“Okay,” Bella said, turning and moving a half-step to the assassin standing behind her. “Forget my third question. I’ve thought about your offer and 1 have an answer for you.”
As fast as a snake she took the sword of the assassin and swung around, cutting Toole’s head cleanly off his body.
His blood spurted as his head went one direction and a moment later his body slumped to the floor.
Remy was slightly stunned. He had never expected Bella to join in a partnership with anyone, but the suddenness of her answer surprised even him.
Oh, well.
So much for his “little talk” with Toole about the customs of the old ways. It seems that Bella had given him a fine, and final, lesson.
Bella turned to the stunned Kyle. “Unless you and the rest of Toole’s men would like to end up exactly like your boss, I would suggest you get as far away from this building as you can, as quickly as you can.”
Remy could tell that Kyle didn’t need any convincing. He nodded, swallowed hard, then backed quickly toward the door. At the door he turned and ran.
“Get everyone into positions,” she said to the assassin she had borrowed the sword from. “I want whoever is coming after our Mr. Toole here to walk into what seems to be a deserted warehouse. And no one moves until I say. Understand?”
The assassin nodded and left the room.
Bella kicked Toole’s head out of her way, then went over to the wall of monitors. “Well, well, dear LeBeau,” she said, looking at the screen. “You’re in town. We just may meet again.”
Remy shook his head as Bella turned and left Toole’s office. If she only knew how close they really were.
He moved silently up and into the hiding place in the rafters.
One minute later an assassin moved quietly past where he had been.
Again, Remy went back to waiting. And this time he had no real idea what he was waiting for. He just knew that he and Bella waited for the same thing.
Whatever it was.
Scott landed the
Blackbird
next to the
Raven
in the large meadow, grateful as always for the craft’s vertical takeoff/ landing capabilities that rendered taxiing unnecessary. He opened the hatch for the three of them to depart, but only Jean followed him out. The Juggernaut remained in his seat, hunched over, quietly growling. Scott had to hope that Cain wouldn’t suddenly explode.
“What happened?” Scott asked Ororo as the X-Men gathered in a circle on the hot pavement of the airport. The only one who didn’t join the circle was Jean, but Scott could feel she was listening through him.
“We couldn’t
fin
d him,” Ororo said. “His jet dropped off his filed flight path.”
“Does he know he is being followed?” Bishop asked. Scott shrugged. “Cain knows what direction he’s gone, so it would seem logical that Service might know Cain is behind him.”
“So we return to the original plan,” Hank said. “We use Cain to track him.”
Ororo glanced at Scott. They were both team leaders, but for this mission she had been letting him take the lead. On missions in the past he had followed her lead. Sometimes it just worked that way.
“Storm,” Scott said, finally deciding on the most obvious course of action. “You, Rogue, and Wolverine take the
Raven
and head south, see if you can pick up word of Service’s plane on the radio. It’s faster even than the
Blackbird,
and we’ll have to proceed more slowly in case Cain forces us to change direction suddenly.”
Ororo nodded.
“You’re assuming, of course, that our Mr. Marko wants to remain with us,” Hank said. “He’s being uncharacteristically calm.”
“At the moment he’s using us,” Ororo said. “The moment he no longer needs us, he’ll be gone.”
“We can only hope,” Hank said, “to find Service before Cain reaches that point, or Service finds that next emerald.”
Scott glanced at his watch. “Let’s get going.”
Robert Service stood in the humid afternoon heat of the New Orleans French Quarter, staring at the old warehouse. Other than a few people walking on the sidewalk down the block, and an occasional cab, the entire neighborhood looked deserted and mostly unused.
But Service knew the emerald he needed was in that warehouse. The third piece that would join with the two emeralds in his shirt pocket. He had no idea what would happen when ail three were together again, but it didn’t matter. From the moment he’d touched the big emerald in his father’s room, he’d been driven to find the other parts.
And now his quest was almost finished.
