"So it doesn't need to be calibrated… at all?"

"Not if what the X-Men are saying is true," Prodigy explained, examining the small shard of the gem of Cyttorak. It was currently held behind reinforced glass on the top level of one of several identical towers located around the perimeter of Genosha. "And, given my powers… I'm pretty sure they're not lying."

"So this should be a piece of cake, then," Captain America continued, having fully healed some time ago after his encounter with Magneto.

"Not necessarily," Prodigy replied. "With power flowing to all the towers at the same time, we've then got to destroy those crystals so that the resulting feedback wave negates the effects of the radiation, restoring everyone to how they were before the towers were first activated. Still, I'm glad the X-Men had experienced something like this once before—otherwise, I'd have no idea how to do it myself. The idea of being brainwashed some—even if it wasn't complete yet, and even if was in the opposite direction Magneto intended—well, I just… I want to be completely sure I'm in my right mind again before I… leave here."

Captain America nodded solemnly. Prodigy had been cooperating willingly with S.H.I.E.L.D. and the X-Men, after learning what he had from the mind of Xavier, though he had adamantly refused to outright join anybody's side. Rogers could tell the former Acolyte was still having a tough time dealing with all the blows—both physical and emotional—he had been dealt in the last several hours. The emotion-inflaming radiation hadn't helped in that respect, either, and even after this was all over, Prodigy—along with the rest of the surviving Acolytes—would be spending a long time in a specialized S.H.I.E.L.D. prison capable of holding them.

To their credit, most of the Acolytes had realized that it was all over, and when Nick Fury had given them the choice, most had surrendered peacefully, to be boarded onto S.H.I.E.L.D. helijets and transferred to the aforementioned prison when all the cleanup work here was over with. For now, though, those who had surrendered were helping to either dig out those buried in the massive sinkhole created by Boom Boom or were giving the S.H.I.E.L.D. members access to the various Genoshan towers, so that they could reverse the effects of the Cyttorak radiation.

Some—about a third or so, roughly twenty—of the surviving Acolytes had continued to resist, but with the X-Men and Brotherhood members now all in one place—and with the immense help of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s new power-neutralizing guns—their last stand hadn't lasted long. Those stubborn enough to still fight had been pounded into unconsciousness and were currently being kept under strict watch on the northern shore of the island by some of the surviving S.H.I.E.L.D. soldiers and a few X-Men.

"You hear that, Fury?" Captain America said into his comlink. "We have to destroy all the shards at once, otherwise it might not work."

*I heard it,* Fury's voice responded back. *But we're all connected here, Cap—that's not going to be the hard part. The problem is getting power back to all of them at once so that we CAN destroy them—as it is, this island's been sapped dry since Xavier's son, er… bought the farm, as the good Professor told us.*

"What about the S.H.I.E.L.D. base underneath?" Captain America asked. "Moonstar had re-activated the power—if the generator's still intact—"

"It still wouldn't be enough," Prodigy interrupted, shaking his head. "We actually HAD tapped into the generator shortly after I had been recruited by Magneto, but once we built out enough it wasn't adequate to even power the expanding main tower anymore. There's no way that could power all of the peripheral towers at the same time, even if we just hooked it up to power them and nothing else on Genosha."

*So is there another Acolyte who could power the reactor, even for a moment?* Fury asked.

Prodigy tapped his chin for moment before responding. "Several, actually, even among those who willfully surrendered. But that's not the problem—the problem is getting them to withstand the intense temperatures and pressure that would create once the main circuits were powered and the feedback loop closed off. I mean, that's why we never really considered doing what Magneto apparently did to Legion—well, I didn't consider it, at least…"

*Hrrmm… hold on a moment,* Fury replied, and after a few awkward moments of silence between Captain America and Prodigy, his voice came back on over the comlinks again. *Beast here has an idea. What if we used a telekinetic bubble to protect that Mutant for the short period of time? Would that do it?*

Prodigy's expression perked up slightly at the suggestion. "Actually, that could work… but no, no… wait a minute. All the telekinetics we had were either unwilling to cooperate or, well… they were… killed. There's the Five-in-One, but something tells me they wouldn't be willing—and that's even IF they're still down there in the Hub, which given the info Professor X fed into our minds, I doubt."

"Isn't there an X-Man that can do that?" Captain America responded. "Jan Grey, or something like that?"

*Jean,* Captain America's comlink crackled back to life again, though this time it was Beast's voice on the other end, rather than Nick Fury's. *And yes, she could do that… but she was one of the initial Acolyte captives. A large group of X-Men and Brotherhood members are helping to dig out all the debris around the cell rooms, which apparently withstood the force of Boom Boom's blasts—from what I've gotten out of them, Jean and most of the others are safe inside, but they're buried. And Jean's currently unconscious, apparently from all the physical and psychological turmoil she's been forced through since being captured.*

Captain America glared briefly at Prodigy, who refused to return the gaze, his eyes shifting to look at the floor.

Shaking his head, Steve Rogers responded back into his comlink, "Well, perhaps once we dig her out and give her medical attention, she'll be well enough to help us out on this."

*Don't forget, the reactor's somewhere deep underneath all that rubble, too, assuming it's still even capable of working,* Fury replied, apparently having taken his comlink back from Beast. Sighing, he continued, *It looks we're stuck at a dead end at this project until we can clear out that big mess "Boom Boom" created. Everyone who isn't part of the medical personnel, return to the island's center and help with the excavation. That's an order.*

"Heh," Magma mumbled, her eyes dilating slightly as the injection one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. medics had given her began to kick in. "Yeah, that's… that's working pretty well, now. Painkillers. Where would society be without them?"

"You're pretty lucky, miss," said the S.H.I.E.L.D. medic who was patching up Magma's raw, bloody back. "Your flame form cauterized the wound from Boom Boom's explosions pretty well in the instant before you were knocked out—not to mention they caused those little explosive energy balls she threw at you to detonate slightly before they actually made contact with your body. If they had hit your back directly, we could've been looking at a shattered spine, not just a large flesh wound—though I don't think the skin on your back will ever fully heal from this. There will likely always be a large scar back here."

"Enh, whatever," Magma said, waving it away with an over-exaggerated hand gesture and then wincing at the pain the movement caused. Her speech was beginning to get a little slurred from the pain medication. "Already got burn marks all over m' body, what'sh another, eh? At least I don't have to help the others lift up a butt-ton of rocks, heheh. I think… I think I'm gonna go nap now, if that'sh okay."

"Isn't there something else we can do?" Storm asked from her position standing next to Magma's cot, on which the Mutant—who almost immediately drifted off—had been lain on her stomach, her back exposed so that the medic could place bandages and cooling ointment across it. As for Storm herself, she had several cuts, scrapes, and bruises, but nothing serious. "From Kurt's report, there was a Mutant capable of healing others—Elixir, I believe. He had gold skin."

"Gold skin? Oh, then he was one of the ones I saw who wasn't willing to accept Colonel Fury's ultimatum," the medic responded, her attention still focused on fixing up Magma's back. "Besides, if he can heal, I imagine he can hurt, too. I don't think I'd trust him with healing people he hates so much."

"Point taken," Storm nodded. "I think… I think I'm going to go help the others in the excavation effort. Let me know if anything changes, or if you need help."

"Will do," the medic replied back as Storm flew up into the sky, making her way over to where most of the Mutants were gathered in the middle of the sinkhole. By this point they had formed several lines out of the pit, with the ones at the bottom helping to carry rocks and debris up to the next person in line, who carried them up the next individual, who carried them up to the next—all until the debris was finally deposited outside the outer "ring" of the massive cave-in.

It was an odd sight, Storm thought to herself as she landed near the center of the main excavation, which had unearthed the intact cells about a fourth of the way down by now. X-Men working alongside Acolytes working alongside Brotherhood members working alongside the odd S.H.I.E.L.D. agent… what she wouldn't have given for that to have been a commonplace occurrence…

"How many are down there?" Storm asked one of the Multiple duplicates that she had landed next to.

"Gambit, Pyro, Jean, and five Acolytes—well, former Acolytes, I guess," Jamie shrugged. "But Rogue and one other Acolyte were buried under all the rubble, unable to get inside the cell in time. Kitty's down there now, phasing through the rocks, looking for 'em."

No sooner had Jamie finished speaking than a yell came out from Kitty in the cell below. Storm put her head down into the crack that had been split open in the top of the cell during the initial cave-in.

From what she could see, Kitty had indeed found Rogue and the other Acolyte—a tan-skinned girl, from the looks of it—and was phasing them both out of the rubble and onto the floor of the cell.

"They're both not moving," Shadowcat said urgently as she let them go, de-phasing herself. "Rogue was lying on top of the other girl, but what's weird is that Rogue seems pretty free of cuts and bruises, but the other girl has plenty of pretty bad gashes and, judging from the odd way her limbs were splayed, a broken bone or two."

"M!" cried one of the Acolytes down there in the cell with them, running over and cradling the fallen female Acolyte, cradling her broken form in his arms and feeling around her neck.

"Pyro, can you check Rogue for a pulse too?" Shadowcat asked.

"What?" Pyro asked, looking up from his position slumped against one wall of the cell, absentmindedly running a finger over one of his cuts. "Why can't YOU do it? You're right there."

"Um, because," Shadowcat said, holding her hands up and wiggling her fingers. "My new outfit doesn't have gloves, and I don't want to get knocked out simply by touching her neck."

