Chapter 29 Heavy is the Head part 5

If you want to help me financially, you can do it on https://www.patreon.com/NeverluckySMILE

Rogue grinned pushing herself forward as she hurdled a downed tree smashing a mutate aside with ease. "We'll see 'bout that sugah!" At the same time four became three as Cyclops' blast took Frenzy in the chest, hurling her back with a cry of agony as her chest shattered under the power of his force beam.

Harry's commands continued to wrap out, commanding the team to help each other at need, but more importantly keeping the flyers concentrated, breaking up any large group of Sun People. They also kept Pyro, Crucible and a few of the other long range fighters among Magneto's troops at bay, allowing Havok, Magma and Cyclops free reign from their positions above the berms.

Despite that, Senyaka, Mastermind's guard, closed the distance to Cyclops along with a mutant that looked almost like Rahne, save her werewolf form looked even wilder. From his arms long energy whips appeared lashing out and trying to catch Cyclops around the neck. Spyke got in his way, his own arms sporting dozens of knives as he went toe to toe with the whip user before the werewolf girl got to him.

She proved strong enough to snap some of his bone knives, but Cyclops had gotten some distance at that point and Harry quickly redirected two golems to aid the two. A stone sword flashed down, and the werewolf girl jumped to one side cursing aloud with a distinct Californian accent. "Damn it all, where'd the fucking clay men come froMMMAGH!"

Her words trailed off in a squeal of agony as Cyclops' eye beam caught her in the side hurling her away to smash against a stone formation behind her. But Senyaka had closed with him, and his whips caught Cyclops around the chest and leg, picking him up and hurling him away to crash with bone-jarring force into a nearby tree.

"Stinking flatscan symps like you, you make me fucking sick, always wanting to protect the status quo, never knowing or caring what they've done to your own race, what they still do to us whatever you bleeding hearts think! I'm going to enjoy this you damn hypocrite!"

"Spare me," Cyclops grunted, surprising the man by getting to his feet. Even more surprising he didn't look as weakened as he should have. The Orihalcum reinforced suit Cyclops wore had not only blocked the heat of the energy whips but had also helped block Senyaka's secondary attack, which was to drain his victim's life force away via his whips.

As the sounds of battle continued all around them Cyclops went on. "I understand you, and those like you might have real grievances, might have gone through harsh lives, but that's no reason to paint all humanity with the same brush. And just so you know asshole, we're the same fucking race! Just because you've got powers and a few different genes doesn't make you any better than humanity, just the other side of the same coin as the Friends of Humanity!"

"We're nothing like them! We're fighting for our very existence!" Senyaka roared, lashing out with his whips once more, forcing Cyclops to dodge.

Yet instead of trying to open the distance in the jungle, which was becoming increasingly more open as the battle continued chopping down trees left and right, he close the distance, his eyes flashing out to impact not Senyaka but the ground underneath and around him. "Oh yeah, you've really been fighting for your existence here in the Savage lands haven't you? Preying on weaker people, forcing them to go through procedures to turn them into mindless drones, quite the statement for the so-called master race."

"GRAHHH!" Senyaka screamed his whips catching Cyclops, slamming him into several trees before pulling him close. "I'm going to drain you until you're a husk traitor, then I'm going to snap bone-boys neck, then I'm going to torture that gal over there in green and yellow in front of your…your… dying… eyes…"

Senyaka trialed off as his energy whips disappeared, dropping Cyclops who shook his head blearily. Despite the Orihalcum scales in his suit, the energy draining of the whips had begun to get through with that extended touch. Above him, Senyaka touched the hilt of the knife sticking out his lower chest, before staring at Cyclops over his red wraps. Without another word he fell, and Cyclops pushed to his feet, shaking his head as he moved to help Spyke against the were-wolf girl before they both fell back.

While this was all going on Guardian and Phoenix kept their distance, launching attacks of their own at need to keep their friends from being flanked, and taking out a few of the Acolytes they knew had strange area effect powers. One of them, Whiteout, had barely begun to send to the bright flash of psionic light that would have blinded everyone she wished, only to collapse as Jean dropped a tree on her, having felt the buildup of psychic force nearby.

Another, a man who had been about to manipulate gravity under Magma and Havok, had collapsed when a Bombardacaught him right in the chest at long range. Whiteout would survive her wounds, the man, later found out to be called Lifter, would not.

In the main however Guardian kept control of the battlefield, while Jean kept an eye out for Magneto and Exodus. However, it wasn't either of those that were the first to take the field, but Zaladane.

Riding a chariot powered by her magics Zaladane appeared surrounded by the remnants of the Pteradon tribe who began to rain fire down on the X-Men and the flyers, caught out of position as they finished an attack run on the ground forces. The flyers scattered, followed by their fellows, who were joined by more Sun People rising out of the jungle further away.

Magneto's citadel also began to fire on them, electronic bursts of power that acted almost like flak. Banshee howled as he was nearly blinded by one, his decision to not wear a mask coming back to haunt him as the electronic blast singed his hair, skin and nearly his eyeballs out of his head. He fell but then disappeared, his emergency portkey activating to save his life.

At the same time as the flyers scattered Zaladane shot spells of magic down. It was orange and blue blasts, her magic shattered a golem before slamming into Spyke's shoulder where he had a bit of his bone armor protruding.

It was the worst kind of spell he could have been hit with, Zaladane's equivalent of a Bone breaker curse. It shattered the bone, then continued on, shattering every bone in his body, thankfully without imparting enough force for the bones inside him to explode as the one he had extruded did. But that was scant comfort.

"AGHHGHHG!" Evan screamed in agony, and then was gone, teleported away thanks to the emergency portkey function.

Zaladane turned in her chariot about to fire at the berms protecting Magma, Havok and now Cyclops again only to scream in turn as her chariot exploded in a wave of lightning that could never have been made in nature, more powerful than any lightning spell she had ever seen. It was only a last-minute levitation spell that kept her from plummeting to her death, and even so she was forced to the ground to dodge several dozen ice crystals and blasts of wind.

Storm landed in front of her, her eyes sparking like little lightning bolts her teeth clenched as she glared at the woman who had just nearly killed her nephew. "Your people apparently call you a high priestess. Let us see how you fare against a goddess!"

Around the two battling Sorceresses the battle continued, with a massive spell lighting up the air zooming over the battlefield to smash into the distant citadel. Whether it was that or Reed's ongoing electronic warfare, the electrical flak cannons fell silent. And then several dozen of the golems linked up, becoming giants who smashed down at the Sun People and the mutates in the jungle around them.

Slowly the battle was swinging in the invaders favor. Their better equipment, training, individual powers and, most importantly, organization told against the haphazardly organized if at times individually powerful Acolytes and Brotherhood members, though there were still several Brotherhood members missing still. Magma too seemed almost unstoppable at this point, her energy form giving her some immunity to damage, and her ability to change the environment of the battlefield at need had turned many a flanking attack back on itself.

Now more than Guardian and Phoenix were wondering, where were Exodus and Magneto? Unfortunately for the Custodes they didn't have long to wait for the answer.

