PAST TENSE

Part IV: Hello Again

By Ryan Krupienski

The Xavier Institute; Four Months Ago

It was a cold, stormy night, rife with rain, thunder, and lightning. It wasn’t anything that any normal person would really want to brave, not even in a car; it was nearly impossible to see through the downpour, and the wind was almost strong enough to knock even the heaviest of men off their feet. No, no normal person would have wanted to be out in that mess.

However, Sophia Frost was anything but normal.

The young teenage girl marched slowly towards the front door of the large mansion before her, staring straight ahead with an absent look on her face and her hands clasped together in front of her, holding a Louis Vuitton duffle bag. An invisible barrier seemed to surround the young blonde, not a single drop of rain touching her, and she did not seem phased by the chaos that was in her midst. She was focused on one thing and one thing only – going home.

Sophia walked up a few steps and arrived at the front door to the mansion, but before she could knock, the double doors swung open. Before her stood an assemblage of men and women who her mother had normally said were their mortal enemies. Sophia wasn’t an idiot – she knew her mother was in trouble. She also knew her mother had made the right call in sending her to stay with the X-Men.

“What the…?” Jubilee started to ask, flabbergasted just the same as her teammates. “Who’re you?”

“Emma’s a telepath, remember? It’s just an illusion,” Banshee said, stepping to the head of the group to stare down the girl. “Quite frankly, though, I’m disappointed.”

“Is there a point to all this or can I go back to bed?” Iceman chimed in as he wiped the sleep from his eyes.

“According to Cerebro, Emma Frost is standing right in front of us,” Cyclops said coolly. “None of us are going anywhere until this is dealt with.”

Sophia looked at each of the X-Men before her, taking a moment to stare into their eyes and get a sense of whom they were. She had been instructed by her mother not to use her powers to read anyone’s minds, at least not initially; Emma wanted her to acclimate to her new environment in a more natural way. Boring, but perhaps it would do Sophia good.

She looked at each of the X-Men and decided then and there that these were people she could trust. She hadn’t run into that much in her life, but she knew they would take good care of her… and her sisters. Hopefully they wouldn’t make a mess of this for her.

“What is this supposed to be? A joke?” Cyclops asked, crossing his arms and narrowing his eyes.

Suddenly, a psionic image of a woman appeared right in front of Sophia, and it faced the X-Men with a commanding presence. Though she wasn’t there in person, Emma Frost was imposing as ever, even with her visage being merely little over a foot tall. Before any of the X-Men could say a word or make any sort of move, ‘Emma’ began to speak.

{X-Men, don’t bother trying anything, I’m not even actually here. This is a pre-recorded message,} the avatar explained. {As you can see, I’ve sent my darling Sophia to your institute… though we have our differences, I hope you will not take your anger towards me out on my daughter. She needs a safe haven in which to reside and I trust you cannot only accommodate her but keep her safe as well.}

That was all Emma had to say, and suddenly the psionic image disappeared into thin air. The X-Men looked at Sophia for a moment, dumbfounded, wondering just how in the world Emma Frost had yet another daughter they hadn’t known about until recently.

“That was… odd,” Cyclops said, hesitantly taking a few steps in the girl’s direction. “Sophia’s your name?”

“Oh please, this has to be a trap…” Jubilee muttered under her breath.

“Please,” Sophia said as she stepped inside the mansion and Banshee closed the door behind her. “Will you help us find our mother?”

“Us?” Iceman questioned, and before he even had a chance to look confused, an expression of surprise washed over his and the rest of the X-Men’s faces as Sophia began to glow. Slowly, the light spread out behind her, and in a manner of seconds there were four identical girls standing at her rear.

“An interesting ability…” Banshee started to say.

“I’m not sure I completely buy this,” Cyclops said with a slight shake of his head. “You mean to tell me that you don’t know where your mother is?”

“No, she sent us away.”

“She said we’d be safe here.”

“We know there’s things she’s not telling us.”

“She thinks we’re too young to understand.”

“Understand what?” Banshee inquired.

Sophia turned around briefly to glare at her ‘sisters’ and they all gave her a look back that more or less promised their silence. She turned back to face the X-Men and said, “We only agreed to come because we knew you could do something. Our mother needs your help… someone is trying to kill her.”

Three Months Ago

“This is wrong.”

