Lightning sat on the floor of his cell on Asteroid M, Magneto's home base, with his arms wrapped around his knees wondering how on Earth he'd gotten into his current situation. Well actually he knew very well how it had all gone down but it didn't make it any easier to take. He'd been stuck inside this rubber covered cell for, well he didn't know how long it was actually, and he desperately wanted out. Even worse, Angel had been captured with him and Lightning had no idea where he was or what might be happening to him. Was he even still alive?
It had all started some time ago when Magneto and his new group whom he called the "Brotherhood of Evil Mutants" (made up of Quicksilver who was extremely fast, his sister the Scarlet Witch who had a "hex" power she could use against people, Mastermind who could create incredibly convincing illusions, and Magneto's ultimate toady who was, appropriately enough, called Toad and could jump around like one) had taken over the tiny nation of San Marco in South America. The X-Men had gone there, stopped him and freed the country but in the process Professor X had a bad accident which had cost him his mental powers. He was just a normal human now. (See X-Men #4)
Not long after that Harry, Sirius, Bobby, Warren, Hank, Jean, and the professor were watching a track meet happening in New York City on TV while Scott was in his room reading having declared watching a track meet to be "juvenile" under their current circumstances. One of the athletes suddenly started winning everything by jumping past all of his competitors. He did it so often that the crowd accused him of being a fake and began to attack him. The students at Xavier's school realized he must be a mutant too and set out to rescue him even though Xavier warned them that since he'd lost his telepathic powers he wouldn't be able to help them this time. Nevertheless they managed to get the mutant away from the crowd and fled, catching a subway which swept them away to safety.
Then things started to get weird.
"See how everyone is staring at us." said Marvel Girl as she looked around the subway car. It was crowded and it was clear that everyone had recognized them.
"Ignore it, Marvel Girl. We paid our fare just like anyone else"was Cyclops' reply. Lightning had to stop himself from giggling at that. Leave it to Cyclops to try to ease the tension with a completely irrelevant statement that was somehow still appropriate. Meanwhile Beast was looking closely at their guest.
"There's something familiar about you, my friend" Beast was now saying to the guest, "something disturbingly familiar."Although their guest denied ever meeting them before his ability to jump in the manner that he had reminded Beast very strongly of the evil mutant Toad. He reached forward and pulled a mask off the man's face. It was the Toad.
It quickly became apparent that Magneto had been using the Toad as bait in an attempt to find where the X-Men were headquartered. Thankfully that plan had been foiled by Beast's observations.
Before anything else could happen the train stopped and opened its doors allowing the Toad to try to escape. The X-Men piled out of the train after him and chased him into the main terminal at Grand Central Station where the other evil mutants were waiting to get word of how Toad was doing. That's when all hell broke loose.
The battle was fierce but short. The upshot was that Magneto bound Angel with a bunch of iron slats from a train gate. When Lightning flew over to try to free him he also got trapped by the slats. He couldn't use his electricity without shocking Angel and the iron slats were controlled so thoroughly by Magneto that they were resisting all of Lightning's attempts to remove them with his telekinesis. The other X-Men were kept from helping them by the rest of the Brotherhood. The Scarlet Witch hexed a nearby passenger's luggage which all opened up spilling out their contents and causing Beast to slip and crash. Iceman fought against a bunch of illusions cast on him by Mastermind and Marvel Girl helped him when she distracted Mastermind by lifting him up in the air with her power. Meanwhile Cyclops was grabbed by Quicksilver but he turned his optic blasts on him and sent him running. Quicksilver's speed was the only thing that saved him from being hit.
Magneto decided it was time to leave and he summoned the others to follow him as he carried Angel and Lightning away. The others all went with him except for Toad who had been caught by Cyclops. Mastermind prevented pursuit from the rest of the X-Men by creating an illusion of a rhinoceros charging through the Station. That caused a general panic in the crowd and allowed the Brotherhood to escape with their captives.
Angel and Lightning were quickly taken from the train station and put aboard a small airship of some kind. The ship took off going straight up higher and higher until it looked like they were heading into orbit.
