verynaughtymutant | Oh mother tell your children, not to do what I have done.

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Oh mother tell your children, not to do what I have done.

Cable could be called a great deal of things but he wasn't a coward. He wasn't scared of physical pain, or death, or of what people thought of him or of making the hard choices. He wasn't afraid of anything, really.

So when he opened his eyes to find that the trees and sun of Tabula Rasa had turned into stone dark tunnels and the birdsong replaced by the familiar march of pounding feat, he reacted more with annoyance then fear. This was another trick by his hosts, presumably, and he intended to treat this one just like he treated any other. He would sit patiently in a comfortable seat and wait for it to be over with as little fuss as possible. He'd long since grown tired of other people trying to make him dance on their strings and didn't like to give them the satisfaction of reacting.

It wasn't until he heard the voices that he knew that something was wrong. Around him were soldiers, which wasn't unusual and they were looking at him expectantly, which also wasn't unusual but, in this case, he recognized them. They all wore faces and voices that should have been forgotten over the years but somehow never had been.

"Dayspring," he heard himself being addressed by a name he'd long discarded and realized, vaguely, how much younger he must be, "do you think the Autosystems are still on line?"

And that was when he knew which day it was. And for the first time in a very long time, he was afraid of what came next.

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It had all happened in the blink of an eye.

Rahne had been riding her Vespa down the boardwalk one moment, something she did so often that just following the path had become second nature, and then, suddenly, somehow, everything had shifted — the light gone dark, the bike gone, people around but her clothes replaced with a uniform, one that had never been her own. More than most, probably, she knew full well just what this place was capable of doing and how much it could #$@% with people's heads, but never had it been like this, and for a moment, utter shock registered on her face, eyes going wide and mouth dropping open.

Still, she'd prided herself on holding onto her reflexes, and it lasted only for that instant. Whatever had happened, she wasn't here alone; Cable's presence couldn't have been a coincidence, not when she saw him more frequently on the island than she suspected she ever had before it. What was more, she could feel it, too, like a sensation just under her skin, something she hadn't known in a long, long time: her powers. Drawing in a deep breath, her senses more acute than they'd been in nearly a year, she looked at Cable pointedly, jaw set and arms folding across her chest, though she didn't expect an answer. "Well?"

Zell had been in his room putting away his laundry, and in a blink of an eye, he was in some weird place, dressed in an unfamiliar uniform, and holding some kind of gun.

A gun? Puh-lease! He set it down, and before he even looked around too much, he felt it. They were all there! He concentrated for a moment, and there was an audible 'CHINK' as he reset his connections.

"OH YEAH, BABY!" he exclaimed. He noticed Cable and a bunch of other people around. As many heads turned towards him, he added, "Got my magic back, Cable! Where the hell are we?"

Though he was pumped to have magic restored, it generally meant he would need it, which would probably suck.

He had not quite noticed Rahne yet. Zell had seen her around the island, but had never really spoken to her much.

Cable's men all turned to look at Zell after that and Cable shook his head slowly before turning back to Tetherblood and speaking in a language he hadn't used for years.

"This mission is over. We're getting out of here."

There was a ripple of discontent that spread through his men in response but only Tetherblood dared speak up.

"We've been hunting for the Chaos bringer for years and now," he started before Cable raised his voice to interrupt him.

"And now we're not," he said with leaden finality as his eyes sought out all his clanmates, daring them to disagree.

They didn't.

"We Bodyslide now.", he finished and, at his order, they did. In a second, they had left the tunnels and appeared again in an open camp in the middle of a broken wasteland.

Hope turned to him once they landed with a searching look.

"Nate.." she started but Cable was in no mood to talk to ghosts.

"Askanisson," he corrected her forcefully before turning to address the rest of his men. "Get to perimeters, everybody. I want us secure."

One they started moving, Cable turned back to Rahne and Zell, who he'd been carefully ignoring.

"Welcome to the 40th century," he said flatly.

And it was a relief to be speaking English again, inelegant as it might be, it wasn't the language he'd wooed his wife with or sang lullabies to his son in and he could do without the past clinging to him so closely.

The conversation was a blur to Rahne, all words and syllables she couldn't make sense of, but with the distinct feeling that it was best she just go along with it — something that Zell, she thought his name was, hadn't seemed to figure out, for which she shot him a look of warning out of the corners of her eyes — she did exactly that, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that she was in no way supposed to be there. The situation seemed precarious enough without her adding to it.

Noticeably relieved when Cable's attention turned from the soldiers to the two of them, she raised her eyebrows when he spoke, letting out a short, disbelieving laugh. She hadn't been expecting that, though for that matter, she hadn't really known what to expect at all. "Christ, the 40th century?" she echoed, not quite skeptical. "And would ye happen to know what we're doing in the 40th century?"