As the words rolled off his tongue, Sean Cassidy slammed his fist down on the table that he and the room’s other two occupants, Scott Summers and the woman known as Beatrice, sat at. The old, clichéd Irish temper was coming out, which in Sean’s case was really a rare thing; he was a pretty mild-manner guy most of the time. In this instance, though, he wasn’t the least bit happy, and though he thought of Scott as a close friend and acknowledged him as his leader, he was seriously starting to doubt the man’s judgment.

“Sean, we’ve been over this,” Scott said, not flinching at all from his teammate’s angry display.

Beatrice added, “Yes… many times.”

“They’re children! Or she… she’s a child! Obviously Emma brainwashed and conditioned her in some fashion. I know it’s a priority for us to find Emma, believe me I want to find her…” Sean paused for a moment to catch his breath, then continued, “But this exploitation of an innocent child is wrong.”

“Whoa, Cassidy, just cool it! I wouldn’t go using strong words like that,” Beatrice said, pointing an authoritative finger at the redheaded man. “No one’s exploiting anyone. She’s volunteered for this each and every time.”

“We’re not making her do anything she doesn’t want to do, and you know it,” Scott reiterated. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t go around making accusations.”

Sean shook his head; perhaps he was showing his feelings a bit too much, maybe a more diplomatic approach might work. It hadn’t worked for the past several weeks, but he wasn’t one to give up without a fight.

“Scott, Sophia spends about half o’ her day inside Cerebro. That’s no way for a thirteen year-old girl to live…!”

“She’s actually about fifteen now, according to Hank… remember, she’s been aging rapidly?”

“That’s not the point, Bea. She’s been secluded from the rest o’ the children, she’s not being allowed to have even a semblance of a normal life… it’s intolerable,” Sean said, calmer but his tone still scathing. “It needs to stop.”

“You’ve heard her yourself – someone’s trying to kill Emma,” Scott said bluntly. “We need to find her, and Sophia wants to find her mother so we can save her. She actuallyasked to use Cerebro.”

“Part of being an adult is knowing where to draw the line for the children. I can’t imagine you’ll let Rachel go about doing whatever she pleases when she’s a teen,” Sean retorted, and he could see his remark had gotten under Scott’s skin a bit.

“She’s the only viable telepath we have, Sean! And don’t give me the whole lecture on her being a kid – we’ve had people even younger as full-fledged members of the field team. We have to do what’s necessary,” Scott insisted. “I’m sorry this bothers you so much, but she may be our only hope of finding Emma, or the Brotherhood…”

Sean’s eyes widened in shock as he took in the last part of Scott’s sentence. “What?”

“She’s agreed to help us find Mystique,” Beatrice said. “And since we knew this is how you’d react, we decided to keep you out of the loop on that one.”

His first instinct was to yell, to scream so loud that Scott and Beatrice would have no choice but to not only listen to him but hear him as well. Of course he would never hurt them, but he was so incredibly enraged; in his eyes, they were doing what Emma had done to Generation X – using and manipulating children for their own ends. Obviously the circumstances were significantly different, but he still felt passionately about his stance on the issue. He finally realized at that moment, however, that he was fighting a losing battle.

“Well, I see there’s really no point in talkin’ any longer. You two have obviously made up your minds.” Sean stood from his seat and placed his hands on the table, leaning on it for a moment as he added, “I’m sorry to say that I don’t condone your decisions and for my own peace of mind, I’ve got to remove myself from the situation.”

Scott and Beatrice stood up at that moment, and even though they knew Sean had already made up his mind, they had to try and convince him otherwise. “Sean, please don’t make any rash decisions,” Scott begged of him. “You know we need you, you’re an integral part of this team.”

“Obviously not integral enough,” Sean said with a shrug of his shoulders. “And I can’t be an accessory to something that I so vehemently oppose. I’m sorry, to both of you, but I’m done. I wish you nothing but the best o’ luck, and I truly hope you see the error of your ways very soon.”

With that, Sean marched curtly towards the door and exited the room quickly, leaving Scott and Beatrice alone.

“You think he just needs to blow off some steam?” Beatrice asked candidly.

