Scott's POV
"Are you ready?" I whispered over my telepathic link to Captain America and his mission partner, Natasha Romanoff. She was enhanced now, via an involuntary gift from her sister, Yelena, and was happier for it, even though she'd never admit it.
Jean had personally undone the Red Room's procedures before Yelena administered the injection. Her supersoldier serum was the perfected version of the prototypes Dante stole from Oscorp. Hers granted her cat-like reflexes, retractable claws, flexibility, and a robust healing factor on top of the ridiculous strength boost the serum provided.
She was also in her new runic armor—the one Dante provided for the main offensive team.
Beside me, Kitty crouched, listening in on their conversation through a few devices she'd planted earlier when we'd secured a warrant to search and arrest Alden.
Taking down the Friends of Humanity turned out to be more of a challenge than I expected, but not for the reasons you'd think. The government—meaning SHIELD—wanted us to do this by the book. Every arrest, every step of the process had to be overseen by an experienced agent and a lawyer so that these charges would stick.
And then there were the foreign investors propping up Senator Alden's silent war on mutantkind. Advanced Idea Mechanics, and a company called Biodyne. We had no solid evidence that linked them directly to Alden but I was hoping tonight would change that.
"Prepare to breach," I sent through the link. "Entering in three, two, one…"
Steve and Natasha's psychic signatures appeared deeper inside the Hampton compound, materializing right outside Alden's personal office, while Kitty and I went in guns blazing, phasing through the front gates.
The first guard who saw us raised an alarm. Dozens of men poured out, wielding rifles and futuristic weapons.
"Those don't look like standard-issued rifles," Kitty noted.
"Shut up!" the lead guard snapped. "You made a big mistake coming here like this."
"On behalf of the United States government and SHIELD, we've come to arrest Senator Alden. Surrender your weapons, or we will be forced to detain you and respond in kind with violence," I said, reciting a line Fury had made me memorize.
The guard sneered. "You really think we're afraid of a pair of mutties? Take them."
They opened fire, and we deployed our defense arrays. Bullets pinged off and blaster fire dimmed as the array absorbed the energy.
Kitty retaliated with an almost bored look, raising her hand and activating her psychic sleep enchantment. An invisible pulse of psychic energy slammed into a man in the back, knocking him unconscious instantly.
Fear flashed across the leader's face. "Grenades!" he yelled.
Dozens of them reached for their sides as even more guards rushed down from the main house. They hurled their grenades as one. I flicked my wrist, sending the energy grenades into the air where they detonated safely, while we were still being peppered with fire.
I began firing back psychic bolts as well, putting more and more attackers to sleep.
"Pull back!" the leader shouted, his face beet red. "Maintain suppressive fire. S-troops, deploy!"
The gunmen fell back as five burly men stepped forward. They were encased in sleek exoskeletons that looked like knockoffs of Tony Stark's designs and rushed us at surprising speeds.
I ducked under the first man's knife swipe, grabbed his arm, and twisted it behind him. My fingers dug into the core of the exoskeleton located on his back, and I crushed it.
Kitty took down two opponents in the time it took me to handle one. She phased through them, striking with precise blows, shattering the central nodules controlling their suits.
The last two didn't stand a chance. I heated the metal attached to their limbs, and Kitty phased through the machinery, destroying it from the inside.
Vastly outmatched and desperate, one of the bigots did the last thing I expected—he surrendered. More followed. Nearly all of them, except the leader, gave up.
I radioed in the SHIELD containment team a block away and put the remaining holdouts to sleep.
Before the team could arrive, Captain America patched us into a conversation happening inside the mansion.
The Senator had surprisingly folded. All it'd taken was a credible threat to his life.
His right-hand woman had tried to kill him while he was trying to flee with an encrypted laptop and some papers.
She apparently worked for A.I.M., and they clearly preferred to keep their involvement a secret.
"We heard you talk about your upcoming attack. You understand that by refusing to tell us about it, the U.S government will be come after you with everything they have. You'll die for this," Natasha said sharply.
"New York doesn't have capital punishment," Alden shot back in his smarmy, confident voice.
"Who said anything about the government doing the deed? Your business partners will take care of that for us."
"You wouldn't," Alden said, his voice tightening.
"Think of your children, Alden. Your daughter," Captain America urged.
"Don't you dare!" he hissed.
"We've looked into her. We know what she really thinks about your politics. Don't damn yourself in her eyes forever."
"I am doing this for her," Alden said, his voice shaking. "What future could she possibly have in a world full of freaks and aliens? How long until her job is automated? How safe could she possibly be walking down the street?"
"And you think killing a bunch of people is the answer?"
"It's the only way I can make them understand. The only way I can make the world see."
It hit me instantly.
"He's trying to provoke a reaction like what happened at the rally last week. If we hadn't been there, America might have a very different view on mutants."
"No offense, but America's already very anti-mutant. The new awakenings and the collateral damage from local fights are getting out of hand," Natasha said. "No, it has to be something bigger. Something that'll stick with the public."
"Something like Magneto," Captain America said slowly, "or the Hulk."
A chill crept up my spine.
Oh boy.
Dante wasn't one for exaggeration, and if he said an enraged Hulk was a city-level threat, then it was. And everyone on this mission had likely read the same threat assessments.
"Ask him," I said. "Watch his micro-expressions. I bet we've got our answer."
Natasha did as I suggested, and the silence that followed told us everything we needed to know.
Those maniacs.
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