Subject: EXC: Wolfsbane "Indian Summer Sky" (4/4) Date: Sat, 1 Mar 97 20:52:29 +0000 From: " Stuart Palin" To: untold-l@netcom.com WOLFSBANE#3 "Indian Summer Sky" Pt.4 DISCLAIMER: Wolfsbane, X-Factor and all featured characters are the property of Marvel Comics. They are used without permission, although no profit is being obtained through this usage. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Rahne stretched as she came out of the anaesthetic. The wound had healed over already, and she could feel that the pain had lessened dramatically. Wildchild was there, pushing Rahne back down onto the bed. "Settle down. You're friend came here a while ago, and he explained what he found. The government set it all up. I said settle down! You came out of the anaesthetic early. Polaris said that is was best just to let you heal naturally, all we did was take the bullet out. But you're still weak." "Nonsense, Ah feel fine. Ah do ha' a healing factor, ye ken. It's nothing like Wolverine's bu' tis good enough. Now let me get up." She pushed Kyle aside, putting her feet on the ground. A little wobble as she stood, but Kyle was there to support her. "So where's Polaris?" "Forge and Mystique went with her to see the government. They're splitting." "Whit?" "They're splitting with the government. X-Factor's becoming independent." "Whit?!" " Tis madness! Whit makes em think tha' it is the best way?" Rahne stormed, pacing up and down in front of Wisdom. "Makes sense to me. Government diddles them, they leave." "Bu' they were set up tae be the government team - public relations fer mutants. Now all the people are going tae see is just another mutant team goin' bad an' turnin' on them. It's the worst thing tha' could possibly have happened! They're just running away agin." "Yeah, I guess. If they didn't want to get messed with, they shouldn't have joined in the first place. They let Havok go, by the way. I don't know why. They just took pity on him, I guess. Mind if I light up?" He lit up before she had a chance to reply. "You ask me, they aren't really all that stable. And I'd keep a real close eye on Sabretooth." "I know tha'." "I mean, besides the fact that he's a serial killer. Look, he would have had to be blind to miss some of the pointers that Wire didn't give the mutagen to Havok." "Blind ... or not looking for them." "Yeah, that's what I think too." "So what did happen? Wildchild said you told them." "Hmph. Kinda silly, really. Just two government departments trying to outdo each other. You see, the FBI has always been in charge of investigating the mob. Apart from a few big bust, through, they've pretty much been in bed with them. Hoover could never bring himself to take action against them. A few years ago, the CIA sends one of their top operatives to infiltrate the mob, looking for people smuggling arms." "Hayden." "Yeah. Now, the FBI gets angry that the CIA's muscling in on their territory, they're also afraid that Hayden'll discover just how many agents are in the mob's pocket. The CIA get some major information that will let them clean up a whole arms smuggling ring. Problem is, it's protected by the FBI, so they need a really good reason. So they hear that the Brotherhood wants a chemical weapon that they can use for intimidation. Hayden sells it to them. Problem is, the FBI already has one of their men infiltrated in the Brotherhood." "Wire." "He buys the weapon, then gives it to the Bureau, together with information on what the CIA's trying to do. He then stages a huge gunfight and tells Havok that Hayden didn't give the bomb to him, tried to arrest him instead. Then the Bureau explodes the bomb in a low-market suburb - they don't lose much, they get a lot of attention focussed on the Brotherhood. “ The FBI sets Wire up to get caught by you, so he can escape and lead you to the Brotherhood. You wipe out the only evidence that they've done anything dirty. Meanwhile, in the firefight, Wire was meant to take out Forge, he being the only guy on the team who could have uncovered the whole mess. Problem is, Wire didn't know he was going to get caught, and the Brotherhood wanted to get rid of Hayden. So, when he gets caught, we find entry plans to the spook's house in his head. I couldn't have figured out what was going on without that. Howare you feeling?" "Like Ah'm back in the New Mutants." "What do you mean by that?" "Oh. Ah used tae get hit on the head all the time - aboot six times all up, four o' them in the first few months. Suddenly in the