Opening his mind to those of his students has allowed Professor Xavier to learn of what's happened. He now uses this same connection to speak to them: 'All students, this is not a drill. Those of you who are uninjured, proceed directly to the Disaster Shelter. You have no need to panic, the X-Men will keep you safe. Those who are injured, concentrate on where you are, and help will find you directly.'
To his team he speaks aloud, first relaying what part of the Mansion has been damaged, then: "To my relief I sense neither casualty nor serious injury. Kurt, take Piotr and Kitty there. Warren will be in the Shelter where you are to take all injured students. You will know their locations."
BAMF
"Hank, you will find Ororo by what remains of Colbur's* Statue," -Rogue and Iceman exchange affected looks- "go to her. The rest of you, ensure everyone is evacuated until I instruct you otherwise."
*An original character to whom Rogue and Iceman grew close. Read all about it in Vol. #1! -Tra
The X-Men move at once.
Meanwhile, perversely, Cyclops has rocketed up to Storm's blasted Attic Greenhouse.
Jean, carried by her telekinesis, touches down seconds later.
She surveys the damage, seeing not only the material -broken plants, shattered pots, dirt and debris everywhere- but the times spent here; Storm's, and theirs together --the time they just spent here, with plans made for another.
Now all gone.
"Look what's been done here." She looks up into his face; obscured once more by the visor. It's not a matter of blame but appeal. "I can sense Storm's still alive. I also sense a darker intent in you. . .You could've killed her with a raw blast. . .Keep fighting this, Scott! We can overcome-"
Despite the plea, she expects the blast -She doesn't expect to feel like her forcefield is being taken down from the other side even as she erects it.
She's pushed back --and suddenly loses her footing on rubble.
Thrown off, Jean goes down -hitting her head hard. Though the lose of balance may actually have saved her from getting a full hit of optic blast.
He walks up to her, removing the pointless guise of his visor, so he may stare directly into the eyes she's fighting to keep open; she can't regain herself in time.
Jean looks up into the eyes she's hardly ever seen, now burning indigo with the Dark optic energy just kept inside. . .the light beginning to flood his entire eyes when they abruptly shut -a change to red light discernible just before.
Jean notices: ". . .fight it. . ."
We see the struggle -Scott trying to keep his eyes shut against his optic blasts even as the light shifts from red back to purple -the Dark Influence having opened his eyes a slit.
The light turns red again, yet his blasts are still held in.
'Don't you like it . . ? Having one thing of which you are truly in control. . ? One thing that can lead to more . . .Beholden to no one. . .The future is yours to see. . .Aren't you grateful?'
". . .No." He squeezes his eyes shut again. "I'm not in control if it's through you."
Weakly from her place on the floor, Jean nods, willing Scott to pull through.
'We can be one. Indistinguishable where I end and you begin. . .But they will stop this. She will stop this.'
He looks upon Jean's now unconscious form with fire once more in his eyes.
"No. . .You stop it!' He shuts them again.
Another voice speaks in Scott's mind, with all the steady calm of Professor Xavier: 'That's right, Scott. You already know control. Wrest it back from this being. We will help you move on from this.'
Scott's expression floods with determination. Yet somehow the Professor's words seem to have had the opposite effect -the indigo fire in Cyclops eyes burning hotter; they flood with heated optic light.
But instead of releasing it upon Jean, he merely bends down to touch the side of her head with his hand. . .making her fall into deeper unconsciousness before he turns. . .
. . .to instead come face-to-face with Xavier, who can see at once something's gone terribly wrong.
He continues to speak telepathically: 'Scott! You must regain control. . .If it's too much for you, son, give it all over to me.'
Cyclops speaks aloud in a voice not his own: "If you could hold this back, you would."
He starts towards Xavier, eyes still flooded with unreleased -tainted- optic energy.
Xavier counters him, in fact, by holding him back -taking control of the specific parts of Cyclops' brain to make him shut his eyes, turn his head and, similar to how Jean had in the basement, arrest his movements. Similarly to then, Cyclops grows angry; concentrating against Xavier's influence to open his eyes; turn his head. It's another tug-o'-war of power; one Xavier wasn't expecting. He's actually having to strain.