"Don't worry" Angel whispered to Lightning, "the others will come for us."
"I know" Lightning whispered back, "I just hope they reach us in time."
They kept rising up until they really did make it into orbit. Looking out the main window up front in amazement Lightning saw that they were approaching a large asteroid which had – buildings on it? It was inhabited?
"Welcome to Asteroid M" said Magneto noticing where Lightning was looking, "impressive, is it not?"
"I'd be lying if I denied it" said Lightning, obviously impressed.
"I'm glad you have good taste about one thing at least" said Magneto.
"How come the space shuttles never report it?" asked Angel.
"As if I would allow that" said Magneto making a dismissive gesture but didn't elaborate further.
The airship soon landed on the asteroid. Lightning and Angel were taken inside where they were quickly separated. Lightning didn't see where Angel was sent before he was shoved into his cell.
"Magneto will deal with you later" gloated Mastermind who then taunted Lightning a bit more before he slammed the door shut. Lightning heard it lock from the outside.
The cell was completely covered with hard rubber neutralizing any attempts Lightning might make to use his electricity. What's more it looked like it was all one piece of rubber with no visible joins anywhere. Once the door was shut it blended in so seamlessly with the rest of the cell walls that he couldn't even see it anymore. He reached out with his telekinesis but couldn't grab on to anything.
He sat down on the floor, wrapped his arms around his knees and tried to think. What was Magneto going to do to him? Would he be tortured? Or killed? Unable to come up with any meaningful answers Lightning eventually gave it up and just waited to see what would happen. It was a long wait.
"So Lightning" Magneto's voice finally broke into his revery, "are you enjoying the accommodations?" Lightning looked around the cell but couldn't see where the voice was coming from.
"Magneto" he called as he stood up, "where's Angel? What have you done to him?"
"Wouldn't you like to know" said Magneto, "he's, well he's not having the best time right now but you can help him."
"How? I'm not exactly in a position to do anything from here."
"Just tell me where I can find Xavier" was the reply, "and I'll let both of you go."
"Yeah" said Lightning, "somehow I don't believe you so, no."
"You think to defy me?" said Magneto, "you're just a kid."
"It looks like you had this cell built especially for me" shot back Lightning, "would you do that for someone who is 'just a kid?'"
Magneto didn't answer but suddenly Lightning was assaulted by the loudest high pitched, most painful siren he'd ever heard in his life. It was so loud he clapped his hands over his ears but it didn't help. The agony that the sound caused was so intense that Lightning dropped to his knees.
Then it was gone and Lightning was on his hands and knees breathing hard. But before he could even calm down the siren was back and Lightning was all the way down on the floor this time while holding his ears.
Finally, finally the siren stopped again.
"Didn't like that, did you?" came Magneto's voice, "if you don't want me to do that again then I suggest you tell me where Xavier is." Lightning didn't have to think over his answer. The professor had done a lot for him and had given him a whole new life in America. Pain or no pain there was no way he would betray him in return.
"No!" said Lightning without any hesitation. The siren came back on again. It was louder this time and Lightning began to scream from the pain.
"You're only hurting yourself" said Magneto when the siren stopped again, "you can stop this at any time." Lightning pushed himself up until he was on his knees and took a deep breath.
"Go to Hell you sadistic bastard!" Lightning yelled at the top of his lungs (well what he actually yelled was "Go #### yourself you sadistic #### ####### piece of ####!" but since that's just a little too impolite to repeat we'll pretend that he really did yell "Go to Hell you sadistic bastard!")
The siren immediately started up again only this time it was much louder and much, much more painful making Lightning feel like his head was going to explode. He grabbed his ears, screamed, and fell down unconscious.
When Lightning woke up he had no idea how much time had passed. His head was still ringing from the siren but thankfully his cell was silent now. He pushed himself up onto his hands and knees.
"Oh dear God" he said to himself, "I never, ever want to go through anything like that again. That was worse than when I faced Quirrel and Voldemort at the end of first year."
