A Very Honorable Mention

Escape Pod!!

I left a heartfelt comment here, and in the latest episode here, after the new story is read, at the 36:20 mark, Stephen Eley made my response the Comment Of The Week! He read a little bit of it, and now it'll be a part of Escape Pod history forever!

How cool is that? Especially when, at first shopping around with what to do with My Hero's fictional adventures, I asked Stephen if he'd consider fan-fiction for his show. He was very encouraging in his e-mail response, but told me 'no'. Then he invited me to write something that was sellable. Since then the fan-fiction has gone on into audio adventures, and I went on to write a novel in November (still out at Tor Books, sitting in the lap, I hope, of my favorite editor couple, one-half of which I discovered is up for a Hugo award as "Best Professional Editor - Long Form").

And while we're at it, here's a reference to the story that My Other Hero read for Escape Pod, which also made me cry. The fact that Alex lent his voice and his talent to it didn't hurt any. (Alex is another of those Real Men I spoke of earlier).

He Had To Beat Her Off With A Stick!!

My Hero, Feedback, had an interview with a beautiful reporter on MSNBC today about some controversial new statuette for Spiderman. The link is here.

"X-Men 2" (If **I** had written it); Prologue

X-MEN 2: “And Power Corrupts”

A Screenplay in Seven Acts by Alan White

This is a screenplay designed to create a sequel which will meet and surpass the expectations created by the first movie, “X-Men,” Directed by Bryan Singer and written by David Hayter. Many went into the first movie expecting more action from what they perceived as a superhero move. In the following story the number of mutants with demonstrable powers who have functional roles is greater, and there are more scenes of conflict between those mutants. This gives a chance for the special effects to far exceed that of the first movie, satisfying the desires of the action-craving summer movie audience. This script also seeks to stay true to the human story of our mutants, as well as provide the action that movie sequels need in order to leap ahead of their predecessor.
This story borrows several elements from earlier issues of Marvel Comics’ “Uncanny X-Men” (tm) originally written by Chris Claremont and John Byrne. Although Marvel retains the copyright of the characters of the Hellfire Club, Proteus, Moira MacTaggart, and Phoenix, the story elements, dialogue, and the usage of these characters herein owe a debt to how Mr. Claremont and Mr. Byrne first introduced them to comic fans everywhere.

(Afternote: This was written in 2000, and is at this point meant only to be a piece of fanfiction.)

CAST OF CHARACTERS

THE X-MEN
PROFESSOR CHARLES XAVIER
SCOTT SUMMERS, AKA CYCLOPS
LOGAN, AKA WOLVERINE
ORORO MUNROE, AKA STORM
JEAN GREY who will become PHOENIX
ROGUE

XAVIER’S STUDENTS & GUESTS
DANI
BOBBY
JUBILEE
KITTY
PETER aka Piotr
ILLYANA
Dr. MOIRA MacTAGGART
Other Assorted

THE HELLFIRE CLUB
SEBASTIAN SHAW, The Black King
EMMA FROST, The White Queen
JASON WYNGARDE, The Black Bishop
DONALD PIERCE, The White Bishop
CAROL DANVERS, The Black Queen
HARRY LELAND, The White Rook
REMY LEBEAU, AKA GAMBIT, The White Knight
TESSA, The Black Knight

THE MORLOCKS
NIGHTCRAWLER aka Kurt Wagner
BEAST aka Hank McCoy
CALISTO
LEECH
Other Assorted

THE SENTINELS
#1 through #6

PROTEUS

X-MEN 2:“And Power Corrupts”

OPENING ACT
Scene One-A Delivery Room
(A woman is having a difficult birth in a delivery room. She is attended by five nurses and a doctor. When finally the baby is delivered, it’s eyes glow. As it cries for food, a sudden mist comes from it and the nurses are drained of their lifeforce by the mist, they die agonizing deaths. The doctor manages to sock the child away into a containment chamber, an infant-sized cabinet in the wall, as the doctor dies from the draining effect.)
(Only the mother is left alive and untouched.)

Scene Two-Pan Out from the Delivery Room
(As the camera slowly pans back, we see a cold, sterile base surrounds this birthing chamber where automated drones are taking the baby away.)

Scene Three-The same Base; advance forward in time
(Establish an ‘aging’ of the base to impress the passage of time.)
(Pan in to a different area of the base where we see WOLVERINE on the hunt. The base is dark and haunting. WOLVERINE seems to be going on instinct alone. As he rounds a corner, he gets a flash of memory . . .)

Scene Four-Flashback, Slow Motion
(. . . We see LOGAN in the same spot in the base, only the set is better lit, LOGAN looks younger--less gruff, cleaner cut--and he is accompanied by a beautiful blonde female. They wear “espionage” clothing . . .)

Scene Five-Present day, Base
(. . . WOLVERINE is back to himself and continues forward. He comes to a catwalk overlooking the chamber which haunts his dreams; coffin-sized experimentation tanks, glass cabinets full of dissecting instruments. Again he has a flashback . . .)

Scene Six-Flashback, Slow Motion
(. . . in the past, this was the place LOGAN and his blonde fellow agent separate along the catwalk. The blonde is struck down, LOGAN gives himself away with a cry of anger, and then is struck down.)

Scene Seven-Present day, Base
(WOLVERINE is stunned by these memories, they are surfacing for the first time. )
(He is discovering that the base isn’t completely deserted. There is a patrol of four GUARDS and a young SCRUFFY-LOOKING MAN dressed in a high-collared trench coat. He has black eyes with red pupils.)
(WOLVERINE attacks without hesitation. He takes out two guards before the SCRUFFY-MAN steps in with a bo-stick. WOLVERINE chops the stick down, forcing the scruffy man to begin using his power to charge the stick pieces and throw them at WOLVERINE. They explode off WOLVERINE, knocking him to the ground.)

SCRUFFY
(Cajun accent) You’re here t’find answers, no? Killin’ me’s not gunna git ya dat, mon ami.

WOLVERINE
At this point satisfaction is all I’m lookin’ for.
(WOLVERINE charges the man again. It is hard for him to fight the projectiles, but it doesn’t incapacitate him. He dodges some of the projectiles and they hit control panels in the walls behind him.)
(The control panel begins to short out in the wall behind WOLVERINE.)
(The two GUARDS who survived WOLVERINE’S attack look panicked.)
(The SCRUFFY YOUNG MAN looks panicked as well.)
(We follow their attention to an upright, man-sized glass cylinder framed with metal. There is liquid in the cylinder which begins to drain due to the damaged controls.)

SCRUFFY
Ain’t none o’us gonna get enny satisfaction if we don’t get out of here an’ right NOW.

WOLVERINE
What the hell is that.

(The liquid has drained completely away and inside is a DESICCATED FIGURE-which begins to stir. The eyes of the FIGURE glow and the glass cylinder morphs into floating blobs, freeing the figure. Note that the metal does not morph)
(This event impacts on WOLVERINE with a markedly noticeable panic. Terror grips him and his posture reflects it.)

DESICCATED FIGURE
Humannnn . . . I . . . hungerrrr . . .

(A misty essence looking identical to the mist from the newborn INFANT in the first two scenes leaves the DESICCATED FIGURE and flows into a human GUARD.)

GUARD #1
Oh god!! Mr. Gambit help me . . . please!!!

(The GUARD’S personality changes from terror to satisfaction. The sound of the voice goes hollow abnd the eyes glow.)

Ah, but this weak human shell will not last.
(The GUARD’S body begins to age and whither.)

GAMBIT (SCRUFFY)
Party’s oveh. Run f’r your lives!

(WOLVERINE, GAMBIT, and the other guard run.)
(GUARD #2 is caught just before GUARD #1's body crumbles to powder.)
(Soon GUARD #2 eyes are glowing, but the body begins to decay.)
(GAMBIT and WOLVERINE are all that is left running until the mist catches up to them)
(The mist seeps into WOLVERINE)

WOLVERINE
(Fearfully, which is a new sound to us fans.) No! What is it . . . get this OUT OF ME . . . (WOLVERINE’S speech dissolves into a gargle of defeat, then his personality changes. His voice goes hollow and his eyes glow.)

WOLVERINE/PROTEUS
After so long. Seems the experiment is over.
(The floor and walls around WOLVERINE/PROTEUS begin to warp.)

GAMBIT
(Running and escaping.) Nuh, Proteus. It’s just begun.

WOLVERINE/PROTEUS
This body is so strong-and it heals itself! It’s wonderf-(Suddenly WOLVERINE/PROTEUS screams long and loud.)

(GAMBIT seems to know what’s happening to WOLVERINE/PROTEUS. He smiles wryly and then completes his escape.)

"X-Men 2" Act One

ACT ONE
Scene One; ROGUE’S Bedroom, shared with KITTY and JUBILEE.
(ROGUE rustles the sheets in her sleep. She’s having the same nightmarish dreams WOLVERINE had in the first movie, only, he is submerged in the upright water-tank which PROTEUS has escaped from in the Opening Act. WOLVERINE sees her standing outside the cage. His face displays terror, he speaks underwater to her but in this dream scenario his voice is heard.)

WOLVERINE
Please . . . please Carol. . . don’t let them do this to me . . .

(ROGUE wakes up with a peal of terror. She wakes JUBILEE and KITTY.)

JUBILEE
Shit!!
(Fireworks crackle from her body.)

KITTY
Aaah!
(KITTY pops through the wall.)

JUBILEE
Whatthehell!

ROGUE
Professor Xavier . . . ah gotta see him.
(ROGUE runs out of the room.)

Scene Two; STORM’S Bedroom
(From behind STORM, we see her open her door onto the hallway. We do not see STORM’S face.)
(From inside her own bedroom KITTY pokes her head out through the wall, a ways down from STORM.)

KITTY
Rogue, wait!

STORM
What is this commotion? You girls aren’t having pillow fights are you? We cannot have Jubilee blowing holes in the furniture again . . .


JUBILEE
(Comes out of her room by opening her door.)
Umm? I’m so sure Ms. Munroe! Like I got nothing better to do than wreck furni-eep!
(JUBILEE sees STORM’s face. We still don’t.)
KITTY
Nothing like that Ms. Munroe-(gasps when she takes note of STORM’S face).


Scene Three-PROFESSOR XAVIER’S study.
(PROFESSOR XAVIER is here alone, ROGUE enters; breathless, panicked.)

ROGUE
Professor Xavier, it’s Logan, he’s in trouble, I don’t know what it is but I know it’s really bad--

XAVIER
And good morning to you as well.

ROGUE
(Exhales) Good morning Professor. Wolverine needs us, right now!

XAVIER
How do you know this, Rogue?

ROGUE
I . . .well . . . I dreamed it, but . . . it was real Professor ah swear!

XAVIER
I know better than to disbelieve matters of the mind, don’t worry. It may be you forged a psychic link when you borrowed Logan's powers a few months ago, and it is still remaining. Possibly you are receiving images which he is currently experiencing. If you’ll allow me, I'd like to eavesdrop on that . . .
(XAVIER concentrates, is about to place his hands aside ROGUE'S face. She jerks back.)

How foolish of me. I'm sorry Rogue, I wasn't thinking. I don't need to touch you to read your mind.


Scene Four; ROGUE’S Mind
(XAVIER enters the Nightmarish Laboratory. He is walking.)

VOICE OF PROTEUS
I hungerrrrr . . . .

(XAVIER slowly turns, terror gripping him. What he sees makes him yell with fear.)

Scene Five; Xavier’s Study
(XAVIER recoils in his wheelchair as if falling backwards from a standing position. Most of the wheelchair, however, dissolves into a cluster of floating blobs and XAVIER lands on the floor. Note that the metal frame of XAVIER’S wheelchair remains untouched.)
(ROGUE is confused as things around her begin to discorporate, turning into clouds of butterflies or melting into goo.)
(SCOTT and JEAN arrive.)
SCOTT
(Rushes to XAVIER on the floor.) Professor!

XAVIER
Rogue forgive me . . .
(XAVIER reaches out and renders ROGUE unconscious with his power.)

SCOTT
Jean, catch her.

(ROGUE falls.)

JEAN
Ahead of you on that, love.
(JEAN gestures and stops ROGUE’S body from hitting the floor with her telekinesis.)

XAVIER
Scott, take Jean and Storm and suit up. Logan is in trouble.
(JEAN reacts with interest, SCOTT notices.)

SCOTT
(Small grunt.) But what’s happening in here?

XAVIER
I don’t know Scott, but it seems the answers begin with Logan.

(STORM enters with KITTY, JUBILEE, and other young mutants trailing-name them BOBBY, DANI, PETER (a young but huge and muscular dark-haired boy) holding the hand of small, blond, 8-yr old ILLYANA. We only see STORM from behind. SCOTT and XAVIER look up as she enters.)

SCOTT
Ororo, good timing. Logan’s ass needs saving again-
(SCOOT gasps as he notices STORM’S face.)

STORM
Why is everyone doing that to me this morning?

XAVIER
Ororo, are you in any pain?

(Now we see STORM’S face. Her pupils are narrow and robin’s-egg blue.)

STORM
Why no, of course not.

XAVIER
Jean take Rogue back to her room, then join Scott in the jet, please. Jubilee, Kitty, watch after Rogue if you would. Ororo first I think a mirror, and then and a few moments of your time will explain some things.

"X-Men 2" Act Two

ACT TWO
Scene One; The X-Jet streaks across the Canadian landscape.
Scene Two; Jet Interior
(CYCLOPS pilots, STORM co-pilots, JEAN navigates.)

CYCLOPS
You certain you feel okay?

STORM
(Smiling.) That question is beginning to annoy me.

CYCLOPS
(Returning the smile.) It’s just that you look so . . . different.

STORM
They are just eyes, Cyclops.

JEAN
And the widow’s peak, Ororo. We’re not used to seeing that.

STORM
You would prefer I combed my hair down into bangs again?

CYCLOPS
Just want to make sure my team’s fit enough to handle whatever can put Wolverine in trouble.

JEAN
(After a beat.) If I didn’t know better, I’d say that sounded like you almost respected his abilities.

CYCLOPS
Yeah, I’m responsible like that. Okay, we have the base sighted. I’m going in on stealth mode. Storm . . . I think we won’t do the fog cover again. That proved to be as bad as a big black jet appearing over the horizon.
STORM
Why not land at a distance? I believe I can get us to the base a bit more stealthily than the jet or a bank of fog.

Scene Three; Mountain Pass clearing
(The X-Jet circles the Canadian base at a distance and lands.)

Scene Four; X-Jet exterior
(CYCLOPS, JEAN, and STORM disembark from the Jet.)

STORM
Jean if you can hold us together with your telekinesis I believe I can channel a jetstream to carry us.

JEAN
I thought you didn’t have that kind of control. You could smash us all into the mountains.

STORM
No . . . I'm feeling a greater affinity for the elements than I used to. Trust me.

(JEAN checks visually with CYCLOPS)

CYCLOPS
Are you sure Ororo? It’d be a shame coming this far just to end up a smear across the Canadian Rockies.

STORM
I am sure.

CYCLOPS
Okay Jean, you heard the lady. Brace us.

(JEAN concentrates, and STORM summons the wind. The three slowly lift. Gain acceleration, then rocket over the mountain range.)

Scene Five; Rogue’s bedroom
(JUBILEE and KITTY are reading various teen magazines.)

JUBILEE
Cho! BOR-ing!

(BOBBY, PETER, and little ILLYANA come in to check on ROGUE.)

BOBBY
How’s she doing?

JUBILEE
Oh, please, Bobby. Little Miss I’m-So-Important will live.

KITTY
Have a heart, Jubes. She’s been through a lot since coming here.

JUBILEE
She can take a number!

BOBBY
No need to go comparing battle scars.

ROGUE
(Waking) What happened?

KITTY
Don’t you remember?

ROGUE
Yeah, ah do. What’s the Professor going to do for Wolverine?

JUBILEE
Going to? Did. The teachers got sent as usual. Did Xavier ever consider sending one of us with? Or doesn’t he know some of our powers are just as good as theirs?

ROGUE
Where’d he send them?

BOBBY
Canada. To that funky base at Alkali Lake the Prof told him about when he left.

ROGUE
What about Fifth Avenue?

JUBILEE
Um, great shopping, cool museums, Central Park East, badass. What am I forgetting?

ROGUE
Unfinished business for Wolverine. (Begins to get out of bed.)

PETER
(Russian accent) Nyet, Rogue, you cannot go anywhere so soon.

ROGUE
Care to physically restrain me, Petey? Ah could use your powers to help me if ya want to try.

(They all step back from the bed as ROGUE gets up goes to her closet. She turns back to her friends.)

ROGUE
Ya’ll know ah wouldn’t hurt a hair on your heads, dontcha?

ILLYANA
I know you wou’int Marie! (Goes to hug ROGUE. PETER holds her back.)

ROGUE
(ROGUE looks profoundly sad, then squats to ILLYANA’S level.) Now you know ya can’t go touchin’ me or (ROGUE makes a scary face and suction noise.) Shhhlllp!!

(ILLYANA laughs.)

ROGUE
But you c’n hold onto this for me until I get back, okay? (Hands ILLYANA her teddy bear.)

ILLYANA
‘Kay!

JUBILEE
Where do you think you’re going?

ROGUE
Nuh-uh, sugah. What you don’t know, the Professor can’t read.

JUBILEE
Um, duh Rogue. Cerebro, hello? He found us all at one time, he can do it again.

ROGUE
I still get a little head start this way an’ you don’t get the guilts for ratting me out.


Scene Six; The Recesses of the Canadian Base
(STORM, CYCLOPS, and JEAN make their way through the base’s deserted corridor. Something ahead snarls.)

CYCLOPS
Jean, up ahead-what’s making that noise?

JEAN
I can’t get any organized thoughts from it. Just emotions . . . feral impressions. It must not be human.

CYCLOPS
Are we any closer to Wolverine?

JEAN
I can only scan so many things at once, hon-and I can’t determine distance.

