Giza

The boy named Apollyon sits amidst what looks like a war scene. Around a pedestal, where the shard of the M'Kraan Crystal stands on its tip, there are eleven other unconscious mutants. Together, with Apollyon included, they are known as The Twelve. They were gathered by Cable, a timelost soldier, to battle Apocalypse, the ageless tyrant.

Apollyon crouches on the ground, leaning against the stone pillar, looking at the unconscious bodies of Death and Famine. Pestilence is nothing more than a techno-organic puddle of muck. War...could be all the way to China by now, with the wallop Cannonball gave him.

Throughout their half-baked mission, they have questioned their gatherer about their true purpose. Now, they finally know. They all somehow had the ability to collectively control the M'Kraan Crystal...and made both Cable and Apocalypse disappear. To where? Who knows.

Apollyon was Apocalypse's son. He's only a few months old, technically. The warped time flow of the demonic Limbo, combined with the fact his mitosis rate was uncharted, caused the young man to age considerably fast. The boy has emotionally reinforced psionic abilities that are on Phoenix, his mother's, level. He has always felt the other emotions of his fellow members of the Twelve, and they were pretty much everything but trusting.

Phoenix is really the only one who cares for him; the maternal instinct. Still, there was something inside of him, Apollyon could feel. Something that...just didn't belong. He felt it ever since he left Limbo. There is a flash of psionic energy in his eyes. Suddenly, he realizes he's not running the show anymore. He never was. Ever since Cable liberated him from Limbo...something wasn't right.

During their struggle in Limbo, six members of the Twelve were possessed by demons. Apollyon freed them using his telepathy...however, he inadvertently absorbed all six demons into himself. He didn't realize it until now. The demons were in full control.

Apollyon is startled. The rest of the Twelve were waking up.

"Wha--?" Archangel grunts, rubbing his forehead. "What the hell was that?"

"Some kind of...electromagnetic disturbance," Polaris explains.

"I don't sense any kind of imprint," Blink begins, "the space that fills itself after someone or something is teleported."

"Why do you ask, Clarice?" Storm asks.

"Because Cable and Apocalypse aren't here," Cyclops responds.

"Are they outside, fighting?" Havok asks.

"Why's everything still the same?" Franklin asks. "Didn't the diamond thing change everything from before?"

"It did," Scarlet Witch says, "but apparently Apocalypse was the only one who knew how to use the M'Kraan Crystal like that."

Phoenix sighs deeply, "Well...I have some memories of when the Phoenix entity impersonated me and sealed the Crystal when D'Ken tried to open it. Maybe, if I concentrate enough, I can try to fix reality."

"Don't be stupid, Jean," Cyclops barks. "You're nowhere near as powerful as the Phoenix. You could destroy the world instead of changing it back."

"Don't call me stupid, Scott!" Jean shouts, her eyes burning with fire.

"I didn't say that--" Cyclops says between clenched teeth.

"This is a tiny piece of the M'Kraan Crystal," Jean explains as she telekinetically attracts it to her hand, "it can't be that hard to control."

"But you can't reshape the entire world," Cyclops argues. "I mean, you can't replicate every single detail."

"I don't need to, Scott," Jean says. "Anything is better than this life. It has to be."

"Just think of the possibilities," Iceman says. "We could all create a utopian society where humans and mutants coexist...and, uh...we could eliminate crime, alien threats, and all that, too."

"We can't do that!" Cyclops shouts. "It would be no better than what Apocalypse did. We have to change it back to exactly what it was before. No different. We don't reserve the right to change what...well, to change what God intended."

"I'm going to have to agree with Scott on this," Storm declares. "We cannot have this power. We weren't meant to have it."

"Ororo," Phoenix says as she turns to her best friend, "we manifested diamond-shaped marks on our foreheads. That's what the Twelve are, that's what we are. We control the M'Kraan Crystal. We were meant to change everything back--"

"No, it isn't...," Apollyon mutters in an oddly deep, disturbing voice. "The Twelve's purpose is finished. You've successfully transported both my father and that impure son of a whorish clone to the Fifth Dimension. You are all expendable."

"The Fifth Dimension?" Phoenix asks. "What's that?"

Apollyon smiles, "Nathan never told you, huh? All those visions he had for months leading to all of this. All the power amplifications he's experienced, gradually, for years. He's more powerful than Sinister lead on, believe me..."

