X-Men: The Raid (Part 9) (Patreon)

(I'm going to keep cranking this out until it's finished, guys. Next week is more X-Men... and the end of the battle!)

When Rogue appeared on the other side of the cartoonish portal, she was flying right into a heavy orange fist the size of a lunch box.

She grunted in pain as the blow clotheslined her, spinning her head over heels as her forward motion continued. She only stopped when she slammed into a concrete wall.

Hitting the wall hurt even more than the punch. It was sturdy enough that she left a circular web of cracks but didn’t break through. Even with her near invulnerability, it felt like… well, she’d flown into a wall.

Rogue bounced off her back with another grunt and lay still, stunned. A chorus of mocking laughter rang out around her.

“How do ya like that, corn pone?” a rough, female voice called out, “A little payback for the cold cock earlier!”

Rogue shook her head, blinking around at where she’d found herself. Even if she hadn’t just been hit, she would have been disoriented by the sudden change of surroundings. The chamber looked broad, but the ceiling was relatively low. No windows, thick walls, fancy machinery everywhere. It looked like the portal had opened open into some kind of underground lab.

Drawing in her legs, she started to sit up, but before she could do so a massive, rocky hand clamped down over her face.

“MFFF!”

Thick fingers looped all the way behind her head, pinned her hair to her skull, then lifted her off the ground like she weighed no more than a Barbie doll.

“Ha!” her attacker laughed, “That all ya got, girly? Figures you’re not as tough as everyone said!”

Held out in an outstretched hand, Rogue clumsily grabbed at the wrist and kicked her legs, her head almost entirely enclosed. His rock-like skin was protecting him from her draining powers and her thoughts were still awash, too surprised and dazed to do much more than squirm.

“Don’t play with her, Stone!” another voice yelled, “Keep hitting her! Don’t let up!”

Stone grunted, then complied by yanking the captured X-Man up high, then slamming her down into the ground. Rogue’s legs, in their tall yellow boots, were flicked up by the sudden downward yank, flopped momentarily to the ground when her head impacted with the floor, then dangled as she was lifted back up again.

After spiking her head into the ground, Stone then turned in place, swinging her like a shotput, then hurled across the lab.

Rogue smashed through several pieces of machinery, tearing through the thin plastic and metal components. After destroying several probably expensive and important scientific devices, she finally slammed into one that was broad and sturdy enough that she only caved it in. The metal shrieked, components crunched, and she grunted at the sudden stop, left slumped in a Rogue-sized indentation in the metal shell, almost like she was lounging in a throne.

“Stone!” someone yelled, “You idiot!”

“Get her!”

Half a dozen sets of heavy footsteps thundered towards her as Rogue managed to lift her head off the back of her metal “throne”. She blinked, staring at her group of attackers.

Several large figures were charging towards her. Morlocks. Big ones.

One was larger and made of gray cement, Stone she guessed. Another was an orange-skinned giantess she remembered from earlier. There was a large man with six muscular arms, a creature that looked like he was part hulked-out dragon, and a man with both abnormally large muscles and an abnormally lumpy head. Even as dizzy as she was, Rogue had a shrewd idea that they were all bruisers, super strong and durable, meant to gang up on and pound her.

The only one that didn’t match the hulking, brutish archetype was a relatively normal looking young woman with short, blue hair. She looked fairly average, even pretty, except for the fact that she had three eyes, two of them so far apart they were almost on her temples.

Rogue tossed her head back and fluttered her lashes, trying to clear her head. It tousled her curly mane of skunk-streaked hair, flipping some of the strands out of her face.

She didn’t have time to sit there and ponder the what’s and who’s. This was clearly a set up to take her out, trapping her in an area with little maneuverability with the few Morlocks that could hit her so she’d actually feel it. If she waited for them to dogpile her, they’d whoop her little butt, invulnerability or no.

With a grunt of effort, she pushed herself out of the crumpled metal. It groaned and creaked as she bent it away with her deceptively dainty-looking hands. Once she was free, she didn’t bother trying to awkwardly stand on the uneven metal, she simply floated up into the air, tucking her curving legs beneath her.

