Chances thrown, nothing's free,
Longing for what used to be.
Still it's hard, hard to see,
Fragile lives; shattered dreams...

The roars of a legion of rioters were becoming violently suppressed sounded out across Washington, DC in those final hours. It was an uncommon feat that so many forces allied together to rein down on but a riot, but the circumstances of said riot were not of the ordinary. Humans and mutants, in what was seen by many as the ultimate culmination of nearly over a decade of heated dispute, have finally gone to war.

It was a race riot unseen and unmatched by any of the past. Full-scale strife had been unleashed on the nation’s capital, fueled by the neo-humanist group the Friends of Humanity’s campaign support for Senator John Stocker and the ambitions of an empathy-manipulating mutant to release an all out, final judgement on society as a whole.

“ – But nonetheless, local law enforcement agencies in conjunction with the National Guard and other military units have taken an iron hold on the uprisings of violence in this nation’s capital,” Trish Tilby confirmed for the viewing audiences at home. She stood outside of Capitol Hill, a flimsy police barricade barely holding off and protecting her from the raging violence behind her.

“Even the Commission on Superhuman Activities has been summoned to intervene in the unfolding riot due to nearly half of the rioters’ bearings as mutants,” the reporter continued as she slowly began walking alongside the police barricade erected at her back. “News on their success in subduing many of the rioters is still coming in, and many other questions remain unanswered as well.”

With the wave of his hand, the cameraman signaled for Trish to pause a moment while he capture a spine-chilling scene. One Caucasian man with a red and black “Friends of Humanity” insignia branded on his arm had charged fearlessly from his flock towards a scrawny young teen, cursed with the appearance of a bald headed chicken.

A lead pipe in the man’s hand, he swung repeatedly and struck the chicken square in the neck and shoulder over and over again. The teen squawked and cried wildly, flapping his out of proportioned and ragged wings feebly as he cowered like a slug. Unlike some of the more popular mutants seen in the media’s light, it was Beak’s only defense.

Or was it?

Just as quickly as the assault took place, Beak’s saviors swooped in with the utmost of efficiency. They weren’t anywhere near the birds of his feather, or even a distant cousin to his flock. And before the F.o.H. garbed assailant had even noticed they were on him, he had been thrown to the cement in a deafening rush and felt a powerful blow force the air to explode out from his lungs.

They were just three men in blue and black fatigues that had tackled him, fully decked out in body armor and totting automatic rifles and riot-batons. The butt of one’s rifle had struck him hard in the solar plexus, while another penned him down by elbow so that they could peel away the iron pipe in his hand.

CBNC’s bravest, rookie cameraman zoomed in on the F.o.H. member’s reddening face, his sharp face contorting in pain and anger as he yelled out at the riot-police officers who had taken him down hard. His desultory yelps and curses were meaningless, especially once one office emptied out a canister of pepper spray into his eyes.

Beak could only stare on at his saviors as he lay cowering in the fetal position in the streets of Washington, DC. Drenched in his very blood and grasping at his wounds with his talons, he was at a loss for words.

But he was sure of one thing. For the first time in his life, the teenage chicken had known not to be afraid of the humans… Not all of them, anyway.

Returning to the form of Trish, the cameraman nodded to her and gave her a thumb up. Though still intrigued by the scene that had just unfolded before her and its significance, Trish nevertheless looked back to the camera directed at her and returned to her news casting monologue with a quiet, calming sigh.

“While we’re currently unable to approach many of the national monuments here in DC, scattered sources have promised to inform us of the status of collective congressmen and senators who were in session earlier today,” Trish conveyed.

“Though it cannot be said with absolute certainty, Police officials firmly believe that a rally held by the political organization known as ‘the Friends of Humanity’ held in conjunction with the House gatherings is where the violence between the organization and various, local mutants erupted.

“It is no secret that, in recent days, the Friends of Humanity are pushing for the Republican Party to launch a secondary presidential campaign centered around the registration and possible confinement of many mutants,” Trish continued with a slight utter. She was trying her best to hide any possible bias in her voice, but maybe some things just couldn’t or shouldn’t be hid.

“While the last such campaign launched by Graydon Creed was cut short due to his untimely assassination, such a controversial campaign was believed to be but a predecessor to such violence as that in which has been seen in the past hours,” Trish said. She gestured a hand out to her side, pausing for a moment while the cameraman took another zooming swoop through the city streets before returning to her.

“Whether or not such violence was provoked by mutants or members of the Friends of Humanity remains to be seen, but one thing is certain – “ Trish began to say, but was cut off by a flash of brilliant light. The roaring sound of thunder quickly followed and the cameraman tore away from Trish’s face towards the direction of the disturbance.

High above the streets of the nation’s capital, a black woman ascended into the air with a rush of wind, shimmering and flowing silver hair following at her tail as she gracefully avoided the twisted and mangled body of a vehicle. A mammoth of a man in rust colored armor had been chucking nearby cars left and right at a wide array of foes, the silver haired woman being one of them.

But despite his might, she was an equally powerful adversary that one would be keen to avoid a reckoning with. Storm clouds were billowing over her figure in the sky, as if her very presence was agitating them. Drawing her hands up above her form as she peaked at a high enough velocity, electrical currents wrapping around the weather wielding mistress just before she brought her hands back down and took a dive for her opponent.

“What the…?” the CBNC cameraman muttered to himself before realizing their news feed was still live and cutting himself short of his vulgar confusion. He was already zooming in on the various figures engaged in battle for not only the viewers at home, but for the executives back at CBNC as well.

Trish reached up and grabbed onto the shoulders of the cameraman, who grinned in response at the images they were getting, and she pointed up to the woman who was taking a nose dive towards the iron armored juggernaut. The cameraman nodded understandingly and craned the camera up at her form.

“Is that Storm?” Trish demanded with an uneasy and shaken voice, her brow furrowed as she could almost feel the tension begin to get to her from the situation. The cameraman shot Trish a look and Trish looked back to him before explaining, “ I thought –“

" – you were dead?!?" Iceman called out to Storm as he was sent rocketing into the morning’s sky past her rapidly descending form with the explosion of another vehicle’s gas tank, this one against his sled of ice. Ororo's skin-cracked and dirtied hands cackled with lightning as she launched bolt after bolt into the Juggernaut's rampaging form, the early morning streets being lit up in a flash with each bolt.

"I got better!" was the only creditable response Storm could muster as each of her hands pumped in and out before her in rapid succession, lightning bolt after lightning bolt scourging from her very finger-tips at the direction of the X-Men’s long time foe.

Normally, Cain Marko would merely laugh at such feeble attempts to assault his massive and powerful frame. But with the sudden arrival of the world’s most powerful telepath, he has found the need to greatly be more cautious. He urgently drew up his gauntlet-covered hands over his face and upper torso, trying desperately to block the lightning blasts Storm was generating from damaging the hinges around his helmet.

“I never shoulda had this hunk o’ junk specially made in Genosha…” the Juggernaut mused to himself under his breath as the continuous attacks rained down on his telepathy-resistant helmet. While he was indeed one of the most powerful monstrosities to ever grace God’s green earth, he was anything but invulnerable to telepathic attacks and the word had spread fast after of his weak points.

“Little hee-eeee-eee-eee-elp?!?!” Iceman cried out as he hit an arch in the air and gravity began to send him plummeting back down into the streets. The world was a blur to him, a mix of burning buildings, overturned cars, an upheaval of asphalt, and all of his longtime friends in the X-Men trying to make the horror end.

"Gotcha!" Polaris chimed as she twisted and manipulated the magnetic field around Iceman so as to lift him up right in the last moments of his fall. Bobby closed his eyes for a moment, then sprung one up slowly in realization eyes that he wasn't street mush. He skimmed over his savior’s form and beamed at the sight of the visible electromagnetic energy cackling around her in her Sunday's best.

"Thanks, greeny-pie," Bobby said with a sharp wink and a playful grin, both attributes that would never be found painted on anyone else's face in such a dire situation but the Iceman's. "I owe ya one," he added as he charged back into the ongoing battle with the Juggernaut on a sled of ice with exploding sickles of ice trailing his frozen frame.

"We're even," Lorna whispered to herself softly with a gentle smile in regards to her former teenage-love’s comment, remembering back to earlier that evening when he had shielded her from a fierce bombardment of missiles that had been launched by the Xavier Institute's rogue defense system.

Just as Iceman, Polaris, and Storm focused their three combined efforts into containing the Juggernaut long enough for their telepathic ally the Phoenix to put him down for the count, a wave of heart suddenly emitted from the streets. The very asphalt was beginning to melt down into its key components of liquid tar when powerful cylinders of molten lava erupted into the air and began overflowing over the X-Men’s battlefield.

It was the intense heat of that lava that would actually work against its wielder’s benefit, for not far from one of the many pools of molten rock she had created was the spade-tipped tail of a demon, drooping limp from his shackled, though sprawled and unconscious form. The lava spewed closer and closer before the very tip of the shadow skinned mutant’s tail began to sizzle…

“MEIN BUMSEN!!” came the high-pitched wail of the Nightcrawler, his glowing cyan eyes springing to life from underneath fatigued, black eyelids. He gritted his fanged teeth and shot a look down to his burnt tail, which retreated far back to his hind and flapped wildly around in the air.

Instinctively, Nightcrawler began backpedaling his bare feet in a furious frenzy against the heated asphalt, trying desperately to move away from the spreading lava pool. Much to the demon’s chagrin, the large pole pressing against his back and the rattling chains strapped to his body had kept him securely confined in place, however.

Using the sudden burst of adrenaline, Kurt Wagner clamped down his eyes and dug deep down inside of him for the strength that he needed to escape a torturous doom. Finally, he was able to touch it. He touched his reserves and he let out a cried as he seemingly exploded in a powerful blast of smoke and brimstone.

A good ten feet away, a similar explosion took place and Kurt reappeared inches above the sidewalk where he would drop flat on his face. He could taste that salty, thick texture in the back of his throat, and as he rose to his hands and knees, he nearly coughed up a lung alongside the glob of blood that found its way in the back of his throat.

When the demon-like man rose from the sidewalk to his feet, not caring that his torn and tattered robe was barely clinging to his body. He started to move towards the streets and the raging battles going on, but nearly collapsed under his own shaking legs. Everything around him… the screams of terror… the cries of battle… the cracklings of flame…

How could his brothers and sisters under their almighty God be trying to kill each other when they could in turn be using their gifts to try and stop the monstrosities man and mutant kind alike had chosen to inflict on each other that evening? What evil and inauspicious force could be willing them to do so?

