Two months ago:
The Wreck-It-And-Wrench-It salvage yard in the middle of the night. 'You don't trust me' Magneto remarks to the time-displaced Marvel Girl a.k.a. Jean Grey. 'You're kidding, right? Of course I don't trust you. You're Magneto' Marvel Girl replies. 'I'm aware' the Master of Magnetism responds wryly. Marvel Girl adds that it doesn't help that he wanted to meet here, surrounded by all this metal. 'It's the perfect place for you to unleash the full fury of your powers' she points out. 'Or hide a body' she adds, before telling Magneto that he should understand her hesitation, as he is the first mutant who ever tried to kill her and her friends. 'That was a long time ago' Magneto replies. 'For you' Jean snaps, reminding Magneto that she was pulled out of her own time with the rest of the original X-Men – just days after they fought him. 'For me it was like yesterday' she explains.
Magneto closes his eyes as Jean asks him 'And in all that time that's passed for you, what have you done? How many times did you attack the X-Men? How many people have you hurt? How many times did you launch full-scale attacks against the world? ' Calmly, Jean tells Magneto that she doesn't care what he or anyone else says – 'You're not an X-Man. You're not our friend'.
Magneto hangs his head and remains silent, while Jean looks at him nervously. Magneto then puts a hand on Jean's arm and tells her that she is right, of course. 'I am?' Jean asks. 'This is why I've come to you' Magneto reveals. 'It is?' Jean enquires. Magneto tells Marvel Girl that mutants have been given yet another chance at survival – perhaps their last chance, and it is an opportunity he does not want to see squandered. Magneto turns from Marvel Girl as he declares that Charles Xavier dreamed of a world where humans and mutant could co-exist in peace, and admits that once, he challenged that idea, but now, though, he believes that if mutants are to survive, they must do so alongside humans.
'Uh. This is weird' Marvel Girl remarks to herself, looking around nervously. Magneto tells her that there are still dangerous threats to Xavier's dream – threats that must be dealt with, and that he has come to realize that he cannot publicly stand against these dangers. 'I am seen as a monster and a -' Magneto begins, as Jean interrupts: 'Terrorist' she declares, to which Magneto points out that is why he needs allies who reflect the very best of mutantkind. 'I need you. I need the original X-Men' Magneto explains. 'I don't -' Jean begins, before Magneto removes his helmet and tells her that perhaps she would feel more comfortable if she sees for herself that he speaks the truth. 'You're letting me read your mind' Jean points out. Magneto tells her that he appreciates the efficiency and necessity.
'All right' Jean replies as she concentrates hard, her telepathic abilities probing Magneto's mind. She begins to cry. 'Okay.' Jean tells him as she turns away. 'Okay?' Magneto asks. 'We'll try it your way... at least, I will...' Jean announces, and Magneto thanks her, before she informs him that convincing the others might be a problem.
Now:
'It's no use! We can't get through his force field!' Angel a.k.a. Warren Worthington the Third calls out as he unleashes energy from his wings towards Magneto, who is surrounded by a magnetic field. 'He's shrugging off our most powerful attacks!' Cyclops a.k.a. Scott Summers declares as he fires an optic blast that does not pierce the magnetic force field. The bodies of motionless heroes can be seen strewn on the ground, while Magneto uses his power to throw a large vehicle towards the young mutants. Marvel Girl telepathically instructs Cyclops to keep blasting, and that she is going to use telepathy to “goose” his powers. 'Will it hurt?' Cyclops asks. Jean informs him that it will tickle, as she enhances his power, which enables the optic blast to break through Magneto's magnetic field, and knocks him back into a train. 'Nice one!' Angel calls out, adding that he was going to ask them to stop flirting, but that it is hard to argue with results.
'Glad you think so, Warren. You're next!' Jean tells her teammate as she uses her telepathy to power-up the energy that he fires from his wings, which surrounds Magneto, who quickly puts up another magnetic force field. Magneto gets to his feet and shouts 'Join me, X-Men! This world belongs to us! I tried to deny it, but I see that now!' Magneto tells them as energy crackles around him. 'What is this?' a replay from the first time we met him? Or is Magneto just running out of material?' Cyclops asks as he fires another optic blast. 'Let's see what you think of this, boy!' Magneto exclaims as he levitates a large train carriage, and hurls it towards Cyclops. The young mutants unleashes an optic blast, but he is unable to stop the train as it continues to fall towards him. 'SCOTT!' Jean calls out, concerned, before she is knocked aside as the carriage lands. 'Oh... oh, no!' the wide-eyed Warren gasps in shock.