"Oh… oh, right," Pyro said, walking slowly over and feeling around Rogue's neck. "Sorry… been kind of a long day."

After a few moments of tense silence, Pyro nodded slightly. "She's alive, but her pulse is a bit slower than normal. I'm no doctor, but I think you're right, Kitty—she's just unconscious, like Jean over there."

Indeed, Jean was still unconscious from all the torturous pain she had been subjected to for the last few weeks, but Gambit had slowly come into consciousness over the past couple of minutes (though he still was in no position to get up and walk around unaided).

"I wish I could say the same for M," said the tattooed Acolyte who had been checking his teammate for a pulse. "I can't… I can't find any pulse on her… oh god, I think she's dead…"

"M? You ain't checking her right, Ink," said another Acolyte in the cell—one who had bone protrusions sticking out of her skin, but in a more blunt, haphazard manner when compared to Spyke's. "There's no way M's powers wouldn't let her survive something like this…"

Coming over and feeling M's neck for a pulse, the Acolyte frowned and then tried the wrist. Her expression becoming more panicked, she again felt around M's neck, pushing down harder this time in a desperate attempt to find any sign of life at all.

"See what I mean, Marrow?" Ink said sadly. "M's… dead. Probably Rogue absorbin' her powers or something made the difference."

As Marrow and Ink both turned to glare at Rogue's unconscious form, Gambit piped in weakly, "Hey, now, don't go blamin' her for this. You knew the situation—it was do or die for us. She took a risk, and it might've worked if the ceiling had held up for a few more moments. You wanna blame someone, blame Boom Boom. Or better yet, Magneto."

Marrow sighed, her gaze dropping to M's corpse. "I guess you're right… it's not like we meant much to either of them, given how quick Magneto killed Skin and DJ… I just… just still can't believe all this is happening…"

"We oughta at least give her a proper burial," Ink spoke up softly, lifting up M's body as he stood up to his full height. "At least when we're done with all this."

"We'll do that, I promise," Storm replied loudly from her position peaking in from the top of the cell, catching the attention of everyone conscious in the cell below her. "But right now we have many other lives at stake, and a reactor to unearth. Kitty, can you phase everyone up here so they can receive medical attention?"

"Can do," Shadowcat replied.

It had taken a few minutes, but now everyone in the cell had been phased up to the top ground level and were receiving periodic medical attention from the busy S.H.I.E.L.D. medical staff.

"So what now?" Shadowcat asked Storm as Jean Grey was carried off on a cot. "Should I phase through the rest of the rubble to search for survivors, or…?

"Not yet," Storm said, shaking her head. Nodding at the rest of the Mutants and S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel excavating the sinkhole, she continued, "This whole area—except the rocks directly around the reinforced cells—is pretty unstable. We need to be careful as we continue the excavation, and if you were to pull a bunch of bodies from further down from the rubble, it might cause a cascading chain reaction as filled gaps in the rocks suddenly became empty. No, we need to hurry, but we also don't need to take unnecessary risks—don't phase any victims out until we're sure you can extricate them without causing any damage, either to the delicate extraction operation we've got going on here or to the person themselves."

"So what should I do, then?"

"I'd suggest doing what everyone else that's able is doing," Storm replied, Shading the rising sun from her eyes, she continued, "One of the lines on our left—see, there? It could use a another member to help carry up the debris."

"Well… okay," Shadowcat responded, walking over and carefully making her way up the side of the partially-excavated sinkhole until she was near solid ground again. Sitting slightly under her and passing a few rocks up were a few other X-Men and Brotherhood members in this particular line—namely, Moonstar, Cyclops, Toad, and Avalanche.

"You formin' the end of the line now?" Toad asked, wiping his brow. "Man, I can't believe we still got all THAT to dig…"

"Yeah, I'll be surprised if we get it all done even by the end of the day," Avalanche said. "Too bad using my powers would hurt more than help in this case."

"So, Kitty," Moonstar asked as she heaved a boulder up the line to let her friend take it from her, "Now that we've got a bit of time to kill… mind filling me—us—in on how exactly you got here?"

"Again, it's kind of a long story," Shadowcat grunted as she lifted the boulder and heaved it over the edge of the sinkhole onto solid ground. "And… well… it's not exactly the most uplifting tale, either."

"Yeah, well, so's life," Toad mumbled.

"Well… okay," Kitty said reluctantly, taking a quick swig from her water bottle. "But I guess to really get the full story, I'd need to start back a few months ago, during the whole 'Jamie' incident. My parents and I had fled to a motel in southern Illinois, trying to escape—or at least ride out—the whole invasion, since living in Chicago we were a little bit too close to the advancing front for our comfort. The place—as you'd expect—was pretty packed, and we got one of the last rooms available. Everyone there was on edge, nervous, and pretty agitated- so we tried to stay out of the limelight, but of course, we had to leave our room eventually…"

Kitty yawned, half-stumbling down the main hallway of their hotel floor in her pajamas. Her mind was only semi-aware at this point, having been asleep less than a minute ago. But she was thirsty, and the tap water here tasted horrible—it left the slight taste of dirt in your mouth.

As she shielded her eyes from the comparatively bright lights shining from the ceiling of the hotel room's vending room, she noticed that another man was in there getting ice—fairly tall and muscular, blonde, somewhere in his late thirties. He nodded an acknowledgement to her presence as she came in.

Kitty smiled slightly back, then went over to look at the vending machine's ridiculously overpriced beverages.

Two-fifty just for a small bottle of water?

The other man in the vending room must have noticed her temporarily sour expression, as he commented, "I know, right? Highway robbery. They're milking us for every dime they can get in a crisis like this."

"Yeah," Kitty acknowledged, her mind finally managing to wake up enough to converse with somebody else. She inserted a dollar bill into the machine and then sighed as it was returned, apparently some minute fold in the bill preventing it from being accepted.

As she tried to iron out the bill to make sure it was completely flat, the man continued, "Which I guess makes it even worse—a'course, it seems like every other month we've had a crisis, ever since the Muties were discovered. Hotel's gotta recoup its costs somehow I guess, what with the stock market being such a roller coaster. Never thought it would impact this large of an area, though. Me and my family, we're from North Dakota—one of the first places to get hit. Lucky to get out when we did, since we were on the opposite side of one of the first towns to get invaded. Barely made it out this morning—we just drove and drove and drove, didn't want to stop given how fast they were coming at first. House is probably destroyed now—and my youngest, she's barely two. Doesn't understand why we can't go home. We just have to keep driving farther and farther south as our country gets invaded by a buncha Muties. That's what makes 'em so dangerous—you tick off just one, and then we get, well… this. This keeps up, in a week we'll be forced to go all the way down into Mexico just to get away from it all… and who knows how long until that country gets invaded too, y'know?"

By now Kitty had managed to insert enough money into the vending machine and pressed the button for her water, the bottle promptly tumbling down into the retrieval bin.

Of course, her first instinct was to defend Jamie—he wasn't even under control of himself, if the reports about him were correct (and she was certain they were)… but promptly decided against it. That would raise entirely too many questions.

He's scared, homeless, and he's lost a lot, Kitty told herself as she bent over and retrieved the bottle of water, twisting the cap off and taking a sip. Can't you tell from how much he's divulging to a total stranger? He just wants someone to vent to. I don't think he's in the mood… and you're not either, remember? You're done fighting. Leave that to the X-Men... they'll take care of it. We-they- always do.

Instead, Kitty merely nodded and replied softly, "I hear you… I'm really sorry about your loss."

"Yeah… yeah, thanks," the man said, turning to watch Kitty leave. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Uh… yeah, sure," Kitty said, half-turning to look back at him as she took another sip from her water bottle.

"Are you from North Dakota, too? Minot, I mean. My hometown."

"…No, my family and I are from Chicago. Why would you think-"

"Oh, it's nothing, nothing... you just look familiar. Could've sworn I've seen you somewhere before."

Despite herself, Kitty's eyes widened briefly and she put the cap back on her water bottle. "Uh… well, y'know, I just have… one of those faces," Kitty said quickly, smiling and turning back to walk down the hall to her family's room again. "Y'know, kinda generic-looking. A lot of people say that about me."

That was bad. HORRIBLE, Kitty chided herself. You really need to work on your poker face.

"Oh. Well, uh… g'night," the man said loudly down the hall. Kitty sighed in relief when she heard the ice machine start up again as he went back to what he was doing.

Walking up to the door, Kitty reached into her pocket… and felt nothing but a few bits of leftover change.

Quickly she searched her other pocket, but nope. Nothing.

I cannot BELIEVE I left the keycard in the room…

Looking back down the hallway, she saw the individual she had just been talking to lug up both of the large containers of ice he had been filling and start to make his way out of the vending room… and towards her.

Kitty cursed inwardly again, and nervously knocked on the door.

No response—which was hardly surprising, as her father was an awful snorer. She could hear him even out here.

"Hey, you need any help?" the man called down the hallway to her.

"No… no, I've got it," Kitty replied back knocking a bit louder—but to no effect. "Just left my keycard in the room, duh. They just… they don't hear me. My dad, he's…"

"Yeah, he's good at sawin' logs," the man said, waving Kitty's concern away as he finished walking up to her, putting down the ice buckets he was carrying. "My uncle was the same way. Don't worry, I can really bang on the door if I need to—I'll get their attention. You just tell 'em what's going on."