"Ooh… oh, no… no…" he muttered to himself, a tri-fingered hand gripping the temple of his head. He breathed in and out, nearly to the point of hyperventilation, before he prayed. “This will not do…” and he cursed under his exhausted breath. “This will not do…”

It wasn’t mean to be like this. For the love of all that was holy and sacred, Kurt Wagner knew deep down in the pit of his soul that it wasn’t supposed to be like this…

Washington, DC.
Just a few days prior...

A relatively thin man in his fifties approached a podium located outside of a large stone church. When he took his vows over thirty years ago, he never thought he would have received nearly the same amount of media attention as the Pope himself. Various camera crews diligently anticipated what the good Father was about to say. It was without a doubt that during times of crisis, people have looked to men and women of faith for answers. Was it the will of God, Allah, or something else?

Father Matthew might not have had the answer of how the universe unfolded, but he clearly had something -- truth -- that would set a few records straight.

With a golden cross worn around his neck, along with a black robe and purple sash, Father Matthew cleared his throat as he leaned into the microphone's receptive area. A man of about average height stood behind the humane priest in very similar attire, but it was obvious the man was something more than just average.

Nightcrawler, if only regrettably named after an oversized earthworm, was a name Kurt Wagner wore with pride during his time with the X-Men and later their European counterpart, Excalibur. The indigo-furred, elf-earred, yellow-eyed, spade-tailed teleporter may have looked like a demon as described by Dante's Inferno, but alas, as Kurt would learn in just a couple of days' time...appearances were definitely deceiving. With the most inhuman of appearances, Kurt probably had the most humanistic of souls.

Father Matthew turned around and nodded to Kurt, who silently nodded his head. Matthew began, "I've requested to plea with you all this glorious, but troubling morning that the Vatican does not and did not finance or have anything to do with the heinous actions of the Church of Humanity." Matthew removed his traditional collar to symbolize his priesthood, "And I must remind you all I speak to the world not as a representative of Catholicism, but all religions, creeds, cultural backgrounds, sexual orientations, ethnicities, and most of all, species."

As impolite interjections from the reporters compounded Father Matthew, the morally sound, but confident Nightcrawler took to the podium beside his friend, "The calculated murder of a specific group does not constitute a religion. I am angered, but understanding of the vandalism that has taken place because of the recent controversies within the Catholic Church. However, the accusations that the Church of Humanity was somehow in league with the Catholic Church or any other religious sect are nothing more than cannon fodder for gossip columnists and political extremists."

Kurt continued in his charming German accent as he held up his tri-fingered hands, "Having dealt with William Stryker firsthand, I can tell you his hatred of mutants knows no bounds. Just as Graydon Creed, Adolph Hitler, Erik Lensherr, Saddam Hussein, Slobodon Milosovic, Osama bin Laden, En Sabah Nur, and Senator John Stocker have all declared...a cleansing has supposedly been a long time coming for particular groups of people. And that hatred stems from an insecurity in one's fear of change and lack of willingness to realize political, cultural, and economic instability is not caused by the influences of said groups.

"As a mutant myself, the church proudly accepted me for who I am...which is more than I can say for the common person," Kurt sighed. "But I do not forsake the scared or confused. It is simply not mine or anyone else's place to judge. However, God is that which one cannot outrun, ignore, lie to, or pay off. Those who enact violence or a holy crusade just to further their own ends and spread their prejudiced, absolute hatred."

As the various news reporters once again interrupted Nightcrawler's passionate speech, he delivered one final statement:

"One day, the judgment of the ignorant will come...and only He will ensure what is holy and what is not. Thank you, that is all."

Washington, DC.
Presently...

Nightcrawler scanned the street which had become a battlefield akin to a warlike event. The ground shook violently, which almost caused him to topple over if not for his acute balance due to his natural agility and tail. About a half block away, Kurt saw Juggernaut's rust colored armor and flashes of lightning and felt a breeze of freezing air as Iceman and Storm challenged their longtime foe.

Kurt breathed heavily, as if to will his adrenaline to increase throughout his body. It had been awhile since he ran the Juggernaut simulation in the Danger Room. His absence from the X-Men definitely made his finesse a little rough around the edges, but different circumstances tend to bring out the clear-headedness in everyone.

The beliefs Kurt had vowed to uphold would be challenged if he chose to fight. But even Christ wouldn't sit idly by as his friends would face certain doom. Juggernaut and Apollyon needed to be stopped...hopefully quick enough to regain control of FX, M, Magma, and Radius.

Nightcrawler darted towards the source of the rumbling, intent on helping Bobby and Ororo. He thought he lost Storm before...and he wasn't going to let it happen a second time. With a leap off the top of a silver Lexus vehicle, Kurt exploded into a sulfuric cloud of dust. The cloud reappeared alongside a building across the street. As he clung to the brick surface, Kurt's yellow eyes caught glimpse of an intense fiery form in the shape of a bird. The avatar of the phoenix began to grow in size and brightness as it traded blows with the violet energies of the oversized gray body of Apollyon.

"Mein gott...Jean, I hope you know what you're doing," Kurt prayed as he teleported a second time.

Apollyon seemed to laugh as his eyes, enriched with the Fifth Force he inherited from his father, fired a continuous stream of force directly into the flames of the phoenix raptor. Cyclops, the true Scott Summers (whom Apollyon impersonated for months), grit his teeth as he consciously increased the pressure of his optic blast as the crimson energies against the seemingly impenetrable hide of his wife and Apocalypse's son. Slowly but surely, Cyclops opened his visor wider and wider...but it seemed like Apollyon didn't even notice the force that could level a mountain against him.

The energy emanating from Apollyon did not cease until the earth-shattering wail of Phoenix caused the firebird to disappear...leaving only a redheaded woman laying motionless on the ground.

Cyclops growled as he ripped the ruby-quartz visor from his eyes and unleashed the full wrath of his optic blast against Apollyon. The area suddenly became a deep shade of red. Still, Apollyon stood his ground. "Come on! Fall, you son of a bitch!" Cyclops shouted in pure anger.

As blood dripped from her nose, Jean slowly pulled herself up, drained from her intense concentration of telekinesis which protected her body from vaporization.

"Heh heh...are you implying my mother, your estranged wife is a bitch?" Apollyon inquired as he shielded his face with his forearm, slowly approaching his antagonizer.

Cyclops was forced to step back and put his weight against his left leg to withstand the pressure of his own power. As Apollyon came closer, Scott could feel the backlash of energy against his skull and neck. Sweat beaded down his grizzled face, "She's not my estranged wife! You locked me away! You took a piece of my soul and DNA so you could mimic me!"

Apollyon smiled as his eyes lit up, "If I took a piece of you, I just made the decisions you were going to make anyway...didn't I?"

"RRRRRRrrrrrrraaaaaahhhh!!!!!" Cyclops shouted as he taxed the limits of his body keeping the continuous optic blast on Apollyon, whose verbal tactics were not helping matters. "I didn't want this to happen! You took what I wanted and mixed it with your father's teutonic and ultimately outdated world domination schemes!"

Apollyon was just inches from Scott's face, the pressures between the two men's energies dangerously high, as he snickered, "So...did it work?"

"What the hell do you think?!" came a shout from above.

Apollyon didn't have time to look up as fiery talons dug into his chest and violently threw him into a row of parked cars along the sidewalk. The giant form of Apollyon collided with the aluminum and glass and caused an explosion.

Phoenix flew over the wreckage and thrust her telekinetic energy upon the only child she ever bore within her womb. She sensed Cyclops nearby and turned to see him kneeling on the ground as smoke came from his closed eyes. His eyelids were badly bruised as he replaced his visor and gave a little nod to his airborne wife.

As a unit, Cyclops and Phoenix continued the assault from the ground and air respectively.

Meanwhile, down the street, Domino traded blows with Radius, seemingly to no avail. She thrust her foot into his stomach, then springboarded and flicked her other foot into his chin, at the same time firing shots from her gun. The bullets were aimed at his shoulders, two nonfatal areas, but obviously, the force field protected him.

As Domino landed on her feet, she shook her jet black hair out of her eyes. Her porcelain skin drenched in sweat, she discharged the empty magazines from her guns and tossed the weapons aside. When the empty magazines crunched against the ground as they fell, Domino reached for her back as she pulled out a metallic cylinder. She bit the clip on the top off and threw the thermite grenade at Radius, at the same time back flipping out of the way.

As the smoke cleared from the explosion, Radius emerged unharmed.

Domino sighed as she knelt down, "Yeah, shoulda figured." With a twirl of her body, she brought the blade of a large knife down upon Radius's chest, but the blade broke. Annoyed, Domino furiously threw the small hilt aside, "This is ridiculous."

"Go ahead, waste you arsenal," Radius taunted as he attempted to backhand Domino. However, the higher-skilled player prevailed as the mysterious woman grabbed Jared's forearm and judo flipped him onto the ground.

Domino relished the moment as she twisted Radius's shoulder, causing him to scream in pain. Beatrice smirked, "My arsenal is far from depleted, sonny boy." Domino, however, shouted in pain as invisible shards suddenly poked through her hands which gripped Radius's forearm.

As Domino shakily observed the four bloody holes that completely penetrated each hand, Radius formed his forcefield into a large weight and thrust it towards the ground. Domino rolled out of the way, despite the burning sensation in her hands. Despite the high octane action that laid before her, she could only think of one thing.

Nate, where ever you are...help us win this!

Nearby, Alison Blaire put her former pop star dance moves and training to use as she snap kicked Jubilee in the face. The resulting sound produced by the kick allowed Dazzler to convert the energy into a massive burst of light. She went in to put the knock out on her would be aggressor...or so she thought.

With a feisty grunt, Jubilee instead drove her palm into Dazzler's nose, at the same time generating a massive pulse of pyrotechnics. Alison, as her head jerked back, hit the pavement. As the world spinned around, Alison couldn't help but lose consciousness.

Jubilee smiled as the squeals and pops twirling around her clenched fists spun around faster and became brighter, "It's cake from here on out, Dizzler. It's time you -- hurk!!!"

Jubilee gagged as she caught glimpse of a short, muscular man with burnt and mangled flesh. Wolverine had taken her up into a choke hold, despite the flesh just beginning to reassemble itself along his arm and the side of his face. His grip was firm, but he didn't intend for it to be fatal.

