-X- X-Men: Foundations part 2: Changing World Summary Chapter 1: Bright Stars Chapter 2:Stand Still Chapter 3: Empire State University Chapter4: Distant Early Warnings Chapter 5: Brand Annex Chapter 6: Open Secrets Chapter 7: Change of Faith Chapter 8:Winter Breaks Chapter 9: Healing Breaks Chapter 10: Ice Skate Eve Chapter 11: Razor's Edge Chapter 12:Last Call Chapter 13: Thoughts Ignite Chapter 14: Red Tide Chapter 15: The Pass Chapter 16: Spring Breaks Chapter 17: Kid Gloves Chapter 18: Second Natures Chapter 19: Prime Movers Chapter 20: Moving Parts Chapter 21: Barriers Fall Chapter 22: Hand Over Hand Chapter 23: Hand Over Fist Chapter 24: Open Hand Chapter 25: Open Hand Closed Fist Chapter 26: Racing Heart -XX-
X-Men: Foundations part 2: Changing World
Chapter 14
-X-
Red Tide
Throughout March and into April, spring began to slowly chip away at winter’s hold over the ESU campus. Scott continued his new weekly routine, often letting Lykos close his therapy sessions with a few minutes of hypnotherapy. It didn’t solve all his problems but he didn’t expect for it to. It did leave him feeling a little more refreshed, like having just taken a short power nap, and using that skill set seemed to make Lykos happy. So Scott didn’t see a problem with gradually allowing him more time for hypnotherapy as long as Scott got some more productive stuff done beforehand. For the most part, his head continued to make better sense. “Most of it makes sense when I’m able to look at it objectively, on the page, at a distance, where it’s not so emotional. I can see what my head is doing.” For example, equating various people and experiences in his life with instances of safety or of danger. He could almost trace it back to those origins: safety or danger. To a time where his decisions had nothing to do with the glasses or the streets or even the Home. Not yet. “That was just me, making a decision that it was ‘easier that way’.” “Easier?” “Trying not to care.” Stubbornly refusing to let himself be cared for. “That was easier than feeling the loss or the fear, the pain or the helplessness. I couldn’t control any of those things, any more than I could control my life or my future, or anything else at that point. But I could do this one thing, trying my damnedest to bring all the rest of it to heel.” “By not caring, not feeling?” “Why did I make that choice– to hurt myself instead of to help myself?” Scott asked aloud. He was back to questioning his own inherent character deficits. “Turning off can be far easier than turning back on,” Lykos offered patiently. “Or, sometimes, our emotions refuse to come out in the healthy ways we want for them to. We hurt ourselves, or others, out of misplaced pain and confusion. Out of our misplaced feelings of helplessness.” “... I keep thinking about that moment, the first day at the Home. My first day after waking from the coma, anyway. Here was somebody honestly trying to help me; I kept looking away. Why did I do that?” “Tell me about that window– did you see it again in the nightmare?” Again today, discussing the window... which Scott had begun to find more interesting... but it wasn’t the point he wanted to get at. Scott started to redirect the conversation, but Lykos interrupted. “Close your eyes for just a moment and see if you can tell me.... What do you think it is about that window that keeps drawing your attention back to it?” Keeps drawing Lykos’ attention... Scott thought to himself, but he decided to humor him. He closed his eyes and in his mind’s eye he was looking out that rainy window. His eight-year-old self was making a decision that was about to affect the rest of his life. Everything in him was screaming at him – in pure instinct – to push her away, to distrust everything about the Home. That feeling of revulsion and visceral distrust was so intense, so primal, it startled him. Scott gasped. “Scott?” Lykos questioned. “Are you alright?” Scott nodded. “Yeah. That was– intense. For a second, it was like being back there, in that moment.” “Take a minute if you need to catch your breath.” He closed his eyes again. Tried to picture that window for a second time, but he was too rattled by the visceral distrust it provoked. The