CYCLOPS
Fair enough.
I don’t know how you two see the world, but I could use a little more light in here.
(Suddenly the corridor is lit from ball lightning dancing in STORM’S hand.)

CYCLOPS
You never could do that before.

STORM
I suppose this . . . my eyes, these new powers . . . I am still evolving. And you know-I believe that I like it.

JEAN
(Brief flash of sadness on JEAN’S face. Possibly jealousy. Then suddenly something she senses something) Heads up!

(A pack of wolves come into the corridor from both sides, surrounding them.)

JEAN
Dammit! How could I have missed them?

CYCLOPS
It’s okay, your concentration was too . . .

JEAN
No excuses, Scott. This is our asses on the line here. Unless you can shoot your optic blasts out of the back of your head, one of these wolves are going to get us.

STORM
Not necessarily. Cyclops, you handle the front. I will take the back. Jean, you may detain any stragglers.

CYCLOPS
There’s no open sky here to bring lightning down from, Storm.

STORM
I no longer need an open sky.
(STORM fans her fingers toward the rear corridor. Ball lightning encases her hands just before the electricity arcs out and blasts into the animals.)

CYCLOPS
Right.
Covering the front quarter.
(CYCLOPS pivots, dials his visor, and begins blasting the onrushing wolves.)

(JEAN successfully stops one wolf which escaped CYCLOPS’ blasts and CYCLOPS finishes it.)

CYCLOPS
Good job.
(They proceed and round a corner where, to their surprise, they find WOLVERINE huddled on the ground.)

STORM
Logan?

(CYCLOPS takes the lead, cautioning STORM and JEAN with a hand.)

CYCLOPS
Wolverine?

(CYCLOPS nears LOGAN, crouches and touches him tentatively.)

CYCLOPS
Logan, are you alr-

(LOGAN explodes with a shriek of terror and scrambles away from CYCLOPS. He goes cowering into a corner.)

JEAN
What’s . . . what is the matter with him? (JEAN approaches CYCLOPS and then goes beyond him towards LOGAN.)

(LOGAN looks like a hurt and scared. He snarls but the fear is raw on his face.)

STORM
Careful Jean. He is a cornered animal right now and very afraid.

JEAN
Meager as my talents are, Ororo, I can at least stop him if he charges. And after all, I am a telepa-!

(LOGAN charges, taking JEAN unaware. An optic blast from CYCLOPS knocks LOGAN unconscious.)

JEAN
Scott! (JEAN runs to LOGAN and cradles him. She gives an angry look back to SCOTT.)

CYCLOPS
What? You’d rather I let him tear out your throat?

JEAN
Logan would never do that to me.

CYCLOPS
(After a beat.) I’m glad you know him so well.

"X-Men 2" Act Three"

ACT THREE
Scene One; Professor Xavier’s Study
(XAVIER’S holding class for three of the youngest kids in the school. DANI is his teacher’s aid. It looks like kindergarten. ILLYANA is one of the three. Suddenly ILLYANA cries out in pain and falls to the ground, moaning. DANI runs to her, cradles her.)

DANI
Illyana what’s the matter?

(DANI inspects and find a scaly, rotted patch on ILLYANA’S arm.)

DANI
Professor, look at this! What is it?

XAVIER
I don’t know but it’s hurting her terribly.

JEAN’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
Professor, we’ve arrived safely back with Logan. He’s alive but . . . something’s wrong.

XAVIER’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
Meet us in the laboratory Jean.

Scene Two; The Medilab
(PETER, DANI, XAVIER, CYCLOPS and STORM are with ILLYANA, who is on an examination table. JEAN and a now-conscious LOGAN are off to one side. LOGAN still seems skittish, unsettled.)

JEAN
(Tenderly) Logan, what happened over the last few months?

(Logan remains withdrawn.)

You can talk to me, Logan. You’re among friends again.

LOGAN
Am I? I don’t know what to believe anymore Jeannie. Something’s wrong. It . . .it’s as if a part of me’s missing. As if I’ve gone blind or deaf. Something in me has shut down.

(They are joined by CYCLOPS and XAVIER.)

XAVIER
Logan, what did you find?

LOGAN
(Giving XAVIER a look.) Nothin’.

CYCLOPS
Something up there had you pretty spooked.

XAVIER
(Impatient.) Logan, here, let me . . . (reaches out with his telepathy)

LOGAN
No!! (LOGAN slaps his hand away.) Stay the hell outta my head!! (He pops his claws and prepares to impale XAVIER.)

(A small tornado whips LOGAN around and bashes him into a wall. He falls in a heap.)

DANI
Ms. Munroe, you could never . . !

STORM
“. . .do that before.” Yes I know.

CYCLOPS
Logan, what the hell’s the matter with you? You know the Professor’s trying to help you.

LOGAN
(More frightened than angry.) No I don’t . . . I don’t know anythin’ right now, I told you! I . . I’m worse off than I've ever been . . .

XAVIER
Whatever happened to you Logan, Rogue seems to have picked it up through the link she has with you. You found something-someone in that base, and somehow, she absorbed a brief sample of it’s power without even being in the same country as it was. Now I’m afraid that what she absorbed may have caused young Illyana’s illness.

PETER
Do you mean, like a contagion?

JEAN
I’m afraid so, Piotr. What’s happening to your sister is very like a virus, triggering her mutant chromosomes, causing a cancerform corruption. If we can’t isolate it . . . it could take her life.

STORM
If you cannot isolate it, could it not also spread?

XAVIER
Yes, it could.
You must tell me everything you’ve learned, Logan. And it would help if I could have Rogue down here with us-(brief moment of telepathy, then actual amusement) she’s gone again.

DANI
Now you know why she calls herself “Rogue”.

Scene Three; Fifth Avenue, New York City
(ROGUE climbs the steps of a colonial facade townhouse. It is on Central Park East, we can see the Park across the street. Aside each door is a brass plaque bearing the image of a pitchfork and flames.)

Scene Four; Hellfire Club Interior, Foyer
(ROGUE is admitted into the foyer where she’s greeted by a HOSTESS. All the decor is Early English as are the costumes on the hired help.)

ROGUE
Hi, I’ve an appointment? I was told to use the phrase, “Inner Circle.”

HOSTESS
Just a moment.

(HOSTESS departs. Moments later, a woman dressed in a black parlor maid’s uniform comes out and extends a hand in greeting.)

TESSA
Hello, Rogue. I am Tessa and I screen our third-level applicants.

(ROGUE, who is wearing her customary long gloves, returns the handshake.)

TESSA
(Smiles.) That’s all it took actually. You’ve qualified for the Inner Circle interview. Follow me please?

(TESSA leads ROGUE into the back corridors and through a secret wall panel, up a flight of stairs into the Inner Circle.)

Scene Five; Hellfire Club Interior, Inner Circle
(It looks very much like an eighteenth century courtroom, with a ceiling skylight. In the judge’s spot is Sebastion SHAW, the Black King. To his left and right are Jason WYNGARDE, The Black Bishop, and Donald PIERCE, the White Bishop. Next to Pierce is Emma FROST, the White Queen, and next to WYNGARDE is Carol DANVERS, the Black Queen. Their colonial dress implies their rank with all except crowns. FROST and DANVERS are wearing revealing laced bodices, fur lined capes, and thigh boots with stiletto heels.
(DANVERS is someone we’ve met before. She is the blond woman who was with LOGAN in the Opening’s Flashback scenes. She is different, however, age and experience taking it’s toll.)

SHAW
Greetings to the Hellfire Club. I am the Black King, flanking me are my Black and White Bishops, and my Black and White Queens.

ROGUE
(A bit timidly), What position are y’looking to fill-not a Pawn ah hope?

SHAW
(Laughs) No, my dear. We leave those slots open for humanity. As you’ve no doubt read in our literature, we espouse the ‘mutant politic’. This is something you are interested in?

ROGUE
Well I’ve tried the pro-active version of dealing with humanity. Cain’t say I liked it a whole lot.

SHAW
How so?

ROGUE
If y’all are about politics, then you should know about the near flash-frying of Ellis Island a few months back. A madman was using me as the fuse.

SHAW
Only Magneto was found when that was all over. You don’t mean him?

ROGUE
The one an’ the same.

SHAW
How ever did you survive?

ROGUE
Some friends helped me. Saved mah life really.

SHAW
Emma, who were these friends?

FROST
(Reads ROGUE’S mind, causing some pain to ROGUE.) Xavier’s people. This girl’s a student up at his school.

ROGUE
Rude! I’d have told you.

FROST
Sebastian, she has quite the agenda for coming here today.

SHAW
For us or against?

FROST
(Smiles slyly.) Come girl, confess. There are no secrets from the White Queen.

ROGUE
I . . . I have a friend that you all might know. His name is Wolverine. You gave him this (Produces LOGAN’s dogtags from a pocket.) . . . among other things.

DANVERS
Logan!

FROST
(Almost spitefully.) Yes, Logan. Seems he’s been out winning hearts again, Black Queen.

(DANVERS launches from her seat, literally flying, and hovers before ROGUE. She makes to snatch the dogtags but ROGUE steps back.)

DANVERS
Where’d you get those?

ROGUE
Why don’t we trade information? A piece from me for a piece from you. Logan only wants to know who he was before you . . . experimented on him.

DANVERS
Oh there will be a piece taken from you, alright!

PIERCE
(To WYNGARDE) Are you going to let your Queen maul our new applicant?

WYNGARDE
Well, there is the matter of an entrance fee.

ROGUE
(Stripping off her gloves easily, which are velcroed on.)
(To DANVERS,) Ah wouldn’t if ah were you.

Scene Six; Hellfire Club Exterior, Fifth Avenue
(The Xavier Bentley arrives and parks across the street from the club, on the Park side.
(Inside are SCOTT, ORORO, JEAN and LOGAN.)

SCOTT
Ororo, we’ll need you to stay here. We may need a powerhouse to bail us out.
Logan, can we be sure Rogue picked up the name “Hellfire Club” from your subconscious memories?

LOGAN
(Subdued, as if dreading) I dunno, bub, that’s why they call it a subconscious. I can only go by what Charley said when I finally let him into my head. But I do know this . . . they’re mutants. Just like us. Knowing that, I don’t even care why they did this to me as much as how. How could they run experiments . . . (voice begins to reflect his hurt) . . . torture . . . their own kind?

ORORO
You sound as though you've forgotten something, Logan. We're all human, but humans have been doing this to one another since ever they crawled out of the primordial ooze.

SCOTT
And now they’ve got Rogue. Let’s move out.

(SCOTT, JEAN, and LOGAN move across the street to the Club. ORORO gets out of the car and stands on the sidewalk. She doesn’t notice a flash of pink light and a puff of dark smoke behind Central Park’s wall. In that cloud of smoke, we see two glowing yellow eyes gazing at her.)
(She does, however sniff something pungent in the air.)


Scene Seven; Hellfire Club Interior, Foyer
(SCOTT is stopped in the foyer by the HOSTESS. LOGAN seems almost timid in the background.)

HOSTESS
May I help you sir?

SCOTT
Yes, we’re here looking for a female friend of ours. A little shorter than me, medium-length brown hair with a thick white streak in the middle.

HOSTESS
Ah, I’m sorry sir, the Club has a strict policy of confidentiality. I couldn’t confirm or deny anyone who may have entered today.

JEAN
(Reading HOSTESS’ mind.) She’s seen her, Scott.

HOSTESS
(Surprised, then blows the whistle which hangs around her neck.)

SCOTT
Hey lady, we’re not looking for any trouble, we just want . . .
(Several modern-looking, sleek-suited soldiers enter the foyer coming through sliding wall panels, holding technological rifle-weapons.
(They make the first move, shooting LOGAN. The shot throws him into the wall but he is not knocked out. However, he only remains crouching, almost cowering.)
(JEAN uses her TK to throw off the aim of the remaining soldiers’ guns and SCOTT blasts them back into the walls with his optic blasts.)
(An immensely fat man enters the foyer, dressed in colonial wear, and raises his hand.)
(JEAN, SCOTT, and LOGAN are suddenly flattened to the ground. SCOTT cannot even lift his head or his arm to use his visor.)

FAT MAN
I’m Harry Leland. If you continue to struggle, I’ll make you so heavy your bones will crush.

JEAN
(Telepathically into LOGAN's mind) Logan-your bones are unbreakable-can you-fight against-him-?

LOGAN
(We here his rambling, panicked thoughts reflecting the look on his strained face) I’ve got to get out of here . . . they’re going to . . . I can’t let them do this to me again . . !

Scene Eight; Hellfire Club Interior, Inner Circle
(ROGUE is doing her best to escape The Black Queen, DANVERS, who can not only fly but is super strong, as shown by DANVERS’ ability to crush and throw slabs of courtroom furniture at ROGUE. Finally ROGUE rolls forward under the thrown objects, closing in on DANVERS, and plants her bare palms against DANVERS’ exposed skin. DANVERS hasn’t even a chance to scream as she falls.)

Scene Nine; Hellfire Club Interior, Foyer
(The guards are trained on SCOTT, JEAN, and LOGAN again as they remain flattened to the floor. LELAND stands over them, using his power. TESSA rushes in.)

TESSA
Harry, bring them, quickly.

Scene Ten; Hellfire Club Interior, Inner Circle
(At techno-rifle point, SCOTT, JEAN, and LOGAN are brought into the Inner Circle courtroom. SHAW, WYNGARDE, and FROST are standing in the midst of the fight debris, PIERCE remains seated in the judges’ chairs.)

SCOTT
(Whispering.) Jean, call Storm.

JEAN
(Whispering.) Something is blocking my telepathy.

FROST
That would be me, Ms. Grey. No need to whisper. To me, your thoughts are like shouts.

LOGAN
(Sees past the Hellfire members and into the rubble of ROGUE’S fight behind them.)
No!
(LOGAN tries to rush past the Members but LELAND drives him to his knees. LOGAN fights and is able to crawl to where ROGUE stands petrified, and DANVERS is laying still with her eyes open.)
(LOGAN crawls past ROGUE to cradle DANVERS body as ROGUE looks on.)
She isn’t breathing. She’s not breathing! What have you bastards done to her?!!

SHAW
Wasn’t us, Logan. It was your young friend there.

LOGAN
No! It was you-fifteen years ago-whatever you did to make her stay with you-you as good as killed her back then!

ROGUE
(No trace of her Mississipian accent, she sounds like a different person.) Logan, you knew it was always a matter of finding out how to best survive in a world that hated us. I joined them because The Hellfire Club offered what we were looking for-that best way.

LOGAN
(Pops his claws as he addresses ROGUE, without seeming to realize who he is speaking to.)
You call this (his claws) the best way, Carol? Leaving me . . . to them . . . was the best way?

SCOTT
(Giving a poignant look at LOGAN and what he’s experiencing.)
(JEAN leaves SCOTT’s side and goes to LOGAN.)

JEAN
Logan, we’re here-we won’t leave you behind. Not like this. You aren’t in the past anymore. That’s Rogue, Logan. It isn’t . . . Carol . . . it's Rogue.

FROST
True, but what you hear is the memory-the personality if you will-of the woman she just killed.

ROGUE
(Blinking, ROGUE comes back to herself and realizes what FROST has just said. She sees DANVERS’ lifeless body in LOGAN’S arms.)
(With a shriek of terror, she launches into the air and through the ceiling skylight.)

Scene Eleven; Hellfire Club Exterior, Fifth Avenue
(ORORO sees ROGUE bash through the Hellfire Club’s roof and hears her scream. ORORO lifts her arms and whooshes herself up into the sky after ROGUE on a tight wind. ORORO catches up to a hovering ROGUE.)

ROGUE
I really did it this time, Ms. Munroe . . . I really did it . . . I . . . killed her . . . I killed her!
(Breaks down sobbing.)

(ORORO can only look. She reaches to hold ROGUE and comfort her, but she knows she cannot.)

Scene Twelve; Hellfire Club Interior, Inner Circle

SHAW
You can tell your young murdering friend that her application has been formally denied.

WYNGARDE
Although we do have a sudden new opening for a Black Queen. (Eyes Jean hungrily.)

SCOTT
Look, I’m . . . sorry for what happened here, but Rogue came looking for answers to what you people did to Logan fifteen years ago.

FROST
Now that she’s sucked Carol Danvers’ brain dry, you’ll find she has all the answers Logan will ever need. That is, if you can restore enough of the little skunk's sanity to get a coherent response.

SHAW
Which is nothing compared to the price we have paid for your answers. I want you out of my court, X-Men. Your debt will be settled at a later date, rest assured.

(JEAN coaxes LOGAN away from DANVERS’ body. He enfolds her, full of hurt, needing comfort. JEAN gives it.)

SCOTT
Let’s go Jean. We’re done here.

(SCOTT leads JEAN, who is supporting LOGAN, out of the courtroom.)
(TESSA closes the door behind them.)

SHAW
(To TESSA) Do you still retain their mutant signatures?

TESSA
Like a sweet memory, my Black King.

SHAW
Attend the White Bishop then, Black Knight.

(TESSA approaches the bench, PIERCE stands in his seat and glowers down at her. He raises his arms and cybernetic tendrils extend from his arms, wrapping TESSA’S head. Bioelectric charges snake along the tendrils and PIERCE receives “messages” from TESSA.)
(GAMBIT appears from the side chambers, dressed in white colonial array.)

GAMBIT
Shaw, you don’ really plan to do any spite to the X-Men, do ya?

SHAW
They have drawn first blood, White Knight.

GAMBIT
It was an accident. You know that girl had no control.

SHAW
A long time ago, Remy, when I crushed your pickpocketing hand in New Orleans, I told you that we are all responsible for our own actions.

GAMBIT
She was bein’ used, Shaw, an’ you know that. You as much as fed the Black Queen to her!

WYNGARDE
You sacrifice a piece for a new vantage. Have you learned nothing while being with us?

GAMBIT
(Resentful.) Yeh. Mebbe too much.

PIERCE
(Withdraws his cybernetic tendrils from around TESSA’S head.) I have what I need Shaw.

