The Jewels of Cyttorak (21 page)

Robert Service felt stronger than he’d felt all day. He stomped after the big red man. Just like his green emerald, Robert could feel that this man had a red ruby embedded in his chest. And Robert felt a huge desire to take that ruby. It was like a hunger, an addiction he couldn’t control.

He would own that ruby or die trying.

The red man stood and stomped at Robert.

The two met solidly, and Robert knew instantly as he reached for the man’s chest, that this guy had as much strength as he did. He peeled back the Juggernaut’s armor to reveal the ruby.

At the same moment the Juggernaut reached for the emerald on Robert’s chest.

As Robert’s hand touched the ruby it felt as if the world had opened up to him. His strength a moment before was nothing compared to what he would have when he possessed the ruby.

But at the same moment the Juggernaut touched his emerald and Robert felt his very life force being pulled through the emerald and into the body of the Juggernaut.

With his free left hand he smashed at the Juggernaut, but couldn’t dislodge him.

One of them had to win. Only one could possess both gems. And he would be the one.    
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The Juggernaut smashed at Robert’s head with his left hand, while holding onto the emerald with his right.

But Robert held on and hit right back with his left hand, never letting go of the ruby with his right.

The energy flowed into his body from the ruby and

drained out at the same time through the emerald.

Then back around again as they hit and hit and hit. Neither winning.

Neither losing.

Bfc ack in the Xavier Institute, the Professor frantically H worked at the mansion’s Shi’ar-built computer. At B# the moment he wished Hank was there to help him. But he didn’t have the time to recall Hank. He had to do it himself.

Since the last report from the team, he had hurriedly worked out and ran a dozen computer simulations of what would happen when Robert Service and the Juggernaut met. Over the years, with the help of others, he had studied the power and details of the ruby on Cain’s chest. He had dozens of copies of various texts filled with tales, legends, histories, and religious tracts. He also had them scanned by the alien computer so they could analyze the data more thoroughly than any human mind. Even a mind as impressive as Charles Xavier’s.

He had originally gathered all this information in the hopes of some day finding a way to return Cain to normal. Now he used it to try to stop a madman.

The computer simulations did show one clear result immediately. If one person held both the ruby and the emerald in their possession, that person would be a factor of hundreds of times more powerful than the Juggernaut. Such a person could rule the world.

Or destroy it.

No force would be able to stop him from doing either.

Now, today, those two stones were coming together and somehow, there had to be a way to stop either Cain

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or Robert Service from gaining control of both stones. And gaining that incredible power.

Somehow the Professor knew that the solution to all this was in the emerald. It had been broken into three parts at some point in the past. It could be broken again. But his problem was to find out how before it was too late.

If it wasn’t already.

Gary Service slowly came to. His head hurt and he felt as if someone was sitting on his chest.

He last remembered the Juggernaut picking him up, strong hands smashing the wind out of him.

Then Robert had stepped forward and hit the Juggernaut. And that was the last he remembered.

His brother had saved his life.

Amazing.

Gary moved on the soft sofa and a sharp pain shot through his side. He must have at least two ribs broken. Slowly he forced himself to sit up, the pain taking his breath away and causing his eyes to water. But he had to see what was going on.

Outside explosion followed explosion. Something was still happening, that was for sure.

But for the moment his biggest concern was what had happened to his brother.

Phoenix stood with the other X-Men in a circle around the two battling giants on the green lawn of the Service

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estate. The day had been hot and sticky, but Storm’s microblizzard had reduced the temperature significantly.

The battle, however, had heated things up tremendously. The energy flowing from them ionized the air, forcing the X-Men to slowly back up, giving the two standing giants more and more room.

Phoenix focused her mind. The two gems caused psychic interference locally, but it didn’t seem to hinder long-range telepathy. She called out to the Professor.

I’m here, Jean.
The Professor’s voice came back clear in her head.
And I see what’s happening. You must get them apart if you can. I need more time.

We’ll try.

Phoenix turned to Cyclops. “The Professor says we must get them apart. He needs more time to find a solution.”

Cyclops frowned, staring at the two battling giants. Phoenix knew that the wheels had been turning in Cyclops’s mind since Juggernaut and Service started going at it. “Can you put a telekinetic shield between them the moment we do?”

Phoenix nodded. “Not likely to hold them long— especially with the interference.” She knew it wouldn’t hold them at all, and she knew Cyclops understood that. He knew the limits of her power almost as well as she did.

“It will if we keep them busy,” Cyclops said, reaching over and gently touching her hand in support. “We can only hope that the time we manage will be enough. How long did the Professor say he needed?’ ’

“He didn’t,” Phoenix said. She smiled at the frown on her husband’s face. She knew the X-Men were facing as hard a task as any they’d faced. Of all their foes, Juggernaut had proven the most difficult to defeat.

“X-Men!” Cyclops shouted. “Gather around.”

A moment later the various X-Men stood around him. Phoenix studied the combined team.

Gambit looked dirty and tired, his brown duster streaked with black. She couldn’t remember ever seeing him look so disheveled—and, for Gambit, that was saying a lot.

The Beast stood beside Gambit and kept studying the two giants, frowning, as if looking at a giant puzzle.

Storm looked unruffled and calm, as she always seemed. Rogue, on the other hand, looked quite ruffled and not at all calm, her white-streaked hair in bad need of combing. A large smudge of dirt marred one cheek.

Bishop and Wolverine stood side by side, also a stark image of contrast. Bishop stood like the perfect warrior, straight-backed and showing no emotion, while Wolverine crouched like an animal, a snarl firmly in place.

‘ ‘The Professor wants us to get them apart as quickly as possible,” Cyclops said.