OOOOOOO

Magneto scowled angrily as his hand reached out, rearranging the metal and ferrous material wall of the citadel, opening up the wall so as to let him out into the open. Behind him Sauron's body continued to twitch and sizzle quietly as Exodus joined him. Sauron had held him up, pointing to the scattered number of patrols that hadn't checked in since the start of this attack, and the Brotherhood barracks which hadn't replied to Eric's call to join his main force in his citadel.

He had been concerned about that, but it was next to nothing compared to the reports that were coming from the front. He'd hoped to pull Potter and his troops against the citadel, but they hadn't taken the bait, coming forward too slowly, forcing him to push his own troops out to the limits of the citadel's defensive cannons. Even so his troop's initial ambush had gone well, but then Potter had joined in, turning it back.

Now his attempt to catch them between hammer and anvil was in tatters, but he still had more than enough troops scattered both behind and around Potter's troops. It was just a matter of breaking Potter himself, and Phoenix. If he could do that, Storm alone would not be able to turn the tide.

A bare few seconds after sending the order to the Tech Team to start using the cannons, Sauron had attempted his bit of treason. Eric had felt the Pterodactyl-like mutant's arm on his shoulder turning him, and then the energy vampire had attempted to drain Eric of his power.

But Eric had known Sauron was a treacherous creature, and had thus been prepared. A blast of electromagnetic power had thrown him away, and before Sauron could move, Eric had reached out to the electromagnetic pulses in his brain, frying them. It was a technique he'd been working on for months, the amount of concentration necessary to do it at all then to use it in a combat situation was phenomenal, but it had paid off. The assault had utterly bypassed Sauron's ability to absorb the life force of his victims and his durability to kill the traitor rather easily. Now to see if it works on Potter.

With a nod at Exodus Magneto took to the air, zooming forward towards the battle. "Head for the ground as soon as my initial attack ends Exodus, you know what to do then." Exodus nodded his head while Magneto reached out with his power, tearing up pieces of wire, iron, steel and other ferrous materials from the jungle. When he had a vast wave of bits and pieces of flotsam behind him, he hurled it forward, using his power over electromagnetism to push the speed of the bits of junk almost as fast as a gauss shell.

But his concentration on his attack broke as another mind tried to fight him for the ferrous materials of his attack! It didn't succeed in stopping it, but it had slowed. And this wasn't like the time he had fought Potter to control the material of the base where they fought (wherever it was, Eric still had no clue, and felt that he hated Potter all the more for that).

No, this was someone else using the same sort of mutant power based he did. "What?"

Exodus looked at him then dodged to one side as someone else blasted a large stream of charged particle through the air he had just been occupying. With Storm engaged with Zaladane, that left only Darkstar to command the flyers, and she wasn't able to stop Polaris, Lorna Dane, from charging toward Magneto the moment she spotted him.

"Hello father!" Lorna spat then attacked, bringing her power to bear against Magneto's.

"Father… foolish child what are you talking about?" Magneto asked blocking her energy attack with his own electromagnetic shield looking at her curiously, his fury and desire to turn this campaign back against Potter stymied for the moment. Waving Exodus on, he continued. "Just because you have the same powers as I do does not mean we're related."

The two of them began to fly around one another, blasts of energy flashing out only to dissipate harmlessly against their shields.

"Xavier tested my blood, I saw the results! You're my father, you left me with a foster family instead of taking care of me yourself, and they turned me over to Shaw the moment I started to show my mutant powers. But then again, I suppose I should be grateful you didn't get me committed to an insane asylum like you did my half-sister Wanda!" Lorna shouted her eyes filled with angry tears as she raged.

Wanda, ahh, that useless fool Pietro's sister I had almost forgotten about her. "If you are here, and if she is here, that is proof that you are powerful enough for me to acknowledge you, which I assure you I would have if I had known of your existence. I never knew I had another daughter, so whatever decision was made after that was not on my orders. Wanda was a… special case. Her powers made her mad, unstable, a danger to all around her." Eric replied, his voice coaxing.

Moving backwards and not attacking for a moment he strengthened his shields against Lorna's attacks. Already Eric could tell she didn't have his sheer power, but her will was decent enough. She could be trained, trained to give him a true heir. With that in mind he held out a hand grandly. "Join me daughter! If you worked under Shaw, and yes I recognize the name, you must know that mutantkind's rightful place is to rule over our evolutionary predecessors. And if you are here, that is proof of your strength of will. Join me, and rule by my side!"

Polaris practically gaped at him, then broke out in a mad half laugh half sob, "Th, that's all you care about isn't it, your, your damn mission, your vision of the future, your own place as ruler of mutantkind, fuck you've even changed your damn helmet!"

Indeed, Magneto's bucket-shaped helmet now had a small platinum band around it's top, with bits of diamond and ruby set into it here and there.

"If I wasn't a mutant, would you even care about me at all!? Wanda was right about you, you sick bastard!" With that she renewed her attack, lashing out blindly, ripping up more of the landscape to grab bits of ferrous materials, hurling them at Magneto while redoubling her energy assault. "Screw you, and your fucking vision you're just like god damn Shaw, Magneto!"

"Unfortunate. You would have been a true successor for me. But perhaps you will think differently after this is over." Magneto shrugged his shoulders, and suddenly his shield exploded outward, a wave of energy that slammed into Polaris' shield carrying all of the power of her previous assaults, popping it like a bubble. She screamed in pain as his next attack slammed into her, sending her shooting down to the earth unconscious.

Magneto watched her fall only to blink as she disappeared right above the admittedly shattered and broken tree line. "Interesting, some form of teleportation even under that condition? If so, she was most definitely more interesting than her half-siblings."

Putting the odd moment out of his mind, Eric turned his attention to the battle, searching it for Potter ignoring the ignoring the battle in the sky above him between Dark Star and what few remaining flying assets his own people had. Potter was his target, the rest of the battle would sort itself out once he and Phoenix were removed from the action.

But that was not the only family reunion occurring this day.

OOOOOOO

Initially the sniper team had been supposed to first take out targets of opportunity, trying to pull Magneto's attention slightly off the main battle, mostly to draw off some of his numbers into an environment where they couldn't all be brought to bear than anything else. After that, once the main battle began they would then come in and flank Magneto's main force. Yet while they could move through the jungle as easily as could be hoped, they were badly out of position because of their second encounter, and were nowhere near close enough to take Magneto's forces under fire when they moved to engage the main attack team.

Once they heard the main battle in the distance, they double timed it back towards it in single file, with Vanguard's mutant power activated and him in the lead to take and spring any trap in their way. It happened several times, and he was gasping in exertion by the time he and the other snipers felt they were within range of the main fight. The fact a lot of the jungle around the battle had been shattered and blasted made it much easier than it would have been otherwise.

Scaling a nearby rock face Vanguard and Coyote found a place where they could set up their sniper rifles, and they began to belt out gauss rifle rounds into the distance while Ghigau, Morph, Nightcrawler and the Scarlet Witch waited. They would head forward once the combatants in the snipers sights responded to the attack on their flank.

Vanguard's first shot took out the last Kleinstock brother, impacting the side of his head and blowing through it in a welter of gore the caused some of the nearby Pteradons to squawk and turn in his direction. This cost them badly against Darkstar and the others. Relieved of not being Magneto's targets and with orders to remain in the air, they pressed the attack against the Pteradons and Sun People on their hover boards, slowly winning air superiority through skill over their numbers.