He raised himself into an upright seated position and looked around the room. 'Okay' he thought, 'I have to get out of here. I can't use my mutant powers and Magneto knows it. He thinks I'm helpless but he doesn't know about my magic. Let's just hope that I've practiced my wandless magic enough for it to be effective by now because if this doesn't work I'm officially out of options.'
He stood up. Assuming he hadn't gotten turned around too much since entering the cell he now turned to face where he thought the door was. If necessary he would try this with all four walls. Facing the first wall he made the motions for the unlocking charm with his right index finger.
"Alohomora" he said concentrating hard. To his surprise there was a click and the door, visible now that it was unlocked, swung open outward.
"Whoa" he said to himself, "got it in one. Wasn't expecting that. I wish Hermione could have seen it. Well now that I know that I've practiced enough to do it perhaps next time someone tries to use that siren on me I'll try for a silencing spell. Wish I'd thought to do it this time. Oh well." He pushed the door open all the way and crept outside into an empty hallway. Quietly he pushed the cell door closed behind him and heard it relock.
Now which way to go: right? Or left? On a whim he chose right and snuck down the hallway as quietly as he could until he reached an open doorway in the right hand wall. He peeked through it into the room beyond –
– and immediately ducked back into the hall out of sight. Magneto was in that room but thankfully his back was to the door and he seemed to be busy. Lightning took a deep breath and exhaled as quietly as he could.
'If only I had my invisibility cloak' he thought to himself. Well, no help for it now. He turned back and went down the left hand hallway until he came to another door in the left hand wall (which was actually the same wall as before since Lightning had turned around). It was locked. As it was right next to his cell door maybe this was Angel's cell.
He performed the unlocking charm again. It was easier this time and he wasn't surprised when the lock clicked. He cautiously pulled the door open and looked inside just in time to see Angel turning around to see who was coming into his cell. Lightning quickly raised a finger to his lips before Angel could say anything. He motioned for Angel to come out into the hallway.
"Lightning am I glad to see you" Angel whispered, "how did you escape?"
"I used my magic" Lightning whispered back.
"Right" said Angel, "Magneto doesn't know about that."
"And I want to keep it that way" said Lightning.
"What happened to you?" Angel asked him. Lightning quickly told him about what happened to him after they were separated. Angel snorted when Lightning told him how he'd insulted Magneto before being knocked unconscious.
"Wow" Angel said, "I never knew you had it in you to curse like that."
"I live with you guys," said Lightning, "it was bound to rub off eventually."
"Excuse me" said Angel with a little indignation, "I can't speak for the others but I don't curse like that."
"Oh no?" asked Lightning, "what about the first time you played Sonic CD?" Angel reacted as if he'd been slapped.
"We agreed to never speak of that again" he hissed at Lightning who smirked.
"I wonder what Sirius will do when he finds out about what I said" he said, "I'm not sure if he'll laugh up a storm or force me to wash out my mouth."
"Probably both" added Angel, "so our host used that siren on you too, huh?"
"Yeah" said Lightning, "my head is still hurting. How long have we been up here?"
"Some hours" said Angel, "you must have been knocked out for a long time. Magneto was throwing all sorts of lights and sounds at me to get me to crack. He just stopped a short time ago. I don't think he had the siren going quite so loudly for me though."
"What do we do now?" asked Lightning, "Magneto's back that way" he pointed back past his own cell, "but I don't think he knows we're out of our cells."
"Which is strange" said Angel, "you'd think there would be alarms sounding over our breakout."
"But we didn't break out" said Lightning, "I just unlocked the doors even if I was using magic. Maybe that doesn't trip the alarms."
"Maybe" said Angel dubiously, "but even if he doesn't know about our escape yet he will soon enough. There was a camera in my cell. Was there one in yours?"
"I didn't see one but that doesn't mean it couldn't have been hidden" said Lightning, "I never thought of that. Damn. If there was a camera then he'll get suspicious about my escape and if he was recording us the whole time he'll see that I used an unlocking charm. He's not stupid. He'll work out that it was magic in that case. What do we do now?"
