THE CROWNING MOVE

Part II

By Brent Lambert

Maverick was in the hangar bay awaiting the arrival of Warp Savant. The rest of his team had already arrived, but North was allowing Savant two more minutes to show up before he chewed the young mutant’s ass to pieces.

Sunspot and Bedlam were standing on the other side of the hangar bay, trying to get as far away from an angry Maverick as possible. Roberto nudged Bedlam in the side and said, “I guess our resident rocker boy didn’t hear about Maverick.”

Bedlam smacked his lips outward. “Nope. Guess not. Today’ll be the first time I get to see a face rearranged.”

Spkye, another new member to the world of the X-Men, walked up to the two operatives and asked, “So what are we waiting for? I didn’t stop watching ‘Super Orgies Five’ for nothing.”

“Warp Savant hasn’t shown up yet. Technically, he’s got about another minute, but Maverick runs on a different clock from the rest of planet Earth,” Bedlam replied.

“Did you say ‘Super Orgies Five’?” Sunspot asked, completely ignoring what Bedlam had said.

Evan nodded. “Yea. I watch porn. Big whoop.”

Jesse laughed. “As long as your palms aren’t sweaty I don’t mind how much you shake hands with One-Eyed Willy.”

“And on that note,” Sunspot interrupted. “Here’s our tattooed rocker.”

Warp Savant walked into the hangar bay with that smug look knowing he had just made it on time. Maverick walked up to him and said, “You’re an hour late.”

“That’s not the time I was told by Bishop. I came exactly when I was told.”

“I don’t operate on their timescale. Remember that,” Maverick said sternly and then turned in the direction of his other operatives. “Let’s go. Fantomex has already prepped the jet.”

“I don’t appreciate getting grilled for being on time. Especially when I was told the right time to be here,” Warp Savant said.

Maverick suddenly grabbed Savant’s jacket and jerked him forward. “I don’t care what time you were told. You’re on my team and until otherwise told you do as I say. Understood?”

“What you don’t seem to understand is that I could teleport your head clean off and not get a drop of blood on me,” Warp Savant replied, getting in Maverick’s face.

North let go of Savant and laughed. “You got guts kid, threatening me like that. I’m starting to see why Wisdom let you into this organization.”

“I can make you see a lot better if you grab me like that again.”

Maverick ignored the threat and kept walking to the jet, waving for the rest of the operatives to follow. As they did, Spkye said to his teammates, “Talk about tense.”

“Could have been worse. At least Maverick didn’t try to shoot him,” Bedlam said.

“Huh? He’d do that?” Spkye asked like a kid finding out about the Boogeyman for the first time.

Sunspot laughed. “Now you got the kid scared. No, he wouldn’t do that.”

“Like hell. He’s former Weapon Plus. Those guys are about as bad off as any unstable veteran,” Bedlam rebuked.

Spyke sighed. “I should have just ran tail with Fixx.”

Skin walked out of the shower with just a towel on and into the living room, where Leyu had turned on the television. She was watching an old rerun of ‘Grace Under Fire’. Turning from behind the couch, she looked at Skin and shook her head, “Were you trying to drown in there?”

“I just had to make sure I was clean for my muy sexy lady,” Skin said running his hand through his wet hair.

Sunpyre ignored the comment. “I took the liberty of cleaning up this abominable living room while you were showering.”

“Wow,” Skin said as he ran a hand through his hair, “thanks. Guess with the couch clean, we can cuddle up.”

Leyu laughed. “Aren’t you going to put some clothes on first?”

Angelo shrugged. “Why? Not like they wouldn’t be off soon anyway.”

Rolling her eyes, Leyu walked up to Skin and pushed a finger into the middle of his moist chest. The touch almost made Angelo want to ravish her right then and there. He had almost a month’s worth of passion locked away and it was begging to be released. He didn’t even know if he could keep a certain part of his body from getting happy prematurely.

