"This is a bit of a different situation than the other interviews I've done, what with it not being technically one-on-one. However, I want to make it clear to any viewers that all of you have said you didn't mind."

"That is correct."

"There, you see, audience? They talk as one. It can take a little getting used to."

"Our codename is the Five-in-One, though by the time our audience see this, we will be more widely known as Pestilence."

"And what are your individual names, Five-in-One? The ones your parents gave you, I mean."

"I am Sophie Cucinella."

"Phoebe Cucinella."

"Mindee Cucinella."

"Esme Cucinella."

"Celeste Cucinella."

"Alright, go ahead and tell us your backstory—it's obviously quite unique."

"Yes. Identical quintuplets are so rare as to be practically unheard of, and due to birth complications our mother died delivering us. Thus, our father was tasked with raising us all by himself. As you can imagine, particularly during our young years it was difficult. Our father would be at work almost all day, and even then there was just barely enough to go around. We got to know our aunts and uncles better than our father, as they would often 'rotate' taking care of us all on certain days of the week, whereas we only saw our father for extended times during holidays. Even then, he didn't seem to like being around us. He certainly seemed to blame us for our mother's death, and was often terse. We were a burden to him, but he wouldn't just put us up for adoption.

"We wish we could say we tried to help eliminate this attitude of his towards us, but we didn't. We only strengthened it. We fought all the time when we were young—over big things, little things, nearly anything. We had different interests, different tastes, different personalities—our physical appearance was pretty much the only thing we had in common. We hated that our relatives—and even our father, sometimes—would mistake one of us for the other. To get back at one of our sisters that had 'wronged' us in some way, often one of us would impersonate the other and do something wrong—needless to say, this didn't help us get along any better.

"In an effort to make ends meet, when we were five our father tried to 'shop us around' to different news networks, getting sums of money to trot us out in front of various cameras so that people could stare at us—and, to make things worse, he dressed us all up in identical outfits too, which we hated.

"The audiences seemed to love it, though, to the point where by the time we were seven, our father struck a deal with a network and a reality show about our lives began. The money made from this allowed our father to quit his highly demanding job and be around us more often, but we hated how fake everything became. He acted very kindly towards us on-camera, while off-camera he continued to be as flippant as ever. We weren't fond of our father before, but during this television show we began to utterly loathe him—it was one of the few feelings we all had in common. We eventually grew so fed up with the reality show and our father's 'split personality' towards us that we began to sabotage the show. We refused to talk when the cameras were on us, we purposefully damaged the crew's equipment, that sort of thing. The show was cancelled after just one season—we had done our job.

"Of course, our father hated us all the more for it. Instead of going back to work, he simply decided we weren't worth it and began drinking rather heavily. Those next two years were miserable—we all hated each other, yet we were forced to share the same house. He didn't outright abuse us, but he came close several times.

"And then, two years later, everything changed. Our Mutant powers manifested, and our minds—they began to intertwine. We began to know each other's thoughts, desires—viewpoints. It soon got to the point where there was nothing any of us could hide from the other—we truly became the Five-in-One. Our fighting soon stopped entirely—since we could read everything in each other's minds, we saw our sisters' points of view. Our different thoughts, opinions, philosophies—they all melded into one. There was no more conflict between us, no more hatred.

"After a couple of weeks, our father started to notice the change—at least in regards to the fighting, of course. By this point we were not outright speaking together—that did not start to happen until we fully embraced the mind bond later. He asked us what had happened between us—and we didn't really have an answer, as we didn't know about Mutants yet. We talked about hearing each other's thoughts, which he took to meant that we were getting some kind of multiple personality disorder.

"He considered taking us to a doctor—more out of concern for his image than out of any concern for us. (We had never told him that we could read HIS mind to an extent now, too.)

"Our hatred for our father still existed, however, and we began to play tricks on him. We knew what he was thinking, what he desired, and so worked our hardest to make sure the opposite happened. With all five of us now working together, we accomplished quite a lot in this respect. Eventually he became so depressed and frustrated that he died from alcohol poisoning, a few years ago."

"Interesting, very interesting. Now, did you ever regret your actions? Many people would regret 'killing' their parents, whether it was via direct or indirect means."

"No, we didn't. And we still don't to this day. You must understand, we could see into his mind—what he really thought of us. What he, at times, imagined doing to us… let us just say that they were awful things. He was a miserable person, and we were happy to put him out of his misery.

"By the time he had died, we were of the age where we could take care of ourselves with our powers. Despite only being thirteen, we lived at the house by ourselves. We had brainwashed all our relatives into thinking that our father was still around—he was just busy again, always at work. When an IRS or insurance agent came along asking why our father hadn't paid his taxes or his dues, we brainwashed them into thinking that he had. We would order a pizza, and then when the delivery person came to our door we would 'convince' him that we had just paid him the money, and he would leave. There are many other examples we could give, but you get the idea. We used that portion of our powers quite profusely over the next years—until Magneto contacted us about joining his Acolytes, to which we accepted, especially given how central of a role he wanted for us in his 'empire'."

"Fascinating. So tell me then, last question—why did you decide to join up with Apocalypse? What about his philosophy and his goals—what about them appeals to you all so much?"

"It's quite simple, and it has to do with our own personal experience. One—we have seen the thoughts of many, many people. We know how evil they can get, even if they don't act on such impulses, and how self-serving so many of them can be. As we learned with Magneto, even some Mutants aren't immune from this, and so we must be vigilant—but Magneto wanted something that we agreed with, at least up until he started becoming blatantly incompetent at it—he wanted unity. He wanted everyone, all Mutants, working towards one common cause—wiping out the scum that is humanity.

"Apocalypse wants this same thing, but he's much better at it. He's allowed us to see into portions of his mind, and he has everything planned out—more than we could ever have thought possible, given his past. You see—individuality may be good for a few things, like Mutants using their different powers to create or achieve something none of them could have individually. But individuality is overrated.

"Think back to what we had said earlier—about always being at each other's throats when we were younger. That's what humanity is like normally. People will always preach and hope for 'world peace', if only we would 'respect each other's differences', but it is an absolutely illogical hope. When do countries divide into more countries? When they are given free reign over themselves. On the other hand, when do nations combine into fewer countries? When they have a totalitarian government or empire that forces unity. When our powers emerged, we were 'forced' into unity—we saw adequately each other's viewpoints, and were able to reconcile them until we all not only got along, but began to agree on everything. Obviously this is not possible on a global scale—yet—otherwise this whole interview wouldn't be necessary. But once Apocalypse and his Horsemen are in charge, we will 'force' Mutants into unity—something that they may resist at first because they are not used to it, but in time they will learn to accept and appreciate it. Hopefully, with the best Mutants working on a solution to this problem, within time every Mutant's mind will be connected—nothing will be secret from anyone, with all Mutantkind's knowledge at disposal to any one individual—and our boundaries will be truly limitless then. Until that day, however, we must trust Apocalypse with the new world order that he is planning. And if there is one thing Apocalypse is good at, it is planning."

"Everyone, up up up! Now!" Spyke called out to his fellow Morlocks, as one by one they continued to ascend the ladders in the New York City sewers towards the surface.

Pebbles continued to rain down on them as cracks spread slowly across the ceiling above. None of the Morlocks were sure what was going on, but Caliban had sensed the presence of an extremely powerful Mutant—more powerful than he had ever sensed-several blocks away, around Times Square.

They had made it up three levels through the various sewers and subway tunnels underneath New York City since the first shockwaves made their way through their Morlock camp, leaving so fast that they had abandoned everything except a small amount of food and water. It was blatantly clear that the whole subway and sewer system was becoming unstable, and could collapse within mere minutes.

Lucid was the first one to pop the sewer cover to the surface and make his way up onto a street near the edge of New York City, with the bay only a couple dozen yards away.

"Good heavens… Spyke, Callisto, come up quickly! You must see this!"

Spyke and Callisto glanced at each other in concern, then quickly motioned for the other Morlocks getting ready to ascend the ladder to step out of the way and let them through.

A few moments later and they were both topside. Spyke was the last of the three to break onto the surface, and saw both Lucid and Callisto looking with horror towards the center of the city.

"Lucid, what is—oh my god."

There were hordes of people running past them, nearly knocking the three down as they stared at the center of the city—even at this distance, it was clear that the center had become an utter disaster area. A huge plume of dust and smoke was rising from it, and far down the street they could see skyscrapers collapsed across the road, forming a sort of visual and physical barrier as to what lay beyond it.

After a couple of seconds passed, all three Morlocks gasped as they saw an upside-down skyscraper suddenly appear out of thin air high up in the sky somewhere a bit further away than Times Square, a few moments later falling out of their field of view and presumably slamming into the ground with a huge boom, followed by another shockwave a few seconds later that made everyone stagger for a moment.

"I told you," Caliban said as he climbed up topside himself. "Their presence, their power… it's like a constant shrieking into the ears to me. This whole city will be a pile of rubble within hours."

