I will not die in the night but in the light WHO: The X-Men WHERE: Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters WHEN: Friday Afternoon WHAT: A Sentinel attack on the mansion has the X-Men scrambling. WARNINGS: Non-explicit death of characters, NPC of main characters, destruction of property. STATUS: Complete.
No one would call the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters ‘quiet’. Not by a long shot. There were over a hundred students at any given time, usually teenagers growing into their powers, things were never quiet.
There were, however, periods of tranquility. Moments of peace among the learning, while the children were in classes or training. When for a brief moment the adults could stop and breath for a half hour to relax. Emma wasn’t frequently at the school, currently she divided her time between her business, her New York apartment and showing face at the school to prove to the others that she was not spiraling out of emotional control, but simply rebuilding a facet of herself that had shattered.
Charles was, as ever, a great assistance in clearing her conscience. Her actions previous to Wanda’s rewrite of the world were affecting her more than she would’ve believed. But Emma had finally taken to spending more time at the mansion, and that afternoon was one of those such days.
The library just happened to be one of Emma’s favourite places within the school, it was rarely busy, but it generally had enough minds loitering that Emma didn’t feel entirely lost to her own mind. Something she noticed she was fighting more and more these days. Charles cited a need for socialisation, which Emma had scoffed at but noted the wisdom behind. Taking a chair to the back of the library to settle in, Emma tried to lose herself in a book, succeeding for the most part in growing engrossed, letting most of the afternoon pass her by.
There was a slight darkness settling into the room when Emma first started to take note of what was going on, it was far too early for dusk, and the sky was forecast to be clear and bright all day; chilly, but bright. Emma had long learned not to dispute the weather anymore. Which meant the dark was not natural, least of all when it was only on the far corner of the room either.
“X-Men! Scramble. Children to the Danger Room!”
It was Charles, broadcasting to the whole school, and Emma didn’t pause to consider why as she was out of her chair towards the main of the library, “Come on, you heard.” There was no way for them not to hear. There were complaints and mutters as they started to herd out of the room, until a tremor ran through the building, a giant metal fist through the wall and then the screaming started. “Go!”
The kids were a bit more prompt about getting out and down the stairs, especially as the roof of the building was suddenly lifted right off and tossed carelessly aside, bricks and debris falling everywhere. Marge, a water mimic mutant and the latest instructor at the school, grabbed to Emma’s forearm outside the hall as they both stared up in abject horror. “Is that… that’s a…”
“A Sentinel, yes.” The chilling fact that this was more than just a concept, more than just diagrams on paper, a scheme from a mad-man written down and later destroyed because of it’s implications, that this was steel and electrics and right there, it was enough to terrify even Emma. “Marge, get the children down into the basement, hurry.” There had to be some kind of order to the madness that was currently befalling them, even as the skies started to grey unnaturally, clouds all swirling together as lightening started to collect.
Storm had taken to the sky then, the accompanying red beam that struck the robots head also informed her where Scott was. There were still children descending the stairs though, spilling from rooms along the halls, a sea of worried young mutants slowly descend into the lower area of the school, where they will hopefully be safe. She can already see the puffs of violent smoke to indicate Kurt taking the slower, younger children down to safety in small groups, but she knows he’ll tire before getting even half of a class there.
“Mindee, help to calm what you can,” addressing one of the quintuplets, Emma nodded the Cuckoo down the stairs, noticing the glow of her eyes as she followed directions, elder students taking on the directing and firm roles while the teachers attempted to gain the robots attention.
“Mutant lifeforms detected.”
The noise from the Sentinel echoed through the open cavern of the school, blue lights flashing in its eyes as it stood, mechanical head turning. The banister on the upper level gave out with a crack, two students falling over the edge with a scream before Armor was able to catch them, halting their fall from the third floor.
“Move quickly and carefully for God sake.” She wasn’t sure if she’d be able to take the kids doing something stupid. The top floor was mostly cleared, the halls and stairs filled on the lower floors, just as the giant hand of the Sentinel lowered. “Clear the floor!” It reached right the way down to the lowest level, like a twisted coin drop claw machine.
It was obvious that the children didn’t see it quick enough, some scattering to the sides, but the floor too filled with bodies and pushing to really clear anywhere, “Targets acquired.” The hand closed around almost six students, Emma’s mind trying to work quick enough to figure something out.
“Clear the bottom floor!” She could see Santos, Paras and Celeste urging the students into the dining hall, kitchen and surrounding classrooms on the lower level, “Bobby, freeze the arm,” Drake was quick in icing up and jumping into battle mode and Emma tried to find Megan, “Pixie, can you get them out?” It was times like these that Emma truly wished she’d been able to develop her limited and weak telekinesis, if only to be more helpful against things she couldn’t mind-wham or punch.