Now he did notice Rahne. She spoke kind of like Theresa had. The three of them must have come from the island together. It seemed like another dream trip, but he really hadn't been asleep.

"Yo, no way! That means this is Earth? I actually get to visit Earth? Awesome."

The 40th century part hadn't phased Zell much since he hadn't been in any Earth century before, and it was pretty much all the same to him. He was more struck with being on Earth period.

He also added, "You guys still remember the Island and everything, right? This is probably all fake, just more Island Magic."

"Yes," Cable agreed. "These people are all illusions."

"This," he added firmly, "is a look at a war that was lost a long time ago. So we don't get involved, we don't put ourselves at risk and we don't play the game."

"We just stay here and wait for our two days to tick over."

"Of course I remember the island," Rahne said with a sigh, running a hand back through her hair. Other than that, Zell's enthusiasm went mostly unnoticed; she had plenty else on her mind, mouth set in a tight frown as she considered what must have been going on. "And I'd put solid money on this being a trick of it, but I don't think this is like the last time. I can only speak for myself, but I sure as hell wasn't asleep, and I've never heard about this happening otherwise."

"Okay, so we'll just hang tight and see what happens."

He shrugged. Nobody really knew exactly what was going on, but they were all pretty much in agreement on Island Magic.

"Cable, if there's any fighting, I'll follow your orders. This is your world, anyway. And I guess yours too?"

He turned to Rahne.

"I'm Zell Dincht. Nice to meet ya.' I'm a mercenary back home. Do you fight, too?"

He brushed his hand on the pants of the new uniform and extended it out to her for a shake. He was fairly sure that she could fight given her demeanor. It would come to no surprise to Zell, given his team was half women back home.

If, for some reason, she didn't, he'd want to know.

Cable nodded his approval at Rahne when she said that. It was a fine observation, though he was sure they would find out what exactly was going on sooner or later.

"We won't have to fight," he interrupted, with visible annoyance, before Rahne could reply to Zell. "The clan isn't a democracy. I am the General and the Pope and the President and all the Chiefs of Staff and if I tell them to keep me and my friends safe and away from danger, then they will do it without question."

In short he had been a dictator, albeit one who preferred not to use that word.

"I spent half my life fighting this war and I will not do it all again for someone else's entertainment."

"Rahne Sinclair," she said to Zell as she took the offered hand, and nodded once. "And aye, I could fight just fine, if I needed to." With or without her powers, it was a statement of fact, but whatever Cable said about not fighting, it was still reassuring to know she had, like before, been given her abilities back. Even if none of this was real, she could at least be prepared in the event of something unpredictable happening.

That in mind, she turned back to Cable, unfazed by what was practically a list of credentials. She'd known him for long enough, now, that it wasn't particularly surprising. "That's all well and good, but if something does go wrong, like Hell I'll just sit back and watch."

Zell had always respected and admired Cable on Tabula Rasa. But, the way he just interrupted him to spout off how he's the Grand Puba of Everything, Zell wondered if Cable needed to add Head Jerk to his distinguished list. SeeDs were expected to follow orders too, but there was a chain of command, not mindless devotion to one person. Yeah, the Island may have sent Cable to a place or time that may have ruffled him, but man! Zell returned Cable's look of annoyance. But, he didn't say anything. Yet.

So far, Rahne seemed pretty cool. He gave her a nod as they shook hands. Her stock went up in Zell's opinion when she told Cable she wasn't going to stand back and watch.

He decided to just be quiet for a bit and see if either of the two was about to tell him what was going on around here, or if they were just gonna sit there. There sure as hell WOULD be something going on, knowing the Island.

Cable always acted like that when he was feeling out of control. He shouted how great he was and how he could sort everything out in the hope he could bluff the universe into agreeing with him. And he'd be damned if he was going to stop that now, when he was as rattled as he had ever been, and he needed to scare the ground into stabilizing beneath him.

So he sat down and closed his eyes, with a deliberate calmness. They could take him back to his worst moments, show him the family he'd tried so hard to save and the world he'd left ground beneath a dictators heel but he wasn't shaken at all. He would sit there and meditate and wait the whole thing out.

And then the world shifted again and Cable was back in a dark tunnel with Tetherblood speaking in his ear.

"Dayspring do you think the Autosystems are still on line?""

Well. That wasn't good.

So taken aback by the second sudden shift, Rahne nearly stumbled when she found herself exactly as she had been before, eyes widening. She'd been right, then, that this wasn't like before, but that didn't give her the first idea of what was going on now, and being clueless wasn't a feeling she liked at all. Like this, there was no sitting and waiting for two days to end; at this rate, they wouldn't even make it an hour.

Visibly tense, she drew in a deep breath, glancing over at Zell before her gaze settled on Cable again, expectant with an edge of annoyance. That he didn't know any more than she did what was going on was something that she, at least, would have guessed at, but he was the self-professed President and Pope and whatever the #$@! else of this situation, whereas all she knew was the century. Looking to him was just about the only thing she could do, however displeased about it she was.