"No, really, that's not nec—"

Putting his full force into his fists, the tall man knocked heavily on the door—though "knocking" wasn't perhaps the best verb, Kitty thought, as it was sounded considerably more like a loud pounding. She had no doubt the man next to her woke up not just her own parents, but everyone else five rooms down as well.

As the loud snoring stopped, a tired female voice called out from the other side, "Kitty? Sweetie, is that you?"

Kitty looked up at the man who had helped her, who gestured for her to answer her mother, mouthing, See? No problem, before stooping down to pick up his two ice buckets again.

"Uh… yeah, Mom, it's me," Kitty said back loudly. "I left my keycard in the room, could you come and open up the door for me?"

"There's no reason to wake up the whole floor," her mother called out, her tone a mixture of sleepiness and agitation. "Since when can a door stop you? Just come on through!"

Kitty froze, as did the man with the ice buckets in his hands. He slowly looked down at Kitty, his face turning red as he put two and two together.

"NOW I know where I've seen you!" the man roared, his fists clenching. "On the TV—you were one of those costumed Muties—the X-Men! You're that Shadowkit person!"

Kitty backed up a few steps, putting up her hands and absentmindedly dropping her water bottle. "Hey look, I-I'm really not here to cause any trouble—AH!"

The man had quickly snatched out and grabbed Kitty by her ponytail, lifting her up by it until she was roughly eye level with him.

"So what are you doing here, huh? HUH?" the thirty-something yelled, shaking Kitty as he said that last word. By now, Kitty could hear rumblings from in the other hotel rooms—including her own—as other people were getting up to see what all the commotion was about. "I've seen from the reports that one of you is behind this whole invasion, so what's—eh?"

Kitty phased her ponytail out of the man's hands, falling to the floor and adopting a crouching stance, ready for anything this time as a couple of curious occupants stuck their heads out of a few other doors on the floor. She also heard her parents calling her name in alarm, both of them now fully awake. "P-please—the X-Men aren't really behind this, I know it—and I'm not one of them any—"

Kitty instinctively phased as the large man threw himself at her in rage. He fell through her, hitting the carpet instead while as she leapt through him and into the wall on one side, tumbling into the bathroom of her and her parents' own hotel room.

Almost immediately the door to the small tiled room was open, her father and mother behind it.

"Kitty?" her father asked. "What's going on out there?"

"There was someone out there with me," Kitty said hurriedly, rushing her parents out of the bathroom and back into the main room of their hotel quarters as she began to gather a few of the valuables she had taken on the trip with her. Seeing the urgency on their daughter's face, her parents quickly began rushing to gather up their necessities as well. Meanwhile, outside in the hall the thirty-something's booming voice could easily be heard as he told the others about there being a "Mutie spy" in their room.

"Wait… you mean…" Kitty's mother said, slowly coming to a realization, gasping. "Oh, honey… I didn't know there was someone else out there-I'm so sorry…"

"Forget it- you couldn't have known," Kitty said, raising her voice as a loud pounding began to sound from the other side of their hotel room's door, soon joined by several others. "But we need to get out of here—the guy who was with me out there is pretty big. Between him and the others, it won't be long before they break down the door."

"So which way do we go?" her father asked as he finished throwing his necessities into a suitcase and quickly clipping it closed.

"Wellll…" Kitty said, peaking her head through the blinds in front of the window overlooking the hotel parking lot far below them.

"Out the window?!" her mother cried in disbelief. "Honey, we're nine stories up!"

"I haven't shown you guys personally before—haven't needed to—but remember? I told you I learned how to reverse-phase back at the Institute, a little over a year ago."

"But you said that just like when you phase normally, you can't breathe during that!" her dad said, wincing as the door to their room began to buckle slightly under the pressure. Apparently, someone had gone and gotten some sort of hammer, from the sound of it.

"We can make it—if we take a deep enough breath before hand," Kitty said, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. A significant amount of their things were still laying about the hotel room, but the most important things like their money and wallets had been thrown into their bags. "C'mon, we can do this—each of you, one hand on your suitcases, one hand holding mine."

Kitty's father looked back angrily at the door that was slowly caving inwards, then took his daughter's hand as he lifted up his own suitcase. Her mother reluctantly followed her husband's movements.

Kitty nodded, and—all of them taking a deep breath-she phased the three of them through the window, off the small balcony outside, and out into thin air. As soon as she was sure all three of them had cleared the balcony, she promptly reverse-phased, and they both came to an abrupt halt, the air becoming like hard ground under their feet. Quickly she concentrated, and the "hard air" underneath their feet began to give, and they began falling down towards the ground—but at a considerably slower pace than they would have plummeted had they been freefalling. Although it looked like they were simply floating down to the ground fairly quickly, to the three of them it felt like the air all around them was a sort of goopy water, and they were sinking through it as they fell closer and closer to the ground.

It took nearly a minute for them to near the asphalt. At about the second floor of the hotel, Kitty started to make the reverse-phase more solid and unforgiving, and they stopped falling so quickly, to help cushion the fall ahead. Finally, she stopped phasing all together, and they all fell about seven feet onto the pavement, where all three of them lay splayed on the ground for a moment, taking in deep breaths.

"That… that was… certainly something…" her mother commented in between gulps of air.

"C'mon… c'mon, we've got to get moving," Kitty said, dragging herself to her feet despite the extreme fatigue brought on by reverse-phasing all three of them to such a controlled degree. "I heard the door bust open when we were at about the fourth floor…. they'll be coming down after us pretty soon.
"This is ridiculous," her father said, getting up and jogging towards their car, Kitty and her mother following right behind him. "All this… just because you're an X-Men. You've… you've saved these people's lives... I hate all this running…"

"And now… now you know why I wanted to… had to… leave," Kitty said sadly.

"So where do we go, Carmen?" Kitty's mother asked her father as they quickly opened up the doors to their parked car and got in.

"We drive," Kitty's father said, embittered. "No sense just parking at another hotel in the city, those nuts will be out and about soon enough. Hopefully we can find another good place before morning."

The car pulled back quickly, then turned and screeched out of the parking lot, an angry mob of people in their pajamas running out of the hotel entrance and yelling curses at the Prydes as they drove off into the night.

"Oh, my gosh…" Moonstar said sadly, pausing as Toad and Avalanche helped to pass a fairly sizable boulder up to her and Shadowcat.

"Shoulda just let them have it," Avalanche said.

"Their concerns were justified," Kitty admitted as she and Moonstar lifted the boulder up over the side of the sinkhole and placed it aside. "Even if their reaction wasn't. It was just… a bad sequence of events."

"You shoulda at least popped that big guy in the face," Toad said.

"Kitty, why didn't you contact us?" Moonstar asked. "I mean, that was a while ago… we could've helped you through this."

"Well, that was the problem," Kitty said. "That night in the hotel… at first, it had just further convinced me that I had made the right choice by leaving you guys. That all those negative feelings towards me were not only because I was a Mutant, but because I was an X-Man. I figured if I kept my head down long enough and didn't draw attention to myself… it would all fade away eventually. The day after that… after you all had stopped the invasion by H.Y.D.R.A. and the Jamie clones, and everything had gone back to "normal", we had returned to our house—which, thankfully, hadn't gotten sacked because the invasion force had never made it that far. Still, instead of taking it as a blessing, I was just more determined than ever to distance myself from the X-Men, what with the college year beginning fairly soon…"

"Honey, are you sure? Because once I snip it, that's that…"

"I'm sure," Kitty said, looking at herself in the mirror. In it she saw herself sitting on a chair in the middle of her bedroom with her mother behind her, scissors in hand. Little bits of Kitty's dark brown hair littered the floor around her, which had been covered with a bed sheet to make things easier to clean up.

"But you've had a ponytail ever since… well, ever since you had grown out enough hair as a toddler to have one," Kitty's mom said.

"It's a handle, mom," Kitty replied. "Just one more way someone can get the upper hand on me. I learned that the hard way when we were in the hotel that one night. You didn't see him, but that guy, he picked me right up by it. I know I can, like, just phase myself through anybody who does that, but they can still take me by surprise—and that split second could make all the difference. Besides, I need to change my look, anyways. I'm being recognized too easily in public—and it'll give you guys a bit more peace of mind, too. Especially once I leave for college next week."

Kitty heard her mom sigh, and looking back up in the mirror again, she could see through her mother's facial expression that she was reluctantly acknowledging her daughter's point. Ever since Kitty had moved back in with her parents—even if it was just for this summer—they had been getting confronted more and more often in public. Most of the time it was just an angry individual who had lost someone or something dear to them because of the whole Jamie incident, and after a couple of shouted angry words or a gesture that was it. But a couple of times it had escalated further, and the only way Kitty and her parents had been able to get away unharmed was by Kitty utilizing her powers so that they could run away without anybody or thing blocking their path.

As her mother began to take off the scrunchie that held Kitty's hair back and snip off most of what had comprised her ponytail, Kitty thought about the road ahead. She was nervous about college, sure, as anyone would be—but in a way she was glad she would be leaving the house soon. Her parents had told her that after the existence of Mutants had been made public, a few of their friends in the neighborhood had stopped coming by, while a few others (including some relatively low-level government officials) had immediately dropped by and bombarded them with questions—did they know their daughter was a Mutant, when did they know, how did they know, had they kept in regular correspondence with Kitty once she had moved to the Institute, were THEY Mutants themselves… the questions had gone on and on. Sure, it had been a bother, but after a few weeks the whole panic had died down a bit and things had gone back—more or less—to the way they had been, minus the fact that they could tell their neighbors were watching them more closely.