"You never knew Sinister," Cyclops shouts, his visor lighting up with red energy. "What the hell are you talking about, kid?!"

Apollyon smiles as his wavy red hair falls by the clump-full off his scalp. Four red eyes appear on his forehead as his natural eyes turn red as well -- making it appear he has six eyes altogether. "What am I talking about, Summers?" Apollyon laughs, "I'm going to kill all of you bastards."

Cyclops mouths "I knew it" as Apollyon generates a jolt of purple energy into everyone, knocking them on their asses.

"When they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up from the abyss will wage war against them and conquer them and kill them." -- Revelation 11:7

Elsewhere...

Cable feels his entire body light up with pain as a powerful force of energy blasts him at light speed. He seems to glide forever, it seems. Finally, with a conscious effort, Nathan stops himself. He grabs his ribs and notices he's bleeding. His cloak has been ripped to shreds. He was shirtless. He had cuts and bruises all over his body. Even with the Fifth Dimension enhancing his powers to their fullest potential in an instant, he was getting felled by Apocalypse.

"The...," Cable breathes, his voice full of power. "Fifth Dimension...is inside the M'Kraan Crystal?"

Apocalypse smiles, "No. It merely transported us here, accelerated our physical selves to a higher plane of existence."

Cable scowls, "How did you kill Aéulgo?"

Apocalypse laughs, "Why does it matter? Did you actually believe all that god nonsense? He was never really real. Aéulgo was nothing more than the Fifth Dimension personified."

Cable's brow lowers, "What about Deathglare?"

"Nagruha was the darkness. There had to be a balance. There is always balance, Nathan," Apocalypse smiles.

"And how do you know all of this?!" Cable shouts, gripping his ribs as they slowly begin to heal.

Apocalypse shakes his head, "Did you figure it out, yet? Both of our consciousness reside beyond the physical universe. I know all of this because I know exactly what you're going through, Cable!"

Cable's eyes widen with shock, "You..."

"Yes, I discovered I could draw from the Fifth Force," Apocalypse explains. "It was nearly five-thousand years ago. I discovered a way to cheat death by transplanting my nigh-omnipotent mind into host bodies. Unfortunately, those host bodies couldn't contain the harsh energies of the Fifth Dimension within them, so I needed more and more. Every hundred years, I had to get a new body...until I realized that I didn't want to live that way. I wanted a permanent body.

"After enlisting the service of a brilliant scientist from the late 19th Century, I employed him to manipulate the human gene pool to produce a mutant offspring that would carry the gene necessary to draw from the Fifth Dimension," Apocalypse explains.

"Sinister...?" Cable mutters.

Apocalypse nods, "He manipulated generations of your ancestors to get the desired result -- you. I tried to take you as my host, but alas, X-Factor and those...Inhumans stopped me. Thankfully, my own special recipe of the transmode virus kept your godlike powers at bay."

Apocalypse's body seems to glow as he grows to beyond the height of a twenty story building. He flies in at blinding speeds and punches Cable in the face, sending him spiraling into the zero-gravity-like environment. Blood swirls like a pattern from Cable's mouth.

"It was then that I realized I didn't need you after all," Apocalypse smiles. "Not right away, anyway. I needed you to mature a bit."

"...Is that why you captured X-Man?!" Cable yells groggily, wiping his mouth of blood.

Apocalypse sighs, "Well, unfortunately for your clone, Stryfe, he was artificially grown. The Fifth Dimension gene was not present. The gene is also only dominant with the Y-chromosome, which is why your sister, Rachel, had no godlike potential. Young Grey does have the gene as you do, but his vast powers will not last him past his 21st year. I needed young Grey to keep the reality I crafted alive and to keep the portal to Limbo open." He smiles, "All I needed was the Twelve to transport you and I here."

"You found the Prophecy?" Cable asks. "How could you read it?"

"Months before you did, boy," Apocalypse laughs. "And the language it was written in was very similar to the Ancient Egyptian tongue."

"Then why did you send all of your Horsemen to attempt to kill the Twelve if you wanted them alive?" Cable asks.

Apocalypse smiles enigmatically, "Why not? They had to prove their worth if they were to be the ones to truly make me a god."

"Well, I've got news for you," Cable growls, "I'm a god, too, now."

"Which is precisely why only one of us will walk away from this fight," Apocalypse utters coldly. "This is the end-all, be-all!!"

