Dreamweaver: Part Two
Logan sized up the situation at a glance, the fear and growing anger on the faces in the crowd warning him that there was little change the three of them could talk their way out of this. Still, he had to try.
"Everyone all right?" he asked in honest concern, although he could see no one who was hurt. Lady Luck must be smiling on us tonight. "Hell of a tremor, that one. They probably felt it in Calgary."
"Don't give us that bullshit! That was no earthquake!" shouted a man at the back of the crowd. His words were greeted by a mutter of agreement. "Earthquakes don't throw sixteen-wheelers up into the air and hold them there!" He sounded more fearful than angry, despite the bravado of his words.
Logan rolled his eyes. Great, someone else with Bishop's painful grasp of the obvious. Still smiling, he shot a glance sideways at his companions. Bishop, as always, was ready to fight. Cable, on the other hand, still looked shaky, though he seemed more alert than he had back in the diner. Logan gritted his teeth, not wanting to make any more demands on him, despite how useful his telepathy would be in this situation. He already felt like he'd asked too much.
#I'm touched,# came Cable's voice in his head, sounding tired but sarcastic. # Stall them, would you? I'm going to try something.#
"Not an earthquake?" Logan scoffed, turning his attention back to the crowd. "Are you sure you didn't take a blow to the head, friend? If it wasn't an earthquake, what was it?"
"He did it!" shrieked the pretty blond waitress, pointing accusingly at Cable. "We all saw him glowing! He's got to be a mutant!"
Logan gritted his teeth. The mood of the crowd was growing uglier by the moment. Whatever you're going to do, Nate, do it fast! Cable's expression was distant, distracted. He seemed barely aware of the crowd.
"Yeah!" another man, a hulking red-bearded giant, agreed vehemently. He took a menacing step towards the three X-Men, his bloodshot eyes blazing. "They're probably all mutants! Filthy freaks, trying to kill us all--" He stopped in mid-sentence, his face going blank.
A moment later, the rest of the crowd froze, staring straight ahead at nothing. The silence was welcome, but eerie at the same time. Logan swallowed a sigh of relief and looked back at Cable.
"Nice trick, bub. How long can you hold it?"
Cable shrugged. He looked about ready to drop, but there was a determined set to his features that Logan had seen on Jean often enough to recognize. "Quite a while, I think. But we shouldn't waste any time getting out of here."
"Agreed," Bishop muttered, watching Cable suspiciously.
Cable gave him a scathing look that soon faded. Taking in the shattered vehicles and frozen crowd, he winced, but not in pain.
"Jean's going to kill me."
"Probably," Logan said dryly. "But we'll talk about it later. Let's go see if my car's still intact. If it is, we'll get out of here. If not--well, Jeanie'll just have to stand in line."
***
An hour later, they were speeding down the highway in Logan's slightly dented jeep. The rain had stopped and a full moon, shrouded in a light veil of clouds, shone palely down on them. Cable sat in the front seat, tracking Regina's distinctive psi-imprint while Logan drove and Bishop brooded in the back seat.
Finally losing his patience, Bishop leaned forward and glared at Cable. "Do you have any idea where we're going?" he demanded, his tone markedly hostile.
"No, I'm just enjoying the scenery," Cable said sarcastically. "Of course I know where we're going, you--"
"Enough! Before I gut you both!"
Cable fell silent, looking uncharacteristically chastened. Bishop returned to his sulk. Logan took a deep breath, reminding himself to keep his temper. Glancing over at Cable, he continued in a more moderate voice.
"Are you going to tell me what happened back there?" he asked mildly. "Might help to practice, for when you have to tell Jean. And she will get it out of you, you know."
Cable almost smiled. "I know. She probably felt it happen. At the very least, someone's going to find a major power spike on Cerebro's graphs tonight." He trailed off, staring out the window thoughtfully. "As for what happened, I'm not entirely sure. Some of it's still a jumble. But it seems to have been like you said, a psionic illusion made from one of my own memories." He sighed as he turned back to Logan, looking disturbed and somehow lost. "It was very--vivid. Totally real. I could have sworn I was thirteen years old again--"
"You don't have to go into all the details," Logan interrupted, feeling peculiarly solicitous. "I was just wondering about the earthquake. You have to admit, it was--unusual. I remember Rachel losing control over her powers a couple of times, but she never caused a natural disaster."
Cable flexed his left hand, staring at the techno-organic fiber moodily. "It's not that complicated, really. When I hit puberty, the T-O virus started to advance again. I 'relived' the night when I finally lost all control over it. Redd and Slym--Jean and Scott thought I was dying."
"You're still here, though," Bishop said darkly.
"Obviously!" Cable snapped, his own grip on his temper visibly fraying. "I used my telekinesis to pull my body back together that night. I tried to do the same back there at the diner. I couldn't tell that it was an illusion. And since the T-O virus was actually under control, all the energy I gathered spilled over--like I was trying to fill a cup that was already full." His mouth tightened grimly. "What I could have done if you hadn't stopped me--I haven't thanked you for that yet, Logan."
Logan grunted uncomfortably. "Don't worry about it. I'm just glad you shook it off, Nate. I suspect you're the only one who's going to be able to get through to this kid." He frowned, wondering if he should ask Cable about that strange, smoky edge to his scent. It had only gotten stronger since the diner. Now it smelled--charred?
"I don't know," Cable said, sounding depressed. It took Logan a moment to realize he was talking about the girl. "I'm not even sure how she did what she did."
"What does it matter?" Bishop asked bluntly, his voice challenging. "The girl is obviously a threat. We should treat her as such."
Logan groaned. Why did I bring him along? he wondered, but before he could say anything, Cable swiveled around in his seat and glared at Bishop, clearly at the end of his patience. Logan decided to let him handle it. After all, Bishop was just begging for a good kick in the ass, literally as well as figuratively.
