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xmutanthigh2007-11-30 07:00 pm
Protect And Defend: The Sentinel Attack mini-series
Oh my god” Rogue said, covering her mouth with her hand. Julian was leaning forward, peering at the TV in disbelief. Kitty, John and Meg came rushing into the room.
“Did you hear-” Meg began, but broke off when she realised the group of students already assembled in the living room were watching the horrifying drama unfold on CNN.
Jono and Warren were chatting animatedly as they headed towards the kitchen, taking a coffee break from God of War They caught sight of Amara exiting the living room. Her eyes were red with tears.
“Amara, luv, what’s wrong?” Jono asked.
She looked at him in shock. “Haven’t you heard?” she said shakily. “There’s been a Sentinel attack on Genosha.”
Warren felt as if the floor had dropped away. “Wh-what?” he whispered.
“Not just one Sentinel- two. It started about fifteen minutes ago. They’re saying…” she broke off and sucked in a deep breath. “They’re already saying the death toll is in the thousands. Magneto has issued a plea for help. I… I just can’t watch anymore.”
Jono glanced down the corridor towards Ororo Munroe’s office.
“The senior team locked themselves in there about ten minutes ago. We’re expecting a call any minute” Amara whispered.
Warren looked at Jono. “Get everyone together, we should suit up.”
Jono nodded.
Within fifteen minutes Storm, Frost, Hank, Kurt, Logan and Scott were in full battle gear and going through pre-flight procedures in the X-Jet. Kitty and Bobby stood dejectedly at base of the loading ramp.
“It doesn’t make any sense to leave us behind,” Kitty argued.
“Ororo gave you a job,” Logan said gruffly, looking over his checklist.
“The children are going to be terrified when they hear about this. They’re going to look to you for support and guidance.” Ororo said firmly.
“You’re acting like this is going to be more dangerous than other missions we’ve been on” Bobby said defensively.
“It is” Logan said. “That’s why it’s senior team only”
“Man the comms, keep an eye on the kids” Kurt said, squeezing Kitty’s arm reassuringly. He turned and strode lightly up the ramp.
“We’ll send you updates.” Ororo said, following Kurt.
“Don’t wait up” Logan called, and closed up the ramp.
“This is bullshit,” Keller grumbled. “They act like we’ve still got training wheels on.”
“Yeah, don’t they know how crazy we go when they leave us behind? We want to do our bit, too” Tabby added.
“Hell, we’ve trained our goddamn asses off to do our bit!” Rogue seethed.
“We’ll take first watch.” Kitty said resignedly, indicating herself and Bobby.
Julian nodded curtly. The assembled group crowded in to the lift and were whisked from the hangar level back to the ground floor of the mansion, while Kitty and Bobby headed to the Situation Room.
John was waiting for them on the ground floor. The group headed straight for the TV room to watch the attack unfold on CNN.
“Downstairs sugah, but she’s not in a talking mood” Rogue told John.
“None of us are” Lance said. John nodded.
“I couldn’t really stand to watch any more of it on the TV” John said quietly. He looked at Kitty intensely, but she couldn’t meet his eyes. She knew exactly what he was thinking.
“We should be there, John,” she said forcefully.
“It’s a slaughter!”
“It’s my job! They’re killing our kind! Once upon a time you would’ve been down there, giving them hell!”
“Yeah, and at the end of the day I’d probably be one of the dead. I’m not that guy anymore, am I? I thought you wanted me this way!”
“I-” Kitty broke off, looking completely frustrated. “I didn’t mean it like that.” She said weakly.
“I know. But… it terrifies me, Kitty. You go rushing head long into danger. It’s not your job; it’s your lifestyle. It used to be mine, too, but I gave it up looking for a better way.”
“There is no better way” Kitty sighed. She forced herself to look at him and sighed.
“I better go change,” She said, gesturing to the pretty dress she'd been wearing in anticipation of their date. She touched his face gently "Go rest up, John.” She said softly. “You look exhausted again. There’s nothing you can do… nothing any of us can do…”
John nodded sadly.