“You think you can just stand there wet and naked and I’ll fall all over you. Don’t you?” Leyu chastised playfully.

Skin smiled mischievously. “You tell me.”

Leyu yanked off Skin’s towel and pushed her body into his as they locked in an embrace. Feeling a poke, she laughed. “Just couldn’t wait.”

Angelo shrugged again. “What can I say chica? He knows what he likes.”

Israel Burkdale had once been a hero, like all of the members of the Sapien League. He had fought for justice as a costumed hero. The West coast wasn’t as prominent in its vigilantes as the East, so Israel had been able to operate in relative obscurity. His state of operation was Oregon. Gazer had operated in Portland along with him. One night they joined forces against agents of AIM that had sequestered themselves in the city. They were defeated, severely beaten, and sold off to Black Womb because of their superhuman attributes.

The Leper Queen and Poseidon were operating in L.A. when Crimson Cowl’s Masters of Evil struck the city. Both of them were gravely injured trying to help civilians to safety. While in the hospital, they were ‘mysteriously’ transferred into the hands of Black Womb. Gore had been a young teen hero in Nevada, who had the misfortune of finding himself in a Mafia shootout. Still littered with bullets, he was delivered to Black Womb.

Misfortune continued to plague all of them because the geneticist they were handed over to was Mother Matrix. She disguised her brutality and malice behind supposed altruism. The twisted woman promised to heal their broken bodies, but she instead turned them into even more broken puppets. They became her genetic playthings.

For reasons they still weren’t sure of, they had managed to escape from the Black Womb facility they were being held at. Some tremendous fight had torn apart the building. They didn’t question their fortune and left as fast as their weakened states would take them.

Now that they had fully recovered their strength, they would not rest until Mother Matrix was a dried husk. The Leper Queen had, unlike the rest of them, paid close attention to the many discussions that took place in front of them. She was able to piece together everything to have some knowledge of Black Womb operations. It was why they were at this particular base. Another project of Matrix’s was here and they hoped through him to track down their creator.

They had torn through the first floor and two basement levels. Nothing had yet given them any hint as to where Matrix’s experiment was located. Four more floors were still uncovered, but Silence couldn’t help but to wonder if perhaps Angela had heard incorrectly. It was possible they could be at the wrong base, given the number that Black Womb possessed.

That didn’t particularly bother Jeremiah or Gore as he was called by Matrix. He had killed more Black Womb flunkies than any of his teammates. She had filled Gore with a bloodlust that seemed insatiable. It was a ‘side effect’ of ‘good work’ as Mother Matrix had so eloquently put it.

“Should we split up? We may be able to cover more ground that way,” Gore suggested in the interest of his being able to kill more people.

Viciously turning on Gore, the Leper Queen beamed glowing green eyes at him. “We stay together! You know why this must be, Gore!”

If he was angry with her, he wasn’t very good at showing it. His dark purple lips spread into a wide smile revealing two rows of razor sharp gray teeth. One would have to wonder why Leper Queen would be bold enough to even chastise him given his body’s dense and pronounced musculature. The fact he only wore a pair of tattered black shorts served in that revelation. Along his spine were jagged crystals that looked like chunks of night had been embedded in his back. It was a wonder the Leper Queen didn’t scream from the sight of him rather than glare.

“Perhaps we are being a bit paranoid,” Poseidon said. He earned his name from his abilities over water in addition to the long electric blue hair and his obvious swimmer’s build. The opinion of Paxton was one that the Leper Queen heeded to.

“Maybe we are,” Angela admitted, “But we can’t be for certain. Black Womb bases don’t get destroyed like that for no reason.”

“We’ve managed to do significant damage ourselves,” Silence offered. Israel had been altered so that he could bounce sound off of his body and absorb it from others. He had been allowed to keep the super-speed he had as a costumed hero. Matrix intended him to be the ultimate hit-and-run soldier.