"We use the time we have as best we can" said Angel, "we either have to find a way to escape from here or somehow contact the rest of the team. And don't kick yourself too much. We don't know for a fact that Magneto had a camera in your cell or, if he did, that he was recording you."
Lightning opened his mouth to reply when Angel suddenly motioned him to be quiet as they heard some noises coming from the nearer end of the hall. They both snuck down to it as silently as they could. At the end of the hall they looked out into the large entrance room to the Asteroid. Mastermind was there with his back to them. Coming in through what was obviously the airlock was Toad who looked a bit like he was in a trance of some kind.
"Toad!" Mastermind exclaimed in surprise, "How'd you escape the X-Men? How'd you get here?" Lightning and Angel looked at each other not quite sure what was going on. Yes, Toad had been left behind when Magneto captured them but both X-Men thought Magneto would have sent his ship back to get him later. Apparently not. When Toad answered it was in a slow, sleepy voice.
"I... Had... To... Come..." he said.
And then, before Mastermind could reply, the other X-Men attacked.
"They did come for us" said Lightning as he watched Beast slam into Mastermind with his feet.
"Of course they did" said Angel as Mastermind began to recover, "I told you they would."
"And I believed you" said Lightning as Mastermind cast an illusion on Beast turning his legs to dough, "I think we'd better help them now." Angel nodded his agreement as he and Lightning hurled themselves into the room from the hall. Mastermind turned around just in time to receive a hard fist to his face from Angel which put him down for the count.
"Hey!" said Lightning, "I wanted to do that!"
"Gotta be faster" said Angel with a smirk as the other X-Men ran up to the two of them.
"Angel! Lightning! You're okay" said Cyclops.
"Define 'okay'" growled Lightning.
"Magneto tortured us" said Angel grimly, "Lightning had it worse than I did."
"That's not true" said Lightning, "I fell unconscious pretty quickly. You didn't and had to suffer for much longer."
"How did you get away from him?" asked Marvel Girl.
"Lightning got us out" said Angel, "with his other ability." The other X-Men understood at once that Angel was referring to Lightning's magic but didn't want to name it in case there were unwanted listeners. This turned out to be wise as they heard movement and turned to see Toad hopping away down another corridor.
"Let's get him" said Beast, "before he warns Magneto that we're here." However before any of them could move various bit of metal around the room started to come alive and attack them in various ways.
"I think he already knows we're here" said Iceman.
"Yeah, no #### Sherlock" said Lightning who lashed out as hard as he could with his electricity at some of the metal. After a few seconds all of it dropped to the ground.
"What did you do?" asked Cyclops.
"Hopefully I shocked Magneto into stopping his attack" said Lightning.
"Of course" said Beast, "if Magneto was moving metal with his power then technically he would be connected to it all in such a way that Lightning's electricity might have been able to hit him through his own magnetic power."
"Something like that" agreed Lightning, "although I never thought it would actually work." Before anything else could be said a large door slammed down in front of them.
"Oh no you don't" said Cyclops who began blasting at the door. It took a short time but eventually he blasted it wide open and they all ran through it and soon reached Magneto and the other members of the Brotherhood. Even Mastermind was there having recovered from Angel's punch and getting to Magneto by another route.
Things got even more intense as the battle was joined again where, among other things, Cyclops fought Quicksilver, Angel confronted Mastermind and dispelled one of his illusions, and Magneto sent a grenade at them that exploded into many sharp darts that Marvel Girl and Lightning stopped together with a combined telekinetic shield.
Suddenly everything was interrupted by a loud rumble and the whole structure started shaking.
"The asteroid is breaking up" yelled Magneto, "during the battle someone must have brushed against some of the detonate buttons!"
Things ended pretty quickly after that. Attempting to get in a last blow Magneto tried to kill Cyclops by tossing him into the part of the asteroid that was breaking off from the main one but Angel and Iceman rescued him. After that the X-Men managed to escape the destructing asteroid in one of Magneto's escape capsules which took them back down to Earth. On the way down Cyclops explained to Angel and Lightning that the other X-Men had followed Toad up to the asteroid when that mutant had summoned a capsule to retrieve him. When Toad did that he seemed unaware that any of the X-Men were with him.