'Listen to me, Scott. The entity in your mind is a being similar to Phoenix though bent entirely on destruction. Do not allow it to destroy you. See what it's done to-'
Xavier, gaze having shifted behind Cyclops to Jean, doesn't get to finish as Dark Cyclops begins taking the advantage in their struggle for power; head slowly yet steadily turning, eyes opening by slits -wider.
"No, Scott!" Xavier's strain takes on a different form as he speaks, now both verbally and telepathically, as though trying to call out to someone too far way to hear --shifting from trying to reach his student, to flat out stopping him.
Yet the possessive entity's psionic power holds up as a match. He faces Xavier directly now, optic energy set to release--
"NO!!"
--in the last fraction of a second Xavier succeeds in making Cyclops tilt back his head, the blast going over Xavier's on a path through another portion of the ceiling --except Dark Cyclops' anticipation is just as precise, and he modulates the raw blast down to a level where it'll ricochet instead of go through, modulating it higher as soon as the angle is made --it now bursts through the ceiling as well the floor beneath Xavier's wheels.
"AAAHHHHH---!"
The yell is swallowed up by the sound of shattered construction.
Meanwhile, with the X-Men.
Rogue: "That's rahght, just this way." She directs a line of students.
Among a group by Iceman, he spies one with a clearly broken arm and minor cuts. "Whoa - you should be waiting for Nightcrawler."ah
"I can walk. I'm not dizzy," they respond shakily. "I didn't want him takin' someone he didn't have to."
"Okay -stay close. And here -can I borrow that?" He looks up from this student to another wearing a scarf. They comply and he forms a smooth chunk of ice which he wraps the scarf around before handing it back to the injured student, "can you hold that on there?" The student takes it and applies it to their broken arm.
The two bunches of X-Men-lead evacuees converge at a hallway junction. Iceman notices Rogue also has a well-meaning or mixed up student in her group; one flanked by two uninjured ones helping them to walk with a broken leg, and further injuries verging more towards gashes than cuts.
Rogue: "They didn't want Nightcrawler to have to-"
"-I know, neither did he."
"Ah wish my powers could let me give strength besides just takin' it. Or that the power sharing went both ways. Everyone could be fahne in no time if ah could give them all Logan's healing factor. Storm-"
"-I know. I hope she's not too bad off--!"
Destructive sounds and shockwaves from above rattle them, then--
--KZHOOOOM! --KRHKRHRUMBLLLE!!
Dark Cyclops' optic blast comes through the roof at an angle -thankfully just behind where they already tread -but continuing through the floor.
Those at the back start to fall with it.
In an instant Iceman has made an ice slide to catch them -rubble sliding alongwith.
At the same time--
--FWEEOOO *BANG* *BANG* *BANG*
He looks up at the fireworks taking care of ceiling debris that almost caused a problem, then he looks back: "Thanks, Jubilee!"
"Don't mention it -let's just get out of here!"
"Everyone on the slide!"
Meanwhile, the optic blast continued through to the ground floor.
Wolverine sees it just as an elevator full of students has descended for the Disaster Shelter.
"S@*%!" He turns to more waiting for the elevator to return; some looking stunned.
"Get in!" He ushers at the elevator's return, moving past it himself on his way to the blast sight where the others are sliding down the ice.
"Where is he?!" He looks up through the hole, as if expecting to see Cyclops.
Rogue: "It came from higher up!"
"Screw our orders -I'm goin' after 'im!"
SNIKT
He starts climbing the walls.
Suddenly Nightcrawler has BAMFED in front of the elevator. He looks down the hall. "Iceman! We need you!" He BAMFS up to him than BAMFS him away-
-to the part of the Mansion Dark Cyclops recklessly destroyed in his battle with Storm.
Shadowcat is phasing in and out of the settled wreckage -"I've gotta' check we didn't miss anyone!"- while Colossus holds up a buckling wall threatening to bring more down; a fresh chunk of ceiling having already been tossed aside.
Nightcrawler: "There!" He directs Iceman, who assesses the situation before blasting his ice to solidify the wall, and seal up any other dicey cracks around the area.
Meanwhile, back with Xavier who's just fallen from one floor to another -as well from his wheelchair- and has been rejoined by Dark Cyclops. . . .
