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At about the same time that Harry and company were dealing with the Hand in Vietnam some action was occurring back at the mansion. After Juggernaut had smashed through the first set of wards he had put on it, Harry had made a mistake with the minor wards he set up around the X-Men's mansion afterward. All of them were intent based wards, which was fine enough but he hadn't connected two of the three wards to the house itself but to the desire to harm (an important distinction) the people within the mansion. If there was no one home, the other two wards wouldn't do anything.
The one ward he had connected to the house was a very low powered Notice-Me-Not, which could be overcome by anyone with enough mental toughness. It was a simple mistake and with everything that Harry was up to he could be excused for overlooking it, after all he was only human. Yet it was about to bite them on the ass in a… very minor way really, when they stopped to think about it. To the perpetrators, it would seem a much more substantial victory. The events set in motion however would run the gamut from minor to very major indeed.
"What do you mean there's no one in there?" Fatale asked X-23.
The younger girl shook her head, having just come back from another survey of the mansion. "No one home, all gone."
"We didn't see them leave, so do they have a teleporter or something? There's no way Nightcrawler could've taken them all off one a time could he?" Fatale frowned for a moment. "Not if they were going any distance anyway."
"Just stating what I know," X-23 said shrugging.
Fatale thought for a moment then nodded. "Let's go, I've had enough of this assignment, its high time we ditched this burg."
Her young friend nodded eagerly, and the two of them quickly got into their combat costumes and then made their way from the property they lived in as part of their cover and onto the mansion's grounds. For a moment they felt like they should turn around, like there was nothing interesting here, but their mental defenses easily overcame the weakening Notice-Me-Not ward and they swiftly ran forward.
X-23 led the way, moving swiftly through the forest, keeping clear of any security cameras set into the grounds, moving ever forward. The two of them swiftly made their way through the forest and they soon reached the mansion climbing up some hanging vine on the wall until they were resting on the windowsill of the second floor's atrium/sitting room. Once there X-23 used her claws to cut a small circle in the window around one of Fatale's hands' which was stuck against the glass using a glove covered with suction cups. Then Fatale lifted the small glass circle away, allowing the younger girl to reach in and lift the window latch.
Fatale concentrated for a second, activating one of her mutant powers, bending light around her to become invisible. She could also use it to actually disguise herself as someone else, but it had its limitations. She couldn't imitate someone else unless she had observed them from all angles up close, and she hadn't dared do that with any of the X-men. She might have gotten away with it if she'd been able to come up with an identity that let her into the high school, but as it was, invisibility would have to do. She couldn't do anything for X-23 though, and of course bending light didn't fully erase her presence, so things like motion, heat or even pressure plates on the floor still detected her presence.
She led the way inside, pulling down some infrared goggles, looking down at her feet along the floor of the atrium and then out into the hallway, then up at head height and around. Stepping back by the window she murmured quietly, "No infrared sensors or anything else sneaky I can see on this level. There is a camera at the far end and another one by the door to the elevator."
She picked to knives out of a bandolier she wore around one thigh then moved out into the hallway, throwing each knife in turn at one of the cameras. Her aim was very accurate, and both cameras were pierced right through their lenses. "Let's move on."
The two interlopers moved deeper into the mansion stopping at the top of the stairs, where Fatale took out another camera before motioning X-23 to join her. The two of them waited for a second tensely wondering if despite X-23's nose and other senses there was still someone in the mansion, but after a moment the younger girl nodded. "No one moving around, we're clear."
With Fatale able to bend the light around her she continued to lead the way, taking up cameras and then motioning X-23 two follow her. Soon, following a plan of the mansion Mystique had passed on after one of her first missions in the area, they were at the elevator that would carry them down a hundred feet down into the basement.
As soon as the door closed behind them however they ran into problems and a metallic voice intoned. "Access restricted, to access, please present eye for retinal scan." The top of the panel of buttons along one side of the door lifted upwards, revealing a small retina scanner.
This was a security feature Charles had installed when he first planned the mansion to keep out unwanted guests as well as the kids. If Logan or Charles were in residence it was normally turned off, but both of them made a point of turning it back on if they left the mansion for any reason. Cyclops could override it these days, since they had both decided to add him to the list of users, but the Danger Room wasn't a toy, and they wanted to make certain that none of the youngsters could use it as such. After all, they were teenagers, allowing them access to a system that could literally produce anything they wanted in hard light or robotic form (including, just as an example, robotic versions of famous actors/actresses) was a recipe for disaster.
"Shiiit….." Fatale muttered. "Mystique's notes didn't say anything about this. I'll try to break the system, you keep watch, warn me if anything, and I mean anything changes out there."
X-23 nodded, and Fatale opened a small pouch at her waist, pulling out some wires and a tiny electronic screen, before ripping off the front of the electrical panel.
Eventually Fatale was able to get around it, and the elevator began to move down, but it had taken over twenty minutes, and she shook her head. "We spent too long on that, and I think it sent some kind of warning to the security system when I was trying to break it. We better be prepared for the security downstairs to be ready for us. This just became a smash and grab, so get ready."
X-23 grinned, popping her claws out again and readying herself. "About time!"
The mansion itself didn't have anything in the way of active defenses at this point, but the basement was an entirely different matter. And Fatale had been correct, the time they had spent trying to bypass the security on the elevator had indeed tripped the alarm, and the central security system knew that they were coming, and it was up and ready.
Several guns popped out of apertures all along the basement corridor, both the walls and the ceiling, and even one double barreled machine gun that popped out of the floor hallway down the corridor from the elevator. All of them trained on the entrance to the elevator, several cameras came online pointing in that direction, ready and waiting. Even more security opened up along the other basement corridors, the one leading to the hanger bay, the Danger Room and generator.