“We haven’t structurally damaged this base anywhere near the level ours was,” the Leper Queen countered. “There was barely a pillar left standing.”

“Yes, but we need to remember that the Shiva Program was activated as well,” Gazer reminded.

Angela’s pine-green cloak billowed behind her as she turned to look at Gazer. With intense eyes and diseased patches appearing on her face, she replied, “And hundreds of those robots were laid to waste! Did we ever once find the body of a foreign attacker? Whoever the attacker or attackers were they managed to ruin hundreds of robots without losing a single life.”

Poseidon stepped away from the coming argument and began to type vigorously on a slightly damaged computer. He had worked for a software development company before he was snatched into the world of horror that was Black Womb. After a few minutes of debate between Gazer and Angela, Paxton cried out, “I’ve found him! He’s only a level below us.”

As he said that the roof exploded around them and Poseidon erected a hard bubble of ice around his teammates to protect them from debris. After the dust had settled, Poseidon absorbed the ice back into himself with a loud slurping sound. Paxton grabbed Angela’s shoulder and asked, “Is everyone alright?”

“That’s all going to depend on if you decide to cooperate with me or not,” Maverick said with two guns pointed in the direction of Paxton and the Leper Queen. “Because if not, I can provide a definite answer.”

Angela hissed. “I knew it. This was all going far too well.”

Skin ran his hand across Leyu’s back and made her jerk forward slightly as they lay together on his couch. “Your hands are as cold as ice!”

Angelo grinned. “You didn’t seem to notice ten minutes ago.”

Leyu playfully slapped Skin’s thigh. “Ten minutes ago I had too many other body parts bothering me to worry about it.”

“So are you here on business and I just happened to be a side deal or is it the other way around?” Angelo asked frankly.

Leyu sighed. She knew that this was coming. “I wanted to see you. No business. But I’m about to be involved in some. So I wanted to see you.”

It all became clear to Angelo at that point. “So you came here to tell me goodbye? I thought that maybe you’d want to get away from this life with me. After Ahab…”

“You haven’t been the same. I know. But see Angelo, this is what I want to do. A normal life isn’t something I’m cut out for,” Leyu said as she rose from the couch and began to gather her clothes off the floor.

Skin rose from the couch as well and angrily slapped the center of his chest and asked, “What about me? Don’t I fit anywhere in your grand scheme?”

With eyes on the edge of tears, Leyu replied, “No. That’s why I came here. I wanted to tell you that.”

“Don’t pull that BS with me pequeña señora! I know why you came. You care about me. You care about me more than you even want to say. Why are you afraid of that?”

Tears finally coming to her eyes, Leyu threw down her clothes in frustration. “Because! That wasn’t part of the plan. We weren’t supposed to – “

“Supposed to what? Huh? Fall in love? When the hell did falling in love become something that’s supposed to be planned?” Skin asked in agony.

“I don’t want to be in love! What don’t you get about that? I see what it does to people. It makes them – “

“Happy,” Skin interrupted again. “Be honest. You can’t tell me you aren’t happy when I’m holding you. If you aren’t then get your clothes on and walk out. I won’t stop you.”

Leyu began to slide on her underwear and then her shirt. “I’m going on an undercover mission. It’s going to be deep cover. No telling how long I’ll be gone.”

Angelo crossed his arms across his chest and shook his head. He turned his back to Leyu and walked to his room. “Make sure you lock the door when you leave.”

“Angelo – “

“Don’t. Don’t even try to make this okay. It’s not. For either of us. I just hate you’re going to have to realize it so late,” Skin replied as he slammed the room’s door behind him.

The tension in the hallway was thicker than molasses mixed with glue. Maverick had his guns aimed at the Leper Queen and Poseidon. North’s trigger finger never fired prematurely, but that was a skill none of the Sapien League was familiar with. All they knew was out of nowhere, a group of mutants had come crashing through the roof with a massive explosion. For Angela, it was her worst fear realized. She knew that the people who destroyed their Black Womb base would make themselves known eventually. She had only hoped that it wouldn’t have been so soon. Uncertainty filled her at the idea of having to fight these great warriors who had humbled Mueller.