past week, Ah've been shot four times." "I meant, are you okay." "Aye, Ah feel fine. Maybe Ah'm healin' faster nowadays. It used tae take me a whole day to heal frae somethin' like this. Now, it's only been a few hours." She paused to think. "So why did the CIA want the Brotherhood tae get hold o' the bomb?" "They wanted to take down the whole smuggling ring and the Brotherhood at the same time. They thought that a chemical bomb would give them the reason. The FBI, meanwhile, also wanted the Brotherhood down, but they were willing to let the bomb go off to get enough attention focussed. They also wanted something to hold over the CIA - in this case, the knowledge that one of their spooks had sold a bomb to a terrorist who had set it off." "Tha's barbaric. I can hardly b'lieve tha' anyone could dae something like it." "Yeah, well, I've seen worse." "Ye poor man. Ye dinnae talk aboot it." "I don't want to. It's for me to bear - not you." Rahne hugged him. Polaris burst into the room, triumphant grin on her face. Rahne jumped back from Wisdom, embarrassed, and could see that Lorna had leaped to the wrong conclusion. Wisdom recovered first: "Where are Forge and Mystique?" "They went elsewhere. They had to do something else. Didn't say what. Now I'll have a talk to you later," she added to Rahne, a grin on her face. "Ah cannae b'lieve ye're doin' this. Ye dinnae remember why we founded the team?" "The government's changed. Their attitude to the team has changed. Because of that, we are no longer the same team and are no longer able to benefit mutants in the same way." "Ye're wrong. Forge could find out who's behind this and ye could make sure he never does it agin. Instead ye choose tae leave, doin' p'rhaps more damage tae the mutant cause than anyone else." "Look, Rahne, even if it is wrong, it's too late. We've already split, and there are soldiers around here, wanting to bring us in. We're going to get away by making them think we're dead." Sabretooth, Wildchild and Shard entered the room. Oddly for them, Wildchild and Shard were standing a ways apart from each other and Kyle refused to look anywhere near her, his expression somewhere inbetween depression and anger. "This is the only safe room in the house," Shard said. "The whole place is going to go nuke except for this room, which will just slide down the valley. We'll be hurt, but okay. Forge made us some harnesses to keep us from gettin too hurt." "Sorry you had to be here, Pete," said Sabretooth. "It's going to be messy." "What are you talking about?" Wisdom asked Sabretooth, looking at him side-on. Sabreooth was giving a guilty look if ever there was one. "Never mind," said Polaris. "Kyle, The army's about to come in. Hit the explosives." Wildchild hit a switch on the wall, and harnesses popped out of the walls. They all climbed in as the computer gave a thirty second countdown. Everyone, that is, except Sabretooth. "Why aren't you getting in?" "Don't want to. Just ride this baby all the way down." "Liar," said Rahne. "Ye've done something." She stopped getting into her harness. Creed shrugged "Yeah, you're right. I defuse the bombs. They aren't going off. You're all going into government custody." Rahne jumped at Creed just as the countdown reached zero as the bombs went off. The soldiers just gasped, unable to comprehend what was going on as the house exploded. They had been told that there was a bomb, but it had been defused. This was a change in plans. From the back of the pack was a commotion as Mystique shoved her way forward. She stared at the wreckage of the house. _You idiot, Creed. You never could do anything right._ Changing into a cougar, she leaped down the slope after the tumbling escape room. Soldiers scrambled out of her way as she barrelled past them, not caring whether she hurt any. This had all been planned perfectly - she already had Forge unconscious and secreted where no-one would find him, having lured him away on pretences of "personal business". _This_ was not meant to happen. Soldiers stared after her, a bit perplexed. It wasn't every day you saw a cougar with a sidearm. At the bottom of the valley, the room had burst open and those few lucky enough to have climbed into safety harnesses began to climb out of their cocoons. Rahne and Sabretooth lay unconscious quite a distance away from one another, bruises and surface cuts all over them. As Polaris looked out of her bubble, she tried to find the others, but they were too far away - the harnesses had all landed