"What the...?!"

Zell cast an annoyed look at the gun that was back in his hands. He clicked the safety, then chucked it aside.

"Okay Cable, I figured out we guys can teleport. So, why the hell did you bring us back here? What's goin' on?"

He didn't quite realize they had stepped back in time as well. They were speaking again in that other language, and he wanted someone to tell him in English what was going on.

"Start counting," Cable told Zell, instead of answering his question, and then he turned back to Tetherspring and they talked briefly in the askani language. The other man nodded and barked some orders of his own, so that the soldiers with him all drew their guns and started moving carefully back down the tunnel with, Cable signaling Zell and Rahne to follow them.

After they'd gone about a hundred yards, Cable said something else and everyone stopped, guns pointed in the direction they'd come from.

"3 minutes ten seconds," Cable started counting in English, in a loud clear voice, "three minutes twenty seconds..."

And when he reached 'four minutes 40 seconds' the world warped again and Cable heard the word 'Dayspring' before raising his hand for silence.

"5 minutes," he told Zell and Rahne grimly. "We have about 5 minutes before the loop starts again."

Rahne could only follow along, bordering on exasperated, a feeling that didn't change when everything around them did again. Just because she could take orders didn't mean she had to like it, and a third time around, she was getting increasingly fed up with the whole situation. Island magic was one thing, but this was something else entirely.

"Alright, so we have about five minutes," she echoed, shoulders lifting in a dismissive shrug. "What do we do with those five minutes? Because this is getting old fast." And that was an understatement, though she couldn't say she expected it to be any different this time, either. There had to be something they could do.

Zell was used to Cable's gruff manner. Despite his earlier annoyance, he shut up and started counting quietly. Cable wasn't the type of guy to say he had no idea, and Zell figured he was in the process of figuring things out. It made no sense, but he went with it. Cable was the leader, and Zell didn't need to understand right away. He appreciated a well disciplined unit.

Then the shift happened again. He clicked the safety and chucked the gun once again. He heard what Cable said, and he understood. It was a time loop. Was there something wrong with time here like home, or was it the Island?

He looked to Cable to see what his reply to Rahne was. He wanted to fight.

"About thirty seconds after this," Cable told Rahne in a flat voice, "we walked into one of the nastiest battles of the war. Nothing you would want to go through even once, believe me."

"But it looks like we're going to have to put on a show."

He turned back to his men and shouted "Guns out. If the defenses are on I want them hit by a wall of Plasma."

"I won't ask either of you to stay behind but do try and stay alive. Remember that the men beside you aren't real."

And then he drew his own gun again.

"Oh and Zell," he added as an afterthought, "don't interfere with what happens next."

The younger man hadn't noticed yet but, even without the English translations, once they reached Stryfe he would, doubtless recognize the events from the video he'd seen.

And then, before he could get a reply, he and his men charged forward. They blasted the first defense platform before it could shoot and received a barrage of plasma from the others in return.

For a moment, no longer, after Cable spoke to her, Rahne hesitated. When it came to fighting, her feelings were understandably mixed. It was often a necessity, a job requirement, and she wasn't the sort to back down from a fight. All the same, she had never liked to think of herself as a killer, still struggled with one death nearly a year prior, and the thought of costing more people their lives, in war or not, real or not, was enough to make her stomach turn.

Jaw set, she nodded once, and cocked the gun.

It was awkward in her hands, heavy, and on the first few shots, she faltered, but quickly gained confidence. There were better ways to attack, though, and once empty, she cast the gun aside in favor of changing, remaining with the group but poised for a further attack. Impulsive though she was prone to being, she still hadn't the first idea of what was happening, and was more set on getting out of here than causing a scene. To want to get back to the island wasn't anything she had ever thought she would want, but this still wasn't right.

It took Zell a few moments to quite understand what Cable was referring to. What would he possibly know about....

..!!..

This was the cavern from the projection he had seen! Cable was about to... oh man! This was gonna suck really, really hard.

He braced himself for the first barrage of gunfire. Zell was in the back. Not because he was afraid or wanted Cable's men to do the work for him, but this was the strategic place to be. In a moment, he'd be bustin' heads. He would need an opening..... and then he saw one.

He dashed forward, hopped onto a rock and twirled in the air as the energy blasts flew by him. He landed in the midst of the enemy.

Zell landed in a crouch, then sprang forth to start dealin' some pain. Fists flew and helmets hit dirt. He started weaving a trail of downed soldiers. It was difficult for the large group to effectively blast the close-quarters fighter in the midst of their group without taking their own men down. Zell kept moving and dodging. To stop was to die.