The moment the doors opened X-23 charged out, ducking and weaving as the bullets began to fly, jumping up and slashing the closest gun station to pieces with her claws. While she was busy having fun Fatale simply walked down the up hallway, cloaked once again in her own personal invisibility. Her ability to bend light around her like this enabled her to bypass most of the security, but halfway down she stepped on the first of many pressure sensors on the floor. The double barreled machine gun turned toward her swiftly and Fatale teleported away just in time, the gun firing an instant after she teleported back into the elevator.
Fatale scowled, and began to throw knives with incredible accurately at the most distant gun stations, allowing X-23 to go to town on the nearest ones. Even so, the younger girl took several hits before they cleared that first corridor out, her blood splattering the walls and floor, but her healing factor healing her even before the blood landed.
Eventually they finished trashing every defensive installation in the first corridor then made their way down the first side one. That proved to lead to some kind of large empty room, and after looking at one another quizzically Fatale shrugged. "Move on to the next I guess." They did so, moving up two flights of steps then out into what looked like some kind of control room. "Okay, so obviously the plans Mystique got weren't complete," the blue haired African woman muttered. "But this definitely doesn't look anything like what we were told Cerebro looks like, right?"
X-23 shrugged. "Nope. Big blank room is interesting though."
"Not what we're here for 23," Fatale growled. "Let's just keep searching, and hope that the x-men don't come back.".
They thankfully hit the jackpot with their next corridor, costing Fatale the last of her throwing knives and X-23 quite a bit of pain from being shot four more times while clearing out the automated guns.
"This is the target, right?" X-23 asked.
"Yep," Fatale answered. The room had large screen on three walls, an equally large computer occupying the fourth, with another screen above it. Wires along the floor led from the screens and the computer to a metal chair set in the floor on a small dais. Behind the chair was a stand holding a metal helmet, which had wires leading down it into the floor. "This is it alright."
Fatale immediately moved to the computer bringing up the schematics of it quickly, and downloading it into a memory drive, along with the all the programs it held in its hard drive. While she was doing this X-23 had pulled out a camera and was taking pictures of the setup, including the helmet that Charles used to enhance the search parameters via telepathy. She paused, poking it with one claw. "We take this?"
Fatale paused from copying files and looked at the device. "Why not, this has turned into a smash and grab anyway, they'll sure as hell know someone was here." She was almost tempted to leave a few surprises behind them, but not only would such probably fail, after all Logan was no slouch at this kind of thing, it would also take more time. There was no telling if the X-Men had some sort of alarm that would sound off on their phones or something like that if their security was breached. She certainly would in their place.
They didn't actually since much of the security hadn't been upgraded since cellphones had become so common, and only Charles, Logan and Ororo had such on their phones. Logan had lost his during the attack by the Hand, Ororo had never replaced her own after it had been destroyed during her fight with Candra, and Charles had left his in his room when he left the hotel.
Ten minutes later Fatale finished copying files then frowned thoughtfully for a moment before deciding to smash everything in this room. "Smash it all, grab up that helmet and let's get going."
OOOOOOO
Nick Fury had decided to go to the X-Men's mansion himself to talk to this Harry Potter punk, hoping that the personal approach would work better than a formal message. This way Nick could hopefully get Wolverine to vouch for him. Of course Wolverine would probably not recognize him at first either, but he had enough dirt on Logan to make the man believe he was who he said he was.
Well, that is if he remembers anything of his past, we haven't been able to get anyone close to him since that ordeal with Weapon X. Either way, I really needed to get out of the fucking office. Nick thought to himself, driving his car off the highway and toward the small suburban community where Xavier's mansion was.
The politics of Nick's position were getting very, very bad. Not only were SHIELD's committee members always sticking their noses in, they felt he should be doing more to catch Magneto and other mutants. They didn't seem to understand that the mutants were not a major threat to American security yet. In the future maybe, but now he was happy with the work his field agents were doing, compiling a few names and faces to the Brotherhood of Mutants without devoting more time to them.
But that 'American security' part was another problem. SHIELD was supposed to be an international organization, but at the moment it was decidedly American. Every single one of its backers was American. Only Canada, Japan, Greece and Italy had actually agreed to let SHIELD act in cases of international dangers in their countries. Even the United Kingdom hadn't gotten on board entirely, and that was bad, considering it was one of America's strongest allies.
America could foot the bill easily enough for his group, but if they were seen solely as an American agency, then that defeated the true purpose that SHIELD was created to meet. He'd been pushing for more international recognition and backing since the very beginning, but all the council members were fighting him on it for some reason, unwilling to open SHIELD's information network to foreign parties. Nick refused to let them turn SHIELD into their own personal fiefdom, but fighting them was getting very, very irritating.
On top of that was the problem with Thunderbolt Ross and finally getting the old horse out of the saddle. That thought caused Nick to snort as he turned into the street see the mansion in the distance. After all he was actually quite a bit older than Thunderbolt.
But Nick was also much more flexible, and the Senate oversight committee for military affairs was fighting him tooth and nail about court martialing Ross despite the fact that he had 'Senate approval' that stated SHIELD was the agency assigned to anything that dealt with the Big Guy, and the fact his actions had led directly to a city center being trashed on the order of millions of dollars in damages, a hundred deaths and counting as well as another big green monster being created! But what Ross did have was a lot of friends and support on the oversight committee, and Nick had spent practically an entire week trying to deal with that issue and the issue with his own committee members, and had been forced to delegate more and more of the real work of his position to his aids.
He had at least been able to talk the Army's brass into removing Thunderbolt from command of his unit, which had too closely resembled his own personal army, and break said army up, sending the individuals out into different units. A few of those men worried Nick, but he had them marked down for observation, so he might for once be able to keep another group of fires from starting. A man could dream couldn't he? That had destroyed Thunderbolt's power structure and might keep him from becoming the threat that Nick could all too easily see him become in the future.
So Fury had desperately needed to get out of the office, and this is as good an excuse as any. His phone rang, and he honestly thought for a moment about not answering it, but sighed and put it on speaker phone. "Yes?"
"Sir, we picked up something on our surveillance of the mansion about two hours ago. The automated drones passed it on, but it still took that long to be noticed."