"You! You there!" Callisto yelled out, grabbing a fleeing man as he tried to run by them. "What the heck is going on?"
The man glanced nervously at Spyke and Lucid before stuttering, "Th-the Times Square celebration! Some creepy-looking Mutie just showed up, said that Apocalypse had returned, and something—something about a famine! I don't know what she wants, but she said she's gonna kill every human—but she's teleporting skyscrapers on top of people, man! This is insane! I'm gettin' outta here while I still can!"

With that, the man shoved Callisto away, who reluctantly let go and let him continue fleeing.

"Apocalypse is back?!" Spyke said in disbelief. "No. No way. We defeated him, big time. How could he be back?"

"Well, everything he said certainly seems to line up with this madness," Callisto said. "Come on, we'd better follow these people's lead and get the heck out of dodge before a building ends up falling down on us."

"Let me see if I can contact—" Spyke began, but cut himself off as the power suddenly went out in the city again. They had been in the sewers when the power had gone off the first time, but they hadn't figured it was a huge deal—it had come back on a short while later, after all. They all waited a few moments, but nothing even flickered. It appeared that this time, the power was out in New York City for good.

"Uh… anyways…" Spyke continued, his tone a bit more nervous and urgent as he took out his cell phone. "I was going to see if I could contact the X-Men to give us a lift, but now my cell doesn't have any bars due to the outage. I guess we're going to have to either walk there or see if we can hotwire a bus or something."

"Why would we go to the X-Men?" Caliban asked.

"Wh-why?" Spyke asked, looking back at Caliban, flabbergasted. "Because they're definitely going to be the only people who are going to be able to stop this—and they're going to need all the help they can get!"

Callisto, Caliban, Lucid, Scaleface, and most of the rest of the Morlocks—only a few still had to get topside—looked at each other for a moment, reading each other's expressions in the pale moonlight.

In the distance a couple more loud booms were heard—no doubt more skyscrapers being teleported around the city.

Turning back to Spyke, Scaleface said, "So… what, you're volunteering us to all go and help them?"

Spyke sputtered for a moment before finally replying. "Volunteering?! Guys, whoever that Mutant is who's doing this—they're going to kill millions of people, at least, before they stop! You're seriously saying you're just going to let that happen?!"

"What do you think we are going to do against someone like that, Spyke?" Cybelle said. "Few of us are combat-trained like the X-Men."

"Besides," Scaleface interjected, "It's not like people here have treated us the best. They've forced us to constantly be on the move, living in the sewers…"

"I'm not saying that they're the best individuals in the world, but you're just going to walk away? Let them all die?" Spyke asked.

"Spyke," Callisto said, putting a hand on the former X-Man's shoulder, "Don't get us wrong, we aren't condoning whatever agenda that Mutant has planned. But remember what the man told us—she was looking to kill all humans. We're not part of that group. And Scaleface and Cybelle raise good points… we wouldn't be able to help much, anyways."

"So help out those who are hurt!"

"Then we'd be seen as on their side," Callisto said, shaking her head. "There wouldn't be any difference between us and the humans, in this powerful Mutant's view. Besides, if Apocalypse truly is behind all this—well, he doesn't seem to have any problems with Mutants. If we just find somewhere safe and lay low, we'll probably be just—"

"So you'd be okay living under the thumb of someone who's massacred millions of people?"

"It's not my first choice," Callisto shrugged, "But honestly? We might get a better deal than we've got right now. You know how we live, Spyke. I don't need to tell you this. Façade and Torpid, they both died as an indirect result of stupid human oversight in trying to keep us down."

Another couple of distant booms sounded, and the ground shook slightly again.

"Look, we don't have enough time to have a lengthy debate here," Scaleface said, irritated. "I'm getting out of here with Callisto. If anyone else wants to stay here and die like Façade or Torpid, be my guest."

Spyke watched dejectedly as the Morlocks began to head for the river, Callisto beginning to direct a few of the Morlocks to break into and scavenge a nearby sporting goods store, hoping to find a few inflatable rafts in it so that they could get across the river without needing to get on any nearby bridges, which would most assuredly be a target soon.

"Fine," Spyke mumbled, "I guess I'll—"

Spyke stopped as he turned around to see Lucid standing there behind him, alone.

"Lucid? You're willing to help?"

"I agree with you," Lucid said softly. "It is one thing to strike back directly against the humans that have oppressed us, but this… this is another thing entirely. And I think I have an idea on how we can help."

"What is it?"

"Those skyscraper barriers that this super-Mutant erected around Times Square," Lucid said, motioning with his hand towards the distant wreckage. "They're too thick, my x-ray vision can't penetrate them. However, if you will help me get to a vantage point safely that is high enough where I can make visual contact with this Mutant—maybe there's something that I can see that is making them so powerful. Some kind of weak point, perhaps, something the X-Men can use to their advantage."

"Let's do it, then," Spyke nodded.

"Oh, no," Storm said, tears forming in her eyes as she gazed at the mess of rubble below them on the ground.

The Mansion had been completely destroyed, crushed under the sheer size and weight of the Empire State Building. A large section of the building—most of it, actually—had sheared off due the impact and lay at a crooked angle, leading from the top of the building sticking up out of the Mansion down off the side of the coastal cliff and into the relatively shallow bay waters nearby.

That wasn't the only thing, however—the damage was more widespread than that. Large chunks of debris littered the Mansion grounds, along with a rather thick layer of powdery stone and other building materials.

Storm's heart leapt as she looked around the grounds and found most of the X-Men she had expected to see, all of them in a close circle near the Mansion gates. Motioning to Angel that she had discovered where the X-Men were, they both dove down and landed on the ground next to the small group.

"Ororo," Piotr said, walking up and giving his fellow instructor a bear hug. "We are so glad to see that you and Warren are safe."

Storm took a moment to glance at the assembled X-Men—they were all disheveled, covered in a fine powder of debris that made them look like their colors had faded. Kitty and Danielle looked to be having a particularly difficult time.

"Forget about us," Storm asked, "What about you? I assume this is Blink's work, given what you told me—"

"She's apparently goin' by Famine now," Gambit said grimly, stopping to cough from all the dust in the air. "Apocalypse is pulling out all the stops on this one."

"What about the policemen around?" Angel asked. "Are they-?"
"Some," Xavier replied, his head rested against his steepled hands. "Many are not. Every ambulance and fire truck in the county is coming, so for those who are still alive buried under all that rubble—they'll be attended to soon enough."

"Well, what are we waiting for, then?" Angel replied. "Let's start helping them out."

"No," Xavier said swiftly but firmly, surprising both of the newcomers.

"Wh—why not?" Storm asked, confused.

"S.H.I.E.L.D. contacted Xavier on his cell," Rogue said. "Don't ask me how—the power's out as far as ah can see, along with cell phone coverage—but they're gonna be here again within a few minutes. We're supposed to go with them."

"But what about all the people trapped here?" Storm asked.

"It's…. it's certainly a difficult decision," Xavier admitted, pausing while he coughed. "But Storm, Apocalypse is forcing us to choose the lesser of two evils. Yes, we could help out here—but the more we wait before striking back at his Horsemen, the more time they have to massacre scores of more innocents. If we try to help out those buried in the rubble, we will actually allow more deaths to happen. We'll have to leave this to the local emergency personnel."

Storm was about to reply, but then noticed something.

Xavier, Hank, Kitty, Piotr, Gambit, Rogue, Danielle…

"Where are Maverick, Laura, and Kitty's mother?" Storm asked in alarm.

"Theresa went back with Fury before the attack," Xavier said. "As for the other two… I fear the worst. They were in the Mansion's basement levels when the attack happened. I'm not picking up Maverick's thoughts anywhere, and Laura's are faint—only basic, unsettled thoughts are going through her head, I can't pinpoint her location. The dust has just now settled down, so I assume trying to find out for certain would be prudent."

"Say no more, then," Storm said. "Rogue, Angel—both of you go down to the alternate entrance by the waterfall, see if you can find out where they are and if they're able to be saved. Let me know via comlink if you need any special kind of backup."

Both nodded wordlessly and took to the air, soon flying out of sight as they descended down over the cliff on the other side of the Mansion grounds.

"So," Storm sighed, "How did all of you get out of the Mansion in time? I don't imagine you had much—if any—warning before the building dropped on you."

"Rogue managed to grab the Professor's chair and get out with him before the rest of us," Kitty answered. "Piotr sheltered Danielle as he carried her towards the entrance, and I brought up the rear, making sure to keep Gambit and Mr. McCoy phased with me."

"All of the main building, at the very least, is destroyed to the point of not even being salvageable," Danielle said softly, looking at the X-Communicator on her wrist, her eye glowing brighter than normal. "I'm going through the Mansion's systems right now via my communicator… well, what's left of them, anyways. Everything's been completely crushed… even the… even the lower levels. Obviously the Blackbird and Velocity are both inoperable and inaccessible, even if they were still working."

"And that's where Maverick and Laura are," Hank finished sadly.

Storm was about to say something, but saw a large helijet inbound.

