Chapter 15: The Brotherhood's Assault, Pt 2! Strike of the Sentinels, Pt 1!
[Adirondack Mountains, New York State]
[General POV]:
At the HQ of Trask Industries in New York State, a private meeting was being undergone with the company's higher-ups and one a private line, the president of the United States. On the screen was live footage of the mutant battle occurring in North Salem, between the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants.
It was chaotic, and brutal. But, in Bolivar's opinion, it was typical mutant behavior. They weren't humans, but animals shaped similar to humans — And some of them weren't even that! One can't expect them to behave by themselves, or at all. They're lower than humans, lower than animals and less than bacteria. And these footages only prove Bolivar's beliefs.
"—he citizens are questioning my stance on the mutant problem and my numbers are falling because of it. I may lose the coming election because of them!," the president yelled through the phone speaker. "I want these rebels dead and gone! Whatever it takes!"
"And the X-Men?" a shareholder dared to ask. "What about them? Should we target them, too?"
A silence.
A pause.
Then…
"They're casualties of a war the public will never speak about," answered the president coldly.
"Understood, Mister President," answered Bolivar Trask.
"Get it done, Bolivar," said the President. "Whatever it takes."
"It will be. Whatever it takes," answered the mutant hater, Bolivar, calmly, as the president ended the call. Then, turning to his right hand man, Major WIlliam Stryker. "Send in Sentinel Squadrons 4, 5 and 6."
"Yessir," Stryker grinned a cheshire grin, sharing Bolivar's contempt of mutant kind, as he pressed a button on a remote. "It is done."
"Finally," Bolivar chuckled. "The Age of Mutants begins to dusk. When the X-Men and Brotherhood falls, the mutant community will fall soon after. And from their demise, humankind will retake the Earth, as it always should've been."
With that chuckle, Trask and Stryker watched from their windows as a squadron of 24 Mark II Sentinels, led by 3 Mark III Sentinels, took off, their enormous forms blasting off at supersonic speeds (the Mark 3's were going hypersonic speeds). Their objective? Take out the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants…
[Moments Earlier, East of X-Mansion]:
[General POV]:
BOOM!
BOOM!
BOOM!
The reverberations of a battle between two mutants echoed across all of New Salem, causing battling mutants on the field of battle to pause briefly between their fights to catch sight of who was battling the legendary mutants, Exodus, in equal exchange.
Even Magneto seemed surprised that such a mutant existed.
'Exodus is on the higher tier of Omega level and yet this young man is matching him, blow for blow? Is this really him? Leisis Blake?' From behind his helmet, Erik was clenching his teeth in anger. 'Looks like I'll have to handle him myself.'
As he began to lift nearby cars, willing them to chuck themselves at Luke, something interfered with his willpower of metal — something telekinetic.
"You will not interfere in this fight, Magneto," Jean exclaimed, restraining surrounding magnetic spheres, controlling the cars.
"Yeah, bub, what the misses say!" The short Canadian form of Logan lunged forward, claws out on each knuckle, but Erik used the thrust of his hand to send the Wolverine flying.
"If you think you can face me, Miss Grey," Magneto smirked, radiating malicious delight. "Then please, do try. You'll fail, but at least make it fun, won't you?"
"Your vile reign ends today, Magneto," Jean said, as Erik's control burst free from her restraints and hurled the nearby cars to converge on the telepath. In response, Jean unleashed a powerful wave of psychic energy, pushing back the cars by way of a telekinetic forcefield, which repelled the attack. "I won't fall so easily."
Meanwhile, as Luke traded blows with Exodus, it became obvious who had the upperhand and who was stronger — Both of those titles belonged to Luke.
BAM!
Punching Exodus in the face, Luke watched as the mutant fell from the sky, falling directly into a building and causing said building to cave in on itself in the process.
'The only reason this fight is even taking this long is because I'm consciously holding back my full strength,' Luke thought, privately as he floated in the air, awaiting Bennett's arisal from the collapsed building. 'The Master injected his blood into me before he left, amplifying my power by a factor of three. He even injected me with one of the two remaining cosmic cloud samples, which has given me high-infinite teleportation and spatial sensory powers.'
Luke rubbed the two bands on each ringfinger anxiously. They were silver but also technological in nature.
'That said I created these four rings to restrict that amplification and to restrict the amount of times I can teleport long distances. Why? For several reasons.
'First, the amplification was much too powerful. I alone at my initial base level was a high-level Alpha/low-level Omega mutant just unleashing power twice that level is diving into high-level Omega as is, not to mention 4x? I need to get used to my powers at base, so that when I need to, I can effectively unleash my full power fully.