“I’m not so sure, Sean doesn’t usually make pronouncements like that just for show. Maybe he could use some time away, though,” Scott said, somewhat unsure. “I know he just recently lost contact with Theresa, that’s probably frustrating him more than anything…”

“Well at any rate, he did make one good point – we really can’t rely on Sophia to be our team psychic. It’s about time we went looking for some real telepathic firepower,” Beatrice declared, and from her stance and tone of voice Scott could tell she was deadly serious.

“Oh, I agree. It’s just…” Scott sighed, as thoughts of his estranged wife washed over him for a brief moment. “Honestly, after all the mind games in the past several months, I’m finding it hard to really trust telepaths. I suppose I’ve been hoping we could function just fine without one, but obviously that’s not the case.”

“I don’t think we need to worry about Cassandra Nova The Sequel, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Beatrice assured him. “I know Jean’s out of the question, and even if Nate Grey hadn’t disappeared, he was still kind of psychotic. And of course Nathan had to go MIA on us…”

“Blaquesmith is still missing as well,” Scott interrupted. “I’ve tried contacting a couple of other people too, but they’ve all turned me down. I’m really at a loss.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Beatrice told him, nodding confidently. She truly believed it too; how hard could it be to find a decent, trustworthy telepath?

“Actually…” A thoughtful look crossed Scott’s face, and he wondered why hadn’t considered the option earlier. Of course he’d tried a while back, but that was then and this was now. “I think I might get us our telepath after all…”

Two Months Ago

It had taken almost a month of convincing to finally get him to say yes; at first, just like the other times, the answer had been an adamant ‘no’. He had been a part of something incredibly important with the X-Corporation, and he truly felt like he was doing something that could change the world. The only problem was, deep down inside, he didn’t feel like the world-changing type.

Cyclops had talked to him almost a dozen times over the past weeks, and it was mere days ago that Ever finally caved in and not only accepted the offer to return to the X-Men, but admitted to himself that he missed the mansion. He missed his teammates (though many of them had taken off), he missed his bedroom, he missed the children. His time with the X-Men had been the true turning point in his life, the first time he had experienced what it could really be like to have friends and family and a real place in the world.

As Ever stepped into the lounge area that was near the dormitories on the third floor of the mansion, he smiled to himself as the emotional residue from the area washed through his mind. Feelings of security, happiness, fun, and the like hit him, and it was all he needed to remind himself that he’d made the right decision in coming back. He’d grown up in a hellish dimension where everyday was a war… it was nothing like this. He wanted to leave that past and the person he was behind, and while the X-Corporation had certainly given him the perfect chance for a whole new beginning, he really just wanted the one he’d already started on at the Xavier Institute.

The once and future X-Man started on his way again, eager to unpack his bags and get settled back into his old living quarters. As he started thinking just where all of his extra belongings would go, he suddenly sensed a familiar presence nearby; it was faint, but he knew all too well who it was.

“Ivan,” Ever said, smiling at the young black-haired boy who approached him. “How’s it going, buddy?”

“Awesome, Mister Ever!” the boy said, visibly elated to see the man. “Are you coming back for good?”

“I am,” Ever said with a definitive nod, and Ivan’s smile widened. “Pretty cool, huh?”

Ivan nodded. “Guess what! You’re never gonna believe it!” Something had happened in the past couple of months, and Ivan wished that Ever had been there to see it happen.

“What – don’t tell me you joined the X-Men?” Ever said with a wink.

“No,” Ivan said, rolling his eyes. “It’s so awesome… me and Natalia are free! We can both be outside at the same time now!”

Ever was stunned at the news; it seemed like there had been a lot of progress in even the smallest places while he was gone. The X-Men had rescued Ivan and his sister almost a year ago and the twins had latched onto Ever after settling into the mansion. Ever had taken to them as well, for not only did they share common abilities, but just as Ever had grown up neglected and abused in a sense, so had the children. The twins’ powers had oddly manifested at an early age and the X-Men came to discover that for years their parents more or less tortured them until finally abandoning them in the Nevada desert.

As more or less a defense mechanism, the twins’ powers had developed a tragic side effect: only one of them could exist in the material world at a time, while the other shifted to the Astral Plane. Jean had worked with them as much as she could and even Cassandra had tried to lend a hand, but their situation was still the same when Ever left the mansion several months ago. He was elated to know that their ‘curse’ had finally been broken.

“That’s great!” Ever exclaimed. “How long ago did that happen?”