“You boys wanna tussle, huh?” she wiped her mouth, “All right, then. I have a couple things to say to ya’ll too…”

The southern powerhouse was about to charge the nearest Morlock and give them a taste of their own medicine, when the small one threw out her hands. Rogue learned then why that girl was with the group.

Bio electricity leapt from the three-eyed girl’s hands to Rogue’s chest almost instantly and her body immediately contorted. Her arms and legs shot straight, back locked stiff as a toy soldier’s, her head thrown back, pretty features a taut grimace. The invulnerability that protected her from damage did little to help her against the strain of her own body, forced to fight itself as she was electrocuted. Her power of flight seemed to lock up as well, leaving her hovering in mid-air as she trembled and strained.

Oh, it hurt, but she couldn’t cry out. Her eyes flew wide, but her mouth was clamped shut, her vocal chords likewise clenched too tight to make a sound. While the electricity rushed through her, crackling and dancing across her costume in blue arcs, her body was beyond her own control.

It didn’t last too long, but it was long enough that she didn’t have time to recover before the others were on her. Once the electricity was cut off, she dropped out of the air and fell to her knees, rump plopping onto her heels as she sucked in ragged gasps of air. It felt like she’d just had an intense full body workout, her lungs burning, heart pounding, muscles aching.

“Hit her quick!” the three-eyed girl cried out, “I don’t have many of those!”

The dragon-man complied by whirling in mid-step and taking a running swing with his thick, powerful tail. The blow hit Rogue in the chest and sent her flying like a line drive. She crashed into the far wall, her back and shoulders smashing another spider-web of cracks in the concrete, then she fell to all fours.

The others bounded after her, Stone in the lead, a broad grin on his craggy face.

“We don’t need any more!” he called, “Little miss red neck isn’t going to last five more seconds!”

With a last leap, he landed in front of her, shaking the ground before he raised both massive fists.

Rogue knew a thing or two about super powered fist fights. She knew that you needed strength and durability to hit something and not break yourself, but to generate force you needed mass and acceleration. She didn’t have much mass, but she was strong, durable, and her ability of flight gave her a lot of the last part of that equation.

She’d already gotten her feet beneath her when the living boulder had landed in front of her, then when he raised his fists over his head, she moved. Using the considerable power in her shapely legs and her powerful of flight, she exploded upwards and swung her fist into Stone’s chin, an uppercut with every ounce of acceleration she could generate.

The impact sounded like a thunderclap. Stone was lifted off his feet and thrown backwards, making his comrades gasp and scramble out of his way. His heavy body landed with a crash on the concrete, massive arms and legs bouncing limply before he lay still.

He was out cold. His jaw was visibly broken, split in half up the middle.

Forced to scatter momentarily, his comrades gaped at him then turned back to Rogue.

The southern X-Man hovered before them, more ready for the scrap than they’d expected. That punch had hurt her hand and she shook it a few times, managing to cock her hip in mid-air in a sassy taunt. She wore a coy, flirty grin, but her eyes were hard, her other fist balled tight and eager to deal more punishment.

“Now ya’ll didn’t think it would be that easy, did ya?”

The Morlocks stared, not having a response.

Rogue didn’t give them time to come up with one. She launched herself at dragon-man, ready to pay him back for that smack with his tail.

------------

Siryn was forced to keep up her sonic scream almost constantly, sweeping it around to defend herself from all directions. With Storm no longer supporting her, the Morlocks in the upper windows had resumed their fire and to make matters worse, those that had initially fled had doubled back and converged on the square. Now the young X-Man was being attacked from above AND below.

She darted to the side, twirling in a barrel roll to avoid a thrown brick, then let loose with another sonic scream. More blasts came down from above and she avoid those as well, looping back and letting fly another cry. It was weaker than before, more strained.

So far, she’d managed to stay a step ahead of them, but she was getting tired. Every scream was less powerful, her turns and swerves looser, slowing down. It didn’t take a genius to see she couldn’t keep this up forever.

Below her, the Morlocks milled about and yelled at her, throwing things and occasionally leaping at her, but none of them had any ranged attacks. They did, however, gather up the unconscious Dazzler and Jubilee, carrying them away. Domino cried out in her gag and squirmed as someone came for her as well, laughing as they picked her up over their shoulder. Her luck powers couldn’t do much for her at this point; there was only so much bad luck that could befall someone with her bottom perked up on his shoulder, the smiley face on her underwear beaming merrily.