“Do you hate Black Womb?” Gazer asked suddenly and to the shock of everyone in the hallway. Henry was the least powerful of his group, but he was the boldest. He saw nothing wrong with questioning the man that was pointing a gun at two of his teammates.

“Yes. We hate the bastards. So what?” Warp Savant replied angrily. He was still running off steam from his encounter with Maverick.

“We are enemies of Black Womb as well. Why not join forces together and do away with Black Womb, have a few drinks, and take a snapshot over their bodies,” Gazer replied.

“Sounds like a tempting offer, but you need to be on the level. Why are you here?” Maverick asked.

Gazer looked over to Angela, who nodded cautiously. “We’re trying to track down a high profile geneticist. One of her experiments is in this base. We think he may know where she is.”

“What’s her name? And what’s this experiment?” Maverick asked as sternly as if he were talking to children. He still didn’t trust these invaders, but he couldn’t’ really judge them in regards to that. These mutants had murdered the Black Womb agents in cold blood like they had been mere farm animals. He wasn’t a squeamish man, but the killing done here had been needless. Besides, anyone that could so unthinkingly perform a massacre was not someone that North wanted working alongside him.

Gazer was about to open his mouth, but Angela cut her eyes at him with such venom, he frowned. Maverick saw the exchange clear as day and said, “I don’t like people who hesitate when I ask questions.”

The Leper Queen’s indignation shined through as she replied, “You practically hold us hostage and except full disclosure. You offer us no assurances.”

Warp Savant grinned. “That’s par the course for an ambush, honey.”

Maverick agreed with the young punk wholeheartedly, but he needed whoever these mutants were. They had knowledge and North desperately wanted it. Even if it meant hurting a few people to get it. X-Corps, as it stood now, simply did not have the upper hand in their business ‘dealings’. As it stood, any information he could procure would be well worth it.

“I don’t want to have to ask again. What’s HER name and where is the experiment?” Maverick said as his trigger fingers began to etch closer and closer to unloading plasma. He didn’t really intend to shot any of them, but he had no intention of leaving without the information he had been sent for. Failure wasn’t an option against Black Womb. They were already in an uphill battle.

“Mother Matrix and Crown,” Israel answered hastily.

Fantomex’s eyes narrowed. “I know that name. Crown was meant to be the first of Mueller’s new genetic offspring.”

Israel nodded. “She was going to call them Mutants of Mass Destruction, but after her death the project was stopped.”

“Stop talking,” the Leper Queen ordered.

Fantomex turned to her. “We need to work together. Black Womb has done us all harm.”

“No we don’t,” Angela hissed.

Suddenly, Maverick’s guns were covered with ice and sprouts of high-pressured water exploded from underneath all the X-Corps members, sending them flying wildly into the air. Poseidon clapped his hands together and those sprouts turned to ice. Looking upward, Paxton said, “I hate to do that, but you don’t seem to see eye to eye with us.”

Another reason Paxton hated to do it was because to ‘create’ his large amounts of water, he had to molecularly rearrange other things. In this case, the metal that constituted the roof the X-Corps members had crashed through. The Sapien League had to abandon this floor quickly or suffer a cave in.

“You’re not going to like this,” Warp Savant said as he absorbed his fellow X-Corps squad members into his psyche and deposited them on the floor.

Ignoring the queasiness in his stomach, Maverick leapt to his feet and kicked Poseidon in the face hard enough to send him crashing into the Leper Queen and knocking both on the floor. Fantomex pulled out his guns from his side and delivered plasma blasts to the chests of Silence and Gore. Red optic blasts from Gazer struck the Neo in the face and distracted him long enough for Gore to rise to his feet and tackle him.