Nick nodded, the surveillance drones weren't allowed to be used on American soil, but outside of tying down someone with mental defenses like Natasha (and not like Clint, alas) they were the only ways they could keep tabs on Xavier's mansion these days. And even that was decidedly a catch as catch can thing. "What did you see?"
"Two people, profiles unknown, moving into the mansion from behind. We haven't seen any sign of a forced break in but…"
"Understood." Nick began to feel his adrenaline thumping for the first time in far too long. "I'll handle it."
"Sir, regulations state…"
"Lad, I wrote those regulations, and I am fully cognizant I am about to do something that breaks several of them, but I'm the man on the spot right now, and those same regulations state the man on the spot has final say. So you just tell a team to get on a helicopter and start up my way, but tell them to stay clear unless I tell them to come in."
Understood sir," the voice on the phone replied, sounding rather huffy and Nick made a note to make rotate that communications operator out into the field again. The boy needed a bit of real world experience to offset that by the book stuff.
Nick was almost tempted to simply gun his SUV's engine and blast through the mansion's gate, but decided that was both unnecessary and foolish. So he just drove up, hopped out and hooked up a device, one remarkably similar to the one Fatale had used in fact, to the gate's controller. The gate opened obligingly within four minutes and he got back into his car. SHIELD had a vague map of the mansion, and Nick knew that the main entrance opened into a foyer unfortunately free of cover, so he braked in front of the garage entrance, where he once more got out and overrode the security on its doors.
A single tap of a button made the back of the SUV pop open, bringing with it a bit of the trunk's floor. He reached in, pulling out a large handgun, which looked vaguely like a modified desert eagle, but not quite. They were a SHIELD special, commissioned before Stark went round the twist, and were loaded with a mix of rounds, ranging from explosive to stun. They were damn expensive, so only a few agents had them yet, but they were also the best gun a man could hold in one hand.
His other hand grabbed up a large serrated knife, and so armed Nick made his way through the garage and into the mansion proper with all the skill of a combat veteran.
Fatale and X-23 had just finished their jobs and were making their way out of the mansion in order to let Fatale more easily teleport them away. The place she had in mind was a city in Greenland, so any help she could have, such as not needing to port through the walls of a mansions or the ground around it, would make it that much easier.
She had thought they were in the clear so it came as a surprise when X-23 held up a hand as soon as the elevator doors opened, sniffing the air. "Someone here, not X-man, new smell."
Almost as soon as she said that Nick shouted, "Freeze, Federal agent," and then opened fire, his bullet setting set to stun. Fatale yelped and ported the two of them out into the hallway, then they both dove aside, leaving the helmet behind for now as they ducked and dodged the incoming fire.
Even so X-23 was hit twice, but the stun rounds, large heavy rubber bullets, only stung a bit. She snarled, popping her claws and jumping forward towards the shooter. "RARGH!"
"Oh now that brings back memories," Nick quipped, ducking underneath the charging young woman's charge, she was fast, but she fought like a berserker, which meant he had an edge there. He swiftly changed from the stun bullets to regulars, and shot her point blank when she tried to turn back toward him.
His grin disappeared however when a knife whizzed through the air where his head had just been. "Sorry Baldy, but she's with me, no shooting the teammate." Fatale riposted, then teleported right in front of the man who had so abruptly attacked them.
Her knife sought his throat, but Fury had jumped to the side through the doorway into the dining room the moment Fatale disappeared, and she teleported again to dodge two more bullets heading her way. "That's Mr. Baldy to you brat!"
A growl warned Nick that the other one was up and moving, and he backed away from the wall nearest the place he had downed her moments before just in time. X-23 clawed through the wall, tossing chunks of it his way, and he grunted as his shoulder was smashed by one such chunk. The Kevlar in his coat protected him from most of the impact, but it was still jarring and it distracted him just long enough for Fatale to disappear under her cloak.
Nick cursed then smashed a small bowl of sugar out onto the ground diving forward to duck under another slash from X-23. His knife flashed out, catching the girl in her side and ripping her side open, but as he had feared the wound was healed even before his lunge under her outstretched arm finished.
He heard the crunch of sugar from his side and whirled kicking out and catching the invisible Fatale in the stomach launching her backward to clutch her stomach, but this opened him up for X-23 to close, claws slashing again. He raised his knife in a block and watched in shock as the claws slashed through it, slicing open his Kevlar vest, leaving three long slashes across his chest.
Fury jumped away, raising his gun firing point blank before ducking away, raising his coat up to protect his head. This time the bullet wasn't normal or stun, but an explosive round, and when it struck X-23 in her stomach, it went off like five pounds of cordite.
"ARGH!" X-23 howled, the skin of that side of her chest blasted and burnt, some of it just gone entirely, revealing her innards and the adamantium coated bones protecting them.
Fatale gaped wondering what would happen if one of those rounds hit her. She swiftly threw her last remaining knives at Fury, catching him in his shoulder, the knife able to barely pierce the Kevlar there. The one aimed at his groin and the other at his face however occupied his attention long enough for her to reach over and grab her partner by her shoulder. "Let's go X!"
With that the two first teleported back out to the hallway, then as Nick moved after them, his gun still set on explosive rounds, Fatale reached down with her free hand, scooped up the helmet and then with a grimace of concentration, popped away.
Nick growled, leaning against the doorway between the hall and the dining area. "Well fuck." He looked around him then at the closed door. For a moment he thought about blasting his way inside, but if he did that he could kiss any chance of allying freely with the X-men and this Harry Potter person out of the water. Then he looked down at the remains of his knife, which had been made of titanium, but which the younger girl had sliced right through with her claws. And she was already healing before the other girl grabbed her.
He winced, feeling the gashes in his chest, as well as his shoulder, which while not serious was still debilitating then he pulled out his phone. Surprisingly it had survived, and he flipped it open. "Good job spotting them, there was an attempted break in, but no one's home. I'll wait for them here, but get Clint and that Alvers boy over here. I might need some more character references."