The empty white space field suddenly becomes solid as both Cable and Apocalypse find themselves inside a colossal alien temple. "Welcome to the Arena, Cable," Apocalypse grins as he cracks his knuckles together.

"Don't worry, I don't plan on staying long," Cable mutters as both of his eyes pulse with white light.

Apocalypse shouts as he leaps into the air, flipping as if he were in water, landing his two fists into Cable's nose. There is a sickening crunching sound as the bone is broken and the nasal passages fill with blood. Cable flows with the hit, allowing his neck to fall back so it wouldn't hurt as much.

Apocalypse shifts his fists into the size of large boulders and lunges for Cable. Nathan erects his telekinetic shield around his body and uses his own forearms to block the oversized hands. Cable performs a roundhouse and catches Apocalypse's jaw, causing a tooth to fly out of his mouth.

"Godlike power and you can't get rid of gum disease?" Cable quips.

Apocalypse growls as his Egyptian fashions begin to resemble his old, blue-armored look, "You made me lose concentration, whelp."

Cable smiles, "You still need your armor to channel your powers...your host body can't contain the energies. You're going to burn yourself out by staying here--"

"It won't matter!" Apocalypse shouts. "When I kill you, I get your body!" Apocalypse's lower half seems to turn into a snake's tail while the rest of him grows beyond normal proportions. He grabs Cable by the neck and by the waist in each hand, slowly torquing his spine.

Cable grimaces in pain as he attempts to get out of his mortal enemy's grip.

"Let's try to make you seven feet even, shall we?" Apocalypse laughs as there are two loud pops. Nathan tries to shout with each pop, but he's fighting to stay conscious.

Cable let's out a war cry in Askani as he flails his right leg, kicking Apocalypse straight in the eye ball. Apocalypse cries out as he drops Nathan on the floor of the Arena. Cable concentrates as he readjusts his spinal column telekinetically. He falls on his stomach. It felt like he had broke his back instead of fixing it.

Apocalypse cowers on the floor, covering the gaping hole in his right eye socket with blood spilling down his face and onto his chest plate. "My...eye!! Surely you can do more to me than just maim me!"

Cable talks as if the wind was knocked out of him, "Believe me...I'm going to take this as slow...as I can...ughhh."

Apocalypse laughs as his armor reforms over his eye, "You can't even stand."

Cable suddenly rises to his feet, "I don't need to stand as long as I have my brain!"

*KRAK*

"Argh!" Apocalypse growls as he feels the force of Cable's TK-reinforced punch upon his jaw.

Cable keeps on coming with the punches, ramming his fists like sledgehammers into Apocalypse's armor. "My sister told me I could destroy a star with a thought...Celestial armor can't do SHIT against that!"

Cable feels his fist push through as the armor shatters. With a telekinetic burst of energy, he rips the armor off of Apocalypse like a candy wrapper. Cable feels a whoosh of sickness as his skin suddenly goes white with horror.

Apocalypse smiles as red glowing eyes seem to penetrate Nate's very soul. "He" has the outline of a young man with long hair. He walks up to Cable, the gray skin covering him, some wires sticking out of his naked body, but his blue eyes and blonde hair were all too distinguishable.

"Oh, that's right," Apocalypse voice speaks from the man's body, "I had to take a new host after your little Calling of telepaths destroyed my former body. Guess who I picked?"

Nathan's neck muscles twitch, "Tyler...?"

Apollyon laughs as he kicks Havok in the stomach. Polaris holds Apollyon in midair by grasping the iron in his blood. Out of nowhere, a blast of concussive force is generated by Havok, hitting Polaris in the lower back region.

Apollyon smiles, "When will you people learn? I can take control of your minds and, in essence, your powers!"

Phoenix is crouched in a corner, trying to telepathically counter her son's attacks, but something is preventing her to do so, almost as if...there are more than one mind inside of him.

Cyclops opens his visor and shoots out a continuous stream of his optic blast. Apollyon blocks it as a purple sphere appears around his body.

Franklin lets out a cry as he charges up to Apollyon, but he is flung back as the TK shield zaps the young Richards, causing him to fall onto the stone floor. "Pathetic little worm!" Apollyon shouts as he prepares to psi-blast the youngling. Franklin is visibly hurt. He's trying not to cry. Apollyon raises his fist, which has a large purple clawed gauntlet of energy surrounding it. "Prepare to answer to God...my father...Apocalypse!"