But after the incident with Jamie, things had gotten a bit more hostile. It was one thing for you to know the parents of someone who had been involved in an incident half the nation away that had destroyed some buildings and ended up with a few dozen people injured or killed—and had even been one of many Mutants who had helped to take down Apocalypse and save the world (though the latter was unconfirmed as far as the general public and the media were concerned—after all, some of the X-Men had been seen committing crimes that had led to Apocalypse's release in the first place. The general argument presented was- had they truly been good Samaritans, or had they simply been cleaning up another humongous mess that they themselves had made?). It was quite another thing for one of their daughter's own teammates to have declared war on the United States, killing thousands and invading several towns in the far northern area of the central United States. Just like the Prydes themselves, all of their neighbors had left for a brief time during the "One-Day War", as most had retroactively dubbed it. Answers were still being sought about the true reason behind the war to this day—the trial of Jamie Madrox had officially declared him innocent, though understandably, few understood how or were satisfied with what little answers the media and public government officials had been able to dig up from the H.Y.D.R.A. base ruins. To know somebody who was only one step removed from knowing the chief perpetrator of the carnage personally—well, that was something different entirely. Any good will that had been built up among Kitty's parent's neighbors had been erased with the One-Day War, and then some.

Kitty hated seeing her parents almost friendless now. A few—mostly relatives- would still call or drop by occasionally, but even then, Kitty could tell that things were a little tense when she was around. They all could. There still obviously lingered within their few friends some doubts, even if they were polite enough to not actually give voice to them. Are your daughter and her Mutant friends up to what you say they're up to? Is she who she says she is? Are YOU who you say you are? Why is she back here?

Her mom momentarily diverted her attention, as she was done cutting her daughter's hair by now. But as Kitty quietly helped her mother clean up, her thoughts quickly returned to the track they had been on. If she had just been an average Mutant and not an X-Man, they would still have had to deal with the aftermath of the whole "Mutant revelation", sure, but things wouldn't have become as bad as they were now.

Not to mention she never would have met Logan and Sam—and then watched them die while she was helpless to do anything about it. She never would have been involved in all of those life-or-death situations, where if one tiny thing had gone wrong, she would have been dead, too. Granted, she never would have met people like Kurt and Piotr either, but she wouldn't have known what she missed, anyways. And she was sure she would have made other friends, too—ones whose lives weren't on the line every other week!

Kitty's mom told her that dinner would be ready in about an hour, and Kitty nodded as she went back up to her room, her mind only half-focused on what she was actually doing.

No, no, it was time to turn over a new leaf. Time to leave the X-Men behind… before they made things even worse for her and her parents, good intentions or not.

Kitty sighed as she returned to her room, then signed onto the Internet on her laptop. Going to her e-mail account, she saw a couple of old inquiries from Kurt and Danielle, wondering how she was doing—she had never bothered to answer them. She was never really sure HOW to answer them. Or even if she should. That life was behind her now, and perhaps—perhaps it was best to just sever the ties now.

Kitty bit her lower lip for a moment in indecision before deleting the X-Men's e-mails from her inbox—and then finishing the job by blocking their e-mail addresses. Once that was done, she got up from her bed, walked over to her closet and opened it, and filed through the many clothes she had—until she found a well-worn, form-fitting black-and-yellow uniform with a purple stripe running down the middle.

A single tear running down her left cheek, Kitty took the uniform off its hanger, ran down into the garage with it, and threw it into the garbage can before heading back in to read a book. The more she could distract her mind from the thoughts currently running through her head, the better…

"Daddy, will you hurry up already?"

"Coming, Sweetie, just- whew—just gimme a minute," Kitty's father said, finally catching up with his daughter, breathing heavily as he put down all the bags he was carrying. "I mean, I like to think I stay healthy, but—heh—nothing like what you've been through the past few years. Do you—whew—do you really need all this stuff?"

"I don't need it, but I definitely want it," Kitty giggled as inserted her newly-acquired dorm room key into its lock and turned the key. "Gotta have most of my wardrobe with me, right? Now, let's see where I'm gonna be… huh…"

Her father looked down at her, her face twisting in disappointment.

"What's the matter?" he asked. "This is the correct room, right?"

"No, no, this is it," Kitty said, walking two steps into the center of the room and looking around. "I just… it looked bigger in the brochure. Certainly for the amount of money we're paying for it, I thought…. well, nevermind."

Her father couldn't help but chuckle. "Honey, you've got quite a lot to learn about college life," he said, ruffling his daughter's shortened hair.

"Definitely gonna need to go through my suitcases again," Kitty said, opening up the small closet. "I think I'm gonna have to send, like, half of my clothes back with you."

"Told you," her father smirked.

"Mom's going to be a while, right?"

"The parking lots are packed, so yeah. It's going to take a bit for her to walk all the way up here from that off-campus site. I mean, you were the one who wanted to go to the University of Illinois, Kitty—you knew it was going to be rather large."

"No, I get it, I get it," Kitty said, quickly returning to her previous excited demeanor. "Hey, could you toss me that suitcase-no, no, THAT one. Yeah."

Kitty caught the suitcase her dad lightly tossed across the tiny room to her, and immediately laid it down on the floor, phasing her arms into the suitcase and phasing out several clothes partially. "Yeah, this is mostly stuff I can leave—just let me- wait a second…"

Kitty's face twisted in confusion as she felt something hard in the suitcase she had phased her hands through.

Odd, this should only contain shirts and cardigans…

Kitty's face froze as she phased the hard object in question out of the suitcase.

"Dad…" she said, standing up and turning around, a scowl on her face. "What is THIS doing in here?"

Her father looked at the yellow belt with an "X" emblem on the buckle that Kitty held in her hands.

"That, uh…. that was your mother's idea," he said sheepishly. "She found your old X-Men costume in the trash—told me about it. I mean, we understand where you're coming from, Sweetie, but—shouldn't you have something to remember those years by? You did quite a lot. A lot to be proud of."

"I guess," Kitty said, "But I've turned over a new leaf, Dad, and I don't want to look b—"

Kitty suddenly stopped and hid the X-belt she was holding behind her back. Clearing her throat and smiling, she gestured with her head towards the anxious-looking individual who had just peeked in the doorway—a bearded man somewhere in his fifties, wearing a suit and a kippah on his balding head.

"Ah!" said Kitty's father, smiling as soon as he turned around. "You're the campus rabbi, I presume?"

"Good guess," the rabbi abruptly laughed as they shook hands. "Yes, I'm Rabbi Breyer. I just wanted to stop by and see how things were going."

"Oh, just fine, rabbi, just fine," Kitty's father said. "We're just—ah, starting to decide how Kitty wants to decorate her room."

"Welcome to the Chabad Center, welcome," Rabbi Breyer said, walking over and shaking one of Kitty's hands with both of his, which were a bit slick with sweat. "I think you'll find it's a great place for Jewish students here on the campus. Our facilities here are top-notch, really just top-notch. If you don't mind me asking, er, ah—what exactly were you holding there before I walked in? It looked… well, it looked quite interesting."

"Oh, this?" Kitty said, her face reddening a little as she reluctantly showed the rabbi the X-belt she had kept behind her back. "It's just a, uh… keepsake."

"Ah, from the X-Men, I presume?" the rabbi smiled as he carefully looked over the belt and set it gently down on the dorm's only current piece of furniture—a bare mattress. "They've been in the news quite a bit lately."

"Well, I'm… I'm no longer with them anymore," Kitty replied. "Now that I've graduated from high school, I'd decided to try to further my education and all that."

"Well, we're excited to have you!" Rabbi Breyer said, grinning. "Not only a fellow Jew, but a salutatorian who graduated a year early and a former X-Man, here at the Chabad Center—you've got quite a bright future ahead of you, young lady."

"Thank you," Kitty said, bowing her head slightly in respectful acknowledgement. "But really, I just want to be treated like anyone else here."

"Oh, no, I understand, I understand completely," the rabbi said, the nervous grin stubbornly staying on his face. "But, uh, are you attending the welcoming ceremony tonight for the incoming class? It'll be so weird talking about the future 'Graduate Class of 2007' already, you know… my, my, how time does fly…"

"Yes, we're all planning on attending," Kitty's father interjected. "Her mother is here too—she's just parking the car. We'll be staying here until tomorrow."

"Will you be taking her-?"
"Yeah, to the Registration Center," her father replied. "We figure it's better—maybe safer—than having her rely on the government-supplied public transportation. Once she's registered tomorrow morning, we'll drop her off back here and then be on our way."

"Ah, good, good," Rabbi Breyer replied. "Yes, I tend to agree with you there—Mutants from all over the state, on one bus … but, let's not focus on that prospect, shall we? Beyond meeting you, the whole 'Registration Day' thing tomorrow was primarily why I came up to see you all. I wanted to make sure you had some sort of plans to get there, since the University President would be in hot water if the only Mutant on campus wasn't up there doing what the law required of her."

"No, no, I'm required to register, so I'll… I'll register," Kitty said, her smile becoming more forced.