His raspy voice whispered into her ear, "You don't know what yer doin', darlin'..." Jubilee gasped for breath one last time before her head slumped to its side and she passed out. "You don't know what yer doin'...," Wolverine repeated as he slowly laid Jubilation safely onto the ground.

Logan huffed from exhaustion, as his healing factor worked overtime to repair his frail body. The physical exertion was slowing his regeneration. However, in many ways, while the procedure was hell, the adamantium skeleton strengthened his bones -- which made the fight a little easier for him...except for the pain that shot through his body at almost every moment. He'd need a blood transfusion when this was finished, if he survived at all.

A recovered Dazzler, who nursed a bloody nose, walked up to Logan and observed Jubilee out cold on the ground. Ali smiled, "Thanks." She paused as she observed the other individual bouts taking place. She and Wolverine both knew their time of rest would run out and they'd need to be in the game at a moment's notice.

Wolverine felt himself lose his step and fall into Dazzler's arms. The adamantium skeleton was too much for her to carry, so he took a knee to the street, "No problem....ungh..."

"You look like hell, Logan...," Dazzler said worriedly.

Logan's blue eyes shot up at Alison as a hint of a fatigued smile crawled onto his face, "No kiddin'."

"You gotta take it easy, man," Alison fought back tears, "We just got you and Ororo back...how can someone deal with this? Someone's declared dead, only to be revealed it was a hoax? I don't want you to die...I don't want anyone to die."

Wolverine lowered his eyes and panted, "Too late for that..." Grunting, Logan pulled himself to his feet and extended his claws, "If we don't at least try to put a stop to this, everything Chuck stood for would be a waste."

A crackle of thunder, as well as various energy discharges, and the sound of two telekinetic forces being crushed together echoed throughout the DC area as Logan observed the X-Men, past and present, even a former X-Force soldier, fight for a better tomorrow. It wasn't Magneto they were facing, nor even the last scion of Apocalypse.

The prime X-Men were fighting to put an end to the prejudices inflicted upon mutants. They were there to prove that mutant abilities could be used for good. It wasn't the typical good verses bad. Hero against villain.

If they died trying, at least perhaps they could have led by example.

Wolverine focused on Phoenix and Apollyon as the two powerhouses mimicked a sort of polar opposite effect. As the parent and child seemingly fought to the death, memories of his final duel with his son, Victor, flooded his mind. And inevitably, his grief for Jacob tugged at his heart once more,  "...everything."

Washington, DC.
Then.

Senator Robert Kelly sipped a glass of water as he stood behind a podium. The events that had transpired had created perhaps the worst violence to break out within America's borders since Watts or the aftermath of just about any Laker game. Senator Stocker, the leader of the Friends of Humanity, was perhaps the "dark side" of Kelly himself, but that did not mean Kelly believed something had to be done about the mutant threats.

What was worse, the entire world would see the riots on television...adding more fuel to the anti-American fire. Of course, America wasn't the only country with questionable politics regarding mutants. China and France, in particular, have been almost worse in terms of dealing with the homo superior breed.

And then there was Genosha, ruled by the most vicious pro-mutant terrorist leader. He could feel the urge to "liberate" American mutants, offering them safe haven in his nation...at the same time, lash out against their human oppressors.

But Robert couldn't think of that now.

As he stood within the press room, he looked at the audience of FoH brethren and reporters and spoke, "I am making this speech in total representation of the Friends of Humanity. Regardless of my...past disagreements with what seemed like their organization as a whole, my main disposition was with their leader, Mr. Stocker. But now, after today's events...I must concede my previous stand and fully support the FoH after their peaceful protest was interrupted by hostile local mutants! I will testify, so help me God, that I witnessed the mutants striking first with my own eyes. These unidentified mutants, when and if they are contained, will be tried as potential terrorists against our country's citizens."

Robert straightened his glasses as he could almost foresee the picture of himself, as he delivered this very speech, appearing in history books throughout the nation in just a few years' time.

He continued, "It is my belief, as I have witnessed the beginnings of the riot before being safely escorted by the capital's brave men and women to a secure location along with other politicians...that the continuing riots have escalated from a simple squabble between the FoH and a few mutants into a full scale outbreak of violence between our nation's armed forces and even more mutants...apparently including the outlaws, the X-Men, who have allied themselves with Juggernaut -- who has demolished many of Washington's landmarks."

"Mr. Kelly! A question?"

"Senator, what about the X-Men's heroic acts against Magneto, Apocalypse, and the Sons of Set, recently?"

"Was it true the White House was destroyed by Juggernaut?"

"Did the X-Men initiate the riots?"

"What is the death toll at the moment, Senator?"

"Is it true you have been appointed by President Bush as the new Mutant Security General member of his Cabinet?"

"What about the hidden video tapes provided by the CIA of you talking with the X-Man known as Cyclops a few years ago? It was rumored that Cyclops has been seen in the riot. Comments?"

Frustrated by the media coverage, Senator Kelly rose his hands and shouted over the commotion, "I will be putting all of my backing into the Friends of Humanity's secondary campaign for president. I admit, I have always had my doubts on whether or not mutants should be registered or just contained...but we now know something must be done."

Washington, DC.
Now.

"Although I am tempted to yell yippee ka-yay...," Beast smirked as he held on for dear life around Cannonball's shoulders, "I think you should veer towards our volcanic friend over there."

Sam Guthrie silently cursed his blue-furred teammate as he used his bio-kinetic "blasting field" to shoot through the sky towards Allison Crestmere, his former teammate from the New Mutants.

"Now ain't the time, Hank...," Cannonball said in a tone that sounded all too like Cable's commanding voice, despite the Kentucky accent. He descended at blinding speeds towards the lava-enriched streets -- towards the source of molten rock.

At the last possible moment, Beast locked his knees and sprung off of Cannonball's back, tacking Magma from behind as Cannonball pulled upwards to burn off his built-up momentum.

"Off of me, you bloody excuse for a Muppet!" Magma shouted as her body seemed to mimic the molten core of the Earth itself. Beast shouted as his fur began to sizzle and catch fire. As the lava began to rise in the street around Magma, Beast's eyes went wide.

"It appears...my plan of action," Beast yelped as he blindly leapt into the air to avoid the golden orange globular liquid from destroying him. Cannonball flew in and temporarily deactivated his blasting field, allowing Beast to jump onto his back, "...sucked!"

"GUH!" Cannonball grunted as Beast's muscular form almost broke him in two. Cannonball quickly activated his powers once more and flew through the streets to avoid the lava. Beast jumped off of Sam's back once more, this time landing on top of a building.

Cannonball descended at Beast's side, gritting his teeth, "We can't get close enough to her. Ah'd kill her if Ah tried to slam into 'er."

"Maybe this hasn't occurred to you, Sam," Beast said, "but there is a possibility..."

"Ah'm not killin' her!" Cannonball shouted in Beast's face.

Hank flashed his canines as he roared, his trademark dry sense of humor evaporated, "Damn it, kid! Washington is in social upheaval! The American center of democracy is in ruins because of this riot! Mind control or not, Magma wouldn't let this happen if it were someone else!"

"She was mindin' her own business in school until Apocalypse's damn son recruited her!" Cannonball shouted. "This isn't her fault! Ah don't care, damn it!"

Suddenly, a faint green glow filled the sky, postponing the argument between friends. A green-haired woman with a slight pudginess in her midsection hovered in the air, surrounded by a brilliant green energy.

"Calm down, boys," Polaris said. As Cannonball and Beast looked on, Lorna descended towards Magma, who was becoming more and more fiery with every passing moment.

"So they send in a pregnant woman? Hah!" Magma laughed.

Polaris smirked, "I don't know about you, but this bun in the oven is actually strengthening my powers from all the hormones." Lorna held out her hand as Magma suddenly found a transparent green bubble surrounding her.

Magma powered down slightly as she forced lava to boil up to the surface through manholes and burst against the magnetic bubble and at the hovering Polaris...to no avail.

"I'm not going to...not going to quit after all this shite has happened to me! From Emma Frost screwing with my personalities to all of this...this...," Magma huffed as she rested her palms on the inside of the magnetic bubble. "I ...was living a bloody normal life..."

Polaris frowned as she cut off Magma's blood flow to her brain -- not to kill her, but to take her out of the fight. As Allison's body returned to its flesh and blood form, the surrounding lava pouring throughout the street seemed to darken and harden as it lost energy.

Lorna sighed, "So was I..."

Meanwhile, an exhausted Domino was backhanded by a forcefield-encased fist belonging to Radius. As blood spiraled through the air as Domino twirled before landing violently on the asphalt, she began to wonder if her luck had run out. Most of her weapons were depleted and she relied solely on her hand to hand fighting skills. While she was perhaps only second to Wolverine, her skills meant nothing when she couldn't make contact with Radius's face, chest, testicles, or any other pressure points needed to get the K.O.

Domino spit a wad of blood out of the side of her mouth as she twisted herself onto her back, only to feel the blinding pain of Radius's boot almost crush her neck. Gagging, Domino's suffocation suddenly became minimal priority when Radius removed the gun out of her hand...and pointed it directly in her face.

"This is pretty fucking hilarious. You'd laugh in the morning...if you wouldn't be dead. But anyway...are you feeling...lucky, punk? Well...do ya?" Radius snickered as he did his best Dirty Harry impression.

"...huuuuk....," Domino spat as blood gushed out of her mouth with every ounce of pressure Radius pushed down on with his boot.

"I thought so," Radius smiled as he began to pull the trigger.

At least, until something large and rust-colored collided into the man, propelled by a flash of lightning and a large ice formation shaped into a giant fist. It couldn't have been more perfect. Just like a Road Runner cartoon.

Domino jolted upwards, gripping her throat, and found Storm, Iceman, and Nightcrawler staring at her with wry grins. Kurt held the helmet which belonged to Juggernaut and tossed it aside with his prehensile tail. During their tussle with Juggernaut, his helmet was removed...after which Phoenix (during her fight) delivered a massive psi-bolt into the otherwise unstoppable Cain Marko.

"You okay?" Iceman asked.

Domino lightly caressed the puncture wounds in her hands, "I've handled worse." Domino met eyes with Storm, a woman who once might have had feelings for Cable, "Good to have you back, Ororo."