“Last week,” Ivan explained. His eyes were wide with wonder as he continued, “It was sooooooo weird… I was just sitting outside reading a book and all of a sudden she was sitting right next to me!”

Ever laughed inwardly; he couldn’t help but crack up at some of the kids here. They reacted to things with such innocent awe, and while Ever didn’t begrudge them that, he certainly envied it. His childhood had been nothing short of a nightmare – he was never loved, never felt safe, and he certainly never dared to dream. Though he was an adult now, he didn’t mind missing out; making sure no one would live the sort of life he had would be enough for him.

“Well, what do you say you help me get unpacked, and then you, me, and Natalia maybe get some pizza?” Ever suggested. “I’m starving.”

Ivan approved the idea with a nod as he looked up at the man he thought of basically as a big brother. He truly was glad that Ever had returned; he felt safe with the X-Men, but he felt even safer now that his favorite teacher was back.

“So,” Ever began to say as he and Ivan started walking down one of the hallways, “what else has been happening around here since I’ve been gone…?”

Mutant Town, New York City

It was an area of about five square blocks of Manhattan that had secretly become more or less a mutant neighborhood over the years, though no one, not even its residents, had openly acknowledged it until recent months. The world was a changing place, and while there were still plenty of people who feared and hated mutants, those mutants were slowly but surely developing a true sense of pride about their abilities. The name Mutant Town had only been recently adopted – albeit unofficially – but things had stayed relatively the same. It was, in general, a peaceful part of the city, at least compared to certain other areas that were rife with crime and danger.

Things, however, were changing yet again.

The X-Men were in town, and it wasn’t a social call. Less than thirty minutes ago, a riot had broken out after a strange creature – one that even some mutants were denying was one of them – brutally murdered a handful of teachers and counselors at a school. Details were sketchy, but of course the media was putting their own spin on the events. Humans and mutants alike were crowded in the streets, scared straight and rightfully so – any of them could be next, they thought. The X-Men’s presence served to ease the nerves of some of the rioters, but overall it just instigated greater feelings of grave danger; certainly it had to be a big deal if the world’s most famous mutant super-heroes were on the scene.

Colossus, Kwannon, and Iceman stood at the main entrance to school, facing a large crowd of angry, scared, and confused people. It was an eclectic mix of human and mutant, ‘normal’-looking and physically mutated individuals, and it would definitely be something to applaud if they were perhaps gathered peacefully. Colossus by default was taking the lead, as Kwannon and Iceman were hesitant to do so. He wished that more of the team was available to help, but with Cyclops and Domino off in Chicago for an X-Corporation conference, Banshee gone, and Jubilee and Proteus keeping watch over the mansion, he didn’t have much to work with.

People yelled slurs and death threats and pleas for help, but it was all too much for any one of the X-Men to process. They’d deduced a good portion of what was going on, most predominantly that the alleged murderer was in fact a mutant, and a very powerful one at that. What truly shocked them was that the mutant wasn’t any sort of monster, but rather a seven year-old girl who had no idea how to control her abilities.

The potential controversy that could erupt from such a revelation had already sunk in for the trio of X-Men, and they knew they would have to act quickly. The only problem was that they had no idea of the exact nature of the girl’s powers, hence no way of truly ensuring they could safely extract her.

“Bring it out!”

“It has to pay for what it did!”

“Somebody call an extermination squad – that monster should be put down!”

“Why are you just standing there?! Can’t you do something?!”

“Don’t let it get away!”

Colossus sighed as he moved his gaze from person to person, trying to assuage everyone’s fears by giving them all reassuring looks, but deep down he knew it was a futile effort. If he had a microphone or megaphone or something of the like maybe he could actually speak loud enough for people to hear, but the noise was so loud that with just his voice he wasn’t even going to bother. He looked past the crowd for a moment, though, as a squad of black SUVs pulled up across the street and stopped abruptly. Over a dozen men and women from the city’s SWAT team began filing out, and while Colossus was relieved to see some back-up arrive, he also dreaded that their interference may escalate the situation even more.

“Piotr… I can’t decide if this is a good or bad thing,” Kwannon commented as several of the officers filed through the crowd and up the steps leading into the school.

“You are not alone, tovarisch,” Colossus told her.