"Good to hear—quite a load off of my shoulders," the rabbi said as she slowly began to back out the door. "Smart thinking of them to put Registration Day right before most colleges started their semesters—less of a headache for all of us. Anyways, I need to greet the other new students. Let me know if you need anything further, Miss Pryde—and I'll see you all at the ceremony tonight. Ten o' clock sharp, don't be late!"

"Names?"

"Uh, Kitty Pryde," Kitty said, straightening her dress absentmindedly. "And these are my parents, Carmen and Theresa Pryde."

"Hrrm, Pryde, Pryde…." the concierge mumbled to himself, flipping through the pages of the book in front of him. "With an 'i' or a 'y'?"

"A 'y'," Kitty responded. "I know, everyone thinks it's an 'i'."

"Ummmm…." the concierge said, looking back through a few pages. "I'm not seeing any Kitty Pryde. You ARE here for the ceremony for the incoming 2003 freshmen, correct? The campus is pretty busy tonight…"

"It could be under Katherine," Kitty suggested.

"I know what Kitty's short for," the concierge said, a bit indignantly. "I'm not seeing Carmen or Theresa Pryde on the guest list, either. No Prydes."

"B-but we just moved in today! Rabbi Breyer himself visited us a few hours ago!" Kitty protested.

"Hold on, let me double-check the late additions…" the concierge responded, pulling a hand-written list out of one of the pockets of his suit. "Pryde, Pryde… nope, sorry."

"Now hold on a second!" Kitty's father said, gently pushing his way in front of his daughter. "Let me see that book. We've paid a lot of money to come here, and—"

"Sir, look, I'm just doing my job," the concierge said, putting up a hand to stop Kitty's dad from continuing. "It's probably an error, but you're not on the list, I'm sorry. Don't worry, it's still half an hour before the ceremony starts—if you go up to the administrator's office, she can get this sorted out for you in plenty of time for you to still make it in before the whole thing starts."

Kitty's father looked about to protest further, but she tugged on her dad's sleeve a little. "It's just two stories up, Daddy. C'mon, it'll just take a few minutes. We're holding up the line."

Her father glanced back at the concierge one more time before sighing. "Alright, let's get going."

Getting out of line, the Prydes headed for the stairwell at one end of the hall. As soon as they were out of earshot of the attendees in line, Kitty's mother scolded, "Honestly, Carmen, I don't see what the big deal is. This kind of stuff happens."

"You know it's a pet peeve of mine," Kitty's father replied as they began to walk up the stairs. "All this bureaucracy… it's one of the main reasons why I thought it would be a lot better for Kitty to attend a smaller school."

"We've already had this conversation," Kitty's mother responded firmly, "And it's a bit late to be restarting it now. This isn't about you, it's about Kitty. This is her education, after all."

"…Right. Sorry, Honey."

"It's fine," Kitty said, waving it away as they reached the top of the stairwell and walked towards the administrator's office. At this time of the night, all of the hallways up on the third floor were empty and most of the doors locked tight, though all of the lights were still on. "I'm just a bit baffled as to how our names weren't on the list. I mean, Rabbi Breyer pretty much hunted us down—like he said, I'm the only Mutant at the university."

"I dunno, I almost think it was on purpose," her father said under her breath.

"What?" Kitty's mother asked. "Why would you say that?"

"Well, I mean he was totally polite and all, but he obviously was a bit nervous," Kitty replied. "Overly talkative and sweaty and all that. I don't think he's had to deal with a Mutant student before—just a bit cautious, I think. I don't think he did this on purpose, though, Dad. That seems a bit far-fetched."

"Well, I'm going to ask the administrator just what's going on," Kitty's father replied as they reached the door to the office. Turning the knob and opening up the door, he continued, "It's just inexplicable to me that someone as well-known as you would be—"

Even with as many combat situations as Kitty had been in up to that point, it still took her and her mother a couple of precious moments to process what happened next. A loud popping noise sounded from inside the room, and her father staggered backwards for a second- a newly-formed hole suddenly streaming blood down his forehead- before he collapsed to the ground, his face affixed with a permanent mixture of shock and confusion.

All was silent for a split second, before both Kitty and her mother cried out as one.

"DAD!"

"C-CARMEN?!"

Immediately more gun shots sounded from inside the administrator's office, and Kitty pulled her shocked mother away from the door.

Brushing away the tears that were already cascading down her cheeks, Kitty phased and quickly pulled her shaking mother through the wall into a room diagonally down the hall from the office.

"C-Carmen… what—what happened-" her mother began, a faraway look in her eyes, in total shock.

"Mom… mom, listen… LISTEN!" Kitty cried, shaking her mother until she managed to look back at her daughter. "Dad was shot—you stay here until I come back in, you got it? And I won't be using the door, so make sure it's locked."

"C-Carmen-" her mother choked, the faraway look in her eyes still there.

"MOM!" Kitty cried, tears really starting to roll down her face as she shook her mother again. "DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"

"Y…yes…"

Kitty decided that was a good enough response and phased back through the wall into the hallway, where two college-age men were standing over her father's corpse, holding pistols.

One of them was in the middle of cursing. "—it all, what the—I said don't shoot until YOU SEE THE GIRL. That's the father, and now she'll be—"

"SHE'S BACK!" said the other one, who was facing Kitty as she phased out of the wall.

Immediately both of them turned and began pouring fire at Kitty, who quickly phased again, passing right through the bullets until she was through both of the individuals, then re-phasing and grabbing one of the young men in the back. He instinctively swung back at her, but she got his arm in a lock, broke his arm at the wrist, and then thrust the butt of his own gun into his forehead hard, knocking him out.

It was at that moment that she saw another college-age individual in the administrator's office proper—this one a female—and behind her, an overweight middle-aged woman, bound up behind the desk and gagged.

The female with the gun let out a loud curse and leveled her own gun at Kitty, but the Mutant had slid back behind the door again, sweeping the remaining conscious young man's legs out from under him.

"You little—" the thug let out as he hit the floor, right before Kitty phased her hand through his and grabbed his pistol, pulling it away and smoothly shooting him in both of his kneecaps.

No sooner had the man cried out in pain than Kitty phased through the wall into the administrator's room, leveling her acquired pistol at the college-age girl in the room, who had her own gun pointing at the administrator.

"That's enough," the female snarled. "Come any closer, and Mrs. Williams here gets it in the head."

"Why are you doing this?!" Kitty cried, her voice a mixture of anguish and anger, slowly standing up, her gun still pointed at the other girl.

"Because everywhere you Mutants go, you bring violence with you," the girl said darkly, a few tears running down one of her own cheeks. "…Case in point."

"What? That doesn't make any sense! Why would you contribute to something you see as a problem?"

"I'm preventing something even worse from— AH!"

Even in such a tense situation, Kitty had reacted too fast for her, suddenly flinging her borrowed gun at the other girl while she was in the middle of her explanation. Instinctively the girl moved out of the way of the incoming gun and fired her own weapon at the administrator—but it was too late. In the split second she had spent dodging the gun, Kitty had leapt across the room, phasing through the administrator's desk and grabbing Mrs. Williams by the foot, dragging her down into the room below. The other girl's shots would have connected with the administrator—had they been a split second earlier—but Mrs. Williams had already been phased, and the bullets passed right through her head.

Kitty and the administrator came falling down into the room below, the latter screaming even behind the masking tape on her mouth as they fell the couple of feet down on the floor. Not having enough to time to calm or reassure the woman, Kitty simply commanded, "Stay still!" She quickly phased back into the wall and back up into the room above, just high enough where she could see above the floor. Taking her arm out of the floor, she took hold of one of the cursing college student's feet and phased the girl about halfway down into the floor, the latter's lower legs now peeking through the top of the ceiling of the building level below. The girl, unable to move her arms, fired her gun again instinctively, but the bullet just bit into the floor directly below her. Kitty heard Mrs. Williams let out another scream, but the bullet had impacted the floor at least ten feet away from her—it was simply panic setting in for the poor woman at this point.

Hanging onto the girl's foot and using the kicking girl's legs for momentum, Kitty flung herself back up into floor/ceiling, making sure to grab the protesting student's gun and phase it back up with her.

"No!" the girl screamed, grasping the situation as Kitty phased back up in front of her, gun in hand. "No, no, NOOOO!"

"Why… why can't you people just LEAVE. US. ALONE?!" Kitty cried, whacking the girl across the face with the butt of the gun as she said each accentuated word.

"I'll tell you what," the girl mumbled, her voice dripping with hatred, just her lips started to drip out blood from the blows. "We'll leave you alone as soon as you leave us alone, Mutie."

Kitty let out a cry of rage and pain as the girl spat a bloody tooth at her face, and used an upwards kick on the college student's head, which was roughly at knee level to her now. As the girl's head snapped back, Kitty thought she heard a sudden crack, and the girl's head suddenly cocked to the side at an odd angle, her eyes rolling into the back of her head.

Kitty vaguely remembered phasing back down to set Mrs. Williams free, as well as hearing the campus police appear in the hall from all the noise. She vaguely remembered—very vaguely—telling them briefly what had happened, and the police officers radioing that the building be kept in lockdown and the ceremony put on hold while they searched the premises for any other would-be assailants.

But Kitty very clearly remembered phasing back into that room where her mom was sitting, huddled in a corner, rocking back and forth, sobbing uncontrollably. She remembered as she walked up to her mother slowly and they embraced each other, Kitty finally letting it all out as they sobbed into each others' shoulders.

