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"Are you sure? There are all androids?" Harry asked.
"Or something similar Harry, they don't have minds I can find." Jean said telepathically, staring at the six cameramen along the far wall that had grabbed her attention as she did one of her routine area of effect screenings. "I thought at first they had some kind of defense, but when I tried a direct assault, I still couldn't find anything."
"Did Betsy discover them as well?" Ororo asked down their link. As always her telepathic voice was slightly fainter given her mind's natural 'electric fuzz' defense', but deep and vibrant for all of that to Jean's telepathic senses.
"No, I don't think she noticed them before walking up there, and you know she has a problem talking aloud and concentrating on what her telepathy is telling her." Jean replied. "I'll ask her what she senses when she's done speaking."
Jean and Betsy's telepathy worked slightly different, with Betsy's always being on like radar, while Jean had to concentrate sending hers out like a pulse before narrowing down her attention. "In all honesty she should've noticed them before me, but I suppose she was too anxious about her part of this announcement to notice what her senses were telling her. did you know she was so worried Harry had to use a Cheering Charm on her this morning?"
"Public speaking isn't for everyone, but that isn't really important right now is it?" Harry said. "I wonder if they are just here to spy, or something else?"
"I don't know, but we should be ready for anything, I've already contacted Wyatt, Dani and Piotr." Jean replied, speaking of the three Custodes already here in Magical Mind's HQ. "I'll pass the word along to Susan verbally, and she'll pass it to Reed, but you're on again Harry."
Harry nodded slightly, hopping to his feet and moving towards the podium as Betsy finished answering questions about her eyes. "Good catch and well thought out response love."
"Ahh, those last few questions I should probably answer for Ms. Braddock." He said aloud taking over swiftly from Betsy and smiling at the crowd. "These eyes were actually developed several months ago, but there were, as Mr. Gerome asked about, problems with the programming, and there was a danger of external access with the first few versions. Both of which have now been solved entirely. There is now no external way to access the eyes or how they interact with the patient's brain. And the eyes now see as naturally as normal ones."
"In terms of production, there we ran into several bottlenecks, but only one really matters at this point: that being the lack of medical knowledge of surgery required to emplace them and the corresponding synaptic connections. Again with the help of Mr. Fantastic, and with Doctors Tonas and Rao this problem has been solved. The medical facilities here at Magical Minds are now fully capable of handling this procedure, as well as our other advancements in prosthetic technology."
Harry began to flip through a few screens, showing arms and legs prosthetics, on par with the eyes Betsy had showcased a few moments earlier in how well they acted almost as well as the original. Over the next few moments he answered several questions, turning them over to Reed Richards when they got a little too technical for him, then took the podium again to talk about the prices.
Here he made another surprise announcement: "I realize that even here in in the UK that is a bit pricy. However as I have mentioned before I am a veteran myself, so I have a special deal for war veterans. For the next four months any vet who wants these will get them, both the prosthetics and the operation, at 2/3rds the price regardless of their nationality."
That drew some actual applause from the audience. But after that the questions turned to business side of things. Several of the reporters asked whether or not MM would be selling the prosthetics and the process itself to other hospitals only to be told no. Others asked about whether MM would set up other hospitals the world over to handle the procedure, to which Harry replied no once more. The technology and procedures were both proprietary and would remain so. All the while Harry's eyes were moving around audience, but his attention was on the six androids at the back of the room.
"Betsy says she's ready to go, and Dani, Piotr and Wyatt are outside in the hall," Jean sent.
"Good, and if anything does start happening Jean, you hit the ground and stay there, understood?" Harry sent back, his worries and concerns coming through clearly down the link. Ororo's words echoed both his order and his worries a second later.
Jean scowled. She really didn't like being treated like she was so fragile. "Harry, you covered me with every defensive spell you know before we left Camelot, and I'm wearing my Phoenix suit underneath my normal clothing!"
"Doesn't matter love, I still don't want you involved in any combat." Harry replied firmly, again echoed an instant later by Ororo.
Barely restraining from sighing physically Jean sent an affirmative back as Wyatt entered the room, opening the door at the back silently and moving to stand within the crowd of cameramen. He was talking into a phone quietly as if he had been held up for something or other, a small press pass dangling from his neck just like those of the cameramen. Jean noticed MJ look his way, giving the Native American man a once over of approval before turning her attention back to the podium, though Jean was surprised to note that she too had looked in the direction of the four androids before doing so. Maybe their body language is wrong or something?
Jean put those thoughts out of her mind, watching with pride as Harry began to finish with the announcements, putting her concern about the androids to the side for a moment. This would be a major boon for Magical Minds.
And all this because of projects that Reed had on the back burner while he was devoting most of his time to her space-based stuff she thought to herself shaking her head mentally. Most of it had been done by Reed's computers and other systems in the Baxter Building, but the think tank that Harry had put together for the medical side of things had really come through for them as well for the actual operation side of things. And none of us had to even be part of the process up until this point, things are really taking shape all around.
Just then a question came from a tall middle-eastern looking man, with a sallow face and a surly expression. "Is it still your policy to not provide your medical advancements to countries of the Islamic faith that will not meet your ridiculous societal demands?"
Harry smiled grimly, not backing down from the question. "Magical Minds and its subsidiaries will not sell, allowed to be sold second hand, or in any way allow or products to be sold to countries that sanctioned terrorist activities within their borders, or that have not taken a stance on mutant/unpowered equality, or have spotty track records in the area of human rights. This is my personalpolicy, and all of my companies will adhere to it. I have said before and I will state again, humanity has more enemies out among the stars that we need to unite against. We cannot allow this internal division, which is wholly of wool cloth rather than fact, to allow it to divide us when there are so many forces out there that would love to take us down. And frankly how women are treated in many Middle East countries is personally abhorrent to me."
"You are holding your medical technology hostage, forcing your opinion on mutants down our throats just as much as any terrorist does when they take a hostage!" The man spat back angrily. "Do you think the world will continue to allow this?"
"I think you don't have a choice," Harry said bluntly. "If you want my companies medical breakthroughs you must meet my price, and my price isn't just monetary."
The man scowled, but sat down as Harry stared him down. However that seemed the cue for things to go pear shaped.
The androids at the back finally did something, all of them pushing a button on their video cameras the front of which suddenly changed, the wide lenses shrinking down to a point and becoming what looks like laser weapons of some kind. "For Allah, death to those touched by Shaitan!" said one of them, causing the man who had questioned Harry to twist around in shock, staring at the androids as their weapons began to thrum, pointing towards the podium. Shaitan was the name for Satan in the Islamic faith, and the hatred of mutants in Islam was justified by saying they had been touched by him.
Several blasts went off, but Harry wasn't there having leapt to the side and rolling away. They impacted the dais where he had been standing destroying the podium and the wall beyond the platform.
The crowd began to scream but Mr. Fantastic stretched his hands out pushing them down and lying over the entire audience with his rubbery body, over which he wore the unstable molecule suit he had developed to stretch with his powers, and which Harry had reinforced via runic arrays. This left the androids at the back of the room, MJ, Wyatt and a few others standing at the back of the room now alone.