Siryn couldn’t do anything about that. She couldn’t do anything about Storm either, nor had the slightest idea of what had happened to her. She was alone, tiring, and facing the inevitable truth that sometime soon one of her enemies was going to get lucky. As much as she hated the idea of retreat, particularly when she was leaving her teammates behind, she couldn’t do anyone any good if she got captured or killed. She had to get out of there, at least to a more defensible position.

Gathering herself, she flew at the face of the western building. She poured on more speed than she normally dared in the tight quarters, outrunning several blasts that hadn’t led her enough. In fact, it looked like she was going to fly right into the brick wall, but whirled around at the last instant, turning her back to the wall and drawing in a deep breath.

Bracing herself and throwing her arms and legs wide, she dispersed as much of the impact as she could. It still hurt, but she didn’t bash her head or knock her breath out; she needed her breath for what came next.

The instant she struck the wall, before she began to fall, she let loose with the most powerful sonic scream she could manage, giving it all she had left. The force pinned her back to the bricks, flattening her against them and keeping her in place as the scream erupted from her mouth.

She gave the scream as much spread as she could, directing it both at the gathered foes beneath her and the windows opposite. Many Morlocks screamed and clamped their hands over their ears, even falling to their knees as their brains rattled in their heads. It shook dust from the opposite walls and made the grass sway away from her in waves.

Essentially, the tactic was the equivalent of a pause button. The Morlocks in the windows opposite mostly stopped firing or fired wildly without aiming, while the ones in the windows above her couldn’t get an angle on her. The foes below, facing the full brunt of the cry, could do nothing but cry out in agony, their vibrating inner ears making them lose any balance they had to begin with. For a few seconds, she was safe, but it didn’t win her the fight and she knew that as soon as she stopped the cry, she’d be back where she started.

However, she only needed a moment’s respite, to distract them for long enough to escape. She held the scream only slightly less than as long as she could, giving herself enough left in the tank to perform her next maneuver.

Ceasing her scream, she let herself fall a few feet, past a window that had been broken clean of glass. Crying out again, she then took flight, turning and darting through the open window before the Morlocks could recover and hopefully before they could see where she went. Her shoulder clipped a small piece of glass still trapped in the window frame, ripping her costume and giving her a shallow cut, but she ignored it. Once inside, she ceased her cry altogether and tumbled, rolling with the fall and coming to a stop in a crouch.

Behind her, she could hear the Morlocks crying out in anger, shouting at each other, demanding to know where she’d gone. Many had caught glimpses of her as they’d cringed in pain but hadn’t been able to keep track of precisely which window she’d gone through. A good number rushed into the building, fighting to squeeze their way through the doors two or three at a time, a clumsy mob, while others just yelled and looked around, thinking it was all some kind of trick.

Now they were acting more like proper Morlocks. Whatever had gotten into them that made them suddenly so disciplined and focused seemed to have gotten out of them, or had its attention focused elsewhere. Whatever the case, Siryn wasn’t the lass to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Panting, red hair sticking to her face and neck, the fiery young X-Man got to her feet and ran. The room she’d found herself in looked like a waiting area, rows of chairs and sofas arrayed in front of a reception desk. She found a path through the furniture, her boots pounding on the floor and crunching broken glass, but not audible above the din of Morlocks thundering into the building.

For a moment she considered running across the room to the opposite window and leaping out to freedom, but for all she knew there would be more Morlocks waiting for her. It would be what they expected her to do. Also, she wasn’t the type to run away, not from these absolute clods.

Instead, she ran out the doorway and into a larger hall, following the signs for the stairs.

The disorganized clamber of the Morlocks beneath her was loud enough that she heard them from several floors down. They were still yelling, banging through doors, bumping into each other, probably destroying whatever was in their path as thoroughly as a stampede. God bless the ignoramuses; made them much easier to keep track of.

Siryn found the door to the stairwell shoved it open and found herself face to face with a chubby Morlock.