Pixie managed to get in close enough to grab two students, using her powers to teleport them out and to the floor safely, the other four trapped as the Sentinels hand raised past the roof. “Angel, it has four students.” She saw the wings in the air, circling around the machine as it raised it’s other hand, a blast of red beam firing wildly in attempt to hit Angel. There was more screaming inside as the students weren’t sure what to do.
“Miss Frost, where do we go?” The wreck of the entrance way now made it illogical to try and traipse over it, likely to cause more damage than not. But everything on the upper levels was potentially dangerous too.
“Into groups and get into the classrooms, keep yourselves low. Try to have at least three skilled offensive mutants in each room. Go, hurry.” She’d just finished talking as a beam cut through the side of the building, destroying the far wall and sending shockwaves everywhere, a boot following it down as the Sentinel presumably tried to crush whoever it could under its foot.
There was a high pitched scream in the air as Emma caught sight of straw-yellow hair and a sunflower dress before she heard the smack. It took her less time to process that Laurie had just been dropped from the grasp of the Sentinel as she looked up to see Esme clinging on to the fingers. “Kurt! Where are you?”
Lightning struck the Sentinels head, Cyclops’ beams hitting the neck join and Angel was taking back to the air to try and reach Esme just as the Sentinel swung its fist, the blond telepath flying from her grip and Emma had to turn away, diamonding over to avoid sensing anything from that at all. “Hide now, all of you.”
The halls cleared quickly, students diving into rooms and gripping to each other as Emma descended the stairs. She almost stopped in the doorway of the dining hall, Celeste and Mindee huddled against each other, sobbing, but her organic form felt no sympathy or pity and she forged on, walking through the hole in the building to Cyclops’ side.
“The students?”
“Hiding as best they can, who does it have?” She wasn’t sure if she could stand to watch this thing crush more students, Wallflower and Esme were enough.
“Dryad and Network.” Scott watched as Iceman, Pixie and Angel all tried to get in close enough to grab the students or break the arm, Iceman sealing ice around the wrist joint of the robot. “Where’s Nightcrawler?”
“My best guess is he wore himself out trying to get the students to safety,” which was noble as ever, but could’ve helped them right now. “Where’s Hank?” She knew that Beast was on the grounds, she wasn’t sure if he was attending the injured downstairs or if he’d somehow been injured himself. “We need to destroy this thing.” Before it killed more students.
“Whatever it’s made of, we can’t get through it, my optic blasts can barely dent this thing.” She really would rather that Wolverine were at the school right then, at the very least to just jump on the mechanical menace and shred it as he usually did.
“Oh my god, look out!” Pixie screeched as the Sentinel raised it’s half closed fist to punch Angel out of the sky, sending the airborne mutant tumbling into the school with a crash and rocking the two students it held back and forth in it’s fist.
“Kindly remove yourselves from the area Ms Gwynn, Mr Drake,” Hank’s voice carried over the comm systems, just as Emma pointed out the modified quinjet to Scott.
“Hank, be careful, it’s got Dryad and Network.” Only it didn’t, as Emma dropped her diamond form to reach other to the students, to let them know that something was about the happen and to hold on, she couldn’t pick out either of their minds.
“They’re gone, Scott.” Placing a hand on his shoulder, Emma just sighed, pulling back her anger and frustration, “Do your worst Henry,” Bobby and Megan were both out of the way, as McCoy gained speed and closed the distance, Emma expected him to fire the limited weapons the quinjet held, instead he aimed the ship straight at the Sentinel and flew into it at breakneck speed.
“Jesus,” the explosion was resounding, rocking the entire grounds as Emma flinched down for cover, Scott following to brace over her and offer added protection, arms covering Emma’s head. “What the hell…”
The Sentinel lost the entire middle section of it’s torso, the damage causing it to fall to the ground, head taking out a further section of the school, the students screaming wildly as part of the building caught fire.
“We’ll discuss Henry’s theatrics later, Iceman, Pixie, find the ship, check on Beast. Storm, if you could take care of the fires? Scott go find Warren, make sure he’s okay, the others and I will get the kids down to the basement now, before another one of those shows up.” They could call for help later, contact the Avengers, or SHIELD, whoever. But right now they had to get their house in order.
“Students, downstairs to the basement, through the garage, now. If you require help, call for help, a teacher will be with you shortly.” It was going to be chaos, utter chaos, until they got things in order, tallied the casualties, addressed the deaths. Then they could find out where that damn thing came from. And destroy it all over again.