SHAW
Then let us begin.

"X-Men 2" Act Four

ACT FOUR
Scene One; Xavier Institute Interior, Medilab.
(ORORO has returned to the Medilab, finding a new person has arrived who is standing with XAVIER and PETER. She is a smallish woman, short, straight brown hair, round-rim glasses, speaking with an Irish brogue-this is Dr. Moira MacTAGGART. Also, ILLYANA’s condition has worsened, the “infection” has spread across her upper body.)

ORORO
Dr. MacTaggart! I’m so glad you could join us.

MacTAGGART
Storm. I understand your powers have b’come more acute?

ORORO
And not mine only. Professor . . . Rogue has . . . there’s been a terrible accident and Rogue killed one of the mutants of the Hellfire Club. She insists that it was only a brief touch and then-it was all over.

XAVIER
(Pauses for a beat.) Which one was it.

ORORO
I’m sorry? You know them?

XAVIER
They have made . . . offers in the past for my membership.

ORORO
It was Carol Danvers, their Black Queen. Who are they Professor? If we would’ve known we were facing dangerous mutants we could have been better prepared.

XAVIER
I don’t know the Hellfire Club to be overtly aggressive, Ororo. Subtlety is more their strength. I wasn’t as concerned for your welfare as much as I am for Illyana.

(We see ILLYANA’S prone body.)

Scene Two; Mansion Interior, Large stark metal room.
(A door opens and LOGAN enters. SCOTT is just behind him. He also enters and closes the door behind them, sealing them in. Scott crosses the room, leaving LOGAN by the exit.)

LOGAN
(Subdued.) What is this, Cyke? What’d you bring me here for?

SCOTT
Consider this a debriefing. I want you to tell me what the hell you thought you were doing back there?

LOGAN
(We seem to see LOGAN’S age weighing on him here.) You petty-ass little boy. Is this about Jean, again?

SCOTT
(Laughs to himself.)
(SCOTT lets go a small optic blast which tags LOGAN in the shoulder, spinning him around and landing him on his knees. The pain forces him to growl, but his face looks more hurt than angry.)

It’s about the team, Logan. We needed you back there. In case you hadn’t noticed, the Hellfire Club handed us our heads.

(SCOTT looses another blast, slamming LOGAN against the metal wall.)

SCOTT
(To the air) Activate protocol Summers-Alpha. Bypass target Scott Summers.

(Suddenly metal tendrils whip from the ceiling to ensnare LOGAN and suspend him. LOGAN hangs helplessly, seeming to be defeated already.)

What a waste it was to go to Canada and get you.

(SCOTT discharges a small blast which pongs off LOGAN, swinging him in the air.)

All you’ve ever cost this school was a lot of heartache.

(SCOTT discharges another small blast which pongs off LOGAN, swinging him in the air.)
(LOGAN cries out in pain, but the sound is more like despair.)

If you can’t get your shit together Wolverine, then steal my motorcycle again and get the hell out of the mansion.

(SCOTT discharges another small blast which pongs off LOGAN, swinging him in the air again.)

LOGAN
Damn you, leave me alone! You don’t understand!

(LOGAN has had enough. He unleashes his claws and goes berserk on the tendrils.)

NOBODY FUCKING UNDERSTANDS ME!!

(LOGAN frees himself, leaping to the ground.)

SCOTT
Activate Summers protocol Beta.

(A metal firewall slides in place to stop LOGAN. LOGAN slices through the wall and advances on SCOTT.)

Activate Summers protocol Delta

(A few robots clatter into the room from sidewall panels. LOGAN beheads them as they reach him and he continues advancing. Nothing seems to stop LOGAN, he is all snarls and fury, a primal, terrifying force.)
(When he reaches SCOTT, LOGAN plunges his claws into SCOTT’S stomach. JEAN’S voice cries out over the speaker system.)

JEAN
NOO!!

SCOTT
(SCOTT is wrapped around LOGAN’s fist.) Hhrnnn . . .

Scene Three; Mansion Interior, Danger Room Control Booth
(JEAN is listening to SCOTT’S voice coming from the speakers.)

SCOTT’S VOICE
No Jean . . . it’s okay. He didn’t . . .

Scene Four; Mansion Interior, Danger Room
(SCOTT trying to straighten up from LOGAN’s blow.)

SCOTT
. . . didn't. . . use his . . . claws . . .(coughs)

(LOGAN steps back, huffing with his exertion. The claws had been withdrawn in the nick of time. SCOTT falls to his knees, though. LOGAN’s punch evidently hurt.)

Welcome back . . .Wolverine. For better or . . . worse.
And . . . don’t think . . . no one knows what you’re going . . . through. We both know it doesn’t matter . . . one damn . . . what society thinks of us.
Its what . . .our family thinks of us . . . whatever family we manage to get along the way.
It’s all about losing that love.

Scene Five; Mansion Interior, Danger Room Control Booth.
(JEAN listens to SCOTT’s voice and realizes he’s speaking to her.)

SCOTT’S VOICE
. . .Or about losing the love of the one woman who has ever really known you.
It hurts like hell opened up and swallowed you. It hurts.
But family will always be there to help you pick the pieces up Logan.

Scene Six; Mansion Interior, Danger Room.
(LOGAN stands over SCOTT as SCOTT finishes his statement.)

SCOTT
We weren’t created just to shelter only young, lost new mutants like Rogue, Logan. We’re your family too.
If you want us to be.

(SCOTT offers his hand, still in pain. LOGAN takes it and helps him up.)
(LOGAN has gained a new respect for Scott. We also see by his posture that LOGAN has regained himself-his confidence and his personality.)

LOGAN
You really are a dick.
(LOGAN clamps SCOTT in a buddy hug.)
(SCOTT winces in pain, his gut still hurts.)

Scene Seven; Mansion Interior, Nighttime, ORORO’S Bedroom
(ORORO is sleeping.)
(Nearing her bed is a FIGURE cloaked in shadows. All we can see are the eyes, which are yellow.)
(ORORO reacts, lancing a bolt of lightning from her hand.)
(The FIGURE disappears in a puff of smoke. The stench makes ORORO gag. The FIGURE appears in another puff of smoke, clinging to the ceiling .)

FIGURE
You have nothing to fear, beauteous damsel, from a mere admirer.

Scene Eight; Mansion Interior, Nighttime, SCOTT and JEAN’s Bedroom
(SCOTT is on the bed, shirtless, his ribs taped. JEAN is in the bathroom with the door closed.)

JEAN (From inside the bathroom)
Scott, are you sure you’re okay?

SCOTT
No, it hurts. Fair warning-it’ll take me forever to get to sleep tonight.

JEAN
(Comes from the bathroom wearing a sexy red negligee. Her voice is almost a purr.) Damn right it will.
(Approaches the bed.)
Scott, I think there’s something you need to know.
I made a promise to you a while ago and I have no intention on breaking it, no matter who comes to this school. Logan may need us, but Scott . . . I know that you need me.

SCOTT
(While his emotions are welling, we hear SCOTT’s dependance.) Ah, God . . . I do Jean..

JEAN
(Sits on the bed, places a finger to his lips.)
And I need you. I need your inner strength and your courage. You bring stability to my life that I’ve never had. Never.
I’m not letting that go for some hairy Canadian with an attitude problem.
Do you hear me?

SCOTT
Yes Jean. Loud and clear. Ow! Watch out for the ribs!

JEAN
No, you watch out for them.
(JEAN places her hands on the bandages. There is a warm glow, SCOTT hisses with pain, then with sensation.)

SCOTT
(Amazed. SCOTT prods his own ribs. The pain is gone.)
Jean . . . what’ve you done?

JEAN
Just a little first aid.

SCOTT
But how . . .

JEAN
Shh. Now, let me see your eyes.
(Jean begins to remove the ruby Oakleys.)

SCOTT
Jean! Are you crazy-! (Catches her hands.)

JEAN
I said hush. (With a little concentration, JEAN causes SCOTT’S hands to flutter away.)
(She removes the glasses.)

SCOTT
(SCOTT’s eyes are red, boiling with energy. Slowly they go solid, then normal, with brown pupils.)
(SCOTT looks at her like a newborn.)

Oh my God. Jean. How are you doing this?

JEAN
I guess it’s my turn to evolve.
(JEAN crushes SCOTT in an passionate, deep kiss.)

Scene Nine; Mansion Interior, Nighttime, LOGAN’s bedroom
(Smoke alarms go off, waking LOGAN.)
(He jumps out of bed, stalks out of his room using his nose to lead him down the stairs and into the living room.)

Scene Ten; Mansion Interior, Nighttime, Downstairs Livingroom
(LOGAN finds STORM suited up in the living room, summoning wind to clear away the smoke which had billowed around their guest--The FIGURE-who is now in the light. It is a slim being, blue-black with a velvety fur covering him. His teeth are fanged, his hair curly, his ears pointed. Twitching behind him is a shimmery tail ending in a spade-like point.)

LOGAN
What the hell is that?

STORM
Logan, allow me to introduce Kurt Wagner. He likes to be called Nightcrawler.

LOGAN
I wonder why.

(NIGHTCRAWLER disappears in a black explosion of smoke and appears before LOGAN in another explosion, extending a two-fingered-one-thumbed hand to shake.)

NIGHTCRAWLER
Schon nacht, Herr Logan.

LOGAN
(A cough wracks LOGAN. He pops his claws instinctively. NIGHTCRAWLER hops back.)

NIGHTCRAWLER
(NIGHTCRAWLER backflips to his original position in the living room beside STORM.) I’m terribly sorry, Logan. I should think before I act-I know my appearance could tend to . . . startle people.

LOGAN
(Fanning the air) It ain’t that--those smoke bombs of yours stink like hell. Literally.

NIGHTCRAWLER
(Smiling at the metaphor. Fangs glistening.) Just so. As I was telling your associate, the perfect Storm here, I’ve been watching the Hellfire Club for some time now.

LOGAN
We don’t want no part of the Hellfire Club.

STORM
It’s much more than that, Logan. Kurt, tell him.

NIGHTCRAWLER
Ah, yes. You see, I represent a faction of mutants the world doesn’t normally come into contact with, that is, if we can help it. And we have found out something about the Hellfire Club that should very much interest you.

STORM
He was going to take me to his people and explain more fully.

LOGAN
Are you crazy? You can’t just go off somewhere in the middle of the night with some guy who looks like he escaped from Dante’s Inferno.

NIGHTCRAWLER
Ah ah, Logan. Haven’t you learned yet not to judge a book by it’s cover?

LOGAN
(Speechless for a beat.) Then I’m coming with you. Gimme a minute to get my suit on.

STORM
Oh really? Willingly?

LOGAN
Everybody’s a comedian in this damn place.

Scene Eleven; Mansion Interior, Night, Medilab(XAVIER and MacTAGGART are keeping a late night vigil over ILLYANA. PETER is also there, napping by her bedside.)
(An alarm goes off, PETER awakes. The monitors hooked up to ILLYANA’s ravaged body indicate that she has just died. MacTAGGART does her best to revive ILLYANA, but it is no use. PETER collapses across her body, wracked with grief.
(In slow motion, ROGUE’S teddy bear falls to the ground.)

MacTAGGART
We have to begin testing everyone in the mansion, Charles. See if ennyone else has this damned disease afore it’s too late.

XAVIER
It already is. (XAVIER’S eyes start to glow. His voice becomes deep, resonant-we’ve heard it before-it is PROTEUS.)

(The mist that is PROTEUS seeps from XAVIER’s body and enters into MacTAGGART.)
(MacTAGGART/PROTEUS cackles as her eyes go white, and reality begins bending and warping around her. XAVIER and PETER begin screaming.)

Scene Twelve, Mansion Interior, SCOTT and JEAN’s Bedroom.
(SCOTT and JEAN are basking in a literal afterglow. JEAN suddenly seems to sense something. She sits up, naked.)

SCOTT
What is it?

JEAN
I think it’s an intruder . . . the images are all jumbled. Wait here.
(Gets out of bed, goes to the door, still nude.)

SCOTT
Hey, you can’t go out there like that!

(JEAN turns, grins. Then with a flourish, visual energy shaped like a flamebird enfolds her, “costuming” her, covering up her nudity.)


Scene Thirteen; Mansion Interior, Nighttime, Downstairs Hallway below the stairs
(ROGUE is crouched by a phone which she cradles against her ear.)

ROGUE
(Her voice again has no Mississippian accent.) Gambit it’s me. You have to come and get me . . . something’s wrong with my body. I’m in Xavier’s mansion.

(The energy talons of a flamebird reach into the scene and snips the phone wire.)
(ROGUE looks up and recoils.)
(In midair, descending slowly from the stair balcony, is JEAN with the flamebird effect shrouding her. Her eyes are flame.)

ROGUE
Get the hell away from me! What are you?!

JEAN
You know me, Marie. I’m Jean.

ROGUE
No you’re not and my name is not Marie! Why the hell does everyone call me that?! I’m Carol! Carol Danvers, dammit!

(The commotion has students all coming around to investigate. JEAN and ROGUE have gained an audience. In their eyes we see awe at what JEAN has become. JUBILEE comments “Like WHAT the HELL is happening to everyone around here, okay?”)

JEAN
(To ROGUE) No honey, you aren’t. You’re a girl named Rogue. Listen to me . . .

ROGUE
NO!

JEAN
(A beat.) Rogue hurt you, Carol. She didn’t mean it. She killed you. Now, you’re a memory, hon. A memory of a woman who needs to move on.

(ROGUE launches into the air, seizing the bannister and tearing it free for a weapon.)

ROGUE
I’m the Black Queen! I’m Carol!
Rogue couldn’t do this!

JEAN
Well obviously she can now.

(Grabs and holds ROGUE with one firebird talon and affects ROGUE’S consciousness with the other.)

Sorry, Carol, but there only ought to be one person in there at a time.

(What PHOENIX does causes ROGUE to go unconscious.)
(JEAN remains in the air , on the same level with the upstairs railing, with the flamebird manifestation holding ROGUE’S unconscious body.)
(SCOTT approaches the broken bannister. He is level with the floating JEAN. He has replaced his ruby Oakleys. They can’t hide his fear as he witnesses the change in JEAN.)

SCOTT
Jean . . . what is happening to you?

(Downstairs, the elevator to the belowground laboratories slowly opens. PETER is carrying an unconscious XAVIER. PETER is now a steel-skinned giant. Carrying XAVIER is no problem for him, but he looks drained. He stumbles forward.)

PETER
Comrade Summers . . . Illyana is dead . . .and Dr. MacTaggart has . . . has been . . !

(PETER turns back to flesh and collapses with XAVIER.)

(The whole mansion begins to tremble as if there is an earthquake.)

Scene Fourteen; Mansion Interior, Montage
(Students all over the mansion are quaking in the tremors, and panicking. Powers are going off everywhere.)

Scene Fifteen; Mansion Interior, Hallway
SCOTT
Jean, can you sense what’s happening?

JEAN
There’s no intelligence behind it, Scott- not for miles around. It must be an earthquake!

SCOTT
(To the students around them.) Everybody, get into the sub-levels NOW! And I emphasize: NO heroics!

Scene Sixteen; Mansion Interior, Various
(The students scramble. We see KITTY using her power to take others with her through the floors.)
Scene Seventeen; Mansion Exterior, overhead.
(Six SENTINELS come down on boot jets. Each one is about twenty feet tall. The rumbling bass of their bootjets are causing the tremors.)
Scene Eighteen, Mansion Interior, Hallway.
(The ceiling crashes in and a massive metal hand reaches down.)
(JEAN stops the rain of all debris with her left telekinetic flamewing. With the other flamewing, she releases ROGUE and attempts to hold the giant mechanical hand back.)
(SCOTT blasts at the hand with his optic blast. Pieces of the hand dislodge, but it is not enough. More of the roof collapses over SCOTT. JEAN uses her other TK wing to shield SCOTT, leaving the giant hand free to blast her with a ray of power out of its’ palm. She falls, and so does the rest of the debris. SCOTT, XAVIER, PETER and ROGUE are buried in rubble.)
(Standing staring down into the broken open ceiling are the SENTINELS.)

SENTINEL #1
(Booming metallic voice) Targets Four of Six sighted and suppressed.

SENTINEL #2
Acquire the available Four targets. Relay for further initiatives.

Scene Nineteen; Mansion Exterior, The SENTINELS
(The eyes go red on one SENTINEL. That one speaks.)

SENTINEL #6
Targets Four of Six acquired. Genoscan for remaining two reads negative within a minimum five mile radius. Waiting for initiatives.

Scene Twenty; Unknown Control Station.
(PIERCE is fully plugged into a bank of controls by the tendrils that come out of his own skin.)

PIERCE
Bring who you have back to us Sentinel Six. We’ll worry about the missing two later.

Scene Twenty-One; Mansion Interior
(Four of the SENTINELS unspool their capture coils and each pick up a victim; SCOTT, ROGUE, XAVIER, and JEAN.)
Scene Twenty-Two; Mansion Exterior, the SENTINELS
(Each SENTINEL places their captive into their transparent chest cavity, self-seals them in, then launches off into the night.)

"X-Men 2" Act Five

ACT FIVE
Scene One; Underground In Brickwork tunnels.
(STORM and WOLVERINE are following NIGHTCRAWLER, who continues to disappear in the shadows ahead of them.)

WOLVERINE
Good thing you got a distinctive smell, elf, or I’d think you was tryin’ to ditch us.

NIGHTCRAWLER
Just the opposite Wolverine. I can’t help what shadow does to my body, but I am with you all the way.

Scene Two; The Tunnel opens to a large cavern of Brickwork with many levels.
(NIGHTCRAWLER leads WOLVERINE and STORM in. They discover themselves surrounded by several small shapes and hulking large ones, which stand behind the bannisters of these different walkway levels. We get glimpses of disfigurements, multicolored skins, odd limb placements, extra or missing organs.)
(WOLVERINE and STORM are led to the center court, where sits CALISTO, a thin, haggard woman with an eye patch.)