After leaving Idaho, he’d had his pilots leave their planned flight path and go south toward Phoenix. Then, staying away from all commercial flight lines, and staying below ten thousand feet, they had made it into the south, at first heading for Miami, but then turning back when they passed New Orleans. In fact, spotting the emerald in New Orleans had been much simpler than finding it in the Idaho wilderness. And once on the ground, a simple cab ride had gotten him to the right neighborhood.
He glanced around. Nothing. No one watching, no one moving as far as he could see.
In the back of his mind the red creature was again getting closer. But it wasn’t here yet. And whoever had last owned the emerald he was after had died earlier in the day. Service had felt it like a fleeting thought.
He moved across the street and toward what seemed to be the front door of the warehouse. He shoved it open, expecting resistance from a lock, or some sort of latch.
Nothing. The door had been left open.
Inside, the warehouse seemed empty, yet fairly clean. The air was a good fifteen degrees cooler than outside and the difference made small beads of sweat form on his arms and forehead.
He moved inside, strolling toward the back until it became clear in his head that the emerald was above him.
“Office upstairs, huh?” His voice echoed in the empty space as he looked around, searching for a way up. A staircase against one wall seemed the best, and he quickly climbed them, finding a short hall and ornate office at the top. The door to the office was standing wide open and a decapitated man was sprawled on the expensive carpet, his blood now a dark brown stain covering a large section of the room.
“Previous owner of the emerald, I presume,” Service said to the body.
He stood in the middle of the room and turned slowly, letting the direction of the third emerald show him the way.
The desk.
He stepped around behind the oak desk, but the direction changed. With a quick check of the drawers, he knew it wasn’t in the desk.
It was in front of the desk.
Again he moved back around to the desk and the direction in his head said the emerald was very close. His mouth was almost watering at the nearness of his goal.
He bent down near the extended front of the desk and inspected the wood. A clear hidden panel.
Without a thought he smashed his fist into the panel, shattering the wood into splinters.
A small safe. He grabbed the handle of the safe with both hands and yanked.
An explosion sent him tumbling backwards, crashing into the bar. Except for the jarring of the impact, he felt nothing. No pain, not even shaken.
He quickly checked to make sure the two pieces of the emerald buttoned inside his shirt pocket remained against his skin in his tattered shirt. They were right where they belonged.
He stood and went back to the now-shattered desk. The door to the small safe was twisted and he yanked it off its hinges like tearing a piece of paper. He knew that he had gotten considerably stronger, but even that surprised him.
Inside the safe was a small leather pouch. He picked up the pouch and stood.
“I’ll take that,’* a voice said from behind him.
He turned around to face a beautiful blonde woman in a purple outfit, flanked by two masked men carrying ninja-type swords. She stood with her hands on her hips, no weapon in sight. But from her attitude, it was clear to Service that she didn’t think she needed a weapon.
He smiled at her. “Do you even know what’s in here?” He held up the pouch.
“Something our Mr. Toole there,” she gestured to the body, “was afraid to give up.”
“As he should have been,” Service said.
Holding the pouch carefully out in front of him so that she could see, he tipped it upside down and let the emerald slide out onto his bare hand.
The surge of energy, the blinding flash of green light, surprised even him.
And the feeling of power was so wonderful that all he could do was laugh.
Logan could smell the assassins hiding in the shadows of the old warehouse. He moved silently from shadow to shadow, working his way forward toward a side door. Service had gone in there, obviously not knowing he was walking into a trap.
And Logan wasn’t about to stop him.
Not after following the guy around the entire country for the last day. As far as Logan was concerned, the ambush would do him some good.
An hour before, the
Raven
had picked up a radio request for an emergency landing for a private jet coming in to New Orleans from Idaho. Storm took the
Raven
there, radioing the
Blackbird
to do the same. When Hank pointed out that they could hardly land their craft in the middle of Jackson Square, they contacted the Professor. As it happened, there was, on the outskirts of New Orleans, a private airfield run by a young woman named Kris. She was a member of the underground network of mutants that the Professor kept in touch with. They could take in both craft without the difficulties that would arise if a group of outlaw mutants tried to land at a public airport.
