We begin with an ellipsis-shaped panel.
There's Scott in a large room of the Mansion, looking over the others there: youth, few of them students of the school.
Scott is looking at them directly - he wears no glasses or visor.
Then we see the scene tinted, as though we're wearing a ruby quartz visor, before it's all obliterated in crimson.
Now we see a brochure for a camp called "Extreme". It advertises team building and relationships to last a lifetime, amidst such activities as ziplining, rope bridge obstacle course, tandem rock wall climbing, etc. 'Break the mold and join us for our Spring Break trial run!' The experience begins.
We see Cyclops' perspective as he looks over the camp. The bus with the non-mutant campers -driven by Collossus- pulling into the grounds. Series of panels depicting camp goings-on: Day 1 The campers are assigned to tents - 4 per. While mutants and non-mutants have their own while they warm up to each other, the tents themselves are not positioned in a segregated fashion. Early interaction seems at best cautious from both sides. Day 3 Activities across the days have been structured to show the abilities of mutants and non-mutants alike a la "we all have gifts". As well, we all have limitations; support is encouraged. Dispositions verge more towards curious and tent assignments have begun to shift to an equal number of mutants and non-mutants per. Day 6 The two "sets" of campers have begun to blur. However... Days 1-6, new perspective: All this time one of the non-mutant kids has been resistant to whatever the camp's trying to teach. Night 3, They find and snag a spare tent, preferring to sleep alone than with any mutants. In the interest of not fostering contempt by forcing, the camp counsellors A.K.A. some of the X-Men, allow this. Sharing quarters is only one portion of the experience. Across the Days the kid is insistent the mutants cheat during activities, even though teams never consist of mutants alone. They refuse to work with their mutant teammates, trying to manage every task on their own instead. Night 6 They've managed to flip another kid's opinion. They now share the snagged tent. The counsellors are careful now to be within earshot anytime this kid is around the other non-mutant kids, lest they undue any more work. Early Morning of Day 8 The kid makes use of a cellphone -perhaps their own for emergencies, perhaps one they stole- and calls their parents: "This camp is full of mutants! The counsellors even are!" One resistant individual... ...it only takes one.
Day 8
Jean gets a sense of what's to come. -Abruptly the camp is concluded. She makes quick work of tear-down with her powers. -Colossus drives a bus of non-mutant campers to where he'd originally picked them up 8 days prior. -Parents have been notified citing severe weather warning as the reason their kids' experience is ending early. Storm will make that true in a controlled fashion. -Resistant kid's parents inform them on pickup they've called a friend of theirs in authority. But back at the camp grounds, it's already as though they were never there.
We see Cyclops' perspective again, a mirroring shot to the opening of the camp as he looks over the now empty grounds, before climbing on the bus going back to the Mansion.
-The X-Men have gone, leaving no trail for some misinformed individual to follow-up on.
That evening at the Mansion....
Storm: "Well that was a whirlwind of a week."
Jean: "Though all things considered, I think 'Summers' Camp' was a success." She turns a little smile to Cyclops A.K.A. Scott Summers.
He smiles. "Success enough. We'll have to change things up to relaunch this Summer. A new location, for one thing."
And so we dissolve to a different park, currently misty and seemingly being checked out by Cyclops as we see it through his perspective again.
Later that month, exterior of the X Mansion.
A car pulls up, driven by a youth.
An adult male is in the passenger seat.
Youth: "Woo. I can't decide if I'm inspired that a mutant's this rich, or aggravated that it's the first I'm seeing of it."
Man: "Yeah. I have my opinion about Charles Xavier. But while we're here, leave any attitude at the door. The mutants who do know him..my brother..I know what life could've been for him instead-" he pushes open the door "-no good."
We see the opulence of the foyer.
And Xavier is there. "I knew I detected another Summers mind. Welcome back, Alex."
Alex has his arms across his chest with his hands beneath each arm. "Thanks. This is Colber."
Colber (coolly): "Hi." Off a look from Alex, he adds more respectfully: "Professor."
Xavier smiles at him before shifting attention back to Alex: "So what has you coming here to see me instead of your brother?"
Colber arches a brow at Alex, silently asking the question 'he just read your mind, didn't he?'
Alex reacts like he should've expected the Professor to know his intent before he voiced it.
In any case, before he can voice anything else, Alex a.k.a. Havok, still standing with his arms across his chest and shielding his hands, discharges his powers, thus explaining the unusual posturing; he's absorbed all of his own blasts.
"That's been happening outside of my control for the last couple days. I thought you might be able to help like you did for Scott."
"I'm sure we can. Beginning with an examination from Beast to see what might be causing this." Xavier turns his wheelchair away to lead the way, but turns back as Colber speaks up.
"Ugg. Like a medical exam? Alex, you said you only needed me to drive, right?"
"Yes.."
Xavier: "Perhaps you'd like to visit our rec room while Alex is occupied. It'll point it out to you." He resumes leading the way. Down in the Medical Bay..... Beast: "You report being healthy and my cursory findings support that statement."
Alex: "Plus this never happens even when I am sick." "Do you recall any traumatic injuries as of late, or even further back?"
"Nope."
"Perhaps then it's a matter of power fluctuation? Output growing at a rate disproportionate with control. A quick trip to the Danger Room should help us attain certainty in that regard."
Alex seems disinclined, and voices a fact over that: "How? You don't have any previous measure of my power."
"Such data is recorded each time the Danger Room is used. Since your initial* visit to the mansion included a sojourn -or should I say 'foray'?- inside, you have been measured. We never delete the records."
*Between the events of Issue # 0 and now, Cyclops found his long-thought-deceased brother.