CALISTO
Nightcrawler what y’ be bringing me?

NIGHTCRAWLER
A gift, Calisto. A new friend.

CALISTO
I’z usually sure it’s me what lead the Morlocks. Was me who say what come and what go.

NIGHTCRAWLER
But Calisto, my maiden, I tried to explain to you how serious the Hellfire Club situation is. We cannot afford to ignore it any longer.

CALISTO
(Leaps from her seat and roundhouse-kicks NIGHTCRAWLER to the ground.)

(WOLVERINE gets between NIGHTCRAWLER and CALISTO who does a martial kick and sends WOLVERINE flying backwards. He lands to the ground, rolls, unsheathes the claws, and is ready for a tussle.)
(Another FIGURE detaches from the rabble overhead and blocks WOLVERINE from CALISTO)
(This FIGURE is very near the shape of a gorilla. It is huge and blue and it’s fur is far more shaggier than NIGHTCRAWLER’S. It has a male voice which is surprisingly smooth and well-dictioned.)

FIGURE
Now see here my impetuous little friend with your sextet of phalli . . . has your mother never taught you manners when you pass through the doorpost of your neighbor’s demesne? First, introductions are in order. I’m the Beast. The hundred or so misfit mutants virtually surrounding you are the Morlocks. You will need to beat us all before you will reach Calisto.

WOLVERINE
Actually, I din’t have anything else on the agenda for tonight.

BEAST
But we do. Multitudinous activities. Now play by our rules or we’ll send you home in a shopping bag.

STORM
Calisto, tell me why Nightcrawler brought us here. Is there some way we can help?

CALISTO
Lookit she pretty uplander want to help us poor muck-dwelling Morlocks. It sweet, don’t it?

(The tiers of MORLOCKS jeer and caw around them.)

(STORM begins to feel the turning tide against her. The close ceiling and the atmosphere, the horrific faces of some who peer out from the shadows above begin to make her extremely uncomfortable . . . almost frightened.)

STORM
Very well, Calisto. If you feel the need to treat this and these people here like some tribe of animals, that is your prerogative. My friend and I will leave you to it.

NIGHTCRAWLER
Storm, please no, please don’t leave . . .

CALISTO
Hai! (Leaps to attack NIGHTCRAWLER again.) Is who you beggin’ Nightcrawler?

(A wind tumbles CALISTO in place, created by STORM’s hand. CALISTO does not reach NIGHTCRAWLER this time)

STORM
You wait until we leave, woman. I will not again stand idly by while you mistreat these people.

(The wind suddenly dies away. STORM doesn’t not understand how. At her feet, a misshapen little green boy stares up at her.)

GREEN BOY
Leech no want you hurt mama.

CALISTO
(Landing back to the ground, free from the wind drafts, CALISTO lashes STORM across the face with a backhand blow.)

WOLVERINE
Alright, dammit, that’s it! (Charges BEAST.)

(BEAST is as acrobatic as he is loquacious. He leaps and clamps the overhead pipes with his toes. From that vantage point he swings WOLVERINE into the air, disorienting him. Then after series of blows while WOLVERINE is midair, BEAST slams WOLVERINE to the hard brick floor. WOLVERINE is unconscious.)

CALISTO
(To STORM) News for you, sweet-meat. That there Leech. He meant to make it a level field tween me an you. See, I don’t fit into the upworld, but ain’t cause me am any mutant. Hahah! Ya face! Look how it crease so! Right, I is no mutant, but I rule the Morlocks-and I is the one thing stand between their hatred of yuh pretty-pretty.

NIGHTCRAWLER
Calisto please, no disrespect was meant by bringing her here. If you would only please . .

STORM
(Giving herself some room.)
Calisto. If it is an equal match you are looking for, then let us do this . . . I am from Africa, I know something about neighboring tribes. Let me challenge you, fair to fair. If you win, we leave and never trouble your realm again. If I win, you let Nightcrawler speak his peace and grant him his wish.

CALISTO
OHAHAHAH!! M’pretty-pretty ya do know a thing or three!

(CALISTO unbuckles a hip holster, and tosses one of two machetes to STORM.)

I will even take the small of the two . . . and spit your head ‘pon I’s blade--go make a pillow of that fine fine cotton-so hair!

(The two square off in the court, which now seems to STORM to have been designed as a perfect arena. Above them, the MORLOCKS cheer.)

Scene Three; A Courtyard of flowers, wreathing a gazebo.
(The sky is unseen, as is anything beyond the courtyard. This has a very unreal quality to it. Sitting in the gazebo is JEAN. She is dressed in eighteenth century noblewoman clothing. Her hair is done up in a colonial coif.)
(Jason WYNGARDE comes into the courtyard, joins her in the gazebo.)

WYNGARDE
Lady Grey. How are you this fine morning?

JEAN
Confused, sir. Where am I? Where is this place?

WYNGARDE
Why, this is your estate, Lady Grey. Do you not recognize your own rolling meadows and lush farmland?

JEAN
I have an estate?

WYNGARDE
Of course you do. You are a very powerful woman in this country. The very power your heart has always longed for, you have achieved it, my Lady.

JEAN
I have?

WYNGARDE
You will never go hungry again, milady. Never begging scraps of sustenance from miserly tyrants such as Xavier. You are your own woman now.

JEAN
I am? (A wicked grin splits JEAN’S face.) I am!

(The flamebird signature of her power flares from her, consuming the gazebo and WYNGARDE.)
(The flamebird’s fire consumes all the unrealness of the courtyard, leaving only reality.)

Scene Four; The SENTINEL Bay.
(JEAN is a living prisoner in the chest cavity of a SENTINEL. WYNGARDE is in the same SENTINEL, only he is free. Her power has flushed his illusion away.)

WYNGARDE
Pierce! Shut her down!
(PIERCE is still linked with the SENTINELS.)

PIERCE
Idealistic simpleton.
(PIERCE only has to gesture in virtual space and the suppression of JEAN occurs within her SENTINEL.)
(The flamebird signature dies out.)

SCOTT
Jean!

(This large vaulted chamber contains the six SENTINELS, four of them each containing XAVIER, ROGUE, SCOTT, and JEAN. They are all conscious. On a suspended surrounding ramp is SHAW, FROST, LELAND, TESSA, and GAMBIT.)

SHAW
She is fine, Cyclops. Evidently we cannot afford to let her powers out of their cage for too long.

WYNGARDE
But she is weakening, Mr. Summers. This time when I started my illusory landscape, she didn’t know where she was.

SCOTT
Just leave her alone you son of a bitch!

WYNGARDE
Oh, no no. I told you before, we need a new Black Queen. Power like hers is too exquisite to relinquish.

ROGUE
Ah’m the one who killed your Black Queen, why don’t you take me? Or do you only need a brainwashed mutant to fill that role?

SHAW
Everyone wants to believe poor dead Carol joined us against her will. Carol wasn’t a fool. She knew that anyone privileged enough to become one of us would finally know true safety.
But to extend that privilege to a swamp-rat like you and risk you accidentally stealing any more of our lives? I think not.

XAVIER
What I hope is that you aren’t holding us here out of any intention of safeguarding your lives against Proteus. Proteus doesn’t care what mutant he consumes. He’ll go through us easily to get to you.

SCOTT
Who is Proteus?


XAVIER
Proteus is what Logan found up at Akali Lake, along with clues to his own past. Proteus is a mutant who can warp the very fabric of reality. It seems the Hellfire Club has been keeping Proteus prisoner there all these years, and he has one hell of a vendetta he wants to settle with them.

SHAW
How do you know all this Xavier?

XAVIER
I was Proteus’ host for the last thirty-six hours. When it tried to possess Logan in Canada it found itself severely wounded in it’s weakened state.

Scene Five; (As XAVIER voiceovers, superimpose the possession scene of WOLVERINE in the OPENING ACT, Scene Seven. Extend the scene to show PROTEUS’ mist form fleeing WOLVERINE immediately after GAMBIT escapes.)

XAVIER
You people knew that would happen--that’s why you coated Logan’s skeleton with adamantium fifteen years ago, to make him the perfect weapon against Proteus. Any metal is anathema to Proteus--adamantium even moreso.

But when Proteus nearly perished inside Logan, he was able to escape through the mental link Logan shares with Rogue.

Scene Six; As XAVIER voiceovers, superimpose ROGUE’S dream in ACT ONE, Scene One.

XAVIER
When he found it was me who would be of most benefit to him, he quickly took me over.

Scene Seven; As XAVIER voiceovers, superimpose Xavier in ROGUE’S mind, ACT ONE, Scene Four.)

XAVIER
Eventually he would have consumed me, but after taking me, he discovered I was the only one who could help him get Dr. MacTaggart to come to the school. So he accelerated Rogue, Storm, and Jean’s powers in order to make an excuse for "me" to invite my old collegue to come.

But accelerating them cost him energy, and then he had to feed.

Scene Eight; As XAVIER voiceovers, superimpose the teddybear that Rogue gave Illyana falling slowly to the ground from the child's limp hand.

Scene Nine; Back to realtime and Xavier

XAVIER
(A tear rolls down XAVIER’S face) Illyana was the fuel Proteus used for his manipulations of the others' powers.

Scene Ten; Widen the angle to include the prisoners inside their Sentinel prisons.

ROGUE
But why, Professor? What did Proteus want Dr. MacTaggart so badly for?

FROST
A mutant will last Proteus’ energy needs for only a finite number of hours until we are consumed. Eventually, he will run out of mutants. However, he would never run out of the energy which his own mother’s body provided him while he was an embryo. Proteus wants a means to survival and Dr. Moira MacTaggart is that means.

SCOTT
Did Dr. MacTaggart came up with some kind of food for this mutant?

SHAW
You didn’t think any mere human would became so prominent in her field because she likes mutants, did you boy? She only wanted to help her own. Proteus is MacTaggart’s son.

XAVIER
If you truly believe that then I can see how cooperating with you was the worst mistake she ever made. Did you actually promise her that you would help her and her child those many years ago?

SHAW
We had the means Xavier! If we hadn’t lost Wolverine we could have done it.

ROGUE
At Logan’s expense!

GAMBIT
Finally I’m beginnin’ t’ see dis for what it is. Proteus would’ve fed off Logan’s healing ability forever, nuh? While dis adamantium would have kept him trapped in Logan’s body? ‘Ventually it would have driven Logan insane, cus I think Proteus’ powers are to Logan what his skeleton is to Proteus. Eventually Proteus would’ve ate what was left of his mind.

(Whispering to self) You call that helping somebody, m’sieur?

SCOTT
I’ll confess to some ignorance of my own, over here. How the hell do these robot bastards figure into all this?

SHAW
Oh the Sentinels have only one thing at all to do with Proteus. They have the ability to deal with Proteus the same way they will deal with all the dangerous mutants in this world.

SCOTT
Besides yourself?

SHAW
Yes, besides me. We have very powerful friends who worry about you and I more than you do, Xavier. Believe it or not.

Scene Eleven; The MORLOCK Tunnel
(STORM and CALISTO are in the thick of the fight. After a few moves, it seems bad for STORM. CALISTO even hacks off half of STORM’S white hair.)


CALISTO
HAHAA! Where your pretty go so quickly, uppity-up?

(But STORM will have none of it. STORM gains enough advantage to defeat CALISTO with the ram of her blade into CALISTO’S gut.)
(At first STORM is horrified at what she’s done. Then she looks around. With half her hair gone, she looks a brutal sight-in a neo-punk way.)
(STORM throws down the machete.)

STORM
It is settled. Which ever one of you is a healer should attend to her, unless her death is what you all secretly want. Nightcrawler, tell me what I had to do this for, and it had best be a good reason

NIGHTCRAWLER
Fraulein, I try to be as loyal a Morlock as I can, but Calisto didn’t understand the threat the Hellfire Club poses to us.
They are known by us as “the beautiful mutants” They are able to fit into society, and that is just what they intend to do-but at all our expense.

(WOLVERINE wakes up.)

BEAST
My friend is attempting to say that the Hellfire Club seeks to make peace with humanity, but for itself only.
They will offer the United Nations instruments called the Sentinels to subjugate all of mutantkind in exchange for their own personal immunity.

WOLVERINE
Hiding away down here in the deeps, what d’you care?

NIGHTCRAWLER
The Hellfire Club knows all about me. I was their . . . mascot. (Full of self-loathing) Am I not perfect for the part? But when they hatched this plan of theirs, I became a liability to them. They couldn’t deal with humans and have something like me hanging around.

STORM
Were you down here hiding from them, Kurt? Are you even a Morlock?

BEAST
We have accepted him.

NIGHTCRAWLER
And I will only bring you trouble. I assure you, in order for Sebastian Shaw to demonstrate his sincerity and the power of his Sentinels, he’s going to use them to wipe us out first. The ugliest, scariest mutants. The mutants who make the humans feel the most fear.
Calisto wouldn’t believe me. She wouldn’t send anyone to investigate, possibly stop Shaw.

STORM
Why didn’t you simply ask this of us back at the mansion?

NIGHTCRAWLER
Calisto and the Morlocks had given me shelter. I . . . I wanted to be loyal. And now that loyalty has been rewarded. God has smiled on the backside of His creation.

WOLVERINE
We haven’t agreed to anything yet.

NIGHTCRAWLER
(Confused.) I thought you understood. Our perfekt Storm has defeated Calisto.
She now leads the Morlocks. We are yours to command!

Scene Twelve; The SENTINELS Bay
(The scene is the same, except, FROST has changed from her colonial outfit into modern business attire.)
FROST
Are the envoys ready to receive our little care package, Sebastian?

SHAW
I’ve just broke connection, Emma. They’ll be expecting you within the hour.

SCOTT
This is insane! You actually think the United Nations is going to trust mutants to give them a safety measure against other mutants?

SHAW
They will when we deliver the famed Charles Xavier to them, signed, sealed, and regulated by our Sentinel. Miss Frost, if you will take your place we will have the White Bishop launch you and Xavier to your destination.

(FROST ascends the scaffold to the head of the SENTINEL which imprisons XAVIER. FROST enters a control booth in the head and straps herself in.)
(PIERCE tweaks cyberspace and the SENTINEL containing XAVIER and FROST lifts off, disappearing through a roof port into the night.)
(Suddenly GAMBIT whips a pair of supercharged playing cards across the room, and they land within the cavity of the SENTINEL which is imprisoning ROGUE.)
(Explosions go off around ROGUE and she finds herself with her new powers.)

ROGUE
(While breaking her bonds.) Me? It’s me you break out first? Are you crazy? (Flies free of the SENTINEL.)

GAMBIT
(Jumping from the walkway, swinging across the bay to reach PIERCE) Oui, m’petite, I am crazy for believin’ I should be wit’ dese peoples! So if you got da Black Queen’s powers, Rogue, then is you I want coverin’ my ass when I try to stop the White Bishop!

ROGUE
I got a better idea! How ‘bout ah get some help for the both of us!
(ROGUE spins in flight and bashes herself missile-like into the SENTINEL that contains JEAN.)

JEAN
(JEAN flies free of the SENTINEL shrouded in the firebird manifestation of her powers.) Excellent call, Rogue. You get an “A”.

Scene Thirteen; Mindscape
(Suddenly for JEAN, the world changes, and WYNGARDE looms over her as big as any SENTINEL.)
(With a gilded golden cage, WYNGARDE entraps her.)

WYNGARDE
No, my pet. I’m not prepared to let you go just yet.

Scene Fourteen; SENTINEL Bay
(From SCOTT’s point-of-view, we see WYNGARDE standing on a SENTINEL platform, only gesturing at the aloft JEAN, both of them normal-sized. JEAN is reacting as though she is caged.)

SCOTT
(To himself.) Fight it Jean! Fight it!

Scene Fifteen; PIERCE’S Control Platform
(GAMBIT has reached the platform where PIERCE is. PIERCE is occupied by his cyberspace manipulations, which control the SENTINELS. GAMBIT charges up cards to throw and suddenly he is flattened to the deck. LELAND is behind him.)

LELAND
You haven’t heard what the Hellfire Club does to traitors? We squash them flat!
(LELAND presses down, GAMBIT cries out.)

GAMBIT
You’re . . . the bigger traitor . . . you’re . . . sellin’ out . . every mutant on de planet . . ! (GAMBIT cries out again, we hear bones break, and blood pours from his mouth.)

(ROGUE swoops into view, and kicks LELAND over the rail. LELAND falls and makes a loud impact.)

ROGUE
Oh God, ah’m killin’ people left and right.

GAMBIT
A fall won’t kill dat fat man . . . m’petit-he got. . . a lotta bounce to him. Alla my ribs . . . dey got to be crushed . . .is you . . . gotta stop Pierce now . . .

(SHAW comes from a leap, down onto the walkway between ROGUE and PIERCE. He is now shirtless and is obviously a powerhouse.)

ROGUE
You sure you want to face me with all that skin showing?

SHAW
Yes I’m sure. You’ll have to kill me too if you’re going to get to Pierce. A little girl like you prepared to do that?

ROGUE
(Thinks a minute, then strips off her gloves real slow.) It’s your own policy. Traitors have to die.

(SHAW grins. He then scrapes up GAMBIT as a living shield. GAMBIT screams in agony.)

Scene Sixteen; Mindscape
(In JEAN’S mindscape, WYNGARDE is reaching into his cage and pulling her out. We can hear SCOTT distantly in the background. Suddenly, SCOTT appears in the cage with JEAN.)

SCOTT
Jean, snap out of it! It’s an illusion-Wyngarde’s an illusionist!!

(WYNGARDE uses his huge hand to smash SCOTT flat against the inside of the cage. His broken body twitches then lies still. JEAN shrieks in horror.)

Scene Seventeen; The SENTINEL Bay
(The illusion fades. JEAN sees blood running out of the nostrils of SCOTT who is still captive, and now unconscious. )
(She looks back at WYNGARDE with pure sparkling hatred. Her eyes go fiery yellow.)