Suddenly, the landscape changes – the buildings and train carriages vanish, as a sterile, high-tech training room takes it place. 'Are you all right?' Jean asks Scott as she helps him to walk. Scott tells her that he is okay, while Jean instructs the Danger Room to end the program. They are inside their HQ on the island state of Madripoor. 'Woof. That sucked' Angel tells Scott and Jean as he flies over to them. Jean then instructs the Danger Room to erase the session log. Scott admits that he isn't too proud of that, and there is no need to record their performance. Jean explains that she isn't trying to protect their egos, and reveals that she had Hank hack into the Danger Room's systems and make sure they had some real privacy when they wanted it. 'If Magneto knew we were training to fight him -' Jean begins. 'Based on how we just did? My guess is he'd rest easy' Warren tells the others. Cyclops shrugs his shoulders and points out that they might have done a little better if they were all here. 'Where is Hank, anyway? For that matter, where's Bobby?' Scott asks. 'They knew we had a session scheduled, didn't they?'
Marvel Girl remarks that this isn't acceptable, they have to keep practicing, to make sure they are ready. 'If we don't, we're finished' she points out, adding that she expects this kind of thing from Bobby, but not from Hank. Warren offers to go and find Bobby and let him know that he has to get his head in the game, while Scott walks away, announcing that he will talk to Hank, adding that he owes him a man-to-man conversation, anyhow.
Henry McCoy a.k.a. the Beast is sitting on the floor of some sort of laboratory, reading some electronic device. He tells himself that the code is unclear, jumbled, like an intricate mathematics problem – that's how he will crack it – how he will master it.
The door to the lab opens and Scott calls out to Hank, who doesn’t look up at his friend, instead, he tells him that he should knock, that it is only polite. 'I did knock. I guess you didn't hear me' Scott responds. Scott walks into the lab and looks around, while asking Hank who he was talking to. Hank tells him that he was speaking to himself, that he does that sometimes when he is trying to work through some crisis of faith or self-doubt. 'I'd recommend something similar for you... but you'd never stop chattering to yourself' Hank declares, without looking at Scott, who tells him that they missed him at practice. 'I was busy, as you can see' Hank points out, adding that if Scott keeps distracting him, he will still be busy during the next Danger Room session – and the next.
Scott tells Hank that he is sorry about before, and admits that he shouldn't have jumped down his throat about all that magic stuff. Hank tells Scott that he understands, as magic is frightening to those who don't understand it. 'Then again, so are eye beams and fire wings and walking, talking snowmen' Hank points out. Adding that so is throwing in with a genocidal madman who has tried to conquer the world on multiple occasions. Scott tells Hank that he is trying to apologize, and admits that magic scares him, he doesn't get it, but that he was out of line. 'I know that coming here... to this time... has been particularly tough on you' Hank doesn't answer Scott, he just looks at several monitors in his lab, before turning to Scott and putting a hand on his shoulder, telling him that it is all right, and that his apology is accepted. 'Water under the bridge, so to speak'. He then asks Scott to excuse him, as he has a few things to finish up. “Genocidal madman” Scott quotes Hank, asking him why he let Jean talk them into this. 'One of us acted out of unrequited love. The other...' Hank begins, to which Scott interrupts him, announcing that this is his cue to leave.
When Scott is gone, Hank looks to the shadows in the lab, where a bookcase stands, filled with books, and Hank's eyes glow as a voice calls out 'Magic scares him. Poor little flower. And he hasn't seen anything yet'.
Bobby Drake a.k.a. Iceman is in his quarters, sitting on the edge of his bed, he is on his phone: 'Hey... uh... it's Bobby. You know? Bobby? Your boyfriend? This is, like... this sixth message I've left for you. You don't respond to voicemail. You don't respond to texts'. Bobby looks upset and closes his eyes as he speaks into the phone, telling Romeo's voicemail that it is taking every ounce of his willpower he can muster to avoid a “Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo” joke.
Angel appears in Bobby's doorway, his wings retracted. Bobby doesn't see Angel, who listens as Bobby continues to leave his message, telling Romeo that, hopefully, he is just busy saving the world or something, and that he is, too. 'If it's the long-distance thing, we both said we could handle it' Bobby reminds Romeo, adding that he has really got to see Madripoor sometime, that parts of the island are terrifying, sure, but that some other parts are pretty amazing. Angel turns and walks away, as Bobby concludes his message by telling Romeo that he will let him go, and asks him to call him back. Bobby hangs up, and switches to his ice form.