Ali frowned at the TV in the bar, the reports of the Genosha Rescue effort cutting from clips of Alpha Flight and the X-men, Jean-Paul on screen one moment, Logan the next, Sasquatch and Beast after that. She had stayed behind, a loud telephone argument with Guardian about how idiotic it was to take almost all their heavy hitters out of Canada when they had suspicions that another Sentinel could be out there. She took a sip of her beer, lamenting the fact that had she been slightly less hard-headed, she would be on the news right now.
"Julian would just die if he saw that..." she muttered.
So, instead of being part of the rescue effort, or reuniting with her friends at Xavier's, Alison Blaire was sitting in a dingy bar in Niagara Falls drinking. She turned her attention to the bartender, hailing for another drink which promptly escaped her fingers as soon as she turned back to the news, her face suddenly ashen as the bottle fell to the floor.
"Jesus Christ," she whispered, catching just a few crucial words of a breaking news report,
“…unconfirmed reports of a third Sentinel, somewhere in the upstate region of New York…”
In seconds she was out the door, fumbling with her headphones as she rocketed into the sky, disappearing as an urgent streak of purple.
“I should have been there...”
The team had been gone for almost two hours. Bobby and Kitty were at their posts in the Situation Room, monitoring the teams’ progress. They were still anxious and angry, and sat in uneasy silence.
Bobby sat up quickly when a ping sounded from the console he was seated at.
“What is it?” Kitty asked.
“Proximity alarm. There’s something heading towards the school. Something big” Bobby answered. He punched a series of commands into the computer, bringing up a stream of data. His face fell as he read it.
“No. That can’t be right.” He breathed. Kitty turned to look at him.
“What” she asked.
“Hit the evacuation alarm.” he said.
Kitty took one look at his face, and then she slapped a red button on the control panel.
A warning tone sounded throughout the school and grounds, followed by a calm female voice.
“Attention students. Please make your way to an evacuation point immediately. This is not a drill.” The tone repeated and the massage played again.
“Why are we evacuating?” Kitty asked.
“There’s a Sentinel. It’s headed straight for the school. E.T.A. five minutes.”
John was jolted awake. “What now?” he muttered, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. He slipped on some shoes and padded down the hall, to find a group of the younger students being shepherded into a hidden escape tunnel by Warren. He was carefully doing a head count as they passed in front of him. John frowned and hurried down corridor. He caught sight of Bobby.
“What’s with the evacuation?” he called.
“Sentinel” Bobby said, his face tense. John’s jaw dropped.
“You’re fucking kidding” John breathed.
“Go with the kids, make sure they’re okay” Bobby instructed.
John stared at him. “No way.”
“C’mon man, you’ve been sick. You’re not up to a battle.”
“I’m not running away this time, Bobby.” John said hotly. “Or being driven off. This place is my home, and I’m throwing in with the rest of you.”
Bobby paused and looked intently at his old friend for a minute. Then a ghost of a smile crossed his face and he slapped John on the back.
“Help with the evacuation. Double-check the boy’s dorm is empty. We don’t have a lot of time.”
John nodded.
Kitty rushed past him, so focused on what she was doing she almost didn’t see him. He called out to her, and she paused.
“Promise you’ll look after them” she said, nodding towards the students climbing into the tunnel.
“I’m staying” John said.
Kitty looked surprised. “Now you’re rushing head long into danger?” she said with a tiny smile.
“Must be catching,” he said with a shrug. He caught her hand. “Love you.”
She leaned up and pressed a kiss to his lips. "I'm sorry we're missing our dinner reservation,” she said sadly.
Before John could reply "Me, too" she was gone.
“Sixty-two, sixty-three, sixty-four…” Warren counted, as the last of the children in the group raced off into the tunnel. “Oh man, we’re missing some…”
“The boys’ dorm is totally clear” John said, jogging down the hall. “Meg is checking the girls’ dorms now.”
The older students were assembled on the front lawn of the school. They stood in silence for a moment, all eye scanning the horizon for the threat.
“There” Tabby said breathlessly. She pointed to a dark shape in the sky.