With that done and not waiting to hear the response, Nick put the phone away and began to perform some emergency first aid. He sat down wearily at the sofa in the living room, chuckling a little now at how his day out of the office had turned into more fun than he'd had in months.
OOOOOOO
While Jean and Harry were out on their date, Ororo spent time with Kitty going all around the city and watching the Festival of Lights. It was a truly magnificent sight, though dealing with the young girl's concerns about what she had been forced to do yesterday against the ninjas had been somewhat problematic. Still, Ororo would not have wished it any other way.
Kitty was a truly kind soul, and she didn't like using violence even against people who were trying to kill her. Even though her paralysis ward hadn't actually hurt the ninjas other than simply paralyzing them, sticking them in place, the news that this had eventually caused whatever spell was inside them to kill them (or whatever had really happened, even Harry didn't really have much of an idea, he hadn't studied them after all) shocked Kitty to the core and made her feel very guilty.
Indeed most of the kids were dealing with guilt about what had happened yesterday, with the stark exception of Scott and Jean. But while the other teens were seeking other people to talk to or places to seek advice from (Kurt had disappeared that morning in search of a church, and didn't come back until late that night) the young Kitty Pryde came to Ororo to talk to about it.
Ororo pointed out logically that Kitty couldn't have known what would happen when she had paralyzed the ninja. That Kitty had done them no real harm beyond doing so and in fact had put them down far more gently than Jean and Ororo had been doing at the time. And then when the girl responded with the fact that it was their being forced to remain in one place that had caused whatever spell was on them to start (or stop) working Ororo responded that it was because they were part of this Hand cult, not because of Kitty.
Eventually she got through to Kitty and she calmed down. The two of them spent the rest of that evening talking and having fun together until the young girl was dead on her feet, and once Ororo took her back to their set of bungalows she fell asleep before even pulling up the sheets.
Later that night Ororo was sitting out on the veranda of the bungalow she shared with Harry, not a stitch of cloth on her person as she watched the waves come in and out along the beach. This was the first night since they had slept together that first time that Ororo wasn't sleeping next to Harry, and it bothered her. Oh, she wasn't bothered about the fact that he was out with Jean that actually made her happy for both of them, after all she loved them both, not equally, but to see the two of them take such joy in one another made her happy too.
No, what Ororo was worried about wasn't anything like that; she was worried about the fact that so far in their relationship Harry had been the one putting forth the most effort. Other than being there and helping Harry through his grief over what happened to the wizards at Hogwarts, and being used as a sounding board Ororo hadn't really put in anywhere near as much effort into the relationship as Harry had.
I hope he didn't take my teasing about the translation spell wrong she thought to herself. It's just one of those things that bother me.I put in a lot of time to get as good with languages as I am, and suddenly realizing that some magic user could use a shortcut like that to bypass years of work irritates me. Harry didn't seem like he cared one way or the other, but maybe I should figure out somehow what he wanted to use his forfeit for.
Ororo thought for a moment about her man, and her own feelings for him. She had known almost from the moment they got together that this relationship was one that could last if they wanted it to. And her feelings for Harry had only grown stronger as she had seen more and more aspects of his personality, and vice versa. He was kind, friendly and generous to the point of self-destruction, in turns gregarious and insular, both of which called to her own admittedly odd nature.
She frowned a little looking over at the packet that Harry had handed Jean. She hadn't taken it with them obviously, and had left it out here when they arrived after checking in. Ororo had looked through it again smiling faintly at how good an offer it was until she got to the part about the stocks. She had known about the health care benefits, as well as the base salary and Harry had mentioned giving her some stock to give her a say in the company but 49%? If Emma could see that she would have blown a gasket Ororo thought, amused. I know he's not much of a businessman, but that's just too much.
She smiled now. That is one aspect of our relationship I will have to step my game up in, stopping him for making foolish mistakes like that out of the goodness of his heart. I realize that he doesn't trust nearly as quickly as it may at first appear, but still he can't just give away gifts like that if he intends to keep hold of the reins of his corporation. I suppose for the engineering, division, it would be alright, but not outside of it.
"I just wish there was more I could do," she muttered aloud, sighing faintly. At the moment most of the things we're doing are magical based and I'm no help there. It's a little frustrating frankly, and we have to take more of the burden off him. I can see it in Harry sometimes that it's getting to him slowly, the fact that at the moment he is utterly indispensable to our future plans. I'm perfectly happy with that, but he isn't and it's getting to him. He wants to leave a lasting mark on this world, something I wholeheartedly approve of both in the specific and in the concept, but to do that the edifice must be able to keep going without him there to power it.
She shook those thoughts off, resolving to talk to Jean about that later. Possibly between the two of them they could take more of the burden off Harry's shoulders. With that thought she sighed and turned in, resolving to get some sleep. After all, there was no telling about when her two loves would return.
OOOOOOO
Jean's reaction to the sudden flood of altered memories in her head was both immediate and sudden. She first grinned slowly and leaned in kissing Harry on the lips. Then when she pulled back Jean pinched him hard on the cheek scowling angrily. "You idiotic… man you, gah! That's what you were keeping a secret?! I could've been in space for over a month now and you didn't tell me! With that she leaned in and kissed him hard on the lips again, then moved back quickly summoning up her clothing again, completely unconsciously changing the molecules of her dress into the unstable molecules of her new suit, a sight that had Harry's eyebrows shooting up in surprise.
It was a show of telekinetic ability that was almost astonishing to him, despite his own ability with magic. The fact she was doing it unconsciously was even more amazing, and Harry made a mental note to start her on learning how to use transfiguration (or whatever it was she just did, that too would take some study) in combat.
Almost as soon as she stood up however she began to feel a little woozy, and began to gasp, "Wh-what?"
"Oh shit," Harry muttered and hit her with another spell. "It's a sort of anti-altitude spell, it helps makes the air you're breathing match the normal air rather than the thin hair up here."