Storm simply nodded. Her eyes were pale...almost mirroring her soul. The four of them looked up to see the continuing struggle between Monet St. Croix and Apollyon against Cyclops, Wolverine, and Phoenix.

"Lord help us...," Nightcrawler swore.

Trish Tilby, still covered in an innocent man's blood, brushed the raven hair out of her eyes as a technician dabbled some makeup around her forehead and cheeks. Despite the makeup, however, Trish still had massive bags dropping from her eyelids.

"...can you believe the sun is coming up?" Trish muttered. "I doubt anyone is still awake watching this coverage..."

"The producers say it'll get you attention," the camera man said as he hoisted the videocam onto his shoulder. "CBNC needs to give CNN a run for their money for once." He cleared his throat, "You're on in five."

A televised voice of a newscaster was heard from a live broadcast on a nearby speaker, {{...we now take you to CBNC reporter Trish Tilby, live on the field. Trish?}}

Trish held the microphone up to her face like a batter stepping up to the plate. As the makeup technician hastily made his exit from the camera's view, Trish sighed and yawned one last time before the camera's portable light lit up and illuminated her face, "Thanks, Dan and good morning. We are reporting to you live from Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington...it's currently 5:32 AM Eastern Standard Time."

Trish turned around, "As you can see behind us, the White House has been completely leveled. Local firefighters and law enforcement has confirmed there were no casualties suffered...as the presidential home was evacuated long before any danger was present."

"It is also apparent that now, after the very long riot which transpired since late yesterday afternoon, activity has died down," Trish said confidently. Distant energy discharges and rumblings were felt throughout the area, producing sounds equivalent to explosions by bombing.

Trish tried not to flinch as she continued, "Those sounds are not bombs, Dan...I don't know if you can hear me, but...as you can probably figure out, there is still fighting going on. But this may be because the team of mutant activists known as the X-Men have stepped in...fighting what appears to be some kind of...giant gray creature. If you remember your history, the creature looks an awful lot like Apocalypse..."

Trish coughed a little before she said, "I'd also like to relay a message from the local law enforcement and FBI thanking the citizens for staying in their homes during this national incident...it just made their jobs a lot easier handling the huge number of arrests and tending to the wounded."

{{Trish? Can you hear me?}} Dan, the newscaster's voice asked over the speaker.

Trish nodded, "Go ahead?"

{{What can you tell us about the alleged rumors of the X-Men appearing before the riots started? Is there some kind of conspiracy going on here, or did they actually start this riot and heroically swoop in to end it -- thereby torpedoing any chance of the Mutant Registration Act from being passed?}}

Trish appeared to swallow to keep her heart from leaping out of her throat, as her ex-boyfriend, the X-Men's Beast couldn't have been capable of such a thing, "I...honestly couldn't tell you at this point, Dan. All we know is that...if you pan over there..."

The camera man twisted his view westward as the silhouette of Apollyon's gigantic form was barely seen in the distance. An equally massive firebird sparred with the giant in the epic battle.

Trish continued, "...you can see the giant and the giant bird of fire apparently fighting. This appears to be the signature of the X-Man known as Phoenix. And with the erratic weather patterns the DC area is experiencing, one can assume X-Man Storm is in the area, as well."

{{Is there a reason why the Avengers weren't called in sooner?}}

Trish did the most un-newsworthy thing and shrugged, "...It's uncertain, but it looks like the X-Men were the only ones to deal with the riot. Both factions of the Avengers, I'm told, are involved in their own assignments. A giant wood statue in Los Angeles is being handled by the West Coast team, while the East Coast team has been ordered to safeguard New York in case terrorists see the instability here in Washington as an opportunity to attack."

{{And the other heroes?}}

The camera panned back to Trish, "The Fantastic Four has been granted to decline participation in the national effort to prevent other riots from starting. As it is known, both of the Richards children are mutants. Naturally, as family, they need to be protected. As for X-Corp, they are assisting the East Coast Avengers in securing New York, ensuring satellite riots do not break out simultaneously. The Champions and Force Works, in conjunction with other superhero teams, have been spread out across every major American city to assist law enforcement in keeping the peace. Excalibur and X-Force, in conjunction with the UN and SHIELD, are patrolling Europe and Asia, insuring stability in those areas, as well."

"Other than that," Trish sighed regretfully, "there is not much we know what is going on with this Apocalypse look-alike and the X-Men and what their battle has to do with the initiation of these riots between the Friends of Humanity and local mutants..."

She was the personification of beauty, grace, intelligence, and a world class upbringing. On top of that, she could very well be thought of as the perfect mutant, if there was ever such a thing. Nigh invulnerable to damage, superhuman strength, the power of flight, and telepathy were her combined puissance.

He was the manifestation of an ugly war, unceasing torment, a berserker rage, and the hidden secret of a shamed government program. While his talents allowed him to live many lives and come to be known as many things, he would have gave it all up if he could have just saved his love’s life in those precious moments…

They were almost exact opposites, even in their motives upon arrival in Washington, DC the afternoon before. He wanted to trace the seams of a forming conflict between the Friends of Humanity and mutants nationwide, as well as the X-Men’s role in the affairs, but he found her at the end of one of those seams. She wanted to ignite the conflict into an all out genetic war for reasons that conflicted with an X-Man’s very ideals.

And so, after a long night of chaos and strife, confusion and hatred, stirring emotion and overwhelming death, the two find themselves in a clash. To little surprise, it’s one that isn’t going well for the wild man of nearly over a century’s age. Not at all because of his seniority, but because of his physical condition after recent battles.

That, and he seems to be holding something back, as the young woman he fights is quick to point out…

“Why don’t you just DO IT?!” she screamed as she swooped right to left out of the way of his deadliest punches, all aimed for various pressure points in her solar plexus and neck. They wouldn’t be enough, however. Not for the young mutant’s cunning and speed… and they both knew that. “What are you afraid of?!”

Before her opponent could respond, she took flight into the air and sent a boot into his adamantium-laced chin. The stocky burn victim was driven back by the full force of her superior strength, sent recoiling into the ground and into a tumbling roll. When he came to a halt, he slowly and relentlessly began to lift himself up on his hands and knees.

The Wolverine, for neither the first nor the last time in his life, coughed up a disgusting, black and dark red lump of blood. M swallowed back a lump of her own as she watched him from the safety of ten feet above the ground. When the Canadian’s vomiting was said and done with, he looked up to her with his dark and stubborn, beady eyes.

“I ain’t afraid of nothin’, darlin’…” he growled lowly before shoving the ball of his lead foot into the asphalt and rising to his full height. He ran a forearm across his mouth, wiping off the remnants of his vomit before declaring, “Not no more, anyway.”

“Then why aren’t you giving it your all?” Monet scowled and demanded to know, gesturing to the mangled runt’s hands, or more in particularly the back of his hands. Logan hadn’t unsheathed his claws since he had awoken, and with all the anger and despair coursing through her, Ambassador St. Croix’s daughter just couldn’t understand why to save her very life.

And Apollyon wanted to keep it that way.

“Scott told us you – all of our enemies – would if you ever got the chance!” the Algerian woman said as she dived for Wolverine, sending a piston-like series of attacks – fist after fist – at her opponent. Logan tried his best to shove away, deflect, or block any of the punches from connecting, but it was only going so well.

“I’ve said it once before tonight an’ I’ll say it again…” he strained and groaned as he tried to master the full potential of his overworked and fatigued body. Fist after fist crashed into his arms and beat into his bones, the only thing keeping them and his body from becoming grounded beef being his adamantium-laced skeleton, as he struggled to emphasis the point he had been trying to make for so long. “That… ain’t… Cyke!”

As Wolverine worked his way through the barrage of M’s punches, he delivered an adamantium-laced fist into the young girl’s forehead. For the first time in their battle, she cried out in pain and stumbled backwards. Logan took his opening and put all of his strength into performing a spinning-heel-kick aimed for her jaw.

But Monet had been back in the fight just an instant faster than he had been able to deliver his attack. Her parallel hand shot out and grabbed onto his ankle, her titanium grip locking his kick in place just before it could strike her beautiful, bronze-colored face. Wolverine shot her a stunned look over his shoulder as he stood there before her, barely able to continue pivoting on his other leg for balance.

“No!” M cursed as she attempted to reach out across the battlefield with her latent telepathy, but something was blocking her from delving into her leader’s mind. It then dawned on her, or so she thought. “I can feel it! That bitch…” Monet cursed as she twisted Wolverine’s ankle and put the weight of her crushing strength on it.

Logan let out a howling cry, and he began staggering and shrinking down low on his balancing leg. M continued to say out in a shallow breath of a sort of hatred only rivaled by her impersonating counterpart in Generation X, “That traitor, Jean… She’s messing with our heads! Making us see what’s not really there!”

“You really think that, don’t ya?” Wolverine said with a growl through gritted teeth, the pain and damage bearing down on his ankle reeking havoc on his nearly exhausted healing factor. It was working over time to repair his mangled, blistered and burnt body, as well as the injuries he had sustained earlier in the fight with Magma and Apollyon. How his healing factor could take much more, Logan couldn’t begin to fathom.

But still he pushed on, his nostrils flaring as he crouched low on one leg as the other was held wrenched in Monet’s grasp. He stretched an arm out to his side and clenched his fist, a muscle twitching in his wrist as he did so that forced three, six inch long blades to shoot out from the back of his fist with a loud SNIKT!

M shot a look down to Wolverine’s fist and claws, her face suddenly grew ghostly pale. Logan gritted his teeth down even harder and his upper lip began to twitch. The flames still consuming the buildings around the two gleamed off the three-adamantium blades, and the Wolverine took a whiff of the morning’s air, and he knew what he had to do.

“Yeah… I can smell it in ya…” he said quietly and sympathetically. M still had firm hold on his ankle and Wolverine’s back was nearly touching the street as he was barely on his last leg, but still he vowed unto her, “But there’ll be no more o’ it tonight!”

A sickening crunch echoed throughout the battlefield and Monet St. Croix nearly fainted in shock as the leg gripped in her hand nearly turned into a limp noodle. Before she could even conceive of what had happened – that Logan had dislocated his own leg to get the better of her in their battle – a sharp pain unlike any other that she had ever felt shot through the side of the mid-thigh of her right leg.

“AAAHHH!!” she cried out in shock and released Logan’s ankle, letting it drop down lamely to his side as he lay there on the ground. The Wolverine normally took pleasure in the sudden and deafening pains of others. But not of this girl, and not on this day.

