IRRATIONAL CHOICES

Part VI: Small Favors

By Brent Lambert

“Might have me killed? Really?” Valerie Cooper mocked as she sat across from the mutant who had been posing as her commander for quite some time. She hated being made to be the fool and Ch’Vayre had done just that. Now she found herself in the middle of some mass conspiracy involving at its center an organization known as Durklan Inc.

“You can mock me all you like, but when the bullet rips through your skull you’ll know I’m right. For all you know those two guards with work for Durklan,” Ch’Vayre said as he looked up at Valerie’s protection with an angry stare. His shackles left him in a position he found completely infuriating. He was a Prelate of Apocalypse! To be bound like a dog was an utter embarrassment.

Valerie knew Ch’Vayre’s type. They were proud, arrogant, and thought they could do no wrong. If she were really going to get anything out of him she would have to play to those traits. Nibbling on a pen, she said, “I would figure a guy like you would be a bit more ambitious. Why ally with them?”

“I had no intention of being permanently bonded with Durklan, but since arriving in this era I have been at somewhat of a disadvantage. You have to realize that being here is difficult. A lot of things change over the course of two thousand years.”

“So you were with them for information?” Valerie asked hoping that her guards were loyal or she could indeed be signing her own death warrant.

Ch’Vayre turned his gaze towards the ground. “Among other things. I needed some leverage in this world and they could provide it.”

“What do they have in mind for X-Factor?”

Ch’Vayre laughed and shook his head. “They don’t just have plans for them. You’re on their list too. Durklan has every intention of killing you.”

Valerie tried not to be shocked by the revelation. “Why me?”

The Prelate looked like the next words coming out of his mouth were disgustingly sour. “For a number of reasons. Mainly, because you’re my direct descendant.”

There were a number of things Valerie prepared herself to hear when entering into this interrogation. On the list, what Ch’Vayre just told her hovered somewhere between finding out her dad was Elvis and the tooth fairy is a cross dresser. To the guards’ credit they didn’t flinch under the revelation. They were probably as shocked as she was.

“Mom always did say Dad’s side of the family was crazy. Guess I pass it along,” Valerie said as she put her forehead into her hand.

Ch’Vayre laughed. “Look at this way. Now the world can be assured that you’re not a butch lesbian.”

Valerie was about to order one of her bodyguards to pistol whip the bastard when both of them suddenly dropped to the ground. She stood to her feet as the door opened and she found herself face to face with none other than…

“Sinister!” Valerie yelled as the pasty white geneticist lifted her up by her throat and flung her to the other end of the holding cell.

The future Prelate did not look at all pleased. “Took you long enough. I was starting to think you had abandoned me.”

“My father is a man of his word,” Vulcan said as he entered into the room. He moved behind Ch’Vayre and melted away his shackles.

Sinister smiled. “Rise Ch’Vayre. We have work to do. I have quite the way for you to keep your master’s memory alive.”

Ch’Vayre wasn’t quite sure what Sinister was getting at, but he knew that it had to be better than his impending demise at the hands of Durklan. If there was anyone who could keep him out of harm’s way in that regard it was Sinister. The man had enough experience and cunning to rule the world if he wanted to, but he was unlike Apocalypse in that aspect. Sinister simply saw the world as a large petri dish for him to observe and tinker with. The Prelate wondered what part he now had to play in the experiment.

“Don’t be frightened, Prelate. Remain loyal to me and your place in my coming plans will be well assured,” Sinister said as a pink terrasect portal opened in front of him.

Frowning up, Ch’Vayre haughtily said, “I fear nothing, Sinister. We should go before Cooper’s soldiers arrive.”

Essex laughed. “Trifle things. But you are right. We need to go.”

Valerie’s eyes were just beginning to open as she dizzily watched the three mutants vanish into the swirling pink portal at the door of the holding cell.

She lifted her cell phone out from under her bra strap and hit her speed dial. Trying to catch her breath as the phone rang; Valerie knew things had gotten out of her hand. She needed X-Factor back here as soon as possible. A familiar voice picked up the phone and Valerie said, “Jamie, I need that favor.”

Shard felt the power of Polaris ripping through her photonic body and trying to literally pull her apart. Through her pain, Shard was able to look Polaris in the eye and she knew instantly this wasn’t the Lorna she knew. There was something fearsome behind those eyes. It was a warrior’s scar. Bishop had those eyes.

