genosha mission instead of Wanda. Mystique still seemed to really stress out her younger cousin.

Heck, Mystique seems to stress out everyone else, now…

Noriko waited a few moments before knocking again, not hearing a sound on the other side of the room. [Hisako, open up! It's Noriko, I just want to see how your English studies are coming!]

A few more moments passed, and still no sound.

Noriko knocked once more, this time urgently. [Hisako, I'm not kidding! Open up—are you okay?]

Still nothing.

Noriko finally pressed a button on the door's side panel to open it up—but to her surprise, Hisako wasn't in there.

In fact, Noriko noted as she walked into the room, Hisako's desk in the corner of the room was completely empty. No English book, no manga comics…

A thought suddenly entered Noriko's mind—a thought that nearly caused her to panic. Channeling the electrical energy stored in her gauntlets into her body to make her superhumanly fast, she ransacked Hisako's entire room in minutes, tearing it apart—searching through every drawer, under the chairs and bed….

In fact, the wind from the speed at which she was going back and forth across the room caused a sheet of paper that was attached by a piece of tape to Hisako's pillow to detach and float towards against one wall, the motion catching Noriko's attention. She immediately rushed over to it, noticing a note in Hisako's handwriting on one side of it—addressed to her.

She read it in a fraction of a second, the panic she had been feeling turning into fury just as quickly.

X-23 perked up as she heard a loud clang coming from the door inside the old decrepit barn that the X-Men all knew now led to the Brotherhood's base.

A second clang, then a third.

She unsheathed her claws.

On the fourth clang, there was a sound of metal sheering, and a blue electrical blur immediately rushed out of the barn.

Most people would have cried out in pain as Surge raced up to them, grabbing them with her arms and pinning them to the ground, her hands crackling with electrical energy that burned X-23's skin easily.

Of course, she had been familiar with pain far worse than electrical burns.

"Where is she?!" Surge screamed in rage, her eyes practically popping out of her head.

"This is your only warning," X-23 replied, calmly but sternly. "Get off of her and get back into your base."

"Where is Hisako?!" Surge screamed even louder, the more powerful electrical surges from her hands blackening and peeling X-23's skin where they made contact.

Wordlessly, X-23 swept Surge's legs out from under her with a spinning kick, then before the Japanese teenager could react she seamlessly reversed their positions despite the electrical burns on her arms, X-23's hand-claws now pointed at Surge's neck as she saw from the corner of her eyes the other members of the Brotherhood (minus Wanda) coming out of the barn.

"She is with us," X-23 said, keeping Surge's hands pinned to the ground, despite the crackling electrical energy from her gauntlets now starting to burn into Laura's hands as well. "The note she left for you should have mentioned that."

"Yeah, and I'll bet you forced her to write that," Surge said, spitting in Laura's face.

"We did not," X-23 said, unfazed. "She contacted Jean mentally before the group left for Genosha. Jean told the rest of us that Hisako did not wish to be there. Since Jean and Mystique are now gone, Xavier made contact with Hisako and we arranged to get her out last night, while all of you were asleep."

"I am going to kill you," Surge spat, practically frothing at the mouth with anger by now, the charges from her gauntlets burning even hotter against X-23's skin.

"You are not able to," X-23 replied simply.

"Yeah, well what about the rest of us?" Blob said, smashing his fist into his open palm for emphasis. "I don't think you can take all of us, Little Miss Logan."

"I've been up against stiffer odds before," X-23 said, her muscles visibly tensing.

"Laura, stop it!" all of them heard, and turned to see Maverick running towards them, along with Husk and Iceman, who had also been tasked with guarding the Brotherhood's base.

"Leave them alone, Laura," Maverick said as he caught up with the group.

"They provoked me," X-23 said matter-of-factly. "I am only responding in kind."

"We don't want to start a fight here," Maverick said. "Laura, LET HER GO."

X-23 glared at Maverick, but reluctantly stood up, the myriad electrical burns on her skin almost immediately beginning to heal.

"Let me see Hisako," Noriko said to Maverick, standing back up. "Even if everything that clone's told me is true… I still have to see her."

"Not now," Maverick said. "Perhaps tomorrow, at registration time."

"You can't stop me," Surge growled, electrical power surging into her legs.

Before she sped away, however, Iceman unleashed a beam at her, freezing all of her body except her head in place.

"Well, I can," Iceman smirked. "See, at least with Pietro he didn't give off telltale signs before he sped off somewhere. You don't exactly have that advantage."

"Why… w-why can't I see her?!" Noriko said, starting to shiver from the cold encasing her.

"Because right now, she doesn't want to see you," Maverick said. "Why do you think we took her out of there while you were asleep? She's afraid of you, Noriko. Grateful for your rescue, but still afraid."

"But… but I tried to…" Noriko said, her voice wavering before she cut herself off.