"Makesss sense I suppose," she slurred a bit, shaking her head as the spell went to work. "I, I should've figured that there was something going on allowing us to breathe up here so easily. How does is work, and what happened did the first one fail or something? I don't remember you hitting me with a spell before we got here."
"Ah for that you have Hedwig to thank," Harry said chuckling a little. He motioned over to where they had begun this part of the date and made Jean looked down while his other hand made the bed disappear behind them. "And that hurt by the way," Harry said rubbing one hand over his cheek.
Jean laughed. "You deserve it, keeping that a secret from me for so long even though you knew about my dream to go into space. That was a little cruel you know."
"I didn't mean it that way," Harry said mildly putting his arms around her, his head over her shoulder and motioning again for her to look down into the snow. "See there, it's called a stabilization ward. It stabilizes distances, so you don't feel the effect of going up into the higher altitude."
He reached down and picked it up, and Jean noticed that it was about as wide as his palm and covered with very tiny script. "These are better than the spells because the spell won't last for very long, and they have to be place or height specific, never figured out why. These you can use at any height but they are a one off. There's no place in the array for it to take in power. Sort of a security concept I guess, though I could've gotten around it if I really wanted to. This though," he waved his hand at the landscape around them, "was a spur of the moment idea and I didn't want to use something experimental."
Jean nodded. "Ahh I see, and now, I think we have some place to go yes?"
"Go, go where" Harry asked jokingly, looking around him. "I think this is a fantastic view why should we go anywhere?"
Jean reached over and grabbed his ear twisting it a little. "Harry Potter," she said in a very calm, conversational tone. "I love you, and I truly enjoy your sense of humor most of the time, but going into space has been my dream since I was about four years old and heard this story of a boy and his robot that could transform into a spaceship, sharing facts about space. So if we do not start off right now, I'm going to have to hurt you."
"Your wish is my command, your royal Redness," Harry laughed faintly, "though I'll warn you that the disorientation that you felt from teleporting from New York to Vietnam will be quite a bit less than this one."
"Don't care," Jean replied chirpily. "Let's go."
Harry laughed again, squeezing his arms around her and bringing her into a kiss. She kissed him back, though didn't close her eyes like he had hoped she would and a moment later felt the vertigo as they teleported from the top of Mount Everest up to High Note which was still in orbit over New York.
Behind them on the mountains they just left a group of Nepalese mountaineers looking at one another. "The noise and the moans have stopped," said one to another. "Daylight seems to have banished them."
"I know, but what could have caused it? The voice, it sounded like a woman."
"Like a woman getting the fucking of her life you mean," one said laughing a little and spitting to the side. Up here his spit froze almost before it reached the ground and he chuckled. "I have no idea what could have caused it, but the lights in the sky will certainly make for an interesting story back down below won't they?"
They all laughed, and continued their trek, while around them the sun began to break through the clouds.
OOOOOOO
Jean groaned, her hands on her knees and she bent over trying desperately to keep her gorge from rising. "You, ugh," she gasped "were not kidding. Ooof, that was horrible. That was horrible to the Nth degree."
Harry gently began to make circular motions on her back with both hands trying to calm her body down a little. "There, there, it'll pass quickly I hope. And then I can show you around High Note, and you can tell me what you think."
Jean nodded looking up at him and said, "I'm sorry you know, I shouldn't've pinched you like that but like I said being in space has been my dream, even when my more powerful emotions were blocked I was able to keep that dream. Knowing that it was so close and that you were keeping it from me as a joke was well… it wasn't very nice."
"I know Jean," Harry replied smiling faintly, leaning forward over her to kiss the back of her neck whispering against her skin. "If I had realized that it had been a dream of yours for so long I would never have kept it a secret even if I wanted to spring it on you as I did." He shrugged. "I'll admit I sometimes am not so good at that kind of thing. But just because we are in a relationship and love one another doesn't mean we won't do stupid things that irritate each other."
"Well don't worry about that Potter, if you ever get too irritating you have two girls now who will smack you back into line no worries." She leaned up slightly sighing faintly. "And you have precisely an hour to stop doing that."
"I can see you're feeling better," Harry replied dryly taking his hands away from where they had gone around her, gently making circles on Jean's stomach as he talked. He stood up, letting her do the same, and held out a hand to her. "Shall we go?"
Having a pretty good idea of what would interest her Harry took Jean on a very brief tour of the asteroid. First he covered the area where he was putting in the laboratories, where he was setting up one laboratory for when Reed was introduced to High Note, sometime in the future but not a set date as yet, the farming areas, the small forest, where Melody was sleeping at the moment and then straight to what he knew would really interest her, the observation area.
Jean laughed a little looking around. "I can see Ororo's been here, her sense of interior design is everywhere. Though the view in here," she murmured looking away out into space, her eyes drinking it in, "that is magnificent." She moved forward pressing her face against the glass like a puppy looking out a window. Then she looked over her shoulder her smile almost positively wicked. "When we do go all the way all for the first time, this is where we're going to do it."
"Really," Harry laughed coming up behind her and pressing her flush against the glass, his hands pinning Jean's against the glass on either side of her head as he began to nibble at her neck. "I was thinking more along the lines of Olympus Mons myself."
"That'll do Harry, that'll do," Jean murmured pressing back up against him, for a moment, but her attention was firmly on the view in front of her. "So, how do we get out there?"
Harry's eyebrows rose. "Are you sure that your powers will be able to handle that?"
"Don't know, but if my powers failed," she smiled, leaning up to kiss him tenderly on the cheek. "You'll be there to protect me won't you?" Her lips lingered briefly on the check she had pinched down on Mount Everest then leaned back looking at him expectantly.
He laughed, moving aside. "Manipulative little minx," he said slapping her rear as she moved past him on their way out of the observation deck. She jumped a little but laughed and the two walked swiftly to the hangar area which Harry hadn't changed much as yet.