“Put me down or regret it later,” Shard said.

“Not a chance. I’m not letting any of you crooks walk out of here alive,” Polaris said.

From the ground below, Red Lotus slipped out a dart from underneath his wrist band and flung it upward into the back of Polaris’ neck. A small amount of red liquid inside the projectile quickly projected out of it and into Polaris’ bloodstream. Angrily, she ripped the dart from the back of her neck and turned on Red Lotus. In the process, she dropped Shard from the sky and the XSE was caught in the arms of Mongoose.

“Thanks big guy,” Shard said.

“No problem sweetie,” Mongoose smiled as he sat Shard on the ground. “Are you alright?”

“I’ll be better when we get her out of the fight,” Shard said as she pointed upward at Polaris.

Polaris flew down at Red Lotus and slammed him with a giant green fist. Red Lotus was flung to the side and Lorna hovered over his body. “Wrong move assassin. You’ll need more than darts to—”

Lorna passed out abruptly and landed on top of Red Lotus. He pushed her off of him and set her gently on the ground next to him. “Sorry.”

“Not as sorry as you are gonna be,” an angry voice said from atop Red Lotus.

Lotus quickly rolled away from Polaris and launched himself to his feet with a quick upward thrust of his back. He saw where the threat came from and said, “Hell, how many of you freaks are there?”

“Enough to stomp you to the ground,” Junpe said. He stood at 7 feet tall and large bone protrusions stuck out all across his back. His skin was red, bumpy, and his veins looked like they were pumping enough blood to fill a dam. The man’s (if you could call him that) eyes were a deep green and on the bridge of his nose was a black crescent moon. When Red Lotus looked down at his feet he saw that he had one large toe with a gigantic grayish toenail. Junpe’s hands were large enough to wrap around the throat of a tiger easily and while there were no visible nails it was easy to see that the skin was incredibly rough.

“You’re welcomed to come and try,” Lotus said with a cocky grin. A few months ago he might have cringed at having to take on this guy, but since the incident in Mexico he knew he could take on more than his usual opponent.

As Junpe was about to step forward, a black shadow bubbled underneath him and ebony energy suddenly ripped from the ground underneath Junpe. He was blanketed by the power and a beastial scream came from within the black onslaught. Red Lotus watched in a mix of pity and awe at the sight. After what seemed like an eternity, but was only ten seconds the attack stopped and Junpe fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

The Shroud stepped over the genetically altered soldier and said, “I think that takes care of the last of them. Should we leave with Lorna now?”

“Sounds like a good idea. I don’t even want to know what’s going on in here,” Red Lotus said mocking a shiver down his back.

::I can’t allow any of you to leave, I’m afraid::

The mutants looked around the room in search of an intercom system, but could find none. Shard cursed under her breath. “Should have anticipated surveillance. Got too caught up in the fight.”

“A little too late for regrets now eh?” Mongoose said as he looked up at the air.

Ruby Claw hefted Lorna on her shoulder and said, “We need to move now!”

::As I said, I can’t allow any of you to leave::

An electrical surge went throughout the room and shocked nearly everyone. The Shroud grabbed Red Lotus next to him and slipped into a Darkforce portal. Shard, given her composition, was unaffected by the attack.

“Dammit!” Shard said as she looked at the unconscious bodies around her. “Need to move!”

Shard jumped over Mongoose’s body and booked it for the nearest exit. As she reached the door, it slid open and standing there was a bald 30-something Indian man. Not thinking twice, Shard thrust both of her arms forward and fired off photonic shots at the man. It was to her great surprise, when the energy hung in mid-air and dissipated.

“You will be an interesting study,” the man smiled as rings of white energy came from his forehead and struck Shard.

As vertigo overcame Shard and she stumbled back from the man. The world around her was twisting and turning. In the midst of her confusion, she could have sworn she saw Forge as he was during her time. Under duress, she said, “We could use you.”

She fell backwards and landed atop the unconscious Junpe. The Indian man stepped forward accompanied by armed guards. He looked upon Junpe with disgust and said, “Collect them all and take them back to the lab. Make sure they’re all properly secured.”

“Of course Dr. Osman.”

The doctor hoped that the Danes were having as much success as he was.

Jacob Dane untied his daughter’s straightjacket and threw it on the floor. “Now are you ready to try and listen to us honey?”