Jean is walking through some a living area, past some sofas and a bookcase, she is probably just out of the shower, as she us drying her hair with a towel, when a voice calls out to her, bidding her a good evening. 'I trust your training session went well' Magneto remarks. He is dressed in civilian clothing, with his robot assistant, Ferris, hovering at his side. Jean turns to Magneto and tells him that she is surprised he wasn't observing. 'Wait. Were you observing?' she enquires. Magneto tells Jean that this is not a school, they are not students and he is certainly not a headmaster. 'Those are shoes I could never hope to fill' he adds, and Jean looks away from him, before smiling and announcing that training went well. 'Five by five' she tells him. Magneto falls silent, and Jean explains that it is something Logan used to say, before explaining to Magneto that it went fine.
Ferris asks Jean if there is anything he can get her before she retires for the evening, and suggests chamomile tea. Jean thanks the robot, and announces that she is all right. Jean points out that it has been a few days since they dealt with Black Tom, and asks Magneto if he has had any luck tracking down the others – Shaw, or the White Queen. 'It will take time. Enemies such as these... reveal themselves on their own schedule' Magneto replies.
Jean remembers being at the Wreck-It-And-Wrench-It salvage yard, when she entered Magneto's mind, she thought he might have been watching her. She realizes now that he was watching her, making sure she didn't dig too far, didn't look in the wrong places as she made her way through his labyrinthine mind. So Jean used decoys in case he was following her. She knew he is telling the truth, at least, Magneto thinks he is telling the truth. But Jean knew that there was something more – she could feel it – other thoughts, pushed away, buried – hidden. When she opened a door within Magneto's mind, she glimpsed into his past, when he was a prisoner as a child – and it made Jean cry.
Sitting in her quarters, Jean quietly tells herself that Magneto has lost so much, he wants peace so badly – she can feel it – but he is so angry.
Suddenly, Magneto's voice is heard over the communications system, announcing that a situation has arisen, Sentinels have been detected in Barcelona, Spain, and the X-Men are needed. 'Sentinels... thank God' Jean utters to herself, before telepathically patching her team together. 'To me, my X-Men' she calls out. Putting his shirt on, Scott asks Jean how that felt. 'Honestly? Kind of creepy' Jean replies. Bobby looks back at his phone as he tells Jeannie that he liked it, and that she sounded like a total badass. The Beast walks towards the hangar bay, announcing that he will get the Blackbird prepped, not that it needs his help, as most likely, the plane already primed the engines in anticipation of their needs. He adds that it wouldn't surprise him if it one day leaves them behind and jets off to save mutantkind on its own. Outside, Angel hovers of the old building they are using as their HQ and tells his teammates that he is just waiting on them.
Shortly, Angel flies alongside the Blackbird, which approaches Mach-5 as it speeds towards Barcelona, Spain, only ten minutes until its destination. Inside the jet, Bobby leans into Jean and tells her that if Magneto wanted to kill them, throwing them at Sentinels would be a good way to do it. Scott tells Bobby to cut Jean some slack, reminding him that they all agreed to be here. He points out that they would be going on ops just like this even if they had stayed with Professor Kitty. 'Magneto is trying to protect mutants. He doesn't want to kill us' Scott declares. 'Not yet' Jean remarks quietly. 'That's comforting' Bobby tells her, folding his arms, while outside, Angel grins as he shouts over the comms 'Welcome to Barcelona, X-Men! Hope we survive the experience!' In the distance, fire and smoke can be seen, and ther Blackbird draws closer to the street where five large Sentinels are standing. Each of them has different-colored parts to their body, and one of them calls out 'Greetings... fellow mutants'. The X-Men look puzzled. “Fellow mutants”? Bobby quotes. 'Saywhatnow?' he asks, confused.
Back in Madripoor, Ferris informs Magneto that the X-Men have arrived in Spain and have engaged the Sentinels. Magneto instructs Ferris to monitor them, and adds that he wants constant updates. 'You are...concerned for their well-being' Ferris remarks. Magneto replies that they will be fine, as they know how to deal with Sentinels. He explains that it is simply this world, that the more things change, the more things stay the same. 'Yes, Sir. I understand' Ferris responds, while Magneto uses his powers to open a thick metal door. He starts to descend some stairs, and asks Ferris, who hovers alongside him, 'And what about our project?' Ferris reports that all is going according to plan. They arrive at a hidden lab, where energy crackles around a platform that is in the center of the room. Ferris informs Magneto that the Time Platform is almost ready, and soon, he will be able to send the young X-Men back to their time period of origin!