near one another, but Rahne and Creed were nowhere to be seen. She struggled out of her harness, managing to escape first. Aside from Shard, who was already down here and unhurt. Wildchild crawled out of his harness and checked Wisdom - he was alright, but slightly concussed. He wasn't as tough as most mutants, and had only managed to get half into his harness, having stopped when Creed said that he had defused the bombs. He should be round soon. "Putting in backup charges was definitely a good idea, Polaris," he said. "You had Creed pegged right. But what are we going to do now?" She opened her mouth to speak. BLAM! Shard saw Polaris spin grotesquely, then fall, blood trickling from a wound on her head. She didn't know how bad it was - she was too far away. "MYSTIQUE!" she yelled, leaping at the mass of red hair that held the gun which had hurt her friend. Three more bullets were fired, each passing through the hologram, but she didn't care. Firing her bolts at Mystique, she was made even more angry as the shapeshifter dodged even close-range shots which flew past her form, destroying trees, shrubbery, rocks, melting snow. Wildchild ran into the fray, but Shard yelled: "Go find Rahne! I can handle this woman. She can't even touch me!" As Kyle ran further down the slope, she fired a rapid volley of blasts as Mystique, hoping to break her concentration. Then she charged the woman, launching a vicious kick. Rahne slowly came to consciousness. She couldn't see well yet, but her sense of smell was better than ever. There was blood nearby - hers and Creed's. He was moving around too. She was probably down in the valley below Fall's Edge - she could smell trees, dirt and winter snow. She struggled to her feet, using a tree for support. She had to clear her head - Creed was conscious, and she couldn't have him sneaking up on her. She shook her head, trying to clear up her eyesight. It was then that she realised that she'd lost Creed. She could smell where he had been, but not where he was. But she could smell something else - she ducked just as a log swung with great strength slammed into the tree near where her head was. She could smell Creed all of a sudden, right behind her, pinning her arms to her sides, lifting her up into the air. "You're good, pup. Faster'n me. But I'm bigger, I'm stronger and I've got a longer reach. I'm going to eat your heart." She stopped struggling, began to focus her strength. "Why dae people always have tae think tha' aboot me? Jus' b'cause Ah'm a girl disnae mean Ah'm weaker." With that, she slipped down through Creed's grip, grabbing his arm as she went. She still could hardly see, but she could hear his arm swing back and forwards, heading towards her guts. She stood up, using the momentum of his swing to help her to throw him several metres away, his arc ending in a rather large tree. She could hear the thick trunk break as he slammed into it. As she hurried towards him, she wondered if he was dead already. "Good move," Creed mumbled, wiping away blood from his mouth. "You are strong, after all. Too bad. Won't save you. I'm still tougher." He charged her, and she met his wild swing with a punch straight to the stomach. It should have knocked him silly, but all it did was disrupt his swing, so he connected with his palm instead of his claws, knocking her away. _He is tough. Ah dinnae ken if Ah c'n take him down without hurtin' him._ She charged him this time, feinting with an outstretched claw, lashing out with her foot at the last minute, slamming her heel into his knee and jumping over his head before he could recover and stand up. She turned to see him again and he was already up and running at her, even though he was limping with his injured knee. Grabbing hold of the tree behind her, she lashed out with both feet at his head, sending him sprawling to the ground. She'd probably broken his nose. She jumped away again, back to a tree, goading him on to charge her again. She'd managed to get him angry. Now he'd be more dangerous but would do stupid things. _Ah've got tae take him oot now._ As he charge towards her one last time, she could see that he wasn't behaving properly, still smarting from her last hit. She stood her ground before his berserk fury, not afraid at his upraised claw, until he got right close. She jumped up, holding on to the branch above her head and curled up into a tight ball as he charged underneath her. He tried to jump to meet her, but between his stunning from the last blow and the