One of the SWAT members, an African-American man with slightly graying hair, walked right up to the X-Men and immediately said, “What the hell is going on in there? And why are you just standing out here doing nothing? I thought you X-Men were some kinda professionals at this.”

Iceman scowled as he started to say, “Hey, don’t even start with us, old man…!”

Colossus motioned for his teammate to be quiet and he calmly replied to the man, “Sir, this situation is… complicated.”

“There’s a murdering super-mutant monster inside that school that needs to be taken out,” the SWAT leader retorted. “Doesn’t seem that complicated to me.”

“Pardon me, Lieutenant Allen,” Kwannon interjected, reading the man’s name from his badge, “but in case you haven’t noticed, there’s also a couple hundred people out here in a state of panic. We can’t leave them unattended.”

“You sure didn’t consider all the variables when three of you hopped into that jet of yours and came flying down here,” the Lieutenant condescended. “My God, where are the Avengers or Fantastic Four when you need them?”

“Lieutenant,” Colossus said quietly, leaning in a bit and keeping his voice low so that no one else would hear him, “the so-called ‘monster’ inside this school is a little girl who has no control over her powers.”

Lt. Allen swallowed back a lump in his throat and took a deep, despondent breath; he had a feeling there’d be something to make this job even more complicated. “And what exactly are her powers?” he asked, still stern but more polite.

“We don’t know, which is why we can’t just go rushing in there,” Kwannon explained. “This is an extremely volatile situation, and we need to…”

Before Kwannon could finish her sentence, the doors leading into the school exploded behind the X-Men, and the mutants went flying through the air along with the few SWAT agents who were standing with them. A deep, guttural bellow of the bloodthirsty type followed, and the crowd of rioters started to flee as a nearly ten foot tall insect-like creature made its way outside.

The X-Men quickly jumped to their feet but were too late to make the first move as almost the entire unit of SWAT officers began opening fire on the beast. Kwannon ducked out of the line of fire and Iceman took to the air on a platform of ice, while Colossus charged towards the creature, deflecting many of the bullets heading its way with his steel hide.

“A little girl…” Colossus whispered to himself as he approached the monstrosity. Was it really, though, or had Cerebro gotten it wrong this time?

The insectoid roared with an inhuman ferocity but Colossus did not flinch; he would not back down until this matter was resolved and the child was safe and sound. Behind him, the SWAT team were reloading for the next round of their attack, but Iceman saw to it that they wouldn’t have a chance to continue as he frozen each and every one of their weapons and subsequently caused them to shatter into a million pieces.

Lt. Allen cursed at the X-Man and then turned his attention to Kwannon, who had just come to a standstill in front of him. “The only thing your guns are going to do is kill someone! Let us handle this!”

Before the lieutenant could respond, both his and Kwannon’s attention turned to Colossus as the creature took a swipe at him. Colossus dodged the attack and several more after it, then proceeded to firmly grasp the beast’s front legs and push it back a bit. The monster snarled and hissed at the X-Man as an iridescent ooze dripped from the sides of its mouth, and Colossus’ face contorted into a scowl as he continued to push with all his might.

“Well this is working…” Iceman quipped, but his words trailed off and his mind became cloudy for a split second. It was mere seconds later that he found every person on the ground quiet and still, including the insectoid creature.

“What in the world…?” Kwannon looked around, astonished by what had just transpired. It was like a movie that someone had put on pause, except her and her teammates were moving. She immediately deduced the culprit to be a telepath, but who?

“You’re lucky that people like me exist to clean up little messes such as this,” came the sound of a woman’s voice in an unmistakably British accent. “I’m no Phoenix or Psylocke, but trust me when I say that my abilities will more than do the trick.”

Colossus stared for a split second longer at the unmoving beast before him before turning his attention to the young brunette woman who was coming towards him. “You… what are you doing here?”

“I’m here to help, of course,” the woman responded. She looked at Iceman and then Kwannon, nodding at them both, and continued, “I don’t believe we’ve met. My name is Martinique Jason.”

“Mastermind’s daughter,” Iceman said coolly as he lowered himself to the ground. “I know exactly who you are.”

“Sorry to cut the meet and greet short, but what exactly did you do to these people?” Kwannon asked.