After they disembarked from the capsule it lifted back up towards the sky making the X-Men realize that Magneto and his Brotherhood must still be alive up on the remains of the asteroid. However there was nothing they could do about that since Magneto could control where the capsule would land again and it might be anywhere. They would just have to wait to see where and when Magneto and his Brotherhood turned up again
"Hopefully that won't be for a long time, if ever" said Lightning although he knew it was a fool's wish, "I never want to be tortured like that again, whether it's by Magneto, Voldemort, or someone else."
"Don't bet on it" said Iceman, "villains are like roaches. They never really go away."
"Don't insult roaches like that" said Beast, "unlike villains they have their appointed places in the world's various ecosystems."
"Thank you for that lovely bit of wisdom Hank" said Iceman, "way to make me feel guilty every time I try to kill one from now on."
"You're welcome" said Beast with a smirk as the X-Men began to head home.
When the six X-Men arrived back at the school they were met by a very relieved Sirius Black who grabbed Lightning and gave him a bone crushing hug.
"Don't ever scare me like that again pup" he said to the young hero, "when Magneto captured you I thought I might never see you again!"
"How did you know about that?" asked Lightning as Sirius led them to where Professor Xavier was waiting for them. Sirius had stayed with Xavier during the mission.
"The professor kept me up to date on what was happening the whole time" said Sirius as they reached a smiling Xavier in the main livingroom.
"How did he know?" asked Beast who looked at Xavier, "you have your mental power back?"
"I never lost it" said Xavier, "I only pretended to after our first battle with the Evil Mutants." At the gobsmacked looks the X-Men were giving him he explained.
"Remember this is a school" he told them, "and you can't advance in any school without passing your various exams. Well, this was one of them and I'm proud to say that you've all passed with flying colors. You've proven you can think and act for yourselves without my help and I couldn't be prouder of you all. Congratulations my X-Men!"
"Wow" Lightning murmured to Sirius, "I hope Snape never finds out about how Professor X tests us."
"Don't even think that" said Sirius, "Hogwarts wouldn't survive." Suddenly his face took on a stern expression although his eyes twinkled with mirth. "And now your mouth has a date with some soap." He grabbed a spluttering Lightning and began pulling him out of the room.
"What's that about?" asked Marvel Girl watching them leave.
"Trust me" said Angel as he tried to suppress his laughter, "you don't want to know."
Late that night after almost everyone else was asleep Sirius was wandering the hallways of the mansion deep in thought. When he heard his name called he looked up in surprise. His feet (with him attached to them) had found their way to the open door of Professor Xavier's office and the professor was inside at his desk.
"You're up late" said Xavier gesturing for Sirius to come in.
"I could say the same about you" said Sirius, "but it's your house so your rules."
"I often work late" said Xavier, "the thoughts in the mansion are quieter during the late night hours. At the same time if someone is having a nightmare I can sense it and help calm them down."
"That would have been nice to have in Azkaban" said Sirius.
"So what's on your mind tonight?" asked Xavier, "I'm sure you weren't wandering the mansion just for fun."
"Just thinking" said Sirius, "I have a request for you. I was going to wait until tomorrow but we're both here now, so why wait?"
"What can I do for you?" asked Xavier. Sirius took a breath before he answered.
"I was very upset by some of what happened earlier today" he began, "when Harry and Warren were captured by Magneto it frightened me. I honestly thought that I might never see either of them again. I was extremely close to summoning Harry's broom and flying off to try to rescue them."
"That wouldn't have worked" said Xavier, "you would have had to go up into orbit to reach Asteroid M. The lack of oxygen would have killed you long before you got anywhere near the place. Even if you'd used the Bubble Headed Charm that wouldn't have stopped you from freezing to death in the cold vacuum of space once you made it up there. Not even the best warming charms would be able to fight against that."