Beside him Coyote's first shot was nearly as good. He took out one of the Sun People's skimmers, smashing its engine into pieces and hurling the man over the front of it as it lost power crashing into the ground.

Below the two snipers the Scarlet Witch scowled, pacing around irritably. "How much longer!?" She'd been getting more and more irritable as the day passed with no sign of her brother and father in the jungle. Or as Wanda put it, 'silver-haired daddy's bitch' and 'He Who Must Be Neutered'. That last name was one she'd come up with after Lorna and she had come to grips with their sisterly status.

"Ease up Fraulein, we'll get it stuck in once again soon enough." Nightcrawler soothed, putting an arm over her shoulder, squeezing her shoulders companionably. "It will be only a matter of time before they reply to our little attack here."

Suddenly the Scarlet Witch tackled turned under his arm, tackling him into the ground as suddenly a blast of Arctic power went straight over his head had been. "Never tempt fate like that!" She shouted into his ear, before rolling away into the underbrush as Nightcrawler teleported himself away, smirking lightly at the remembered feel of Wanda's form lying on his own.

Where they had just been lying another blast of some kind of energy attack hit the ground. A second later Quicksilver appeared, zooming through the woods towards Nightcrawler's current position. At the same time a group of mutates and a few Brotherhood members attacked out of the broken jungle landscape. Most of them were animal like, two of them, male and female, looking like werewolves, while another looked almost like across between a wolf and a cat in form. They were accompanied by a pack of similar mutates, their eyes blank and their faces set in a rictus snarl.

Two of them however would have been familiar to Nick Fury if he had been there. Laura, or X-23, and Fatale, charged forward behind the more animal-like mutants.

"Take it to the flatscan lovers!" Toad of all people shouted, jumping up toward the snipers. He screamed and fell back when Vanguard threw his shield at him, the edge of it slamming into Toad right between the legs.

"Um, oops, sorry?" Vanguard muttered, leaping up. "Coyote start porting around, concentrate on providing cover fire to the main battle, the rest of us will take this group on up close and personal."

Even as Coyote acknowledged Vanguard leaped off the outcropping, his rifle behind him as the runic array in his hand flashed white, filling it with a plasma gun at his shouted command of "Gun three!"

Landing he hosed the mutates with it on full auto, the sounds a staccato rhythm of 'zzzrrakk' sounds, barely audible over the sound of combat.

Ghigau and Morph closed with the feral mutants Sigyn's gift morphing into a spear, then a sword at Ghigau's mental commands, as Morph's arms morphed at will. "Lupa, Lupo, Thornn, what's up peeps! Chase any good bones lately Thornn? If you haven't I got one for ya!"

"Oh that was just bad." Ghigau muttered, shaking her head from nearby.

Quicksilver had paused, one foot raised in the air as he stared, only to duck as Nightcrawler popped in from having kicked Lupo's face, a fist flashing through where Quicksilver's head had been. "W, Wanda? Wha, what are you doing here!? Why, how'd… why're you out of the Vault!?"

Seeing her brother for the first time in years and hearing that question Wanda lost it completely. She slammed her hands together and with cry and a surge of power her ability to manipulate chaos magic spread out. The trees to either side became whips, slamming into a few mutates. The ground collapsed into mud, the air becoming filled with sparkly bits of pure magic that exploded on contact singing or changing what they touched.

Even Quicksilver collapsed, his footing lost under the wave of unnatural transfiguration that Wanda had caused. She stepped forward staring down at him her face a rictus of anger. "Hello, brother. We have to talk…"

Quicksilver somehow got his feet under him once more, still staring at Wanda, the battle forgotten for a moment. "But, but Father, he… he said you had to stay in the Vault, that your power was too dangerous to let you out, to let you stay with us. But if you've actually learned how to control it… that's wonderful! Is that why you're working with the flatscan lovers, to use them to find us?"

"Hell no you ass-kisser! I joined up to kick your ass, and his too! You can take that whole Mutant Supremacy crap and shove it!" Wanda scowled. "And don't talk to me like you think leaving me in the hellhole was for my own good, the old man just didn't want to deal with my powers, it's that simple."

Wanda scoffed, almost absentmindedly conjuring up a wall of air to slam Lupo back, then flinging a few of her hex bolts at the werewolf-like mutate. "I've never understood why you were so eager to chase after his cloak tails, but I don't care either. Surrender Pietro, and I'll only smack you around a bit. Or," she smirked, her hands still sparking with Chaos magic. "We can do this the hard way."

"Potter must have brainwashed you like he did the Brotherhood in New York!" Quicksilver gasped, shaking his head. "Well don't worry sister, once we get you away from them you'll see things more clearly."

"Pietro you stupid bastard I just said IEE!" that was all Wanda could get out before Pietro almost disappeared, speeding towards her so fast she couldn't target him again.

But Nightcrawler had both anticipated this response and finished off Lupa, teleporting with the female werewolf-like mutate up into the air and dropping her. She might eventually heal from that, but not fast enough to matter to the rest of this fight.

Before Quicksilver could reach her however, he was forced to dodge to one side as Nightcrawler nearly took his feet out from under him. "Sorry mine old enemy, but attacking your family like that is just not on."

"Damn it! Get out of the way blue boy!" Quicksilver barked, zooming towards Nightcrawler, who popped away only to reappear, his fist slamming into the silver-haired man's face with enough force to send him sprawling for a second. But Quicksilver's fist shot out, connecting with Nightcrawler in turn before he could pop away.

"I am a man, a blue man!" Nightcrawler gasped as he came out of his teleportation. But that moment of levity was enough for Quicksilver to target him, not from the front this time. He zoomed away through a few amazingly still upright trees, coming in at an angle as fast as he could go. His arm snapped out, and just as Nightcrawler turned toward him, his arm clotheslined the X-man in the neck, hurling him backwards gagging. That would have crushed any normal human's jugular, but Nightcrawler had quite a bit more durability and strength than any normal man.

Rolling on the ground, Nightcrawler kicked out, catching Quicksilver in the chest when he moved to follow up. As he staggered back, Wanda announced her presence once more, smashing him away from Nightcrawler. "Thanks for the assist Kurt, but this is family business, butt out!"

With that, she turned her magic on Quicksilver, her face set in a grim frown. "Hard way it is Pietro!"

Elsewhere in the battlefield, Shanna led her small rebellion in to aid the snipers, with her, Puck and Logan in the lead. He snarled, roaring aloud as he saw Laura trading slashes with Ghigau, her claws against Ghigau's weapon, which had changed into a hunting dagger to match Laura's close range. Laura looked up, and spotted him, her eyes going wide before a kick sent her skidding away.

Fatale also turned, frowning as she looked first at Logan then at the battle going on beyond them. Exodus had arrived, and above him Magneto. If we don't win this now, no way we will…

OOOOOOO

Exodus hit the battle like a bomb, his patrician face angry at having had to wait so long to join the battle. Before he even touched down he swatted the Human Torch out of his path with the equivalent of a telekinetic slap, lashing out telepathically at the same time, while Darkstar avoided a similar fate with difficulty

That this slap broke every bone in the Human Torch's body despite his flame was immaterial. As was the fact he disappeared between one second and the next, spirited away by the emergency portkey on his suit, which was really proving it's worth today.