"God's busy at the moment!" Blink shouts as she appears through a portal inside of Apollyon's TK-sphere. She lunges her fist forward, hitting Apollyon in the mouth and then the stomach. She lifts her leg above her head and sends it crashing down upon the top of Apollyon's skull. He falls flat as his shields drop.

Franklin wheezes as he runs into Blink's arms. Blink hugs him, "It's okay. You're all right, don't cry."

"He's getting up," Archangel whispers to everyone, his eyes and wings lighting up. He flaps his wings, generating multiple photo-fletchettes at Apollyon. The young mutant simply blocks them telepathically, disabling them from tarring through his psyche. He forces everyone telekinetically into the four stone walls of the throne room.

Storm, however, stands motionless as she hovers in midair. Her eyes and hair are crackling with electricity.

"Resilient, aren't you?" Apollyon smiles. "You're surrounding yourself with an electrical field, preventing me from assaulting you telepathically...or telekinetically...ingenious plan."

Storm holds out her hand and mutters coldly, "It always is." She half-expects lightning to strike Apollyon in the head and knock him out...maybe even to kill him, but nothing happens. The Mother Earth has nothing to offer Ororo Munroe, in a great time of need.

"NO!!" Phoenix shouts telepathically.

Apollyon smiles, "Quiet...mom. I'm having fun with this one. I find it interesting that Ms. Munroe is vulnerable to the very lightning she commands."

"What are you---?" Storm looks shocked as the winds begin to pick up, causing her to rise into the sky, past the open roof of the Citadel. Dark thunderclouds loom overhead. The lightning within them burns like a flickering lightbulb.

Apollyon telekinetically lifts himself beside Storm, he stretches his muscles as he sighs, "Mmm. All the fear you're putting out...it's empowering me. I'm in command of your mind now, Ororo...you know what happens when a toad is struck by lightning?"

Storm spits in Apollyon's face, "You will not win."

Apollyon wipes the saliva from his eyes, "Very well."

There is a flash of light and the sound of Storm's lifeless body hitting the stone floor of Apocalypse's throne room. There was a large chunk of charred flesh on her temple as blood poured out of her ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. Smoke rose from her body.

Blink grabs Franklin and shields his eyes.

Phoenix gawks in shock as a tear rolls down her cheek, "No..."

"Ororo...?" Polaris gasps.

"Damn it...," Iceman sighs, covering his face with his hand.

"Come on," Cyclops yells with clenched teeth as the other members of the Twelve begin to rally behind him. "Let's take this bastard out."

"No," Jean pleads. "He's my son!"

"He's APOCALYPSE'S son!" Cyclops yells, spitting in the process.

Phoenix's hair appears to catch fire as she generates a massive telepathic pulse into her teammates, knocking them out. Jean looks down at Franklin in Blink's arms, having a look of concern on his face. He saw Storm's body. Oh God...even with the Fantastic Four, he's never seen anything that graphic.

Jean turns her attention to her son, who has descended to the floor of the throne room. He observes the corpse of Storm and laughs. Tears stream down Jean's face as she swallows to ease the stinging in her throat.

Finally, the mystery is revealed. Jean can sense six other alpha waves other than Apollyon's own coming from her son. They were demons.

"Mom," Apollyon calls out telepathically. "Help me..."

"I will, baby," Jean whimpers as she walks up to him. She lightly touches his deformed face. The extra sets of eyes disappear and his eyes return to their natural green color. "Try to relax...I'm going to try to exorcise the demons inside of you..."

Phoenix grips Apollyon's skull with her fingers applying pressure to various points as she telepathically delves into his mind.

Cyclops groggily awakens from the psi-bolt he received. His psychic rapport with Jean enabled him to be less susceptible to her attacks. He sees Apollyon and Jean together. He can only think one thing, the safety of his wife.

Apollyon lets out a shout as he is flung at top speeds through the stone pedestal carrying the M'Kraan Crystal and into the far wall by a crimson ray of energy. The Crystal hits the floor with a chime-like clang.

Phoenix lets out a shout as her mind is literally set on fire. The nature of being in Apollyon's mind while he was fatally blasted in the abdomen, combined with the fact of his emotion-based powers, caused a destructive telepathic fire in Jean Grey-Summers' frontal lobes.