Harry and Betsy immediate made for them over Reed's body as Susan went invisible and Ororo pulled Thomas to the floor, rolling way with him. Jean on the other hand pulled out a small handgun from her purse set below her chair, pulling it out and drilling one of the androids through the head with a high velocity bullet.
A bare second later had to roll aside once more from more fire as Harry and Betsy did the same, the blasts impacting Mr. Fantastic's body and causing him to grunt but doing no real damage. Jean's roll halted when she lashed out with a kick against the wall bringing herself to a halt and staring.
MJ didn't know what she was doing. She should've just simply ducked and run for the door. But she was close by one of the people with the guns, so it just seemed like a good idea to try and take the fight to them.
The next thing MJ knew she had grabbed one man's arm, twisting it around and hammering out a punch that should have laid him out with a broken jaw. She knew quite a bit self-defense after all sometimes a girl had to defend themselves.
But the man didn't drop instead acting as if he barely felt her punch, his arm coming off of his weapon to smack her aside with surprising force. MJ got her arm up to block the blow, and felt herself actually hurled away by the blow. It was only the fact that she had instinctively rolled with the blow that allowed her to keep her forearm from being broken.
Wyatt however had much better luck than MJ. Sweeping one leg out he caught two of the androids dumping them to the floor, as his other hand came up holding one of Cold Steel's tazer weapons set on high as it moved toward another android's face. The tazer sizzled against the android's chin, actually short-circuiting the android's brain and depositing him on the floor.
One of the androids he had tripped let go of his rifle and grabbed Wyatt's leg pulling him to the ground, rolling with him to push the Native American down. Wyatt against tried to bring the tazer to bear, but the android's strength overwhelmed him for a moment, and he didn't have his Coyote armor on.
Then Dani and Piotr were there, banging the door open and getting in among the androids before others could pile on Wyatt or continue to fire at the oncoming Betsy and Harry. Sigyn's Gift came up as a heavy short knife slicing into one android's neck while Piotr took another android to the floor, his hands also filled with Cold Steel type tazers. The android couldn't keep both of them away from its head, and it joined Wyatt's first target, spasming on the floor.
Harry and Betsy joined in too, tagging another android as MJ rejoined the fight, trying to tear the android pinning Wyatt down off him. She got just enough of its attention for Wyatt to grab his tazer and shock it in turn.
At the same time the few other people at the back and , whose presence had stopped Harry from using his magic up to this point, finally dropped to their faces and Harry dealt with the last android, banishing it's head off its shoulders.
As Mr. Fantastic pulled his body back into its normal shape releasing the audience Jean walked forward quickly, helped Mary Jane to her feet. "Are you okay?"
"I, I suppose," MJ said shaking her head. "What was all that about?"
"I don't know, but will find out. But you were looking at those androids, what gave them away?" Jean asked, checking her over.
"They were fidgeting with those cameras of theirs too often I suppose, and… I don't know, they didn't seem to blink enough if that makes sense."
"It does, seeing as they are, you know, androids." Jean leaned down, her fingers gripping the front of one of their eyeballs and pulling out a small lens made to look like the front of an eyeball. Behind it was a small video camera, short-circuited like the rest of the droid's head, but rather eerie looking set into its very human looking face.
"Now I've seen everything," MJ murmured as she stared down past Jean's shoulder.
"If you spend any time at all around here, you'll understand never, ever, tempt Fate wit that phrase again," Jean said dryly,
"They were not with me!" said the man who had spoken up against Harry's selling policy a moment ago, looking at Harry angrily. "Do not even think about questioning me on this. They were not with me!"
Harry cocked an eyebrow at him as he stood up from where he had crouched, having rolled there as the action began. He looked subtly over at Betsy, the closest of the two telepaths, who was already moving forward to help the rest of the audience to their feet.
"He's telling the truth Harry, he wasn't with them. Oh, he doesn't like us, and he's got some views on women that make me want to gouge off his bollocks and serve them in a curry, but he's no terrorist." Betsy replied, having caught his gaze towards here.
"Besides, android technology like this is well beyond most terrorist groups, especially with Hydra having been hammered so badly pulling in its tentacles from the various terrorist groups it'd been sponsoring thanks to the attacks on its heartlands by Dr. Doom." Jean broke in.
"I believe you," Harry said aloud, nodding. "You'll still have to convince the police of that, and I'm not going to stand in their way, but I won't have my own security question you. But my point still stands, human rights violations, mutant human quality, equal rights between men and women. The reason I do not sell to nearly any Middle East country goes on and on. Terrorists are just the most obvious of them."
"Jean, grab one of those androids as you're leaving, leave the other five for the police to look at, I want one of them for our own people to deconstruct. I'll confound the witnesses' minds to let them think there were only five, and have Sage alter our security cameras accordingly."
Assigning Piotr, Wyatt and a few of the actual security guards to deal with the police, as they arrived, Harry, Jean, and Ororo met up with Sage in her office on the top floor. Dani went back to the kids, along with the Fantastics and Betsy.
"I'll go down in a moment once everyone else's been questioned, but considering I'm the victim here, that shouldn't take too long." Harry said, pacing lightly as the three women who had been with him already set down in various chairs while Sage leaned back in her own chair looking at her employer. "But I want to know where these droids came from, how many there are within Magical Minds, and how we didn't detect them. The Trust Me arrays should've come up with no answer to them, which should've been an answer in itself!"
"It was, and it is, indeed until you hired me your hiring people were turning them away." Sage said calmly. "I made the decision to hire a few of them however and to follow their movements. They have not been able to discover any of Magical Minds secrets. They are all low-level functionaries hence this attempt at escalation. We should be happy to know that whoever is behind this apparently has no idea about our abilities, since there is no way they should have thought such a small scale attack would work."
"It would've caused a lot of casualties if not for Mr. Fantastic and our knowing it was coming." Ororo said grimly. "From what they knew this would've resulted in a massacre, so I am not inclined to see anything to be happy about Sage."
"They also apparently wanted to pin it on terrorist groups, though I am uncertain if it was meant to be a red herring, or someone particularly foolish simply added it on to the end of their planning session. It's too damn obvious." Jean said.
"We'll ignore the terrorist angle for now," Harry said with a nod, stopping his pacing and staring at Sage. "You made the decision?"
"Yes," Sage nodded. "It made good counter-espionage sense. Because of that we were able to discover a lot about how the androids communicate with one another, as well as several of the ways they communicate with their overseers. We've even discovered the nearest communication hub."
Harry nodded slowly. He wanted to come down on Sage for making that decision on her own, but he had hired her because he wanted her to make such decisions on the business side of things. He couldn't come down too hard on her for this, especially since he wanted to build up to the point where all his lieutenants could act like that.
So he simply nodded. "Alright, I understand that, though you should have still told us that androids like that could pass the Trust Me arrays. We would've been ready for the reporters and their followers being a possible danger that way. If not for Jean spotting them this could have been very bad."
"Agreed," Sage said with a nod. "But you placed me here in not just to run them, but also to streamline your espionage services and help expand them is much as I could. That means I must make counterintelligence decisions too, which this was."
"Very well," Harry said with a nod. "So, any lead on who they are?"
