CHAPTER 37
For the people who live here, they considered it the most safest haven in the world.
Somewhere where they could be themselves and not be shunned for it. Where their differences will not be the recipient for disgust but awe and acceptance.
For them, the Mansion was synonymous with safety. A true paradise for mutant-kind.
So they were not to be blamed when the first reaction they had was panic when they heard their loving Professor's screeching shrill echoing through their heads.
The psychic wave of agony woke up every inhabitant of the Mansion in panic, but what followed after was what drove them with fear.
For people who had since convinced themselves free of the outside world's unfairness, the voice that roared out with rage brought them an even deeper terror.
"CHARRRRRLLLESSSSSSS."
There weren't wrong to feel fear as following the voice was a quake that shook the entire Mansion, literally.
Before the ignorant students further devolved into panic, the teachers immediately swung into action as John traced the origin of the quake to-
"It's coming from Draul's room."
"Tin man, get the kids to the other side of the building!" Logan yelled out to Piotr.
"What the hell is wrong with him!" Scott asked a question they were all wondering.
"Before that, someone should go get the Professor." Ororo said as they made their way down the hall to where Draul slept.
The further they walked in, the more that saw the damage the sonic quake did. From the floor board all the way to the ceiling had crack marks, becoming more pronounced as they walked deeper.
When they got to the room, they were surprised to see Draul clutching his head as lines or red glowed through his entire body.
"Draul, we need you to-" Ororo started, only to be cut off by the calm question that ominously echoed through the room.
"Where's Charles?" He raised his head but that only served to raise their caution as they saw his red gleaming eyes.
"C'mon man chill for a sec will ya." Logan said but his words fell on deaf ears.
"Where. Is. Charles?" Draul said, this time slowly as his red lost a bit of its glow as it seemed to regain its calm.
"He's punctuating his words! That can't be good." John remarked as they got ready for a confrontation. His calm red eyes were only sending it wrong signals.
"Whatever happens we need to get him out of the Mansion." Storm whispered to the others as the tensed their breaths.
Draul waited for an answer, but seeing as he wouldn't get any his eyes regained their glow once more and that was when they acted.
"Now!" Storm yelled as Scott wound down his visor fully exposing his eyes and let out a giant beam from them that shot towards Draul before the latter could react and clashed with him as it shot his through the walls and out of the Mansion.
"That ought to do it, right?" He asked not fully expecting an answer.
They rushed through the rubble, following the path of the beam as found the target in an open field – unhurt.
"You've got to be kidding me." They watched as the young man stood up, bare chested with only a pants on, with no sign of damage whatsoever.
"Storm, looks like we'll gonna have to count on you to knock him out when you have the chance." Logan said and he extended his claws.
"We're here." They turned to look at the new arrivals, Piotr and a young boy, late teens.
"Bobby what are you doing here? Where's the Professor?!" Scott asked the new additions.
"I'm here to help. Kitty found the Professor but it looks like he's not doing too good. He's passed out." The new face, Bobby, said as his body took a crystalline look, freezing the ground around his feet.
"We'll bicker later, Colossus, John and I will attack him head on. The rest will try to hold him back and flank him." Logan said while the rest nodded, with Bobby's face adopting a slightly nervous look.
During the whole time none of them took their eyes of their target so they didn't miss when his body, the part was visible, started glowing with red vein-like lines and started emitting smoke.
Scott was the first to attack since barring Storm, his mode of attack was the fastest, aiming to stop whatever Draul was doing as he let out another beam from his eyes.
But the result this time shocked them.
Instead of pushing him back like it did moments ago, they watched as Draul brought forth his hands in a block as the beam clashed against him.
Seeing what was happening, Scott tried to output more to push Draul back which only made him slide for a few feet before he once more held his own even as his hands blazed red.
Storm seeing as how Draul was keeping Scott at bay and deterring the others from attacking rose to the air as the clouds rumbled. Her sclera and iris turned pure white as the clouds spurn and lightening cackled.
Her person seemed to become as one with the weather as lightening and wind danced around her. She raised her hands and pointed at Draul.
Instantaneously, as if heeding her silent command, from the clouds, a bolt of lightning , faster than the eyes could follow, struck Draul deep into the ground as it formed a trench as it's insane temperature turned the ground it stuck into crystalline glass.
The surrounding fell silent after the thunderous boom of the lightning as the spectators waited with bated breaths for any upheavals.
"Is it over?" Bobby asked after awhile and he couldn't miss the soft clicking of tongue he heard from Piotr. "What?!"
The moment he said that, a blast of dark red beam shot out of the rubble straight at the hovering Storm who couldn't put up a strong defense immediately as the beam crashed into her and shot her away from the vicinity.
"Storm!" Scott cried out as his eyes went red in rage and without listening to John's call telling him to stop, he fired another beam at Draul who this time did something different.
They watched as Draul's eyes glowed red and as if copying Scott, deep dark red beams shot out from his eyes and clashed with Scott's midway.
They held their beams even as the collision cackled with red sparks, prompting every one else into action .
The first to close in was Colossus, who rushed Draul and punched at his head, immediately causing his to stop the beams he was emitting from his eyes as Scott's beam hit him once and shot him back inside the trench.
Without waiting for him to gain himself this time John jumped inside the trench and engaged with Draul, thereby cutting his focus on the others, which was his plan.
He attacked Draul who was still sprawled on the ground and delivered punches to his face.
The first two went unimpeded but the third he found caught in Draul's hand who then spoke for the first time. "My turn." His voice sounding like a faulty speaker.