"You've killed people, and haven't really seemed to regret it," Maverick said. "That's what concerns her so much, though to be honest, from what Xavier got out of her willingly via Cerebro, she was considerably more afraid of Mystique and the others than of you. If that helps any."

"So you just expect us to LET you get away with all this?!" Lance said angrily. "Kidnapping one of our members in the middle of the night?"

"Lance, stop with the macho talk already," Husk sighed. "You guys don't have the manpower to stop all of us, and you know it. You've lost."

"Ain't that just always the case?" Toad muttered under his breath to Lance.

"Hey, Blue."

Nightcrawler shook his head, his fitful sleep interrupted. Slowly he looked up from his position on the floor.

"….Tabitha?"

Something's not right…

"Aw, look, they even gave your tail its own little shackle! How cute."

"…So you ARE here, like we thought," Kurt sighed, getting into as comfortable a position as he could, considering he was chained to the floor of his underground cell.

"Yeah, I've been here for a while," Tabitha stated matter-of-factly, dragging something fairly heavy in behind her that Kurt couldn't quite make out in the dim light and sliding the heavy solid cell door shut behind her. "The balmy weather takes a little getting used to, but the facilities are pretty nice now."

"Tabitha… how could you do this?" Kurt sighed, not really having the strength to shout at the former X-Man. "I get that you didn't think the X-Men was the place for you, but… this? With Magneto?"

"Hey, Magneto may be a bit of a stick-in-the-mud, but he's got his head in the right place, Blue," Tabitha said, sitting down on her knees so that she was almost at the same level as Nightcrawler. "You guys never let me have as much fun with my powers as I wanted—here I can use 'em anytime I want to! I've made tons of friends! And I mean, this whole Genosha thing? WOW, what a plan! There's no way Professor X would've ever thought of this."

"I agree," Kurt said, glaring at Tabitha. "So… why are you here? What do you want with me?"

"Aw, come on, Blue," Boom Boom said, waving Kurt's concerns away. "I'm not like that. I mean, I get it why Magneto and everybody are keeping you all in here—I mean, you DID kinda break into our territory uninvited and all—but I'm not gonna torture you."

The word "torture" finally made Kurt realize what hadn't seemed right about Tabitha—she looked normal.

"Hey, wait a minute," Kurt said, "Why aren't you covered in burns?"

"See, just be glad you're not Amara," Tabitha replied back, her tone and expression turning slightly bitter at the mention of her former best friend's name before abruptly turning cheery again. "Yeah it was a bad first couple of weeks here, but then we got this new guy in—whatsisname, Felix… no, Elixir! Yeah, he can heal other people's injuries in seconds, Blue. He's an amazing guy. So yeah, he touched me, used his powers, and like half a minute later I was back to my normal self! Pretty cool, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess," Kurt admitted. "But I'm not sure what you're here for. You said you're not going to torture me, you're obviously not going to set me free…. What do you want?"

"Well, first, I just wanted to see you—make sure they didn't go too far. I'm not gonna lie, Blue, you look awful-but you'll pull through. Which is good, because I don't think you're like the rest of the group you came with. See Blue, I think if we give you enough of a push, we can turn you."

Kurt let out an abrupt, bitter chuckle despite himself. "Really? And how would you do that?"

"I've seen the mischievous side of you, Blue—you may act the model X-Man, but I know you chafe now and then under Professor X's rules. I mean, otherwise you never would've taken me to that school carnival that one night, right? You never woulda helped to throw that party when all the adults were gone, you never woulda went off to Saint Sebastian island when we were on that cruise… So I just think if you really see what we're doing here, you'll come around. It'll be tough—I know it's difficult to accept when your worldview gets shattered—but you're a tough little fuzzball, you'll pull through. And then we won't have to keep you in these dumb power-dampening shackles!"

"Huh," Kurt said, looking at the chained cuffs around his hands, feet, and tail as Tabitha got up and walked back to the cell door. "I was wondering why I couldn't teleport out of here."

"Yeah, some science genius around here designed them—don't really understand how they work, don't really care," Tabitha said, grunting a little as she slid the rectangular object she was carrying with her to one corner of the room, into the circle of dim light but out of Kurt's reach.

Kurt saw that the object was a wireless television set, and Tabitha switched it on and began switching channels.

"How do you even get a signal in here?" Kurt asked.

"Hey, it's the coolest thing—we actually have a satellite!" Tabitha said over her shoulder as she kept searching through the channels. "See, we got another teleporter here, Blink—she's the one who rescued me from jail, and no offense, but she can teleport waaay farther than you can, Blue. Anyways, some of the super-brains around here put together the satellite and she just teleported it up into orbit! Apparently, unlike how they portray it in most movies, you CAN actually survive up in space without a suit on for up to, like, a minute, minute-and-a-half if you hold your breath. Since she was only up in space for a second, it was no real problem for her. Apparently the satellite hacks other satellites, or something like that. We're actually amplifying signals from the major U.S. channels, here…. Now, let's see…. Ah! Here we go! One of those boring news channels."