"Aim, 98% certainty on that. No other terrorist group has the means to create such lifelike androids, except perhaps Dr. Doom, who lacks the motive, and HYDRA, who lack the means at present."
"Expand on that," Ororo asked. "I'm sorry, means? What does that denote in this case?"
"Both the knowledge to create them, and the infrastructure to not only use them, but to do so without worrying about the resources being wasted, not good," Harry said answering the question before Sage could. "I thought AIM had been hammered by SHIELD too much to throw resources away like this."
"That assumption is incorrect. SHIELD has indeed struck several other bases in South America Canada and even Asia, but their European presence might still be strong. In fact, they could have expanded their network as HYDRAs has been forced to retreat to protect its main holdings." Sage replied.
Harry frowned, thinking hard. While his people could hammer any single AIM installation, they still didn't have enough boots on the ground as it were to find them. It would be several weeks at least before Mystique and her black ops team was ready to go, and frankly Dennis' ongoing recruitment for their espionage activities even with Emma and Sage's help hadn't really helped much on the actual agent side of things.
He would stack their computer networking skills, both espionage and counterespionage, against any other group in the world and be confident they'd not only come out ahead but having stolen the opponent's own network away from them. But they just didn't have enough agents on their own, which forced them to use the existing intelligence agencies contacts, and if they didn't know things, then of course Harry and his group didn't either.
"All right," he said at last. "This has to be responded to, but in a way that can't be traced back to the Custodes, I don't want any possible like between the team and Magical Minds. You said that you knew where their local base was?"
"Yes."
"Good. Ororo, go take the kids back to Camelot, I'm afraid we won't be heading to the Althing today. As for AIM, here's what we're going to do…"
OOOOOOO
Later that day, Mystique fixed her hat slightly, staring across the rain drenched road towards her target building. It was a large apartment complex which had unbeknownst to any of the locals been bought out entirely by AIM.
How the hell Sage was able to figure that out just by the height of the people coming in and out of the building I don't know since there was nothing in the local computers that could lead to that conclusion, she thought, shaking her head and not incidentally shaking the rain off of her parka and large hat, before glaring up at the sky overhead.
They said this would be of downpour, but they didn't mention anything about it being a torrential one! You'd think having a mutant on our team that could control the weather would be useful in times like this, but no. She refuses to manipulate the weather patterns like that these days, saying it would damage the balance of the planet. I think it's just a copout, freaking tree hugger, volunteering to take the kids sight-seeing in the Savage Land instead of to the Althing.
Not mind you, that Mystique could altogether blame Ororo for doing that. Ororo, like Emma was fascinated by the Savage Land, though in Ororo's case it was the people there as well as the geography, whereas Emma was fascinated by the dinosaurs.
The shape shifter chuckled under her breath, remembering the look on Emma's face after she had come back from that date with Harry on his magic carpet. And I can't believe I am now so used to magic that the idea of a magic carpet doesn't make me think of I'm living in a Disney movie or something.
The spy in Mystique was quite happy with this weather however. Not only did it make hiding much easier, but it was so bad there was no one out on the road.
Moving backwards from her original position, she made herself small as only a shape shifter could, her body turning into a young pre-teen version as she ducked, Once she was out of sight, she raised a hand underneath her hat to tap the com-bead in her ear. "See anything?"
"Negative," Nikolai's voice said from his vantage point on a rooftop several blocks away. With this rain visibility was cut down tremendously, but thanks to his position he'd still be able to fire into a few of the windows facing his current position from the apartment complex. "I see a few people in there, and, get this two of them at least are wearing that yellow uniform AIM is supposed to use."
"Bizarre," Mystique noted, before shrugging her shoulders. "It could be a sign of indoctrination, wouldn't be the first time I've run into something of that nature. Anything else off about the interior?"
"I can see a wall of gadgets on the far side of one room, and what looks to be a staircase where there shouldn't be one judging by what we found on the apartment's building plan. We'll have to be aware that they might have changed up the layout inside."
"Never go by plans like that," Mystique said, her tone professional. "Making a plan ahead of time is all well and good, but you can't be wedded to the idea that you'll know the layout of any building like that."
"Understood," the Russian replied. His voice was calm but understanding her critique was in fact a critique.
"Morph, Paige, are you ready to go?" Mystique said. No code names on this mission. In fact even Paige's presence at all was pushing things, but given the number of spells she had on her person it was doubtful anyone would connect her to her Custodes persona. Especially since she hadn't been seen with the team in Canada or Asia.
"Ready," said Paige's voice, while in the background Morph could be heard to mutter 'no still too tall, no, ah that's better' getting his form right to match his 'date'.
"Shadow Cat?"
Mystique was rather ambivalent about bringing Shadow Cat along on this mission, but her various abilities made her ideal for covert ops, at least this kind of espionage work anyway. The girl would never have the stomach for wet-work, which was frankly fine by Mystique. Kitty was worth a lot more to their cause for her mind than for her physical abilities. Plus, if anything happens to her under my watch Ororo would probably tear me to pieces and use those pieces to feed the fish. Potter might be more understanding, maybe. Huh, no when did I start thinking about it being our cause rather than just Potter's?
"Ready to go, I'm waiting on the roof down the street," the young girl's voice replied. "I've got disillusion, Notice-Me-Not and muffling charms on my feet too."
Mystique nodded, wondering if their backup was in place, but not wanting to insult their allies by asking. Especially since Harry was nearby, and he was enough of a hammer under more circumstances even if they weren't.
Breathing in, Mystique then moved quickly from her original point backwards, swinging up onto a fire stairwell until she was hidden once again behind a series of vases set out to water. There she crouching, making certain there was no one in the apartment to her side before pulling out her own rifle as her body returned to normal. Setting the rifle down between the parts so that only the tip of it could be seen pocking out from between them she set her eye against the scope, watching the doorway across from her. "Morph, Paige, go. Repeat the operation is a go."
Within moments, Paige and Morph were racing down the street. They looked to be like a normal couple caught out in the rain, complete with parkas, and a large umbrella.
The umbrella was pulled out of the man's hands as she watched, swooping away through the wind until it was crunched under the wheels of a passing car. Just as they did, the small HUD on her screen turned off for both of them, and Mystique nodded, understanding they had turned them off. Radio waves like that would give the game away.
The man looked all for keeping going, but the woman had been drenched by the sudden loss of the umbrella, and since she was wearing a dress it was quite obvious. A second later her heel broke as she tried to run on, and she pulled him to a stop, limping towards the front of the apartment building that was their target, banging on the door and hitting the buzzer constantly.
"Jimmy come on," she shouted, "we need to get out of the rain for a bit."
The door quickly opened, and a middle-aged man let them in, smiling affably at them and shaking his head. "What the heck were you two doing outside anyway?"
Morph shrugged his shoulders gesturing to Paige. "Blame this one, she didn't want to cancel our date."
"Oh don't give me that!" Paige said, her English coming out with a Scottish accent rather than her normal Kentucky twang. "I didn't see you complaining when we were at the restaurant!"
"That would be because the restaurant was… oh I don't know… dry," Morph said, his own voice a Yorkshire drawl.