Pained now both physically and emotionally, Xavier looks up: "Please, Scott," he speaks aloud, looking straight into his eyes, "find everything in yourself to stop this before we all must stop you!"
It looks like the appeal might be working as Cyclops' closes his eyes. . . . . .only to sneer before opening them again, Xavier finding himself staring once more at the threatening glow of Dark light.
Just then, some scattered fire pokers on the floor by Dark Cyclops are thrust upward, like an arm against his throat pushing his head back, while a metal fireplace grate is bent out of shape to become a crude kind of shackle, binding one of his arms and legs to the fireplace fender.
He tries to look up through the damaged ceiling to see who now speaks: "What is it I have come upon, Charles? I would never have expected such a confrontation from your pet."
But before Xavier can answer Magneto, Dark Cyclops' scowl turns into another sneer:
"You can't hold me, either."
His optic power is unleashed --what his plan is given how the forced tilt of his head has him aimed is anyone's guess, but in that same instant he uncurls his fist --and as if by the spread of his bent fingers, he splits his beam
--a portion breaking his bindings, while two other portions zip up towards his foe just ahead of Dark Cyclops turning to discharge a full blast in follow-up.
Since they were wielded without much sight of him, the portions come just shy of hitting Magneto, and he just manages to move out of the way of the whole one. At the same time he again commands what metal is in the room --whether broken or whole, as well as what metal he can detect in the rooms nearby --windows smashing as it all rises into his "grasp", and he throws it all in the direction of the corrupted X-Man.
Dark Cyclops gets bashed and cut and angered. This time spreading/splitting his blast into 10, destroying every projectile as at once he aims to discharge another, in full, towards Magneto --yet abruptly, his eyes close over the power, actually jolting him back, and we see Xavier behind him, displaying a look of high concentration.
Dark Cyclops actually seems amused now. "The definition of insanity."
Xavier suddenly reacts as though he's been hit as his telepathic hold is snapped -Scott's eyes open, and his optic blast is discharged --yet not to go forward towards Magneto. He telekinetically directs the beam back, not even turning to look at the man he's about to obliterate
-Is this pure callousness? Or is some part of Scott Summers still aware?
No matter --Magneto is ready.
Just in time he erects a magnetic forcefield in front of Xavier, then propels it forward into the blast and the unsuspecting Cyclops, who's caught off guard completely given the psionic blocking properties of Magneto's helmet.
Xavier now watches as his once most trusted X-Man is forcibly pushed out of the Mansion before he can react; Magneto moving aside at the same time as hitting him upside the head.
Dark Cyclops falls, senseless.
Xavier knows it won't be for long.
He yells: "Scott is being controlled by a malicious entity, Erik. We must try-"
"-I will do what I have to, Charles. As I know you will." He descends out of view.
The face of Professor X is the image of desperation and disturbance as Wolverine arrives on the scene: "This has gone on long enough--"
"--Logan, no! Not yet--"
"--Scott -or whatever that is would've killed you if it wasn't for Magneto!"
"Please! I need only one more chance. Kurt will take me to Cerebro." He crawls towards his wheelchair as his previous emotions have given way to determination.
In the next second he finds Wolverine helping him: "Last chance, Chuck. And I might cut if off early."
"Thank you, Logan," he gets resettled.
"Where's Jean?"
"In Storm's room in the attic. She's been rendered unconscious but otherwise unharmed." At this he shifts attention away from Wolverine to mentally contact Nightcrawler, while Wolverine heads for the attic.
Meanwhile, on the Grounds, Cyclops is coming back to his senses.
His unshielded eyes open releasing ruby beams of light, Scott immediately shuts his eyes; it's all coming back to him --then overcoming him. In the next moment his eyes open again; fiery indigo.
He sees Magneto: "It's always you!"
"Who proves to be your match and more?"
"Ruining everything!" He's back on his feet.
"And yet you're the one who's reduced this place partly to ruin," Magneto erects another forcefield around himself and one around Cyclops, who lets loose with an unmitigated blast; steadily punching through.