Monet instinctively tried to fall back and pull away her impaled leg from Logan’s claws, but another metallic SNIKT echoed throughout the area as he drove a second set into the front of the woman’s left thigh. Tears erupted from M’s eyes almost the very instant the metallic blades burst through her nigh-invulnerable hide.

With a thud, she dropped down backwards onto the street’s asphalt, blood gushing from her thighs. She desperately grabbed at her wounds, trying to put pressure on them and suppress the pain through her strength, but it was useless. Wolverine quickly unsheathed his claws, and though one of his legs was immobile, he managed to pull himself up on top of the former Generation X student.

He pressed his left forearm down against Monet’s neck as his small frame straddled her, and he peered down into the young woman’s eyes tortured eyes. With a grimace, he put all of his weight into the arm resting on her cervix as if to crush her windpipe.

M let out a whimper as her air supply was cut off and urgently removed her bloodied hands from her thighs and grab onto his torso as if to throw him aside, but before she could, Logan ceased the moment in her struggle. A straight, adamantium reinforced punch to the temple, and the junior X-Woman was out cold with only so much as a barely audible, gasping moan.

Logan sighed quietly to himself as he rolled off the unconscious Monet. He reached down to his torn and ripped, black sweat pants, feeling the pockets for that stogie and set of matches he had swiped earlier. Finding only the stogie, he grumbled and flicked a piece of a peeled off bit of his skin that was stuck to it.

“Ya free, Lorna? Popsicle?” Wolverine suddenly called out as he took the stogie between his teeth for good measure as he began straightening out his bum leg. He was near exhaustion, but he wasn’t one to allow himself to be kept out of a fight… well, not without a fight, at least.

Given a few moments, Polaris soared along side Iceman and his bridge of ice in a transparent green, magnetic bubble. The two touched down onto the street before Wolverine, side by side, and slowly approached him with a shared mixture of shocked and bewildered expressions on their faces.

“Heh, whoa… Logan…” Bobby’s eyes went wide as he tilted his head to the side and examined the mutilated Canadian’s sitting form. Finally, the frosty one shrugged and with an amazed sort of smirk said, “I guess I wouldn’t be far off by saying you look like you’ve been to Hell and back, eh?”

“Enh henh… Funny, Drake,” Logan said as he ran his bloodied hands down his leg to the joint he dislocated. His joints were harder to dislocate and pop back into place due to his body’s natural resistance to both, but he knew he could do it with enough precision and will. “Gimme an icy on my warm, will ya?” he asked, looking back up to his two summoned arrivals.

“Dude… that’s what got Lorna like in the condition she’s in in the first place!” Iceman said in mock protested as he thumbed towards Polaris’s belly. Lorna scoffed and crossed her arms as Bobby had a snicker fit while kneeling down to Logan’s side.

“I can tell by the smell of hormones she’s lettin’ off,” Wolverine commented with a snort as Iceman began delicately freezing the moisture on top of the wild man’s wounds. Logan shivered a bit, biting down onto his cigar before letting out a cool sigh as the pain in his injuries began to soothe. “Congrats, kid,” he then said to Lorna with a nod, his intentions of finding a light any time soon dying with the newfound knowledge.

“Thanks, and congratulations are in order for you on surviving a nuclear explosion,” Lorna replied playfully as Bobby rose up to his full height by her side. The green haired woman grimaced a bit in a sickening despair upon further inspection of Logan’s injuries. “Wish I could say it was good to see you, though…”

“I’ll be fine, darlin’,” Wolverine stated in a dismissive fashion. He then shot a look down the street where he saw Magma, Radius, and Jubilee confined in globs of ice while surrounded within magnetic bubbles. Logan then looked back to Lorna and Bobby and nodded up to them, “You two playin’ guard duty on the KOs, right?”

“Yeah,” Polaris said quietly as she nodded to him in confirmation. Bobby shot a concerned look back to their captives to insure they were still in place as Lorna continued to explain, “It’s safest for me and the babies right now, though I really wish I could hel – “

“Babies, eh?” Logan interrupted with an impressed and flattering smirk. He gave Lorna the look down, examining the slight bulge that was already beginning to form in her belly. A light, almost maniacal chuckle echoed in the back of his throat. “Ol’ Alex hit a double… guess I owe him two rounds instead o’ one if we get outta this mess.”

Polaris smiled gently to herself and stared at the asphalt just under her feet. She was feeling a bit guilty that such a conversation was transpiring amidst such chaos, but while the other X-Men were helping Cyclops and Phoenix fight Apollyon, there was little else they could do but talk and guard Apollyon’s band of X-Men. They had to be kept from causing anymore trouble for them and the District of Washington as the police and national guard went to work.

Iceman, on the other hand, had felt a slight drop in mood at the sudden mention of Havok’s name. He was the father of Polaris’s children, and yet he wanted nothing to do her. What did that mean for the future of their children? Would they grow up with an altogether absent father, or worse yet, a father they saw on occasion but never truly knew? Fathers weren’t all they were cracked up to be – Bobby knew that. But he also knew one other truth. That, despite that fact, they were supposed to be.

Wolverine didn’t need his hyper-acute senses to tell that the tension and awkward silence was beginning to grow among the three, so he was quick to get to the point. With the sickening pop of a joint in his leg followed a sharp, blunt pain. That was a good sign, as far as he was concerned, and he slowly began to move to his feet.

“I ain’t gonna be much help to Slim and Red right now, but I’m gonna give it my best,” Logan said as Bobby and Lorna quickly moved to his side, helping him up by the shoulders. The man nodded to them in thanks and hiked a thumb to the fallen woman not far behind him before he asked, “You two can cover M incase she comes to, right?”

“Of course,” Polaris said without protest and she reached out to the magnetic field around M, confining the woman’s presence with the use of her powers. Iceman cocked his head to the side and with a sigh confirmed their dedication to that very cause.

“Oh yeah,” he said with the sarcastic roll of his eyes as he began freezing the outer layer of water molecules around Monet’s form, encasing her in a batch of ice. “What us second stringer, founder of the X-Men types are for...”

Polaris shot Iceman a look, giving him a dull smirk at his unheeded sarcasm. She shook her head and took grip of the iron in M’s blood, causing the young X-Woman to levitate upwards and move across the street to her three other, captive and unconscious teammates. Lorna then lifted herself up magnetically and followed suit.

Iceman generated a sled of ice under his feet, ready to join Lorna, until Wolverine put a hand to his shoulder. Bobby turned his head to the man’s mangled face, curious as to what else he had to say, and Logan simply grinned knowingly. There was something else in the air when he caught scent of Lorna’s hormones, and it was a bit warming to know for even such a hardened warrior’s soul.

“Keep that wit up and she just might notice ya again, Drake,” Logan said as he patted the man’s frozen, chiseled back. Bobby was taken aback by Logan’s words, and the Wolverine shrugged his blistered and bruised brow up at him with a toothy grin. “Good luck,” he then said before turning towards the direction of the battle with Apollyon.

“Huh…” Bobby muttered to himself as he watched Logan go, and his mouth curled up to the side of his mouth as he found himself lost in a continuing state of contemplation at his increasingly confusing life. “Back at ya, Logan…” he finally said and then headed in the opposite direction as Logan to go meet up with Lorna.

A little over a year ago….
Disclosed Location.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” the young redheaded woman asked, concerned, as she sat on the corner of the desk. With her emerald green eyes, she stared into her mentor’s warmhearted blue eyes. Unlike most men his age, his blue eyes hadn’t grown pale and dark, but seemingly more lively and compassionate.

“Well, I’m not exactly a novice in voicing subjecting my opinions on others…” the elder man said with a stifled chuckle as he set a hand on the young woman’s knee. Her hand came down onto his, giving it a light squeeze as he continued. “Not even on such a wide scale,” he reassured her with a nod and gently patted her knee with his hand. He continued, “I’ve done this before. Why would now be any different?”

“I don’t know,” she confessed as she removed her hand from atop his. She averted her gaze from his wisdom-filled eyes, looking to the floor of the well-furnished, Victorian office as she went on to admit, “I guess I just have a bad feeling about all of this… Tensions just seem so high right now…”

“What better a time to speak out against the reasoning behind the existence of such tension?” he inquired as he released her knee and clasped his hands together, steepling the fingertips together as he looked up to her. The way he seemed to look at her – at everyone that she knew – it was as if he searching her very soul for any contempt she may hold for the decision he had made.

“Last night my husband had such a horrible nightmare…” she reasoned with a sigh, the despair she was trying to hide making its’ way out through the tone of her voice as she reflected on the night before. Just thinking about it again almost brought tears to her eyes. “It woke even me up, it was just so intense and vivid…” she choked.

The aging man before her leaned in closer to her as she spoke, steadying his elbows on his large, oak desk as he drew his steepled fingers to his lips. She had trailed off in thought, and he took the moment to consider her words before speaking.

“He’s a young man with a steady head and a heart full of love and hope to give in a world that opposes the very being of such young men,” the aging man said knowingly, taking a deep breath. He was hiding something from them, she could tell, but she had learned that sometimes prying wasn’t always appropriate with her mentor. He continued after another brief silence, saying to her, “I’m sure it’s only the beginning of many nightmares… It’s how he deals with them and acts on them that he’ll be judged upon.”

“I don’t want to lose him…” she suddenly said as she thought back on the nightmare her husband had had, the very content of it shaking. The young woman looked back to the aging man and reached out to him with her heart, pleading quietly to him, “I don’t want to lose you…”

He knew her concerns and fears were valid, but sadly enough he had also knew there was nothing he could say to her to calm her. It would be a hard road ahead of her and husband, and it was unfortunately one that he couldn’t take with them. He knew from all that he had seen in the past years that he couldn’t take it with them if his dream were to see its ultimate fruition.

And he knew that in a few days time, he would be dead…

“Come, child,” he finally said after their moment of silence, slowly beginning to wheel himself out from behind the desk. She gently wiped a tear away from her eye as he passed her, and she looked up and out the window that had been sitting behind him as they spoke. Just before wheeling himself out of the room completely, he then swore to her, “No one ever changed the world by just sitting around…”

“Rag dolls!” the immensely large Apollyon bellowed as he flung a backhand towards the trio of men and women about him, lashing out against those who opposed him with an invisible empathy-manipulating force. The bombardment of such vivid memories and intense emotions struck them all in different ways.