Nori swore in Japanese
“We need to buy some time,” Kitty said. “They’re only halfway through the evacuation,”
“I’ll go roll out the welcome mat,” Julian said darkly.
“Hell, let’s all roll out to meet the damn thing” Josh said.
Jono shook his head. “Not today, mate.” He looked appraisingly at the golden skinned boy. “No offence, but the best place for you is in the Infirmary.”
“I need to be here, to help if any of you…” he trailed off.
“Jono’s right” Nori said gently. “We’ll send injuries down to you.”
Josh looked like he seriously wanted to argue, but suddenly all the older kids were looking expectantly at him. He sighed dejectedly. Lance thumped him on the back good- naturedly, and he hurried off.
The students nervously watched the approaching Sentinel, its dark bulk looming closer in the sky.
"So, unless our training paid off, we're in Barney," Jono declared.
Julian shot him a glance, and then trained his eyes on the robot. "If you can't talk sense, then shut up."
Tabby nodded nervously, not taking her eyes off of the robot, either. "For once, I'm almost inclined to agree with him."
"It means," Jono clarified, "we're in trouble."
“All right.” Kitty said. “Spread out. We put ourselves between it and the mansion. Between it and our home” she said heavily. Jubilee and Rogue caught her eyes.
There would be no running away for any of them this time.
They broke apart and spread out. Julian moved to launch himself into the air when Lorna rushed up to him.
“I'm coming with you” Lorna said. “There’s nothing I’d rather do right now than kick some metal ass”
Julian considered her for the moment. “Your wish is my command,” he said charmingly, reaching out to take her hand.
“Be careful” Piotr called.
Julian winked. “You know me.”
Just before they pushed off from the ground Julian glanced at Rogue. She nodded to him.
“Up we go then, Kermit” Julian said to Lorna, as they launched themselves up into the night sky.
The Sentinel touched down a kilometre from the school, crushing trees and plants under foot. It turned its massive head, scanning the area. It identified its target, and began to move.
Julian and Lorna stayed low, giving the Sentinel a wide berth. They slowly circled it, assessing it. Lorna set down on the ground behind it, Julian hovering in the air above her. Both of them stayed behind it, hoping to delay detection for as long as possible.
Lorna looked up at the hulking machine, and her blood ran cold.
It had to be thirty feet tall; its body was a muted dark blue, as though it was coated in the same kind of radar-absorbing paint used on Stealth bombers. The deep blue was broken by crimson coloured demarcations on the arms and legs. The armoured head - two blazing golden eyes and a sensor panel in place of a mouth- was an obscene mockery of a face.
This is not the Danger Room! her brain screamed at her.
Lorna swore so violently that Julian almost blushed.
“It’s not metal, Julian! I can’t do a goddamn thing to it!” she cried, panic rising inside her.
“Then what the hell is it made of?” Julian asked.
“I don’t know!” Lorna cried, her face scrunched up in concentration as she searched for anything metallic she could lock onto. “But whoever made it, they obviously made it Magneto-proof.”
“But not Hellion-proof, I’ll bet” Julian said with a grin. He flew into the air behind the great machine, and raising his hands, pulled as hard as he could. It seemed to slow slightly.
“Stop moving… you bastard…!” he said from between clenched teeth.
“Wouldn’t it be easier to hold it from the front?” Lorna called up to him, still struggling to get a hold of the machine herself.
“Undoubtedly, but I don’t want it to see us. Look out!” he suddenly cried.
A hatch at the back of the Sentinel’s left leg had opened, and a series of razor sharp metal darts exploded out towards the green haired girl. Lorna had seen it, and she threw herself into a sharp roll to the right, reaching out with her powers as she came up again. The darts froze midair, inches from where she’d been standing.
“Not even close” Lorna said darkly. She lashed out with a hand, throwing the darts violent back towards to machine, but with a slight flash of golden light they bounced off before they could hit, scattering in the opposite direction. Lorna swore again.
“Well, at least we know it’s got metal somewhere.” Julian drawled.
“Yeah, but it’s shielded, too” Lorna said, awestruck.