Concern flickers across Magneto's face. He generates another collection of metal, around himself and his adversary, and through a combination of it and his magnetic field, manages to deflect Cyclops' blast largely back at him --of course his body just re-absorbs the energy but the force is still enough to cause him to slide back, and the splay of light obscures his vision
-All the metal and Magneto's helmet interfering with his ability to detect him, whether visually or psionically.
He's forced to stop blasting to see and instead finds himself pelted by piece after piece of metal. He splits his blast again to deal with it. "If it didn't take until Storm talked sense into you, things would be better for mutants!"
Magneto tightens the metal in front of himself to make a second shield --it's hard to say if he breaks it apart a second later or if the blast did --his magnetic one granting him just enough time to evade a hit himself. "You only think that because of your myopic view of the world-"
He now makes the metal tighten around Cyclops, boxing him in a deflective semi-sphere.
"-adopted from Charles'. You're too much his puppet to see things any clearer."
VKKHKHZZZHOOOOM
Dark Cyclops breaks out and begins tracking Magneto with his beam, as the levitating leader of the Brotherhood narrowly keeps ahead of the earthbound leader of the X-Men. "What? No fancy tricks this time? You'll merely overcome me with direct power?"
What looks to be a portion of a metal bed frame rises to bash Cyclops from behind, and Magneto grins: "You should be listening to what I have to say."
The impact knocked him off his feet. From his knees, Dark Cyclops looks up: "You're the one who won't learn!"
He discharges another full blast-
-Magneto has had enough of this cat and mouse game and is ready with a piece of Cerebro's walls encased in his magnetic forcefield to deflect and force the blast back again--
--however, just when it nears him Cyclops sneers, his beam splits and whips around Magneto's shield.
Magneto tries to extend his magnetic shield to guard himself from all sides while splitting his physical barrier to do the same, but he only manages to tear it asunder before the blasts hit--
--"AH--AUGGHH!"
While his forcefield absorbed some of the blow, it wasn't enough.
Dark Cyclops walks towards the older man's crumbled body,
just as a voice rings through his mind again: 'Don't do this, Scott!'
But the voice of Professor Xavier sounds muddy. It's hard to say, as we see him in the damaged Cerebro, if the unclear connection is from that, or the extent of the dark entity's corruption of Cyclops' mind.
On his way to Magneto, Cyclops pauses by the hole he'd previously made in Cerebro, and stares down at Xavier. "He's always been counter to your plans. The one mutant who brings everything down." He looks up, his next words coming as a thought: 'No more.'
Xavier watches through the hole as Cyclops walks beyond, and pleads with him in both voice and thought: "He is still my friend! As are you! Please--!"
Dark Cyclops discharges and splits another beam, this one stronger, this one into more, which swerve around Magneto like a semi-nucleus. "We should've taken him off the board a looong time ago." With a twist -an unwinding motion of his hand, the nucleus loses its shape, as if pulled back by a whip Dark Cyclops is about to bring down.
"NO!"
BAMF - BAMF
-in the nick of time.
The ground where Magneto had lay gets pulverized.
"Why would you do that?!" Dark Cyclops rounds back to the Cerebro shaft. "You called him-"
"Scott! This is enough!" Regrettably, yet decidedly, Xavier concentrates through Cerebro; but whatever he's aiming to do can't be done fast enough.
"-You're too impartial."
"SCOTT!-
-AAHHH!"
Xavier falls with the control panel as Cyclops destroys the catwalk of Cerebro.
BAMF! - BAMF!
Xavier is grabbed just in time to avoid a follow-up blast.
Cyclops' grits his teeth in frustration, then-
BAMF! -he's grabbed
BAMF! -before the cloud clears a familiar, near-berzerker yell rings out: "AAAHhHhhHH!!!!"
BAMF -Nightcrawler gets out of the way.
Dark Cyclops can tell the assault is coming from behind him. He turns at the same time he discharges a swerving blast.
Wolverine draws back his arms as if he's preparing to stab him in the back, but restrains himself enough to only slash at him as he just manages to wind away from the blast by dodging in the same rotational direction as Cyclops' turn.
"KURT!"
Nightcrawler: "Engaged!"
They're in the Danger Room,
and Nightcrawler has just turned on a sim to give Dark Cyclops more to contend with --as if Wolverine isn't enough!
"This is for Xavier -the students -Jean! -Storm!!"