JEAN
You petty, ignorant little pissant. Did you really think watching him die would bind me to you?

(The flamebird talon of JEAN’S manifestation grabs WYNGARDE.)

Wyngarde, you have only begun to inherit sorrows.
You want power? I’ll give you power.
(The existing scene fades for the both of them. It becomes the universe, surrounding them.)

You thought you were dealing with a simple mutant. I’m am no longer the woman you knew.

(JEAN and WYNGARDE begin to expand, grow until the stars around them cluster into galaxies.)

I am fire and light.

(The galaxies become pinpricks.)

I am life incarnate.

(The universe of pinpricks becomes a black shell spheroid, with other spheroids in a white void.)

Now and forever, I am PHOENIX.

(WYNGARDE’S escalating scream becomes the background noise as the visuals become a reflection in WYNGARDE’S iris. When we pan back, we see the iris belongs to the eye of a man who has utterly lost his sanity.)

And your petty mind cannot handle what . . . I . . . am . . .

(JEAN is obviously drained from that effort and begins to fall. The SENTINEL which had her captive catches her with it’s huge hand. We see PIERCE had been waiting for his chance, controlling the capturing SENTINEL through his cyberlink.)

Scene Eighteen; The SENTINEL Bay, PIERCE’S Control Platform
(ROGUE is still held back from PIERCE by SHAW, who is using GAMBIT as a shield.)

(There is suddenly a blast of black smoke behind PIERCE. NIGHTCRAWLER and WOLVERINE appear in it. WOLVERINE is disoriented from the trip.)

WOLVERINE
Ah geez. Y’need to work on yer takeoffs, bub.

ROGUE
Wolverine! Get Pierce!

(Wolverine needs no more coaching. Out come the claws. WOLVERINE slashes PIERCE’s guts, exposing the fact that PIERCE’S body is full of electronics.)

(PIERCE becomes livid and machine tendrils come sprout out of the electronic panels to ensnare WOLVERINE. Electricity arcs from the connections and we have WOLVERINE “sizzling on the grid”)

(SHAW dives over the side of the walkway with GAMBIT, aiming to crush GAMBIT beneath him.)

(ROGUE is torn between who to help first. She dives over the side and reaches GAMBIT. She uses her grip on GAMBIT to swing both GAMBIT and SHAW in a loop, then crashes SHAW to the ground harder than he’d anticipated. SHAW bounces back, invigorated.)

Scene Nineteen; The SENTINEL Bay floor
SHAW
The more punishment I take, the stronger I get!

ROGUE
Then there really is only one way to stop you.
(ROGUE rushes him, clamps her hands aside his head. SHAW screams and then falls to the ground. ROGUE stands over him in the grip of his memories and power.)
(At her feet, however, we see SHAW is not dead, but he is out.)

Scene Twenty; PIERCE’S Control Platform
(Above, WOLVERINE is fighting the electric torture from PIERCE.)
(NIGHTCRAWLER appears in a brimstone flash behind PIERCE, wraps his arms around the cyborg, then disappears with PIERCE in another brimstone flash. NIGHTCRAWLER has left PIERCE’S arms behind and their sudden broken attachments sputter madly.)
(The electricity from the cables which entrap WOLVERINE stops. WOLVERINE cuts himself free.)

Scene Twenty-One; The Sentinel Bay, Near Exit
(TESSA is sneaking away, sensing the Hellfire Club’s imminent defeat. She is stopped by the BEAST.)

BEAST
While I would not expect such a dainty lass as yourself to overflow with bravado, you could at least remain for the conclusion of the matter.

TESSA
Which is what?

BEAST
Well, this is the part where you get the other X-Men out of the Sentinels for me.

TESSA
You do know that I am merely a mutant hound? I have no other overt powers except providing Pierce with the mutant imprint to specify the Sentinels’ suppression abilities. I can’t help you get the delivery Sentinel back that still has Xavier.

BEAST
Kind of you to be concerned, but don’t you worry your pretty Elizabethan-coiffed head about that. We have someone working on it.

Scene Twenty-Two; Exterior, Night Sky, SENTINEL-Head control booth.
(FROST sits and finds the SENTINEL falling out of control.)

FROST
Oh what the hell? Pierce, are you there?

XAVIER’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
What’s the matter Emma? Finding yourself with no control?

FROST
(Suddenly unable to move, she struggles.) Why do you think . . . they sent . . . a telepath
(FROST breaks free of XAVIER’S control)
. . . to accompany a telepath!?
(FROST activate a switch in her cockpit.)
I don’t feel like plummeting to my death today, Xavier. Do you?

Scene Twenty-Three; SENTINEL inner chest cavity
(XAVIER squirms under the clampdown of his powers.)
(Outside of the clear chest covering, XAVIER sees STORM flying after them.)
(STORM has modified her hair to even-out the impromptu haircut CALISTO gave her. She looks lethal.)

XAVIER
(Whispering to self.) Be careful, my X-Men.

Scene Twenty-Four; Night Exterior.
(The SENTINEL speaks with FROST’S voice)

FROST
What are you going to do, Storm? Blast us with electricity? Fry your mentor along with me? Maybe use a tornado to smash us all out of the sky?

Scene Twenty-Five; The SENTINEL Bay, PIERCE’S Control Platform
(BEAST is studying the controls, WOLVERINE stands with him.)

BEAST
Damnation and blast. Most of this design has no manual interface. Pierce controlled it all from inside himself.

WOLVERINE
What say we just slice this shit to ribbons? Fine tuning’s not my cup a’ tea.

BEAST
Well it is mine. Before I wound up a refugee from the Blue Zoo Review, Mama McCoy’s baby boy was riding a full scholarship to MIT, and that mutated grey matter of mine tells me that there has to be some kind of control apart from Pierce.

(ROGUE flies up into view from below the walkway.)

ROGUE
The Sentinels have manual controls in their head cockpit.

WOLVERINE
How do you know, kid?

ROGUE
Because Shaw knows and now . . . I know Shaw.

BEAST
Serendipity!
(BEAST bounds off the control platform and comes to rest on the head of a SENTINEL.

Scene Twenty-Six; The SENTINEL Bay, Sentinels
(BEAST climbs into the head-cockpit of the SENTINEL upon which he landed.)

(Just below him, NIGHTCRAWLER is checking the vital signs of both JEAN and SCOTT, as TESSA takes them out of their SENTINEL prison. They are both still unconscious from their ordeals. He is satisfied that they are both okay. WYNGARDE, beside them on the floor, is a babbling idiot.)

Scene Twenty-Seven; The SENTINEL Bay, the Head-cockpit

BEAST
(Singing) Am I blue, what’ll I do, I’m loo-ooking for you . . .

Scene Twenty-Eight; The SENTINEL Bay, PIERCE’S Control Platform
(ROGUE joins WOLVERINE, who stands guarding.)

WOLVERINE
You doin’ all right?

ROGUE
Yeh. Ms. Grey . . . well I guess I should call her Phoenix . . . helped me sort mah own mind out from Carol’s.
How are you doin’?

WOLVERINE
M’okay.

ROGUE
I . . . I know what Carol meant to you. I’m sorry . . . I’m so sorry.

WOLVERINE
Well, you know more than I do, kid. Can we just leave it at that?

ROGUE
Sure. Welcome back, Logan.

Scene Twenty-Nine; Night, Exterior.
(STORM courses alongside the flying SENTINEL)

STORM
Can’t you see, you’re only giving the humans what they want? If they fear you enough, they will use these robots against you as well. None of us will be safe!

FROST’S VOICE from the SENTINEL’s Exterior Speakers
Who’s the telepath here, Storm? Me or you? I’ll tell you what the humans are thinking, thank you very much.

(The SENTINEL turns in air and attacks STORM. She begins dodging techniques which save her.)

Scene Thirty; Night, Exterior, SENTINEL-Head cockpit
(FROST pilots the SENTINEL.)

FROST
Then again Storm, I won’t bother. You won’t live to see that day anyway.
(The control toggle suddenly become unresponsive in FROST’S hand.)

What is this! Pierce, what’s the matter now!?

BEAST’S VOICE on the Cockpit Speakers
I’m sorry, Donald Pierce is no longer in one piece and cannot come to the phone. May I take a message?

Scene Thirty-One; The SENTINEL Bay floor.
(The SENTINEL bearing XAVIER lands again. STORM is accompanying it.)
(XAVIER has already rendered FROST unconscious, BEAST and NIGHTCRAWLER assemble the unconscious SHAW, FROST, WYNGARDE, LELAND and PIERCE’S remains together in a heap. TESSA remains conscious.)
(JEAN and SCOTT are awake now too.)
(WOLVERINE supports GAMBIT while ROGUE accompanies them.)

SCOTT
What are we going to do with all these guys?

XAVIER
I was the world’s leading telepath before Emma Frost was born. I’ve seen to it that she and her ‘brethren’ will be asleep for some time to come.

GAMBIT
If dey never wake up, dat would be fine wit’ me.

WOLVERINE
Heh, you’d sleep easier at nights, I’m sure.

XAVIER
Gambit, you know you’re welcome to stay at our school. We’ll keep you as safe as we can.

ROGUE
Professor, reg’lar cops won’t be able to keep them prisoner for long. What are we supposed to do with them,?

XAVIER
Why, nothing. They have their philosophy and we have ours. Let’s show them what it means to live and let live.

WOLVERINE
(After a beat.) Bullshit! What about these big freakin’ machines of theirs? If the United Nations get so much as a whiff of these, they’re gunna use them and then we’re all dead.

PHOENIX
Leave that up to me Logan.

(PHOENIX lifts into the air and her flamebird wings begin to slice the heads off the SENTINELS. She doesn’t stop there. She explodes them, pounds them to dust, utterly destroys the whole SENTINEL Bay.)
(Her face is predatory and the joy she gets in destroying is our most prominent image.)
(It is haunting.)
(As she lands, no one notices the bodies of the Hellfire Club begin to decay and rot until TESSA screams. Note that PIERCE’s cybernetic remains are intact, and his eyes are blinking-to be resolved in a later movie.)

(The assembled X-MEN scramble back. MOIRA/PROTEUS rises up from within the corpses of the Hellfire Club. Reality becomes surreal, taking on fluid shapes which morph and bind SCOTT, ROGUE, STORM, BEAST , GAMBIT and XAVIER.)
(PHOENIX remains free, telekinetically readjusting the warped reality that tries to bind her. WOLVERINE is untouched. NIGHTCRAWLER teleports away.)
(MOIRA/PROTEUS consumes TESSA. Her death is grizzly.)
(MOIRA/PROTEUS turns to WOLVERINE. We see clearly now, MOIRA’S body is showing signs of decay.)

MOIRA/PROTEUS
So you’re the little mutant designed to contain me.

WOLVERINE
(Only in WOLVERINE’S eyes do we see the terror he feels. His body is poised, his claws are out.) Leave me alone.

MOIRA/PROTEUS
I’d leave you alone if I could. But I want to live. That’s all I want. You all wanted to live-why can’t I?

(PHOENIX bats MOIRA/PROTEUS to the ground with her flamebird manifestation.)
(MOIRA/PROTEUS makes the direction of “up” into “down”, and lands feet first. WOLVERINE goes sprawling because of the gravity change. PHOENIX only twists in air to re-orient herself. MOIRA/PROTEUS’ captives are now upside down.)

XAVIER
Proteus, we want to help you, but not at the expense of other lives.

MOIRA/PROTEUS
(Petulantly) It will only take one more. (Fixes on WOLVERINE. The mist begins to leave MOIRA’s body.)

XAVIER’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
Jean, you know what you must do.

(PHOENIX picks up WOLVERINE with her flamebird talon, aiming him like a dart at MOIRA/PROTEUS.)

(MOIRA/PROTEUS sees this threat and lashes out at PHOENIX, changing her very body into a cluster of globules. PHOENIX breaks apart, shrieking, WOLVERINE falls to the ground.)

SCOTT
JEAN!!!!

(MOIRA/PROTEUS advances again on WOLVERINE.)

WOLVERINE
Oh God. Somebody help me.

(A series of lightning quick“bamf-clouds” -NIGHTCRAWLER’S teleport signature- approach WOLVERINE. NIGHTCRAWLER snatches WOLVERINE up, and in the last bamf-cloud, NIGHTCRAWLER flings WOLVERINE straight at MOIRA/PROTEUS.)
(Like a dart, WOLVERINE is shot into MOIRA/PROTEUS’ heart, claws first. The metal plunges into PROTEUS’ misty essence and goes off like an explosion. WOLVERINE howls as the energies discharge through him.)
(PROTEUS gives his final death scream and dissipates.)
(WOLVERINE is left with MacTAGGART impaled on all six of his claws.)

(As the energies of PROTEUS dissipate, a clot of them coalesce and JEAN reforms and falls to the ground. SCOTT runs to her.)

(The mutants can only stare in horror at how this has all ended. We see XAVIER is taking it the hardest. He breaks down in wracking sobs.)

"X-Men 2" Epilogue

CLOSING ACT
Scene One; Xavier Institute, Exterior
(The day is bright with new promise. The mansion is being rebuilt by the students. We again see PETER in his metal form carrying an inhuman amount of materials. JUBILEE is welding metal with her pyrokinetics, etc.)
(ORORO stands with XAVIER overseeing the work. NIGHTCRAWLER and BEAST are under the tree in the shadows, nearby them.)

NIGHTCRAWLER
And how does our leader intend to direct us now that we are all safe again?

XAVIER & ORORO
Well, I . . .

(They laugh at XAVIER’S mistake.)

XAVIER
Pardon my presumption.

ORORO
Well, actually Professor, it is your decision to make. I would like to see the Morlocks out of the sewers and out from under the tyranny of dictatorship.

XAVIER’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
You want them to come here?

ORORO’S THOUGHT VOICE
Professor, you never intended for this to be Xavier’s School For Gifted but Only Beautiful Youngsters?

XAVIER’S TELEPATHIC VOICE
But there are so many of them . . . and they do have a completely different culture than we do.

(ORORO only patiently waits for XAVIER to make the right decision.)

XAVIER
Hank, Kurt . . . welcome to the X-Men. We’ll need your skills to help us add a few new wings onto the mansion if we’re all to live here comfortably.

(Elsewhere on the grounds, LOGAN is cutting wood with a claw. Nearby SCOTT is directing traffic. PHOENIX hovers into the scene and collects LOGAN’S materials in a flamebird talon, and goes back to the construction. SCOTT and LOGAN watch her go. PHOENIX blows SCOTT a kiss, and a set of flame-lips flutter down and brush against SCOTT’s cheek.)
(SCOTT only looks concerned.)

LOGAN
Hey. This Phoenix-level of hers. It’s not changing her into someone you fear, is it?

SCOTT
I hope not, Logan.

(ROGUE and GAMBIT walk by.)

ROGUE
So you’re from Louisiana? I’m from Mississippi!

GAMBIT
Two states sittin’ in each other’s lap. Sounds like karma t’ me.

(ROGUE blushes.)

So what kind of name is Rogue for a petit cherie?

ROGUE
What kind of name is Gambit?

GAMBIT
De name’s Remy. Remy LeBeau.

ROGUE
Marie.

(ROGUE and GAMBIT walk on, out of the scene.)
(LOGAN is staring at them open-mouthed as they walk off-camera-we understand, as does LOGAN, that the name exchange was nearly word for word when LOGAN first met ROGUE in the last movie.)

LOGAN & SCOTT
Son of a bitch.

(To SCOTT.) Ay, bub. Screw all this work. Let’s go get us a couple a’ brewskis.

(Cut to SCOTT and LOGAN as they race their two motorcycles out the gates of “Xavier’s School For Gifted Youngsters.”)

(Screen goes dark, but credits do not roll.)

Scene Two; Behind Xavier's mansion. Exterior.
(Fade in. JEAN lands out of anyone’s sight, near the mansion’s rose gardens. She looks pained.)
(Suddenly JEAN drains the roses of their life force. They shrivel and die, as does a large patch of grass and shrubbery around her. JEAN focuses, restored, but with a worried, guilty look on her face. She goes back resolved, into the mansion.)
(Pan up to the sun.)

ROLL CREDITS.

"A Friend In Need"

This is the original story which will never become one of the audio drama episodes. :D

"A Friend In Need"
A Feedback fan-fiction companion piece
by Alan White

"You want who to play him?" The man who had taken the codename 'OutSource' was pacing furiously across the Burberry rug in his office. The bluetooth flashed in his ear.

His guest watched him go past the window that served as one entire wall of the room, overlooking the southeastern corner of Central Park. The aged peaked roof of the renovated Plaza Hotel seemed within touching distance just below her eyeline. She credited the well-heeled man for keeping his hands behind his back and not flinging them crazily around.

"Tom Cruise has black hair and is five-foot-nothing! There’s more space between Matt’s chin and his beltline than Tom's got height!"

OutSource's guest made a pained expression and wagged her hand, sending a silent sign for 'Too harsh'. He nodded back to her.

"Look, I appreciate your opinion on the matter,” he said, “But Matt is the only person the public is going to accept to portray Feedback. It was Matt who they fell in love with and Matt who they want to see. Trust me on this. I have to go now, I have a visitor. We'll talk later" OutSource reached up and disengaged the headset.

He took a breath as if drinking in the sight of his guest. "Am I crazy or are they? America didn’t vote for an actor in a Feedback costume--what makes Hollywood think they’d accept one now?"

"They did vote for an actor," she said. "Among the other things he is."

OutSource blinked. "No they didn’t. When they voted for Feedback, they voted for an ideal. They voted for a man who knew what it meant to be a superhero and who was living up to the dream. They didn’t vote for an actor in a costume any more than they voted for a software engineer in a costume."

"You’re right. If they had voted for me, they would have voted for an actor in a costume."

A surge of awkwardness rose in OutSource. "I didn’t say that."

"You didn’t have to but it’s fine. I’m going to let you take me to lunch anyway."

"What’s your preference?"

"You know what I like."