Jean slumps to her knees and see Apollyon sprawled out on the floor in a pool of blood, stemming from a large wound around his intestines. He tries to lift his head, but it is blown off by a second optic blast. His feet tremble and fall limp.

Cyclops walks up behind Jean and sighs, "It's done."

Phoenix vengefully glares at Scott, "You killed him."

"He was going to hurt you," Cyclops explains.

"He was possessed by demons, Scott!" Jean cries, gasping for breath. Blood drips out of her nose from the damaged blood vessels in her brain. "I was trying to exorcise them until you--" Jean pauses. "I'm powerless. Can't feel you anymore...can't feel anyone."

"Jean," Cyclops speaks, trying to grab her shoulder, but she turns away as she grabs her mouth, sobbing. Scott looks back at the rest of the Twelve, who have woken up and were staring at the results of the transpired events.

Scott's shoulders slump downward as he walks past his friends and teammates. Alex looks at his brother as he walks away. He tries to say something, but stops himself. Havok doesn't know why. He's been gone for so long, he doesn't even know how to talk to his own brother anymore. The rest of the Twelve look on in grief as Jean sobs over the lifeless bodies of her best friend and her son.

"Wolverine killed you!" Cable shouts as he punches Apocalypse across the face.

Apocalypse has taken possession of Genesis, better known as Tyler Dayspring, Cable's son. He smiles, "Tyler, like all of my hosts, go through a sort of...genetic screening to better prepare them for my inhabitation. Wolverine caused your son's mind to die, but his body was left very much alive. And you left it in perfect storage for me, in a coffin on the Guthrie farm! HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Apocalypse's eyes radiate red energy as they blast Cable in the chest, sending him into the wall of the Arena. Cable falls to the floor and is slow to get up. His back was broken from the fight. His nose was broken and bleeding badly. His liver was ruptured, there was massive internal bleeding. His telekinesis was all that was keeping himself together, and even that was not enough.

"Dad...?" Tyler's voice asks.

Cable looks up as blood drips into his eyes. Tyler was standing there, with his arm stretched out, offering to help his surrogate father to his feet. Cable fights back tears. He yells, his voice cracking, "Don't...use his...VOICE, damn you!!"

Apocalypse laughs as he grabs Cable's arm and with a quick flick, rips the left arm completely out of the socket. "ARRHHHHH!!!!" Blood erupts from the wound, causing Cable's eyes to roll back into his skull.

Energy cackles from Apocalypse's eyes, Tyler's body. His wicked smile suddenly fades as he grunts. He grabs his chest. The eternal heart of Apocalypse was failing. "Arrrg--!" Apocalypse grunts. He falls to his knees and then onto his stomach as he rolls around on the ground, pounding the floor as the host's vital signs begin to slip. "I will...not...ugrrr...die...I am...the High Lord...the first mutant...En Sabah Nur of Akabba. I will have your body, Summers...momentarily...once I deal with this minor...cardiac arrest...problem...urrggghhh--!!!"

Cable's teeth chatter as his body temperature drops rapidly. His body was surrounded by his own warm blood. He grips the laceration with his free hand, his fingers becoming lubricated with his plasma and blood cells. He smiles as he catches his second wind, "This is for Tyler, Aliya...and everyone else that's suffered...because of you..."

A vein bulges in Apocalypse's forehead as he appears to be dry-heaving. He pounds his chest, trying to defibrillate his heart. But it was no use. Cable was telekinetically blocking off every artery to the heart.

Cable's left eye begins to slowly dwindle as his telekinetic force becomes less and less. His face and entire body was blue with coldness.

"You know...none of this would have happened if you didn't impregnate Jean...," Cable coughs.

Apocalypse's eyes bulge as he struggles to breathe, "Survival...of...the...f-f-fit--"

Apocalypse's eyes go from red to pitch black as he lets out his final breath. Tyler's gray body turns to dust and seems to be blown away by a calming wind. The Arena fades from existence, as well, returning to the endless space field of white light of the Fifth Dimension.

Cable begins to breathe heavily as he feels his life slip away slowly. From this point in the Fifth Dimension, he knew all. He was omnipotent. He was a god. But he did not know where he would go next. His immortal life was drawing to a close.