image shifted away from him. Beyond the concrete memories, there were blurry ones. A different window. One with snow. He assumed the Home, in winter this time. But it felt– calm. Quiet. Almost unnaturally so. He’d never asked Lykos if he thought it was possible to remember things from the coma.... Scott couldn’t place that location, the snowy window. It felt familiar in the dream, but Scott had woken in late springtime... to gray and rainy Nebraska. This memory couldn’t have been from before that one– could it? He heard music in that memory too, which was unusual for his dreams. It was always the same fragment, always with that place: the snow and the window. Like the way, in dreams, you look for something you can’t ever find. The song was always just out of his reach. “I can’t make it come clear,” Scott finally admitted. “Let your mind relax and focus on the details,” Lykos advised. “There’s this line I can barely remember. But sometimes I can’t get the refrain out of my head; like a record with a skip that keeps on repeating... I haven’t thought about that in years.” He was looking out the window; I should have looked for her face instead. For just a second, he was still, in that bright place, and the song felt nice. “And the other memory?” Lykos prompted quietly, refocusing him away from the quiet place. Scott swallowed hard. That last one troubled him the most. There was another window. Everything here was red and there was falling. How could he still be falling when he was inside? Why did everything around him shimmer in a red tide? He was gasping for air. Scott opened his eyes. His hands were shaking. He didn’t know why. Those images made no sense. He didn’t know what they were or why they left him feeling terrified. “We’re getting very close to that last image,” Lykos said quietly. That last memory was the one Lykos seemed most curious about– professionally. It probably seemed an irresistible subject for his hypnotherapy skills.... Scott didn’t know if he was close yet– or if he ever wanted to be; he didn’t like that last image. It felt more foreign and unnerving to him than any of the others. “I know this is difficult, Scott,” Lykos offered. He seemed to register his patient’s deep discomfort and handed Scott a cup of water. “I don’t like making you uncomfortable; I’d much rather talk about things you want to talk about– but that’s not always what is needed, or required of me.” Scott nodded and took a sip of water; he managed a smile. “I know, doc. I get it.” The truth was, Scott had decided he didn’t want to know what was on the other side of a window filled with fire. He’d always assumed the crash knocked him out and he hadn’t woken between then and the Home, roughly a year later. What if it didn’t? Or worse– What if that stuff was there anyway– under the snowy fog of a coma– a place where he was completely helpless. Flames and falling and crashing. Pain and death. Alex. His parents. He didn’t want to know. “Give me a solid hour’s time in hypnotherapy and we’ll find it, Scott. No pain. No trauma.” Maybe the only way out was to go through, dig deep enough to find the truth. Or maybe he’d get lucky this time; just let his head keep on protecting him with amnesia. Unlike the others, this particular image hadn’t risen to the surface until they’d really started digging at it. Maybe if they stopped digging it would settle back into whatever buried recess of his mind it belonged to. Or maybe he was just hoping against hope with that last possibility. “Gimme another week, doc.” “Your choice, Scott,” Lykos reassured him. “As always.” Scott sensed his deep disappointment over Scott’s decision, as always. Karl Lykos was still sitting in one of two chairs opposite his desk when the phone rang. “Well.” “Ever closer, but still, no.” On the other end of the line, Lykos heard an instruction: “Have Hodge go up, yet another notch.” And he heard the reply given in affirmative. It gave Lykos a sick feeling in the pit of his gut.
-x-
The following morning Scott was back at Lykos’s office door, looking like someone who hadn’t slept much last night. “Think you could fit me in for some hypnotherapy, doc?” “Sure, Scott,” he answered, stepping back to allow Scott inside.