Secondly, the restrictions on my teleportation draws and generates energy — energy I can store in my rings to boost my overall power to high-level Omega. It's actually ingenious. I manage to surprise my own self with my intellect sometimes..'
A rumbling deep within the wings of the building caught Luke's attention.
"Oh, he comes again," Luke thought aloud, clearly amused. 'I didn't even have to use any of the two vials of the Master's blood to beat this guy — let alone take off any of the rings restricting my power.'
The Master — Lewis — left each of his clones two vials of his blood (Except Crystal and Chris, whom he gave three as they didn't have any in their system). As they could permanently amplify one's power regardless of species, as long as they weren't originally divine beings, the clones were instructed to use them solely in emergency situations.
'The doesn't count as an emergency situation,' Luke thought, causally catching Exodus' punch and headbutting the mutant before giving three punches of his own to the chest while holding the mutant's neck to keep from him getting blown away in the process. 'That said, I sense 27 fast moving projectiles heading my way. I can tell that they are huge, so I'm guessing they're sentinels, which means I'll need to hurry this along.'
Kicking Bennett straight in the chest, Luke watched as the orange-skinned mutant went flying. Then, quickly following after, Luke felt power rush his system as it doubled, teleported into the mutant's falling trajectory, grabbed the mutant behind by the neck and nose-drove him feet towards the pavement at supersonic speed.
CRASHH!
Upon impact, he was knocked out instantly.
'I want to kill him,' Luke struggled, internally. 'I could kill him. It would be easy…However, if it happens anything like it did in the comics, them, when he dies, the psychic backlash from his death alone would render any mind within the vicinity to be overwhelmed and telepaths and psionics worldwide would feel it, and I don't want that attention quite yet.
'I already sense SHIELD, the government and various other presences watching this. I have had OMNIS blurred my face to best of his ability, but I know SHIELD has already secured footage of this battle.
'Plus, his followers are fanatics, and The Master's image is priority above all else….'.
Looking at the approaching X-Men, Luke pondered what to do. 'Hmmm… The 'Assault Striker' is nearby, cloaked in invisibility mode. I'll have it gather up Exodus and return to the lab for proper research.'
"Luke!" Ororo Monroe raced his way, concerned and wearing a face that screamed awe and inspired. A very bruised, battered and bitter Scott Summers followed behind her. She ran up to Luke, looking for signs of injuries, finding none, before hugging him in a tight embrace. "I'm so glad you're ok."
Luke hugged back stiffly, but not because he didn't enjoy it. 'Those clankers are coming closer,' he sensed. 'I'm certain Magneto should be able to sense them any moment now.'
"You did… good work…Luke…," Scott struggled out as Ororo pulled away, but not necessarily out of genuine relief, so much as duty. And he still struggled to say it.
'Seriously, dude,' Luke internally shook his head, as he noticed Scott's outstretched hand and semi-frowning face. 'Well, it doesn't matter. Soon, you too, shall make excellent agents of the Master.'
Luke ignored Scott's hand, which clenched into a fist when Scott noticed. Before any of them could speak on it, Luke spoke. "We've got company."
"What?" Ororo looked in the direction Luke was looking in, confused. "I don't see anything, though."
"Sentinels, just beyond—" Luke began, but was interrupted.
"I sense Sentinels — To the North of us!" Magneto bellowed. "To arms, my Brotherhood! Join hands with Charles' brood for now! We fight as one!"
And as the army of Sentinels came into sight — 24 Mark II at 20 feet tall and 3 Mark III at various sizes of 25 and 30 feet tall — All flying at them at supersonic speeds, the two sides of mutants decided on an unspoken, temporary truce.
"That's a lot of Sentinels," Bobby counted.
"We've never faced that many before," Pyro noted, ever the realist.
"We'll have to try," Ororo encouraged. "We have faced every threat that's gone our way. We can face this, too."
"We will achieve victory if we work together," Scott preached, looking at his gathering team, like he was beginning to give a speech. "We are—"
But Luke didn't intend to listen to this fool give his speech of the day, like he was Luke's leader. The only person worthy of his subservience was the Master. He had no love for Scott Summerr…Or rather he feels nothing towards him, except, maybe, annoyance, that is, if anything at all.
No, he needed to take care of these tin cans and get it over and done with. He had eyes watching him, and he had no qualms giving them a sight to behold.
'Maybe I can take a nap afterwards, in a nice, warm bed….," Luke thought, almost yawning lazily to the thought…