"Quite frankly, it doesn't matter to me, Bishop," Cable snarled, in his anger reminding Logan of Jean again. That kind of incandescent, barely-controlled rage did not come from the Summers side of the family. "I'm certainly not going to approach this girl without my shields at full. But if I can't figure out how her power works, I can't shield the two of you from it!"
Amazing, Bishop flushed and muttered a quick apology, lapsing once again into silence. They drove on for another quarter of an hour in relative quiet. Logan was actually beginning to relax and enjoy the moonlit scenery rushing by, when the wheel suddenly wrenched out of his hands, causing the car to swerve violently.
Fighting to regain control, he abruptly realized what was going on. "Cable!" he snarled. "What the hell are you doing?"
Light flashed, so bright it was painful, and there was an explosion behind them, right where they'd been a moment ago. The flash came again, this time hitting the car, but the Jeep only shuddered, as if pushed sideways by the wind. For an insane moment, overwhelmed by the scent of burning plasma, Logan thought it was Havok attacking them. Then, he realized who it had to be.
#It's Taylor!# Cable snarled in his head. The wheel was suddenly free, and Logan fought to keep the car straight as they were hit again. Once more, the attack failed to incinerate them, and Logan realized why when the air in the car began to glow gold. A shield, NATE'S shielding us, that's why we're not dead yet--
#I can't hold it forever, Logan! Get off the road!#
They were hit again, and, suddenly, getting off the road wasn't a matter of choice. "Hold on!" Logan yelled as the Jeep hurtled down into the ditch, stopping only when it smashed, head-on, into a tree.
***
Cable groaned, pushing himself away from the dashboard, which seemed to be a little closer than it should be. He couldn't see straight. He blinked, trying to clear his vision, but it didn't work. His head was throbbing, and as he reached up to touch a particularly sore spot, his fingers came away bloody.
Figures, he thought muzzily. I'm a psi, so of course I hit my head. Makes perfect sense.
The details of the crash came back to him slowly, and he turned to check on Logan and Bishop, wincing at the way the world seemed to spin. They were both unconscious, but between Logan's healing factor and Bishop's ability to absorb energy, in this case the kinetic energy of the crash, they should be all right. He mind-touched them to make sure, relieved when he found no trace of shock or excessive pain. But even that small telepathic expenditure made him feel sick.
He forced himself to concentrate. Someone had to distract Taylor until the other two regained consciousness, and he wasn't going to be able to do it from here. Reaching down once more for those long-untapped reserves, he blew out the car door on his side with a single thought. The flood of telekinetic energy seemed to ease his headache, to make everything around him clear and sharp, like cut crystal. He liked this clarity.
Half-falling out of the car, he gritted his teeth at the stabbing pain in his left side, but crawled forward until he could reach a tree he could use to pull himself to his feet. Scanning the area, he sensed Taylor approaching, his thoughts dominated by cold fury and--jealousy? Cable withdrew, casually wrapping a telekinetic shield around the car to protect Logan and Bishop. It was keyed to their psi-imprints, so they'd be able to leave, but no one and nothing else should be able to get through.
He spared a moment to wonder at the ease with which he was doing all of this. It reminded him of the battle with Nate Grey, when he'd felt like an outside force was helping him, holding back the T-O virus and augmenting his reserves. It's a good thing, too, he admitted to himself with a strange, detached candor. Ordinarily, I'd be dead on my feet by now.
The moment before the attack came, he sensed it. But instead of merely shielding, he turned Taylor's attack right back on him, feeling the feedback build. He sensed shock and panic from the other mutant--and a momentary opening. Following up on his advantage ruthlessly, Cable seized Taylor's mind in a telepathic vise and shut down his conscious ability to access his power.
#Where is she, damn it!# he demanded, sorting through Taylor's recent memories in search of Regina. # TELL ME!# The protracted contact was making him nauseous. Taylor felt no guilt about the innocent lives his greed had destroyed. His memories of the police officers he'd killed were tinged with something very close to pleasure.
Then Cable saw Regina, sitting quietly on a narrow bed. From the look of the wall behind her, she was in a log cabin. # Good,# he said to Taylor, extracting the location from his mind. # Now, go to sleep.# Taylor's conscious thoughts winked out like a streetlight at dawn, and Cable released him contemptuously.
He headed through the trees to where Taylor lay sprawled on the ground, not far from where the car had crashed. Leaning over, he took a set of keys out of the man's pocket and walked away without a second look, headed unerringly back the way Taylor had come. All he could see was a light through the trees--the cabin, he knew as he sensed Regina within. Focused on his objective, he had no idea he was being watched.
***
/Warning,/ the computer said sweetly, in the voice of the young woman who had once been its controller. It presented a viewing window that showed Cable stumbling doggedly through the woods. /Detection of alpha-class mutant in target area. Power signature is on red-list, flagged priority. Instructions?/
The man watching cursed, his normal impassivity warring with real concern. His crimson eyes burned fitfully. "Oh, Nathan. Such a talent for being in the wrong place at the most inopportune time." He shook his head, knowing he couldn't risk the original plan now. The girl had potential, true, but the useful tool she might become was not worth the sacrifice of his masterwork.
But perhaps there was another way--He watched Cable's slow but determiend progress through the forest, and frowned at his 'grandson's' battered, exhausted appearance. Interesting. There might yet be a fringe benefit to this unexpected turn of events.
"Scalphunter!" he called, knowing the comlink would be active. His computer was very efficient, though he missed Threnody.
"Right here, boss," was the prompt reply.
"I have a second assignment for you. Listen very carefully--"
to be continued
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