-x-
“What happened to you?!” Scott ran a hand through his hair in an effort to smooth himself out as he dropped into a seat beside Ororo and Jean. Jean craned forward in her seat to look around Ororo at him. “You look like you got hit by a bus.” Scott only grinned at her. “Thanks.” “Seriously– you okay, Scott?” Jean asked. Scott nodded and reassured her that he was, simultaneously feeling his own limited optimism drain away. It looked like his ability to fake his way through not being okay had finally run out. The most maddening thing about that, today anyway, was that he did actually feel a little better after letting Lykos put him under this morning. Drained was an apt description for the way he felt right now, and he guessed that showed. His limbs felt a little too heavy, his brain a tad too dull, but only a little more drained than his typical state of morning exhaustion. Maybe that wasn't really an improvement, but drained was preferable to the state of high-anxiety he’d been living in of late between the nightmares and the sleeplessness. Last night his head had decided to treat him to a double feature of each. Jean was still watching him worriedly. “I know you don’t want to hear about the quack medicine,” he warned her. “Lykos did hypnotherapy?” Ororo asked curiously. Scott shrugged. “Could have been worse. Shang-Chi wants to sign me up for acupuncture.” “Acupuncture is an ancient medical discipline,” Jean replied. “Hypnosis is a cheap parlor trick, more fad than medicine.” “Shang-Chi said that too. I’m still not in favor of being poked with needles.” “Just knocked out cold for no reason?” “Sure you didn’t wake up missing a wallet?” Ororo kidded him. Scott patted down his pockets for effect. “Everything’s here,” he replied jokingly. Amanda popped her head over the seat behind them. “We’re still going to Heroes for Hire this afternoon, right?” Ororo agreed and ran through the details. They were throwing a party for the kids’ hockey team to celebrate the end of their season, and it was an unofficial kick off to the start of the spring break holiday. Class started to settle down as Dr. MacTaggert took the stage for her final lecture of the semester. “Don’t we have guest lecturers scheduled for today?” Scott asked, flipping through his class syllabus. “Yes. On Ro’s recommendation.” “Really?” “Drs. Burstein and Temple, from the Heroes for Hire free clinic,” Ororo explained. “They also teach medical students at the NYCC campus in Harlem,” Jean added excitedly. “I’ve been talking to them about clinical rotations.” Scott laughed at Jean’s trademark enthusiasm. “Already?” “Pre-med students do shadowing all the time, Scott. It’s good experience! But I shouldn’t say any more– there’s a surprise announcement involved.” Sure enough, Dr. MacTaggert brought the class to order a few minutes later by reminding the pre-med students to stay for a special announcement at the end of the period. “We’ll have a busy class today for our last lecture of the semester. Our special guests, Drs. Burstein and Temple, will speak to us about their important work in the fields of emergency medicine, emerging diseases, and hospice care.” In the row behind Scott, Ororo, and Jean, Ted excitedly elbowed Cal, looking a little star-struck at the prospect of Cal’s new medical mentors doubling as their guest lecturers. “Then Dr. Lykos will be on hand to speak to the pre-med students. But first, I’d like to set the table for them, and start to wrap up our previous semester’s discussions by speaking about medical ethics in light of current events in medicine.” The first topic in her slideshow read: Ethics in Modern Psychology. Scott ignored Jean’s look of utter triumph. Honestly, when he’d left Lykos’ office this morning, Scott had thought Lykos looked more the worse for wear than Scott had felt after an hour of hypnotherapy.
-x-
Deep in the abandoned cellars below an old New York City speakeasy, a man was hooked up to a machine meant to drain him of his life force– or, in this case, meant to separate a mutant from the collected energy of other mutants’ life forces. The man contorted painfully, strapped into place on a standing gurney. At the moment he didn’t bear much resemblance to a mortal man. He’d taken on the look of some almost prehistoric creature as the energy flowed through him and then was finally siphoned away for storage, for study. Dr. Lykos fell slack in his restraints. No longer Sauron but Karl Lykos once more, as the machine drained him dry of stolen mutant energy. With his experiments into hypnotherapy, Karl Lykos had realized his own mutant ability to absorb energy from others. And, for a while, he’d been able to drain off just enough negative energy to help his patients without harming them. He’d likened himself to some physician of olde, siphoning off the bad humors. For the while, he’d still been a whole man, a man of science and medicine, a legitimate doctor. That had all changed the first time he’d tried to use his new skills on another mutant. From that moment forward it had ceased to be anything resembling a skill. He was an addict, unable to fully control either