Harry quickly used a few spells on himself, an air renewal spell, another spell to slow down his breathing, a heating and a shield spell then stood waiting next to Jean as she brought her own powers up around her. The aura of flame covered her in a thin veneer of flame from head to toe, capturing a bit of the air around her.
With that done she tentatively reached out a telepathic tendril to Harry, who felt it hitting the exterior of his mental invisibility cloak and then he opened up a small pathway under his invisibility cloak allowing her access to his mind again. "Scientifically speaking," he sent as soon as the connection was made, "that shouldn't really do anything to help you breathe in space you know?"
"I believe that the Eternal Phoenix would laugh at the very idea that science as we understand the term could have any bearing on its powers or even its avatars." Jean laughed.
Harry chuckled, and hit the button that decompressed the hangar Bay. Moments later the hangar bay doors opened out to space, and Jean laughed as her aura did indeed protect her. Putting it in words would be incredibly difficult, but Jean thought that maybe her flame was simply changing something in space into air for her, or maybe calling upon the Phoenix flame did something to her body making her not need to breathe? In any event she wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. "Hey Harry?" She said looking over her shoulder again.
"Yes?"
She reached over quickly touching his shoulder gently, "You're it." With that she blasted off as fast as she could go, straight through the bay doors and out into the wilds of space. Harry gaped at her for a moment, wondering where this rather coquettish playfulness was coming from. After a moment he simply chuckled and chased after her enjoying it anyway.
He raced off after Jean, though his magic couldn't quite propel him as fast as Jean was moving until Harry figured out a way to sort of create dozens of Bombarda spells behind him to thrust him forward. Even so he barely kept up with her because Jean allowed it, until they entered a small field of debris from several satellites and bits and pieces of other detritus. There the tag game began to be much more about maneuverability than pure straight ahead speed.
Harry quickly closed the distance, tagging her leg and then racing backwards as fast as his magic could push him, ducking underneath a broken down bit of flotsam, then dodging around it as she flamed straight around the other end.
Jean slapped his shoulder and raced away again, zooming now away from the earth at speeds that their bodies should never have been able to endure, one protected by his magic, the other by her own powers and the shard of the Eternal Phoenix in her. The game of tag continued for two hours or so, but eventually Harry was forced to call a halt to proceedings. "Enough, enough, I give," he laughed, grabbing Jean's hand as she circled around him again laughing in delight. "Let's head back, I'll show you a few more things that then we should probably head back down to join Ororo and the others."
Jean frowned a little, then realized how far out from Earth they'd come. They were literally over the moon right now, and she gasped in astonishment. "Did we really cover that much distance?"
"Yep," Harry shrugged. "It didn't take us that long to get out here really."
Jean hummed thoughtfully to herself then reached forward to take Harry's other hand with a smile. Harry smiled back leaning into kiss her and suddenly with a pop they were both back in High Note. Still smiling Harry moved away and lead Jean around again much slower this time, and then stopped in the room he had devoted to making the Orihalcum.
She took one look around and asked Harry "What the hell? Is this Fiendfyre of yours that dangerous that you need all these wards? There must be dozens here." While she was no expert, the sheer number of arrays in the room was startling. There was nowhere near the amount that Harry was putting in the Room of Requirement, but the fact that all of these were geared to stopping one spell was startling as hell.
"Yeah I do," Harry muttered. "Remember what I said, Fiendfyre wants to get out of control and burn things. But it supplies the right mix of heat and magic, its better than even Blackfyre. I tried to make the magical portion of the metal with Blackfyre at first because that's a little easier to control if you're a Black by blood which I technically am, but I couldn't figure out a way to recreate it with runes, so I would have to stay here and use it personally."
"Not a chance in hell Harry," she murmured, looking around and thinking. "You've got too many other demands on your time to let Ororo and I put up with you disappearing up here for large lengths of time. Is there any reason you couldn't enlarge the entire unit?"
"You mean other than there not being enough space? I don't want the runes of this room to be anywhere close to the runes of anywhere else, there's such a thing as spillover, and the other wards aren't compatible with these, that's why I didn't hit this room with a space enlarging charm or runic array. Hell, technically some of these runes shouldn't work together, but I was able to make them work here, I don't want to press my luck."
"I mean maybe enlarging the room physically. There was a lot of junk out there, add it in, physically enlarge area that way, you can create more of this metal in one go. We'll toe the stuff over, you start transfiguring into rock, or," Her smile suddenly widened. "We can go out to a NEA, a near Earth asteroid. There are upwards of 4,000 of them ranging across the size spectrum. The Atiras, or Apohele asteroids classification are the closest, heck that's probably where Magneto found this asteroid."
Harry blinked. "You'll have to tell me more about them, but for now, let's do this."
With that they zoomed out into space, both of them now moving far faster than they had before, yet even so it took them longer than they had spent playing tag to find some of the NEA asteroids. Once Jean found a small asteroid she didn't think was among the named asteroids to add to High Note, Harry hit it with several disillusion spells and the two towed it back to High Note. With Jean holding it in place Harry merged the smaller asteroid to High Note's side right over the room which he had set up to create Orihalcum. It wasn't as easy as sticking the smaller unnamed asteroid against High Note, he had to go slow so that the outer wards and the Fidelius would cover it.
This took him another solid hour, and he smiled as he finished. "That's it for now, I'll come up and enlarge the interior setup after we're finished with Hogwarts, it'll keep for now. Let's head down to the others, I bet they're worried about us." Jean nodded, reaching forward to take his hand, and the two went in to have lunch with Melody before heading down to Vietnam.
OOOOOOO
"…Cold Steel, so good you can bet your life on it!" On the TV room that dominated an entire wall of the sitting room a cold steel commercial was blazing until Cordelia grabbed up the flicker and muted it. She looked over at her sister where she was calmly going through notes, at a small table set up in a corner of the room and shook her head. "How the hell have you stayed so calm through all this, Emma? You even demanded Cold Steel change its advertising to take advantage of the attack on us for god's sake! It's barely been twenty-four hours, and I'm still getting the chills sometimes."