The man chuckled, though his eyes if you looked at them closely were much harder than the rest of his face as he looked at them both. "You can take a seat over there and get a little dry, I'll check with the tenants and see if any of them have a umbrella that they would be willing to sell to you if you're in a hurry."
"Thank you sir," the woman said, smiling and patting his hand for a moment. "It's nice to see a real gentleman these days."
Morph rolled his eyes, then moved over deliberately away from the woman and leaned against the wall while the man the older man chuckled, patted the younger girl on the hand and moved off. His eyes glanced up at something over the doorway, and Morph tensed, but the man didn't do anything, simply moving away entering his office which was set along the one wall across from a series of mailboxes.
Now alone the young couple went back to their wrangling, as Paige made a show of trying to get the water out of her hair and dress. Even as she did so however, Morph's eyes were moving, taking in the area. It was an open hallway, not too big and not too small, with two elevator doors at the far end. There was a stairwell sat next to them, and everything was lit with overhead lighting.
All in all it looked like a typical apartment complex, nothing about it could tell anyone that it was being used by a terrorist organization. On the other hand, it also looked like a perfect killing zone if someone had set up weapons at the far end of the hallway. There was no cover anywhere except for the door leading into the apartment manager's office/room, and Morph would be willing to bet that door was heavily reinforced. He also noted that a few of the lights didn't seem to be actually creating as much light as it should, which probably meant that there was some video cameras in them as well, probably trained on them right now.
So Morph was ready when the door when the two elevator doors opened, and instead of normal elevators there appeared to large Gatling guns of the type that could have been found on a jet fighter. Instantly Morph hardened his body, and Paige swiftly pulled out a shield stone, hurling it forward as she began to rip skin off with the other hand, revealing her metal form underneath.
"I'll never get used to seeing that," Morph said, shaking his head as the shield stone went off. It created a magic shield in front of them for a few moments as the whizzing purr of the cannons began to fire thousands of rounds impacting the shield, the pullets banging off in all directions as the once quiet hallway became a battlefield. It only lasted a few seconds, but that was enough for Morph to be ready, while Paige ducked behind him.
"Compared to some of the weird shit we've seen this is nothing!" said the Kentucky Belle, then she looked up abruptly as something came out of two of the light fixtures above. "Gas!"
Thankfully in her metal form Paige didn't have to breathe, and Morph quickly sucked in a lungful of air, expanding his body and his lungs so that he could go for a few more minutes without it. At the same time one of his hands morphed into a heavy mace, slamming backwards shattering the entrance way out as a signal to the others that they had been blown.
Outside Mystique of course saw that, and scowled angrily. "Fire!" She shouted, and suddenly several of the windows facing her direction came under fire from the shooters. With the defenders thus pinned down, she leaped down from her hiding place, pulling off her sniper scope and switching from single shot to full auto as she raced across the rain drenched road.
At the same time two trucks zoomed down the road, the lights automatically changing the favor them as they came, and she smirked. SAS Special Projects Team, there's no one better. "Shadow Cat, go!"
"Gone," Shadow Cat said having already leaped onto the roof of the target apartment. She hadn't learned how to apparate just yet, but her normal athletic ability was well up to this task.
Mystique beat the two trucks across the road by a few seconds, but by the time she was inside the target building, Morph and Paige had cleared the two Gatling guns and smashed the door to the manager's office down. Paige was pinned there at present, a high grade laser shooting down from the stairwell that led up from the managers apartment up into the rest of the apartment complex.
"Fire in the hole!" shouted a voice behind her, and Mystique ducked out of the way as one of the SAS men came forward, hurling a grenade up into the stairwell before diving into the protective cover besides.
"Good afternoon miss," the person who had tossed the grenade said, his voice muffled by the baklava he wore over his face. All of the SAS men wore them, their features entirely obscured, as was normal on this kind of operation. After all, SAS people were routinely sent against enemies that wouldn't have any particular qualms against targeting their families, friends or even acquaintances for revenge for.
"Captain, assign one troop to each stairwell!" Mystique barked, "Paige, keep going that way Morph, take the other stairwell with troop two. Agent Red, how are things going out there? "
"We've got them bouncing," said the sniper shaking his head internally at his call sign on this mission, and in the background she could hear his gun and several others going off. "SAS troops three and four are en-route. No other responses, though two gun turrets just opened up on the roof. We are moving. No other response from anything nearby."
Mystique smiled a shark's smile. Always nice to work with professionals, especially when they can give you the numbers you lack.
Moving forward, Mystique joined Morph in charging up the stairs, only to run into their first real hurdle. Six massive men, easily taller than Piotr in his Colossus form and even more powerfully built dressed in the traditional yellow and black AIM outfit charged down towards the attackers. On their wrists they had heavy bracers with built blasters which they used immediately, opening fire on the attackers. "For AIM!"
Grenades flew over Mystique and Morph's head as she dragged Morph back down the stairs, lifting him up easily and hopping down from one level to the next, before dropping him and firing up into the stairwell at the defenders while watching the grenades go off. Behind her the SAS men had already taken cover, teams of two firing while the others ducked back into cover, cool and professional.
Behind them, one of their snipers who had been given a laser weapon for this operation set up, firing over his fellow's heads at the first of the bruisers to come down into his range.
The grunts or whatever they were had shaken off the initial assault and moved forward not even noticed the fire from the normal guns, but that one lost his leg to the laser beam, the beam slicing cleanly through at his kneecap and dumping him forward down the staircase. One of the other SAS man took the opportunity to fire on full auto through the AIM soldier's facemask, which eventually shattered under his fire as did the face behind it.
Seeing that, Mystique dropped her rifle and pulled out her plasma handgun, firing up. It too was a laser, one of Jean's toys. Small bolts of plasma impacting some of the AIM bruisers, they had to be the AIM equivalent of the Hellion troopers of the same name, though where they came from she didn't now.
Then she had to stop firing as Morph leaped up into the midst of the bruisers, smashing them aside and hurling them down the stairwell. He had morphed again into full on combat mode, his suit gone, one hand replaced by a mace, the other coming down to a maul like point. This he thrust hard into one bruisers' faceplate mask, pinning him against the far wall as it began to die.
Mystique leaped up, dodging past the two remaining bruisers along with three of the SAS man to take up position on the next level. Kicking the door open she hurling grenades in both directions before following them out firing on full auto as more defenders made their way towards them.
OOOOOOO
The top floor of the apartment had none of the frantic activity of the lower levels, mainly because the three AIM troops or scientists that been there when the attack began were now unconscious. Shock stones would do that to you.
At a computer Shadow Cat sat, her fingers dancing over the keyboard, as she uploaded the virus Sage had created into the system, which connected it to the AIM network worldwide.
They even seem to have their own satellite systems! Well, Harry will deal with those, she thought to herself chuckling evilly. "Sage, Mystique, I'm done."
"Roger that," Sage said back in the Magical Minds headquarters, watching her own computer as the virus began to do its work, highlighting areas of interest on a holographic globe on her desk as she began to follow its progress, smirking as it gave her more and more access to AIM's network. "Good job girl, now get out of there and let the rest of the team do their bit."
"Don't have to tell me twice," Shadow Cat murmured, phasing out up through the roof and dropping down onto the street.
