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….
Erik Lehnsherr, somewhat later.
The man woke up with his head resting on something soft. His eyelids lifted with difficulty, revealing a vaguely familiar ceiling to his eyes… a helicopter cabin.
How he ended up here remained a mystery to which his memory stubbornly refused to provide an answer, but attempting to sit up sent a jolt of pain through the back of his head.
"Hello, Erik," a painfully familiar voice greeted him, immediately triggering an avalanche of memories.
"Charles…" the mutant pronounced, savoring every sound, slowly assuming a sitting position.
There was no helmet on his head. On the opposite side of the helicopter cabin lay an unconscious Mystique, and Toad lay like a sack in the aisle between the seats.
"So, you outplayed me," exiting the cabin, he indeed found Xavier, behind whom stood one of his students. The one with the blood-red visor on his face.
"Who was that?" Not thinking about using his powers, even though there was plenty of metal around, Magneto touched the back of his head with a smile.
"I'm afraid you won't take my word for it," his vis-à-vis returned the friendly smile mirror-like.
"Why is that?"
"It's hard to believe that fairy tales from history textbooks have real roots beneath them," his old friend replied obscurely. "I will tell you about him with pleasure, but right now we have a more pressing problem."
"Yes," every hint of amusement vanished from the mutant's face. "You prevented me from securing the future of our species."
"I prevented you from making the most terrible mistake of your life," the telepath shook his head negatively. "If your plan had succeeded, not only the leaders of over two hundred countries but the entire population of New York would have perished, unable to survive the forced mutation." Charles leaned closer, looking him in the eyes seriously and without any falseness.
"Erik, your invention does not make ordinary people mutants; it initiates the mutation gene that is already present in the human organism…"
The friend's narrative dragged on for a long time.
Senator Kelly survived the fall into the rocky surf from twenty feet and managed to swim several miles to shore, only to die before his kidnapper's eyes, disintegrating into several liters of water on a medical table.
The video recording was made right during their conversation with Charles, and Magneto saw the whole process with his own eyes on the laptop screen.
One could suspect a setup, but such brazen lies were never his friend's style.
Furthermore, the new information about the latent X-gene was not something Xavier would joke about.
If even for a minute one assumed the friend's prognosis was correct and the fate of Kelly awaited all those irradiated… after such destruction of a multi-million city and world leaders, the Mandatory Registration Act would seem like a child's toy. Mutants would simply start being shot on sight.
"I understand you, Charles," Magneto replied after considering the revealed information. "But it still changes nothing. I will continue our fight."
"I know," Xavier replied wearily.
"Turning me in to the authorities?" Erik smirked ironically with half his face.
"You kidnapped Senator Kelly and killed his assistant," Charles sighed, growing gloomy and bestowing a condemning look upon him. "But I doubt I can prove it after the witness's death."
"And if you don't want to attract attention to your school," Lehnsherr's smile widened.
"I believe you are wrong, Erik," his friend's blue eyes looked tenaciously, "but… recently I was told that the world needs both of us, and I must agree with that point of view. I cannot become a leader for mutants of the entire world if we truly have to fight for survival. But you can. I will let you go, but I ask you, Erik, do not resort to radical measures if they can be avoided. The war has not started yet. We must not be the ones who fire the first shot. The ones who bear the responsibility."
"I won't make promises," the Master of Magnetism shook his head.
"But you can promise to try," the telepath didn't back down.
"Yes," this time Magneto nodded. "You know my opinion, the war is already ongoing; it simply hasn't transitioned into the hot phase. But I won't do anything that could harm mutants."
"I hope so."
"Since we have reached an agreement," feeling the tension release for the first time since the conversation began, the leader of the Brotherhood of Mutants switched to a warmer tone, "allow me to ask now."
"Of course," Xavier accepted the tone, closing his eyelids placatingly.
"What happened to Sabretooth? Was it from him that you learned of my plans?"
"No," Charles shook his head. "I'm sorry, but when he attacked the car Rogue was traveling in, his head was cut off."
"How?" Lehnsherr was genuinely surprised. Hearing such an admission from Xavier, who rejected casualties, was akin to meeting the real Santa, and even the latter would have surprised the elderly mutant less.
"He was unlucky," the telepath pursed his lips. "Traveling with Rogue on that road was a certain… man. With very complicated abilities. Realizing that Sabretooth was capable of regenerating injuries, he decided to end the fight in the most… reliable way."
"Was he the one pretending to be the girl on the train?" Magneto guessed immediately, not believing such significant situations could be coincidences.
"Yes, that was him," his old friend confirmed the expectations. "His name is Loki, and according to his claims, which I have every reason to believe, he is a real God from Asgard…"
….
Strangely enough, the story of the event that could have led to the start of World War III and a planetary mass slaughter ended very peacefully.
We loaded the device on board, I woke up Magneto's subordinates, and the high contracting parties went their separate ways.
They didn't even try to squeeze the anti-telepathy helmet back from me.
Though that wasn't surprising, as it was completely useless on its own, working exclusively in conjunction with Lehnsherr's abilities.
The principle was the same as Cerebro's, only in reverse, upon reflection from the helmet's inner surface, dispersion of Erik's gravitational-magnetic field wave occurred, and the resulting spectrum resonated with his brain's electromagnetic field, rendering it impervious to telepathy.
….
Bonus Chapter on every 500 power stones;
If you want to read ahead by 20+ chapters from here you can visit my Patre-on.
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