Number One, With A Bullet

by Phil Hartman

12/31/99: Akkaba, Egypt: 12:23 hrs local:

He had traveled thousands of years to receive an ass-whupping.

#Looks that way right now,# Cable thought angrily, trying to get to his feet. #Grey's dying, Scott and Jean are down - FLONQ !#

He saw Scott fire an optic blast, and cursed when their foe drained his father of his stored solar energy. Jean rose up, screaming -

- Apocaylpse's face was torn off -

- and something dead, withered and obscenely wrong was left, to hurl Jean aside.

#Can't move,# Cable thought, assessing his injuries. #Something was broken inside when the backblast tossed me over here - not my spine, but a lung ? - damnit -#

He saw Apocalypse turn back to Nate Grey, the glow intensifying again -

- and the air parted, and then it was just noise.

San Francisco: 00:24 hrs PST:

#I HATE transdimensional physics -#

"Dom, move it !" the woman commonly known as Domino heard Sam Guthrie yell. "We gotta get clear b'fore the cathedral falls in on itself !"

The ashen, purple-eyed woman looked back, seeing the Cable who had assisted them fade into the growing fireball.

~Nate ?~ Domino thought, some tiny voice in her mind whispering about the psi-link they'd had, some vain hope of it still existing, even after Gryaznova and Blaquesmith and that assassin -

- ~Dom ?~

~Damnit, Summers, I leave you alone for five minutes - !~ Domino thought.

~Dom - what -?~ she heard, pain seeping through the link, HIS pain, like none she'd ever felt second-hand from him.

~Screw it,~ Domino thought, diving for the window. ~I'll be damned if I'm going to let some unemployed hack of a writer or that Gracy Goodheart waitress have you, you overgrown, angst-riddled, bastard spawn of a can opener !~

~Madelyne could never open cans,~ Cable tried to reply -

- and Domino rolled with the impact.

Her eyes took in the scene:

Cyclops and Phoenix down, no gross injuries.

Xavier, apparently unconscious.

Nate Grey, moaning, in some kind of energy field.

Cable, struggling to get to his feet.

And Apocalypse -

- #Damn, someone left him in the bathtub too long,# Domino thought, pulling her gun. #Bare skin -

#-NO ARMOR -#

- and the air was split by thunder.

The bullet was true, entering the External's right temple.

The next thing anyone saw was a shower of blood, bone and fluids Domino did not want to dwell on too closely.

And the biggest energy backlash she'd ever seen.

#Oh,# the probability caster thought, #SHIT.#

"BOZHE MOI !?"

"OUTGODAMNITDOMNEXTTIME GIVE US SOME FLONQUING WARNING !!!"

Storm, Iceman, Beast, Rogue, Gambit, Magneto, Marrow, Sunfire and Polaris ducked instinctively as Cable flew - #FLEW !?# Storm thought, amazed - overhead, carrying Domino, and Jean rocketed past with Scott and Xavier in a telekinetic field. Nate Grey brought up the rear, shakily, but alive.

~Apocalypse is dead - RETREAT !~ Xavier ordered from the retreating pack of psis and Summers. Storm, Rogue and Polaris gathered up the others, who bolted out of the pyramid as blue fire started to consume it.

Then, the blast wave caught them, and all was white.

"...sir !? Cable ?!"

#Flonq ...#

Cable stirred, looking around with a sardonic grin, at what remained of the battlefield.

Apocalypse's pyramid was gone, with much of the surrounding terrain fused into glass. The X-Men, Magnus and Domino were digging out of a deep sandpit with the assistance of the other X-Men and X-Force.

"He's gone ?" Cable asked, looking around.

"Messily - your girlfriend's gotta learn to use a lower caliber," Nate Grey snorted, coughing up sand.

"Shut up, kid," Cable chuckled, looking around.

100-plus pounds of albino mutant tossed herself into his arms, kissing him longingly.

"Arrogant, overgrown - you are MINE, Summers, you hear me !? You EVER go off to fight some ancient assbite of a demigod again, you have the decency to marry me and have dozens of children with me first !" Domino insisted.

"Well, when you put it that way ..." Cable chuckled, kissing her.

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