His skin was a mottled brown, making him look almost like a recent burn victim, making his eyes appear very white as they widened in surprise as she almost bumped into him. He wasn’t startled for long, though. Realizing he’d found her, his lips pulled wide in a broad grin.

She knew what she looked like. Athletic and pretty, a pouty, girlish face, along with her healthy helping of freckles. Her glossy suit displayed a well-trained figure, but she was still thin, not particularly tall, even a bit delicate. To him, she looked like a sweet little thing that might faint if he could grab her quickly enough to stifle her scream.

He reached for her mouth, intending to clamp it shut and thus leave her helpless, just a little doll he could pick up over his shoulder and march off to show his buddies. It was a mistake.

Rather than knocking his hand away, she lunged towards him and swung her fist up past his outstretched arm, snapping his chin up with a crisp uppercut. Her other fist came next, looping around her shoulder and smashing his jaw to the side.

Someone her side would have been knocked cold by the precise one-two punches, but he was fairly large, if flabby, and though the blows staggered him back, he kept his feet. So she just kept hitting him, following him as he stumbled and snapping his head back with repeated, sharp punches. She beat him backwards until he was at the edge of the steps, then drew back and swung a haymaker into the point of his chin.

Siryn didn’t stay to watch the Morlock tumble down the steps. As soon as his feet flew out from under him, she turned and ran up the stairs towards the next floor, listening to him bang and grunt his way down. He wouldn’t be following her; if her knockout punch hadn’t put him down, that fall would.

Greasey wanker. Serves him right for trying to put his hand in her mouth.

Siryn rounded the steps to the next floor, then continued on, outpacing the Morlocks coming from below.

Those backstabbing cowards on the top floors had been having a bit too much fun firing down on her from their safe little hiding places. She could be very sweet when she wanted to be, but Siryn could admit to holding a grudge on occasion.

She wasn’t going to run; she was going to the top floors. She had payback on her mind.

----------

In her subterranean prison, Storm was living her nightmares. She was totally enclosed, unable to move, unable to see the sky. She couldn’t see anything; there was no light where she was. There was only grit and dirt, her own coughing and whimpering as she breathed it in, and the feeling of being suffocated, without ever dying.

“HEEEEELP! PLEEEEEASE! PLEEEEEEEASE HELP!”

Her screams dwindled away into sobs and rasping coughs as she breathed in the surrounding dirt. She had no idea how far down she was, but she didn’t hear the feet pounding the ground above her or the cries of the ongoing battle. No one would find her down here. She would stay here forever, no one hearing her cries.

But then, a voice did come to her.

“Oh, poor Storm… all alone and scared.”

The instant she heard another voice, Storm’s heart leapt, filling with desperate hope. She was too wild with fear to notice its taunting tone, all that mattered was that there was someone else nearby. Someone who could free her.

“PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE!” Storm cried, “PLEASEHELPPLEASE!”

The voice laughed. It was coming from nearby, slightly muffled, but it was familiar.

“That’s perfect, Storm. Plead. While your team is defeated, beg me for mercy.”

Storm shook in her tiny prison, rasping panicked breaths, her eyes darting about.

“Underneath that haughty exterior is just a frightened little girl. Even after all this time, you haven’t learned how to control your fear. You would never survive down here.”

The voice was coming through a small hole, almost like a mail slot, opened in Storm’s confines. They were down here, no more than ten feet away, and they knew where she was.

“Pleaaaaase!” she sobbed, “Please, I can’t breathe! I can’t! Please help!”

“The Morlocks have no room for weakness. Those that can’t fight, that can’t overcome their weakness, they die in the darkness. They die… unless they submit to someone strong.”

Storm moaned, clenching her eyes shut.

“You claim to be the leader of the Morlocks?” the voice laughed scornfully, “then face what we face, Storm. Submit or die.”

It was Callisto. Even through her terror, Storm realized that now. As her heart hammered and her body screamed for release, she also realized that above her, the X-Men were being destroyed.

“Submit to me…” Callisto said, “Kneel before me… or be left here, buried, forgotten, for all eternity.”