"A Frost getting the chills. Really, how droll," said Emma, looking over at her and cocking an eyebrow. "I can be calm dear sister because it wasn't the first time I've been attacked like that. Experience breeds familiarity and also a certain amount of a blasé attitude. I hope you won't have to get used to it, but as long as I'm the head of Frost Corps, I'll have an enemies and some of those enemies will be willing to resort to… extra-lawful means in their attempts to remove me as an opponent."
"Were you able to talk the police into looking into Hammer Industries as a cause for why we were attacked? That still makes the most sense to me," Cordelia asked, her eyes narrow and dangerous, showing the dangerous amount of concentration their family was known for. While none of the men or any or the weapons they used could be linked back to Hammer, the timing was very suspicious, and Emma's younger sister had latched onto that suspicion without any prompting from her.
"Not so directly, no." Emma actually frowned now, putting away the work she was doing. They were about to have some sister bonding time watching a movie, hopefully not a sappy movie but Cordelia was the one picking it so Emma was uncertain what to expect. She briefly looked down at the papers smiling victoriously inside. When the knowledge that Emma had fended off an attack with her company's weapons went viral the sales of Cold Steel weapons had gone up across the board.
Several private security firms had asked for weapons demonstrations, and a few American and Canadian police districts had also contacted their sales teams. Though in the case of the police, they would probably not be buying the weapons anytime soon. The private security firms, most of which handled security in Africa and the Middle East and other areas of unrest, had long-standing connections to other weapons manufactory companies, including a few that Hammer Industries covertly owned. With that and the mud in the face that Hildebrandt had taken being at the scene of what was being called a murder by the sensationalist media (pushed by her friend Paris in return for arming the woman's own security team with anything she wanted gratis) as well as this latest debacle, Hammer Industries was having a very bad month.
If only I could figure out a way to extend that to Shaw having a bad month. Shaw's own weapons company was not at the moment in direct competition with her own. And to be frank most of the weapons he made went to his security teams, allies and cronies. He produced steel, a lot of it, and some other resources both in the gathering and in the creating, which was his major money maker, and that couldn't be touched by anything she personally could do. Although Harry's long term plans should cut him off at the knees, oh god I am sooo looking forward to that. I think he had something to do with this latest attack, I can't prove it, but all my instincts and the information I have on him tell me that Hildebrandt would never be that overt. One specialist possibly, but an entire team of mercs on American soil while he's still nearby, no that's not his style, and he knows that Justin Hammer will react poorly to more setbacks in America.
On the other hand, Shaw had no real reason to be involved with something like that, and he wasn't so stupid as to act precipitously like that, So Emma was uncertain if it had been him, or some idiot under him. On the other hand, her plans for the Hellfire Club were moving right along, and she had some ideas to hasten a few of them, but that would take some fine finagling. Luckily, I am a most excellent finagler…
She shook her head and came back to the conversation. "The question was did I have any proof of that supposition Cordelia, and I did not." Not that I wanted to share at any rate. The last was a thought she kept to herself, since even her sister didn't really know what her powers were. Cordelia was bright enough to have an idea that she had some kind of power especially after she had anticipated the attack on them, but what that power was Emma hoped that she hadn't yet realized.
"Instead I merely guided the conversation and hopefully the follow-up investigation will head in the direction I hope. I doubt they'll be able to find any connection between that lot and Hammer Industries itself, but possibly Robert himself, or whoever he used. Regardless, if Hammer was involved, and recall my dear that we do not have much proof other than the timing. Don't let yourself become too wedded to one idea that you dismiss others."
Cordelia nodded thoughtfully, flipping through some VCR tapes looking for a movie that the both of them would like. "Have you ever thought about adding some… superpowered help to our security team?"
"I have yes," Emma replied now looking at her sister thoughtfully. "Unfortunately with all the paperwork and other demands on my time I haven't been able to do any research just yet on people who might be willing to work for us or who we could recruit. We might be best served grabbing some down on his luck mutant and pay him, but then it I'd be right back to square one on the character issues about which I have gutted our current team."
"Actually," Cordelia said looking over at her now, meeting her eyes. "I know of this one girl at my old school. She, um, she might have some kind of electromagnetic powers. She made up her own suit and acted like a crime fighter for a time, but her roommate found out and blabbed about it. She distanced herself from that, and the matter was forgotten because, well, the roommate was a bit of a ditz, but she might be a good place to look. I think her parents had to pull her out of school they couldn't pay for it or something her father was laid off something like that. There's also this guy in New York who apparently goes by the name Spider-Man, but I doubt we could recruit him. He's acting like a hero though the Daily Bugle says otherwise, and I doubt he's interested in money or the bottom line."
"I've heard of that one too, silly really. Oh, heroes are nice and all, but they think only of the problems in front of them, rather stupid frankly. As for this girl you mention, that is much more interesting. Anyone else?"
"Not that I can think of personally. Oh there are several that we could probably bail out of jail, but you said you wanted people who didn't have any character issues." The younger woman brightened up for a moment. "Although, we could still look at them, see if any of them are willing to be reformed, or possibly be a poster child for rehabilitation. Doing something like that and being public about it would be fantastic PR wise."
"Hmmm… It's a thought certainly. We would have to do through background checks on any we wish to rehabilitate like that however. As far back as possible, full psych evals… still it is a definite possibility, though they would need to want to be a part of society again, we can't simply keep holding a sledge hammer over their heads or whatever to keep them from acting out. Not only would that mean their desire to be part of society is forced but these hands," she held up her thin, pampered, lily white hands, which still had blisters from the unused to work of firing her submachine gun, "are not built to wield a sledge hammer."
Cordelia laughed at her joke then found the movie and said happily, "Found it, Dr. No extended edition. Now where's that popcorn?"