"You came in here to give me some entertainment… and you put it on C-SPAN?" Kurt asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Well, you can ignore whatever they're blabbing on about right now," Tabitha said, getting up and sliding open the cell door. "But it's almost morning back in the U.S.—and it's August 20th, that stupid Registration Day, remember. So, anyways, I just wanted you to enjoy the show, Blue."

"Show?" Kurt said, his head perking up at the word, a growing sense of dread forming in the pit of his stomach. "Tabitha, what show?"

"You'll see, Blue," Tabitha said, winking before she slid the cell shut behind her.

"Tabitha, what are the Acolytes doing?!" Kurt yelled anxiously.

"That's part of the surprise!" Tabitha's muffled voice came in through the other side of the door. "But that's not the point, Blue! It's not so much what WE do—it's what THEY'RE going to do in response! Just watch and learn, okay?"

"Tabitha?" Kurt yelled again, yanking on his chains to little effect. "Tabitha, you've still got time! Whatever's going to take place—you still have time to stop this!"

No response.

"TABITHAAA!"

Cyclops looked around at the crowd gathered at the entrance to Bayville's town hall before checking his watch.

Yep. Five minutes before registration officially started.

"Alright, eight fifty-five check-in," he said, turning on his long-range comlink. "Everyone, report in."

Cyclops' stomach untwisted slightly as the various X-Men "on duty" reported in from their places around the contiguous U.S.—all reports came in fine, no suspicious activity yet.

Due to an agreement made beforehand with the government, the X-Men—since they were largely already "known" Mutants with their capabilities "not substantially under question"—had registered early. Now most of them—along with a fair number of Jamie duplicates—were monitoring the Mutant Registration buildings throughout the country. There had been at least one Mutant Registration building designated in each state, with some of the more populous states having two or three. It had been known for weeks now that all Mutants—by law—had to register by the end of the day at one of the buildings in their state. Taxpayer-funded buses—each complete with their own entourage of armed guards and even a military escort- were picking the Mutants up and dropping them off, primarily to stave off the "no transportation" excuse that many politicians figured some of the Mutants would have.

Cyclops didn't like it. The military show of force, the fact that at everyone of these registration stations they had one Mutant guard and almost forty specially-trained guards armed with AK-47s—it obviously belied the official stance taken by those who had passed the Registration Act that registering as a Mutant wasn't any bigger of a deal than getting a state ID card and social security number.

Still, at least they weren't being rounded up and kept in some cell in the meantime—the Mutants were able to fill out a few forms and then be taken back to wherever they lived.

He would be lying if he didn't admit that he thought things were heading towards something worse, however. Most of the Mutants here were clearly unhappy about being here, and the guards looked tense. Cyclops hated to think about such things, but if there was a misunderstanding and just one twitchy guard overreacted—

-Yeah. Yeah, he definitely wasn't going to think about that.

Instead he focused his attention on the Mutants lined up in front of the building, all talking amongst themselves, but eyeing the guards warily, who eyed them back with just as much distrust.

All the Brotherhood members were here, including Quicksilver (against their will, of course), along with Forge, Dorian Leitch and his mother, the Morlocks, a few Mutants from elsewhere in the state that he didn't recognize… and Hisako.

At first Cyclops had protested Hisako's presence in the line at the same time as Noriko, but Xavier had assured him it would be okay. Hisako may be a bit too green to be counted on to supervise a registration station, he argued, but though Noriko was mad at her, Hisako was fairly certain that she wouldn't be attacked. Both of them DID have to get registered, after all.

Of course, Hisako wasn't certain enough to satisfy Cyclops. Not on this day.

So when Noriko finally walked up to her cousin and tapped her on the shoulder fairly hard, Cyclops paid careful attention.

[Hisako. What the heck?] Noriko said, turning her younger cousin around to face her.

Hisako's eyes turned around, a slight glow of pink emanating from them briefly. […Noriko. I don't think this is the time or place… please leave me alone.]

[Tough,] Noriko said, crossing her arms. [It's never going to be the 'right' time or place, so we're talking about this now.]

[Alright, fine,] Hisako said. [But you know Cyclops is here, along with a lot of armed guards.]

Noriko let out an aggravated sigh. [Hisako, I'm not going to hurt you. I'm mad—extremely mad—but you've got the wrong idea about us if you think I'd hurt you.]

[Do I?] Hisako said, her expression narrowing. [The Brotherhood has killed and hurt many people. You killed your parents.]