His telepathic assault however met with staunch resistance, the attack dying almost as soon as it left his mind, blanketed and confounded. For all his power Exodus lacked experience when it came to telepathic conflict. He couldn't even figure out where the two telepaths facing him were, only that there were two by their differing styles. Nonetheless Exodus' defense was far better than his offense, something he was about to learn.

He plowed into the battle occurring between the Custodes and his own allies like a runaway train, hurling Warpath, Paige, and Thing aside and bolstering his own forces, shattering hundreds of the strange golems with a telekinetic assault that looked like a solar explosion. At the same time he lashed out with his fists, punching the armor clad warrior at the attacker's head aside.

Magma and Rogue closed, with Magma hurling balls of magma before trying to open up a fissure directly underneath him only to watch Exodus bat the magma aside almost contemptuously while at the same time hovering a foot off the ground. Rogue nearly got in place to touch him, but found herself suddenly in the air, then hurled backwards, though it didn't hurt at all, and indeed gave her a bit more strength thanks to having absorbed Shaw's mutant power. "I know of your power X-man Rogue, and I will not let you touch me!" Then he stopped, his forward momentum barely stopped by a blast of force impacting his head.

While Colossus skidded away shaking his head groggily saved from a broken jaw only by his Orihalcum helmet and his own metal-clad hide, Exodus turned in the direction of that blast. He recognized its originator as Cyclops, the field commander of the misguided and brainwashed X-men. Normally Exodus would have some sympathy for him, seeing him as merely a tool of the arch race traitor Xavier, but now, seeing the X-men here with the other race traitors the so-called Custodes, he knew Cyclops had willingly chosen to stand with humanity against his own race, and the idea of sympathy went out the window. "Die traitor!"

A blast of telekinetic force lashed out from his hand towards Cyclops, a blast of such power that the X-men's leader probably would have been turned into a pile of offal despite his Orihalcum reinforced suit if it had landed. It didn't because it was intercepted by a blast of equal or greater power in the form of a gigantic punch of telekinetic fire as Phoenix soared across the battlefield. "Why don't you pick on someone in your own weight class asshole!"

Phoenix's own telekinetic assault lashed out again, smashing Exodus off the ground and away from the main battle despite his hastily reinforced telekinetic shields, the chief Acolyte having no time to embed himself into the ground. He was unharmed, but that hadn't been Phoenix's chief objective, no her job was to take him out of the main battle once again, he'd already done enough damage.

Seconds later after Guardian had replaced the golems lost Magneto appeared, several large ferrous or metal giants moving forward at the same time to combat Guardian's golems. While those golems began to do battle with their counterparts, he sent out a column of energy blasting Havok backwards and using his magnetic power to hurl both Colossus and Paige into Magma.

The Kentucky native pushed herself groaning to her feet and Colossus grunted in pain, noticing his broken arm while the two leaders slammed into one another in midair over the main battle, a beam of pure magic slammed out into Magneto's electromagnetic shields. "Cyclops, you've got command for now, wait until myself, Storm or Phoenix return."

Ahead of Guardian, Magneto's shields held but buckled, forcing Magneto to pour more of his strength into them, losing control of the metal behemoths he had brought into the fight and the thousands of metal and ferrous material spears he'd slowly been gathering once more after Polaris' unexpected confrontation. A wave of Harry's hands transfigured those into glass, hurling them into packets of Sun People who had tried to form gun emplacements here and there in the riven jungle battlefield.

Then Magneto lashed out, slamming a blast of electromagnetic power into Guardian, and he lost the ability to concentrate on the battle at large. "Good luck Cyclops!" He spat through the com gear in his helmet before he began to press his attack against Magneto.

OOOOOOO

Elsewhere Phoenix found herself smashed out of the sky by Exodus, who had suddenly teleported right into hand to hand range. Only her reinforcing her shield had protected Jean from taking more damage. That and the number of spells Harry had layered her with and her uniform's Orihalcum reinforcement. Note to self, don't let this bastard close the range!

While smashing Exodus away from her physically, Phoenix also attempted a physic assault, she felt she had the measure of her opponent's ability given her hasty reinforcement of Diamond a moment ago and was willing to chance it. On the psychic plane a wave of telepathic fire arced out and away from her tentacle tree protected mind, only to run into a wall of adamantine power. Damn it!

Her assault encompassed that defense, looking for some chink in its armor, but Exodus' mind was inviolate, and he lashed out in turn both physically and mentally, splitting his concentration in a way that Phoenix had to match. His own attack beat back her telekinetic assault though his physical assault lost to her own and he slammed into the ground of the jungle, the jungle's growth around them flattening and searing into ash in an instant.

On the astral plain the fires of Jean's assault was banked swiftly, and she hastily threw up the psychic equivalent of a firewall, not trusting her Belsham tree to defend her from an attack of that magnitude. The two of them attempted a few subtler probes while their main assaults were stymied against one another, but there Phoenix's belsham-trees saw her through, snagging and smashing Exodus's probes, ripping them into pieces before they could break her second line of defense. At the same time however, her own assault couldn't get through the adamantine wall of Exodus' will.

Realizing she couldn't win this battle on the astral plain Jean left the fire wall in place, devoting a bit of her mental ability to keeping it up while concentrating on the material plain for now. Their telekinetic duel became even fiercer for a time, with Exodus attempting to close using his teleportation ability matched with her ability to track his mind just enough to keep one step away from him. Then Exodus made a mistake.

His own attack on Jean's mind might have failed, but he had felt something in her body: two other, slowly forming living souls. "I can feel the lives growing within you Phoenix. Do not worry, I am not a monster who would paint the child for the treason of the mother to her race. I will make certain to extract your ovum from your corpse. They will be raised by the Acolytes to follow the righteous path of Homo Superior supremacy."

Jean saw red. Not only was this bastard so blasé about his eventual victory, but he had threatened to brainwash her children afterward! Hell, she could swear she felt the Phoenix respond, too! Her anger merged with her power, breaking what little restraint Jean had on her power and a sudden punch of telekinetic power smashed through Exodus' shields, smashing into his jaw, retaining enough power to pulverize his jaw and most of his teeth in his mouth.

"You fucking DARE!" Phoenix roared, her voice a mix of an angry lioness protecting her cubs and a bird of prey such that any animal in hearing range, even the dinosaurs, froze in atavistic terror.

Her opponent didn't, but even as he tried to reinforce his shields and his healing factor, one better than even Logan's, went to work, a second blow smashed into those shields. This wasn't a jab however, but a battering ram of force that impacted his chest, flinging him upward into the air and continuing as Phoenix followed, keeping her attack going crushing his ribs, as she closed somewhat.

Before Exodus could counteract their momentum Phoenix's assault smashed him into the roof of the massive cavern that encapsulated the Savage Land, protecting it from the outside world and the normal artic weather. That ceiling of rock was miles thick, no one knew how dense. But the rock gave way behind Exodus' body as he continued to try and break free of his opponent's assault, only succeeding as he burst out into the Artic sunlight.

