Judgement Day
They came to this market-place in Egypt to do the unthinkable. With the help of the one time Morlock Caliban's mutant tracking ability they hunt the foot soldiers in the mysterious mutant known as Apocalypse's insane war to determine the survival of the fittest.
Cable isn't concerned about the certain danger that lies ahead. Something else has preoccupied his thoughts since encountering the Riders in the sewers of New York. Something disturbing...something evil.
"You will not find a treasure like this in all Alexandria." The merchant tells Dom, as she and Nathan pause at his booth and Dom inspects a ivory handled knife. "And only 700 Egyptian pounds."
"You're being cheated." Cable tells her.
"Ah, the lady is a friend of this man?" The merchant asks, making note of Cable's massive build. "Did I say 700? You can have it for 200."
"Any word from Caliban?" Dom asks through the psi-link she shares with Cable.
"Not yet." Cable replies. "He and Storm are working the roof-tops. Leaving us with my least favorite part. The waiting."
CRACKABOOM
Suddenly Caliban crashes down on the merchant's booth, crushing it in his mad dash after the Dark Rider know as Tusk.
"You were saying?" Dom remarks.
"I knew this was going too smoothly!" Cable replies.
"My shop! My merchandise! I'm ruined!" The merchant yells.
"One side, one side. Let a Rider through." Tusk yells, pushing through the crowd.
"You cannot escape." Caliban yells. "Caliban promised Cable/Nathan he would catch a Dark Rider. And Caliban never breaks a promise."
Tusk runs into the street, directly in front of a truck, which swerves to miss him and crashes into a building. The old stone structure gives way and topples over. Domino spies a young boy about to be crushed beneath the rubble and dives towards him covering him with her own body.
"Nate, I could use some back-up here! Like right now!" She yells to Cable, as she leaps.
In the heat of the moment, Cable dares something with his mutant ability he hasn't tried before. Taking the idea from the X-Man Cyclops, who has honed his optic blasts to the point where he can send a sharply defined shot. Cable sends out a rapid-fire succession of telekinetic bursts. And combining it with Cable's own innate marksmanship skills it results in a very effective telekinetic shooting gallery. Cable blasts each chunk of concrete into dust before it can reach Dom and the boy.
"It's okay, kid." Dom tells the boy in perfectly accented Egyptian, as they are showered by the concrete dust. "We're okay."
"We've set off enough fireworks for one day." Cable says, as he helps her up. "Let's book before the Egyptian authorities are all over us."
"Thank you." The young boy tells him.
"You don't have to thank us." Cable replies, also in perfectly accented Egyptian. "Nobody else is going to die because of Apocalypse."
Tusk, having lost Caliban in the confusion, is making his way down a dark alley while congratulating himself on his ingenuity when suddenly a bolt of lightening strikes, knocking him off his feet.
"End of the road, little one." Storm tells him. "The Dark Riders have much to answer for and we will provide the questions.
Storm grew up on streets much like these in Cairo. As a thief, she knew that her life depended on how quickly she could escape through the back alleys to safety. But, she learned then than no matter how fast you are, if someone has no other purpose than to catch you, you will be caught. Ironically, she learns today that it works both ways.
Cable, Dom and Caliban enter the alley and Cable makes straight for the little dwarf, picks him up with one hand and slams him into the wall.
"Listen to me, you piece of trash." Cable whispers with a voice of pure ice. "You're going to lead us to the Dark Riders or--"
"You don't scare me. Apocalypse taught us, X-Men don't kill." Tusk tells him.
"Apocalypse is dead, right?" Cable asks. "If you want a similar arrangement I can arrange that." Cable throws the little man across the alley into the far wall.
"Domino, Cable is bluffing, isn't he?" Storm whispers. "This is not the way the X-Men handle things."
"Reality check, Storm." Dom says smiling at her discomfort. "Cable ain't no X-Man."
"Stop!" Tusk screams, as Cable advances on him once more. "I'll...help you. Why shouldn't I? Gauntlet and the others judged and defeated Tusk Prime and my brothers. I was the only one to escape. Help me rescue them and I'll take you to the heart of the Dark Rider's stronghold."
"Saddle up, People." Cable orders. "We're moving out, now."