Storm nodded in agreement. Phoenix knew that was the signal between the two team leaders as to who would take command in this instance.

Cyclops returned the nod. “First,” he said, “we have to blow them apart. Then Phoenix will put up a telekinetic shield between them.”

“That won’t hold them if they make a concerted effort to break it down,” Hank said. “And from what they are doing at the moment, it seems likely that they would.”

Phoenix nodded. She knew that also.

“Understood,” Cyclops said. “That’s why we have to keep them from making that effort in any fashion we can. What we’re after here, people, is to buy time. As much as we can.

“Bishop, I want you to thrust your hands into that energy field that building around the pair of them. That should short them out for a moment, and also charge you up. Rogue, once they’re distracted, I want you to smash into Service at the exact same moment that Storm and I hit the Juggernaut with everything we’ve got. Aim at the left shoulder. That should add extra torque and spin them. That should be enough to knock them apart.”

“Agreed,” Storm said, nodding.

“Once they’re apart,” Cyclops said, “I want Storm, Rogue, and Bishop to keep Service busy. The rest of us will do the same for Juggernaut, while Phoenix keeps up the telekinetic shield any time they start at each other. We keep that up until the Professor contacts us.”

All the team nodded.

“All right,” Cyclops said. “Take positions.”

The X-Men fanned out around the fighting giants.

Phoenix moved so that she was standing on a line that she hoped, in a moment, would be between the two. Bishop took up position in front of her.

Scott and Storm faced the Juggernaut behind Service.

Rogue floated a distance off behind Juggernaut, facing Service.

“Bishop, now!” Cyclops shouted.

The mutant from the future leapt forward, and thrust his fists into the ionized air around the two combatants.

Phoenix smiled a grim smile and prepared her tele-

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kinetic shield. As Cyclops had hoped, Bishop’s sudden intrusion distracted both Service and Juggernaut for a moment.

“Go!” Cyclops cried.

Almost instantly, Phoenix saw Rogue flash at Service. His left arm was in the air, preparing to hit the Juggernaut. She hit him solidly, head down, square in the left shoulder.

At the same moment Cyclops and Storm blasted the Juggernaut in his left shoulder with as much power as they could muster.

The sudden and surprising impact sent the two giants flying apart, head over heels through the air.

Phoenix almost wanted to clap for joy. The first part of the plan had worked even better than they’d hoped. The two were far enough apart that she didn’t need to put up a shield.

Service smashed into the side of his mansion and disappeared inside in a large cloud of dust and shattered lumber.

Cain landed a half a football field away on the wide lawn, crashing into a large oak tree as he came down.

“X-Men,” Cyclops shouted, “keep ’em busy!”

Phoenix stood her ground as Wolverine, Beast, Gambit, and Cyclops headed across the lawn at the Juggernaut.

In the other direction, Rogue and Storm flashed inside the house, joined a moment later by Bishop.

The fight was on. Phoenix just hoped it wouldn’t be their last.

Cyclops watched as the Juggernaut climbed back to his feet. He was angry, more than Cyclops had ever seen him before. And they had seen him angry—Cain was not one to hide his emotions.

Wolverine was first to arrive near the Juggernaut, who started back toward the mansion. Wolverine came in fast and hard, clipping the part of Juggernaut’s chest, just under the ruby, that was exposed by Service’s rending of his armor.

The impact caught the Juggernaut in midstride and knocked him off his feet. Perfect flying tackle, except that Wolverine didn’t get out of the way fast enough and Juggernaut smashed him aside, sending Wolverine flying into a nearby oak tree.

Cyclops watched Wolverine hit and crash through the branches. He hit the ground and lay still for a moment, then slowly climbed back to his feet. There was no one tougher than Wolverine. He would be all right.

Gambit peppered the Juggernaut with exploding cards square in the eyes and chest as he tried to stand up. Even the Juggernaut had to hold up his hand for protection as hand grenade-sized explosions went off in his face, one right after another.

“The ground!” Hank shouted, pointing at the lawn in front of the Juggernaut.

Cyclops understood. Under Cain’s feet he blew a hole in the lawn. Caught off-balance by the explosion, the Juggernaut toppled into the hole.

“Keep digging!” Hank shouted.

Cyclops focused his hardest and tightest beam at the bottom of the hole, moving it quickly back and forth,

blasting away huge chunks of the earth under the Juggernaut and deepening the crater.

“Don’t stop,” Hank shouted. “It’s working.”

Cyclops kept the beam focused, going down, deeper and deeper, as the Juggernaut fought to grab a handhold, anything.

“Gambit. Help me dig!” Cyclops shouted as the pit reached twenty feet deep. Focusing his beam this intently was starting to give him a headache, and the help would be appreciated. Besides, Juggernaut was too deep for Gambit’s exploding-cards-in-the-face trick to be effective any longer.

“And blow the earth away from his hands,” Hank said, “to keep him from climbing.”

Instantly Gambit switched his aim, tossing one kinet-ically charged card after another at the ground under the Juggernaut as Cyclops continued pommelling the dirt and rock.

Every time Cain managed to grab a hand- or foothold, Gambit blew it out from underneath him. It was as if he was on a huge, exploding slide leading directly into the bowels of the earth.

In all their years of fighting against the Juggernaut, this was the first time they had tried this trick as far as Cyclops knew. For the moment, it looked as if it was working.

“Bete,” Gambit shouted over the sounds of the explosions coming from below, “I only got fifty-two o’dese t’ings. Remy, he need some ammo.”

Beast instantly scrambled toward a flower bed nearby. Then with expert aim, he used both hands and one foot

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to lob rocks, the rubble of small statues that had been smashed in the fight, and bricks back to Gambit, who caught them, charged them with kinetic energy, and tossed them with deadly aim into the pit below.