Ignoring the arctic cold which would have killed any normal man in short order, Exodus fell to his knee for a moment before angrily pushing to his feet, lashing out only to see Phoenix actually dodge his assault, returning fire with her own telekinetic blast. He tried to teleport towards her, only to smash his fist into some kind of mixed telepathic/telekinetic illusion of some sort. While Phoenix couldn't' get through to his mind, she could use the her own telekinetic powers to obscure herself as well as using her telepathic powers to hide precisely where she was, and she did so now.

As the battle continued and Exodus began to use his teleportation power more often, she even created a type of body double made out of her telekinetic power, encapsulating a Phoenix fire assault. This proved horrendously effective when Exodus tried to punch through it. Despite his body's durability and his own telekinetic shield, the power of the Phoenix fire got through, incinerating his arm from the elbow down.

"GRAH!" he roared in agony, and as Phoenix tried to press in lashed out from below her, slamming her up and away. While his healing ability went to work on reconstituting his arm on the atomic level, he threw all of his power into that attack, smashing Phoenix up and through the stratosphere as her assault had previously done to him.

Jean somehow felt many of Harry's defense spells fail all around her body as she grit her teeth, blood flowing from her eyes and mouth as her body couldn't deal with the amount of power she was putting out for a second before that same power began to heal her, imitating her opponent's healing ability but needing her to direct it whereas his did not.

A second later she threw off the attack, righting herself only to find the attack had smashed her out into space. Good, out here there's no chance of us accidentally incinerating anything important, like oh, the rest of the Antarctic!

She had barely a second to formulate her next attack before Exodus was on her, his own powers encapsulating his body with enough air to fly as easily through space as she could. His arm had finished reconstituting itself, and he felt he had the measure of her now. "You are powerful Phoenix, I can see that, but you are no match for me! My sympathy for your unborn children will not save you!"

"Keep jawing fucker!" Phoenix growled back then lashed out as he did the same, their telekinetic powers blasting into one another with enough force to shatter continents now that they were out in space, neither holding back any more. Indeed many of the world powers could now detect the outpouring of energy they were putting off, and many, including a certain one-eyed professions paranoiac wondered what the hell was happening.

Not that either of the people involved had any thought to spare for that. They matched one another blow for blow, with Phoenix retreating as she had to keep the range open, unwilling to let Exodus use his greater physical abilities against her as he had once already. Aided by the few remaining spells on her, Phoenix's own attacks began to get through Exodus' shields. Despite his massive amounts of power, he didn't quite have the endurance Jean did, thanks to her training and, it must be said, her status as an Avatar.

His healing ability and teleportation continually acted to keep her own her toes, and she gritted her teeth more than once as his attacks got through her power once or twice, but the stalemate continued for more than fifteen minutes as they tried to batter their way through one another's defenses. But if the material plane had devolved into a pure power exchange, the renewed telepathic battle was a thing of leverage, of two judo masters attempting to throw one another off-balance enough to get in a killing or disabling blow.

Once again the living nature of Jean's second layer of defenses served her well. She could afford to concentrate more on her own attacks because her Belsham-trees were mostly self-sustaining by this point, able to snag the bits of Exodus' power that got through her fire wall. Her own assault couldn't quite get through the wall protecting Exodus' mind, but she was still pressing in against it, forcing him to divert some of his attention.

And that, in the end was what finally ended the battle, the number of things the two of them could concentrate on at one time, and Jean's ability to plan just a little bit ahead while Exodus mostly relied on his instincts. Between one dodge of a physical attack and the next, Jean moved her body just slightly, covering her previous position with another TK illusion hiding a Phoenix fire assault.

She hadn't moved enough to let Exodus sense it, his ability to find her mind having become too good for that to work. She had simply adjusted her position upward somewhat, the illusion encapsulating her legs. A punch that would have smashed into her head smashed into her leg, shattering both Harry's few remaining defensive spells and her own shields before crushing the bones within it rather than her skull as Exodus had hoped.

Then the TK bomb of Phoenix fire exploded, incinerating Exodus' arm up to the elbow despite his own shields and durability just as Jean, gritting her teeth from the agony of his assault, struck both on the material and psychic plane. The pain of that attack and the need to split his attention cost Exodus, and for just an instant his physical shields slipped as he hurled her telepathic attack back. His other arm rose, smashing into Jean's shoulder, shattering it despite her TK shield, Harry's defensive spells and the Orihalcum in her suit.

"RAAHH!" Jean screamed not reinforcing her shoulder, rather throwing her strength into an attack. This attack was not a battering ram but a single claw of TK force, slicing instead of smashing into Exodus' defenses. Those defenses might have withstood that assault if Exodus had been able to concentrate on it, but he couldn't and her claw carved into his shields, then his body, slicing into his eye and the brain behind it.

Yet even that Exodus' healing ability could have dealt with. If Jean hadn't immediately followed up with another rapier of power, slicing into his faltering shields right over his heart. His heart exploded under her attack, and Jean reached out, crushing his body as his mind began to shut down from the agony he was feeling. And she didn't stop, Phoenix Fire searing away at Exodus' form until there was nothing left, not a single cell on top of another.

As his body finally disappeared under her assault, Jean sent out a probe through the psychic plane, ignoring her exhaustion to make certain that nothing of her opponent lingered. Only when she was certain nothing remained of Exodus did Phoenix let her power fade, exhaustion and pain setting in. Not a one of Harry's defensive spells remained, her suit was ruptured in places, and the ribs along one side of her body hurt like fire, indicating they were at least broken, just like her thigh bone. It was only Harry's spells that had kept her from taking internal injuries from that last blow, and Jean was more thankful than she had ever thought she would be for his paranoia.

It took her more than a few moments to concentrate through the agony of her injuries to do more than keep a sphere of air around her. When she did, Jean didn't immediately turn her attention to get back to the Savage Land and the battle occurring there. No, her thoughts turned to what Exodus had said to enrage her so near the start of their own engagement.

"Minds, as in plural?" She murmured, unheard by any, one hand moving to rest protectively over her stomach, which, she was assured, would begin to show her pregnancy within the next few weeks. Jean wasn't looking forward to that, but even so… "Heh, I wonder what Harry will think of that…"

OOOOOOO

In the battle between Harry and Magneto it was Harry who was attempting to close with his opponent and Magneto who had to keep the range open and was facing his opponent's ability to apparate. The one time he had allowed Harry to stay within striking distance Magneto had paid for it with a couple cracked ribs despite his ability to channel his powers into his body making him nearly as durable as Colossus sans his Juggernaut armor and even his forcefield, which had given way under the blow for just an instant. Magneto's own ability to teleport away was all that saved him from an ignominious defeat right then and there.

Despite all he had learned about Harry's attacks in their first engagement he could not match the sheer scope of those abilities, only able to overcome or dodge them at his best. His ability to read his opponent's body language gave him an edge in anticipating Harry's attacks, but not their type. He could locate Potter easily enough thanks to being able to localize his electromagnetic signature, but couldn't grasp and use that field, making Potter's attempts to hide or use illusions useless. But Potter learned that quickly, and began to hide real attacks mixed in with illusions, or scattered conjured attacks among same.

Magneto's reflexes, which he could enhance well beyond human norm thanks to his speeding up the electromagnetic signals in his brain, were enough to keep him from being overwhelmed, but it was a near run thing a time or two. His shield was called upon more often than he would have liked, and Magneto was quickly realizing that he wasn't the only one whose repertoire had grown since their first clash. Damn you Sauron, if you were here to aid me this would be much simpler!

