(1st story)
(New York City)
Following the attack on the students at the Jean Grey School, Rachel and M charge through a rainy, crowded street towards a subway entrance. M recommends that Rachel drop a psychic net over the entire area, as they are about to attract a lot of attention. Not the good kind either, as this is a snatch and grab. Rachel tells her it’s rush hour and there are hundreds of people but, when M insinuates she cannot do it, Rachel gives it a try. M suddenly spots the shooter and urgently asks Rachel if they are hidden. Rachel answers yes just in time for M to rugby-tackle the man to the ground. As M brings him down, she remarks that he is definitely the guy they are after, as she smells cordite on his clothes and she can even see the gun powder residue on him. Plus, he’s afraid, terrified in fact, of what she will do to him, given that he shot a child.
Rachel informs M that there is an express train coming with hundreds of people on and she cannot keep the psychic mask intact with so many coming and going. As M drags the man to his feet, she tells Rachel that if she is having trouble with her abilities then she can program a Danger Room scenario for her. As he is talking, the man suddenly elbows her in the face and pulls out two guns, pointing them at unsuspecting bystanders. He tells the two women that for all their powers they will never see them coming.
Rubbing her cheek, M glares at the man and tells him that it hurt and asks how he did it, given she was holding him. Continuing to point the guns, the man says that the future is there and he is just a distraction. As Rachel worries about the train about to arrive, M points out that Jubilee’s message also mentioned the future. The man then turns the guns on himself and tells the women there will be more bodies before they realize the future is unstoppable. Before he can pull the triggers, M uses her super speed and rushes up to him, putting her fingers over the barrels. She tells Rachel to drop the psychic cloak, as locking down the man’s mind is more important than caring who sees. Whatever tricks the man has up his sleeves will have to wait, as he will be finding it hard to remember how to breathe.
All the subway passengers can now see the women and the fact M is carrying a seemingly unconscious man. Rachel tells M that her highness Ororo Munroe will have something to say about all of this, given that they went after the man without clearing it with her first. M realizes that but, with two students down plus Jubilee and Shogo targeted, it makes the prisoner all the more important. It will be up to Storm to get on the right side of this thing.
In his lab, Beast updates his records to show that neither Primal nor Sprite show any signs of improvement. After exhausting all conventional medical remedies, he is now considering some alternatives. Looking at the two unconscious children Beast wonders how he can let them die when they have barely begun to live.
Elsewhere, Psylocke programs a security barrier across one of the doorways and comments that now the defenses are routed through a neural convert, if anyone should break through she will hear it in her brains. A voice calls from behind her and she turns to see a small student with red skin and a tail stood there. The boy, wearing a baseball helmet and clutching a stuffed toy, asks if more bad men are coming to hurt them. Psylocke kneels down in front of him and tells him that there are. In fact, there will probably be three times as more next time. If that scares him then good, because he should be terrified. That’s why there is a curfew too, so he should go to bed and she will make sure he is safe.
In the study, Storm leans forward and asks he future daughter Kymera what she isn’t telling her about the attacks. As her pet panther sits at her feet, Kymera answers enigmatically with everything and nothing. Storm asks her what kind of answer that is but Kymera just looks down and avoids the question. She tells Storm that, when she asked for them to have a mother daughter relationship, she didn’t imagine it would begin with parental scolding. Storm says she isn’t trying to scold her she just wants to…
Kymera cuts her off and adds she just wants to interrogate her. She says she is from the future and she knows things and she understands how that is interesting to someone like her. But she is still a person and her daughter in her time; she isn’t just an intelligence source.
In the gym, Jubilee is teaching Shogo how to operate the force field device Bling! made for him. As Shogo holds the device, Jubilee counts down and he presses the button, creating a pink bubble around him. She praises him and then tells him to do it again but faster.
The shooter that Rachel and M caught is now in a holding cell as his captors and Psylocke stare at him. Psylocke says that she is ready and Rachel turns to M, about to say something. M cuts her off and guesses that Rachel is about to say that two students are dying in the med bay, or maybe that the killer has constitutional rights that they aren’t observing. Rachel simply tells her to take a minute to chill out. M tells her that it’s easy for her to say, as the guy didn’t try and fight back and she hates it when they don’t do that. Rachel asks if she wants to beat on him, to which M replies she really, really does.
With a psychic crossbow pointed at the man, Psylocke says that she has been up all night, single-handedly securing a half-a-million square foot structure from an enemy she can’t even identify. She asks if they can imagine the psychic wear and tear she is experiencing from overhearing three dozen nightmares and panic attack. The whole school is terrorized. From what it looks like, though, the other two have been off doing their own thing. Rachel tells her that M picked up a psychic trail and they went after it. They were just about to tell Storm, for all the good it would do though. Maybe she can dither the information out of the man.