“I’m an illusionist, and a low-level telepath. I don’t think I have to say much more than that,” Martinique said with a smirk. She turned her attention to the behemoth behind Colossus and added, “As for her…”

The insect faded away in a split second, and the X-Men watched as the form of a young blonde-haired girl was slowly revealed. She was curled up in the fetal position with her head buried in her arms, rocking herself back and forth. Colossus stepped towards her tentatively and reached out to her as she slowly looked up at him.

“There’s no need to be frightened anymore, little one,” Colossus told her in his most gentle and caring voice. “We will help you.”

The girl took the X-Man’s hand and rose to her feet, then walked down the steps with him to arrive in a group with the others. Martinique kneeled down for a moment to greet the girl and told her, “Everything is going to be just fine. We’re going to help you.”

“What do you mean ‘we’?” Iceman demanded.

Martinique stood back up and gave him an irritated look. “Do you have a problem with me, Mister Drake? I know I used to be a criminal, but certainly I’ve proven myself after my time Excalibur…”

“We appreciate the help, thank you, but somehow I don’t think this is any sort of coincidence,” Colossus said. “I have to ask once more, what are you doing here?”

“It looks like your commander-in-chief must have forgotten to tell you,” Martinique informed them, somewhat amused. “I’m your new teammate.”

Salem Center

Harry’s Hideaway was about as busy as it ever was in the late afternoon, which wasn’t very busy at all. The lunch rush was over and dinnertime wouldn’t officially start for another hour or two. Cameron preferred it that way; unless he was in a classroom, a mall, or in the middle of a fight, he didn’t like a lot of hustle and bustle around him.

Across the table from the young Hispanic man sat someone he had only met twice before today. Her name was Kitty Pryde – or Katherine, as she preferred it now – and he’d been shocked to find out that she’d signed up with the United States government and helped devise methods to spy on her former teammates in the X-Men. She wasn’t their enemy or anything, she didn’t hate them, but he knew she didn’t quite trust them much anymore after everything Cassandra Nova had done. They’d been compromised in the worst way, and Katherine knew it wasn’t their fault, but if anything of the sort ever happened again, the CIA couldn’t let the information contained within the X-Men’s databases fall into the wrong hands.

The two sat at the same corner booth in the back they had in past times, and Katherine still had her image inducer set to give the illusion to all but Cameron that she was a cigar-chomping old man. Though she was quite certain that none of her old friends were in the vicinity, she didn’t want to take any chances.

“So,” Cameron said, breaking the awkward silence between them, “what’s next? Eyeball implants so I can record everything they say and do?”

Katherine shook her head at the comment. “Don’t be ridiculous. And stop treating me like I’m the bad guy, okay?”

“I just have some big issues with this whole downloading their files thing,” Cameron said bluntly. “I can barely look any of them in the eye anymore.”

“You didn’t seem to have a problem with infiltrating them in the first place,” Katherine pointed out.

“I was sent in to observe them and report back anything major, nothing more. This is totally not what I signed up for,” Cameron retorted.

Katherine sighed, in a way understanding his frustrations. “I know you feel bad because you’ve actually grown to care about them all. Trust me, I do too. But don’t think of this as a betrayal… think of it as another way of keeping the world safe and secure.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“Actually, not at all. I’ve just gotten real good at facing reality and keeping my emotions in check,” Katherine told him. “Anyway, I actually wanted to tell you that it’s done. You can disconnect the device from their servers.”

Cameron perked up a little at the news. “Oh? What about anything new they upload, any files they update?”

“We’ve got everything that’s really critical, anything else we can have you obtain on a case by case basis,” Katherine explained. “We just don’t want to keep the device there for too long. The longer it’s there the better the chances that they’ll eventually find it.”

“Yeah, they’ve only had the past couple of months,” Cameron quipped. “What I don’t understand is if you can do the whole phasing thing, why didn’t you just pop in there and download everything yourself at once?”

“Two reasons. First of all, their database is huge – there’s not a portable device with enough memory to hold even a fraction of it. Second, my ability disrupts anything electronic… the hard drive would have been wiped clean the minute I phased with it.”

“Okay, I guess…” Cameron said with a slight shrug. It made sense, but he still wished that he didn’t have to be the one to do the dirty work.

Katherine’s mood suddenly softened, and a somber look crossed her face. She knew it was odd asking a virtual stranger, but she just had to. “So… how are they doing? How’s… how’s Piotr?”