The two of them teleported across the landscape, engaging and disengaging quickly, throwing direct attacks at one another and attempting to get through their opponents defenses with little success at first. A few bruising attacks got through, but nothing decisive. Worse for Magneto though he didn't know it, was that Harry was still holding back a lot of his attack spells just in case he'd need them later.

About five minutes after their first clash, the two of them hovered near Magneto's citadel, staring at one another across the empty air between them, waiting for their opponent to make the first move.

Magneto slowly shook his head. "Potter, why do you fight me? All I have done is for the good of mutantkind! Look at this place, a haven safe from the outside world and now entirely ours! Think on it, a hidden base from which we can launch our war of genetic superiority without fear of reprisal."

As Harry hovered there silent, Magneto went on, his tone that of a father trying to reason with a son. "Can you not see that your attempts to guarantee equality for mutantkind is doomed to failure? You made some progress I'll admit, but much of it was reversed because of that madman in the Asian Ocean. And what of the Middle East, Africa, the Southern Americas?"

He went on, taking Potter's silence as an excuse. "Your movement lacks numbers, I have those numbers! You lack conviction, conviction to do what is needed, I can provide that. Only united can mutantkind stand against those who would oppress us. Only through force can we take our rightful place."

"Rightful place?" Harry asked his voice cold.

"Yes! Only by being on top, by forcing humanity to realize we are their betters can true peace be achieved! Only by conquest can mutantkind be saved from its genetic inferior! Humanity's time is at an end, the future belongs to Homo Superior!" Magneto shouted, his eyes burning with the power of his vision.

"If your genetics make you so special, why did you need to use technology to create your mutates? If you're so superior, what does it say that you have to resort to near genocide here in the Savage Land to get your way?" Harry asked. "My god man, I might have made fun of you for it the last time, but you really do sound like Hitler, you know that?"

"I am nothing like that monster!" Magneto roared in fury lashing out with an electromagnetic blast of power, a PPC stream that cut through the air between them, forcing Harry to dodge. At the same time, he reached out, attempting to use his power directly on Harry's body once more, only to find his power unable to get through Harry's magical shielding. "How dare you say that, you who never lived through the Holocaust, you who are a mutant in name only!? You know nothing of suffering!"

Harry laughed hollowly, suddenly stopping in place, his hand coated with magic smashing Magneto's next attack out of the sky. "I know nothing of suffering? You know, if I at all respected you, I might try to explain how wrong you are. But as it is, I'm just done listening to you!"

With that Harry went on the attack. "Rifela, Diffindo, Neque Hasta et Longinus!" Hidden among area effect transfiguration spells and several dozen illusions from his other hand these three attacks homed in on Magneto in a matter of seconds. Worse however were the blasts of pure magic power, energy and force given bare form and sent at Magneto.

Unlike the first time they fought Magneto's shield held this time against the penetrating attack Rifela, and he dodged the cutting spell easily. When he attempted to use one of his wormhole-based teleportations to get away from the condensed explosive spell however, he found the wormhole actually sucked in the explosion around him for some reason, hurling him out at an angel from where he had hoped to appear though not penetrating his shield. Magneto's own attack, a series of charged particle blasts and metal shrapnel ripped from the ground beneath Potter, went awry, only catching him with the edge of their impact, which wasn't enough to get through his shield.

The two of them once more danced around one another, Harry attempting to close once more behind a myriad of illusions and transfigurations while Magneto kept his distance, attempting to find some way of getting through Harry's shields. His attempts to disappear using his power to bend visible light failed, Harry able to follow his movement by use of low-level Shatter Shakers and watching for where the magical waves bounced off clear air. Harry's attempt to do the same also failed, having no spell to cover his body's electromagnetic signature even if he could prevent Harry from using it.

In response Magneto tried to change the gravitational field of the planet directly under Harry, making him hundreds of times heavier. Harry grimaced, but his Magia Erebea allowed him to survive this and he quickly cast a levitation spell on himself, cutting off the effect of the enhanced gravity while lashing out.

Magneto was then forced to dodge as the trees around him suddenly reached for him, ignoring a few that were obvious illusions only to nearly get impaled as Harry switched out an illusion with a real spike of diamond at the last second. Ducking under that assault he felt the spear clip the top of his helmet and growled angrily, redoubling his assault. Using his ability to manipulate electromagnetism he fired off blasts of power at his enemy, trying to keep Harry still long enough to force him to the ground. Need to limit his mobility somehow!

It was Harry's turn to dodge and teleport away from danger, and he did so, only to run into Magneto's next attack. Harry looked around to see several small silos in the ground around the citadel open, and out came the nukes Morph had told him about. There were only twelve of them, not the dozens he had feared but even so it was a horrifying sight. Magneto hurled them all at Harry, who was able to transfigure two of them before Magneto threw up a shield around Harry and the missiles enclosing them both and then reached out, manipulating the missiles' detonators into exploding.

The nuclear explosion was magnificent, hurling Harry away with a cry of pain to embed into the side of the citadel. Which, since most of it had been made by Magneto, was metal. The sides of the dent all around Harry moved swiftly to entrap him as Magneto hurled himself forward eager to end this fight. "Die Potter!"

But Harry wasn't nearly as hurt as Magneto had expected. His Magia Erebea given durability and his Orihalcum enhanced crysis suit saw him through the worst of the attack with only a few capillaries in his eyes and his mask having broken in place. He was battered, bruised, but very much alive, and had yet to unleash his full magical power just yet. Now with the nukes dealt with, it's time to end this.

The metal around Harry transfigured into diamond again, a mix of a transfiguration spell and his Terraemotus offensive spell, hurling towards Magneto who despite his surprise at Guardian's survival batted them aside or took them on his shield, only to blink in shock as Harry apparated right into his face before Magneto could track him. A Fulgur Plumbum slammed into Magneto's shields from point blank range powered by as much magical strength as Harry could put into it, and Magneto's shield popped for a split second, leaving him open to Harry's next assault.

This wasn't so much a spell as pure magic, a magic blast with a barely formed idea of CUT behind it. But the power of it was such that it made nearly any actual cutting spell pale in comparison

And it hit Magneto right above the waistline, cutting him neatly in two despite his power's reinforcing his body. "GAHHHH!"

Magneto's body fell from the sky in two pieces, slamming into the side of his citadel a few times as he did, each time screaming out in renewed agony. Normally he could have used his power to hover or reach out to the metal of his citadel to halt his momentum somehow. But the pain from being literally cut in half overcame even Magneto's ability to control his powers. Magneto never even saw where his legs landed, having dropped straight down unlike his upper body.

He slammed into the ground with another cry of agony, as his helmet, a helmet that, Harry noticed had like Morph said changed to more resemble a crown complete with a ring of golden spikes along the top, rolled off his head, coming to rest nearby.

Harry landed nearby, reaching down to pick it up, looking at it contemptuously as his suit's mask disapeared. "Heavy is the head that wears the crown Eric. You always saw yourself as a savior, the ruler of all mutantkind, never admitting anyone else could have any clue as to how best to lead 'your' people. But instead of trying to simply save them, you wanted to reverse what you saw as the racist status quo, putting mutants on top. I can understand it, but I could never condone that idea."