She passed by Nicolai and the SAS shooters who had abandoned their initial position to move in close to join the assault into the apartment complex. All of them gave her a high five as she passed and she grinned back, before trotting down the street, phasing to let the rain pass through her harmlessly.
OOOOOOO
"We had to deal with ten more musclebound types and the SAS people took some injuries," Mystique reported later to both Harry and to Major Trenton, the commander of the SAS Squadron that had been seconded to her command. "But other than that, it went off without a hitch, Sir."
She was on her best behavior here. Trenton was not one of those who had approved of what he thought of as amateurs being given command of this operation, but he couldn't argue with the results and so simply nodded his head, smirking over at Harry. "So, are you going to be in charge of taking all of these other AIM bases down?"
"No, I'm going to pass them on to the locals." Harry responded
The SAS major nodded his head at that. He knew Cold Steel was in the process of discussions with the bigwigs about selling some of its more offensive-capable weapons to the British Army. With those and a few loaned laser weapons the Special Air Service could handle the two other AIM the bases that seemed situated in the United Kingdom with a smile on their face and a song in their hearts.
The rest were a question however. "Ireland will no doubt be very angry to learn that they have four terrorist bases operating within their borders, but the Irish guard will handle those as well, and the Swiss' reaction doesn't bare thinking about. The rest though… Italy? Germany, Greece? France? Poland, Spain? I'll give you that GIGN could probably handle them, if they get the okay from their higher ups to do it, but the others?"
"This is a test," Harry said simply. "I want to see how corrupt the governments are, and how connected the AIM group is to them. If we see the bases haven't even been abandoned, or that the locals don't try to attack them, we'll know because of Sage's little virus."
"I see," the man said grimly then nodded his head. "All in all, an excellent joint operation."
"One of many, I hope," Harry said, raising his teacup to the other man who returned the gesture.
OOOOOOO
The next day however, Harry set aside his concerns over AIM to turn his attention once more to more interesting things, in this case the Althing and the Asgardian mysteries. Getting up quietly, he slipped out of the bed, one hand gently stroking down Ororo's side smiling at his African goddess before heading off to take a quick shower.
She had come in late the evening prior with a few of the kids after giving them a tour of the Savage Land to find him up and waiting for her. A permanent runic doorway between Camelot and the Savage Land was already nearly finished thanks to Kitty and Dr. Druid. Harry would only need to give it a once over before setting it up in the Hall of Doors.
Emma and Jean weren't there. Neither of them had been very interested in the idea of the Althing, or rather Emma hadn't been interested at all, while Jean had initially. But she had joined Reed the evening prior to go over some designs for various ship-based weapons systems and had checked telepathically last night to say she wouldn't be making it. Nowhere near as good as Reed was at designing things from scratch she was excellent at pointing out where designs could be simplified, and was a good go-between for Reed and the scientists of Carol's think-tank who to a man were intimidated by Reed's abilities.
The kids however had been looking forward to going to the Althing since the teachers had mentioned the kids needing an outing away from Camelot. Camelot offered a lot, but it was no real substitute for dealing with strangers, something all of the kids would have to get used to. After all, they couldn't live their entire lives stuck in Camelot or even the Savage Land, and those who had physical mutations could cover them easily enough via image inducer.
Since they had so many teachers to the kids, it had been decided to take them all along. Melody was ecstatic, and it had been she who had decided which Althing they would go to. There were after all several of them going on at the moment scattered across America and even more in Norway.
But they decided to go to one being conducted in Michigan, because she had found a website advertising it and a 'concert the likes which had to be seen to be believed', advertised this entire week . It turned out this particular Althing was such a large gathering it was expected to run for 2 weeks minimum, possibly more depending on how long or contentious the major debates went, or even just how long they decided to keep going. The website stated this was going to be a massive undertaking, the largest in their history.
So Melody had decided on the day when the most bands and singers would be performing. The music loving Melody couldn't pass that up and Harry had no reason to refuse, since he had no way of knowing if one day of the Althing would be better for information gathering purposes than any other. The group might have been open and friendly when he met them outside that country concert, but Harry doubted he'd just be able to waltz into their major debates off the street. But then again, that's what spells were for.
He was also happy to have her along so he could test out a few new spells he'd come up with to allow Melody out and about without being overwhelmed by the different 'songs' her mutant power forced her to perceive in the people and things around her.. The new spells acted to limit the number of 'songs' Melody could see, rather than simply blank them out en masse, it blocked different 'songs' by type. It was a very finite difference, and had taken quite a bit of tweaking in Harry's rare spare time over the past few months, but it was ready now and should allow his daughter to go out into the world with more ease than she could ever hope for previously.
Coming back from his shower, Harry he leaned down, and began kissing Ororo on the lips gently, then down her throat to right between her breasts, his smile growing as she began to stir before coming up to give her a lingering kiss on the lips. "Your turn in the shower love, I'd guess the little monsters'll be in here shortly to wake us up if we're not out of here quick."
His smile turned into a grin as she swatted him playfully. "They're lovely children Harry Potter," Ororo said before reaching up to pull Harry down into a deep kiss before releasing him. "Let them have their fun. All too few of them have come from a life where fun was an everyday occurrence after all."
"True enough," Harry said with a sigh and a sober expression. After all that kind of thing could be said for the two of them and their early lives too as well.
He sat down on a nearby chair, pulling on his trousers before staring shamelessly as Ororo got up from the bed, stretching and cracking her neck lightly before smiling at him and shaking her head. "We don't have time for that," she said with mock censure but she still gave her hips an extra bit of swing as she entered the bathroom, looking back at her man with a saucy smirk on her lips.
Harry sighed, leaning backwards and wondering not for the first or last time how he had gotten so lucky to have the love of such woman, and not just Ororo, but Jean and Emma too. All of them were magnificent beautiful inside and out, and all of them, for some reason were in love with him as he was with them.
Of course, there might be a fourth too, Harry thought, his thoughts turning serious once more, If Lady Hela was sincere about her interest and still intending to follow up on it.
He pulled the communication mirror twinned to the one he had given Hela towards him from where he had set it on the table, activating it once again, his magic senses on high as his fingers remained on the activation runes, feeling the pulse of magic in the device. His mutant power tried to activate too, but Harry kept it at bay.
Nothing. The other mirror isn't responding. There was a brief moment of connection when he could feel the spell reaching out for its counterpart, but the other mirror didn't pick up the signal.
"There could be any number of perfectly logical and understandable reasons that she hasn't contacted us, or can't respond to our attempts to open contact... Aaand I don't believe a word I just said," Harry muttered with a frown, leaning back and looking over at Hedwig, who alighted onto the armrest beside him.
He gently stroked her feathers, smiling slightly at her while inside he didn't feel like smiling at all. "You always know when I need you, don't you girl?"
Hedwig precked complacently, satisfied that her human was properly aware of how much she took care of him. But even though her eyes closed halfway in pleasure from the pampering her gaze remained focused, hard and intent on Harry's face. She too was worried about the masked one, especially after the message those two irritating ravens had passed on before escaping her just rev-justice for the many trials they had put her through. But despite that message, Harry and the others simply had no way of knowing what was going on in Asgard.