the scope of his own powers or his hunger for more mutant energy. “When will you finally be done with me?” he cried out in a state of abject despair. “You need me,” the cool voice replied, “to keep your condition from progressing. If that is no longer the case, simply say the word and I will release you.” Lykos felt the creature stir hopefully within him. Sauron. Lykos looked down at his claw-like hands, still shaking and weakened, still feeling the rush of energy through his veins like an addictive drug. He knew, without the restraints, he would flee like a wild creature in desperate search of more prey. He was trapped in some cruel modern day retelling of Jekyll and Hyde. Except his transformation was now carefully orchestrated. Timed. Controlled. In the service of this cold excuse for a man, whose long ago claim to help him had instead turned him into a weapon. No longer a healer but a hunter... a man set against himself. “Then spare me your dry theatrics. I have promised your alter ego an even greater prize.” Sauron sensed the presence of mutant energy, like the predator he was. Lykos himself was little more than a glorified battery, the conductor through which the cold man could access the powers of other mutant energy absorbers. Because of Sauron, the moment Scott Summers had walked through his door Lykos had known exactly who and what he was. Not only was he the cause of all this elaborate subterfuge and planning. Not only was he the cold man’s target, his primary mutant of interest. But Scott Summers was one of the most powerful energy converters Lykos had ever encountered. Sauron served as the conduit between them all. The cold man had lived many years, many lives, and gone by many names. Scott knew him as Essex. Martinique knew him as Bocklin. Lykos preferred not to name him at all; a name granted the illusion of humanity, something which did not exist. Only cruelty. And here, in his element – truly mad with science – he was something far more sinister than any mortal human being. The cold man taunted Sauron with his promises, all the while Lykos struggled to keep the beast contained... until the opportune moment, when Sauron could be controlled. Sir Robert Windsor was very fond of the saying, “No one can relax around Dr. Jekyll after they have met Mr. Hyde.” It was a truth which Karl Lykos hated, but a truth all the same. Lykos wished he never had to know how thoroughly this monstrous excuse for a man had devoted himself to torturing this boy– much less, his own role in the same... to his eternal shame. Scott Summers’ mind was a deep sea of repressed memories on top of damage on top of more repressed memories. Impossible to know which were real, which were manipulation, and which were no more than collateral damage to the cold man’s selfish will. “Take the good doctor back to his office.” Martinique came forward to collect him from his gurney. Lykos wrenched one newly-freed hand clear from his restraints and closed his grip around his captor’s pale wrist. A sneer crossed the cold man’s unnatural features in response to Lykos’ contact, but he replied as calmly as if discussing the matter over afternoon tea. “We’ll soon be finished here. But for now, still much to learn.” “You won’t get away this time. They are closer to tracking you down than you know.” “I have outplayed the most powerful telepath of our time, outmaneuvered the most brilliant and the most brutal mutants of our age. I’m hardly worried about mystics and witches– and, as for magicians, I have my own.” He laughed suddenly and turned to command Martinique Wyngarde. “Quick! Raise the drawbridge. Their pitchforks are at the ready!” Essex stood elaborately clothed in flowing blue and red, royal garments, as the cellar surrounding them became a medieval castle, all in play to Madame Cerveau’s illusion. The cold man was amused for a moment, his ego and humor gratified by the grandiosity of her illusion, but only briefly. The flash of amusement quickly faded into boredom. He had other toys with which to play. “Take him from my sight.” As the cellar around them returned to its normal appearance, Martinique’s own appearance shifted away from her younger, more elegant self. As they climbed the steps she was once more garbed in the dashing appearance of a younger version of her father, Jason’s, infamous alter ego. This version was clean-cut and conservatively dressed, neatly fitting the required role of an up-and-coming assistant professor and PR expert for ESU. Youthful or middle-aged, Lykos had come to deeply distrust the Wyngarde visage all the same. Much like the cold man, Jason Wyngarde seemed to have traded away parts of his humanity long ago. All that remained was the twisted embodiment of Mastermind’s deceptions. Perhaps Martinique and Regan were not as far gone, not yet anyway. Only time would tell how much farther the daughters would follow down their father’s path of rot and deception. Behind them, the cold man had already returned his attention to the various monitors in front of him. Lost in the study of energy readings, bloodwork analysis, and shortwave transmission data.