"S.H.I.E.L.D. incoming," she said, pointing to the incoming aircraft off the coast.

"Again," Gambit added. "Wish they coulda just stayed with us in the first place… they knew how bad things were gettin'…"

"We're not their only concern at the moment," Xavier said, raising his voice as the sounds of the helijet's rotating blades because more audible. "Gambit, I'm seeing the emergency vehicles parking outside. Could you please pry open the gates and let them in?"

"No problem," Gambit nodded before heading off.

All of the present X-Men stepped back from their former positions, forming a small landing pad for the helijet, which landed shortly afterwards. The side door opened, and Fury stepped out onto the ground, which was covered with a mixture of snow and dusty debris.

"My god," Fury said, taking a look around. "He's definitely not playing any games this time. Is this everyone? We've got to get out of here ASAP."

"Still undetermined," Xavier replied. "Angel and Rogue are checking out the alternate entrance to see if Laura and Maverick are okay. Gambit is letting the emergency personnel in, he should be back in a minute."

"Doesn't look good, Professor," Fury said, shaking his head. "I caught a glimpse of that waterfall entrance on my way in—there isn't really much of anything left there except a crumbled cliffside."

"My mom—where's my mom?!" Kitty asked urgently.

"She's fine, Pryde," Fury said, holding his hands up in a calming gesture. "But this is a worldwide catastrophe we're dealing with, here. We need all hands on deck."

"Worldwide?" Hank asked. "How so?"

"Blink isn't the only one souped-up and on a rampage," Fury answered. "Sinister has surfaced in Moscow, the Five-in-One in London, and Rockslide in Shanghai—all within minutes after that teleporting psycho gave her televised speech at the Times Square celebration. Not only that, but satellite imagery shows that a large section of the continent of Antarctica—over a third of its land mass, in fact—is breaking off from the rest. It's happening slowly, so whatever this is, it's not our immediate concern—but massive tsunami warnings have been issued all along the lower South American, African, and Australian coasts."

"What is going on?!" Kitty said, near hysterics. "How is this all happening?!"

"I'm in the dark as much as you guys," Fury shrugged. "But we may have some incoming info."

"What? From whom?" Xavier asked.

"Spyke and one of the Morlocks—forget his name. Got a call from them a few minutes ago—he says he tried to call all of you first, but he didn't get an answer for obvious reasons. Says they've got something that may be helpful—we'll be meeting them shortly, as we've got a camouflaged helijet heading for their position now. They're not far from where Blink's turning New York City into one giant field of rubble."

"Well, at least they're okay," Storm said with a sigh of relief.

"Speaking of which," Hank said, pointing towards a couple of flying figures coming towards them, carrying something in between then, "Our fliers are back."

"Oh no… Laura…" Kitty said, putting her hands up to her mouth as she began to sob.

Laura—who was being tenderly carried by both Angel and Rogue- was a shredded, tattered, bloody mess. It was clear that her healing factor had already been at work, and would continue to heal her—but her entire body was missing below the waist, and her upper body was covered in deep scratches and wounds, including a deep gouge in the right side of her skull. She was currently unconscious.

"I think I'm gonna be sick," Danielle said softly upon seeing Laura, letting her gaze sink down to the ground.

"Her entire lower body had been crushed by the collapsing underground levels," Angel explained sadly as he and Rogue touched down. "She had attempted to get out before the Empire State Building had fully collided with the Mansion, what with her enhanced senses and all, but even then she wasn't quite fast enough. We found her upper body sticking out from under a wall of rock a few feet inside the waterfall entryway. There was no way even Rogue could free her from that debris without stretching her entire body beyond the breaking point. Amputating her lower body was the only way—she was the one who had suggested it, in fact, but as soon as we did it, she… well, you can see."

"She'll heal," Hank said, putting a hand on Kitty's shoulder. "It may take a while, but from what Maverick's told me, she's been through worse."

"Where IS Maverick?" Storm said, the dread in her voice rising.

Rogue simply shook her head sadly.

"Oh, god, no…," Kitty said, her sobbing starting to intensify. Danielle began to weep as well, and they both walked over and hugged each other, sobbing into each other's shoulders.

"We didn't find any sight of him," Rogue said sadly, her eyes switching to focus on Gambit as he caught back up with the squad, a flood of emergency rescue personnel behind him as they headed towards the wreckage. "We asked Laura before she went unconscious—we were told he wasn't fast enough. Got crushed underneath all the rocks—it was too much force at once, even for him."

"Sadly, I had thought so," Xavier said softly. "Still, we needed confirmation."

"I think it's about high time we get back at these sociopaths before they end up killin' more of us," Gambit said, his voice tinged with anger and impatience.

"We've already got X-Force heading towards Shanghai," Fury said as he gestured for everyone to follow him back up into the helijet. "Because of her proximity, they're picking up Hisako on the way. They're our first attack force, simply because we've got them ready. But we've got to get the others—and that's going to take a while."

"So no matter what, hundreds of thousands—perhaps millions—of people die in the meantime," Piotr growled, shaking his head. "I will personally cave in Apocalypse's head for this."

"Diving headlong into battle isn't going to do anything except cause more of us to die needlessly," Fury said, the helijet beginning to take off as the entry ramp closed up behind all of them. As soon as the aircraft lifted above tree level, those present could see through the cockpit windows the scores of ambulances and fire trucks stopping near the Mansion wreckage. "We've got to plan smart here—see what they've got, and what and who we can counter it best with. We're still flying too blind here for my liking—which is why all the helijets I've got moving around the world to pick up your various X-Men are meeting up at the helicarrier. We'll lay down our plans there, so I'd advise all of you to start thinking about strategies. We're going to need all the help we can get, so I've already gotten my people to contact individuals who… may not normally be our allies, to help us."

*RRRINGGGG! RRRIINNGGGG!*

"Huzzah? Whuzz... that's not the pizza I ordered…"

"Deadpool!" Domino yelled from inside their shack's bathroom. "The phone! I'm kinda busy at the moment!"

"What's—oh, right! RIGHT!" Deadpool said, his expression changing in a fraction of a second from sleepy and confused to wide awake and excited. Picking up the phone on the desk he had been laying his head on, he answered, "This is Deadpool and Domino, mercen—wait, what? How did you get this number? ….Uh-huh… and you REALLY want us, amirite? Not a trick or anything? Okay, then, you've got my interest. Continue…."

A minute later Domino came out of the bathroom, only to jump as she looked up to see Deadpool standing right in front of her, a huge grin evident behind his face mask.

"W-wade? What are you doing?"

"Oh, don't worry, I wasn't peeking through the door cracks or anything," Deadpool said, waving Domino's concerns off. "Though MAN, we really need to put an air freshener in there… anyways, like I told ya. I was RIGHT. We got a job—vindication, baby!"

"Really?" Domino said, becoming excited herself. "Who's the client?"

"S.H.I.E.L.D."

"S.H—What? You're kidding, right? This is one of your jokes."

"Nope. Told ya something big was going to happen."

"Wade, they're our enemies, remember? You just clued them into our location—they'll be here in minutes! We've got to pack up a few essentials and get out of here, while there's still time!"

"Nah, trust me, they need us. Wait until I tell you who our target is."

"…Who?"

"Apocalypse," Deadpool grinned.

"Alright, I have officially gone from surprised and confused to terrified—and furious at YOU for agreeing to this job," Domino said, in one deft motion taking one of her guns out of its holster and pointing it at Deadpool's face. "Even if S.H.I.E.L.D.'s not pulling our strings on this, you've just signed our death warrant. I mean, Apocalypse? Are you crazy?!"

"You already know the answer to that one," Deadpool said, whistling happily as he walked back to his seat and leaned back on it, apparently completely unconcerned that he had a gun pointed at him. "But think about it, Dom—if we pull this off, we'll be legends!"

"We kind of already are. And 'legends' is exactly the kind of title I want to keep—not 'corpses.'"

"Eh, we'll be fine," Deadpool said. "We're going to have lots of backup, and this story arc is going to need some serious comedic relief. There's no way I'd be killed off."

"At least tell me we'll be set for the rest of our lives with the money they'll be paying us."

"Nope. We're doing this totally pro bono."

Domino cocked her gun. "….Why?"

"Recognition! Accolades! Plus, as I mentioned earlier, participation in the finale… oh, and if Apocalypse takes over the world, I think we'll be outta business."

Domino was silent for a moment, her eyebrows furrowed, before she finally spoke again.

"Well, I guess I don't have any choice this time, do I? So, in thanks… I'll see you in about ten minutes when you recover from the hole in your head, partner."

BANG!

"What was that?!" Toad shrieked, jumping up from his seat almost to the point where he knocked his head against the ceiling of the helijet he and the rest of X-Force were in.

"A distant explosion," Captain America said grimly from his positon in the co-pilot's seat. "From the external camera's magnified view, it looks like Rockslide—or War, or whatever he's calling himself now—is plowing his way through an oil refinery."

"Man oh man, how are we gonna defeat this guy?" Toad said, squirming as he sat back down in his seat. "He's like two billion stories tall—"

"—Exaggerating much?" Wanda interrupted.