The intense details of that reunion yours to witness
in a future, Special Issue, set in the near past! ~Tra
So they go -reluctantly on Alex's part- into the Danger Room; Beast in the control room part of it. "I won't engage a simulation, just a short Level 1 training sess--"
Alex -abandoning his odd stance now he's in this room- blasts unintentionally before any training mechanisms have even come up.
Beast glances at the results: "Astounding." Back to Alex. "And you're still able to blast when you do choose?"
Alex blasts again, aiming at three different targets/decoy dispensers -one with each hand and the final with his chest- thus ending the session right there. "That I chose."
Beast checks the results again. "Right. Both breakthrough and chosen blasts have the same power output, which is notably higher than the last time."
Alex seems surprised.
"It could be my initial hypothesis or a second that's just come to me. As you don't have much occasion to use your powers, perhaps they've built up a bit and require some discharging?"
"Alright." He sighs. "Give me a longer session and we'll see if more blasts make a difference."
He does.
It doesn't.
Beast: "Output is at the same level as when we started. Right then. So we don't yet have a known cause, but fortunately that doesn't preclude us from a solution. I'll get straight on the manufacture of guards for you. It shouldn't take longer than a couple hours. We have a fair supply of ruby quartz in case your brother's eyewear needs replacing. It happens often enough."
"Is there somewhere I can wait that isn't in here, or the medical bay? I can't stand places like that when I'm not actually sick. Actually I can't even when I am."
"Well, as you seem to have your errant blasts contained well enough, I welcome you to stroll the grounds." Alex nods and starts walking out when Beast adds, "however, Cyclops does have a training sim scheduled for today - your timing was fortuitous in that we got in ahead of him. Perhaps you'd like-"
Alex had folded his arms again but raises one hand to wave away Beast's suggestion -- that gesture punctuated by a(nother unintentional) blast.
Beast: "Oh my."
"Anyway, my last experience with my brother in the Danger Room was enough." He resumes exiting. "The grounds sound great."
Beast: "Just perhaps keep to yourself if you see any of the students anywhere. To be safe."
Meanwhile, Rogue and Bobby enter the Rec Room, seeing Colber checking the place out.
Rogue: "Oh. Hi, you must be a new student."
Colber is instantly more interested in her than the room: "Nah, I just came here with someone. I'm waiting 'til it's time to go."
"Oh, well, anyway I'm Rogue."
Bobby holds out his hand: "I'm Iceman."
Colber smirks, shaking Bobby's hand: "I'm 'Rockman'," he says in a lightly mocking tone.
Bobby lowers his hand, already building an impression of this guy. It's not favourable.
We return to the lab later on....
Cyclops comes in. Still in his combat suit but wearing his glasses instead of visor; that's in his hand. "Beast, could you take a look at my visor?" he sets it on Hank's work station. "I think the adjustor's on the fritz. I had to end training prematurely because my blasts kept coming out stronger than I set them to."
Beast (somewhat absently): "Certainly. I'll have a look as soon as I finish building these blockers for Alex."
"My brother?"
"Yes. You'll likely find him on the grounds. He arrived about an hour ago with a little power problem..." It seems a new thought is coming to Beast as he looks towards Cyclops' visor.
Cyclops exits.
Meanwhile, in a lab quite unlike the X-Men's.... This one is close quarters, but the two occupants, a man and a woman, of whom we're getting a top-down view of, seem used to working closely together. Close-on one pair of hands, then the other, doing work - measuring substances, leafing through notes, chemically manipulating said substances. The woman speaks: "We have enough product to repeat the process several more times if this one doesn't work."
Man: "Fingers crossed it's the one that does."
He adjusts the heat of a Bunsen burner beneath a vial of red liquid. . . .
Sunset coming on back at the Mansion, we now join the Summers brothers in mid-conversation on the grounds. Alex: "-just with how much it meant to you to find me, it doesn't seem like I've seen you much around."
"Our schedules haven't lined up, we both have our responsibilities."
"You could have less."
At first Scott seems confused, but then he gets it: "I thought you had come around to me being an X-Man."
"I came around to your Professor's preparatory mindset. Not the extreme of it."
"Fine. I still am one."
"Fine." It's not fine.
Scott sighs.
"Look, you said the Centre's anniversary's coming up?
Alex nods.
"You'll see me there."
And we see Beast walking up to them with Alex's blockers in hand, though alongside him is also Jean with a medical kit of some sort.
Beast provides Alex with a chest plate and specially designed gloves: "Er, they may pose some challenge in the grabbing and grasping department, but at least you can relax your posture."
"Thanks. I'm sure they'll do until my body adjusts." He starts putting them on right away.
Beast: "Ah, and speaking of adjusting-" he hands Scott back his visor. "On a hunch I looked over your power data from the training session today and compared it to your last. Similar to your brother, your levels track considerably higher than previously."
Scott and Alex exchange a look; both their powers have increased in strength?
Jean (off their looks): "I also found that curious. With your permission," she looks to them in turn, "I'd like to take some blood samples. Perhaps it's something specific to Summers DNA."
Alex: "Strange it would trigger around the same time, though. It's not like we're twins."
Beast: "It could be coincidence, or perhaps related to your returning to each other's lives; an event you share in time. Secondary mutations have been known to occur after intense emotional and/or stressful situations."
Another look between the brothers; yeah, that could fit.
But wait - Scott: "Secondary mutation?"
Jean: "We're not saying it is. We don't know anything yet."
The request for permission hanging in the air, Jean adds to Alex, "Hank told me you're not fond of the Medical Bay. I can take your blood here, if you comply." That's what's in her kit; syringe, disinfectant, cotton n' tape etc.
Alex shrugs. "Sure."
Scott has no objections to a blood draw, either. While he's waiting for his turn, Beast adds to him: "Oh- while your visor was in fact functioning correctly, I've adjusted the increments on the dial now so you should have the control you need, again."
"Thanks."
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