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In the basement bar one floor above, Cameron Hodge was grumbling mutinously. J. Martin went to deal with him while Lykos sat down at the bar and poured himself a shot of something strong enough to settle his nerves before they headed outside. From what he could overhear, Hodge was angry over the slow pace of the operation. Lykos choked back a bitter laugh. If Cameron Hodge knew anything at all about this operation, it would send him screaming into the night. The pawns never knew more than was needed to play their parts. As far as Hodge was concerned, his part was to ferret out some nefarious scheme for which he could harangue Summers, ideally, driving him from campus. “He’s got what he needs– for now. That means you’re done for now,” Martin warned Hodge. “Stand down and don’t do anything stupid.” “You’re not listening to me! He’s going to get away, he’s leaving for spring break soon. There won’t be time after that to recover our momentum before summer. Then what? It was all for nothing, the whole year?” “Fine. Take it up again– but no more than two notches– If this backfires on you, he’ll have your hide.” “But if it works,” Hodge countered with a cocky grin, “I’ll be golden.” Lykos rolled his eyes and resisted the urge to take another shot. It was barely eight a.m. after all, and he had an early morning engagement still on his public schedule. A few minutes later the three unlikely compatriots stepped outside into the cold early daylight. Hodge checked his watch. “You have somewhere to be?” Martin prompted. Hodge nodded. “A class I want to audit.” “You just said yourself, the semester’s almost over.” Hodge only grinned as he walked away. “When things are moving too slowly, they need to be shaken up.” “Where are you going, then?” Lykos ignored his handler and walked away as well, waving off Martin’s protest. “I can find my own way back to campus.” Martin only needed stand outside for a moment longer before Jason Wyngarde walked down the short set of steps to stand on the stoop and light a cigarette. “You know, the Hodge kid has a point.” Martin waved away his drifting smoke with annoyance, similarly shaking off Jason’s observation. “He’s as reckless as he is self-important.” “True,” Jason agreed, “but he’s also about to cause trouble, just at the time Bocklin is losing interest in the big picture and ready to cut him loose.” “What did you have in mind?” “I’ve been studying that shortwave transmission technology our friend has been using.” “A bit late for that, isn’t it? The biochip is degrading rapidly now– as intended. It will be useless in a few more weeks.” “But right now it’s fully operative and the signal is still virtually untraceable. I think I may be able to better adapt that little toy to our own future needs. A field experiment would be in order to test my theory, and the time is right for it now... while all the key players are looking the other way.” “What do you need me to do?” “A couple of things. I’ll start by rerouting the transmission. You’ll need to give Hodge some new marching orders. Best if you let him think it’s his own idea.” “That shouldn’t be too hard.” “After that– I hope you feel like traveling.” “That depends on where to.” “How about a nice family trip for spring break?”
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Dr. MacTaggert’s lecture centered strongly on patient advocacy across multiple medical disciplines. She began with psychology because, as she put it, unlike in general medical practice, psychology could be a more subjective discipline. “There is not always clear blood work or other test results available to help guide the psychologist through diagnosis or treatment. Likewise, patients experiencing psychosis are sometimes not their own best advocates. This can be true in all realms of medicine, but it casts a special responsibility on the psychologist to be certain that he or she is acting in the best interest of the patient, while also remaining true to their Hippocratic Oath.” Ted had stopped taking his usual neatly thorough notes and was instead listening raptly. Beside him, Tilby was taking notes with interest. Dr. MacTaggert next pivoted to a similar theme on societal responsibility. “When we think of lapses in medical ethics, it’s easy to let ourselves focus on past man-made atrocities like the Tuskegee Study, or systemic instutionalized isolation of the physically and mentally disabled, or wartime abuses of science and medicine of the types seen in World War II Nazi laboratories. We like to think ourselves far removed from those lapses in our free and advanced modern societies. We are not. “As Drs. Burstein and Temple will tell us from their own medical experience, we need look no further than a few blocks downtown, in our own backyards, to find a government and a society looking the other way from deadly, contagious disease – because that same disease primarily affects people on the outskirts of society. We must all shake ourselves loose from this complacency, from the combination