Such effect it had was clearly evident and effective…

“PAIGE!” one of Apollyon’s opponents shrieked in a living horror and he yanked at his head with such rage and unbearable fear. Cannonball’s blast-field reared and propelled him away from the gray monstrosity and he collided into a nearby, burning building’s concrete wall, sending bits and pieces of it falling down to the streets below.

A woman with strawberry blonde hair had collapsed to her hands and nears just before reaching Apollyon, trembling in remembrance of what had long transpired before with the love of her life. As tears streaked down her bruised and bloodied face, Dazzler quietly uttered the words, “Why, Longshot… why…”

“You’re an idiot, McCoy!” roared the furry blue primate of a man as his charge on Apollyon abruptly came to a stop, a deep growl emitting from the back of his throat with his words. Beast looked down his shaking, razor sharp claw tipped paws, a rage exploding inside of him at what he had forced himself to become. “An idiot…!”

“Rag dolls…” Apollyon said again as he watched the fickle transformation of his once-enduring enemies, shaking his head down to them. They tried to collect themselves from their stances, but such action had only led them to a further madness. He laughed in ridicule at their efforts before crying out, “Every last one of you!”

Gunshots rung out in the distance and Apollyon was thrown off of his balance, his maniacal laughter dying in the back of his throat. He could feel tiny, precise pains in his left eye as he noticed a bit of blood trickled down his cheek and his vision began to blur.

“Then why don’t you pick on someone your own size?!” Domino yelled up to the empathic bully. A deafening scowl grew across the son of Phoenix and Apocalypse as he shot his attention onto the Lady Luck. Beatrice took aim with her handgun and tried to fire another shot for his right eye, but found that she was finally out of bullets. Apollyon was on her in a moment and she cried mockingly, “No, really… I mean that!”

“Well, hey… if you die, then we’ll call it a deal!” he yelled back at her hatefully, his bloody eye glowing a dangerous violet. With the stomp of his massive foot, the street split down the center of the street and Domino was sent plummeting down into the sewers below, blocks and chunks of concrete following down after her.

“Dead yet?” he inquired as he looked down to the sewers below, only seeing a pile of torn asphalt where Beatrice should be. He shrugged, ambient molecules beginning to vibrate around him as he shrunk down to his natural size, that of a 6’3”, bulky gray young man. “Eh, we’ll call it square for now since you EASILY have to be on your way…”

From the shadows, the ragged and mutilated form of one of the worlds’ most dangerous and feral men silently emerged from behind Apollyon. He was one of the most egotistical sociopaths that the Wolverine had ever stalked, and what was worse was that he had good reason to be. But that would end at his hand if he had his say so.

And his say so he would have.

“ARGH!” Apollyon’s battle cry sounded for one of the first times that night as his natural sized frame was sent sprawling onto the street, nearly tumbling into the gap he had created that led to the sewers below. His head then arched back in a contorting pain and he tried so hard to reach out to his assailant – to manipulate whatever emotional scars they may bear – but it was like they were invisible to him.

Chunks of gray skin and an eerily thick batch of blood splattered in every direction, and the Wolverine just kept hacking away his adamantium claws at Apollyon’s hide. But suddenly, even the all-business warrior found himself in a moment of pause as violet energy cackled about the slaughter he had created.

“Aww shit…” Logan muttered to himself with a low growl as the energy came to laugh and leached itself onto him. Wolverine saw the burning Hell around him scurry about in his vision as he flung into the asphalt and pinned in place. He tried desperately to break the telekinetic grip bounding him in place, but he was just too weak from the day’s struggle…

Before Logan’s very eyes, the chunks of gray flesh and pools of blood that he had dug from Apollyon’s back began slithering back to their owner, collecting in their respective places on his very hide. It was then Apollyon rose back up to his feet, and the wounds on his back sealed together with an exploding, violet flash.

The next thing Wolverine saw was Apollyon’s face as he had turned around to face the Canadian, a shimmering broad sword composed of ambient molecules generating in his hand. A vengeful, hating sneer crossed Apollyon’s face in those last moments and with a single swipe Logan’s very insides spilled out to his sides, lying about on the street.

Wolverine trembled violently as his eyes clamped down shut, the morning’s cold air nipping at his very insides. His healing factor was just too overworked to begin sealing up the wounds – he knew that. Soon may very well bring his final moments, but Apollyon was intent on waiting it out as painfully as possible.

“You’re falling to pieces, old man!” Apollyon laughed maniacally as he rested his broad sword on his shoulders, and Logan gasped in a mix of pain and horror as suddenly his intestines began shifting around in his lower torso. Though fearing what he would see, he opened his eyes, and floating before him glowing in an aura of violet purple, were the very intestines he had felt shifting inside of him.

“Aren’t I just a little mother fucker?” Apollyon chuckled and cocked his head to the side, swinging his broad sword about carelessly. Wolverine couldn’t help but watch his intestines float about in the air, stretching out in bizarre and twisted fashions. The blood dripping from the intestines dripped on to Logan’s body, and Apollyon was about to pull out even more vital organs for Logan to see, before he sensed another presence nearby.

“Heh, get it, Scotty Wotty?” he said as he let the intestines fall limp over Wolverine’s body, releasing his telekinetic grip on them and the wild man as well. Apollyon cocked a brow curiously and turned around to face sergeant mother’s husband. Cyclops stood there, having rose from underneath a pile of rubble battered and bruised, with his visor gleaming in the morning’s dawn.

Apollyon made a gesture with his sword, trying to emphasize his sadistic point. “I fucked my own mom when I was impersonating you?” he stated bluntly, suddenly growing concerned as he realized his empathic abilities weren’t working on Cyclops either. He repeated to Scott as he continued to try to work his magic on him, “‘Aren’t I just a little mother fucker?’” he inquired, shaking and waving his hands about sarcastically. “She was all showing me her ‘oh!’ faces,” he said with a laugh, shrugging his shoulders up and mimicking the expression in his own wicked and mocking ways. “She was like ‘oh! oh! oh!’”

Cyclops was unmoved by the bastard’s words. He simply tilted his head to one sound, letting off a resounding crack, and did the same with in the other direction, warranting the same result. The estranged leader of the X-Men then wiped his forearm across his bloodied face and coughed up a bit of blood quietly.

Even though Apollyon and the Dawn had imprisoned him for so long, and even though he had his life mocked and shattered in his absence, he had still never lost his dignity. And he wouldn’t.

“Oh, you X-Folk are no fun…” Apollyon said with a tired and disregarding sigh. “Heh, ‘oh!’” he suddenly caught himself in his own joke, a sort of daring giggle rolling off his tongue. He rolled his dark violet eyes, and brought his broad sword up in a ready position, as he was about to do battle with Cyclops. “Just imagine all the gawky stares I got from having to be so uptight, and boring, and all-talk, no action.

“Well, now I’m plenty action,” he explained as he looked about Washington, DC – a city in siege at his hands. He couldn’t help but continue grinning as he witnessed the result of his actions. The tempo in his voice kicked up as he returned his sights onto Cyclops, and he continued to declare, “I’ve created my own Outer Heaven!”

Cyclops drew up his fists as if in a fighting stance as he and Apollyon began pacing each other. The latter’s broad sword began charging with ambient energy, glowing in his signature violet energy. Its tip remained pointed at the first X-Man as they paced about each other, both waiting for the right moment to strike in a one on one fight.

Scott wasn’t sure how long he would be protected by Apollyon’s empathic powers, but he did know he was protected thanks to his wife, wherever she was. Phoenix had gone down moments ago in the same explosive attack Apollyon had launched, but she had since made herself known. Thankfully, Apollyon couldn’t shut up…

“The mass hysteria… the genocide… brothers and sisters clawing each other to death for survival! Cats and dogs… living together…!” Apollyon said as he went down the list of apocalyptic attributes, a mix of a sneer and a grin as he stared through Cyclops’ visor into his eyes. “We even have the dead rising from the grave!” he said proudly as he cocked his head towards the fallen Wolverine and then up the street to Storm, who could be seen flying above Iceman and Polaris, who were guarding the fallen X-Men.

“All’s we need now is the sun to turn as black as sackcloth and for the moon to turn to blood!” Apollyon continued to preach on. Something inside of him spoke of him to unbalance his opponent’s nerves through speech if his powers were of no use, and he reveled in every moment of it. He then stood erect, falling out of his battle stance with broad sword in hand, as he gestured about them. “Welcome to Washington, District of the Apocalypse! District of the future. District of the strong,” he said with a laughter that echoed throughout the deserted city streets around them.

“Though, I’m still not sure if that last one means my Four Horsemen will be apart of it or not, but eh… rules are rules,” Apollyon said with a delicate shrug, staring down the street where his X-Men were imprisoned. Out of the corner of his eye he saw it coming, but wasn’t able to move fast enough. It was a fist, colliding into his cheek and throwing him off balance for just a moment’s time.

“You have way too much of your father’s flare for apocalyptic jibber-jabber, and way too much of your mother’s confidence,” Cyclops said as Apollyon spud around to face him, and the X-Man delivered another blow to his face. Scott was out for the gray mutant’s blood anyway he could get it, where it be optic blasts or bear-fisted boxing.

“Just DIE already!” Apollyon demanded, getting straight to the point as he brought his broad sword down just above Cyclops’ head. Scott’s hand quickly shot for his visor, unleashing a continuous optic blast for the blade as it dropped. His bruised eyes were flaring up with pain as Apollyon pressed the sword down onto the optic blast, his massive strength enough to push through even his opponent’s force beams, but Cyclops persisted.

Apollyon gritted his teeth as he pushed through the optic blasts, spreading the flow of force energy down the middle as he drew closer and closer to Scott’s face. He knew he was only inches away and Cyclops was already beginning to strain against the force, so he pressed on, taking pleasure in every moment he grew closer until…

An explosion of fire lit a pile of rubble and shredded cars behind the two opponents. Apollyon’s concentration snapped as he felt a backlash of telepathic energy strike his mind and Cyclops capitalized on the moment to dive out of the path of Apollyon’s dropping broad sword.

From beneath the rubble and turned over vehicles ascended the fiery avatar of the Phoenix, Jean Grey-Summers in its center with her legs pressed together and her arms outstretched as to command her flaming talons of telekinetic energy.

Apollyon muttered a curse to himself and tossed aside his broad sword, feeding off the immediate populace’s feedback of emotion and ambient molecules to increase to the giant he once was only moments ago. His mother was back in the game, and though he had easily disposed of most of the X-Men, Apollyon knew he would need all of his strength and concentration to bring her down for good.