OOOOOOO
By the time Harry and Jean returned it was around midmorning, and all the kids were awake and out and about. Although calling them kids wasn't really accurate anymore, and Harry reminded himself he shouldn't be doing it any longer. They were all blooded now, and he hoped that they were mature enough to realize if they needed to talk they could go to someone else. Scott hadn't needed that after his run-in with demons helping the Fantastic Four, but then again demons were sort of very easy to hate. In Harry's opinion assassins like the Hand were pretty much the same, but that wasn't going to fly with the kids.
None of them were around however, so Harry cheerfully hoped that they were all already taking care of that issue. He opened the door to the bungalow he shared with Ororo motioning Jean inside, and neither was surprised to see Ororo there sitting nude at one of the tables as she munched on what looked like some kind of bagel. Fresh bagels and fruit were Ororo's favorite morning meal.
The two of them kissed her on the cheeks and sat down on either side of her, smiling and reaching for some food her themselves. Harry however stopped Jean's hand as she reached for one of the fruit. "Don't get between Ororo and clementines," he warned, "it isn't pretty."
Ororo laughed a little sheepishly an odd sound coming from such a self-possessed woman is her. "I have things that bother me sometimes, and clementines are my favorite treat. On that note though," She said reaching out a hand to grasp Harry's own. "I wish to apologize for poking fun at you and teasing you about the translation spell. I know that it was necessary, it's just that I don't like seeing it used, it makes all the work I put in learning languages the old-fashioned way seem superfluous and rather stupid. But I didn't mean to tease you that much, I hope you didn't take it poorly."
Harry chuckled. "You'll find my feelings are very hard to wound Ororo," he said lifting her hand to his mouth and kissing it tenderly. "Trust me, if you hurt my feelings I'll let you know. I just had this conversation with Jean, funny that. I love you Ororo, and sometimes loved ones irritate each other. Don't worry about it."
Ororo sighed. "That is a load off my mind." She looked over at Jean now, "How did your date go?"
"Let's just say that Harry here went above and beyond," Jean laughed then scowled a little at Ororo. "And did you know what he had planned for our date? And the present he was going to tell me about?"
"Yes, I thought he probably should have told you about it sooner, yet at the same time it was a very well-chosen present wasn't it?"
"True enough," Jean replied chuckling again, her fingers twining around Ororo's finger on the table. "It's fantastic, and we spent the rest of the date up there." She filled Ororo in on what they had been doing up in space, as well as a few suggestions Jean had offered to Harry on how to improve the asteroid base while they were working to enlarge it. Harry was enthusiastic about those suggestions as well as her help, and felt that Jean's suggestion about enlarging the Orihalcum factory would probably solve that bottleneck. It wouldn't be a resource that they would suddenly have an abundance of, but it certainly would become far less time-consuming to create in large enough amounts to be useful.
After that Jean cocked her head to one side and asking a little hesitantly, "Um, you know, this is a three-way relationship, and you and I haven't as yet done anything but kiss that one time."
Ororo laughed, reaching over to caress her cheek tenderly. "Well then, let us take care of that right now. I was thinking of going flying today, and I would dearly love the company."
"If I might make a suggestion of where to go," Harry said, "heading up the coastline might be good. Ha Long Bay is a port up north that is supposed to be one of the most magnificent sights in the world. Filled with little rock islands that come out of the sea everywhere. I saw a picture in a brochure, can't remember most of it, but the picture was amazing."
"We could ask Kitten about its significance, but instead let us simply follow the coast and see for ourselves. Are you ready to go now?" Ororo asked holding her hand out to Jean.
Jean laughed a little embarrassed. "Are you seriously going to go out like that?"
Ororo looked down at her nakedness and laughed. "You Americans, you need to get over that whole nudity taboo thing." She stood up and moved over to the drawers where she had put her clothing, taking out a simple silk dress and pulling it over her head. It fell to her knees, but it was very obvious that she wasn't wearing anything underneath it, both because the color was white and slightly see-through.
That sight made both of her lovers gasp and Harry very consciously shifted in his seat.
Jean however simply stared blushing hotly. "Th-that's even worse!" she said pointing at Ororo. "Have you ever heard the concept that concealing just enough to interest is almost as devastating as showing it all?"
Ororo looked at them both and chuckled. "Very well, I'll change into something else."
Jean almost stopped her but shook off the temptation. "Good God," she muttered, as Ororo moved into the bathroom to change this time, laughing quietly at them still. "The unembarrassed slightly naïve Ororo I could deal with. The unembarrassed not at all naïve sex bomb, that's going to take some getting used to."
Harry very seriously considered just grabbing them both and tossing them into his room and having his wicked way with them both, since Jean had been saying that while turned around and picking up the pale white dress that Ororo had dropped after their exclamation. He too shook it off though. "You're telling me. It's as if sometimes she doesn't really realize how sexy she is, and the other times it's like she can turn it on or off and when it is on you seriously feel the effects."
"Poor baby," Jean laughed. She leaned over and kissed him hard on the lips before pulling back before he could deepen it. "What ever will you do?"
"Praise magic for the girls who have for some strange reason fallen in love with me?" Harry asked quizzically. "Well that and take a very cold bath, maybe with ice in it."
Jean laughed again. "That'll do Potter, that'll do."
Ororo came back at that point, dressed in the costume she had worn during their escapade in London. "I don't suppose you could hit us with one of those Notice-Me-Not spells of yours Harry?"
Harry nodded agreeably, thinking that this would also be a good chance to see something, to see if he was correct about something in Ororo. If he was, the results would be phenomenal, though it would certainly be a long-term project rather than a short term. He waved a hand at both of them, and they glowed briefly as the spells hit them.
The two women kissed Harry on the cheeks and flew out of the door. Harry chuckled, and sat down in one of the plush chairs, pulling out the array for the farming area up in High Note. He was almost done with the array that would protect the elves while they were in there, and he had already finished with the other one that sped up time. It would take several days to put in place, but hopefully not even a full week and that plus Jean's help would have solved the two bottlenecks in his industrial plans.