"I do. Reservations for two at Queztecoatl. We taking my car service or yours?"

"It’s a beautiful day--why don’t we take mine? Open the windows."

OutSource went to his desk, moused his computer to a special subroutine, and clicked. The glass wall descended into the office floor and the outside air filled the room with a tug on their eardrums.

"Hop aboard," she said.

He stepped in to her magnificent curves and pressed the gold fabric of her costume against himself. He loved the way her body fit against his. He draped his arms around her neck. On a burst of golden sunlight, they launched out into the midday sky.

* * *

"What do you think?" asked Blackthorn. "Can he handle something like this?"

There were two men standing at the nexus of a communications hub. The first favored his right leg, which was on the same side that a webbed pattern of white scars played across his stern expression. The second man looked relaxed in comparison. He wore a pair of boatshoes with no socks, jeans, and a black t-shirt with a big blue "F" stenciled from upper right shoulder to below his left armpit where his right hand was tucked. He unfolded his arms and ran his hand through his thinning hair. "Feedback can handle anything," he said.

Their faces were washed out in the glare of the monitors before them. Actual content was reflected in reverse miniature across the glasses of the second man.

"No, Cluster. He can't." Blackthorn didn't seem in touch with a sense of humor. "But I need to know if he can handle this."

The chamber of electronics extended around them in a blur of activity. Data-gathering technicians sat at multiple stations, bookmarking streams of audio and text for deeper analysis by second-tier crunchers. People in jumpsuits with cables spooled around their left or right shoulders crawled at the edge of the periphery. The steady hum of eighty dozen cooling fans sounded like a steady ocean tide.

Cluster drowned them all out and gave the monitors his full attention. “Well," he said, “That can’t be right.”

“It’s exactly what it looks like. Would Feedback be any good there?”

“Isn’t anyone else able to go? Dragonryder, Imagine This, or even Inevitable! Don't we have like half a dozen paranormals in Tech Support that we could send instead?”

“You know Feedback has more power in his pinky than our paranormals combined. That’s why we've kept them here in Tech Support rather than graduate them to Excelsior."

”Speaking of which, I think Dragonryder's ready. She started out with Excelsior--it's unfair to keep her back here just because we--"

"Cluster. Focus."

"Okay then, speaking of Excelsior--there’s six other members in that supergroup they could have called on--why does it always have to be Feedback?”

Blackthorn let go of a lengthy exhale. “Same reason, essentially. He’s the best.” Cluster was caught by a look of severity in Blackthorn that he hadn't seen before. There was not only a deep loyalty in that look, but a faith. “Eleven superheroes stood stripped of their powers, shoulder to shoulder before all of America, and presented themselves for us, John and Jane Normal, to be their judges. In doing that, Stan Lee empowered America in a way we never dreamed of. When the smoke cleared, only Feedback was worthy of us. I wouldn’t be the CPU of anyone else but him.”

Cluster was left a little speechless. He’d known John Blackthorn for a while now and had the impression the man was all business and efficiency. Seeing sentiment from the tactical genius was like seeing maliciousness in Feedback--surely it existed but Cluster didn’t believe anything common could bring it out. He looked back at the events unfolding on the monitor screens. Right…nothing common. “Okay, well…you said it. He’s the best and we work for him, so … let him make the decision.”

Blackthorn grinned. “I knew there was a reason I keep you around.”

“Feedback keeps me around.” he returned, grinning as largely. "You get Pre-Fetch and the boys to line-up the games he'll need for the mission, and I'll get the man."

"Roger that," said the CPU.

* * *

OutSource and his lunch date didn't make it to the restaurant. The bluetooth making the journey across the Manhattan sky with them had begun to flash in his ear.

"If you answer that," said the woman who propelled him through the air, "I will drop you."

OutSource held up a finger to her, already in conversation. "When was this?" he asked to the unseen. He was quiet as he listened to the answer.

"If I'm the flying one in the costume, why do I feel like the bystander?"

Still he was not listening; he was not in the present. "I have a little surprise for you, Cluster ... I'm going to be there. Yes, I know you only told me because it’s a media opportunity, but from the way it sounds, they’re already covering it from their end. Yes. Well I have transport resources of my own and this is my city. OutSource out."

At last he turned to her. "I'll make it up to you."

"You don't have enough connections for that."

"Yes I do."

"Okay, where are we going."

"South."

"How far."

"The end. And you're going to need to do more than chauffeur me once we get there."

"Seriously? You think I should go too?"

“I do.”

“Are you trying to start some trouble?”

“Yes … No.” He sighed, and hoped he only said to himself, “Yes.”

* * *

The site was still under construction and would be for quite some time. That said, it was the most pristine construction site in all New York City. It lay easily overlooked at the base of the most well-known and most haunting emptiness in the world. Unless travelers took a well-educated turn down a narrow street, an accidental turn onto a medium channel, or swept through on a tour-laden chariot from the drive on the western end, the surrounding neighborhood revealed nothing of the nature of Ground Zero.

The west quarter of the site was hedged by a shiny black wall of marble. Etched in the surface of the wall were the names of all those who did not survive the terrorist attack on the buildings which once stood here. The names were legion. Atop the wall was a platform where viewers would stand and observe murals of the buildings which before blinding tragedy, were named The Twin Towers. Lined along this platform today was constructed a table row with five chairs. The five individuals who sat in them appeared gathered to hold court. An immense dais was erected before them and anyone who would stand thereupon would not only have the scrutiny of the five, but also of the thousands of silent names stretching between the table and the dais like a river. An outer audience of camera lights, crews, and accidental onlookers lay along the south and west periphery, surrounding them.

The first to arrive on the dais came in like a fallen missile. Before anyone even registered the red and black comet, he landed with the deafening impact of an immense gavel on stone. When he looked up, it was from a warrior’s stance; one knee down, one fist covering the "V" in the inverted white triangle on his chest. “Am I late?” he asked.

“No,” said one of the five, “You’re the first.”

Next to the answering judge, another leaned over and said, “I always did like him the best.” Then she straightened up. “Welcome Major Victory.”

The hero on the dais nodded and the growing crowd quietly clapped in reverence to the site. He stood up. Beneath his red unitard and black wrestler’s briefs, his muscles were still flexed by the superleap that had brought him there. He then flashed a chisled ivory smile that was set within a lantern jaw and framed by a pristine set of dimples. “Thank you for the invitation.”

Seconds later, a black and pink missile streaked in from the west, circled the dais, and spiraled in for a dainty landing near Major Victory. Like a graceful cherub, Fat Momma clutched the points of her cape demurely and curtsied to the five chairs. “Hello, judges.”

They perked noticeably in their seats, including the one who had identified the Major as her favorite. One of the five waved. Another smattering of subdued applause came from the audience.

Fat Momma looked to Major Victory. Their capes swished as they closed in for a hug. She spoke quietly but the shotgun microphones amplified her question and it echoed around the site. “Do you think it will be just us?”

“You know him … he wouldn’t miss this no matter how short the notice.”

“Well, he’s got that crew of his, what are they called again…?”

“Tech Support…”

“Yeah. Maybe they’ve got him doing something else…”

The Major flashed another of his heart-stuttering smiles. “You know what? I want a Tech Support!”

Fat Momma laughed. “As if you need one. You’re the most organic man I’ve ever met.”

Laughter pealed around the site. The Major took in the increased crowd like the proud father of good children. “Thankyew! Thankyewverramuch!” He raised a hand. “How’s my hair?”

The laughter turned into applause and thunderous cheer. Somehow, Ground Zero transformed just then from a memorial to a celebration. It was as if some vast invisible being had just given one big cosmic sigh of relief.

Fat Momma marveled. “How do you do that?”

“He’s Major Victory, that's how!” The voice was heard seconds before a tall broad-shouldered figure appeared in a black mushroom cloud of brimstone smoke. Feedback reached for the Major’s hand in greeting but the other two heroes turned away coughing, fanning the acrid fumes with their capes.

“I’m sorry! That wasn’t what I …” he helped them fan the air. “I mean I never realized how badly this ‘bamfcloud’ really would stink!”

“Dude!” said the Major, “There must have been a thousand other games you could’ve absorbed to get you here!”

“I didn’t have too much time to choose. I only heard about this an hour ago…”

“That’s alright baby, I’m glad you could make it.” Fat Momma wrapped Feedback in a hug that spoke volumes of the bond they shared. Inherent in their familiarity was the night they stood as lone survivors of the onslaught that had torn their teammates away from them, one by one. But before they were alone, Major Victory had stood with them and together the three had faced a series of trials before the watchful eye of America. One of those trials was before a classroom full of children.

Now the three heroes stood again before five of those same children. The chairs of the judges dwarfed their small frames.

"Now that the three of you are here," said Johann Nelson, the centermost child, "We should get started. The five of us asked you back because we weren't actually satisfied with the way the last challenge turned out." His young voice wrestled with syllables of advanced speech.

"Yeah," said Karen Morris, the girl who had named the Major as her favorite. "The question about Major Victory's hair was just mean and stupid."

"Most of the questions our classroom asked were stupid," said James Porcelli, a boy on the right end. "In fact, we thought that asking questions at all was stupid."

The heroes looked at one another as Feedback held out a glove, "Now kids, the show was about testing the content of our character, not our powers..."

"We know that!" said Serena Albee, the child sitting next to James with her hair parted through the middle and bunched in two fat pigtails on either side. "But that was weak!"

"Alright now little girl," said Fat Momma, "I know your Momma didn't teach you to use that tone of voice with adults?"

Serena shrank slightly in her chair, looking so much like Fat Momma it seemed like the heroine was scolding her own child. The boy on the leftmost end looked nothing like either of them. He was a thin blonde with a sullen expression, and he chose the moment to speak up. "You're superheroes. We wanted to see some powers. We still do."

Major Victory tried to speak out of the corner of his mouth. "Hey Feeds? Momma? How did these kids get hold of all this equipment?" His voice boomed, amplified back.

"And what I want to know is how they got the work shut down on Freedom Tower?" said Fat Momma.

"And why would they pick this place of all places anyway?"

"What Peter said stands," said Johann. "We want to see powers. So if you are going to prove to us who the best superhero is among you, we need to see you do it with powers."

Feedback looked around. "How would you like us to do that? I don't see any obstacle courses or physical challenges ..."

"Last hero standing!" said James.

The hero trio looked at each other.

"Last hero standing!" James repeated. Peter and Serena picked up the chant.

"Okay kids," said the Major, "This was cute. But ... we're members of the same team. We're not going to fight each other..."

After Karen, Johann's voice added to the mix. "Last hero standing! LAST HERO STANDING!!"

"This is absurd," Feedback said. Then he realized more than just the kids were chanting. The crew on the cameras, the bystanders and tourists; the adults all were chanting along.

"LAST! HERO! STANDING!"

"Why don't we just leave?" asked Fat Momma. "This noise is about to get on my last nerve."

"You want something on your last nerve," said the Major, "Try THIS...!"

Before Fat Momma could react, Major Victory had punched her clean off the dais.

* * *

"What in the hell was THAT all about?!" OutSource strained against the grip that his date had on his shoulder. They struggled briefly across the construction site, detached and hiding from the crowd near the dais.

"What are you going to do, publicize him into submission? That's Major Victory out there going wild."

"Well then YOU do something," OutSource snapped. "He's going after Feedback next!"

"Oh sure. Now you recognize."

"Please!"

* * *

"Major Victory," cried Feedback, "What are you doing?! You didn't giver her a chance to alter her density--you might've killed her!!"

"Just like I'm not giving you a chance--!" The Major's two red-sheathed fists were raised behind his head as the arc of his leap jetted him at Feedback.

"Game ON!!"

Victory's fists crashed down on Feedback's raised forearms and were met with like force. Now shimmering around Feedback's arms were the images of organic steel striated with metallic muscle. The Major growled in pain but bore down. His opponent's height took away Victory's advantage so he stomped forward into Feedback's long gut. He felt the hard steel of Feedback's manifested power under his boot sole, but the black shiny suit and metallic blue "F" folded at the waist just the same.

"Chris..." gasped Victory's target, "This isn't right...you have to check on Nell..!"

"No he don't," echoed a voice soaked in anger and amplified by equipment. "Nobody gets the drop on Fat Momma."

The full-figured heroine reached down to her belt as she sailed up over the dais. Her cape flapped furiously. She plucked a freshly materialized donut from her belt and chomped into it. "It's on now."

She raised the donut over her head and while Victory and Feedback watched it, Fat Momma struck her own midsection in three rapidfire beats. The sound she made when her free fist hit her flesh was nothing compared to the reverb when she was done. Major Victory went to his knees in agony and Feedback curled up in a foetal position. Both men cupped their ears with their hands trying to keep their brains from spraying out.

Suddenly the dais was awash in golden sunlight. "Alright kids, playtime is over."

Fat Momma turned in the air and watched the shapely curves of Lemuria hover into view. "Them kids ain't the problem," she said, "Major Victory done lost his damn mind."

"I wasn't speaking to the kids," said Lemuria. "One, this is the wrong place to have a sparring match. It's disrespectful. And two, Feedback didn't do anything to you and you hurt him too."

"You know what Lemuria, don't worry so much about Feedback, okay? He already has a wife."

Lemuria looked stunned for a second. Her dark lustrious hair flowed around her slack expression. Then she grinned wickedly. "Yeah, but it isn't you."

"What?"

"When he's back at Excelsior's lair, honey, Feedback can do his own laundry."

"What?!"

"Fat Momma, please. It's obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes."

"What are you--?"

"Just forget it, Moms. You might as well be chasing after Levity for all the good it'll do you. Feedback loves his wife."

"Are you trying to get your skinny ass kicked up in here?"

"Bring it on, Nell. Nothing here but space and opportunity."

With a roar of fury, Fat Momma launched across the sky at Lemuria.

* * *

"Blackthorn, get Back-Up and Firewall out here!" OutSource shouted. "This is a disaster! Victory, Momma, and Lemuria are literally trying to kill each other and they've got Matt in the crossfire!"

The dais was a good six or seven stories high, a sheer pillar of poured concrete towering over OutSource as he crossed Ground Zero.

"You're all we got right now, OutSource. We sent Feedback across the country by amping up the teleporting powers he took from a game that Blackmage and Kommie loaded up. None of us could follow him."

"Well what else can he do right now? What game did he play?"

"We figured 'Mutants: Apocalypse' would fill him with dozens of powers."

"But are they going to help him fight three other heroes at the same time?"

"OutSource, those are his Excelsior teammates. Surely they won't really hurt each other..."

"You don't see what I see! Find a way to patch into all these TV cameras down here and take a look for yourselves!"

"Sounds like a plan."

A blast of solar energy corruscated off the dais with such intensely that OutSource felt the hair on his sideburns crisp.

* * *

Feedback's head was swimming in the heat of Lemuria's power. Waves of solar energy poured down from the goldenclad woman as if the sun itself had dislodged from the sky. He wondered if she knew she was killing him, or if she even cared anymore.

Through his blurred vision he saw the five schoolchildren watching the spectacle. He remembered back to the original challenge with them. He had been himself and trusted, as with the 450-pound prisoner from whom he had earned three hugs, that his sincerity would be enough. At the conclusion of the entire contest, it had been. He was now America's Next Great Superhero. But that day in that classroom, before all those kids, he had felt only like America's Next Great Big Dork. Surrounded by the children, it was easy to see himself again the way it was in grade school. He had worn glasses. He had lost a front tooth. He clothes were usually some knit or plaid piece and his hobbies never, ever took him out to the sports field were the popular kids hung out.

That day he had discovered how crushing defeat not only felt, but tasted. It was a bitterness that went down the back of his tongue and festered in his belly, down where the roots of his past still were clutched. Yet, that crushing defeat didn't last ... for him.

Lemuria, Major Victory, and dear Fat Momma--they had hugged him, congratulated him, celebrated with him, fought by his side. But they had not won the contest. The bitterness he felt from failing one challenge could not have been anything compared to what his teammates ... his friends ... had to be dealing with every day.

Why was it only now that this was coming to the surface? What had taken away their self-control?

As his costume began to smoke and searing heat snaked into his throat, Feedback realized he had to stop thinking and start acting.

"Game..." he choked, "...on..."

Two white eyes with blue catlike irises materialized in front of his own like free-floating goggles. A superimposed image of wildly flowing white hair encircled his head as he called up the game's next mutant power. He could feel a grasp of elemental energies in his palms. He flexed his hands and the very fabric of the air surrounding the dais squeezed. He drew the weather in on them with his fingers. Immediately clouds coalesced in a sphere as he brought the temperature plummeting. The heat from Lemuria crashed violently with the cold condensing air. Lightning erupted across the dais. Thunder followed, throwing everyone back onto the ground. Rain then fell in sudden torrents across them and Feedback thought he'd cry from the feeling of sheer, cool water on his face.

The respite was brief. Major Victory chugged toward him through the curtains of rain with an evil grin splitting his face. “Thanks for putting out the hot chick!” he crowed as he punted Feedback in the ribs.

White hot pain dissected him.

He could not get air enough to cough, let alone switch powers. The Major hauled him into the air. Cold rain poured into Feedback’s gaping mouth.

“Chris … don’t …”

“Who’s the Next Great Superhero now?!”

Silently apologizing, Feedback called the elements to him. A bolt of lightning speared down and pinioned the Major to the dais. Feedback felt the electricity pouring into him through the Major’s grip and it felt like flowing life. The Major, however, was clenched in a rictus of shock and went down convulsing as thunder hammered around them.

Feedback climbed to his feet, head hanging low. Then he looked to the children. "Who ... are you ... ?"

They began speaking from left to right, each taking their turn rhythmically.

"I am just two and two." said Peter.

Karen followed by saying, "I am hot. I am cold."

"I am the parent of numbers that cannot be told," said Johann.

"I am a gift beyond measure, a matter of course," said Serena.

"I am given with pleasure when taken by force," said James.

In unison, the children finished, saying, "Who am I?"