of fear, denial, and a desire to pretend that there is safety in normalcy – there is not. What affects the least of us today will affect everyone else tomorrow. “We must all be on guard against such ethical lapses in our societies, especially in medicine and science. We cannot allow any of our fellow citizens to serve as canaries in our coal mines. We are all interconnected. Rich, poor. Abled, disabled. Black, white. Gay, straight. And everyone beyond or in-between those narrow designations. If you think that’s not a matter of ethics or science worthy of your time, study, attention, and action– you are sorely mistaken. Worse, you may even, one day, find yourself at the mercy of a society willing to sacrifice yourself, your family, your elderly parent or your young child as part of some ‘undesirable population,’ out of a misplaced ‘survival of the fittest’ nationalist philosophy.” Moira’s special guest lecturers were the first of her audience members to offer a standing ovation, and the rest of her somewhat stunned classroom gradually followed their example. Cal Rankin stood and applauded vigorously, despite looking a little green around the gills. “Shame on us,” Moira continued her oration, “if we ignore the warning signs and allow ourselves to look the other way, only becoming concerned when contaminated blood samples begin to affect supplies in our blood banks, or there is a dead movie star to mourn, or an innocent child with a superstar spokesperson to draw and popularize our attention to a newly worthy charitable cause. If we allow ourselves to look the other way today, we only clear the way for a tomorrow where a disease we pretended would only affect gay men and drug users has now spread to hemophiliacs and blood transfusion recipients – those whom we couldn’t so easily write off as somehow morally bankrupt –” It was at that point when doors began opening at the back and the sides of the auditorium, streaming in bright morning light and cold, crisp morning air. Ushered inside by neat lines of picket-sign-wielding protestors. Scott and Ororo quickly stood and looked around to see what was happening. It was a Church of Humanity protest. Dr. MacTaggert as quickly instructed everyone: “Please remain calm. I ask everyone to keep seated until the room is cleared.” Scott and Ororo sat down, as did Tilby (looking appalled). Ted shifted worriedly in his seat as Cal (currently gripping his armrests furiously) sat white knuckled in his own seat while Mike Pensive led a line of chanting, sign-waving student-protestors down the center aisle beside them. Jean was disgusted. “What can they possibly object to? It’s an ethics lecture.” “Same as protesting the sciences,” Amanda responded distastefully. “They’re utterly useless.” “They object to any curriculum they can’t control with their own dogma,” Scott added. Tilby added (to their surprise), “They don’t see this as a class – same for much of the modern curriculum, for that matter – but as a means to usher in some new world order, to which they strongly object.” “They see any change as a threat,” Cal concluded bitterly. “I didn’t know there were so many of them.” Meggan scrunched down in her seat beside Amanda. “They mean to imply strength in their numbers,” Ororo said. “When you’re accustomed to enjoying uninterrupted privilege, the push for other’s equality can begin to feel like your own oppression. But it is not.” “The changes ESU is talking about making don’t even amount to functional equality, not in any practical sense – not yet,” Scott concluded. Jean agreed. “We’re still a very long way from a truly just society – what I suppose they would classify as their ‘new world order’. From refusing to fall back on our own prejudices and preconceptions, from learning to judge each other fairly, on anything other than heritage or looks alone.” In a way, Moira’s ethics class had been very much centered on a “new world order” in that it was focused on the creation of a more just, more open-minded, and more responsible society. One that would push for those same values in the wider world. And her students had very much taken that message to heart. “We don’t have to ignore our differences to accept each other,” Amanda countered, “just the opposite.” “We are all so interconnected,” Meggan insisted. “So many tapestries of shared experiences.” “We need to see and grow, and not try to assimilate others to ourselves,” Ororo agreed. Scott nodded. “That’s precisely why we need the things they so stringently object to. Affirmative Action and the Americans With Disabilities Act. Title IX. All those so-called government-interference programs that Hodge and Gyrich love to rail against. Because we’re more than just our grades. If we’re ever going to learn to truly coexist with one another, we have to learn to see and respect each other first. We can’t do that without inclusion.” Again, Tilby surprised them with her agreement. “Hodge and Gyrich see Pensive and his Church of Humanity as a tool they can use to gum up the works toward that kind of progress and equality – if they can just muddy the waters enough to make people like themselves doubt who the victims of inequality really are.” “Your attention, please.” A newly arrived Dr. Lykos stepped up to the microphone in front of the classroom. “Students, you have the right to protest within established guidelines. You may assemble– outside the building, removed from entrances and exits, to safely express your grievances. You may not remain inside classrooms, blocking the isles or otherwise disrupting official ESU activities. Disperse yourselves now or we’ll have the proper authorities clear you from this room.” With that warning in place – and looking well-pleased with the disruption he’d already caused – Pensive began to lead his slogan-chanting, picket-sign-waving followers back outside. Once the room had cleared, Dr. Lykos turned the remainder of their lecture time over to Drs. Noah Burstein and Claire Temple to talk about their work. Then he returned, as promised, at the end of the class to announce an event to be held at Brand Annex after spring break, to officially mark the start of summer – with summer internships. His announcement was met with a chorus of pre-med student groans. Lykos laughed agreeably. “How about we sweeten the pot, then? This summer will also mark the start of a new medical partnership between NYCC and ESU. Dr. Burstein and Dr. Temple have been key partners in helping us put this together, so please give them a big round of applause.” Lykos paused to allow the remaining students in the audience to comply. “For those of you following our BS/MD curriculum, or those brave souls in the BS/MD/PHD program, you’ll have a much wider array of clinical education opportunities available to you with this new partnership. In the spirit of everything we’ve seen and discussed today, I hope you’ll make use of those opportunities and broaden your medical horizons. “Oh, and one more key announcement. We’ll have much more to say about this one at the upcoming Brand event, but I’m pleased to announce a new research partnership between Brand Corp. and Dr. Anthony Serba that will allow his very important research to continue on ESU’s campus with a focus on fighting cancer, studying HIV/AIDS, and with an eye toward tracking emerging diseases all around the world.” Ted clapped enthusiastically this time. Though Ted was undoubtedly happy to see Cal’s old research lab making a triumphant return to the Brand research fold, there was another impression given. Perhaps following Dr. Lykos’ example, Ted was also trying very hard to forget the earlier disruption and restore normalcy. “Ralph says the Brand bigwigs will be there for the official announcement, and our whole lab will be there, of course. It’s a big deal, be proud!” Ted encouraged Cal. Tilby added her congratulations before she headed off in pursuit of Dr. Lykos, presumably in search of an interview or at least a few good quotes to cover this morning’s news for the Excelsior. Cal, by comparison, was still looking angry and a bit mutinous as the class broke up and they all made their ways outside. This morning’s lecture had hit a lot of hot buttons for Cal, even before Pensive’s protestors had crashed the hall. He shook off Ted’s newfound enthusiasm, mumbling something about being tired of being ignored. Outside, the protestors had reorganized themselves, marching in neat formation on sidewalks around the quad. In addition to their normal anti-science, anti-cloning fare, today they carried a handful of colorful anti-gay and pro-death-by-AIDS signs. Out on the quad, Cameron Hodge and Henry Peter Gyrich had set up a booth for their Concerned Students group, taking full advantage of the attention-grabbing display to spew their own political propaganda. Moira’s students briefly fell silent as they took in the depressing sight. One thing was certain: today’s action was not spontaneous, nor was it meant to be a stand-alone protest.... This was far from over. “Dr. MacTaggert is right, you know?” Cal told Ted. “All of us are affected. You can pretend otherwise, but none of us are safe, or free, as long as some are still considered expendable.” After that he took off alone, headed away from the protestors. “Is Cal okay?” Jean asked Ted. Ted nodded, though he looked worried. “He’s just been going through a lot recently. He’ll cool down.” “Given all this, I don’t think your lab and the Brand people will be the only ones present for that lab re-opening,” Scott stated. Jean grimly agreed, just as they walked past a sign reading, “Right makes Might”. “I’ll talk to Emory when I get to the radio station,” Scott told Ororo. “We’re going to need to organize some counter-programing.” Ororo agreed. “I’ll talk to Misty too. Some of the NYCC student activist groups may wish to make their opinions on the matter known as well.” Scott nodded. “Good trouble.” Ro smiled determinedly and offered him a fist bump. “Necessary trouble.” None of them noticed ESU’s public relations consultant for the Brand project, there watching the unfolding protest from across the quad.