He couldn't understood what happened as he saw himself flying out of the trench before crashing onto the ground, knocked out by one of Draul's punch.
Colossus watching the sonic boom that spat out Thunderbird in the form of a punch roared as he launched himself at the now standing Draul.
Bobby taking the split second to act, slid around Draul as he froze his entire body in a block of ice before Colossus rammed into him, sending him skidding backwards.
Logan didn't let up the attack, as he brandished his claws while Draul brought up his for a block but watched as the adamantium clad claws cut through his arms like a knife through water.
Not giving him any chance to attack, Logan slashed with his claws, sometimes sending in kicks and punches, keeping the man steadily on the back foot as Colossus joined him, both working in tandem with each other, as they kept pressing him on.
It was during the beat down that they found out he could heal which in turn increased their ferocity.
If his eyes glowed, Colossus would send a punch to his head. If he tried to stop the attack, Logan would slash at his wrist.
They continued the same way for a few minutes, looking for a way to knock him out as they rushed at him again.
The moment they got near him, Logan's senses screamed at him but before he could even form words from his mouths, all he saw was flashing red as an explosion swallowed him and Colossus.
Colossus was knocked out by the point explosion while his skin was burnt off, showing off his steely bones and organs.
If it wasn't for Colossus armament, Logan was absolutely sure that the explosion would have killed him. His own body was testimony to that fact.
What was worse was that he regeneration was coming up slowly, way too slower than normal, taking a few minutes before he could fight again. While it was an impressive regeneration factor to be able to heal from sure-death wounds, he doubts that the rageful young man would be willing to wait for him to engage him in another tango.
He looked at the young man who didn't look out of breath as his red veins pulsated ominously as his eyes never lost its red glow.
He started walking towards the Mansion, no doubt looking for Charles like a murder robot.
He couldn't help but wonder what the hell the Professor did that made him dip this much. Considering the Chuck was found out cold and Draul was clutching his head when they found him, it wasn't hard to put two and two together.
'Damn you Chuck!' Sometimes he couldn't help but wonder what the hell was wrong with the baldy. Others might not see it but how could Xavier fool him; Xavier had a tendency to be short-sighted. Always believing his ideals were what was needed.
While he meant well, Logan could tell that the world wasn't always black and white. Contrary to what most might think, they was a thin line between this two philosophies; the grey area, where people thrived the most.
Irrespective of what most people took as fact, those who found themselves in the grey were those were most times than not come out on top. They were the ones who were able to see with unhindered clarity, the faults of both sides of the spectrum.
Charles Xavier lacked that.
He watched as Draul continued walking towards the mansion before Bobby stood in front of him to halt his advance.
"S-stop." Bobby said but as if not hearing him, Draul ignored him altogether.
Seeing no other way, Bobby let out jets of ice at Draul to freeze him while Scott let out another ray of beams but all that did was halt him for a moment before he pushed through Bobby's ice stream and Scott's beam.
He was a few feet away from the iceman before his advance stopped.
He tried pushing himself, but it felt as if his body was strapped to a megaton block of metal, but budging a bit.
He scanned his surroundings and found the most likely culprit – Jean.
She stood in place with an outstretched arm to him as telekinetically halted his movement.
They all took a second to breathe, but it turns out the breath they took was too soon as they lost it the next second his started moving, albeit with effort towards Jean.
Even the combined effort of Scott's beam, Bobby's ice and Jean's telekinesis was only able to reduce his advancement pace.
He pushed through the three obstacles as he made his way, step by step, towards the mansion with only one target in mind.
His mind currently worked like a machine. It erased every inconsequential task in order to focus on the main objective.
It was something Draul was worried about when he took Banner's Hulk serum; What would happen if he were to lose himself to anger? Would he rampage like the Hulk, or was there a way to prevent such rampage?
The only answer he came to was to leave it to his brain – more specifically his subconscious.
His subconscious was a working machine with it own directives which was centered on the main's desires.
So instead of being a rabid monster, he became a programmed machine but with the anger still taking over the main's thought process and influencing it's subconscious, the only choice it had was to follow the main's directive which unfortunately aligned with the source of his anger – Charles Xavier.
The others were inconsequential, trifling obstacles barring his path.
So he continued on.
He currently stood in front of Bobby and Scott, who currently had terrified expressions on their faces. His eyes glowed red as he sought to permanently erase these annoying bugs.
He was just a second away from frying their brains, ignoring Jean's scream when the sky crackled.
The once dark night sky once again lit up in the fury of heaven as lightning danced ferociously in the nights sky, illuminating the surrounding cities.
In the middle of the sky stood a goddess, hair made of lightning as her eyes glistened with righteous fury.
"YOU WILL CEIZE YOUR ADVANCE CRETIN!"
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…
And for the first time that night, the entire city of New York shook as the lightning rained down in God's fury.
KRAKOOM!
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Before you take out your anger on me if the chapter wasn't to your satisfaction please hear me out.
I am in no way planning to nerf the MC, regardless how how some of you might think this chapter so. While the MC took the Hulk's serum, he isn't as strong as the hulk was when he broke Harlem or even in thy first hulk movie. The Hulk's strength comes from converting his excess energy into biomass while the MC just have the excess energy. So if you think he should have mopped the floor with the X-Men (which in my humble opinion, he actually did), the access to the energy he has was what limited him.
Draul's brain like I said before, is like a machine. Since he has learned how to manipulate different energies, it stands to reason that him being angry wouldn't change that fact either so while he could just say 'fuck it' and nuke the entire school, his brain however was focused on a single objective.
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Now you can crucify me ☠️⚰️