"—and he's got a bunch of 'little' copies of himself everywhere!" Toad continued, undaunted. "All of us—I mean, all of us former Brotherhood members—we all tried to take on Rockslide when he was normal and we still got our butts whooped!"

"Honestly? I have a few ideas in mind," Captain America replied. "But nothing concrete yet. But we can't just sit back and do nothing, so we've been assigned to tackle the Horseman farthest away from the X-Men, to minimize travel time for their teams."

"It's just always about them, isn't it?" Pyro said matter-of-factly.

"Hey, if we're going to go out, it might as well be against someone we all hate," Avalanche said. "Me in particular."

"Avalanche is right," Captain America said. "In fact, what little plan S.H.I.E.L.D. and I have been able to cobble together for our team so far is that we'll sneak in on the perimeter and Lance will work as a distraction, egging Rockslide on while the rest of us focus on some way to take him down, or at least immobilize him."

"Well, at least he's attacking China and not Japan," Surge murmured, looking out one of the side windows at the devastation near the horizon that used to be Shanghai.

"Noriko…!" Hisako said from her isolated position near the back of the helijet. She had barely said a word during the entire trip, but knew that the mission was more important than any animosity between her and the others. Still…

"Shut up," Noriko growled.

"Hey, c'mon now," Blob said diplomatically. "We start fightin' each other now, we ain't never gonna get through this."

"He and Armor are correct," Captain America said. "Stow that attitude immediately, Surge. Besides, if we don't stop him here it's only a matter of time before he makes his way to Japan."

"But—"

"We're getting within visual range," Captain America interrupted. "Engaging visual cloak. All right X-Force, let's do this. Plan is to land near the coast and make our way to Rockslide's sphere of influence as quiet as possible. Make your final preparations."

War never ceased to be amazed by the power of the upgrade Apocalypse had given to him.

It was more than "just" the incredibly enhanced powers; there was something… technological within the piece of the Font granted to him. Something that had bonded with his brain (well, whatever his equivalent of a brain was, anyways). Every Mutant was pointed out in blaring red in his field of vision, sort of like the Font had taken a highlighter to it.

It had helped make sure he had corralled any innocent Mutants away from the destruction he was now causing, but it also made blindly clear when a helijet full of Mutants appeared on the horizon. He hadn't just simply watched the vehicle fly into the area and make it too easy for them to figure out he had noticed him—he had simply made sure that a couple of his "miniatures" on the crumbling rooftops were keeping an eye on it.

Besides, he was currently swatting at the utterly ineffective Chinese military copters swarming him anyways. They were starting to finally get the idea—that they weren't any more annoying than flies to him. Any damage they did to his enormous rock avatar he simply replaced with more rock from the ground or buildings. Thus, a few were starting to pull back, regardless of whatever their orders were.

Still, through his many sets of eyes he could see the helijet beginning to slow down and circle around. Whoever the Mutants were in that vehicle, they were definitely looking for a place to land.

War decided he'd figure that one out for them.

Plunging one of his giant fists into the ruined ground with an enormous crash, he flooded part of his presence into one of the few skyscrapers still standing at the edge of the city (though it was crumbling and certainly not structurally stable any more).

With a grunt, a huge explosion of force sounded at the base of the skyscraper, lifting the building off the ground and right on an intersection arc with the helijet's current trajectory.

"Did he just—?!" Quicksilver stuttered.

"He did," Captain America winced. Flipping switches and yanking the control stick downwards as hard as he could, he shouted, "Brace for impact!"

"Permission to curse long and hard, Cap'n?!" Toad yelped as he buckled himself up in his seat.

Captain America sighed as the skyscraper quickly rushed up to meet them.

"…Permission granted."

"Alright, everyone, here's the situation," Nick Fury began, sighing. "I'll explain what we've got, our plans—such as they are—and then I'll open up the floor for questions and suggestions."

He was at the head of a long table, in a briefing room deep within the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarrier. The room was rather dimly lit, most of the focus on the collection of large flat screens behind Fury, the largest of which showed a satellite map of the world with certain locations highlighted in red. Most of those at the table were the X-Men they had rescued from the Mansion, but a few S.H.I.E.L.D. officials were also present—high-ranking, from the number of medals pinned to their uniforms—as well as Spyke, Lucid, and a couple of X-Men who lived relatively near to Bayville to the point where S.H.I.E.L.D. had managed to already get a helijet to their residence and back. So far, that just included Multiple, Husk, and Iceman.

"Apocalypse has somehow managed to power up his four 'Horsemen' to levels beyond even what his previous Horsemen could have accomplished. We've got five locations to worry about," Fury continued, pointing at the map and, with touches at various points on the screens, brought up satellite views and various footage of the incidents as he began to talk to them.

"First up is—and I'm sure you're all aware due to how televised it was—the former Acolyte codenamed Blink, who's now calling herself Famine. New York City is quickly becoming a giant pile of debris, as she's teleporting any building taller than a few stories somewhere else in the city—upside down—and letting them fall, letting the city essentially destroy itself with the help of gravity. Scans still show her at Times Square—in the middle of a relatively long line of buildings in the center of NYC that are still standing. At first we didn't know why she was keeping those buildings intact, until we zoomed out."

Some of those present gasped as the satellite view of New York City zoomed out to encompass all of the downtown area—and the intact skyscrapers, easily visible against the background due to all the dust and rubble everywhere else, clearly spelled out in giant letters the word "MINE" across the landscape from a top-down view.

"Another psychological tactic of hers," Fury said, shaking his head. "Regardless, she's used relatively large piles of rubble to build a circular barricade of sorts around her central position. The army engaged her briefly, but they pulled back as soon as she teleported one of their missiles right into the White House. It's clear that whatever we throw at her, she just throws back at us."

"The White House?!" Angel gasped. "Does that mean—the President—"

"Unknown," Fury said grimly. "That's why he's not here via video conference, in fact. As soon as the news broke out about Times Square, he was evacuated underground, but the missile launched at Blink was a pretty potent one—the White House has been utterly destroyed. Salvage crews are currently being shuttled to the site to see if the underground bunker was penetrated. We most recently tried to down her with long-range snipers, but somehow she knew where they were, and as soon as they fired she simply teleported their bullets on a trajectory right back at their skulls.

"Regardless, she's now had upwards of three hours to tear New York City apart. Estimated casualties are upwards of a million already, though that's likely to increase more slowly as anyone left alive has probably evacuated the area by now.

"However, Blink's also managed to find just the right weak points in our power grid, and she somehow shut down the grid for the entire eastern half of the U.S. shortly after her broadcast ended. The western half—and Texas, which has its own power grid—still have power, for now at least. I'd imagine she's going one area at a time. Still, she remains a priority B target currently due to how far-ranging her attacks can be.

"Moving on, we've got mass chaos breaking out in London, England, though of a different sort. We're a bit more in the dark on this one than the others, for reasons you'll soon see. The Five-in-One now call themselves Pestilence, and shortly after our satellites tracked their signatures to London every single individual within a thirty-mile radius began to act as one—namely by brutally attacking and killing the unsuspecting innocents outside of that radius. Our guess is that Pestilence is somehow mind-controlling them all. Estimated casualties at this point are about thirteen thousand and climbing very quickly—people not under their control are starting to fight back, but of course they're simply attacking their neighbors, so no matter whether the ones under control of Pestilence or those not under their control die, they're still casualties.

"Here's where it gets a bit confusing—a couple of eyewitness reports say that there's simply tens of thousands of duplicates of the Five-in-One with weird insectoid eyes, mouths, and claws, but what little footage we've gotten out of the area simply shows one massive group of citizens attacking the other. No duplicates of any kind."

"It must be some kind of mass mental projection," Xavier commented. "Another psychological tactic these new Horsemen are using. Hence why cameras aren't picking it up."

"That does not make any sense," commented Laura, to everyone's surprise. She had been utterly silent since she had regained consciousness. She was seated at the table just like everyone else, but had a blanket draped over her waist on down. Her healing factor so far had managed to grow back her legs a little lower than the knees, so as such she was stuck in the seat for the time being. She also had a half-finished, rather large plate of food in front of her—regenerating that much used up a lot of energy, after all. "Why would you make it more obvious to the enemy who your opponents are? It would cause much more confusion if they had simply let people appear to everyone else as they are."

"Facing down a legion of insectoid psychics is a lot more disconcerting—and, quite frankly, scary—than facing a bunch of normal humans wielding assorted weapons," Beast interjected before Xavier could answer. "After all, even for those people who haven't personally witnessed large crowds of violent individuals, they've seen it before on TV. This, though—no one's ever seen anything like this."

"It doesn't matter much, anyways," Fury replied. "If one of Pestilence's 'troops' fall, they'll simply use that 'extra slot' to take control of someone else within their range. Once they're done with London, I imagine they'll move onto other major cities and just keep repeating the same tactic. There's already been reports of a few relatively small organized bands of hostile individuals making their way through the Channel Tunnel and into northern France.