Sighing he sat up, conjuring some writing equipment quickly and jotting out a note to Hela, before putting it in an envelope and handing it to Hedwig. Hedwig took the letter with her usual grace, and Harry watched intently as she left her temporary perch, flying around the room as she seemed to orient herself on where she needed to go. Then she slowed down moving back towards her perch and lighting down, her eyes narrowed and feathered fluffed now in irritation. "PRECK!"
"You can't sense her at all?"
"Preck." Hedwig replied, still ruffling her feathers in affronted dignity.
"is it because she's in a different dimension?"
"Preck," Hedwig replied shaking her head in the negative.
"Could you find Balder perhaps, go from wherever he is to wherever Hela is?"
"Gwah," Hedwig shook her head.
Harry got the impression that there was some kind of barrier in the way here that was blocking Hedwig's ability to find her destination, not just a case of the distance being too great. Given Hedwig's unique mode of transportation, even dimensional travel wasn't an issue, so that made sense. "I see… in that case, we need a way to break through that barrier somehow, or force open the connection between the mirrors."
Hedwig bobbed her head once, and Harry's fingers again began to gently caress her feathers as he thought before he conjured up more paper. Hedwig hopped to the back of his chair and Harry began to write out plans for an amplification array that he could use on the mirror to try and force a connection through them. It might be dangerous and burn out the mirrors, but it's definitely necessary at this point. Someone is playing silly buggers here, and I refuse to let Hela be the one getting buggered.
He was almost finished when the alarm he had put on the door alerted him to little people outside, just as the door opened. He frowned at it then looked at Illyana one eyebrow raised as she raced in at the head of several of the other kids. "You undid the lock?"
Skidding to a halt she nodded happily, and he smiled back. "Good, we will start formal instruction next week then."
The lock had been a little test for her, which, after several days of attempting to give them what the adults called their morning attacks, the would-be witch had finally succeeded in passing. She was still a little young to start her magical education in terms of Harry's original dimension, but he didn't care about that. She was ready mentally and physically, that was the only thing that mattered to him.
"Hello father," Melody said skipping out of the group and hopping up into his lap. "Are you ready to go?"
"I take it that means you all have had breakfast?"
The kids nodded, and Harry chuckled, standing up with Melody in his arms giving her a hug before setting her down. "All right, we'll meet you all in the great Hall. Gather the teachers and the other kids, and then we can go."
With Hedwig's help Harry and Ororo had already scouted out an area for them to teleport into, a rather important bit of information as the not so small tent city/dock that had sprung up on the coast of Lake Huron in Michigan was big enough that a careless apparition or teleportation could cause havoc. Within minutes of gathering everyone who wanted to go to the Althing together they were in Michigan, where despite Ororo's smoother means of transportation, a few of the teachers and kids had a negative reaction to this most useful but stomach-turning magic. They took a few moments to get everybody settled and then began to make their way to one of the several entryways into the Althing.
Harry made certain to count heads, and ensure that all of the kids who needed the image inducer had them on, and double checked that everyone's emergency portkeys were powered. Then he nodded at the teachers, handing over control of the cavalcade to them. Ms. Brown took over quickly, laying out the ground rules with a certain air of experience, before clapping her hands. "And remember, have fun and be respectful! That's it."
With that the many of the kids charged forward with sounds akin to the battlecry of a horde to Harry's mind. The adults quickly followed, walking quickly to keep pace with the charging horde, and more than one of the people also making their way to the target entrance looked at them, and shook their heads.
A man shouted out, "A school outing of some kind? We don't normally get those here, most schools don't want to be seen as promoting alternative religions, not ones for children that young at least from what I've seen." The man wore a miniature hammer on a bracelet that suggested that this was a genuine member of the Asatru Kindreds and not a curious seeker.
"Private school," Harry said, waving his hand, amused that the man didn't recognize him despite Harry not having covered himself in a notice-me-not for this. "The kids all did really well on their last state tests, and they picked the Althing as their school trip."
The man laughed and nodded his approval before making his way back to the others of what was apparently his group, many of whom were equally amused by the rampaging youngsters, some even going so far as to cheer them on and call out "They're getting away, don't let them escape," to the adults, who laughed.
It didn't take them too long for Harry and the others to make their way to the closest entrance, while they had appeared a ways away from said, the Althing was large enough there were plenty of entrances around its outer edge. As they approached the gate Harry was actually surprised to see a rather professional looking ticket booth. There was a relatively young woman there with various tickets and the like with two large and fit men by her sides, wearing armbands that had a stylized hammer similar to the one on the bracelet he'd seen a moment ago
I'd wager 5 galleons we just got our first peek at the local security force Harry thought to himself appraisingly, and if I'm not mistaken, those are the tazers Emma and I put into production...that's rather amusing. The tazers in question were set on their belts for easy access, in exactly the way a policeman would wear them. The men acted friendly enough, making eye contact with the various people ahead of Harry's group as they paid their fees and got their proof of entrance, but the 2 men were very clearly keeping a sharp watch.
The ticket maid, who was dressed in period costume which reminded Harry of Dani's description of Sigyn, was overjoyed to see so many children at her booth. "It's always good to see children eager to learn and explore. While I can't give you a discount per head or for scholastics, I can offer these pamphlets with some of the highlights and-Oh, can't forget the maps, we did our best to keep things organized and neat but it's still very easy to get lost if you aren't careful."
One of the guard stepped forward and between the two of them they quickly organizing the large amount of purveying she was about to do.
"Not a problem," Harry said with a chuckle, pulling out his wallet and paying for each of the kids to enter the Althing along with the rest of the teachers and adults who had come with them, Amara, Piotr and Dani and a few other people, including Kitty.
He hadn't actually realized there would be this kind of organization to this Althing. But he figured that the locals could also use this to spark some interest in their beliefs if what he'd been told about their refusal to proselytize had been true, and raise a bit of cash for themselves. He had no problems with either of those, as it showed a certain amount of pragmatism that Harry could relate to, and happily handed over the equivalent of 400 pounds or so in American dollars for all the kids and another 150 for the adults. Each kid eagerly waited in line and went off to the side once they got a ticket, and one of those little wrist bands that proved they'd been cleared along with the small bundle of pamphlets from the helpful security guard.
The guard, a tall, fit man with a russet beard, leaned down and made eye contact with each child in turn as they got their wrist bands. "Make sure to read the rulebook young ones, all the rules and boundaries inside are there for a reason. We did our best to make the Althing safe for everyone but you all need to watch out for yourselves and eachother anyway, ok?"
Once he was sure that all the kids had agreed the guard gave them a broad smile, "Excellent, then be sure to enjoy yourselves and if you have any questions or problems, look for these armbands." He said, gesturing to his fellow's arm.
After that, the rest of the group got their accoutrements and such from the booth and re-gathered off to the side past the booth itself for a last minute huddle. Harry and the other adults once again did a headcount of the kids and Harry cast a quick notice-me-not so they could have some privacy. Once that was done, Harry clapped his hands to get everyone's attention.