She’d seen Jubilee, Dazzler, and Domino beaten with her own eyes. Since she was mimicking Psylocke, it stood to reason they had her as well. Jean was down and more than likely Wolverine had been defeated as well, or the young berserker would have been tearing into them by now. Siryn was being overwhelmed, Rogue had vanished. That left only Kitty, in the worst-case scenario.

The X-Men weren’t just facing a great challenge. They were on the route to fall.

“N-no…” Storm whispered.

Callisto continued, her voice fervent, rough with passion.

“Your proud back will bend. You will crawl to me. In the dirt. And you will beg for my mercy, in front of all my people. You will surrender the leadership of the Morlocks and the X-Men to me. And you will surrender yourself, in return for my protection.”

Storm’s stomach roiled at the thought, even as she began to feel faint from hyperventilation.

The X-Men destroyed. It would be her that brought them to this. Her lack of foresight, her arrogance. She’d underestimated Callisto, fallen into trap after trap, and the women that counted on her would fall too. They would all be killed or enslaved by the Morlocks, them and everyone they failed to protect.

Her terror made her tremble, its voice keening and crying out to escape at all costs, to give or do anything to be freed from her prison. But another voice began calling as well; it told her to fight. She was an X-Man, a superhero, a goddess. She couldn’t let Callisto win. No matter what, even if she died in the darkness, the Morlocks had to be stopped.

“You will make a magnificent slave,” Callisto taunted, “It will be very pleasant to see you look up at me, in fear and hope. Yes. I will enjoy that… and you… very much.”

Long ago, young Ororo Monroe had been buried in rubble for days, trapped and thinking she would die. The trauma had followed her ever since. No matter how much courage she had in battle or otherwise risking her life, the thought alone of being trapped in a small place had been enough to take her breath away.

But she was no longer the frightened little girl from all those years ago. She was stronger, more powerful, not just in her mutant abilities but in her spirit. In her time as an X-Man she had faced dangers that little girl from Cairo had never even known existed. Even while her terror threatened to steal her strength, she was the wind rider, the weather goddess, the leader of the X-Men. She was not little Ororo, she was Storm.

“Kneel or die, Storm,” Callisto told her, “Those are your only options.”

Storm gritted her teeth and drew in a deep breath, controlling her panicked breathing.

By her own words, Callisto was wrong. She could kneel, die… or she could overcome her fear.

She drew in another deep breath, then let it out. And again.

She WOULD overcome. Her fear would not be the enemy that defeated her, nor would she let her team, which had battled for a better world for decades, be destroyed this day. They would turn the tide and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat once more.

“There’s no way out,” Callisto said, “You will not escape unless I wish it. And I will… once you’ve begged enough that I am satisfied.”

Storm ignored her. She ignored the closeness of her prison as well. All that mattered was her breathing. She drew in a deep through her nose, her breasts rising as her chest swelled, then let it out, one breath at a time. Dust tickled her throat as she breathed it in, nagging at her and reminding her of her prison, but she held it at bay.

Breathe. Just breathe.

Her pounding heart slowed, still fluttering but no longer trying to burst from her chest. The weight of her terror was oppressive. She kept it at bay by focusing inside herself, where she was calm and strong, where nothing could touch her.

And then she coaxed her powers back to life. Just as she focused on breathing, one breath at a time, she focused on making it colder degree by degree.

“I can wait as long as it takes,” Callisto tittered, “How about you…?”

Gently, like she was willing a tiny spark into a flame, Storm coaxed a chill into the walls around her. With each breath, she seeped the cold deeper into the dirt, steadily lowering its temperature until it began to freeze. Frost grew on the walls of her prison, then small beads of ice. Goosebumps were forming on her skin, her hair prickling.

With each breath she drew in heat and breathed out cold, seeping it deep into the ground around her.

Slowly, her prison itself began to freeze.

----------

In a chamber carved out of the ground, Callisto waited as her rival, trapped a dozen feet away, grew silent.

“You haven’t fainted, have you, Storm?” she teased, “How embarrassing that would be…”

But again, there was no response. It was possible that the claustrophobic “goddess” had indeed hyperventilated to the point she lost consciousness. That would be annoying, as they’d have to wake her up again to continue her torment.