"Now, onto the third Horseman—Sinister, who's now Death. He's shown up in Moscow, and in addition to his incredible regeneration powers he's gained the ability to exponentially accelerate the forces of decay within an ever-expanding proximity around him. He can also specifically target something a bit farther out than his sphere of influence, but it can't be much farther and he has to 'suck in' the rest of his sphere to do it.

"Now, this isn't just causing people to age prematurely or cause buildings to decay a little more quickly, people—this is a massive acceleration of the process. People caught in his 'death aura' rot away to dust before they can do much more than take another step, and even things that should be sturdier—like major buildings—crumble into pebbles in a matter of seconds. There's even soldiers that have shot bullets at him from well outside his sphere of influence, but as soon as those bullets enter that sphere they crumble apart, so conventional firepower isn't going to work here.

"Unfortunately, that's not even the worst of it. For every person that dies within his death aura, he somehow managed to suck in that person's soul—life essence, whatever you want to call it—into himself, making him physically stronger as well as expanding his death aura. Already he's quite the hulking brute; his strength right now is estimated to be roughly on par with Blob's, and will be surpassing the X-Force member's strength fast.

"Once they realized this, the Russian forces pulled back, but not before he caused irreversible damage to Moscow—he showed up right next to the major governmental buildings, and most of those at the highest echelons of power in the country are likely dead. However, the good news is that he attacked in the morning, so relatively few people were downtown. Most have evacuated the area while he continued to turn the city's major landmarks into dust, so the death total so far is relatively small, at about twenty-five hundred. However, at the rate his sphere of influence is expanding, it won't be long before he'll be able to kill people before they even see or hear him coming, so that's bound to go up dramatically the longer we let him roam free."

"So is he a priority target or not?" asked one of the high-ranking S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives at the table.

"He's the Horseman we can afford to wait the longest on, as right now anything that gets near him crumbles to dust regardless. We're going to need to send Mutants at him that are somehow able to withstand his aura and attack him directly."

"Good," Laura said. "I was hoping he would be the one I could go after."

"Are you sure?" Husk asked. "Even with your abilities, if he's decaying things that FAST—"

"I will be fine," Laura said sharply. "Besides, I owe Sinister."

"Personal vendettas will only get in the way of what we're trying to achieve here," Fury said. "Your mind should be fully at the task at hand, X-23. Anyways, we've called in for a little help in addition to you X-Men—your former enemies, Deadpool and Domino. The helijet I sent for them should be here within the hour. Their powers will likely help out quite a lot against this enemy."

"D-deadpool and Domino?!" Danielle sputtered. "Are you nuts? They tried to—"

"Trust me, no one knows what they've done better than I have," Fury explained. "But right now we ALL need to stand together. The fact that they accepted this without wanting payment shows me just how far they're with us on this one."

Some of the X-Men still obviously had misgivings, but Fury manipulated the screens so that they showed imagery of eastern China and continued with his briefing.

"Last but not least for the Horsemen, we've got Rockslide, now going by War. His enhanced powers have allowed for an absolutely gigantic version of him to surface in Shanghai, along with countless normal-sized versions of him doing lesser damage. Due to his sheer size and strength, he's currently our A-priority target—currently casualty estimates are at about three million and still rising more quickly than anyone else's. He's utterly decimated the entire city of Shanghai by now and seems to be turning north, to the outskirts of town and a major power plant hub that supplies power to millions of others—it looks like he plans to cut the power one large region at a time, just like Blink.

"This is why I sent out X-Force and Hisako nearly as soon as we found out about this. Given that he's on the other side of the world, he'd have taken the longest time to get to from our current location, anyways. They only just recently arrived in Shanghai—"

"—How are they doing?" Kitty interjected anxiously.

"I'm not sure, but it doesn't look good," Fury shook his head. "We lost contact with their helijet just before I began this briefing."

The room was silent for a few moments before Fury continued.

"The current unknown is what exactly Apocalypse himself is planning. As I mentioned to most of you on the way here, a huge section of Antarctica has been quickly shaking itself loose and looks like it's slowly heading north into the southern Atlantic Ocean. We don't know why Apocalypse is doing it, or how, but there's no way this is simply coincidence. It hasn't moved north much yet, so snow and ice is still all we can see from our satellites. I'd bet dollars to donuts that whatever this… thing is, it's been here for a long time, just like the three pyramids and the Sphinx that Apocalypse used in his first attempt at world conquering. Antarctica, apparently, has always been a significantly smaller continent than we've thought. What this big chunk of the continent's purpose is—and how it got there—is unknown. I suspect we'll find out the hard way in due time.

"Regardless, it's our last priority for the moment. It's moving only about sixty miles per hour, so it'll be a while before it gets close to any populated landmasses. As I mentioned to the X-Men earlier, because of the earthquakes involved as Antarctica separated, we've got massive tsunamis about to hit the southern coasts of Africa, South America, and Australia—heck, they're sweeping right across the Falkland Islands as we speak—and the casualties as a result of them are sure to surpass any of the Horsemen's individual counts so far. However, the tsunamis aren't really anything we can deal with right now, and we need Apocalypse to reveal a bit more of his hand before we can make plans about how to deal with this thing.

"Oh, and before I open the floor to questions—I've been told that the Morlock Lucid has some important information for us…"

"Uh… ahem, yes," Lucid said, standing up awkwardly from his seat, clearly not used to speaking to so many people at once. "Well, uh… you see…"

"It's okay, Lucid," Spyke said softly, patting Lucid's back from his seat right next to the other Morlock. "They aren't gonna do anything to you. I promise."

"Yes, well… I had a hunch, you see, that something must be making these Horseman super-powered. Since Apocalypse, apparently, had some kind of weird… alien?... tech that upgraded him, I figured these Horsemen might have it, too. So with the help of Spyke, we scaled a building right outside of Blink's barricade and I had a quick look in at her—I have X-ray vision, you see. That's my, uh… my power.

"And indeed, I saw something rather irregular inside Blink. A sort of… diamond-shaped… thing… inside her head. It was so bright I couldn't look at it for a few more seconds without turning away, but the diamond had branching out of it circuitry-like 'veins' throughout the rest of her body. So, whatever this diamond thing is in their heads—that's likely what's giving the Horsemen all their power."

Lucid sat back down with a sigh of relief, glad to have his part done with.

"Wait, in her head?" Multiple asked. "Would Apocalypse have to, like, remove her brain in order for that to happen?"

"You would think so, but no," Lucid replied. "Her skull and brain are completely intact. I don't know how exactly to explain it, but I… I know what I saw."

"No one's doubting you," Spyke said reassuringly. "We just want to make sure we've got all the details straight."

"So that's our target," Fury said. "Someway, somehow—we need to get that diamond out of them—preferably intact so we can figure out what exactly it is. That'll probably take their powers down back to normal."

"But to do that, we'd have to kill them," Husk mumbled. "Which is what we were planning on doing anyways."

"At least we know where to aim, then," Danielle said.

"So, beyond the X-Men, who are the rest of the reinforcements?" Iceman asked. "I mean… these new Horsemen are nuts powerful. Combined, we couldn't take down the old Horsemen. I'm guessing that since Spyke and Lucid are here, the Morlocks are down for helping us?"

"I could only wish," Spyke huffed. "They all just ran away. Wasn't their fight, they said."

"…What?" Kitty asked, in disbelief. "It's everyone's fight!"

"Yeah, I know," Spyke said. "But they wouldn't help us. I get their feelings towards humans, but… well, Lucid was the only one willing to help me. So I guess… I guess we're not Morlocks anymore."

"Evan… I'm so sorry," Storm said. "I know how much it meant to you to have a group like that that you were responsible for protecting."

"Thanks, Auntie O, but you're not the one who should be apologizing," Spyke sighed. "Caliban and Callisto... I don't know. I guess I underestimated them or something."

"Well, what about those Acolytes we all locked up?" Iceman asked. "Give them something like a reduced or eliminated sentence in return for helping us out?"

"Too risky," Fury said, shaking his head. "They could just as soon turn on us as help us out, and that would compound the problem even further. Even if their offer for help is genuine in the beginning, once they see what they're up against they might just turn against us at the most inopportune moment. No, I'm not risking that. They're staying in their prison."

"So then who else?" Iceman asked. "There's no way—"

"S.H.I.E.L.D. will help out in any way we can, but unfortunately it's largely going to be up to all of you," Fury said.

"Again," Husk muttered softly to herself.

"So we're screwed, then, is what you're saying," Iceman moaned, slamming his forehead down onto the table. "Great."

"We at least have a good idea of which of you would be effective against which Horseman," Xavier replied. "So Fury and I have discussed this- we're dividing you all up into teams, once the others get here. It'll take precious time, to be sure, and lots more will die in the meantime—but, I regret to say, we don't have a choice."

"Question," Danielle asked, raising her hand. "What's to keep Blink—er, Famine—from just teleporting everyone to New York City to help her out if things get hairy?"