"I realize that now" said Sirius, "you probably stopped me from running off in a panic, didn't you?"
"A mild calming influence" admitted Xavier, "just enough to keep you from doing exactly that."
"Thank you" said Sirius, "but to get back to my point, the whole incident reminded me of how young Harry still is and how I should be the one protecting him."
"Do you want Harry to stop being one of the X-Men?" asked Xavier with a frown but Sirius raised a hand as if waving away the suggestion.
"No, no" he said, "I'm not going to do that to him. I mean the sensible, even parental part of me (if you can believe that I have one) worries about him and would like to take him away and hide him in some concrete magic proof bunker. Obviously that's not a practical idea."
"Perhaps not" said Xavier, "but I would be concerned about you if you didn't worry about Harry. I worry about all of my X-Men when they're in the field."
"At least you can help with your telepathy, even from many miles away" pointed out Sirius.
"That's true" conceded Xavier.
"I'm not going to ask Harry to leave the X-Men" said Sirius, "I just can't do that. He's happy being part of your team and he loves being an X-Man. I can see it in his whole manner. When we went flying together on New Year's Day it was quite obvious to me that he was happy and I'm not about to ruin that."
"So what do you want?" asked Xavier as he leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers in front of him.
"I want to help more than I already do" said Sirius, "I'm not a mutant so I can't be an X-Man but before I was sent to Azkaban I was a fully trained auror. Mad Eye Moody himself was one of my trainers and he's as hard as they come. 'Constant vigilance' is his personal mantra. I know how to fight, or at least I did back then and hopefully I can recover my skills through more exercise and training of my own. Maybe I can't help in the field very much but at the very least I want to give Harry and the others as much support as I can."
Xavier looked at Sirius for a long moment as he pondered what the younger man had said.
"I see" he finally said, "I'll have to think about this. I won't say no to help freely offered but if you really do want to get more involved it will take some planning. The biggest problem is that your power is magic."
"I know, the secrecy and all that" said Sirius, "America is less secretive than Britain and Europe but that doesn't mean the American government wants wizards to be openly throwing around their power – even if everyone knows about Dr. Strange."
"He's a special case" said Xavier, "otherwise you're right. That's why Harry keeps his magic as a secret backup weapon. On the uncommon times when he does use magic in the field it can be passed off as part of his mutant abilities."
"Maybe my magic can be passed off the same way" said Sirius, "if I keep my identity secret too."
"It might" said Xavier, "in that case I would urge you to see if you can start learning to use your magic without a wand. Talk to Harry about that as he's been working quite hard at it these last months. It served him well today."
"It did" said Sirius, "I was surprised by Harry's wandless magic. At home the common wisdom is that wandless magic is very difficult. Only the strongest wizards can do it at all, and not usually for anything major. But Harry told me that's not true and you pointed it out to him."
"I did" said Xavier and he told Sirius about the conversation he and Harry had the morning after they had rescued Hank from Conquistador. Sirius was impressed that Harry had performed the lumos charm on only his second try.
"Have you told Albus about this?" he asked.
"Not yet" said Xavier, "but now that Harry has used it in the field in an effective manner I'm thinking of telling him soon."
"My godson is amazing" he said with a grin, "now I really want to help out him and the team."
"All right" said Xavier, "if you're sure of this then you need to get stronger. You're still recovering from Azkaban even now. You should exercise more. Scott can help you there. Also you'll have to learn to fight again as you're out of practice. It will take quite a while for you to get back to a level where you're fit to do missions."
"That's true" said Sirius, "perhaps I can use the Danger Room?"
"I'll consider it and let you know" said Xavier, "the Danger Room is designed so that magic doesn't disrupt it so don't worry about that. We'll just have to create training programs that will be appropriate for you and you won't be able to train alongside the X-Men for quite a while yet as they're too far ahead of you right now."
"I know" said Sirius, "I was able to see that the very first time I saw them train."
"Well good" said Xavier, "let's sleep on it for now and we'll talk more about it soon. Good night Sirius."
"Good night professor."