"Okay you lot, we've got the whole day to explore this Althing, so let's get those maps out and decide where and when we meet for meal times and when we're about to leave. Remember, if you run into trouble, you all have Portkeys back to the castle although based on first impressions, we might not actually need them."
It didn't take them long to pull out what was a simple and yet clearly detailed map of the widespread area that the Althing had basically claimed for the duration. Several pages were devoted to each section of the Althing, clearly delineating sections that were devoted to one specific focus like music or crafting. While Harry originally thought that it would all be a hodgepodge with various bits mixed in, he had to admit this made a great deal more sense and also reinforced that the organizers for this had put an immense amount of thought into the setup.
They all quickly found the spots that focused on food, which were spread out at conjunctions to the other sections, and held a quick consensus on where to eat. Ironically, the lunch spot was decided to be the 'Gildihǫll' which literally translated to 'feasthall' if one squinted at it. Dinner was at the 'Spakr lax' aka, the 'Quiet Salmon' because Melody liked the name and the other kids quickly agreed. Where they were now was decided on where they'd regather to head home, no sense in confusing the matter after all and as they wrapped that up, Harry could see the younglings were getting impatient with the slow adults, even the kids who had been the most leery about being out like this around normal people.
"Alright, looks like we're all set now. I know you're all eager to get going but remember to pay attention and obey the rules! That being stay safe, be respectful and have a blast..." Harry paused here with an evil grin on his face that made Ororo roll her eyes in exasperation, "Now, my pint sized minions, CHARGE!"
And once more the miniature invasion, in more ways than one, was let loose. Although thanks to the spells Harry had put up, it did startle a few people to have a bunch of extremely energetic children come out of nowhere.
Melody, the little princess and Ororo went in one direction towards the designated 'Bragi's Field' area, the dancing and music center, interested in the music already being played in the background, which they could hear from here over the tumult of the crowd. It sounded almost but not quite Scottish, a high skirling sort of tune played on some kind of string instrument Harry thought. The other kids raced off in different directions as the teachers somehow managed to keep them organized by what they were interested in leading them one way or the other despite Harry's little prank.
Amara decided she wanted to check out the docks, to see if the ships there resembled anything that the stories of the Varangian Guard were said to use. The idea of longboat races also intrigued her in how different they were from the stories of the Greek Galleys her people used to sail in. She 'dragged' Piotr behind her, even though he was more interested in the contests of strength and wrestling going on elsewhere.
Kitty had taken one look at the area devoted to crafting, carving and games and practically squeed. After all the time spent as Harry and Ororo's apprentice she had picked up a passion for crafts and even just simple carving, not even anything related to runes. Plus she recalled Dr. Vorlus mentioning that the Ancient Scandinavians had had their own version of chess that had been around a long time before chess itself had made its way to Europe even if she had been too drunk to remember the name.
Harry was left to his own devices for a moment along with Dani, who had of course been interested in the Althing and had been almost as excited as Melody about coming here. Harry wondered if she was thinking of converting from her own Native American religion to Asatru, and if so what Gods she would choose to follow, but wasn't going to pry.
Dani wasn't thinking that actually, there were enough parallels between her current belief and the Asatru faith it wasn't really necessary in her mind. But she did wish to become even closer with Lady Sigyn, who had impressed her immensely, and thought learning of the faith built around her pantheon was one way of doing it.
Now the younger girl grinned at him, linking her arm with his for a moment giving him a far too innocent smile. "So, does this mean you're my date Mr. Potter?"
"I don't think so luv," Harry said with a grin. "My date card is completely full, and I don't think I'm your type anyway."
"Nope, though your relationship is." Danielle said with a smirk, before adding somewhat more seriously. "Any pointers?"
"Openness and communication is a must," Harry said as they began to meander through the Althing, smiling at the small stalls which were set up here and there and the people in period costume, all of it looking hand crafted, and in a few cases excellently so. A few of them matched Dani's descriptions of Sigyn like the maid at the booth.
Others had possibly the most realistic looking Viking armor Harry had seen. Many others were in more modern outfits but had patterns, images or sayings on them which made it clear that they were just as much a part of the culture on show here as those in costume. None of those ridiculous helmets with huge horns here I see. Harry noted wryly.
A few of the kids had already stopped by a stall near the entrance that was offering to do up their hair in styles similar to what the Ancient Scandinavians were said to have worn, but luckily Anechka wasn't among them. Harry doubted that her hair would react favorably to being toyed with like that, at least not by a complete stranger. Harry did make a mental note that maybe finding a book on the styles could be a good gift for the girl.
He paused, looking down at Dani curiously. "Are you still sore about Piotr deciding he was a one-woman man?" He hadn't thought so, but it was best to make sure, given some of the blow ups he had seen at Hogwarts back in his old dimension.
"No," Dani said firmly, shaking her head quickly. "I'll admit I was extremely interested in joining Piotr and Amara, but their friendship means more to me than my romantic interest in them. But I am well…" She blushed looking away, not wanting to say it aloud.
"Interested in both men and women?" Harry supplied with a nod, his voice low so that the passersby couldn't hear them talk. "You know I'm not going to judge you for that kind of thing."
Harry obviously wasn't bisexual himself, but his ladies all were, though Emma was the only one who had recognized that before meeting the other two women. Ororo had found women attractive but had never acted on it, while Jean had never had feelings like that toward girls until merging with the shard of Phoenix Force she held in her and getting to know Ororo and Emma.
He gave a light 'hrm', as he worked out what questions to ask Dani to help her work this out. "Are you interested in flings, or something serious?"
Dani paused thinking about it as they passed through a series of families, all the kids done up in period costume supplied by one of the other booths they had passed complete with foam weapons for them to flail at each other, with the adults chattering about some local scandal or other. Harry took a moment to notice that most of the adults he could see seemed to be carrying firearms, pistols of course, at their sides.
He had to approve, these people obviously believed in looking after themselves. Some, both stall keepers and Althing goers, had peace bound melee weapons of many different kinds and makes. Axes and swords seemed to be the most common, many having intricate work done on them in what Harry had grown used to thinking of as the "Scandinavian scrollwork."
There'd even been a sign as they entered park Harry and two people looking over other people's guns to make sure that none of the pistols were hot loaded, with a bullet in the breach, and that the magazines were not in the actual gun. As Harry and Dani watched one entrant go through the process, they could overhear that the magazines could be on the person but not in the guns, and everyone also had to have a viable state-issued ID. One person who didn't have their ID had to leave their weapon with the attendants after a brief disagreement and received a receipt of some kind for the person in question to exchange for the weapon when they were able to provide their ID as proof he wasn't carrying illegally.
Harry supposed that was some kind of compromise on firearms safety with what he was gathering was a societal touchstone that all members of their culture/faith be reasonably armed as law allowed, and had to approve both that and the fact that they had them in the first place. One of the things Harry most liked about America was that they had the right to bear arms. After all, criminals would have no qualms about breaking any law against it, and frankly, a lot of mutant powers were lethal, and you couldn't rightly outlaw them.
It didn't hurt that he heard similar conversations around him in the hubbub, most likely started by others seeing the same thing he and Dani had, and one saying Harry heard "A locked door will only keep out an honest man." was a truism that Harry was determined to remember and share when he could.