"Nothing, theoretically," Xavier said. "But remember, I was connected to Apocalype's mind when I was forced into being his Horsemen. He believes too much in 'proving grounds' and 'survival of the fittest' to allow his subordinates to this. We all knew, as his first Horsemen, that if we failed we wouldn't get backup. It was our test, of sorts—and I imagine this is a sort of test for his second group of Horsemen, as well."

Storm nodded. "He's not incorrect. I had the same general impression. Now, of course he's being awfully hypocritical, since he's upgraded himself and his Horsemen so much—and how he thinks himself automatically worthy of ruling the world—but such is his way of thinking."

"So," Fury interjected, "That's how things stand. Team Famine—i.e., the ones of you that are going after Famine—you'll be going as soon as Kurt arrives from Germany—he shouldn't be that long, either. Team Death, Team Pestilence—you'll be leaving later, once everyone we need gets here. In the meantime, I suggest you all at least try to get some rest and sleep, if you can. Meeting adjourned."

"Hold up," Kitty said as everyone except Laura and Professor X began to get up from their chairs. "I think I know someone else who could help us that you're not considering, Colonel Fury. You don't know much about Apocalypse's new 'continent' or what these diamonds are all about, right?"

"Correct," Fury nodded. "We've got our best computer experts working on it, using code we've downloaded from H.Y.D.R.A. bases—which, as we've since learned, were all working for Apocalypse before they were destroyed—but so far we haven't really made much progress. I'm no code expert myself, but from what I understand, the computer language they're using… it isn't binary. As such, it's baffling us so far. If we could just crack that code, we might be able to download secrets from any still-functional H.Y.D.R.A. databases, perhaps find out more about Apocalypse's plan… but like I said, we've got our best techs on it and nothing's going on."

"Well, why don't I take a crack at it?" Danielle offered. "With my powers—"

"No, remember what Colonel Fury said? It's not binary," Kitty interrupted. "Binary's the basis for every kind of computer coding we've created, Danielle. Whatever Apocalypse is using, it's something completely different than the ones and zeroes that are the basis of our normal technology—so your powers won't work on it."

"Right," Fury said. "So we're arrived at a dead end, then."

"It might be," Kitty admitted, biting her lower lip briefly. "But I think you should try someone else besides your techs. Someone I know—er, knew—pretty well."

"Alright, I'll bite. What powers does he have?"

"None—he's a normal human. But he was a classmate of mine- a computer coding genius, Colonel Fury, and smart, if… rather obsessive. I've never seen anyone like him. With Forge missing, he might be your best chance at cracking this code."

"Shadowcat, we've got the absolute best S.H.I.E.L.D. hackers from around the world working on this," Fury said, frustrated. "I'm sure your friend is smart, but… really, he's just your age. He doesn't have the experience yet, and I'm not willing to risk S.H.I.E.L.D. security by letting a hacker in on the project without—"

"He once bypassed Cerebro's security systems in less than five seconds without triggering any alarms," Kitty interjected. "Not only that, but he managed to reprogram it to accept him as its user."

"…What's his address?"

"Is everybody okay?"

"I think… augh… I think I've broken my right leg," the Scarlet Witch grunted. "Slightly below the knee…"

"Considering the circumstances, I think the rest of us are okay," Quicksilver said, standing up and shaking his head.

"Well, that's nothing short of miraculous," Captain America said, finally letting go of the non-functioning, smoking flight controls.

Steve Rogers had managed to swerve the helijet down just enough where the bottom of the skyscraper had clipped the propellers in mid-air, the vast majority of the crumbling building shooting over the S.H.I.E.L.D. vehicle. One of the propellers had sheared off, and another had bent—meaning that although the Uncanny X-Force and Armor had survived the impact, the helijet was going down.

It had taken some careful steering from Captain America to avoid impacting the ground at a particularly destructive angle, and at the last moment Blob had shielded Surge, Avalanche, and Toad, while Hisako had engaged her psychic armor and tried to shield Quicksilver, Pyro, and the Scarlet Witch. Unfortunately even with her armor engaged, it had been a struggle for Hisako to shield three people at once, and Wanda had fallen out of her grasp at the last moment.

A rumble quickly started around the crashed helijet, and the members of X-Force looked at each nervously.

"We need to get outta here!" Quicksilver yelled.

"Quick!" Captain America said, crawling back from the smoking cockpit controls and flinging his shield at the collapsed sliding door to the helijet's main hangar bay where the rest of the members were. The force from the shield forced the thick metal door open, at least a little. "Everyone out—remember, we've got fuel tanks on this thing!"

Armor shaped the pink psychic armor covering her right arm into a hammer-like form and slammed it against the door, popping it off its hinges and sending it sliding it back onto the ground outside. The two speedsters zoomed out first, quickly followed by most of the others. Before Wanda could even fully stand up, though, Toad hopped over and tackled her—out of the helijet, it turned out.

"Toad! Get OFF—" Wanda began as they both landed on the crumbled asphalt outside of the helicopter, Toad now on top of her—but she stopped herself as Toad quickly reached under her and lifted her up, taking care not to put pressure on her broken limb. Within seconds, he had her supported, her right arm around the "hunchback" piece of his uniform armor to keep her upright without having to put any pressure on her right leg.

"C'mon, hurry up!" Toad said hurriedly, helping Wanda limp away from the helijet as quickly as they could, the smoking wreckage suddenly exploding and sending them both back to the ground again from the shockwave.

"Well, well, well," said several voices around the group of Mutants, as quite a few rock-men began to form out of the crumbled asphalt on the ground. "Who do we have here?"

"X-Force," Captain America said, taking a battle stance as he readied his shield, "Prepare to—"

"Yeah, yeah, we get it," Avalanche grunted, sending a focused rumble through the ground in front of him, shattering one of the rock-men that was forming in front of him.

The other X-Force members that were able—Captain America, Blob, and Armor—began to pound away at the numerous Rockslides that were forming out of the ground, while Pyro fired off his flamethrowers at the emerging forms to soften them up and Surge struck out at a few with electric bolts, knocking large chunks of them off.

"Toad… Toad, listen to me," Wanda said as the shorter Mutant helped her up again, dodging an emerging Rockslide's swipe at his legs. "I'm just going to slow you down… give me over to Fred or something and—"

"And what?" Toad chuckled dryly. "C'mon, babycakes, I ain't got squat against a horde of Rockslides… or much else, for that matter. And, as y'can see, everyone else's got their hands full at th' moment. Now, do what ya do best!"

Wanda merely glanced down at Toad, smirked, and let loose a blast of hex energy at the emerging Rockslide, sending it crumbling to bits as they made their way into the circle of X-Force members that was quickly forming, with the physically stronger members on the outside.

"Aw, Lance Alvers?!" remarked a Rockslide that had managed to fully form nearby. "Man, this IS my lucky day! Two birds with one stone!"

"You wish," Avalanche spat, letting loose another torrent of force through the ground at the Rockslide, shattering him with a bit more force than seemed necessary.

As X-Force continued to pound away at the various rock-men forming around them, however, it quickly became apparent that they were forming at a faster rate than they could be knocked down.

"Cap—Cap, what are we gonna do?" Pyro yelled. "I mean—you see what I'm seein' here?"

"I... I don't know," Captain America muttered.

"What? I can't hear you!" Pyro yelled. "Gonna hafta speak louder than that, mate!"

"We… we need to survey the area," Captain America yelled back. "See if there's anything that can help us out."

"Help us out against THIS?" Quicksilver said from his position near the center of the circle. "What exactly do you want us to LOOK for?!"

"Just do what he says, Pietro!" Surge yelled, in between electrical strikes at the incoming hordes of rock-men. "I don't see you contributing anything to the current situation!"

"Ohhhh…. Fine!" Quicksilver huffed, and in a flash of blue and white was off and out of the circle, weaving in and out of the Rockslides forming everywhere.

"CANNONBALL!" yelled a Rockslide from above, jumping from a half-crumbled office building three stores above them.

"LOOK OUT!" Blob yelled, running over and shielding Avalanche as the rock-man collided with Blob, breaking apart from the impact.

"Oh, man… you okay, Freddy?" Avalanche asked, turning his head back for a moment.

"I'm….. I'm fine," Blob said, shaking his head. "C'mon, keep it up! We gotta make sure they don't get past us!"

"Alright, we need to get back out of the city proper!" Captain America hollered, "It'll keep Rockslide from attacking us from any angle except head-on!"

"It's to the left—Blob's left!" Quicksilver yelled as he zoomed back into the middle of the circle, apparently having done his rounds. "We're already on the edge of the downtown area—but I can't see anything around us of use. Everything's crumbled apart, and anybody else nearby… dead. The really big Rockslide—as I'm sure everyone can see if they just look off to said left—is heading towards the power plant in the distance. I don't know if I feel relieved or insulted that he doesn't consider us enough of a problem to send the big one at us."

"Alright, X-Force, left! Blob's left!" Captain America ordered, and the group began, slowly but surely, to shift the circle in that direction, pummeling away at any incoming Rockslides as quickly as they could.