“Everyone’s hanging in there,” Cameron told her, surprised to see his handler show such emotion. “I mean, a lot of bad stuff has happened, you already know that, but they all basically got each other’s backs. They’re… we’re making it work. And Piotr’s fine. He really loves being a teacher, you know?”

“Art, obviously,” Katherine said with a smile as she brushed a few strands of brown hair behind her ear. “I’m glad he’s doing good. I’d say tell him hi for me, but, you know…”

“Yeah,” Cameron said, laughing slightly. He smiled at Katherine; his teammates always said such good things about her, and he could see why. Beneath the tough-as-nails CIA agent routine, she really was very personable. For a moment he found himself wishing they could get to know each other better, but he quickly shook those thoughts from his head as Katherine shifted back into business mode.

The former X-Man retrieved a small device from her coat pocket about the size of a cell phone and suddenly began moving it all around Cameron’s head. She stopped after a few moments and opened the device up to reveal a screen filled with data that only she could decipher.

“Ah… what the heck was that all about?” Cameron questioned.

“You probably didn’t know but you’ve got not one but two new telepaths joining your team in the near future,” Katherine explained. “I was just running a test to make sure those nannites in your head are working properly. We wouldn’t want anyone poking around in there and accidentally finding out the truth, now would we?”

Cameron was surprised by the news; Cyclops hadn’t informed anyone of any new teammates. He wondered who they might be, but at the same time he didn’t really care, at least not at that moment. He was just relieved that he’d be able to go back to the mansion and remove the device he’d planted on Cerebro’s main server.

“Well I think that’s about all for now, Mister Dalin,” Katherine said as she started to scoot out of her seat and stand up. “I’ll be in touch.”

Cameron stood as well, and watched as the visage of his old handler completely surrounded Katherine once more. “Yeah,” he said as she walked away and towards the door, “can’t wait for our next pow-wow…”

The Present

Her gloved hand struck the green-skinned man hard across his face with enough force to break his jaw, though it fell short of accomplishing that feat. Mystique stood tall and angry over Mesmero, and while she wanted nothing more than to continue in her assault, she knew she had to restrain herself. Like it or not, he was an integral part of her team.

“You stupid bitch!” Mesmero cried out as he pressed a hand to his jaw. “You stupid fucking cunt! I should kill you for that!”

“But you won’t, because you can’t,” Mystique told him, having regained her composure in an instant. “I, however, can make you suffer beyond belief. Please don’t give me more of a reason to.”

“This is bullshit… I don’t understand why you’re so pissed off,” Mesmero told her, spitting a glob of blood from his mouth. “She’s one of them, what’s the big deal?”

“I’m a very liberal person, but there are certain things I will not stand for,” Mystique said bluntly. She glared at him with her cat-like eyes as she continued, “Try to rape someone on my watch again and I’ll have you castrated. Do I make myself clear?”

Mesmero said nothing, instead he just grunted and turned and walked away. He would have liked nothing more than to beat her face in, but he knew he couldn’t; she wouldn’t let him. Although it was through strictly artificial means, Mystique truly had a hold over him – she could kill him in an instant if she wanted. He preferred to live.

After the door to the room slid shut behind Mesmero, Mystique turned to another one of her henchmen, Sabretooth. He looked at her disapprovingly, and she scoffed at his demeanor. “What?” she said curtly.

“Y’know, the guy just wanted to get some ass before we went ahead and did our thing here,” Sabretooth explained to her. “Y’have t’admit that he’s got good taste.”

“It’s like I’ve said all along – all men are pigs,” Mystique said, disgusted. “I’m not wasting my time on this conversation. We have a situation.”

“That Noh-Varr kid that escaped,” Sabretooth said, turning his attention to the monitors on the wall that were displaying news broadcasts from all over the world. “I’d say he’s outdone us. He captured good ol’ Dubya, even…”

“We’ll deal with that little upstart when the time comes. He’s delusional if he thinks this planet is going to be a new Kree capital. This world belongs to mutants,” Mystique said matter-of-factly, maintaining her cool perfectly. “This world belongs to us.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah… you can rule the world all you want. Tearin’ apart all those little super-hero fuckers is good enough for me.” Sabretooth laughed inwardly as he thought about Mystique actually ruling the world; what title would she go by? Empress? Her Holiness? Queen Bitch sounded like a good choice in his opinion.