This desert has swallowed entire civilizations through the ages. But never in it's endless histories has it hosted a crossing party such as this. Cable, Dom, Caliban and Storm are all on camels. Cable is in the lead with a small leash which is attached to the collar around Tusk's neck. Tusk is on foot, guiding the others through the desert.
"I'm curious, Ororo." Cable says. "Why did you agree to come along with us?"
"If you spent more time with the X-Men, you would not need to ask, Nathan." Storm replies.
"Meaning?" Cable asks.
"Meaning, each of us has joined a sort of...family." Storm explains. "As a member of that family, you needed help and I came."
"But being a part of a family...has a price, too." Cable says, his voice growing softer.
"Nathan," Storm reins her camel closer and places her hand on Cable's arm. "You may not know this...but I was not only the one they called 'Windrider' I grew up as an orphan...alone in the streets...without so much as a face to call mother or father."
"I know that pain, too, Ororo." Cable tells her, speaking very softly. "For so much of my life, I've been alone...I've lost my mother...my wife...my son...Everyone I've ever loved..."
"Not everyone, Nathan." Storm says, taking his hand in hers. "Not as long as you have the X-Men."
Domino listens to this conversation, but makes no comment, though her eyes narrow a bit when Ororo takes Nathan's hand in hers.
"Water for you, Patch-Eye?" Caliban asks, offering his canteen.
"Domino, Caliban. For the nineteenth time, it's not Patch-Eye." Dom tells him.
"Caliban likes you, Patch-Eye. Thinks you're funny." Caliban replies.
"Swell." Dom remarks.
"We could be friends. Like Caliban and Kitty Pryde." Caliban tells her.
"Kitty who?" Dom asks, then turns toward Nathan and Ororo, "Hey, Cable, how much longer?"
"As long as it takes." Cable answers.
"And has it occurred to anyone that we're being led into a trap?" Dom asks.
"It's occurred to everyone, Dom." Cable replies. "Well, except for Caliban. But we agreed..."
Suddenly a violent sand storm kicks up. Tusk bites through his leash and takes off, immediately lost in the storm.
"He's bolting!" Cable shouts. "Ororo, can't you do something about this blasted wind."
"This storm is not natural in it's making." Storm replies. "And since we are all aware of what the Dark Rider called Hurricane is capable of..."
"You heard the lady, people." Cable orders. "Stay alert and watch out for--"
Cable is blasted from his saddle by a plasma bolt.
"Cable!" Storm shouts.
"Worry about yourself, Wind Rider!" Lifeforce tells her, as she jumps Storm from behind.
"Riders rule the day, chumps!" Tusk Prime says, as he jumps Caliban.
"We'll feast on your flesh!" Spyne says, as he jumps in front of Dom's camel. "And you're the appetizer, Domino!"
"Try a breath mint, sleazoid!" Dom tells him, as she draws her plasma pistol and fires all in one smooth motion.
Barrage blasts Cable a second time as he tries to get up from the first attack.
"Hi-de-ho, Cable-Boy. Warned you 'bout mixing it up with the riders, but you couldn't help yourself!" Barrage tells him. "Just like our new honcho figured. Now, we got orders to take you in alive, but nobody said I couldn't mess you up first."
Cable's left eye begins to glow brighter, as he replies to Barrage through gritted teeth. "No. Not today, Barrage. Not tomorrow. Not on your best day!"
The ferocity of Cable's telekinetic assault surprises even himself. Simultaneously, it is excruciating, invigorating and exhausting. It is becoming his secret weapon. Like having an atomic bomb in his back pocket. He cannot go to it every time, but it sure can be effective, he notes as Barrage is blasted back over ten yards to fall limp on the desert sand.
"Ouch!" Dom says, as Barrage lands in front of her. "You know, Nate, with all that snap, crackle, pop comin' out of your head, I wonder, do you still remember how to use one of these?" Dom tosses him her spare plasma pistol.
"In a word, Dom, yes." Cable replies, catching the pistol.
They've known each other a long time. But Domino still marvels at his prowess with a weapon. And the Riders fall before Cable's fire as easy as one, Lifeforce is blasted away from Storm; two, Tusk Prime is blasted away from Caliban; three...
"Nathan, hold your fire!" Storm shouts. "We have been suffocated by this sand storm long enough. And if Hurricane believes he can wrest control of the elements from me, he is sorely mistaken."