Yet something told the Morlock Queen that Storm hadn’t merely passed out. As much as she hated (and was jealous of) the wind rider, she could admit the African goddess was very formidable. It would make her degradation all the more satisfying when it finally came, but at this moment Callisto suspected she was up to something.

Her eye narrowed and her brow lowered, putting her tactical mind to Storm’s predicament.

“What’s she doing?” she whispered to the short figure beside her

Mole, fairly recovered from the gargantuan effort it had required to build the tunnels around the school in preparation for the raid, stood with his pudgy hands pressed to the thick earth wall separating them from Storm. While Callisto and Lilith (who sat to one side playing with Jean Grey) wore ruby tinted eyewear that allowed them to see in the dark, the dwarfish, earth controlling Morlock “saw” with the earth itself. It wasn’t true sight, as he could usually only “see” the soles of people’s feet as they touched the ground, but with Storm completely buried, he should have been able tell exactly what she was doing.

“She’s gone still,” Mole sniffed, blinking his filmy white eyes, “Her breathing has slowed down. I don’t think she’s asleep…”

Callisto curled her upper lip. It sounded like Storm was trying to meditate or something, to calm herself.

Such a pathetic tactic. She could find inner peace all she wanted, but she was going to stay trapped and long as Callisto said so.

“Make it tighter,” she ordered, “Squeeze her for a couple of seconds. Let’s see how calm she is when she really can’t breathe.”

Mole nodded and lowered his head as he focused. His tongue ran over his oversized front teeth, making a small slurping sound.

Then he grunted.

Frowning, the stocky Morlock paused for a moment, then leaned into the wall, sinking his fingers into the dirt. His eyes narrowed and his shoulders flexed, another grunt forcing its way between his teeth. Gradually his lips began to pull back into a grimace.

Through the slender slot carved in the wall, Callisto couldn’t tell what was happening to Storm. In fact, when she tried to peer through the small window, she couldn’t see anything at all; it was blocked by something that glistened faintly, like glass.

“What’s happening?” she demanded, then blinked in surprise.

Her breath was misting out in front of her. It was generally cooler underground, but it was September.

“I… don’t know,” Mole’s voice was tight with strain, “It’s… something’s… holding the dirt. It won’t move…”

Cuddling with the unconscious Phoenix, Lilith looked around in surprise as she noticed the chill. Shivering, she drew her helpless captive a bit closer, pressing her lips to Jean’s warm neck.

Callisto clenched her fists, resisting the urge to cross her arms to retain warmth.

“She’s freezing it,” she snarled, “She’s freezing the ground around her.”

Mole leaned into the wall for another moment, then stepped back with a gasp.

“I… I can’t do it!” he panted, “There’s too much ice in the dirt! She’s frozen it solid!”

As her subject cupped his hands and blew into them for warmth, Callisto bristled, her mind working furiously.

If she were Storm, this is exactly what she’d do. She’d freeze the ground, make it so Mole could no longer control it, then generate some kind of sandblasting wind to dig herself free. Without mole to replenish and reform the woman-shaped hole she was in, she would be able to slowly blast away the dirt, force it up and out. It would be difficult and require a lot of power, but she wouldn’t underestimate Storm, particularly not when the wind rider was desperate.

So, her plan to break Storm wouldn’t work this way; she would have to find another.

Fortunately, for every move there was a counter and while none of her Morlocks were a match for Storm’s raw power, they had many different powers at their disposal. Many tools and Callisto had the ingenuity and cunning to use them to fix this particular problem, perhaps in an even more satisfying fashion.

“Lilith,” she ordered, “Call to Gilding. I want her here now.”

Lilith looked up, tilting her head curiously.

“Gilding? Which is she?”

“She’s the one that added the gloss to my throne. The small, shiny one.”

Lilith’s eyelashes fluttered, eyes wide with surprise. She opened her mouth to ask another question, but Callisto cut her off.

“Just do it,” she said, “I want her here, right next to me. Immediately.”

Recognizing the tone, Lilith closed her mouth and nodded. Leaning down, she whispered something to Jean, then slipped her intangible fingers into the redhead’s temple once more, hijacking the X-Man’s telepathy to call Callisto’s tool to hand.