It was an exhausting couple of minutes—Rockslide, essentially being the ground, was hearing everything that they were saying to each other and adjusting his tactics accordingly. If Captain America gave the order to move in one direction, he'd create more regular-sized minions of himself in their way, making it ever harder to push against him. Eventually the circle began to form into more of a line, with the heavy hitters of X-Force at the front while the others "cleaned up" the Rockslides forming behind them. Blob and Captain America also had to shield the group from a couple more divebombs that various rock-men tried from the top of nearby buildings, but it was clear they couldn't keep it up for long—every moment they "wasted" protecting those not in the front line was a moment they weren't pounding away at the army of Rockslides advancing at them. At one point Captain America just barely managed to shield Pyro from a falling Rockslide, the impact knocking him off-balance and costing them a few precious seconds as a few more Rockslides surged into the temporary gap. A quick hex and a quick bolt had stopped them in their tracks, but it was becoming clear that most of them were beginning to exert themselves too much. Surge began to be more conservative with her electric bolts as the charge in her gauntlets began to slowly but surely diminish, and Blob took slightly longer to recover each time he took a direct hit in the back from a divebombing Rockslide.

Thus, it was at first with great annoyance that Captain America noticed that his comlink was blinking. After turning it on and putting it to his ear for a moment, however, his expression turned to one of hope, albeit briefly.

Captain America opened his mouth to tell the others, but stopped himself, smashed his shield against an incoming Rockslide's face, then yelled something completely different than he had intended.

"Everyone, look at your comlink! Listen to the message!"

"What?! Right NOW?" Avalanche grunted back in disbelief.

"As soon as you're able," Captain America said. "Do NOT repeat the message to anyone out loud. You-know-who is listening."

"Aww, aren't going to let me in on your little secret?" chuckled one Rockslide right as Blob literally kicked the legs out from underneath the rock elemental and then smashed the head in with his fists.

"Like anything's going to help you now," said another Rockslide from behind the main line. "Fight all you want, losers. I'm enjoying wearing you guys down. So much more fun than a quick kill."

Wanda let loose a hex blast at that Rockslide, who staggered towards them headless until Pyro lit the rock elemental up with is flamethrowers, reducing him to hot slag before he could land a punch.

"So how does this help us?" Pyro yelled. "It still doesn't tell us where the bloomin' thing is!"

The message that they had all listened to through their comlinks was a recorded broadcast, repeating over and over on their frequency—it was a message from Colonel Fury in case any of them were still alive, telling them of Spyke and Lucid's findings regarding how the Horsemen had become super-powered.

"You really need help figuring out where it is?" Quicksilver said, pointing up towards the enormous Rockslide making his way towards the power plant near the horizon.

""We're having—unhh, keep me steady Toad, you're losing your grip—we're having enough trouble just fighting these ones!" the Scarlet Witch grunted. "How in the world are we going to take out anything that huge?"

"Gothie's got a point," hollered a Rockslide as it jumped off one of the last rooftops still intact near X-Force, who were now nearly out of the downtown area. Blob quickly reached over and covered the Scarlet Witch and Toad, who had been this divebomb elemental's targets. He took the hit with a grunt and staggered to his knees from the impact.

"Blob? Fred?!" Surge said, firing off a half-aimed lightning bolt before coming over to his side and helping him up. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'll- I'll be fine," Blob muttered before shaking his head again and returning to pounding more rock elementals into powder with his fists.

"Regardless, we've got to try going up against it," Captain America ordered. "Everyone, avert your course slightly—we're aiming for the same place Rockslide—er, War—is heading—the power plant."

"You kiddin' me?!" Toad exclaimed. "We can't make it that far! That's, like… at least three miles away!"

"More like two," Captain America corrected. "And we don't have a choice."

Surge's eyes suddenly widened. Zooming over to Quicksilver, she whispered in his ear, "Follow me. And keep close so we can continue to talk at high speed. I have an idea."

Quicksilver looked at Surge oddly, but nodded.

"I'm heading over to the power plant right now," Surge yelled, "My charge is getting too low. Quicksilver, follow me, to help back me up. Now."

"Wait!" Captain America exclaimed, reaching out with a hand as the two blue blurs zoomed past them. "We need to… stick together…"

"They won't be gone long," Blob grunted as a Rockslide punched him in the gut. "'Riko wouldn't leave us hangin' like this."

"Are you certain?" Armor asked, doubt on her face.

"Yeah," Blob said, meeting Surge's cousin in the eyes for moment, his face dead serious. "She wouldn't."

"Alright, everyone, form up closer!" Captain America commanded. "We can't afford a single mistake until they get back!"

Both Quicksilver and Surge were zooming towards the power plant at an ultra-high speed—they made it there within mere seconds, but to Pietro's surprise, Noriko motioned for them to simply make large meandering circles around the plant.

"What's this about, Noriko?" Quicksilver asked as they continued to run right by each other, far too fast for any Rockslides to react to their presence. "We need to get back there!"

"Listen carefully," Surge replied somberly. "And listen quickly, because my charge IS running low, and if Rockslide gets wind of what I'm going to tell you, it won't work. We're all dead as things are right now. You know it, I know it, and so does Rogers, even though he won't say it. We won't last more than a few more minutes before Blob gives out, and I can tell the others are getting tired too."

"So your solution is to just run around aimlessly and be the last ones killed?" Quicksilver said incredulously. "That's kinda… gutless. Even for us."

"No, it's not," Surge replied. "I need you to help me do something, and you're the only other one who can get this done on time. Now, listen carefully…"

Quicksilver's eyes grew wider and wider as Surge told him her plan.

"There is no WAY Rogers will approve of that."

"Which is why I'm not asking him. Now, are you in or not?"

Quicksilver sighed. "Alright, I'm in. Let's get to it."

"This… is… so… COOL!"

"Head in the game, Webber," Kitty yelled, struggling to keep her voice heard above the outside noise as they crossed out of the landed helijet and into a large hangar within the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarrier. "You know what's going on in the world. We don't have time for you to, like, geek out right now."

"Uhhh… yeah," Webber Torque said sheepishly. "But, uh… if we actually DO make it out of all of this alive, you guys GOTTA give me a tour."

"IF you actually manage to crack Apocalypse's coding… I'll consider it," Nick Fury said. "And if I see one thing, ONE thing from this whole experience mentioned in a post on an internet message board…"

"I know, I know," Webber said, putting his hands up defensively. "No pictures, no hacking anything other than Apocalypse's code… everything here is beyond top secret—got it."

"I'm sure you will get it," Fury said sternly, "because I'll have my techs keeping an eye on you. No funny business will be tolerated at all. We're already going out on a limb here, per Shadowcat's request."

"Yeah, that's… wow. Thanks, Kitty."

"Hey, I wouldn't have said anything if I didn't think you were actually capable of doing it," Kitty said reassuringly, putting a hand on "Arcade's" shoulder. "I read your final paper for our computer class together. I've never met anyone with the expertise in this area that you have—and I know some pretty computer-savvy people. Just don't make me regret it, okay?"

"Yeah, I promise I won't play any ga—hey, wait, where are you going?"

"I have to go, Webber. You'll be fine with Colonel Fury, he'll show you where you need to go here. Apocalypse sure knew when to strike—we were, like, scattered all over the world for the holiday season when he struck. We've got incoming X-Men, X-Men like me getting ready to head out, and some already—hopefully—engaging a Horseman on the ground. It's taking a lot of S.H.I.E.L.D. resources to make this happen—they know that with Horsemen this ridiculously powerful, conventional weaponry is worse than useless, it's something that they can outright use against us. It's all or nothing within the next several hours. So, uh… goodbye. I hope I'll see you if- when—I get back."

"Yeah… yeah, we're all pulling for you guys," Webber said, sadly waving back to Kitty as she backed away and made her way to a nearby waiting helijet. "Alright, Colonel Fury… show me what we've got here."

Surge zapped the locked door hinges, the heat melting the lock enough for her to force it open.

It was something she had done several times to get to the center of the facility, but she was glad that that was apparently the last door—she had enough in her for one more bolt, maybe two, but that was it.

And there, standing in a massive room, was the hub of the electrical power plant, a huge generator. Thrumming, it was obviously still running, but the facility had been abandoned in a hurry once War had started to attack downtown Shanghai.

"Quicksilver," Surge whispered over her comlink. "You got all the safeties disengaged yet?"

*Just finished up with the last one. The plant map wasn't helpful at all—stupid thing was all in Chinese.*

"Yes, how dumb of them," Surge sighed, rolling her eyes. "I told you, my Chinese is a bit rusty, but according to the map there were three."

*Yeah. A good high-speed smash was enough to knock them out—no keycards needed here. They all needed to be activated within seconds of each other to work, but—heh—that wasn't a problem for me.*

"What exactly are you doing?" came a familiar voice from the floor.

Quickly forming up out of the ground, an elemental made of cement, tile, and a bit of rock rose up to its nine-foot height, arms crossed in front of its massive chest.