Storm reaches up into the atmosphere and cleaves a wedge of desperately needed air. Within moments, the sand storm which had robbed them of their sight and senses is dissipated. And with it, any advantage the Dark Riders had.
"Storm, we'll secure these. You scout around for the others. Hurricane in particular." Cable orders.
"You stupid, bloated idiot!" Gauntlet shouts, putting his gun to Hurricane's head. "Twice now you've promised to defeat the Wind Rider. And twice it was you who tasted defeat. That's two times too many!"
Gauntlet make to pull the trigger, but before he can, the gun is suddenly pulled from his grasp and flies through the air straight into Cable's hand. Cable crushes Gauntlet's gun like a tin can, while covering the Riders with the plasma pistol in his other hand.
"We're all a little tired of this judge and jury song you've been singing." Cable tells him. "Seems that now we hold the cards, Gauntlet. Wanna discuss the terms of your surrender?"
"Surrender?" Gauntlet replies. "We Riders won't even speak the word, Dayspring."
As if on cue, in a flash of techno-transport energy, the Dark Rider known only as Harddrive provides another ill timed escape.
"Oath!" Cable shouts, throwing the crushed remains of Gauntlet's weapon to the ground.
"Good move, Nate. Shouting always helps." Dom remarks.
"Cable, we have let the Riders teleport out of our hands yet again." Storm says, as she lands in front of them. "Can we not 'Body-Slide' to their co-ordinates?"
"Would if I could." Cable answers, then in a much softer tone, he adds, "But I can't any longer. That...gift...was lost to me recently...along with a friend." Cable then turns towards Caliban. "Caliban, can you get a fix on them?"
"Caliban has sand up his nose." Caliban replies.
"O-kay." Cable says. "People, we need a way out of..."
Suddenly they are all enveloped in the same type of teleportation field as the one that took the Dark Riders only moments ago.
"Nate, at the risk of stating the obvious, we are out of here." Dom tells him.
"We're teleporting!" Cable replies. "This must be harddrive's doing! Stand ready for any....thing."
"In a nano-second they are hostages to the high-tech kidnapping. Their very molecules broken down into bits of energy. Rearranged, recalculated and reassembled in the middle of an unimaginable horror.
"By the Goddess!" Storm cries out. "There are so many!"
"Nate, My God!" Dom says, as she takes in the slaughter all around them. "Who could have done this?"
"Caliban knows this place." Caliban begins to shiver in fear.
"This can't be..." Cable whispers. "Akkaba...it can't be...but it is.."
All around them is horrible death and utter destruction. An entire city destroyed. Women with small children and even babies blown apart where they stood. Dozens crucified in the middle of the street. Every man, woman and child slaughtered with cold precision.
"This can't be!" Cable screams. "This isn't supposed to happen now! DAMN YOU TO HELL, APOCALYPSE!!"
Dom walks forward, kneels beside Nathan, placing her arm around him. "Nate, tell us. Tell us what you know about...this."
"I...I'm not sure." Cable replies softly, then gets up and runs towards a sign that lies in the middle of the blood-soaked street. Picking up the sign, Cable's entire body goes rigid as he reads what he knew it would say. "I...I am back...in Akkaba..."
"What does he mean, Caliban?" Storm asks. "You said you knew. Where or what is 'Akkaba'?"
Caliban's only answer is to draw his huge frame up as small as he can and to whimper in fear.
Cable turns to face them, and reads from the sign.
"Let all who enter here know that this is the birthplace of the Master of The World. En Sabah Nur."
"Apocalypse." Caliban whimpers.
"But, Nathan, why would anyone murder all of these innocents?" Storm asks.
"In the future, there is a place called Akkaba. The rebels...my Clan...my friends and family...settled there. We didn't know...it was Apocalypse's birthplace...Apocalypse came and...slaughtered...everyone. It looked exactly like this..."
"Let me get this straight..." Dom says. "Someone from the future came back in time to do this?!"
"I made a promise that day..." Cable whispers softly. "It would never happen again..."
"Another promise you couldn't keep." A voice shouts from behind them. A voice Cable knows as well as he knows his own. "Isn't that right, Daddy?"
Tyler Dayspring stands with his Dark Riders laughing down at them.
Our Journey Continues With
In The Name Of The Father
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