Sunspot flew above Gazer and began to fire down solar blasts that quickly collided with Gazer’s optic ones in a show of lights and flare.

Bedlam was next to the ice pillar that was still holding Warp Savant. He ran his fingers along the ice trying to figure out a way to free his teammate, when Savant yelled, “Forget about me. Check out where this Crown guy is at. You’re the computer geek.”

Bedlam looked up and furrowed his forehead. “I got geek for you. Just ask yo momma. Anyway sit tight!”

Jesse ran to the nearest computer console and began typing away for dear life. He smashed through firewalls with the ease of erasing a Word document and speed-read through building layouts until he came across where Crown was hidden. It was on a secret floor not within the building plans. It was obviously only intended for Matrix, Mueller, and a few select guards to know.

“I found him!” Bedlam shouted with success.

“Then let him go!” Savant yelled.

As he pulled up a file on Crown, Jesse responded, “Hell naw! This guy is crazy powerful! He’s completely composed of dwarf star matter put into a cooler form.”

“Just let him go! The Sapien League wants him! Give them to him!”

{No! Don’t let him go! Get out of there now! I’ve been monitoring the situation. The Sapien League has made the floor unstable.}

Psylocke had communicated that warning to everyone and Fantomex flipped backwards so that he would land beside Bedlam. Gore was charging towards the two mutants as Fantomex said, “Move for the stairs!”

Bedlam did as he was told and Fantomex fired a shot at the pillar of ice keeping Warp Savant captured. It shattered in a large enough chunk to make the structure crumble to the ground. Warp Savant was caught by Sunspot, who was dodging the blasts of Gazer.

“Aren’t you my hero?” Warp Savant joked.

“Yeah. You’re just a regular princess,” Sunspot groaned.

{Just move it! I’ve convinced them that you’re gone and a violent earthquake is rumbling through the building.}

Gazer’s optic blasts ceased and he helped the Leper Queen to her feet. “We gotta go! This place is going to fall to pieces.”

“Not without Crown,” Angela said.

“Yes without Crown,” Poseidon replied. “We’re not going to commit suicide!”

Fantomex looked at the Sapien League with regret. They had both been victims of Black Womb, but they had let their need for vengeance become all-consuming. To the point where they couldn’t even see allies in front of them. He would have to take them down one day if they continued on this path. Looking back at them one last time, he made his way to the exit stairs.

The same base; Three hours later

“Someone was here before us,” Stryfe said as he telekinetically knocked aside debris and made his way to their desired object.

“Of course,” Perfection replied as she followed behind him, “Xavier’s breed was here according to the master.”

“Aren’t they always?” Stryfe grunted as he threw aside the last of debris in his path.

In front of the two wards of Sinister was the floating, contained black form of Crown. Perfection admired Crown and commented, “He’s flawed, but he will serve his purpose well.”

“You’re not just going to leave are you?” Meltdown yelled as Juggernaut walked towards the large double doors. He was carrying a tiny bag across his shoulder and seemed to ignore Tabitha. She ran up to him and kicked him in the leg. “I know you hear me punk!”

Cain laughed. “I didn’t even feel that. And yeah I’m leavin’. Ain’t nothing here for me anymore. I gotta take a break.”

“C’mon now. There’s a lot a big bruiser like you can do.”

“But I don’t want to do it,” Juggernaut answered. “At least not anymore.”

“I don’t want you to go,” Meltdown pouted. “You’re about the only here who can take it as good as I give it.”

Juggernaut smirked. “Naw kid I always do better. Look, I just need a vacation. When I joined up with my brother I never intended to be around long anyway. I just don’t got it in me to live like an X-Man all the time.”

“So I guess visits aren’t out the picture?” Tabitha asked.

Cain shrugged as he pushed open the door. “Don’t know. Depends on who’s the baddie of the week.”

Meltdown smiled. “I can settle for that.”

NEXT ISSUE: Mother Matrix and the Neo collide! And just what mission is Sunpyre headed into?