yet-to-be-healed knee, he only managed to scrape her. Hoping that someday she may be forgiven, she swung her legs down the other side, then brought them up again, scraping her foot claws up his unprotected back, severing muscle and sinew as she did so. Blood spurted from the claw marks as he slumped to the ground, his arms no longer possessing the strength to swing, his legs suddenly paralysed with the pain. He tried to howl, but lacked the strength. Blood decorated the white snow. Rahne landed behind him, spinning in case she had failed to do what she had aimed. In fact, she'd done it better than she thought possible. Something in the back of her mind said that she should be sorry, that she was evil to have hurt another living being with her claws, but she didn't care. All she saw was a murderer sitting helpless in front of her. She could end it now, the life that had killed so many, betrayed everyone who had tried to help him. Already he was beginning to recover, his muscles knitting together, slowly. She raised her arm, claws extended, ready to sever his spine at his neck, for a moment the life of the killer that was Sabretooth hung in the balance, in the hands of a seventeen-year-old girl. Rahne lowered her arm. She couldn't do it. She couldn't kill him. As she made the decision, he slumped to the ground. His blood was no longer flowing, but the cuts had not healed properly. She looked at her handiwork. Eight long furrows up his back, starting at his hips and going up to in between his shoulder blades. She'd severed all of the major motive muscles in his back, as well as cracking a fair few ribs. No wonder he'd stopped healing. She'd probably overloaded his healing factor. Poor bastard wouldn't call her frail' any more. Hoisting him on to her shoulder, she began up the slope just as Wildchild came barrelling down. "You're alright?," he sounded hopeful, as though he wanted to help. "Aye, the big lug wis nae problem. Still smart a bit fae the fall, though. Where are the others?" "Shard's fighting Mystique. She shot Polaris; it wasn't bad, but we better get back up there before the soldiers get down." The fight had raged around the snow-scattered ground for a full minute now. It may not have been too long but to Mystique, who had been going all-out, it felt like forever. She still hadn't managed to get Shard in one of her momentary periods of solidity. Shard still hadn't made Mystique angry enough to make a mistake, but she wasn't getting any more tired. Unfortunately, soldiers were closing in, giving her a time limit. Neither of them noticed Wisdom, bleeding from a cut on his head, crawl out from his harness. He couldn't see Rahne anywhere - she better be okay, but she was probably fighting Sabretooth. He didn't think she was that good. If she'd survived the f all. He knew that he hadn't. _I need a whiskey_. All he could see was a mass of green hair with a red stain and yellow and blue fighting blue and red. He neededto see better before he could interfere. He sat down next to Polaris, turning her over. The bullet had only grazed her skull, and in any case wasn't too dangerous. It was probably only a steel core surrounded by a plastic shell. Bullets like them are used in riot control - the steel core won't penetrate too far, as it gets slowed down by the plastic shell getting stripped off. Polaris was already coming round. He could hear soldiers coming down the slopes. Probably be a few minutes, yet. He didn't know how Mystique had managed to get down so quickly. Wisdom's vision was starting to clear, helped somewhat by a light blast smashing the harness that he was leaning on, sending him sprawling. The cold of the snow helped somewhat, and he could now make out Mystique's face, and her gun. He put a hotknife through it. He missed slightly, going wide. But both combatants looked a little stunned, and Mystique recovered first, punching Shard in the head. She guesses right - the hologram had become solid in her indecision. She reeled back, not used to getting hurt, and Wisdom took a deep breath. The gun was swivelling up to shoot the girl, and he put another hotknife through the gun, then another through Mystique's leg. Both struck home this time, the one that struck the leg sending a great gout of superheated steam into the air, the sound of the steam explosion mixed with Mystiques scream at her lost leg. Wisdom made his way over to her, wishing that his knives did cauterise like he kept on telling people. All he wanted them to do was put holes