Nathan Christopher Charles Summers Dayspring Askani'Son once thought he was invincible. The man known as Cable now knows that is not the case. That doesn't matter. Cable smiles, thinking to himself it was over...it was finally over. He takes his hand away from his shoulder and grips his phoenix medallion...and lets go.

His body explodes in a violent supernova explosion, spreading energy out in all directions...

The M'Kraan Crystal shard begins to glow as it sits on the floor. A tiny crack appears on its surface. Soon, a white light explodes from it as the shard itself vaporizes. Jean Grey, Scott Summers, Alex Summers, Clarice Ferguson, Wanda Maximoff, Lorna Dane, Franklin Richards, Warren Worthington, Bobby Drake, and Sam Guthrie shield their eyes as their surroundings begin to take on a new shape.

An energy wave sweeps across the entire Earth, transforming every last thing...every last person, plant, and animal...back to the way it was. Everything is restored. The portal to Limbo vanishes and any demons left on our side of the fence are vaporized by the shockwave.

Everything is restored. All over the world, there is great confusion, great sadness...as memories of the life before the Apocalypse are restored. People - humans and mutants alike -- remembered their old lives, as well as their suffrage under the Apocalypse. Humans and mutants worked together, but everything was back the way it was.

The way it was. Humans began to once more fear and hate mutants, the very people who most helped them through this most difficult time during their entire million-year existence on this Earth.

The Apocalypse was over, but for the hundreds upon hundreds that died...they were still gone. The Apocalypse changed everything. Its impact will be felt for generations.

The remaining members of the Twelve awaken in a large, empty, sandy cavern at Giza, the Great Pyramids in their view. The lifeless bodies of Storm and Apollyon partially buried by the blowing grains of sand. They look up at the sky and notice it was back to its natural, beautiful blue color.

"What happened?" Cyclops asks, realizing he was back in his hiking clothes.

Jean observes with her eyes, not her mind, "Everything's back to normal...but yet...everything's changed."

"What happened to Cable?" Cannonball asks, wiping dust off of his leather jacket.

"He's...dead," Madelyne says, rising to her feet slowly in her green armor. Her hair had shortened to its natural length and her skin was now its natural color. "Or at least, Apocalypse is. Either that, or Cable's pretty much a god and he undid everything that happened. Or...unless they killed each other."

"Oh, shut up, you twisted bitch!" Iceman shouts.

Madelyne sobs, "My only child could be dead, show some sympathy!"

"Ugh, where am I?" Rogue asks, her hair fully grown in and her skin back to normal as well. She looks at Storm's charred body and brakes into tears, "No! Oh...what?!" Rogue shouts something out incoherently as she cries. Warren and Clarice run up to her. Rogue meekly looks up at her Omega teammates, her jaw trembling. "I'm so sorry...!"

Warren embraces her, smiling to himself as a tear drips down his face, "I know, Rogue."

Blink joins in on the group hug, "We love you."

Rogue mumbles, "Ororo," as she begins to sob heavily in the arms of her closest friends.

Warlock's eyes jolt open as his techno-organic body has returned to its humanoid form. He looks at his hands, {{Oh man...how could I?}}

"It wasn't your fault, Warlock," Cannonball says gruffly. "I'm glad we didn't lose you after all."

Warlock's lips curl into a weak smile. He snorts, {{There's liquid coming out of my eyes...is that natural?}}

Sam swallows, his voice trembling, "I think so." He hugs Warlock, patting him on the back.

Exodus, awakening far away from the others grabs his chest as he feels the worst guilt one person could. Rising to his feet, he silently pays his respects to Cable, Apollyon, and Storm. Feeling out of place more than ever, he simply teleports away. He had a team of mutant teachers to return to and help them deal with their own tragedies.

Xavier Institute, a few days later...

In Charles Xavier's office, after the funerals held for their fallen, two consistent X-Men, Cyclops and Phoenix, sit across from one another. Scott is behind the desk. Jean is looking out the window, "We've got to stop coming together like this."

"What?" Scott asks, failing to pay attention, as he was still dwelling on the fact that he's lost Nathan for a second time.

"We only seem to really gather when we die," Jean says.

"Well, after Charles...there hasn't been anyone able to keep everyone in line and on the same page," Scott explains.

Jean swallows, "You and I have been distanced ever since I got pregnant with Apollyon. I wasn't under Apocalypse's thrall or something by wanting to keep the child. I wanted us to raise him together. But, I don't know. I understand why you did it. He killed Ororo and you thought he was doing the same to me."