And Kitty would never, ever forget the look of shock and confusion that was plastered on her dead father's face, his eyes staring blankly up at the hallway ceiling.

The world had gone mad.

Kitty had thought it couldn't get any worse, her father having died the night previous. Neither she nor her mother had slept since then, talking with the police and various investigators, as well as with the university president and Rabbi Breyer, who had both offered them plenty of consoling.

Apparently—as Kitty had thought—the female of the trio had been the "mastermind" behind the whole operation, the investigators had told them early the next morning. They had told Kitty her name, as well as the name of the two other college students with her, but she had forgotten them pretty quickly. The names didn't matter, not really. What HAD been important was that, after searching their dorm rooms (and thus their computer files and e-mails), the girl had become part of a fairly radical anti-Mutant group a while back, though no one else outside of the group knew about it. Up until that night, she hadn't committed any crimes—and neither had either of the boys. Their guns had been purchased legally, having passed all background checks. But they had shared their thoughts with each other over a message board, and secretly plotted this little attempt on Kitty's life through e-mails and—it was gathered from the connotations of some of the language—a few in-person meetings, as well. One of the boys was majoring in computer programming, and—judging from his grades—he was quite good at it, whizzing through all of his classes he had taken so far. It had been gathered that the list of those who were admitted to the welcoming ceremony had been hacked and altered earlier that day, so that the Prydes wouldn't appear on it. Knowing university procedure fairly well—both of the boys were college seniors—they had known that they Prydes would have to go up to the building's administrator to fix the problem, and thus they had ambushed poor Mrs. Williams about ten minutes before the Prydes had arrived, making sure that they were ready for whenever their target came up.

The college girl who had been behind the whole plot had actually been a former resident of Bayville—her boyfriend had been killed during the initial Sentinel disaster that had revealed the existence of Mutants to the world, which had obviously been her primary motive. Although the girl was dead now, it was easy to surmise from the e-mails and message board posts that as soon as she had found out that Kitty was moving into the same college that she was currently attending, she had started to plan out the whole thing.

What was especially spooky about all that was that the girl had to have been obsessed enough with Mutants to have memorized all of the X-Men's real names—along with, perhaps, the other known Mutants in Bayville like the Brotherhood members—and then followed their cyber-tracks closely enough (mostly through her computer whiz of a friend) that when Kitty Pryde's name showed up on the "incoming students" list on the university's website, it had raised a red flag. The other members on the anti-Mutant message board community had also helped, many of them volunteering their time to keep track of any time one of the X-Men might be potentially vulnerable—as Kitty had been, given she had been with her parents (who could have been used as easy hostages) and that she had defected from the X-Men recently, thus leaving her without any super-powered backup.

Even spookier? This message board community was not small. It was still a fringe group, to be sure, but it had over thirty thousand registered members, and its daily traffic was considerably higher than that. Kitty guessed that the only reason Ray hadn't been attacked yet was that he didn't have any living immediate relatives, thus making it hard to gain any leverage on him.

And then this morning—several hours ago, now, as it was already started to get dark outside again—the news was on televisions everywhere.

Mutant Registration Centers all over the country had been attacked, blown up. Simultaneously.

Kitty had simply sat numb in her dorm room, two armed security guards posted outside the dorm for the time being, her mother sitting across her on a fold-out chair. Neither of them had said anything, the small television Kitty had brought making all of the noise in the room.

They had simply watched, horrified, and prayed for the victim's safety. They HAD been just starting to plan her father's funeral when the news had broke—obviously, something like that would have to wait a little while. Any funeral service advertising the death of a Mutant's father wasn't likely to grab the right kind of attention, not now. That decision was cemented in stone when Magneto's pirate broadcast hit the air, with the Acolytes—essentially just "Mutants" in many people's eyes—taking responsibility for the bombings. The President had come on the air fairly late that night to give a stern warning to Genosha, but said that he would seek "alternate methods" of calming Genoshan tempers, though he had declined to say exactly what those alternate methods would be at that time. Rabbi Breyer had come in for a time and silently spoke with them again, offering them his condolences and saying that Kitty was still welcome to attend the university, though they would need to keep her under guard for at least a few weeks to make sure there were no more attempts on her life. He also firmly recommended that she not go to help out at their state's Registration Station, given the danger and her emotional state. It was a long drive, anyways—by the time Kitty would have arrived there, the cleanup would have been nearly over.

After the presidential address, Kitty had turned off the television—that was the news she had been waiting for.

But still, neither of them said anything. They merely sat, eyes on the floor, and occasionally on the ceiling, on Kitty's scattered belongings, or outside the window—anywhere but in each other's eyes.

After nearly half an hour of silence, Kitty's mother finally asked the question. She knew one of them had to, eventually. She just didn't want to answer it, because she knew the answer and, right now, she wish she didn't.

"So… now what?"

"I tried to escape it," Kitty said softly. She had mentally rehearsed this answer to her mother several times over the past few hours, but it still was incredibly hard to say. Fresh tears immediately started to pour down her cheeks, an action she honestly didn't think she was capable of any more after the past twenty hours or so.

"I just wanted to live my life as just an ordinary person," Kitty continued, her voice trembling. "Go through college, get a career, eventually get married, settle down, have kids of my own. I mean, is that so bad? Is that so wrong? But no. No, it follows you, Mom. Hmmph. I think you know that too well since the whole Mutant thing went public, huh? The stuff you and Daddy went through for me… and you never complained. You never held it against me. You still don't, even after Dad was killed."

After a few moments of silence, her mother answered softly, "Honey, I know that you never could have foreseen—"

"Mom, I know you think that," Kitty replied, a bit more firmly now. "And that's what I love about you—and what I loved about Dad. It never even occurred to you two that I might have thought this might happen—somewhere, deep inside, deep enough that I don't think I even admitted it to myself until after it already happened. But trouble followed us when we were X-Men—I was stupid, stupid to think it wouldn't continue to just because I left them. I'm still a Mutant, and that'll never change.

"But being an X-Man, that changed me, Mom. As soon as I saw Dad go down yesterday, I—it only took me a second to figure out what to do, in my head. Professor Xavier, Hank, Ororo….Logan… they had all trained me well. Taking down those three people, getting you and that other woman out of harm's way… it just all came so naturally. And, scarily enough, so did… so did killing the girl in the group.

"…I think I need to go back," Kitty continued, standing up slowly. "Professor Xavier was loath to admit it to us, but—like me in the past several hours—I think he, perhaps, admitted it to himself—even if not to us, for some time-once everything really hit the fan with Apocalypse. Once you're with the X-Men for so long, you're not a student anymore. No… no, you're a soldier, and it sticks with you, Mom, and you can't escape it."

"Honey, only if you're sure you want to do this," her mother said, standing up as well and putting her hand on Kitty's shoulder. "If you really despised being an X-Man—than that shouldn't be the life path for you, sweetie."

"I think… I think it was supposed to be, even if I wasn't ready to hear it," Kitty said. "X-23… she was more right than I realized when she attacked me for trying to run away from my problems. So I can't say I so much despised being an X-Man so much as I despised the idea of being a soldier. But, going over what I did last night… I think it's what I need to do. Have to do. Want to do. And I'd do more good with the X-Men than I could ever do by myself—and after all, isn't that the reason we're here, to help make the world a better place?"

There was silence for a couple of seconds as her mother digested what she was saying. "So… are you going to call the X-Men back, and try to help them?"

"I actually did this morning," Kitty said. "Admittedly I did it behind your back, when you had gone to the bathroom—I still wasn't sure if I wanted to go back yet. There wasn't any answer—but not only that, I didn't get a message machine, or even a busy signal. Just that 'the number you have dialed is not in service' computer message. I tried a few more times—again, whenever you were out of the room for whatever reason—and the same thing. Finally, I did a quick internet query on my laptop and found out that the terrorist attacks all across the nation had destroyed phone line hubs at a few crucial places. A lot of cell phone calls to the New York metropolitan area in particular aren't going through, and I think it's going to take a few days to get them fixed. And by then the X-Men will definitely be off to Genosha. Since the President isn't sending any army after Magneto—at least overtly—the X-Men definitely won't leave this alone. Even if he DID send the Army, I don't think it would have phased the Professor. It's just what we are now, Mom."

"So then what are you going to do?"

"Well, like I said, the President isn't doing something overtly. But given how quickly he responded to the whole H.Y.D.R.A. thing, I think he's gotta be doing something—just a bit more secretly. And I have a pretty strong hunch what that 'something' is, given some of the 'classified' stuff I've seen over the past few years.

“That message board full of anti-Mutant zealots had managed to track me here, even though they didn’t have any government help,” Kitty continued, taking out her phone and dialing the number for information. “I bet they aren’t the only ones who were following me…. Hello, operator? Yes, I need your help… what’s the number for S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

Her mother looked terribly confused for a second and was about to say something, but Kitty held up a finger, mouthing, I know what I'm doing.

*I think I misheard you, young lady,* said the operator—a somewhat elderly female, by the sound of her voice. *I didn't hear the first name. I got "Shield", but there are six people with that last name in the area. What's the first name of the person you're trying to reach, again?*

"No, you heard me correctly," Kitty said. Despite herself, a small smirk started to form on one side of her mouth. "But I'm not talking about 'Shield' as in a last name, I'm talking about S.H.I.E.L.D. as in the organization. It's an acronym."