“Up for another dancing marathon, mum?” he mused as he grew well over four stories tall and in proportion, his eyes cackling with dark purple and violet energy as he faced off against the Phoenix. He cried out to her before he moved in for an attack, “Have at it!”

With the piercing battle cry of a legendary bird, the Phoenix came about face in the sky and dove right for Apollyon’s massive form. Both of Jean’s scorching telekinetic talons came across Apollyon’s chest over and over again, raking and digging into him much like the barely living Wolverine had done before he fell from battle.

Apollyon took the blows with good measure, stumbling back over the streets and nearly colliding into a few buildings on his way. Cyclops scurried about underneath his feet, running for Logan’s fallen form. While the rest of the X-Men had scattered in their own fits of overbearing emotion, Wolverine was still lying there helpless. Scott had no love loss for the man, but he respected him and knew it was his responsibility to protect every last man standing.

When Scott came upon Logan, he knelt down quickly and shielded the man with his body as the clash between Phoenix and Apollyon continued on. Chunks of the surrounding building began to fall as the two powerhouses rocked into them, Apollyon swatting and blasting away at Jean, and the Phoenix maneuvering and slashing at Apollyon’s giant form. Deafening loud, bellowing cries from Apollyon and the Phoenix echoed throughout the District of Columbia in those final moments…

“How’s it lookin’, Slim..?” Logan uttered as Scott covered his body from a bombardment of falling chunks of concrete. He gritted in pain as some stray pieces struck his back, while at the same time trying to ignore the fact that he was laying on top of his longtime teammates’ intestines and vital organs.

“Everyone’s about dead, dying, or going insane…” Cyclops said as he lifted his head up and shot a look to Wolverine. He paused for a moment as he swallowed back the lump in his throat and cocked his head to the side. “Good, I’d say,” he finally decided, though a bit skeptical. “What about you, Logan?”

“Ungh…” Wolverine groaned as he lulled his head back against the street’s asphalt, breathing out a sigh. It was as if his healing factor had never been working slower then it was that night, and it was the worst possible time for him to be out of such a fight.

Logan opened up his beady eyes about as wide as he could muster as he watched Jean recoil from one of Apollyon’s attacks, her fiery Phoenix avatar mimicking the effect around her. As she poised his talons for another assault, Wolverine whispered to her… “Jeany… give it yer all… with all yer strength… an’ passion…”

And the Phoenix found herself in a moment of pause. Jean shot a look down through her flaming moniker down at the streets to Cyclops and Wolverine, staring at them with her emerald greens as her hyper-acute senses barely picked up on Logan’s words.

When using her powers to their fullest extent in battle, Jean could see, hear, and sense everything for dozens of miles around. Logan’s words and her ability to hear them gave her in an idea, and as Apollyon rocked towards her, driving his massive gray fists down at her telekinetic empowered form.

The Phoenix threw herself backward, barely avoiding the coming blow from her son. Her flaming wings had been keeping her aloft the entire time, and as she continued moving backwards away from the oncoming barrage of attacks from Apollyon, she decisively came to a sudden halt. Jean flung back her neck and arched her arms up, her flaming Phoenix moniker mimicking the movement in its bird like ways, and she let out a piercing, high pitched cry that held similar effects to a sonic boom.

Apollyon’s four-story high frame staggered as the pitch struck his eardrums, busting them instantly. However, instead of blood spilling out from his ears, explosions of cackling and erratic, violet energy was the result. The son of Phoenix and Apocalypse hung his head low and grabbed onto his head, groaning and cursing to himself before he shot his eyes back up to his mother, and his pool of violets grew wide in shock.

Jean lunged at Apollyon, digging her fiery claws into his massive face. Upon contact, a surge of every individual and every emotion they were feeling at that moment whilst in the District of Columbia was funneled into Apollyon’s very soul. He fell paralyzed in those moments, only being able to twitch and shake, as even just a very fraction of the misery and pain he had caused that night became so vividly apparent to him.

Somewhere on the lower, east side of the city’s housing district, one young boy hid beneath his bed as his father and mother were beaten again and again by a number of invaders. As his mother took a strike to the face, she hit the carpeted floor on her back and landed just before her son’s visage, and one of the invaders fell upon her, tearing at her blouse wildly as she screamed in humiliation…

And just down the street on Pennsylvania Avenue, an elder man – apparently cursed with the mutation of looking like a three-eyed wiener dog – desperately struggled and screamed for help as three men held his chest over an open flame. The local riot-police and National Guard were too busy to heed his cries, however, and so he burned alive…

Far from the cries of a son watching his family be torn to pieces, a mother being ravaged before her very offspring, and a man being burned alive, was the trauma of an Emergency Room’s interim nurse. All around her, bodies were piling up with more injuries then she could bark a text book medical answer at.

Not only that, but the blood was drenching her hands and the crippled and terrified voices crying out to her from all directions for help. She was so confused and lost, and entrenched in her own guilt for being unable to help them all at once and not knowing who to give aid to first, that she quietly found herself a corner and sat. From there, the guilt worsened as she came to the conclusion that she could do nothing…

But what of the middle-aged police officer – a man who had sworn to serve and protect the city and its’ very people that rioted around him – and the sudden urge he felt only to protect his own life at the expense of all others? Rocked by fear and with an assault shotgun in his hand, he stood with his back to a wall, thinking only of seeing the next few moments, and blowing the heads of anyone who came near him…

Even those few lives that Apollyon was shattering, which were multiplied by the many lives that they were touching and being touched by, was just too much for him to bear. The guilt and self-loathing he was being forced to feel – that he never took a second thought of when he knew the chaos and strife he had caused made him feel more alive and powerful than ever – was just too much for him to bear on any level.

Something was happening to him, and he knew exactly what it was.

“T-There’s no other explanation!” Apollyon stuttered as he felt his body begin to virtually tear itself apart, the empathic and ambient energy molecules within him being channeled out of his very pores. He struggled against the Phoenix’s attack, but it was a feeble struggle that prove fruitless in the end. He cried, “Only the strong survive!”

“That’s right,” Jean said diligently as she continued to claw into her son’s very psyche, funneling all of the immediate populace’s heart wrenching and soul-entrenched emotions into Apollyon’s body. As the forming cracks in his body began releasing the violet energy he was composed of, she knew he was soon done with and vowed unto him, “But only if they have each other!”

Apollyon let out a horrible shriek as his very essence began to break down over the streets of the nation’s capital, he and his mother became encompassed with a clashing aura of red and violet. For as much as the Phoenix wanted to save him – to show him the world through her eyes and have him grow up to be a man like Scott and Nathan had become – she had knew now once and for all that he had inherited so much evil from his father and his time in Limbo.

“This doesn’t mean I never loved you…” the Phoenix cried as she reached out into the shriveling form of Apollyon, fighting through the tears welling up in her eyes as she placed a delicate, though lengthy kiss on his gray forehead.

Apollyon trembled in a shaken-bout of approaching demise, spying up to his mother with his violet eyes. He watched as her tears streaked down her cheeks and fell past her lips onto his forehead, and he closed his eyes, knowing that his final moment had come. He was empty inside, feeling neither the energy that empowered him nor the very blood in his veins.

As the shreds of his Egyptian garb began peeling away with the chunks of his empty shell of a body, Apollyon heaved his final breath and confessed in his own sense of perverted and twisted sincerity, “I loved you too, Mom… I really did…”

It was then, as the morning’s sunrise shed its’ full and beautifully blended lights of reds, yellows, and oranges across the District of Columbia, a large explosion of violet and blue overtook the skies and rained down glimmering specs of the being once known as Apollyon…

Charles Xavier cleared his throat as the television crew signaled him to begin speaking. As the light from the cameras reflected slightly off of his bald cranium. He had a warm look of silent determination in his middle aged face.

"Hello, I am Professor Charles Xavier. I have long been a mutant civil rights activist, as some of you in the political and neo-biological circuits well know," Charles began.

"It has been my understanding that the recent ceding of Genosha to be under the power of Erik Lensherr, a mutant known as Magneto, has sparked controversy among many Americans and other countries belonging to the United Nations.

"But I think this is a time that should be dedicated to building bridges instead of burning them. What do I mean by that? I realize it is easier to hate something instead of accept it, but I think if we all work hard enough, together...humans and mutants can live peacefully.

"I'm...not sure why mutants walk the earth. To be honest, it hasn't been proven whether or not mutants are the next stage of human evolution or just some kind of temporary fluctuation of the human genome. There is an increase in pollution and ozone depletion, and our DNA is reacting to its environment just as it always has.

"Regardless, one thing remains true: mutants are human...and they deserve respect. They deserve equality and acceptance. Just think of the perfect society...as mutants and humans use their combined gifts to work for a better future.

"It only takes a select few to ruin the strive for peace for the others. Someone on both sides with an agenda. I hope to see that there will be little of that in the years to come...these troublesome years to come.

"I've always said any dream worth living is a dream worth fighting for...and that's what's important. It should be important. If it goes unchecked, a war will break out...with disastrous results..."

All across the District of Columbia in the opening hours of dawn, many were waking up to the climax of the mass race riot that had devastated the nation’s capital and finding themselves helpless at the sights of death and destruction around them. The world would be a bewildering spectacle in their wake…

Monet St. Croix cried out underneath her breath as she tried to rise, but the sharp pain in both of her thighs was too much for even her. Before she could even conceive of gathering the strength to try and take flight, the loud shuffling of a small figure from underneath a collection of scrap metal had caught her attention.

Coming to her feet, the groggy and emotionally exhausted Jubilation Lee turned her sights to M. The young Asian woman’s black and gold uniform was torn and ripped in various places and her short, black hair was a mangled mess. The young Algerian woman could only imagine what she herself looked like, but neither cared at that moment.

They both locked eyes and breathed in a beat of silence, the burning flames around them cackling and swishing in the morning’s breeze. Even if M could run to FX’s emerging form, FX had suddenly closed the space between them in a sobbing blur. Jubilee collapsed into Monet’s outstretched arms and the two let the tears flow.

Not far from the two young lovers, another exchange was taking place. However, the exchange was not that of an embrace, but of an expulsion. And many knew that it was a very rare thing for Cain Marko – the unstoppable Juggernaut – to be expulsed by any other force but that of his own will.

And it was twice that another had moved him against his very will.