"I, I, all I wanted was what best for mutant kind. To, to protect us all. Not, not another Holocaust, never again…" Eric said, concentrating on the words to get them out, his body barely being sustained by his powers now in some fashion Harry didn't understand. Either that, or it was sheer will power that drove the other man on, something Harry could respect. "I, never again, no…"

"You were blinded by your fears, and your fear turned you into something you hated." Harry said, no feeling rather sad it had to come to this. "I wish it could've been different, but you proved how far you'd go here in the Savage Land if you hadn't already."

"S, spare me, P, Potterrrrr…." Eric coughed, getting the energy to glare from somewhere. "You, you don't know, don't, don't know…"

"I know pain, I know death, and I know suffering Eric." Harry said, simply weary now. "I also know that no matter what side of the coin you're on, oppression and terror in the name of race, genetics, or some supposed superiority is never the answer."

He raised a hand and Eric continued to glare as another cutting spell lanced out, slicing through his neck, detaching his head from his shoulders cleanly.

OOOOOOO

Gambit shook his head as he turned away from the screen, having just watched Magneto's death. That guy, Potter, he's not one I'd like to tangle with. Time to get the hells out of dodge I think.

Having just arrived himself, he was in no position to warn Magneto or aid him or any of the others. Not like he was going to either, no getting involved in a direct confrontation between the Custodes and Magneto's faction wasn't what he was being paid for. Sinister wanted me as a spy and to retrieve his little creation, time I best be doing that and moving on I think.

Moving through the corridors of the Citadel, he quickly descended through the metal and concrete portion deep into the small rocky outcrop that had been carved into the original Sun People's citadel over time. Here, surprisingly away from the more ferrous material of the newer construction, were a few of the Magneto's most secret projects.

He was stopped halfway there by one of the Tech Team, Brainchild. A mutate, he was somewhere between a true positive response to the mutate program and a failure. He had developed a mutated brain, which gave him the intelligence of a genius and the computational skills of a computer, but emotionally he had become almost stunted, reverting to acting like a petulant child at times.

This was not one of those times. "Gambit, there you are! We've lost, though I calculate you know that already, why else would you be down here? You must be looking for a hidden way to escape, of course you are. You always seem to want to keep your options open don't you?"

"Yeah, that be 'bout the right of it mate," Gambit said, narrowing his eyes at the smaller man with his overlarge head.

"Good, we'll escape together. I have seen all of Potter's impact on the world at large, I can analyze his overall goals, what he will do to achieve them and what he will never allow, there is no place for me here no matter how kind he might be to those he's defeated. No, no, no!" Brainchild shrieked suddenly. "No, I want my toys, I want to conquer!"

Before he could return to normal, Gambit had flung a small card at him it's edge sharpened and empowered by his mutant ability. The card impacted Brainchild's overlarge head, exploding with as much concussive force as three grenades. Brainchild's head exploded like an overripe melon and his body fell backwards, dead. "Been savin' that for any of the strong-arm men I might be meetin' on mah way out, but that don't seem too likely now. Sorry Brainy, but Ah got no time fer you."

Luckily Brainchild was the only one he met as he made his way down into the caverns beneath the citadel. Unfortunately this was because Harry had sent a dozen mud golems into the citadel to take prisoners, something mud golems were uniquely suited for despite being energy consumptive, not very fast or intelligent enough to take orders beyond the first one given. They captured the rest of the tech team with little trouble, and several of them began to make their way down from the top of the citadel, cutting Gambit off from the surface.

Two near disasters and he was running now, scared of being discovered before he could get out and travelling further away from the entrance. Several minutes of this passed but he was able to leave them behind for now as he found the hidden lab.

There he found the two projects he was here for. One was a young boy, around twelve, in a cryogenic tube. He had white hair and looked a lot like Magneto, almost as if the boy was his son. He wasn't though the truth was close to that, if much stranger.

Pietro had severely underwhelmed Magneto as an heir. So Eric had decided to make another by the 'simple' expedient of cloning himself using technology he had stolen from one of Sinister's bases, though Eric did not know who had owned said company.

The other was a young redheaded woman who was hooked up to an IV, barely conscious. "Ah there you are Cher." Gambit breathed, reaching down to pull the Iv out of her arm slowly, putting a small bandage on the area when he was finished. With that done he raced over to the computers, downloading everything on them into a small handheld computer of his own before erasing everything on them then destroying what was left.

As he finished the girl woke up, blinking her green eyes at him. "Wh, who, what's going on?"

"Covered all the bases there didn't you mon 'cher?" Gambit laughed nervously, looking over his shoulder toward the door as he heard a now familiar 'shloop, shloop' sound of a mud golem moving down the corridor. "Come on, we gotta get out of 'ere."

"Gambit, right? Magneto introduced you before he began to, to find out what my mutant power was beyond blocking anyone else out of my mind." The girl sat up groggily, shaking her head. "Did he have any luck?"

"Not as much as he'd hoped, but enough. But Magneto's gone now, Madelyne and we gotta go or we'll be joining him. So unless you want to meet the Custodes Mundi up close'n personal, I suggest you get a move on."

Watching the girl nod Gambit breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently some of the hypnosis the girl had been put under had taken despite her mental defenses. That was good, and probably a sign of his employer's influence on the girl before released. Chemicals could influence her far easier than normal people despite her mental defenses, which was just the tip of the iceberg. "Now come 'ere cher, I'm gettin' the both of us outta here."

Madelyne nodded docilely, moving toward him and taking Gambit's hand. He looked over at the cryo-tube, and was about to drag her towards it, but the 'shloop, shloop' noise reached the door, and a muddy fist slammed into the doorway, denting it. Madelyne gasped, and Gambti scowled. "No time, blast it!"

He reached into a pocket, pulling out a signal device, which sent out a powerful signal to a waiting transceiver which piggybacked out into the group of radio devices that the Tech Team had used to gather information on the world at large. As the door gave way to the mud golem's assault, the two of them suddenly disappeared into the device.

They would reappear moments later in a little country of the west coast of Africa.

OOOOOOO

After Exodus and Magneto were dealt with the main battle was a veritable pushover. It had turned into a rout when Ororo rejoined the battle, and ended for the most part when Jean and Harry returned to it having dealt with their opponents.

The aftermath of the Savage Campaign, the name coined for the battles against Magneto's faction by Colossus or Cyclops though neither were willing to admit to it, was ugly. But not nearly as ugly as it would have been had Harry, Kitty and Ororo not put emergency portkey arrays into the suits of every member of the Custodes and X-men, including their newcomers. Yet even with that and the FF's aid there were too many wounded for Harry to like.

Evan, Carol, Banshee and Johnny were the worst off by a wide margin. A concussion was one thing magic could not heal, only time so not even Ororo could do much for Carol's concussion, despite having healed the majority of her other wounds. Not without leaving a few scars, which Harry's salves cleaned up.

Johnny's injuries were worse, but still they healed his bones and skin easily enough. His internal bleeding and ruptured lungs were tougher, but Ororo handled them, while Harry healed Banshee's burns and other hurts.