Just as Rachel says the last part, Storm walks in and gives her a cold look. She asks if the prisoner is secure and, after a pause, Rachel replies that he isn’t going anywhere. Storm demands a team meeting in the Danger Room and walks out again, leaving Rachel and M a little surprised. Psylocke adds that she didn’t even hear her coming; she must be getting good. As they leave, M turns to the prisoner, who is grinning at her, and she tells him to keep smiling as they will be coming back.
With the team gathered in the Danger Room, Storm tells them what she is about to do doesn’t come easy for her. She apologizes to them for letting them down and allowing things to get all confused and disjointed to the point where they are barely functioning as a team. Rachel adds that they aren’t an official team though, to which Storm replies that they are as of fifteen minutes ago. She texted Logan and informed him, not a requested but as a statement of fact. From this point on, no ad-hoc status, no confusion and no “dithering.” They came together out of friendship and that is the way it will stay and they will be much stronger for the unity and formality. Rachel assumes Storm will be leader but Storm declines and says that there will be a silent vote with no judgments.
Before they can do it, though, Psylocke tells them to wait, to which M says she can hear it too. She thinks it’s coming from the detention cell. However, before they can act, a huge explosion rips through part of the school. The women leap into action and Rachel yells that the explosion was in the east wing and the shooter is escaping. When Jubilee worries aloud that he is coming for Shogo, Storm assures her the school is a castle and no one will take him. She orders Jubilee to find Kymera, as she will keep them safe.
M and Rachel reached the ruined east wing to find smoke and flames everywhere. M asks about the fire suppression system and Rachel tells her it must have been disabled. Rachel telepathically links with Psylocke, who tells her that the shooter isn’t even making a psychic whisper and he is more than meets the eye, whoever he is. She finds his containments cell but informs them that Beast’s “unbreakable” polymer shielding is in about a hundred pieces on the floor. She informs Storm that the shooter is gone and he could be anywhere. Storm is programming something into a consol panel and she tells Jubilee to hang on, as she is having Kymera come and stay with her.
Back in the east wing, Rachel and M are suddenly floored by something moving at supersonic speeds. As it whizzes past them again, M grabs hold of it and realizes it is the shooter. She is catapulted across the room though and, as she regains her footing, Rachel joins her and declares that this time they take him apart. The shooter stops and sneers at the women, saying that they cannot stop the future. Before he can finish, he is mauled by Kymera’s panther, as the girl walks up to him holding a knife. He begs for her to wait but she stabs him in the chest.
As she draws the blade out, a digital display appears on the man’s forehead, which reads 004. The display counts down to 003 and Kymera suddenly looks alarmed. She jumps on to her panther and shouts for Shogo, who is being carried by an eagle. The other women run through the flames in disarray, just as the countdown reaches zero and the man explodes.
In the far off distance, the man who started it all stares through a pair of binoculars at the chaos at the school. He declares phase one is complete and phase two will begin at dawn, when they are most vulnerable.
(2nd story)
In the carnage of the Danger Room battlefield, Anole yells at Hellion for breaking into Psylocke’s program. Psylocke leans over Hellion’s shoulders and tells them they are there and they are now committed. Plus, they have incoming fire and the Danger Room safeties are disabled. When she asks Hellion if he wants to prove he has what it takes and he that replies he does, Psylocke tells him to lead his people.
Hellion turns to Rockslide, who is recovering from having a giant cannonball launched at him. He gives him a heads up and Rockslide manages to catch the next cannonball, although he is propelled across the field again. As he rolls away, he tells them he would say it hurts more than being punched by Monet but he would be lying. Standing behind him, Psylocke tells Hellion he is a man down and asks who is next into the fray. Hellion replies that Anole can go, since he can regenerate. He says that they are repositioning the cannon and orders Anole to get in close. Anole seems a little put out, but reluctantly agrees and runs off towards the army. Broo covers his eyes and tells the others to inform him whether he lives or not.
As Anole tears through the hoards of soldiers, Psylocke says that it was a smart choice to use him. Anole may seem sarcastic and aloof but he is a born fighter. This is why the Danger Room sims are so effective; they remove the element of fear and the person’s true abilities can shine. Hellion tells her that she removed the safeties, to which she replies that it just makes Anole all the more impressive. She asks what he thinks but Hellion doesn’t reply. Psylocke then guesses that he thought it would be his moment to shine and that was the whole idea of this thing. As Hellion runs off towards the army as well, Broo tells Psylocke that it wasn’t too subtle. She says that he broke into her database and she doesn’t exactly love the betrayal.
As Hellion destroys the army with his telekinesis, the others look on in awe. Broo says that doing what he is doing now will most likely get them all killed. However, Psylocke says that at the school and in the real world, they run the risk of that every day. This is what she calls a teaching moment.