Feedback blinked. Inside him, a wellspring of peace emerged. Admist the chaos and broken fealty, this was finally a territory he knew. By answering his question with a riddle, he knew what he was facing now. A broad boyish grin broke out. "I have three answers for you. Which one do you want?"

Johann spoke. "Give me the answer that makes you think the hardest."

"You're getting soft in your old age, Deathmatch. None of them made me think hard. That was answer number one, by the way."

"FEEDBACK!!"

He wheeled around, arrested by the tone of Fat Momma's call. She towered over him, breaking through the clouds of his miniature storm. She was now five times her normal size which only meant one thing; now she was mad. In one hand she held a sodden, limp golden figure. Lemuria looked like a drowned doll that Fat Momma had found on a beach.

"WHAT IS SHE DOING HERE? HAVE ALL THE HEROES BEEN THINKING WHAT SHE'S THINKING? ARE YOU THINKING IT, FEEDBACK?!"

"Momma ... you can't hold Lemuria or Major Victory responsible for what's happening here ... this was a trap set by Deathmatch ..."

"WHO? ONE OF YOUR ENEMIES? WHY THIS ALWAYS GOTTA BE ABOUT YOU?" Fat Momma was shaking Lemuria so violently, Feedback feared she might snap the heroine's neck. "I GOT ENEMIES TOO! WHEN'S IT GONNA BE FAT MOMMA'S TURN IN THE SPOTLIGHT?!"

He swallowed resolutely, seeing that there would be no getting through to her. She was as deeply affected by this mind-bomb as the others were. "Game on," he said, calling up another mutant power.

A cluster of translucent muscles bulged around Feedback's forearms. The image grew down his wrists and over his hands until he wore a powerful pair of translucent fists like gloves. He felt a feral rage take him and he flexed. Razor-sharp talons sprang from between the superimposed knuckles of the phantom hands. He cried out in pain, feeling the talons emerge as if from his own flesh. "Nell," he growled, "Don't make me do this..."

"Give me your second answer, Feedback. I could stop all this right now."

Feedback spun on the children. His snarling face was hooded by his shoulders as he brandished his claws. "So can I." He crouched, ready to leap across the gap between the dais and the platform.

"Wait! Wait, wait wait!"

Feedback cocked his head, watching the man scramble along the platform toward the children. The kick of the cologne he wore made Feedback want to shake his newly-enhanced senses clear.

"Feedback, it's me. It's OutSource. That's not the power you want to use right now--"

On a primitive level, he knew the sharply dressed man was not a threat, but he couldn't ignore what else was around him ... with effort, Feedback sheathed the power-claws.

"YOU'RE OUTSOURCE?!" boomed Fat Momma. Her voice, already amplified by her size, caused the crowd to clutch their heads in pain.

OutSource visibly tried to ignore the 30-foot woman pounding across the dais at him. "Feedback--you need to keep your wits and get rid of Deathmatch."

"Oh, I'll get rid of him," Feedback snarled. "Once and for all."

Both Feedback and Fat Momma struck the judges' platform at the same time. Fat Momma reached across the gap and snatched up OutSource, while Feedback completed the leap and landed on the judges table. He grabbed Johann by the scruff of his collar and snarled in the child's face. He put a fist to the child's temple. One pop of his claws and he knew he'd stop this itineration of the villain, maybe for good this time...

Behind Feedback, Fat Momma shrieked, "YOU'RE THE ONE DATING LEMURIA?!" She seemed like a mad giantess playing insanely with her dolls.

OutSource struggled in the giantess' grip. "It's nothing ... not a relationship at all ..." Her fingers were crushing his chest. Feedback could smell OutSource's fear but the children were motionless. Their faces were all blank slates. Clearly they were under some kind of mental control ... but right now Feedback didn't care. Fire in his blood made only one action the clear and obvious choice.

"Feedback ... if you kill that kid ... Deathmatch wins!"

Feedback continued snarling in the child's face. "A kiss," he said. "My second answer is A Kiss. Two and two are the lover's lips. There are hot kisses and cold ones. A stolen kiss can be a pleasurable one, even if taken by force."

Fat Momma thundered overhead. "YOU WANT HER, 'OUTSOURCE'?? I CAN SMASH THE TWO OF YOU TOGETHER FOREVER!!"

"Nell ... please ..." OutSource croaked, " ... for God's sake ... the sake of our kids ... I never meant to hurt you ..."

Feedback dropped Johann. He turned around on the table in stunned realization. The power of the berserker drained away from him, A more chilling emotion crept in. "Fat Momma," he said, afraid to finish the question but unable to stay quiet. "You know OutSource?"

"KNOW HIM?!" Fat Momma answered. Feedback's heart began triphammering as she continued. "I LOVED--!!"

Regret exploded in Feedback. "NOTHING!!" Now he was in a rush to stop all these unchecked emotions. All this betrayal. "My third answer is nothing!! The two and two could be both a negative and positive integer, adding up to nothing! Nothing can be both hot and cold! Nothing can be a parent of something you don't speak into existence! Every gift has its price, and there is nothing in all the world can be given in pleasure if it is taken by force! The ANSWER, Deathmatch, is NOTHING!!"

Karen turned to Feedback with a wry smile on her small round face. "Only your first and second answers were correct."

She and the other children then collapsed back into their chairs like marionettes with their strings cut. Cameras fell over into the construction pit as crews and onlookers fell unconscious too.

Fat Momma halted her tirade and looked at the people she had in each hand. "Oh no." Her size evaporated with her fury.

Feedback watched Fat Momma help lay Lemuria's unconscious body to the ground near Major Victory while OutSource stumbled back to his feet. From across the gap he said, "You never did tell me your whole name."

OutSource's voice was small and hushed but the microphones made a powerful understatement out of it. "I did tell you that I had made mistakes before you met me."

"So this is just a coincidence?"

"I don't know. All you heroes lived on the West Coast. I was visiting my son that night, waiting for the ATM, and I wound up behind your doppleganger trying to empty your bank account. Could be he knew who I was ... maybe he was going to try to lure Nell into a trap all along since he hates the ones you care about. But you showed up instead and saved me. I owed you my life. Even though you worked with Nell, I couldn't ignore you. And I haven't."

"Why would you keep this a secret from me?" Try as he might, Feedback somehow felt a weight in his chest that, painful as they had been, none of the loosed passions from the heroes could equal. "Have I ever given you reason to believe that if I knew who you were, I'd have treated you differently?"

"Feedback ... Matt I ... I just was too ... but when I heard the three of you were going to be at Ground Zero for a new challenge ... I figured I needed to face it. Too many relationships ended unresolved on that day."

Fat Momma gently spoke OutSource's real name as only a woman with a deep history could have. "Those things I said ..."

OutSource tried to wave it away.

"No!!" Feedback felt the weight burst inside, rising in his throat, pouring out of his eyes. "You don't do that! You don't do that to her!! This is Fat Momma and she's a hero!"

"I know..."

"Do you really?!"

"Matt ... I know ..."

With a roar of frustration, Feedback cried "Game ON!!" and disappeared in a burst of fire and brimstone.

* * *

"My life has gotten too complicated." Matt Atherton sat overlooking the San Bernadino Valley from the grassy swells of the San Gabriel Mountains. Blue sky yawned forever above him. A crispy chill blew on the wind, carrying the fragrance of Autumn. Mount Waterman, Twin Peaks, and Mount Baden-Powell formed a snow crusted rim to the world on the far side of the valley.

"Do you regret it?"

Matt dipped his head low and concentrated on a stalk of wild grass. He plucked it. The bluetooth waited for his answer. He could imagine the voice in his ear was embodied by the spectral floating head of his mentor. "No. Meeting you was the third best day of my life."

"Let me guess the second best day. When you awoke from that accident with powers far beyond that of mortal men."

The bombastic delivery made Matt smile. "Yes sir. And the best day was when I married Sarah."

"Then, my hero, what is the problem?"

Matt took another pause before answering. "I've surrounded myself with all these people to help me do what I do ... and I don't know any of them."

"This OutSource thing has got you rattled."

"He's Fat Momma's ex-husband! I brought him into our heroic identities and made Nell have to confront him now in both aspects of her life! I would do anything to change that and save her that grief."

"Fat Momma is a big girl. She can handle it."

"But ..."

"What you heard in New York were the effects of Deathmatch's mindtrap. Most of the time, we're able to control our harsher thoughts ... our more base instincts. That's how we humans survive."

"Should I keep OutSource in Tech Support?"

"That's up to you. Is he any good?"

"Should that matter? Every time Nell sees me now in Excelsior's headquarters, she'll be wondering if we have secrets. How can I lead her in the team or keep her trust if behind her back I have an association with the man that broke her heart and abandoned her with their children?"

"Has he offered you a resignation?"

Matt chewed on the end of the straw. "No."

"Hmm. Why not? He must be making a lot of money from being your publicist! That's pretty selfish..."

"He isn't making a cent. Tech Support are all volunteer. You know that."

"Yes I do."

"I have to go talk to him don't I?"

"At least."

He spat out the bitter stalk of grass. "Stan, this is so hard."

"I have faith in you, son. My Feedback."

He drew his knees up and rested his head on them. No matter how much he accomplished in the identity of Feedback, he prayed that he'd end his days making a mark on the world as profound as Stan Lee's. He marveled at the power of wisdom and at its quiet teaching grace. He clearly heard words that his mentor had not spoken, yet Matt knew he could not have thought of on his own.

On his own, he knew he was nothing.

He knew, as well, that the same went for all his friends.

"Thank you, sir. I'll speak to you next week. Feedback out." Matt voiced the bluetooth to dial another number. He heard the phone ringing, then the connection opened.

"Feedback's Tech Support, OutSource speaking."

Matt addressed OutSource, using his real name. "Can you meet me for lunch?"





END





Thanks again to "Tech Support", to Matt Atherton, and to one of the founding fathers of modern American dreams, Stan Lee. A special thanks to Chris Watters, Tonatzin Mondragon, and Nell Wilson

"A Friend In Deed"

This is the original story which has become the audio drama.

“A Friend In Deed”
A Feedback fan-fiction piece
by Alan White

“I don’t know where I am but I know I don’t like it
Open my mouth and out pops something spiteful
Words are so cheap but they can turn out expensive
Words like conviction can turn into a sentence”

Usually when someone played their iPod so loud that I could hear the song, I got aggravated. If I wanted to hear their music, I’d be listening to it on my own iPod. If I hadn’t left mine home, I’d be drowning the tinny little sound out. The guy in front of me was obviously just from the gym and he was still in a zoned-out, music-soaked world all his own. He was taking a little too long at the ATM, but the longer I waited for him, the better I could make the song out. It was a ditty that I used to love. In fact, I was discovering that I still loved it. Its catchy tempo lifted my spirits and I found my foot tapping. It was taking me back to the days when Molly Ringwald was the media darling and I dreamed of living her “Pretty In Pink” fairytale ending on my side of the tracks.

Unfortunately, my happy ending hadn’t come until much later and it hadn’t lasted.

The song was still as good as it always was and behind the iPod owner’s back, I mouthed the words to myself.

“Whistling in the graveyard,
Calling up your girlfriend,
Just try to make her understand,
You’re squeezing the telephone like it was her hand
No questions (So many questions)
She’s gonna catch you out boy
It all seems so underhand
But she the only thing that ever made you feel like a man,
Man,
Madman,
Madman....”

I was on the verge on closing my eyes and throwing my head up and down, heading into a silent Ducky-dance when I saw him punch the keys of the ATM with his closed fist. I jumped at the sudden aggression. Then I was concerned. I guess because I was already brought out of my shell by the song and I didn’t keep my response to myself.

“Hey guy ... I need to use that after you–leave it in one piece, yeh?”

He spun around on me, his face twisted in rage. It looked like someone else’s expression on the front of this guy’s head. There wasn’t an ounce of anger in the posture of his body. His hands were open, his back straight, his bare arms (where the iPod was stationed on a band) relaxed. Yet I danced backwards a little and barked an involuntary yip at the sheer hatred in his eyes.

“One-hundred, thirty-six dollars in overdraft fees?” he growled overloud, as if he couldn’t hear himself. “How the hell do they think they can get away with charging me that much?!”

As I realized he actually was asking me, I knew he hadn’t heard my little comment when he had hit the ATM keys. Of course not–General Public was tearing it up too loudly for him to know I had even been behind him, let alone had spoken. The hatred on his face wasn’t directed toward me at all, but towards the bank.

What a strange hatred it was. Why didn’t the rest of him know how angry his face was?

I hunched my shoulders and raised my eyebrows–the universal sign language for ‘Dude, I have no idea.’

Then he twisted slightly toward the ATM again and his leg shot straight up and out into the cash machine’s metal face. His foot crashed through the console up to the ankle. The sound shattered the boulevard silence and spat electricity like a ruptured blood vessel up his leg. I did more than dance backward that time but I hadn’t anticipated the curb and went sprawling backwards onto my butt into the street. Embarrassed and scared, I did what anyone would do in my situation. I yelled at him.

Again, his body seemed as though it hadn’t even moved. As if suddenly, it was just now in a new pose which happened to have intersected with an ATM machine. I saw it move, kick, and destroy, but it looked as though it was ... as though it was ... an “IT”.

Aw crap.

The world had been slowly turning into a strange and fantastic place over the last few months. Things that used to be limited to comic books and science-fiction novels were streaking across the skies of cities. Not many people let the change affect their daily lives, but it was always good for water-cooler conversation. Most people who had witnessed the sights didn’t even believe what they saw. I had been one of those.

This thing in front of me, it looked like a man. It’s skin looked real–it had body hair! But nothing could move and then stopped moving with this kind of precision unless it was mechanical. The face, still gnarled in anger, was acting independently from the rest of it–as if running on a different program than the one that made it walk, made it punch, and made it kick.

Striking like a snake, it darted from the ATM and straddled me in the street–so fast I didn’t register it moved until it had my shirt bunched in both its fists.

“You were waiting for that machine, right?”

I choked a little bit, but I could still breathe and speak. “Nevermind dude ... don’t need it anymore ...”

“But I need you to,” it said. Suddenly I was a meatsack going heels over head as it flipped me from the pavement. I slammed against it, now back to back. I felt my vertebrae whip against the shape of him like beads along a lash. My legs hung against his legs. I didn’t watch where we were going, or how, because at that point I screwed my eyes as tight as they could go and screamed for all I was worth.

“Put him down.”

It took a few moments for me to realize the thing had spoken again. We had stopped and I was drawing breath for another round of oh-my-god-im-going-to-die-right-now screaming. All the will I thought I had was being made a mockery in this thing’s fists. And who was it talking to anyway?

I opened my eyes. I screamed again. It was holding me out over the boulevard under its arms that looked like straight, inflexible marble.

Behind him on the roof stood his twin. But there was a stark difference with this other one. His body was slightly trembling beneath a black shiny jumpsuit. His gloves were knotted in fists, and he appeared clearly distressed, trying to hold back his ... what was it? Fear?

When the machine-man who was dangling me said, “You sure you want me to do that?” I realized the other one had been the voice I heard. There again I realized the stark difference between them. Although the voices were identical, there were two radically different emotions.

“I want you to control yourself and stop hurting people.”

And the eyes. The one who had just spoken had the same intense stare as the machine, but his eyes seemed furrowed with empathy.

This thing hurt people already?

“I am in control. That’s why I’m hurting people.”

I discovered that those who are about to die are apparantly infused with a type of madness. “Why are there two ... of you?” I said. “What ... what the hell ... ?” That was the best I could do.

“I’m so sorry sir,” said the one with the shiny jumpsuit. “My name is Feedback and this assailant is a creation of my own fault, but I’m going to get you out of this. I promise.”

Well, that clarified what the slanted “F” across his upper chest was for.

“How do you know I’m your creation?” The gym-shorts-and-athletic-tee-wearing version said. “With your memory, how do you know that I’m not the original?”

“Feedback” suddenly went a little pale. What “Negative-Feedback” had said clearly struck a nerve. But frankly, I couldn’t care less who begat whom. My armpits were numb and the vision of splintered legs and a shattered pelvis was making my eyes water like a little girl’s.

“Listen,” said the costumed one, “If you’ll safely release that citizen, you and I can go back to Tech Support and we can run some tests. If you’re the original ... then you can wear the costume. It really doesn’t matter as long as we’re doing better than ... than the way we are now.”

The creature went immobile for a few seconds, even in its face. I thought maybe the costumed one had found a way to disable it with some kind of logic puzzle, except what he had said was not particularly logical to me. It was, however, hella compassionate. Made me wish for a second that I was “Feedback’s” evil clone.

With a jerk, I was suddenly back from the edge. The sandpapery grey surface of the roof was inches away from my shoe heels. The thing holding me had not changed expression. It hadn’t so much as blinked. Unceremoniously, it then dumped me. I don’t know why I collapsed so completely to the grainy roof surface. I didn’t want to consider how or why my legs hadn’t tried to support me. I levered myself up on my arms and tried to climb to my feet. Nothing happened. Fear exploded in me. I don’t know why, but I looked to Feedback instinctively. The costumed man came to me and crouched by my side.

“Are you alright?”

My throat squeezed shut when I tried to answer. I knew I could still speak, but saying aloud what I was thinking was too horrible to contemplate. I could only shake my head.

“It’s going to be alright,” he said. “Just relax, okay? I’m going to carry you.”

He hooked an arm under my legs and another under my arm, shouldering my elbow around his neck. Suddenly it was like I was five. I was going to bury my face in the crook of his neck when two hands snatched the chance away from me. They gripped Feedback at the sides of his head from behind. The rictus of agony that suddenly etched across his face made me gasp. An inch from the bridge of my nose, fingers dug into Feedback’s temples and the fingertips clawed into his shut eyes. Feedback’s whole body went rigid under me and I felt his arms knotting in torment, curling me against him.

“Let me go,” I barked.

“I ... can’t ... ”

I didn’t know if he meant that he couldn’t or he wouldn’t.