*I'm sorry, but I don't have any records of an organization called S.H.I.E.L.D. Are you sure you didn't misremember the name?*

"Yes, I'm sure," Kitty politely responded. "And I'm sorry to involve you in this, ma'am, but you're just sort of the middlewoman. The person I'm using to get their attention—and it's very important that I do so."

There was incoherent mumbling on the other end for a moment—likely the operator asking a confused question to one of her superiors- before the operator got back on and finally answered, *I-I'm not sure what you're talking about, miss, but I can assure you that no one else is listening in on this conversation except mys—*

Suddenly, there was loud static at the other end, the call interrupted. A few moments later, a modem dial tone-like sound emitted from Kitty's phone, and then suddenly silence.

*Miss Pryde,* said a new voice on the other end—this one male, and fairly deep- *I must admit that was quite clever. Whatever you want, I must tell you right now that the entire contents of this call—and the call itself—are now deeply encrypted and will be inadmissible in a court of law. Now, what did you need? We are quite understaffed at the moment and-*

"I want a pick-up," Kitty said. "Some of S.H.I.E.L.D. IS going to Genosha, correct? Or am I wrong on that?"

There was a moment of silence on the other end before the man responded flatly, *I can neither confirm or deny S.H.I.E.L.D.'s activity, especially not to a civilian. Even a civilian as… unique… as yourself.*

"Well, just in case, you should let your superiors know that Kitty Pryde and her mother, Theresa Pryde, will be waiting at the corner of Grover Street and Kennedy tomorrow morning at ten o' clock."

Before the person on the other end could respond, Kitty hung up.

"Now, Mom—we've got a good twelve hours or so. I think, after everything we've been through, it's time to get some food and finally get some sleep, if we can. But I'll also need your help in picking out and modifying a few clothes from my wardrobe. We're also going to need to go shopping at the nearest sports outlet early tomorrow, to find some protective guards."

"What? Why?"

"Because I'm going to need to make a new uniform before we meet them."

"You can probably guess the rest," Kitty finished. "We helped put together the outfit I'm wearing now, and an incognito S.H.I.E.L.D. agent met up with us. He took us to some place out in the middle of nowhere where a helijet picked me up, and they agreed to my request to come along with them—so here I am."

The sun was finally starting to go down, though the environment was still very hot and humid on Genosha. Most of the excavation work on the collapsed sinkhole had been completed, and though a few—mostly the strong Mutants, like Colossus—were still working, Kitty and Moonstar were now sitting on a ledge overlooking the ring of wreckage, both of them sipping on bottles of water from the Acolytes' storage. There had been many S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and Acolytes who had been killed by the debris before they could be unearthed, but many more had been saved by today's efforts. Rogue still remained in a coma, however.

Avalanche and Toad had left some time ago, once the cell where Mystique's body was had been fully excavated from the debris. The Brotherhood members were currently holding a makeshift funeral for their former leader somewhere near the beach. From what Kitty and Moonstar had seen, Surge looked pretty shaken up at seeing Mystique dead, but the rest of the Brotherhood seemed either apathetic or slightly disappointed only because it confirmed that they no longer had a faction to call their own.

Cyclops, meanwhile, had excused himself a short while back when he had heard that Jean was conscious.

"Kitty, I…. I'm so sorry," Moonstar said, putting her hand on her friend's shoulder. "I had no idea…"

"Well, it's not like I've had much time to catch my breath the past few days," Kitty sighed. "It's nice to actually talk to someone else about this, though. Kinda… therapeutic, in a way."

"So, what happened to your mom?" Moonstar asked.

"Well, right now she's with S.H.I.E.L.D. in an 'undisclosed secure location' back in the States," Kitty said. "The S.H.I.E.L.D. agent that picked me up said he was going take her somewhere safe for the time being, so I said goodbye to her before the first helijet took off. I'm hoping to get into contact with her soon after we get back. Given how many people knew where we lived back in Chicago, I imagine she'll be put into something like the Witness Protection Program, given a new identity and location to live in… though I'm not sure how I'll be able to see her again without blowing up the whole idea of giving her a new identity in the first place… there's got to be a way, though. My mom looked so horribly fatigued when she said goodbye to her—there's no way I'm just going to leave her like that… she's kind of an introvert and soft-spoken, but she doesn't do well completely by herself—especially now… But, she can't move to Bayville, either, as she'll probably in MORE danger there. I'll have to talk with the Professor about it once everything settles down."

"Speaking of Professor Xavier," Moonstar said, turning to look behind Kitty and motioning for her friend to follow her gaze. "You're not the only one who's had to deal with a family member dying lately…"

Both of the girls stood up slowly as Professor Xavier quietly came up to them- with Prodigy, Cyclops supporting a limping (and finally conscious) Jean, and an unidentified Acolyte with a flaming head coming up behind him.

No words were said as Kitty and Xavier looked at each other—but after a few moments, Kitty suddenly embraced Xavier, a few tears falling down both of their cheeks before she pulled away.

"I'm sorry I ever left," Kitty said softly. "I know now that I belong with the X-Men—that I've always belonged with you guys. I don't suppose you'd let me rejoin…?"

"Don't be silly, Kitty," Jean said, putting her free hand on Kitty's shoulder. "Of course you're back in. I don't think you ever really left."

"Yes," Xavier replied, "However, we're going to need your assistance for the moment. We've managed to excavate down to the Hub, but the door is wedged shut, and even Colossus can't pry those thick doors open. We're going to need you to phase all of us into the Hub so we can extricate… my son's… remains… and get the reactor up and running. Match—the Acolyte behind me—has the capacity to get power back up throughout Genosha, with Jean's help in staving off the high pressure inside the reactor. He'll only need to do it for a moment—just long enough for us to activate the various towers' Cyttorak shards and then destroy them."

"And then, finally, we can go home," Cyclops smiled. "The new Blackbird and Velocity have remote autopilots—they're on their way here as we speak."

"Alright, then," Kitty said, motioning for Xavier to lead the way. "Let's, like, get out of this place already."

"I'm gonna miss her," Surge said, wiping a tear from her eye, the small bit of liquid crackling as it touched her gauntlets, promptly evaporating. "She didn't deserve to go… not like this."

"Well, she did get us all together," Blob said, hands in his pockets, all of the Brotherhood members looking at the covered-up grave they had placed her in in front of a palm tree at the edge of Genosha's beach. "And I don't know where I'd be without all'a you guys."

"Whoa, hold up," Avalanche said, pointing up to the towers, which were suddenly glowing red at the top, the brightness quickly glowing in intensity. "Looks like they got the power working again. Get ready."

"I already feel completely drained. 'Ey, don't we get a say in whether or not we're subjected to this?" Toad asked.

"Do we ever?" Quicksilver retorted, right before several small booms resonated from the towers all over the island simultaneously.

Almost immediately, red-tinted shockwaves resonated outwards from the towers, passing over the entire island within a matter of seconds. The force of the shockwaves almost knocked most of the Brotherhood members from their feet, but they managed to stabilize themselves. Having several smaller explosions this time instead of one large one managed to lessen the impact, apparently.

Almost immediately after the shockwaves had passed over them, the Brotherhood members saw the couple signs of the artificial hyper-evolution—such as the white-tinged hair on all of them—revert to its normal color (except for on Quicksilver, of course).

"Man, I really coulda used that," Toad said, slumping to the ground. "I already feel a bit weaker."

"Yes, but that radiation was inflaming our emotions a little, as well," Wanda replied. "It's probably for the best that they did this."

"So, it's to off to Mutant jail for us now, huh mates?" Pyro asked sourly. "And here I just got OUT of a cell."

"You have to ask?" Avalanche sneered. "As a reward for all our 'help', we get the same treatment as all of the Acolytes."

"That MAY be the case," said a familiar voice from behind them. Turning, the Brotherhood members saw Nick Fury walking along the beach towards them, Captain America and a few S.H.I.E.L.D. soldiers flanking him. "But I have a proposition for you. One that I think you'll at least find preferable to going to jail."

"And that would be?" Wanda asked, raising an eyebrow.

"What would you say," Fury smirked, "If I asked you all to join S.H.I.E.L.D. under Captain Rogers' command in lieu of getting sent to the slammer—work off your debt to society that way?"

"So where is this guy you said you were working for?" Rockslide rumbled, looking around the snowy landscape that was dotted with pine trees. "It's been almost ten minutes since you teleported us here, Blink. He doesn't show in another sixty seconds, I'm going my own way. Kinda sick of being used by others as is."

"He said he'd be here," Blink said, shivering slightly as the cold really began to settle into her bones. "I'm not sure what's taking him so long. Five-in-One?"

"We already told you the last time when you introduced us to him—he's mentally cloaked," the quintuplets replied, slightly annoyed. "We can't detect his presence—which is why we're already more wary about this than we were when we got here."

"No need to be so wary—or did you say worried?" asked Sinister matter-of-factly from a position behind them, already leaning against a pine tree. "Sorry, but when you have five people talking at once, occasionally the words blend together a little."

All seven of the former Acolytes turned around, Rockslide taking a battle stance.

"Wow, he IS a big one," Sinister said, his posture and expression surprisingly carefree as he looked up at the rock elemental approvingly. "You weren't exaggerating, Blink."