Once they arrived, it was child’s play for Wolverine to track Service’s distinct scent to the warehouse.
Rogue and Storm were hanging back around the corner near a bar, letting him do the initial scouting. Rogue had tried to contact Gambit on the radio link, but he had turned his off. Neither Rogue nor Storm were particularly surprised at that, but it still would have been nice to have Remy along.
They had managed to then follow Service as he took a winding cab trip into the French Quarter, finally ending up in this old warehouse district. Cain and the rest of the
X-Men team should be landing at the airfield any time now.
Scott and Ororo had decided that the entire team should be together when they stopped Service. But as far as Logan was concerned, the guy would be easy to rail in. And if he got the chance, he’d do it. And get in an extra kick or two in reward for the hours crammed up in that plane.
Suddenly, from the second floor of the warehouse there was an explosion that rocked the neighborhood.
Logan smiled.
The fun’s beginning.
He moved boldly up to one of the masked guys with a sword who had been hiding in a small alcove near the door.
“Y’ hear that?” he asked the guy.
Then, before he could even swing up his big sword, Logan flattened the assassin with a solid punch square in the cloth face mask. The guy dropped to the ground like a bag of flour.
“Been needin’ to do that for days,” he said, growling at the man slumped on the concrete. “Thanks.”
Two more of the masked men faced off against him just inside the warehouse door. One smelled of garlic and needed a bath.
Wolverine charged right at them, ducking their wild sword swings and pounding his fists into the smelly one, then kicking the other into a backward flip.
The one who smelled of garlic scrambled to his feet and again faced Wolverine, sword ready.
“Anyone tell ya that y’ smell, bub?” Wolverine said as he just walked right at the guy.
m
The assassin raised his sword to swing and Wolverine hit him twice, so fast that the garlic man didn’t even see the punches coming. The force of Wolverine’s blows sent the assassin tumbling head over heels across the concrete floor of the warehouse. His sword clattered on the pavement like an alann going off.
Four more of the masked men with swords stepped out of the shadows, facing Logan.
“Oh, now we’re gonna have some fun.”
Suddenly there was another explosion above him and the entire warehouse filled with bright green light.
“This ain’t a good sign,” Logan said, glancing around to see what had changed. Didn’t look
like
anything had. At least not down here. Upstairs might be another matter.
Two more assassins stepped up to join the other four taking positions around him.
Six trained killers against just him. Was this for real or was he just having a wonderful dream?
Scott, Jean, Hank, and Bishop stood on the concrete taxiway where Kris had told them to park. In front of them, Cain slowly crawled from the
Blackbird,
finally gaining his freedom and standing. He did not look happy, but as far as Scott was concerned, Cain never looked happy. Scott was just impressed that Cain had stayed in the back of that plane as long as he had.
The humidity of New Orleans smothered all of them, a stark contrast from the dry heat of Idaho only a few hours earlier. And for most of the long flight from Idaho, Scott had worried about just this moment.
What would Cain do when they landed? Would Cain continue to work with them to find Service? Both he and Jean doubted it, since Cain never really worked with anyone. If they hadn’t been offering him a ride, he wouldn’t have even bothered to talk to them yesterday, let alone ride with them.
So what would Cain do?
Cain glanced at the four X-Men, then said, “What the hell’re we waitin’ for? We know where he is, let’s get a move on.”
Then suddenly Cain grabbed his chest and let out a yell that shook the ground and broke windows in nearby office buildings.
In less than two seconds the X-Men were beside him.
‘ ‘Cain?’ ’ Jean asked, staring up at the pain-filled face of the Juggernaut. It was a sight Scott had never imagined he would ever see. Pain and the Juggernaut did not go together, unless it was the Juggernaut inflicting pain on someone else.
“He touched the other stone,” Cain said, taking a deep breath and setting his jaw in a look of deter
min
ation. “I’m gonna kill ’im for this.”