And speaking of the fallen Weather Goddess, we cut-to where Beast is by her side, administering medical aid via a kit. It's clear they took note of the battle going on around the side of the Mansion, only fragmentally visible from their view.
A low, bestial sound comes from the blue-furred mutant's throat.
"I. . .will be fine, Beast," Storm takes momentary hold of his arm. "Go where you are needed most. Go to our students."
In the Disaster Shelter, Angel has cast aside his own injury to employ his X-Men First Aid training towards the injured youngsters.
"Where's Dr. Grey?"
"Where's Dr. Beast?"
"Taking care of business, I wager," he answers.
They look around as faint pounding and pulsing sounds are just perceived through the walls --evidence of an intense session in the Danger Room.
Where we now return.
Wolverine's declaration of everyone he's fighting for looks to have had some affect on Cyclops as his reactions have stalled.
Of course Nightcrawler and Wolverine's coordinated, dual assault may have something to do with it, and on top of that there's the Danger simulation --saws, blasters, Sentinels --obstacles both fully physical and hard-holograms --the works.
Nightcrawler: "Remember all who matter to you, Scott!" -he BAMFS about- a pesky presence for his ally-turned-foe, whether physically or from the obscuring wisps and clouds he leaves in his wake. "Ve are finding you, ja, but it is vith you! For you! Come back to us!"
He's quick to stay out of accidental range of Wolverine, who's launching a flurry of just-controlled jabs and slashes -their plan appearing to be to wear down Cyclops' body while trying to appeal to his possessed mind.
--but just then Cyclops, or rather, Dark Cyclops, gets his head back in the game, going back on the offensive -he blasts Wolverine back with some small shots -just enough to give himself some breathing room -blasting, too, through some of the obstacles of the sim that bear down on him.
Nightcrawler keeps up his part, BAMFing Dark Cyclops about --into obstacles, away from one's he's preparing for into ones he has to reassess, Nightcrawler getting in his own shots from angles only BAMFs can allow for, while also setting him back up in the path of Wolverine, who destroys any of "the works" that get in his way --a little extra shrapnel to send Cyke's way as he powers at him with his adamantium claws --the decision seems made: it's time to bleed him out.
Except beyond initial seconds, Cyclops doesn't.
Telekinetic force fields cover his wounds until an indigo fire cauterizes them.
Wolverine is close enough that the fire burns him as well, but he endures-
-Dark Cyclops' own pain seems mitigated --if the same could only be said for his power.
VKKHKHKZZZHOOOOOMM!!
splayed-blast --he gives himself more breathing room.
WHIIEW *click click*
Attention is turned towards the Control Room, where Dark Cyclops uses his unnatural telekinesis to remotely disengage Wolverine and Nightcrawler's sim before engaging a targeted one of his own --
--KRRRSSHHGSHHHH!!!!
--an explosion goes off right by Wolverine, blasting him away and down through the icy crust of a murky, frozen lake.
While he's taken care of for the moment, Dark Cyclops turns his attention to Nightcrawler --who can't see Wolverine to make a rescue.
Nightcrawler steels himself: "Forgive me, Scott, as I vill forgive you."
He ramps up his offensive --BAMFING around to the practical pieces of obstacles left strewn about from their sim -Dark Cyclops' not appearing to contain much more than the explosion made for Wolverine, and a snowy wilderness- Nightcrawler throws what pieces he can, sometimes immediately, sometimes after BAMFING with them elsewhere. Getting kicks and punches in besides, and still obscuring Dark Cyclops' vision with the remnants of his sulfur clouds, and now as well, kicked up snow.
Meanwhile, back on the Ground Level of the Mansion, Iceman and Rogue are about to ice-slide off somewhere.
"Alraght, let's go-"
Jubilee's voice is heard before they do: "Not without me!"
Iceman: "You're not an X-Men yet, Jubilee. This is too dangerous."
Rogue: "Just keep the others safe in the Disaster Shelter."
"C'mon! The older kids can watch out for the younger ones. My powers could be useful out there."
Iceman is about to either argue or just go when Rogue has an idea: "Mahnd if ah borrow them, then?"
"Uh-h-h-h...hang on."