"What do you THINK, moron?!" Surge spat back. "It's an electrical power plant. I need electricity for my powers to work."

Rockslide raised an eyebrow. "Really? So you went to the CENTER of an electrical power plant. No. No, something else is going on, and…"

Rockslide stopped for a moment, his features frozen on his face. Through his powers, an emerging avatar of his elsewhere in the facility saw a trashed computer console that was labeled "HUB SAFETY SWITCH #3—ONLY TO BE TURNED OFF IN CASE OF EMERGENCY." Well, it didn't technically say that, at least in English—but the portion of the artifact that Apocalypse had given him allowed him to easily read any language.

"Wait, what are you—"

Surge used the last of her stored-up energy to zip past the Rockslide avatar before he could react, and used her gauntlets to slice open thick main line leading from the generator, beginning to suck all of the electrical energy into her—and then, a ridiculous amount of electricity continuing to course through her, Surge shrieked in pain as she raised her hands directed all of the energy directly above, the gigantic electrical bolt punching through the ceiling of the facility with ease and right into the gargantuan War's head.

"Why are they gone for so long?" Armor said tiredly, punching another incoming Rockslide through the chest and then flinging it into another two Rockslides behind her.

"Armor's right," Captain America said somberly. "They should've been back by now."

"I think we got a few other problems to worry about," Wanda grunted, hexing another Rockslide avatar into breaking apart. "We're running on empty here, especially since Rockslide got in that lucky punch on Pyro and send him sprawling. Now Toad's supporting me AND Pyro, and I can't keep this up much longer. I can't move fast enough."

"Neither can I," said Avalanche, weakly wiping his brow before sending out yet another tremble at an army of incoming Rockslides, sending many of them tumbling to the ground.

"They… they couldn't have left us here…" Blob said softly as he smashed two Rockslide's heads together. "I know 'Riko, she wouldn't… she couldn't…"

"Get through your stupid crush already and look around you," Avalanche said bitterly. "We thought we knew Pietro, and he turned on us. Maybe he convinced Noriko to do the same. It's not like she liked X-Force anyways."

Blob merely continued to batter away at the Rockslides, but his movements were getting slower, more labored. After a clumsy punch, two Rockslides jumped on each of his arms, pulling him down to the ground.

"Blob!" Captain America said, turning around—just as another Rockslide smashed Rogers in the side of the face, sending him to the ground as well.

"If I'm going down," Avalanche yelled, "then I'm taking as many of you with me… as…"

Avalanche simply stopped mid-sentence and stared as the army of Rockslides as one turned to look at the power plant, immediately stopping the fight as the other X-Force members and Armor followed their gaze.

The giant "War" Rockslide was now centered almost directly over it, and had raised one of its gargantuan fists up to pound it into dust—only to have to a gigantic, continuous stream of lightning break out of the ceiling somewhere near the center of the plant and lance right into the giant's head, the force almost immediately crumbling the neck and blasting the remaining ball of rock that made up the giant Rockslide's head up further and further into the sky.

Almost immediately, all of the regular-sized Rockslide's let out a cry of rage and pain before they went inert and began crumbling to the ground, along with the now-beheaded giant rock body.

"What the-?" Toad began.

"It's Surge!" Captain America said. "She may need our help. Quickly, everyone, to the plant! Run!"

Surge hissed from the pain at the sheer amount of electrical power flowing from the plant into her gauntlets—it was causing them to sizzle against her skin. Her heart was fluttering, her eyes glowing so brightly it would hurt someone else's vision to look at her. The hiss was drowned out from the sound of the huge electrical bolt nearly forty feet wide that was being redirected out the top of the ceiling at the ever-ascending, ever-shrinking ball of rock. Rockslide continued to howl in equal measures pain and rage—a howl that quickly became faded away as the distance between him and the ground grew greater and greater.

As Surge expected, she saw Quicksilver zoom into the room, far enough in to confirm what was going on but definitely far enough away to be safe from any electrical backlash.

"Surge, you did it!" Quicksilver cried, shielding his eyes from the bright electrical bolts with his hands. "Rockslide's going to take a while to recover from this—by the time he lands and gathers himself, we'll be ready for him! You can disengage from the generator now."

Surge laughed bitterly, her voice echoing with static. "No."

"N—what?! Surge—Noriko—even with your powers, that much juice flowing through you is going to KILL YOU if you stay connected to the generator! Just—disengage! You can, can't you?!"

"I can," Surge said softly, though the echo granted her by so much power coursing through her veins still made it boom even above the sound of the bolts firing off above her. "But I won't."

Quicksilver just stood there for a second, mouth agape, trying to form words until he finally managed to. "Wh-why?! You told me you'd hold on just long enough to knock Rockslide out, and then we'd—"

"I know what I said," Surge replied, her gauntlets now starting to turn the skin black around the area where they met her lower arms, smoke beginning to leak out of the charred flesh. "And I lied, to get you to do what I needed you to do. As soon as Rockslide crashes back down, it'll all begin again. Look at him, Pietro—look at what he's done to Shanghai. You think even in a temporarily weakened state, we could beat him? Almost as soon as I got that message that the artifact that was giving Rockslide all this power was this little… little diamond inside his head, I knew what I had to do, given where he was going. You've seen the kind of reach Rockslide has as War—the only way to get rid of that reach is to knock him—and his… his 'presence', soul, whatever—out of the picture is to get him to a place where there's no ground for him to manipulate."

Quicksilver eyes darted down the floor for a moment as he put two and two together. "You're… you're going to keep pushing him upwards until he's in space, aren't you?"

"I sure hope I can hold on that long."

"Even—even at the rate you're pushing him upwards, Surge, that'll—that'll take too long! You can't!"

"Oh, please," Surge said somberly, looking and sounding like she was sobbing but the extreme heat frying any tears before they could even be visible on her face. There was now a good deal of smoke coming off of her, her skin black all the way to her shoulders now—and, more alarming, the tips of her fingers seemed to be slowly disintegrating, gauntlets and all. "You know I've never been one to take orders from YOU, Pietro."

Quicksilver was about to say something else when their attention was both drawn to the left side of the room as a faint "boom" sounded out, and then another one, slightly louder and closer—then another and another, until the large section of the left wall burst apart, Blob covered in building debris, Armor and the rest of X-Force following through the holes in the building walls behind him.

"'Riko!" Blob cried, his eyes shimmering as he saw the state of her for a moment before shielding his eyes, as the rest of the X-Force members did when they entered the room. "What—what are ya doing?!"

"What I have to," Surge replied sadly, but sternly.

"No! No, you don't have to! We'll—we'll—find another way!" Blob replied frantically.

"No, we won't."

As soon as he took in the scene before him, Captain America narrowed his brow and shouted at Surge, "Surge, disengage from there immediately! That's an order!"

"Take your order and shove it," Surge said firmly. "This is the only way and you know it. I don't belong on this team anyways… not since the Brotherhood went under…"

"Don't pull THAT card!" Avalanche said. "'Riko, c'mon, you gotta—"

"Stop with the protests that you know won't work," Surge said, the blackened area of her skin now covering her shoulders and neck, and slowly advancing upwards towards her chin and downwards towards her chest. Although it had been mostly hidden by her uniform, it was now clearly advancing up her legs, as bits of the skin on her exposed midriff were now also turning black. Her hands were now completely disintegrated, the loose gauntlets suddenly cracking and clattering to the floor beside her. "I don't… have much time left, so let me say what I want to say… I've got keep this going as long as possible so gravity doesn't just let Rockslide fall back down…

"You guys," Surge continued, sobbing slightly but with no visible tears coming out of her eyes, "Keep… doing what you're doing. It may not be something I'm into, but… the rest of you, you're all where you need to be.

"Hisako… I'm… I'm sorry I didn't listen to you earlier. Maybe if I hadn't tried to hold you close just because I found out you were a Mutant… you wouldn't have pushed back so hard and joined the X-Men."

"Do not… do not worry about it," Hisako said, tears pouring down her own cheeks. "I… I feel like I am starting to fit in with the X-Men. It is a good place for me. I too am sorry… I see now that… that you can be a hero... when you want to be."

Surge merely nodded slightly, splotches of blackened skin now starting to appear on her face and her midriff now almost entirely charred, her arms gone from the elbows up. "And… and Blob—Fred…"

""Riko, please!" Blob begged, "Please don't go… I can't—"

"You've g-got a good group of friends now, Fred. Something you d-didn't have a few years ago. H-hold onto 'em—wherever…. Wherever… th-they go."

"Noriko, no, no!" Blob cried, reaching out with a hand to try to grasp one of her arm stumps and only by sheer force of will keeping it from doing so. "You don't get it, Noriko, I-I-I…. I need you! Noriko, I lov—"

Blob's sentence was drowned out as Noriko let out a sudden, ear-splitting shriek of pain, her eyes emitting smoke for a moment as she felt her heart explode.

And then, the electricity flowing through her flared up even higher. The resulting explosion of electrical energy knocked everyone backwards in a blinding flash of light and force—and then, she was gone.

To be continued…
 

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