Evan too was healed relatively quickly, but he didn't seem to bounce back as the others had. Unlike the others he hadn't been that badly injured before in his life. And it had happened so suddenly, without Evan being able to protect himself at all. Harry knew that would leave a mark on him, but Scott had noticed the same thing Harry and promised to be there for the younger man if need be, as did Ororo.

Thunderbird had a shattered ulna and a mangled hand which was tricky, as was Colossus' warped forearm, but Ororo could deal with them, despite Colossus muttering of 'Why is it always me?'

The rest of Nikolai's team had various wounds none serious, though Nightcrawler was complaining of a sore throat from Pietro's attempt to decapitate him via clothesline, and had taken a long gash to his jaw from something in the heat of battle.

On the other hand Pietro wasn't going anywhere for a while. Realizing her brother had no magical immunity and didn't exhibit any kind of immunity to her mutant power based on their sibling relationship like Alex and Scott had, Wanda had banished his knee caps. And his elbows. Right out of his body.

She was going to do his teeth one at a time but Kurt had stopped her, and then had Ghigau knock the man out. They had captured both him and Toad, though the Blob had died in the battle, his brain box vaporized by a joint attack by Havok and Cyclops that had overwhelmed his bodies immense durability.

When Ororo told Kurt she could make the gash on his jaw disappear, Kurt waved the offer off. "The chicks dig war wounds, ya?"

Judging by how Wanda had looked at him when he said that, the jury was still out on whether or not that was true.

The fact Ororo also had a new scar from her fight with the sorceress and had refused to have it erased did not surprise any of her lovers. "Our scars are part of what makes us who we are after all." Nor did the fact she had left the former high priestess as a greasy stain on the landscape

The rest of the teams had taken bruises, scattered broken bones despite their suits, but not many. The Orihalcum could take a lot of punishment, though Harry made a note on working with Reed to put together a better shock absorbing layer later on (and, he knew, not for the first time, but maybe he would get some of these backlogged projects done in the near future). Now however he had to deal with everything else.

Leaving the wounded for now, Ororo and Harry returned to the Savage Land where they met with Logan and Shanna, or whatever her name was. The two of them, with the young claw user Laura and her partner Fatale strangely enough, explained what had been going on from their perspective, which dovetailed for the most part with what Morph and Wendy had supplied them with. The fact Laura was standing so close to Logan was odd too, but Harry frankly had no interest in what the cause could be at this point.

The strange thing was that other than Fatale the three wanted to stay here in the Savage Land. Shanna was the de-facto leader of the tribe of cave-men who were now the largest surviving faction in the Savage Land and had good relations with the Cat People, who were the next largest surviving group. Both were willing to leave Harry and his people alone, provided they didn't go out of their way to destroy the jungle where they both lived. Harry was fine with that, the resources of the Savage Land were immense, but very few of them were to be found in the jungle.

"Oh, paleontologists etc. might go gaga for what's out there, but I've already got sources for metal, rare materials and so forth, so the idea of mining doesn't really interest me. No, what is here is space which I can turn to farmland, and the secret hidden haven Magneto thought this place would be for mutants when he began his war." Harry shook his head. "Despite the progress we've made, that might still be necessary for more mutants than I can house in Camelot, that much at least Magneto had right."

"He might've had it right Potter, but don't forget the methods he was willing to use." Logan growled, causing Harry to nod agreement, remembering the cryotube they'd found in the citadel. The young boy inside it would be taken out eventually, but only after Dr. Druid, Amelia and Una all looked him over as much as they could.

Who he was or why he looked so much like Pietro none could say, but they had ideas. Wanda for example was convinced he was some kind of clone of her father, but was determined to see if he had any of Magneto's memories before passing judgments. Lorna didn't care one way or another, not waiting to have anything more to do with anything connected to Magneto. Meeting the man had been a severe let down. Pietro was horrified, and wanted 'the little brat dead!'. The silver haired young man, no longer a teen, had major inadequacy issues.

"In any event, even that is beside the point to the technology here. Not just Magneto's but those tech spires that Magneto couldn't access. Alien tech for certain, but what it's doing here and for how long, that will be the question. I am going to hire a lot of tech people, hit them with as many spells to keep secrets as I can and then throw them at this, unless…" Harry turned away, cocking his eyebrow at Reed and Jean.

"Hell no." They both replied then Reed went on. "Harry even I have limits to the number of projects I can concentrate on at any one time. I am already working on my own projects and several dozen of yours, no."

"Me too Harry, sorry. My times taken up by the team, my own projects, my job as chief engineer for Arc Technologies, and well…" Jean actually flushed slightly, gesturing down to her stomach. "This is going to start taking up a lot of my time and cutting into my mobility soon."

"I was just joking, love, I actually just wanted the two of you to sit down and go over the scientists we've already hired. Find five, then I'll meet with them, have them hire a larger team and have them work on those spires."

They both nodded relieved, and Harry went on seriously. "But Jean, I want you Emma and Sage to work on the technology Magneto left here. I want it cleared of booby traps. Let Emma take what info she can find from the prisoner's minds, and hopefully you'll find some things to add to our own tech base."

Emma and Jean exchanged a glance then nodded as one, exchanging thoughts via telepathy for a moment before Emma replied for them both. "We can do that. Will you be using whatever else we find in their trials?"

Despite the mud golems, There weren't many actual prisoners. Outside of those Wendy had been able to talk around, only around five people, Acolytes, Brotherhood and mutates, had been taken alive. The mutates for the most part had fought until they were killed. Among the mutates who had taken to the mutation process, only a woman named Lorelei had been captured to join the others.

"Yes." Harry sighed. "We'll try them all for any crimes they committed. Banshee, work with them, you know what to look for, what questions to ask to force them to implicate themselves. Then I want you to see if you can figure out who is missing. We know Gambit was the only one to get away, but did he do so alone, and if so, how? I want to know."

Banshee nodded and Harry turned to the tall, powerfully built woman in barbarian garb. "Shanna, you represent the people of the Savage Lands. I'll turn any who did more than simply fight your troops cleanly over to you, and you'll sit with me on the tribunal."

"Agreed Chief Potter. My people, the Cats and any other survivors out there will follow you. You freed us, you promise us your protection, and will not interfere with our ways of life. That is all we can ask now that we have to share the Savage Land with those from beyond." Shanna replied.

Harry nodded, understanding the seriousness of that statement but not wanting to deal with it just yet, going on. "As for those who committed crimes elsewhere…"

Harry sighed once more, his emerald eyes growing cold. "Those we will deal with if we think those countries are unable or unwilling to. Magneto, I don't think he was involved in backing the various pro-mutant violence we've seen of late, not enough of these people knew what was going on for that, and getting messages out and in from the Savage Land is too tough for that. Someone else is out there, and I refuse to let Quicksilver, or our other prisoners out where they could be broken free then recruited. And if their crimes warrant it…"

He trailed off but none of his listeners needed him to fill in the blanks. None of them were happy about it for various reasons, but even Reed could understand the necessity. Only Emma however smiled, if grimly. And so Harry takes one more step to being king, if not solely of mutantkind anymore.

"On a lighter note, I think you might want to speak to Wendy and the youngsters she talked into following her. I talked to them myself, and I think they will all fit in well in Camelot." Ororo said.

"And on an even lighter note, I have some news Harry…" Jean said, smiling and taking his hand placing it gently on top of her stomach.