in people; he was sick of their heat having these kinds of side-effects. She was already beginning to shape a new leg, having lost hers above the knee. As she heard Wisdom approach, she began to scrabble for her backup gun, biting her lip to keep the pain out. Wisdom saw what she was doing, and simply stopped a few metres away. He was quite an impressive sight: trickles of Polaris' blood on his long black trenchcoat, a bruised and battered face that was topped off by an incredibly angry mask. All this rounded off by half-formed hotknives emerging from his fingers, hands raised in claw-like positions, pointing at Mystique's head. "You know you can't make it. Just give up," he warned her. "What are you going to do with me?" "You know we can't carry you. We're just going to leave you here with your precious bleeding government. Sorry, but I'm intrigued to see what they'll do to you once you've failed this badly. Probably blame you for the explosion. Don't worry, you'll get to share a cell with Creed." He took her backup gun away from her and just walked away. Rahne was coming up the slope with Creed over her back. It was quite a sight; Creed was nearly four times her size but she was actually carrying the man. Wisdom smiled, he needn't have worried about her. She'd been in a lot of scraps. Polaris was already stirring and Shard had recovered. "Mister Wisdom, you're alright?" asked Rahne. "Yeah, I'm fine. Yourself?" "Alright. Polaris?" "I'm okay, kiddo. Just gotta get my bearing and deal with those soldiers. I hope one of you has a way to get out of here. I don't think I can carry myself, let alone all of you." "I've got that. I called the Flit over here. Braddock gave me an auto-recall unit that activates its autopilot. Should be here any minute now. If it didn't get shot down. You better take care of those soldiers,though." Polaris waved her hand and rocks rose up in front of the soldiers that had just come into sight, distracting them. Shard began to fire bolts into their midst - the soldiers reacted by diving for cover and firing at the group. They were firing non-ferrous slugs, but Polaris was able to simply disable the triggers on the guns. Continued firing from Shard forced the soldiers into retreat just as the Flit came down out of the skies, decloaking just above them. "Looks like we can take these two after all," Wisdom said, pointing to Mystique and Sabretooth. Rahne loaded them on, and they climbed on board with Polaris and Shard providing covering fire. Once the Flit had recloaked, all the military's might could not detect it. "Nice plane," Polaris noted. "Not the Blackbird." "Brian designed it himself, built it frae scratch wi' bits he ordered frae Hank." Polaris smiled. "Mail-order Shi'ar tech. I like it." "Ah hate tae get serious, bu' whit are ye goin' tae dae? C'n ye rejoin th' government?" "Well, we've already quit. I don't think they'll have us back." Wisdom cleared his throat. "Bull. We've got the names of the blokes behind all of this stuff. We offer the government a fair deal. We give them the names of a few people you want out, and they get fired. The people really high up, who are really responsible, get their necks saved, but you know who they are and Forge can keep an eye on them from now on. That should be good enough to get you back in and safe for at least a while. We just better get somewhere where we can talk about this with the rest of the teams. Any ideas?" "Well, there is Westchester," Rahne pointed out. "It is jus' where the X-Men and X-Force _live_." "Bloody hell. Nobody tells me anything. Hey, wait a minute. Where _is_ Forge?" The man known only as Forge woke in a large room, plushly furnished and comfortable-looking. Probably a hotel room, he thought. It was when he tried to move that he found he couldn't. He was spreadeagled and tied to the bed. He looked down. He was dressed in skimpy leather. Turning white, Forge realised who did this to him, and how difficult it was going to be to explain to the team. "MYSTIQUE!" he yelled, largely ineffectually. Next issue, Wolfsbane returns to Muir and finds some unexpected surprises in "Diamond Smiles". ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Stuart E. Palin (kweezil@hotmail.com) -------------------------------------------------------- "Only the insane have strength enough to succeed, Only those that succeed may truely judge what is sane." -------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ---------------------------------------------------------