Noriko's eyes briefly flashed electric blue in anger. [You really want to bring that up? That was an ACCIDENT, Hisako! The reason I'm so grateful for Mystique's help is because she gave me these gauntlets to stop me from DOING something like that again!]

[And you helped me too, and I am also grateful. But that doesn't excuse the way you took me away from my home—my family! Without even asking me!]

[You think you'd be welcomed back after destroying that much of an ancient landmark?!] Noriko shot back, exasperated. [Let's play pretend and assume that your parents WOULD just be fine with it. The Japanese government wouldn't.]

[Who said I wanted to get away with it?] Hisako asked, her gaze turning towards the ground.

Noriko stood there for a moment, sputtering to form a sentence and failing a few times before finally belting out the simple question, [What?]

[Noriko, I ruined the main part of a castle! I realize I didn't do it on purpose but… I have to answer for my crimes!]

[What crime?! You accidentally brought down a pile of old rocks, and you weren't even aware when you did it!]

[Have some respect for our history!] Hisako said back as loud as she dared, to avoid attracting unnecessary attention from the guards. [And besides, it's the same situation as if I were to have accidentally, say, crashed a car into a pedestrian on a foggy night! Maybe it was an accident—perhaps it was even the pedestrian's fault for not being more careful in such weather—but a person still would have been killed, and I would have had to answer for it!]

[Hisako, you're a Mutant!] Noriko stressed. [The damage you caused… it's just part of the 'growing pains' of becoming one! You're talking about dealing with regular humans—Hisako, we're better than them!]

[No, we're not!] Hisako said, starting to turn back around as the clock on city hall hit nine o' clock, and the guard up in front of the entryway opened the front door and motioned the first Mutant in line—Forge—into the building.

[Yes, we are—practically by definition!] Noriko said into Hisako's ear, even though they were no longer facing each other. [Can regular humans shoot electricity out of their hands? Can they project force fields around themselves? No? Then guess what-]

[That doesn't make us better!] Hisako said, turning back around and practically screaming the answer at Noriko, attracting the attention of everyone else nearby. [You know, you talk all the time about us being closer now just because we're Mutants, but we were NEVER close! We visited each other once a year! You're just using it as an excuse to-]

The remainder of Hisako's response was cut short as a blindingly white flash went off inside the building, followed a fraction of a second later by a deafeningly loud BOOM as the entire top floor of the Mutant registration facility was blasted outwards in a fiery explosion, burying them both in hot bricks and debris.

Cyclops slowly groaned and lifted himself up, the loud ringing in his ears slowly abating.

Opening his eyes, he saw the dust still settling from the explosion.

Then at least I was only knocked out briefly…

He couldn't make out much through the dust and debris, but he was able to piece together quickly enough that someone—somehow—had just essentially wiped Bayville's town hall off the map.

Cyclops coughed, his lungs throwing a fit from all the debris in the air. Holding a hand up to his mouth to cover it, he was glad when he took said hand away to find that there wasn't any blood on it. He saw a bit of blood and scratches on the exposed bits of skin that showed through his partially-ripped uniform, but he was in surprisingly good condition, most of the large chunks of rubble apparently having missed him.

He heard a few other coughs and cries for help through the smoky haze—he didn't know how many other people were injured or even killed, but he had to help them.

Even more importantly, he had to tell the others about this situation, get them to come help.

Looking around, Cyclops saw his comlink on the ground a few meters away amidst the debris. The reason he found it so quickly was that he already was hearing muffled sounds coming from it.

They've must've heard that—they've gotta be wondering what just happened…

Cyclops quickly picked up the comlink, ambulance sirens starting to sound in the distance.

*Hello, is anyone—*

*What happened! I just-*

*I'm okay, but-*

Cyclops almost instinctively let the comlink drop again, there were so many voices yelling to each other on the other end. He recognized Amara's voice, along with Piotr's, multiple Jamie's…

"Guys, it's okay, it's okay," Cyclops said into his comlink, causing the others to quickly stop talking as he glanced around to assess the situation. "It's Cyclops, I'm fine. But that explosion you heard over the comlink was here at the Bayville registration station. A terrorist attack—looks like the whole top of the building's been destroyed, and the ceiling of the first floor probably has caved in, too. But we've obviously got a lot of injured here, maybe even some dead—I'm gonna need some help here ASAP, call 911, call the—"

*Scott…. Scott…* Cyclops heard one of the Jamie's voices come through, his tone filled with dread. *It's… it's Multiple—I mean, uh, the Multiple in Salt Lake City, anyway. Scott, because of our link, I'm… I'm seeing what all the other "mes" are seeing, and from what we're all seeing, what the other X-Men are saying…*

*…It's happening everywhere, Scott. The Bayville town hall? It's not the only building destroyed. Every one of us, at every registration building… they've all been blown up, Scott. All within a couple seconds of each other. Every last one.*

To be continued…
 

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