“That explains why it feels so goddamn slippery to my TK” Julian grumbled. “Right then, gotta get rid of the shielding.” He drew in a deep breath and focused his telekinesis to a tiny point, almost like a laser. He aimed at a point on the shoulder, and golden wisps of energy streamed off like steam. He could sense the tight energy field protecting the machine vibrate slightly as his TK disturbed it, but he couldn’t quit crack it.
“Damn it!” He hissed. This was going to take some time.
Slowly, the machine pounded its way towards the mansion, it's silhouette ominous in the low light.
It was within firing range.
“It’s getting ready to fire at the mansion!” Julian yelled to the other combatants, shoving the Sentinel with all his strength.
“No you bloody well don’t!” Julian looked down to see Jono standing at the monster’s feet. The English boy blew out an enormous stream of fire from his mouth just as the machine fired. Jono’s attack still didn’t take out the shields, but it was strong enough to knock the Sentinel’s aim off, and the blast went high….
“I found them! They went back for Dilbert!” Meg said, looking completely exasperated. The three Cuckoos, Jones and two younger girls were hurrying down the hallway ahead of her. Celeste was carrying the school’s pet hamster in a cage.
“We couldn’t leave him” she chastised Meg “He’s a living creature, too, you know”
“That’s fine…” Meg said. “But you need to go now” she gestured to the escape tunnel at the end of the hall.
“That’s 65, 66, 67, 68, 69 and 70.” John counted.
“We’re still missing 4” Warren said.
With a deafening crack! and violent rush of dust and debris, part of the roof caved in. John grabbed Jones by the back of his shirt and rushed him forward out of harm’s way. Instinctively, Warren grabbed Phoebe and spun her out of the way, crying out in discomfort as a large piece of masonry hit his hip. Phoebe crumpled on the ground, clutching her left shin.
“My leg! Oh!” she cried.
Warren crouched next to her.
“What happened?” he asked, looking and not finding an injury.
“Mindee!” she gasped. “She’s trapped. Her leg is broken-” Phoebe broke off suddenly and closed her eyes, drawing in a deep breath.
“I have to cut you off, Mindee!” she said suddenly, her eyes snapping open. “The pain!” She looked searchingly at Warren, pale and shocked. “Mindee is trapped under part of the roof with two other girls. They’re all hurt… and they can’t get out.” Her eyes slid out of focus again. “Celeste is on the other side of the wreckage with Meg. They’re okay.”
“All right.” Warren said decisively, he hauled Phoebe to her feet and pointed her towards the escape route. “You need to get out of here.”
“I’m not leaving my sisters” Phoebe said, looking at him as though he were quite mad.
Warren and John looked at each other. John turned to Jones.
“Okay, well you’re outta here, kid. Get everyone as far away as you can, and keep an eye on them, okay? I’m putting you in charge.”
“You’re putting me in charge? Who put you in charge?!” Jones cried.
John rolled his eyes and pushed Jones into the tunnel.
“Celeste! There’s nothing you can do for the moment. You need to get to safety with the other students.” Meg said, scrambling to try and clear some of the wreckage.
“Don’t do that” Celeste said calmly, her eyes out of focus. “Warren says if we move the wrong pieces, the whole thing might collapse. John is going to get extra help.”
“Why am I always in my pyjamas when this place gets attacked?” John wondered aloud.
Piotr was armoured up, the moonlight glinting dully off the organic steel. John rushed down to him.
“Pete, part of the roof collapsed and some kids are trapped. We can’t dig them out- but you probably could” John said honestly.
“Of course” Piotr said, and turned to rush into the mansion.
John made to follow him, but then he glanced back at the battlefield.
A small, leather-clad figure was rushing around the feet of the Sentinel. Kitty was reaching into parts of the legs, piece by piece dismantling the external projectile weapons on the Sentinel, so her teammates could get closer to the thing with less risk.
John’s eyes were wide as he watched her, and he could feel his heart starting to beat faster in anticipation. He shook his head.
“My turn.” He said, moving forward.
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AHAHAHA best line ever!
But fdjsakfljaer this is SO exciting. It's brilliant thus far! :D GAAH!! *reads part two*
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-rushes off to read the other parts-
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