Rogue reassures: "Ah'll touch you just for a moment. You won't even pass out."
Iceman looks between them.
. . .Jubilee complies, reaching out a bare hand.
Rogue removes her glove and takes it in hers -and Jubilee's power alongwith.
Jubilee braces herself against the wall: "Okay. .yeah -I'm fine. . .Take it to 'em."
Her hand re-gloved, Rogue squeezes the younger girl's shoulder: "Thanks a lot, Jubilee . . . Let's go, Bobby."
Before proceeding Iceman concentrates, succeeding in icing-up his entire body -the first time he's done so.
Both Rogue and Jubilee are impressed.
Iceman (determined): "This one's for Colbur."
The same determination reflected in Rogue's face, she lays her gloved hand on his shoulder and off they go.
Back in the Danger Room, Dark Cyclops has managed to guard himself against most of Nightcrawler's blows, reacting to the acrobatic X-Man as though he's some annoying fly --despite everything, in fact, actually seeming able to track where he's going to be, "watching" him in between going and coming when his vision isn't so obscured, and trying to blast him.
It takes a bit before he has the timing anticipated right, but after--
VKZHOOM!!!!
--Nightcrawler is slammed into the wall, decidedly out.
We hear the sound of sloshing water and then,
a full-berzerker yell rings out.
Yet Dark Cyclops is ready --he pivots, another optic blast bursting from his eyes.
Wolverine is managing to push through the Dark light --actually coming within a centimetre of stabbing Cyclops right in the eye
before he releases even more power--
--sending his foe into another wall -where Wolverine falls, nearly blasted in two.
Their eyes meet for one heated second,
then Dark Cyclops strides away --leaving his latest victims to the simulated cold.
No sooner does he exit when he's grabbed by Shadowcat, and Colossus who throws her and Dark Cyclops towards the ceiling. She phases them through -then through another floor and the wall as the throw sends them on a decided course away from the school, to a point further out on the sprawling grounds.
As soon as Shadowcat's gotten Cyclops through the building, however, she lets go.
Over at the destination point, Dark Cyclops uses a controlled amount of optic blast to prevent himself from crashing against the ground --the earth still getting torn up from its power.
Before he can make a full controlled decent, however, he's blasted out of the air by fireworks.
"UGH!"
And ahead of his rise, a strong, follow-up blast of ice assaults him; aiming to freeze.
True to the rest of his encounters, it seems to be working at first. But then we see the ice melting right off him; a hint of blue-purple flames exuding from his body like a second skin.
Dark Cyclops gets up.
Rogue sends out more of Jubilee's fireworks, her bracing expression showing she's not used to having mini explosives shoot out of her hands, but she's managing.
Iceman pushes himself, increasing the strength of his ice --then finds himself on the defensive as an optic blast pushes its way straight through --Iceman just has time to shift from shooting out torrents to maintaining a thick ice shield in front of himself and Rogue. The amount of his body that's iced-up gradually lessening as he puts all effort into the shield -only just managing to keep pace as it melts and crumbles away nearly faster than he can maintain it --getting closer to that rate with every second.
Rogue (into Iceman's ear): "Keep goin' with it. I've got a plan." She looks through the steam that the clash of power is causing, just barely able to see the form of Dark Cyclops-
-who draws closer.
The patches of late November grass and snow smoldering and melting away with every step, as we now see the return of that cruel smile.
He could end this. Well-developed as Iceman's powers may be, they're not to the senior X-Man's level.
Dark Cyclops is playing with him.
Rogue wildly shoots out fireworks -from either side of the ice shield -up into the air
--between the *POPS* *FLASHES* and steam from the melting ice, Dark Cyclops misses her coming out from behind the shield and getting up close.
She doesn't even need to remove her glove as the expulsion of fireworks through her hands has burned holes in them
-She reaches for the neck of the unsuspecting Dark Cyclopes. . .
He appears caught off guard by the sensation as she succeeds in making contact,
-only to nonchalantly turn, his back to Iceman / the continuing icy blast, and watches even more coldly as Rogue falls.
"This power isn't for children."
"Rogue!!"
Enough games.
Dark Cyclops turns to finish off the other trying youth,
and finds himself instead blasting the organic metal form of Colossus.