Harry was already thinking in terms of laws in the future for the Savage Land, which was the first area of his little kingdom. He had started to need to think of himself as a king before this, thanks in no small part to Jean and Hela's conversation in Niflheim, but now he had an actual kingdom if one that was more than a little wild around the edges. His thoughts began to turn to the absent goddess once again, worry drawing over his face-
"I think I'm interested in something permanent." Dani finally said, bringing Harry's attention back to her and away from Hela. "I don't think I'm interested in the normal teenage angst, I had enough of that at the high school I went to before meeting you all. I look at you and your ladies, and that's the kind of thing I want for myself."
"I can understand that of course," Harry said with another nod. "I went through my own dating period. But meeting with Ororo, then Jean and Emma, well they made an honest man out of me I suppose you could say." One after another, bloody hell, if you look at it all together we really did have a very weird courtship didn't we?
"I suppose I could say that Harry yes," said Dani said with a laugh, smacking his arm lightly before nodding at a woman who was selling maple and honey candy, the smell wafting over them and Dani eagerly bought some. Her eagerness got an amused smirk out of the vendor and Dani shrugged sheepishly she stuck it a piece of maple candy in her mouth. "Even so I'd like some advice on, what to do, both before and after starting a poly relationship." Even as she said that however, her and Harry's attention was grabbed by a few visible mutants moving through the crowd.
"I think the mistake that most teenagers make is they equate physical attraction and emotional connection with long-term compatibility. That and the assumption that changes in life and oneself won't affect the relationship. " Harry mused, while he watched the crowd around the trio of young mutants.
Some of the people were looking at the mutants askance, but judging from their clothing these were locals who had come out of curiosity or interest. The actual Asatru didn't seem to bat an eye when the trio, each of them sporting a different sign of some kind of bird-based mutation walked past them.
Smiling Harry turned his full attention back to Dani. "Those are good starting points but you have to ask' can I see myself becoming a better person with this person next to me. Can I see us growing together, or will we grow separately?'"
"That makes sense," Dani mused, sucking on her next piece of candy as she considered what Harry said. "Certainly you and your ladies have all grown and prospered thanks to your relationship."
Harry nodded then he smirked at her. "So~, any other prospects beyond Piotr and Amara?"
"Not just yet," she said, shaking her head. The only one she might have considered was Rahne. But the Scottish were-mutant was still working through the teachings that had been literally beaten into her by the priest who had abused her at her orphanage. She still had issues with Harry's relationship and his magic for goodness sake!
At that point the duo came to a crossroads with rough wooden signs pointing in various directions. Harry and Dani looked at each other before looking at the signposts, which had the destinations in several languages Harry was happy to see, before looking at each other again, "Any ideas Harry?"
Harry hummed to himself as he pulled out his map, flipping through the various 'districts' before settling on a part of the merchant area that sold books and other literature. "I think I'll browse the local bookstalls, see if I can pick up anything more that could help us with the issues we've been having with our otherworldly friends. Plus, I should see what books on fairy tales and other stories they have available."
While Camelot had plenty of books already he wanted to make sure his twins, and wasn't that a thought that still shook his world, had plenty of memories of Harry and their mothers reading to them all kinds of stories. That was the sort of memory he wished he had of his own parents.
Dani nodded. She knew impending father-dom often weighing on Harry's mind more often now, but she didn't pull out the pamphlet that she'd been given and instead decided, "I'll go with you for now."
OOOOOOO
As she made her way down the lane with one hand holding onto Victoria's hand Ororo kept the young princess and Melody close. Illyana had gone off with Ms. Brown quickly, having spotted a stall with some kind of activity she wanted to take part in. But Victoria simply wanted to explore, never having been able to go to a fair like this before, more because of paparazzi than actual security reasons, and Melody wanted to head to the, admittedly giant area devoted to music and music instruments.
It didn't take Ororo long to see how unrestrained a people these Asatru were as a whole. Yes there were many that were content to keep to themselves and their interests, some carving instruments, others simply sitting off to the side and letting the music surround them. But many more were actively engaged in discourse over music and genre and more, some debating band preferences or album hierarchy. But some had a less concentrated focus and were more than willing to debate with each other or outsiders over an immense variety of subjects albeit relatively quietly so as not to disturb those around them.
If they did get overly excited, others around the debaters would ask or tell them to go to the 'meeting halls', and it would either be taken or the debate would quiet down. Those that still refused to 'keep the peace of the Althing', either Kindred members or causal seekers, would be warned once more before security was called. Ororo nodded. Freedom of speech was good, but so was being polite to those around you.
Although she didn't deliberately eavesdrop on the many and sometimes loud conversations around her, after her years in Cairo and beyond had sharpened her awareness. Ororo was amused by the amount of, call it carefree boasting the Asatru were doing. They all seemed to wish to show off their wares with boisterous flair when they were behind the stall, or engaging in contests of boasting and tale telling if they weren't much like the flyting that she had read about at one point. And of course there were several cases of people getting tipsy and letting their good sense get left behind when they took off boasting.
More than once the three of them saw a few obvious mutants moving among both the Althing goers and vendors. Like Harry and Dani, Ororo noticed the Asatru didn't seem to be bothered by any physical mutations or treat those bearing them with the disdain and disgust that made those here for the first time so obvious. They were treated like any 'normal' person was, and if the particular Asatru had an interest in the mutation in question, they'd be polite but still interested in the mutation and its affects. Many of the mutants so questioned or approached were often nervous by the attention, but seemed to settle down.
Pity, had we known that we could have let Sergei and the others go around with their image inducers turned off. It would have done them a lot of good, though I imagine simply watching other mutants be treated so well will have an effect.
That thought was further compounded with Ororo being witness to three different instances when fights almost broke out between a bigoted newcomer and a mutant they were lashing out at. Before Ororo could intervene the nearby vendors and other Asatru moved between them. Once that was done the racist would be taken to task verbally, and in one case physically, for 'breaking the peace of the Althing. The crowd and the security made it known in no uncertain terms that the racist was the one in the wrong, and the mutants were the ones behaving normally.
Needless to say the bigots had not been pleased at this, the last one in particular rabidly demanding that the security volunteers and other Asatru justify how they could consider the 'mutie freaks' anything like 'normal humans' as she was being dragged away, only to get four words that Ororo had learned defined the Asatru faith. "We are our deeds."...
To Ororo sights like this proved everything she'd said to Mystique in that long ago debate. Yes there were bigots and hateful people among humanity's ranks, that was a fact of life…but for every one of them, there were people like who fight against such hate. She felt their gods would be proud of them, once they were themselves freed of whatever geis was holding them.
Her musings were interrupted by hearing a different kind of music than what she had been following previously. While there were string instruments yes, these were of a much different type than what she heard before, lending themselves more to rolling, deep cadences. Ororo and her young charges found themselves by a dancing field that had a band giving a live performance, one called 'wardruna', and with several people either watching the dancers or dancing themselves as the music continued to play.
Victoria and Melody grinned up at her, and Ororo chuckled, holding out her arms. A second later, Ororo allowed the two girls to pull her out onto the field, joining the dance. With more enthusiasm in their case than skill it must be said, but it was all in good fun.