"If I would have known he was possessed...," Scott begins.

"I know, Scott." Jean sighs, "I'm going to stay with my parents for awhile. Just, you know, until things cool off. I think some time apart could do us good."

She walks towards the door and looks back at Scott, who was leaning against the desk with his elbow, his fingers pinching his chin, looking emotionless.

"Good-bye, Scott," Jean says as she kisses him on the cheek. She pulls the diamond ring off of her finger and gently places it on top of a shelf that had an iron bust of Xavier on it. "Keep this for me when I come back." She walks out the door.

Scott sighs through his nose, standing up. He walks over to the window and watches Jean walk into her red Firebird with suitcase in hand. The car makes a gradual retreat. Scott looks down and sees a small framed photo of a younger Professor X with the original five X-Men, Bobby, Warren, Hank, Scott, and Jean.

Scott scowls as he bashes his fist through the frame. He pulls his fist back, observing the gashes in his knuckles. He could have damaged his tendons. But he doesn't care. Not anymore.

Rogue looks at Pietro and is almost afraid to talk to him about what she did as Famine. She looks at both Archangel and Blink and gets to confidence to at least walk up to Quicksilver and sit next to him. She chokes up as Pietro simply hugs her tightly.

"I love you," he whispers into her ear. "God, I love you."

Rogue shuts her eyes as tears stream from them, "I love you, too. I love all you guys." Sabretooth simply bites his lip, digging a stick into the ground, as everyone walks up and takes their turn giving their returning member a hug.

BOOK OF THE ASKANI'SON
Chapter 107: Finality
By Irene Merryweather

I've just returned home from Nathan's funeral a few days ago. There was no body, just a sort of memorial. To tell you the truth, the way Scott and Jean talked, they weren't even sure if he was really dead or not.

Either way, I guess this is the end. Nathan has finally completed the destiny that was set out for him. He engaged in combat with Apocalypse, killing the maniac and restoring the world.

You know, now that I think about it, I don't think his purpose in life was something thought up by some higher power. It may have been a special preference, but not something predetermined. We make our own path in life whether we realize it or not. Cable did what he wanted up until the end. I've secretly admired him for the year or so I chronicled his adventures. Call it the Florence Nightingale effect, except I wasn't his nurse.

I can't begin to imagine what it was like being in the so-called Fifth Dimension...or what it was like to die there allegedly (hate to use that word, but I'm a reporter, have to state the facts).

During one Christmas, when I was conducting an interview with Nathan, he told me the gist of his complex history for the first time. He told me why he wanted to actually face Apocalypse and kill him. No person can kill another without reason.

Does that make Cable a terrorist? In some people's eyes, maybe. Does that make al-Qaida terrorists, or were they just trying to defeat their own Apocalypse? There is so much we as Americans...as people...as a world that we can learn from Nathan.

He came from a time where "international" was not a word. Despite being ruled with an iron fist and being mostly war-torn, the entire world was united. Cultures were melded together. Humans and mutants were together, fighting for a common goal. The end of oppression.

When Cable told me of his personal agenda to kill Apocalypse, I asked him if he was afraid. He told me something I would never forget:

"Either he dies, or I die. There is no room for fear."

That kind of determination and courage and willingness to sacrifice everything for the world is something that is truly noble. This is the final entry of Irene Merryweather's journal, I hope you've enjoyed reading this. I was told that this would become a bible of some sort someday in the far future. Why? I have no idea.

I used to muckrake celebrities for Christ's sake. Now I'm a pseudo-prophetess. It's a funny world we live in. You better live life to the fullest. Life changes, so you better not bitch about it. What is...is.

End.

"...which is why I've decided the Alpha team should be disbanded," Cyclops in full uniform, explains.

Before him in the War Room are Cannonball, Dazzler, and Beast. Cyclops notices their inaction. They have a look like he was being humorous.

"Your service is no longer required," Cyclops says. His visor flashes, "Get out."

Appearing to oppose, Cannonball and Dazzler eventually get out of their chairs and walk past Scott, out of the room. Beast has a sense of skepticism in his eyes. He walks up to Scott, "What's going on?" he whispers. "This isn't because of Jean leaving, is it?"

Cyclops looks at Beast, "This is the real me. Like it?"

"I then saw a new heaven and a new earth." -- Revelation 21:1