“I actually have to give this Noh-Varr some credit – he’s stirred things up enough to cause just about every delegate from every nation in the world to come together for an emergency UN summit. Let him have the presidents and the scientists… we’ll have every other world leader and politician as our hostage,” Mystique declared.

“You sound pretty optimistic. I’m gettin’ tired of all this sittin’ around an’ shit, though… when are we actually gonna do somethin’? I’d say time’s runnin’ out,” Sabretooth said.

Mystique nodded, agreeing with the feral man for once. “You’re right, time is running out. For them,” she said, motioning towards the images that displayed crowds of scared citizens in countries across the world. “We’ll be leaving within the hour. The future is just around the corner…”

Elsewhere in the Brotherhood’s compound, Ever and Mastermind sat in adjacent cells, though a thick cement wall prevented them from seeing each other. Their powers were dampened, and since regaining consciousness mere hours ago, they had been wondering how their teammates were doing, or if all of them were even still alive. Mastermind had grown up always expecting the worst, but Ever had someone managed to develop a sense of optimism.

“It’s the end of the world, don’t you think?” Mastermind asked, her tone some jesting. “Alien invasions, global prison breaks, psychotic mutants with nuclear bombs… and how ironic, it’s not someone like Magneto or Doctor Doom behind it all.”

“Why are you always so cynical?” was all Ever said, refusing to dignify her comments with an actual response. He hadn’t gotten to know Martinique very well over the past couple months, but he knew enough to realize that she seemed to have some sort of doomsday complex. He’d worked so hard to grow out of his own doom-and-gloom attitude and he didn’t particularly care to be around people that couldn’t even comprehend the concept of hope. In his eyes, it was no way to live… even now, being locked up as he was.

“Ever, the world is not a nice place. You of all people should know this. I will absolutely do my part to make a different, but quite frankly I’m not going to waste my time holding out hope for something that isn’t guaranteed to happened,” Mastermind explained to him. She paused for a moment as she placed a hand between her head and her pillow in attempt to get slightly more comfortable, if that was even possible on the cold, hard surface she was resting on. “Case in point, there is no guarantee that Mystique is going to be stopped. There is no guarantee that the Earth will continue to be ruled by human beings or even mutants. There is no guarantee that we will even be rescued.”

“Have a little faith,” Ever told her. “It can do a lot more than you think.”

“So you’ve found God? I’m glad for you, but I have no use for such inane concepts.”

Ever just shook his head; she wasn’t even getting the point, but he could expect no less from someone so stubborn. While he had never personally met Emma Frost, he knew enough about her to see that Martinique truly was her mother’s daughter.

“Hmmm, I wonder what my mother is doing right now?” Mastermind mused, and Ever thought for a moment that perhaps she had read his mind. That was impossible, though; it was just another crazy coincidence.

“I’ve decided that I’m going to devote all of my time to finding her after we get out of here, you know,” Mastermind continued. Ever furrowed his brow in confusion; she certainly seemed confident that they would escape.

“I thought you said there was no guarantee we’d be getting out of here?” Ever asked rhetorically.

Mastermind grinned and said, “No, I said we might not be rescued… but I can say safely and for sure that we will be making our way out of this place in the not too distant future…”

NEXT ISSUE: Past Tense Part 5! As the last glimmers of the past show themselves, “Iceman” returns to the Xavier Institute with one goal in mind – eliminate the rest of the X-Men, once and for all! Will someone see through his deception before it’s too late, though? And just what does Mystique plan to do with all those weapons she’s acquired?

I didn’t think for a second I’d be getting this issue done this soon but here it is for all the world to see. That said, you can definitely expect to see the next issue by the end of this month, followed by the grand finale to Past Tense in July!

Obviously it was already revealed in the first issue that Ever and Mastermind would be joining the team, and here they are. I also made the decision to remove Banshee from the team for the time being, but he won’t be going into limbo for long. Expect to see him pop up elsewhere within Marvel Omega.

So we’re just about all the way back to the present day – a couple more flashbacks next issue and we are done! Let me tell you that it’s going to be a wild ride from here on out, especially with the added chaos of the events currently happening in the Avengers series.

Hope you enjoyed the issue, and as usual, I just love getting feedback. See you at the end of the month!

~Ryan
06/17/05