"Alright, enough stalling," Blink said. "You've put off telling me everything long enough. First it was after our first meeting, than after our second- you said that once we had done this, you'd show me who your superior was. I want to know who we're really working for, or we're all taking off. No more secrets, Sinister."

"You've been working for a guy named Sinister?" Rockslide grumbled. "Wow, that's some terrific judgment you have there, Blink. And Five-in-One—I thought you all would know better."

"He has technology that allowed Blink to resist the effects of those energy-nullifying rays S.H.I.E.L.D. was equipped with," the Five-in-One replied. "We think he might be useful to have on our side."

"Blink, you're absolutely right—no more secrets," Sinister replied. "But first, I just want to make sure everything went according to plan. Five-in-One?"

"We knew Mystique was going to free Nightcrawler a fair amount of time before she actually did so," the Five-in-One explained, more for Rockslide's benefit at this point than Sinister's. "She may be very good at what she does, but we monitored the entire island, and managed to find and keep close tabs on her within a few days after she had infiltrated our ranks. We mind-controlled one of the other Acolytes beforehand and had him plant the false 'psychic ward' headband in Mystique's 'safe house'. We then informed Magneto of Mystique's plan to free her son just late enough where he would catch her in the act. In a one-on-one match between the two of them, Magneto would clearly emerge the victor—but as busy as he was with the terrorist attacks and the fallout, we knew he wouldn't stay around to watch her die and clean up the body himself. That gave Mystique time to talk to her son before she passed away.

"Once Nightcrawler went to Mystique's 'safe house'—since we knew logically Mystique would send him there if she was downed, judging by hidden camera footage—he discovered the headband. Far from blocking us out, it actually enhanced our hold on his mind, allowing us to project an illusion of one of his fellow X-Men—the one who had infiltrated the island's force field. You must understand, we couldn't directly control him or some other Acolyte because we wanted him to remember shutting down the force field of his own free will—as you mentioned, Sinister, we were not to leave any concrete ties back to this being an inside job until the whole charade was over. The illusion showed him where the power source for the force field was, and he managed to shut it down—however, he must have been given a large shock in the process, as our headband shorted out, and we were no longer able to project the illusion of the X-Man into his mind. Nonetheless, he had done what we had wanted, so we left him to Blink after that."

"He's more resourceful than I thought," Blink mumbled. "I didn't quite get rid of him before S.H.I.E.L.D. showed up."

"A shame, but all part of the bigger game," Sinister replied. "The whole strategy of this, as I told all of you—well, except you, Rockslide—was to pit Mutant against Mutant in a true 'survival of the fittest' conflict. Magneto said he was for such a conflict, but then he goes and puts a big force field around his home turf and tried to super-evolve everyone on his team. Not exactly a fair fight."

"If that's the case, then why did you implant that diamond-shaped device in my head?" Blink asked. "The one that apparently let me keep my powers even when S.H.I.E.L.D. zapped me with those Nimrod guns."

"Just a moment longer, my dear," Sinister said, holding up a finger. "I'm almost done with Five-in-One here, and then you'll have my full attention, I promise.

"Now," he continued, "What about the whole hyper-evolution deal? Did you shut that down, as well?"

"That part of the plan went off without a hitch," the Five-in-One replied. "We undid the mental blocks in Legion's mind, and when he refused to cooperate, we made him self-destruct. The power went down shortly afterwards, and with it the hyper-evolution radiation."

"Excellent, excellent," Sinister said, looking positively ecstatic by this point. "Your information fits perfectly with that which I've managed to glean from other sources—thus, I know you are trustworthy. Now, to uphold my end of the bargain. First, I must preface this by saying that we fully expected the Acolytes to win the big conflict, and were quite surprised when S.H.I.E.L.D. came on the scene with those power-nullifying blasters of theirs. The ability of that technology I implanted you with to shrug off those blasters, Blink, was an unexpected upside, but certainly an appreciated one. Still, we were prepared for either outcome. In fact, having the X-Men win actually makes things a bit easier for us in the long run, since there's fewer of them.

"But I'm getting ahead of myself," Sinister said, bowing to the side as he gestured towards a figure that appeared out of thin air in the midst of them. "May I present to all of you…my one and only superior."

"This guy?" Rockslide asked, looking at the male clothed in fairly unremarkable clothes in front of them, a hoodie hiding the unknown person's face from being clearly seen. "He doesn't look so tough to me."

"Then perhaps you need a closer look," said Apocalypse, flipping back the hood.

All of the former Acolytes gasped. To be sure, only about a third of Apocalypse's face was blue—and one of his eyes red—but that, combined with the voice, was enough to tell all of them who he really was.

"It can't be…" the Five-in-One replied fearfully.

"Apocalypse?!" Rockslide said, taking a few steps back. "Blink, you were working for freaking APOCALYPSE?!"

Blink said nothing- but, with a look of panic on her face, she teleported away in a flash of light.

"Hold," Apocalypse said, raising up a hand—and suddenly, neither Rockslide nor any of the Five-in-One found that they could move anything but their heads.

"Oh god, we're dead, we are SO dead…" Rockslide said, beginning to panic himself.

"Your fear is misguided. Notice that I have not killed any of you," Apocalypse replied. "Nor do I intend to do so."

"But you're not going to let us go, either, are you?" said the Five-in-One.

"If you hear our proposal—and our demonstration—and decline, then yes, we will," Sinister interjected. "And yes, really."

"The teleporter did not go far," Apocalypse said. "I can still feel her portion of the prism nearby."

A few moments later, in a flash of light Blink reappeared back in the middle of them, though she still looked ready to bolt at any moment.

"I just wanted to see if you were going to immediately start killing us or enslaving us, now that we had done whatever it was you wanted," Blink said nervously. "I mean, I saw—I'm pretty sure we all saw on television—what you did to your Horsemen. You controlled them, and their powers—completely. They clearly had no free will of their own…"

"I have grown since then," Apocalypse admitted. "I look back at my mindset at that time and am disgusted. I had learned the truth, and yet was still led to defeat—because I had tried to enslave my own kind instead of finding those willing to serve. What I propose is that you submit to me of your own free will. No tricks, no back-stabbing. Everything I know will be open to you as soon as you have proven your loyalty."

"Magneto recruited us with nearly the exact same promises," the Five-in-One stated. "Why should we trust you instead?"

"I will show you exactly why," Apocalypse said. "Blink, you have served us longest and most faithfully. You helped ensure that our plans on Genosha came to fruition. As such, you have earned the right to taste total power and knowledge."

Apocalypse's one red eye flashed, and suddenly Blink's eyes took on a faraway look, rapidly moving back and forth.

"Oh my god…" Blink muttered, just barely loud enough for Rockslide and Five-in-One to hear. "I-I never imagined… even with all I've experienced… This is…. This is beyond words…"

Blink blinked her eyes once, then twice, her eyes refocusing again on the here and now. "I understand now. I understand all of it."

"Care to… elaborate a bit on that?" Rockslide asked.

"You'll learn—all of you will, soon enough," Blink replied. "But let me just show you what Apocalypse has now done for me. This… this prism he's put in my head… at first I thought it was some kind of advanced tracking device. But it's so much more than that. For one thing- you thought Magneto's hyper-evolution radiation would make us stronger? Check this out."

Immediately Blink's right arm began to glow the same pinkish light as when she teleported, only it didn't envelop her entire body—instead it just simmered around her arm.

Flinging her arm out in a sideways motion, five dagger-shaped blasts of the pinkish energy lanced out from it, all aimed at five nearby pine trees. As soon as the blasts hit the pine trees, they all winked out of existence—only to all simultaneously teleport a couple of hundred yards above the ground further away, all of them loudly splintering into chunks as they crashed back into the snowy soil a couple of seconds later.

"It takes away practically all of your limits," Blink grinned devilishly as she turned back to face the stunned former Acolytes, her eyes glowing pink. "I could teleport this entire forest into the sun in mere minutes if I wanted to."

"However," Apocalypse replied, his eyes narrowing, "You failed to kill the X-Man that you had been assigned to."

"Wh-what?" Blink stammered, looking at her arm as the pink glow abruptly faded from it, as well as her eyes. "N-no, the knowledge, I'm already losing… what are you doing?!"

"You earned a taste," Apocalypse replied. "I reward success, not failure. Had you succeeded in your mission entirely, I would not have had to take away the power and knowledge again. If you serve us in the coming months well… you will get it back. For good."

"I…. I'll do anything," Blink said desperately. "Anything you want me to do… for that minute, I felt… I felt like a demigod."

"So Apocalypse…" Rockslide asked Blink cautiously, "He's the real deal? He's not holding anything back from us?"

"N-no," Blink stuttered, still visibly shaken up, clutching the side of her forehead. "No. I mean, I'm already losing the specifics of what that… that diamond-thing… showed me, but all I saw confirmed what he and Sinister have been telling me. If we side with him… we'll gain everything we've ever dreamed of."

"So?" Sinister asked. "Care to join our little band and share in the wonderful future to come?"

Apocalypse finally lowered his arm, and Rockslide and all of the Five-in-One looked at each other, then looked back at Apocalypse, a new look of anticipation in their eyes. One by one, they each nodded.

"Good. Now, there is still much to be done before the true Reaping can commence. Follow me…" Apocalypse said, a slight smirk forming on his lips as he continued, "…my new Horsemen."

The End
 

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