One of Cable's men took a shot in the chest as they advanced and Cable heard him scream as he fell, the familiar smell of burning flesh filling his nostrils. Tetherblood was beside him as it happened, shooting down the last of the platforms, and he turned to Cable with the callousness of a life long soldier.

"Nothing like a bit of random weapon discharging to settle the nerves, eh Dayspring?"

Cable grimaced in reply without saying anything and gestured ahead, where Stryfe and his soldiers were emerging. They outnumbered Cable's men 2 to 1 but they weren't shooting yet, just lining up their shots, while their master prepared for his next move.

Stryfe himself was at the head of the pack and Cable wondered how that face covering mask and mad voice had fooled him for so many years. Seeing him again, he could see al the clues that this was Cable's twin, that this was a man with Cable's mind and Cable's body but a different history. That this madman was what Cable would be if ever let his anger overcome his reason and just started hurting people so he could see fear in someone else's eyes for a change. It was not something Cable appreciated being reminded of.

Cable's jaw stiffened as he waited for his clone to make the move but, as it turned out, Stryfe didn't get a chance. Zell had broken ranks and jumped straight into Stryfe's gang, breaking their line. And Cable, cursing indiscipline beneath his breath, started shooting into the ranks to help him. And around him, his men followed his lead. Stryfe for his part, merely reached out with his powers and stopped Zell cold in his tracks as if an invisible hand had grabbed him.

"This means death," he chortled, in a voice unlike anything Cable every used.

And then Tyler was there, grabbing Zell and neurolinking them together.

"Don't attempt a bodyslide to escape, father," Cable heard as his clan mates gasped in surprise and he raised his gun, firmly and calmly and prepared to take his shot.

This was what the whole trick was about, of course. Putting him in a place where he had to shoot his own son, once again. It was petty sadism of the worst kind, but if it was meant to leave him a sobbing mess then they had sorely underestimated him. He had taken the shot once and survived, he could certainly do so again.

"Oh, what in the bloody hell —" Rahne ground out through clenched teeth, shifting once more back into human form. However incapable they had been so far of getting out of this, some part of her was well aware that soon she wouldn't have the chance to do so again, and she relished the feeling, the familiar rush that came with a transformation. When it came to fighting, she didn't do much thinking, either, but for that split second, she could've killed Zell herself for falling into that position. She wouldn't have meant it, of course, but it was her first thought.

She could do nothing, though, watching open-mouthed as Cable prepared to take the shot, not having the first clue what the #$@% was going on. Less expectant and more curious, she asked, "Are ye going to do something?"

Zell saw Cable fire, and that's when the mental anguish began. It felt like a fireball erupting in his head. It felt like he was havin' a stroke!

After Stryfe released the telekinesis, Zell dropped to his knees, and immediately collapsed onto the ground. It wasn't necessarily apparent if he was alive or not, but he was still breathing shallowly. Also not apparent were the signs of brain damage from the neurolink collapsing.

But, Cable would know what Zell had just suffered.

Edited 2010-06-30 00:15 (UTC)

Cable's response to Rahne was to pull the trigger. The blast broke the link and hit Tyler and the results were exactly the same as it had been last time. Cable's son fell down like a dead man and Zell collapsed just like Dawnslik had.

He heard some mutterings from his men but Cable was the one to react first, bounding over to grab Zell before Stryfe's men could react.

And then Tetherblood body-slided them all out of there.

Cable stood in the Askani camp and carefully lowered Zell yo the floor. When he woke up the brain damage would probably cripple his speech and movement but hopefully that would be reset when the time loop ended.

Reassured that the boy was blacked out, he turned back to Rahne. "Shouldn't be long now," he said flatly, "I think that was all they wanted to see."

And then, as if in response to his words, the loop restarted and he was back in the tunnels again.

"Dayspring, do you think the Autosystems are still on line?"

And Cable didn't know whether he should laugh or cry or punch something so instead he just closed his eyes for a second. Of course it wouldn't work. Of course he would shoot his son and shatter his student's mind and it would make no difference at all. He didn't know why he expected anything else.

Edited 2010-06-30 07:30 (UTC)

For a few seconds, too stunned by the turn of events to do otherwise, Rahne could only gape, mouth too dry to speak, as the world changed around them again and she turned to face Zell, looking perfectly alright as if nothing had happened. She'd not even been able to question it, to find out what was wrong, what had been done to him. Her stomach turning, she took a few deep breaths, hands curled into fists, in an attempt to keep herself steady — one that was wildly unsuccessful. She had held her temper well thus far, but couldn't take any more of this.

"Right, exactly what they wanted to see," she said, tone clipped, the edge in the words more than apparent. She did have to rely on Cable here and she knew it, knowing so little about the situation, but she couldn't just hold her tongue, either, when lives were on the line, and when she wanted little more than to get the #%!$ out of here. "That worked wonderfully. Now, would ye mind sharing what all of that was?"

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