The other ... the false ... Feedback stood over the both of us, gripping my rescuer’s head like a vise on a melon, and said, “We won’t have to worry about which one is the original if I’m the only one alive.”

Sparks of electricity spat out through Feedback’s clenched teeth. A smell like hot coppery pennies filled my nose.

“STOP!” I screamed not for myself, but for Feedback. He was dying. This man was dying trying to save me.

Nothing I could do would work. This other thing, inhuman in every way, was chugging through my life and Feedback’s life like a sabotaged freight train. The death rattle in Feedback’s throat grated loose and his body collapsed underneath me. I sprawled across him, all my will gone. The unmoved, paralyzed face of the imposter looked down on us, observing us.

What was it waiting for?

As if it heard my thoughts, the thing struck down quickly on me. I was almost relieved.

* * *

Why I woke up again, I have no idea. I also had no idea where I was as I did so. It looked like a very nice place, certainly. The walls were plaster, white, and brightly lit. The ceilings were high and also plastered with a smooth finish. There were pictures on the walls, as if I was either in an office or someone’s home. The pictures were large and framed. The image under the glass was a flat drawing of a poster. A cartoon. It looked like Wonder Woman.

It was Wonder Woman.

I blinked and tried to change position, digging my fingers into a carpeted floor. It wasn’t until I was able to sit up that I remembered my injuries and how dead I though my spine had been. My hips and legs were all a-tingle now, waking up from the blunt trauma of being manhandled like laundry.

And then I remembered my assailant.

And then I remembered Feedback.

With the speed of panic, I spun around. My head shrieked with pain and I couldn’t react to what I saw as I would have liked to. Negative Feedback was sitting in a recliner. His elbows were on the armrests and his fingers were steepled. His fingertips met at the junction between his dirty blonde eyebrows. He had changed his gym togs, and was now in flip-flops, a baggy plaid pair of sweats, and a college jersey who's name I did not recognize. I could tell he had showered because his hair was now dark and shiny, close to his head. Perversely, it made him look even more like the original, but I knew this man was the false one because the real Feedback was lying face down in his uniform, dead at the chair’s skirt. Why would a machine bother to take a water shower?

My breath grew shallow. The heaviness in my chest grew painful. “What,” I said.

“I changed my mind,” the clone said. “Being the only living Matt Atherton is not enough.”

I just watched him. Apparently this change of mind involved me.

“I want you to know something,” it said. “Matthew was not the only superhero in the world. He wasn’t the best one, either.”

I wanted to shrug. I wanted to pretend that nothing this crazy duplicate did or said affected me. Truth was, the heaviness in me was growing and I was having a hard time breathing without making a childlike noise. “I’ve never even heard of Feedback before tonight,” I said.

“Well. You’re in for a treat.” He bent over and jerked the body off the floor by handfuls of taut reflective material. Feedback’s costume didn’t tear as his weight sagged in the others’ fists. It stood up and carried Feedback’s remains to an open doorway off the room. With a gruntless flex, he threw the body into the dark. The sound of the weight hitting the ground made me flinch as if Feedback could still feel it. I had to bite my lip. The clone said, “You’re going to meet more than one tonight.”

“This is his house, isn’t it? Feedback’s?”

“It’s MINE!!”

I jumped at the sound of fury and watched as the face didn’t change. It didn’t look like this thing knew how to truly menace its prey, but that scared me even more. Like a cat with a mouse, it just seemed to be following its own programming expressionlessly with no chance to convince it to do otherwise. I couldn’t change its mind, but I couldn’t change my own either. “Why?” I said, hating how small my voice had shrank. “What does any of this have to do with me?”

“I need to figure something out,” the thing said. “And I need help doing it.”

An unbidden syllable escaped me.

“Oh, you’ll help me,” he said. “Because you want to live.”

“What do you want?”

“I want to know what I’m missing.”

“Dude... I was just waiting to use the ATM ... I’m not a part of any of this at all ... ”

“Do you have any friends?”

Fear made my chest squeeze even tighter and I had to gasp for breath. I nodded weakly.

“No, I mean real friends. Friends that would do anything for you.”

First I didn’t understand, and then I paid attention to what it was asking. It must have saw the look on my face as I started to review the people in my life. “Not do anything for me,” I said.

“Do you really want me to kill you?”

“What! I’m answering you!”

“You’re mocking me.”

“Look, you asked me a serious question and I gave you a serious answer. I’m doing whatever the hell you want me to do–“

”You have no real friends?”

“No! No. Okay? I ... I made some mistakes. Most of the good friends I had I met through my wife. When we broke up last year, they all stayed with her.”

“Not real friends at all then.”

“No. Well, to her they are. Which actually is good because ... like I said, I made some mistakes.”

This creature actually seemed to be thinking about the information I gave it.

“Then maybe I should kill you.”

“Why?”

“You can’t help me.”

“Why, because I have no friends–?”

The doorbell rang from downstairs. It had a distant chime that completed the picture of a nice two-story home in my mind. The clone looked at me. “I’m going to bring that person upstairs. If you are not here when I return with them, I’m gong to kill them.”

With that he left the chair and came straight for me. He lifted me by my upper arms and placed me onto the couch. It was almost as though he were trying to take care with me this time. Then he left through another door, leaving me alone. I thrust all thoughts of escape away from me. I had already gotten one person killed ...

When he returned, he had a radiant beam-like smile on his face, inappropriate in every way, shape, and form. It set ice water in my veins. Following him was a kid who seemed almost half the clone’s height. I don’t know why I thought of him as young and not just short. He had curly hair, googly eyes and a big smile on his face. He bounced lightly on a big pair of spotless sneakers that peeked out from oversized jeans.

“Darren,” the clone said to the guest, “This is a guy I met at the ATM.”

This ‘Darren’ did a double-take. Then he laughed. “At an ATM? Okay...” He leaned across to me and offered a hand. “Darren Passarello.”

I tried to smile and return the handshake. Darren took a deeper look. “Hey, what happened to you? You look like someone beat the crap out of you–“

The fake filled in the details as he saw them. “Someone robbed him at the ATM. Left him pretty much for dead. I took him to the ER and waited with him until they could stitch him up.”

Darren looked back at the fake “They didn’t do such a great job,” he said.

“I know,”said the fake. “That’s why I brought him back here. I thought he’d like some time to mend and, well, you know we’ve got room.”

Darren looked between the two of us, as if sensing that something was escaping him. “Matt, you know you can’t take in everyone with a hard luck story, right?” He looked back to me quickly, throwing up a hand. “No offense, you know? It’s just–this guy here he doesn’t know when to quit.”

“Darren, he was hurt. I couldn’t just leave him there.”

The kid looked back at “Matt”. I only saw his expression when he then turned back to me. “You ever met someone like this before?” What was I looking at on this kid’s face? The hell? This kid adored Matthew Atherton.

Darren turned back to the fake and in a quickly smooth move, snatched its hand and pulled him in to his shoulder for a man-hug. The fake had to bend almost in double to complete it with him. “Dude, you’re a prince.” said Darren into the fake’s shoulder. He stepped back. “So what did you need? When you called me I thought you were alone...”

The fake put his arm across Darren’s shoulders. “Actually old pal, that was it.”

There was the crackle of lightning and I screamed. When the burnt afterimage faded, the fake was holding Darren’s limp body by its hair.

“You didn’t have to do that! Why did you do that!” I was sobbing now and I didn’t care.

“Shut up and tell me something, if you can,” it said. Instead of dropping Darren’s body, it picked him up by the arms and tossed him into the same room with what was left of his real friend. “What did Matt have that I don’t? That kid? Would have done anything for Matt. How does that happen?”

“... I don’t know ...”

“Oh that’s right. You don’t have any friends.”

He took a step toward me, but damn him, before he killed Darren he had already awakened my hope and now I realized that I had an answer he needed to hear. “I was wrong. I do have a friend. I know what friendship is.”

He stopped. “Tell me.”

“Friendship is a decision you make. It’s a commitment.”

“Why? What’s so great about anyone that would cause people to commit to them?”

“I don’t think there’s anything at all great about people,” I said. I could only speak in a rush of words now. “But it’s not about what’s in the person that makes you commit to them. It’s about what’s inside of you.” The evil zombie clone from hell was frozen in thinking-mode again. I plunged on anyway. “If you’re some kind of spin-off from that guy then you came out as a total opposite and you’re not ever going to know what I’m talking about because it wasn’t what he found in other people that made him befriend them–it was what was inside himself all along. Darren talked about it, and when you lied about me, something leftover from the real Matt told you what he’d do. But I’d already seen it for myself.

“He didn’t know me from the average schmuck on a roof and yet he tried to help me. I could have been as evil as you are for all he knew, but you had hurt me and from inside himself he felt he had to get me to safety. I don’t know what the hell that costume was all about or what the hell you really are, but I do know one thing now. I know I had a friend. A true friend. AND YOU KILLED HIM.”

“Matt?”

A voice from downstairs. Belonged to a female. I heard the door close behind her. She hadn’t rang the doorbell. She had heard me yelling as she came in the house.

“Up here, honey,” the fake said.

“Matthew Atherton, why were there no funds available in your checking account for the groceries?”

“Sorry about that, dear. I lost track of my spending again. Come upstairs and meet my new friend.”

“You know, a little consideration before you go making a big purchase without telling me...” she said. “First let me put away what meager groceries I could buy and I’ll be right up.”

Oh my god.

The fake looked at me emotionlessly and mouthed “Wife,” silently.

“Don’t please,” I said. “Please.”

“Well, now. What do you care?”

“Please...”

“Tell me something then. Your answer might save her life. Would you be this concerned for her if her husband hadn’t died trying to save you?”

“Please...”

“She didn’t buy much,” the thing said. “She’ll be up here any second.”

“No,” I choked. “Is that what you want to hear? The answer to your question is no.”

“Depends. Explain your answer.”

“People suck. They step on you if you’re in their way. They love you for thirteen years, then sell off your house and take your daughter across the country. I used to think the less of them on the planet, the better.”

“But that changed when?”

“When Feedback died trying to save me.”

“When Feedback did what?” The woman had entered the room just as I’d answered the last question. She was almost as tall as the fake--as tall as the original Feedback had been.

Feedback.

She had heard me when she entered the room and then said “Feedback” without flinching like she already knew who we were talking about. Intimately.

The charade was over and the woman’s life was forfeit. There was no chance that this empty, cold monstrosity would ever fill the gaping hole it had made in her life.
The monster leapt at her.

“K.Cab Deef!” she cried.

The monster stopped in mid flight. Its stiff body fell to the floor. Its arms were still akimbo. It’s hands still in claws.

“Where’s my husband?”

I stammered. I couldn’t seem to take my eyes away from the statue which the monster had become. Its face was still the same–placid, almost casual. “What–“

”Where is he?” the woman said. Her tone commanded me. I looked toward the room containing the bodies.

“I’m so sorry.”

She sprinted into the room and there was silence. Then I heard the rustling of heavy weight being shifted. “Get in here and help me with this.”

I felt made of lead. I didn’t feel like I could move.

“Hurry!”

The bodies didn’t even register to me when I looked inside the room. It looked like a home office, but it was stacked with boxes, papers, crates, and computer hardware. I had no idea what had happened in here. The woman was trying to position Feedback’s body in a way that she could drag him. “Help me get him out of here. There’s nowhere in his mess that I can lay him flat.”

She looked at me when I didn’t respond. I couldn’t say what I thought she needed to hear.

“Look,” she said, “I know what this looks like, but you just have to do what I tell you, okay? We only have about five more minutes before that thing in the other room comes to, and then we all really will be dead. Do you understand me.”

I nodded and took her husband by his legs. We carried him out and placed him uncomfortably close to the doppleganger. So close that I could see its eyes moving.

“Now,” she said, “Go get Nitro G. He’s smaller than you, you can handle it by yourself.”

“Who is Nitro–“

”The other body in the room!”

She sat back on her heels and pulled a cell phone out of her pocket. I didn’t stop to watch her dial. I went back into the other room and extracted Darren from the wreckage. He wasn’t breathing. As I maneuvered him, I heard Feedback’s wife on the phone.

“... I used the code and now Spectre’s in a Feedback-loop. It’s been about three minutes now. I know I have to hurry! How many times is this bastard going to keep coming to my house, Blackthorn?!”

I dragged Darren out and brought him past her, near the entryway. I just didn’t know why I was doing it.

“Am I on speaker now?” the phone asked aloud with a canned sound.

She had it in her lap. “Yes.”

“Okay, good. Now Sarah, place the phone across his eyes.”

“Feedback's eyes, right?”

”Right. Put it across Feedback’s eyes. Tell me when you’ve done it.”

Sarah crawled over to her husband’s body and placed the phone, open side down, across the eyes. The duplicate watched her as she did it and I cringed, expecting it to grab her any second.

“Okay,” she said loudly to the phone. “It’s on his eyes.”

“Good. Now Sarah, stand back. Get as far away from him as possible. Tell me when you’re clear.”

She got to her feet and backed away, motioning to me at the same time. I raced with her to the doorway. “Okay John, I’m clear!”

“Right,” the phone said. “You might want to cover your ears.”

There was a squeal from the phone of ... well ... feedback. It pierced my already aching head, but I didn’t cover my ears and neither did Sarah. At first nothing was happening, except the both of us squinting against the noise, but then I remembered what Sarah had said. She knew this man–this Feedback. She knew what she was doing.

The scream that Feedback never got to finish on the roof tore out now. His whole body lurched off the carpet. Suddenly, he was on his feet, boots spread, arms out in a martial stance. Lizard-quick, he surveyed the situation. When he saw Darren’s body he practically dove onto it.

“Honey...” Sarah said, “...Spectre’s about to reboot, honey ... ! You have to–“

Feedback tore open Darren’s shirt. Taped to his ribs were two capped hypodermic needles. He started to peel the tape off the boy’s skin, but his gloves seemed too thick to get purchase.

“Matt, there’s no time!”

Feedback’s face grew rigid with determination. He seemed to think this diversion was worth it. I crossed the room before I even understood that I believed him.

Believed in him.

I peeled the tape off for Feedback and took the syringes off the boy. I took the caps off the needles and handed them to him.

“Stand back,” Feedback said.

“No. You stand back.” Negative Feedback ... Spectre ... whatever the hell ... was unfrozen. He was behind Sarah, in the doorway, with his right arm crooked around her throat and his other hand flat against the side of her head. “Darren was right. You really don’t know when to quit.”

I had enough. “You need to pay attention, here!” I said. “You created all this hell because you wanted an answer and here it is! Stop stomping around like a bully in gaddamn schoolyard and learn something for a change!”

Spectre, again, listened to me. It was the delay Feedback needed.

Feedback jabbed the needles into Darren’s chest, injecting the boy with the contents. I didn’t even have time to see how Darren would react. Suddenly there was just this burst of green light and then Darren was gone. And so was Spectre. Then there was this incredible crunch while Sarah staggered forward, free, and the plastered wall to my left crumpled into the outline of a body. Before the flakes of sheetrock could even drift to the ground, there was another crunch on the other side of the room. This time, I could make out Darren's blurred shape at Spectre’s throat as he yanked him up and smashed him across the room again into a third wall.

“Nitro, stop!”

Darren stopped when he had Spectre a few feet into the plaster on the ceiling. The kid looked like he was standing in midair. Spectre was a tangle of broken limbs, hanging out of the ceiling like gutted wiring. Darren held him pinned like that.

“For your information Spectre, I do know when to stop,” I hadn’t noticed when Feedback’s arms had found Sarah, but I saw how tenderly he held her now. “More importantly, I know who my friends are.”

Spectre laughed. Out of any other person, I would have expected a spatter of blood. “Fair enough ... Feedback.” it said. “Game ... off.”

Nitro G’s fists were suddenly closed around emptiness. Spectre’s form drifted backward, up through the ceiling. He was gone.

Feedback wrapped himself around his wife and buried his face in her hair. “I’m so sorry.” His voice broke. “I’d never have let him hurt you...”

“Shhh ...” she said. Her arms fit around him well. She buried her fingers in his hair.

I looked away and found Nitro G. He watched with one eyebrow cocked. “They’re cute, ain’t they?”

“So you’re a superhero too?”

“Yep.” He shook my hand. “You good?”

“Yep.” I looked around. “I think I’m going to be alright after all.”

Feedback invited me to stay for dinner and explained mostly everything I needed to know about his life and powers. I didn’t understand most of what he said, and it seemed as though he didn’t either. He told me about a big crew of professionals dedicated to help him work efficiently whom he had named “Tech Support”, and as in this case, they helped get him out of something too steep for him to handle alone. He said, as an aside, he was going to have to get "Amber" to design some more finger-friendly gloves. He said that the Feedback-field around him gave him the powers of video games, and Spectre was a result of a game he had once played. Whatever. Sarah had apologized for yelling from downstairs in the minutes before she had fallen into Spectre’s trap. She said she thought when Spectre had said ‘meet my new friend’ he had meant another computer game. She said if she knew a real person was upstairs with him, she would have waited much later to turn into a shrew. She had a spectacular laugh. Nitro G was apparently Feedback’s sidekick. The kid adored Matt. Over the mashed potatoes and summer salad it was hard not to see why.


Yeah, the world had changed. There were going to be lunatics in the streets with the powers of small armies. Things were going to be a lot more dangerous now. But I realized while relaxing in the normalcy of Matthew Atherton’s world; things had always been dangerous. There had always been lunatics. What I hadn’t realized before is that there had always been heroes too.

Having survived, I realized that I liked this new world of Matt’s.

And I realized too, that I liked Matt.

THE END










Thanks to "Tech Support", Bluezy Bunny, Boarderlinex, and Elizabeth in particular.
Thanks too, to Darren.
And of course, thanks to Matt.
Game ON.

The World Needs A Hero...Again!!

We bring you some good, old fashioned Audio Drama!!

Episode #3 of my main man's audio adventure is live and on the web. Give a listen! (Warning, it has some PG-13 language. You know ... if it were 1957.)



And this just in; Interview over at Slice of SciFi...