Susan Dane clasped her hands in front of her face in the hopes of a positive response from her daughter. There was a world of regrets locked in her that she hoped to wipe away by finally doing right by her daughter. All her good intentions had led her daughter down a hell-paved road. She had become wrapped into the politics of mutants in a way Susan had never wanted.

“We really are your parents Lorna,” Susan said as tears formed at the corners of her eyes. “You may not want to believe that and I could understand why.”

Lorna had her opportunity and she knew that she should have attacked the two of them, but part of her needed confirmation. She needed to know if these really were her parents. It didn’t matter if they were or weren’t at this point. Either way she intended to put a hurting to them.

“Why did you leave me?”

“It’s a long story so please just hear us out on it,” Jacob said.

Lorna couldn’t have looked at him with more hate. “I’m listening.”

“Your Mom and I first met when we were working for Durklan Inc. Back then it was just a government backed, research facility. We were stepping into areas that were deemed weird science for their time. The two of us worked together in the exploratory genetics department. Durklan was trying to map the human genome long before anybody really thought to do it.”

Susan felt the need to jump in. “We ended up getting married and you came along. It wasn’t easy trying to raise you and be under Durklan’s microscope.”

“So that’s your big excuse? Tell me you have something better than that,” Lorna said.

“There’s a great deal more honey,” Jacob replied. “We got fine enough doing both things because honestly Durklan wasn’t making much progress. We were hitting alot of dead walls. That was until we got someone you are familiar with to start helping us.”

Susan answered the question before Lorna could ask it. “Dark Beast.”

Lorna leaped up from her bench. “Him?! You were working with him?!”

Jacob sighed having expected the angry response. “He came to us right after a telepath had repaired his mind. He needed resources to conduct his experiments and we needed the knowledge he had so Durklan cut their deal with him.”

“What he had to offer us at the time was amazing. He was showing us things we had never seen before,” Susan said. “But then he claimed to have known us and that’s when he told us all about his world. It seemed that our fates weren’t very fortunate there. Then he set his sights on you. We absolutely refused to let him have you.”

“So we ran away and left with you hoping to hide out and never be found again.”

Jacob shrugged. “Of course that’s not the way it worked out. They wanted us back though and agreed to not let Dark Beast have you. Like fools we agreed and I left you with my brother hoping that you would be safe.”

Lorna laughed to mask her fear. The man claiming to be her father looked so terribly much like her Uncle. They had the same nose and brown eyes that would be common except for the sunken experience behind them. Lorna pushed the thought away.

“You know I almost fell for the story, but you got one flaw. I know Dark Beast and he’s a sadistic bastard. If he knew my parents he would have taunted me about it from day one. The bastard wouldn’t keep something like that to himself.”

Jacob responded as if he had anticipated the move already in his head. “He doesn’t remember the work he did with Durklan at all. After they had obtained all the information they could from Dark Beast, there was another organization that we latched on to. Black Womb. Do you know of it?”

Shaking her head, Lorna said, “Only that they were involved in a few shady projects here and there. Nothing more.”

“Well, they had an operative named Fontanelle who was able to work her magic on Dark Beast and make him forget that he had ever worked with Durklan. Then they dropped him off in some sewer somewhere just like he was the common trash.”

Lorna sat down again. “That explains alot. If you’re telling the truth. But why lock me up? Why have New Son kidnap me?”

Susan pushed her hair back and said, “Like we said. It’s a long story.”

Forge had just finished locking his new bionic leg into place when a ragged Valerie walked into his laboratory. His greeting to her was typical of X-Factor’s situation of late.

“You look like hell.”

“Long story. I hope you don’t intend to go in trying to save the day with half-cocked bionic parts?” Valerie asked as she looked at the second grade technology. “Even I can see you rushed that Forge.”

“All I could do on short notice. The guys need my help. They’re walking into more than they can handle.”

Valerie smiled and threw a pointed thumb over her shoulder at the door behind her. “That’s why I called in some back-up.”

A large deformed man stepped through the door and waved at Forge. Scampering at his feet was a woman that was more wolf than female. Forge laughed from surprise. “Guido! Rahne!”

“Hey don’t forget me!” Jamie Madrox said as he poked his head out from behind Guido’s distorted frame.

Planting his hands on his hips, Forge said, “Well, I’ll be damned. Thought it’d be a cold day in hell before I seen any of you walking around these parts.”

Valerie’s expression turned grim. “Fill them in Forge. That temperature in hell just might be dropping.”

NEXT: Someone’s busting loose!