Jared Corbo would become a legend to his Canadian countrymen after the day was done. His protective force field, which had been mutated by events of late and gave him a few useful tricks to play with, exploded out from his body and forced the crushing Juggernaut aside. Radius wasn’t one to play the bottom bitch for long.

Rising with a stumble, the Alpha Flight reserve turned X-Man had found himself in a similar condition to his teammates – a battered and bruised mess. Even though his protective force field had kept him in one piece, the day’s battle combined with the force of Marko’s impressive mass blind sliding him had taxed his powers almost as much as Talyn, the Son of Set and an alternate world Phoenix, had done.

He searched the streets, seeing the X-Men of the past three geneses gathered about. Radius had known full well that he was responsible for the chaos that had ensued the evening before and continued into the morning, but the feelings of overbearing grief and regret that he had thought he would be feeling hadn’t yet struck.

Maybe he was in denial or maybe he was just in shock, but he felt nothing as he surveyed the area. Nothing until he saw Allison Crestmere, possibly one of the strongest and most stubborn women he had ever met, sitting at a street curb not far away. She rocked herself back and forth, clutching her knees close to her bosom.

It was just so heart breaking for Jared to see that she had cracked…

He had wanted so much to be able to go to her and comfort her, and share in their grief. But he knew that she would have to be insane to ever want to accept his touch… to allow him to share in her weakest of moments. So he simply stood there, a single tear shedding from his eye, as he continued to watch Magma rock back and forth in distraught.

The flames would slowly begin to die down around the four rookie members of Apollyon’s prime team of new age X-Men in those moments of personal tragedy. Bobby Drake, reunited with his one-time tutor in weather manipulation Ororo Munroe, were quick at work as soon as they realized the threat to the nation’s capital was dispatched.

Bobby moved to Ororo’s side and bumped the side of his butt into hers flirtatiously; a brief explosion of ice spiking into the air off of her behind at the touch of his, mostly due to the degree of moisture in the air that the two had generated together. Easing the flames that were consuming the city of Washington, DC was never an easier task...

In the past, they had had their moments together as friends, and they were both so touched to have each other back. Their similar powers even made each other kindred spirits, in a sense. But despite that truth, Ororo had to reach deep down inside of scarred soul and search for it within her to flash him a tired smirk at his antics.

Somewhere inside of him, Bobby understood why it was so hard for her to do so and wouldn’t dare press the fact. He winked at her in return and put his arm around her shoulder comfortingly, allowing her to fall in close to him. His green dress shirt with the sleeves casually rolled up, along with his black slacks and dress boots, were a contrast to the multi-shades of brown tattered rags she had worn for so long as the Dawn’s captive.

“You’re back from the dead for only one night and are already trying to steal my date?” Lorna Dane’s voice barked in mock jealously. Iceman shot his one time girlfriend a wicked grin and hunched his brows at her, while Storm continued to smile delicately at the green haired woman who moved to join the two in their embrace.

The man known only as Logan watched the reunion, a contorted and mangled grin forming across his burned and blistered face. For the first time in so long, it had seemed like his family within the X-Men were back together. Of course, the circumstances in which they had gathered again could hardly be anymore devastating… but if it was one thing that Wolverine had learned his life of war and tragedy it was that something as equally good always came out of something so bad.

As he began to reflect back on the day’s losses, most in particularly the death of his son at the hands of a young woman who he considered akin to a daughter, the whiff of a familiar scent struck his nostrils with the morning’s wind.

*BAMF!*

Wolverine coughed up a storm as the smoke and brimstone clouded his head and the weight of a small demon had come upon his shoulders. Startled, though having expected his arrival, Logan nearly lost his balance at the sudden disproportion of weight, but quickly caught himself.

“And here, mein freund, I thought I had it bad with the women these days…” Kurt Wagner teased with a wicked grin, his spade tipped tail whipping up and down. Wolverine unsheathed a middle claw on his left hand and raised it to Nightcrawler’s eye-level with a crooked sneer, and the two men fell bemused with laughter.

Just a short distance from Wolverine and Nightcrawler, the trio of X-Men who were responsible for the day’s primary success had gathered around each other.

Upon seeing the condition of his one time flame, Sam Guthrie took off his brown excavation jacket and put it over Alison Blaire’s shoulders. The former pop star hung her head low in a state of emotional fatigue and exasperation as Sam gripped her shoulders and began rubbing the tension from them.

Her bruised nose covered with sticky and dried blood, Alison sniffled and continued to stare at the ground. She wanted so much to be the assertive and optimistic one in such a time of chaos; to be strong and willful like she had tried so hard to once again be. But Logan had seen it in her eyes when she had returned to the mansion so long ago…

The diva in her was truly long gone.

Cannonball kissed the Dazzler on the back of the head as he held onto her by her shoulders, and she leaned her back into his and closed her eyes tiredly. She wanted so much to just let it out and cry. Cry for all the lives lost and for the terror she had experience in such a short time, but it just wasn’t in her at that moment. And it would be all the more reason for her to cry that much harder when the day was over…

Sam himself had seen much in his time as a New Mutant, member of X-Force, and now as a member of the X-Men. It left him feeling so shallow and cold to think that he had become so hardened and desensitized to it all that comforting Alison was suddenly a difficult thing for him to do.

Maybe he was more disconnected from her then he thought he was. Or maybe… just maybe… he wasn’t the man he once was… and that had scared Sam Guthrie more than anything he had seen that day. It had scared him more than anything he thought would result in the impending battles and divisions.

Hank McCoy, the mutant genius known to the Avengers and the X-Men as the Beast, sighed diligently as his two teammates from the Alpha faction of the dream let the night’s end settle in on them. The battle with Apollyon and his emotionally manipulated team of X-Men had been a long and strenuous one, and he knew that for better or worse, no one family member of the X-Men would be left the same.

As the Beast watched on as Cannonball and Dazzler held each other, he contemplated the repercussions of the days’ events. He, for what had been possibly the millionth time in the last few months, contemplated what role he would play in the world’s mutant affairs, and just what he would need to do to take action on his part…

The woman known only by the names Beatrice and Domino found herself moving to Beast’s side. Though the smell of his singed and burnt fur (from the battle with Magma) wasn’t particularly appealing to her, she found it hard to connect with many of her other “teammates” in the day’s battle. Many of them – most notably Cannonball – were already inclined or preoccupied with others they were close to.

Beatrice, however, hadn’t typically run with the initial X-Men crowd. Cable and the Exiles were more of her bunch, but she had been asked by Sam, Hank, and Alison to back them up in their little investigation, and she did that well. Even if she knew it was the right thing to do, stopping Apocalypse’s son from launching mass race riots and hysteria was just a detour from her trip home.

Now, though… what was she to do now? The day was done. The battle was won. Her quips and remarks had been made. But still, the Harlequin faced woman was no closer to finding purpose in her existence, especially without Cable there with her.

What was it all for though, she thought to herself? She had fought to protect the rift between humans and mutants from growing even larger, and from further violence taking grip of the nation and possibly even the world if Apollyon had his way. But she was still no closer to why she had fought for it and what the meaning behind it all was.

So Domino stood there beside Beast, reflecting on her life and her role among mutant affairs. Her eyes would occasionally drift to his cyan, cat-like pupils, but it was almost like he was a world away. She then knew more than ever that regardless of Cable being there or not that the answers to her questions would be hers to find and no one else’s…

Not far from the listless form of Beatrice, the first two of Professor Charles Xavier’s students and longtime veterans of his band of original X-Men found each other. It was amidst the receding chaos, and what was seen as a search for an impending remedy to the heartache and loss everyone in the nation’s capital must have been feeling, that the two’s very souls would tremble at the site of each other.

Much like Ororo Munroe, Scott Summers was dressed in prisoner’s rags, dirtied from head to toe from months of captivity and a day of ongoing battle the moment he was liberated. Tears began welling in Jean Grey-Summers’s eyes. Not because her husband was in a state of frailty, but because he was in a state of life.

"Scott...” Jean began to say as she reached out to teach her estranged husband’s scraggly beard. While she had spent the last moments of her battle with Apollyon fighting for the sake of being able to share a moment with the true love of her life, she had now found that his very presence there before her had almost seemed too good to be true. “How do I even really know that it's you?" she asked with a belated sigh.

The morning’s glare ran off of Scott’s dirtied, ruby visor as he peered down at his wife. So long had he wanted to see her again, even despite the differences they had parted on. He grasped her outstretched hand and took it close to his unshaven face, and silently vowing to never let anything come between them again, he said to her only one thing…

"Just shut up and kiss me, Red."

And Jean Grey-Summers – the Phoenix – cried as she did just that. The two embraced in the streets of the nation’s capital as the remnants of their greatest adversary’s offspring rained down around them in sparkling particles of energy. The bright pinks and purples and blues were like a subsequent virtue shimmering in the morning’s sunrise…

When Cyclops and Phoenix broke away, they held each other close and looked to the sky’s abroad for any recognition of the hope they shared for a better tomorrow.

Apocalypse's legacy, the legacy of a man who opposed the peaceful existence of all despite their differences, was through with once and for all.

It was now their turn to build the future...

After his moment of deep contemplation had passed, Professor Charles Xavier lifted his head back up to face the camera. For a moment, his pensive and gentle blue eyes had seemingly pleaded to the viewers at home for a solution to the disenchantment he had found in his very own dream. But in the depths of his soul, a surrogate spark had suddenly ignited, and a confident smile had begun to grow on his face.

“It has been said time and time again that the meek inherent the Earth,” Charles Xavier started to say, smug in the belief of an ideology he had fought so long and hard for. He clasped his hands together and drew his head forward, then spoke to the world in the utmost poetic optimism. “So to all those who seek peace between all men and women – regardless of whatever labels science or society has given them – the future is ours.”

Professor Xavier leaned back into his wheelchair and drew his clasped hands down into his lap, continuing to stare into the camera lens before him with a smile laced with hope. It would be a heart that had lit thousands of hearts nationwide and convinced countless men and women of a better tomorrow. And that conviction would be what so many would hold onto and for so long without losing their faith in their fellow man.

Now this was how it was supposed to be.

NEXT ISSUE: It's the breather issue of the year with the X-MEN PRIME ANNUAL 2004! X-Men come and go (but mostly come), the team's mission and layout are restructured, and there's a couple surprises delivered by some old favorites! Oh the drama of Prime continues next month!!!