Chapter 50: The Plan

Chapter 50: The Plan

A/N: Here's the new Chapter! Which also means the next four chapters are up on my Patreon for early access as well as the chance to vote on the direction of the story!

The girls come to a decision.

-x-X-x-

Laura huffs, crossing her arms over her chest.

“They are weakened and exhausted. There’s no need for subterfuge. If we strike swiftly with overwhelming force, they will not even have time to mount a proper response.”

Gwen shakes her head at that, the eyes of her mask squinting in a way that gives the impression of a frown.

“That’s no reason to go in guns blazing though. If we mount a distraction and have one or two of us get their attention at the front, it’ll allow the rest of us to slip in all the more easily from another angle, at which point the second group will have free reign of the place.”

Finally, Kitty interjects.

“Okay but stay with me here... why even bother with the distraction in the first place? Like Laura said, they’re tired, they’re exhausted. Perfect time for ALL of us to sneak in undetected as one, cohesive unit. Our true target is their boss right? We’re aiming to bring Harkins down and take him into custody, yeah? So really, there’s no reason to even let them sound the alarm.”

There’s a pause as all three of them digest one another’s plans. Then, they continue debating amongst themselves. Thaddeus... stays out of it. He recognizes that he has significant sway over all three women, and he also recognizes his incredible inexperience when it comes to things like this.

It’s not his place to step in and dictate what they should be doing when the trio in front of him were all far more experienced. He would be better served watching them and learning from their actions, over putting his nose in things and making a mess of it all in the process.

But most importantly of all... he just didn’t want to be responsible for coming up with the plan, especially when that plan would carry significant risk to all of their lives. Oh, he certainly didn’t mind risking his own life, especially for any of these women, but he preferred not to be the one telling them how he expected them to risk their lives.

As he stands back and lets the three women talk it out, a voice echoes in his ear, quiet as a whisper.

“Not going to interject, Thaddeus? Not going to lay down the law?”

It takes Thaddeus a second to realize that no, Cessily hasn’t developed psychic abilities. Rather, she’s speaking directly into his ear instead of from elsewhere on his body, the all-mercury mutant that’s currently turned herself into a suit of armor for him basically communicating with him and him alone right now. Since his head is covered by a helmet made of her, Thaddeus lowers his own voice and whispers back, confident he won’t be heard even with Gwen and Laura’s enhanced senses.

“... Not my place, Cessily. They know better than me, so I’ll let them figure it out.”

“Mmm...”

Now, up to this point Thaddeus HAS been listening to Laura, Gwen, and Kitty discuss tactics and the pros and cons of each of their respective plans. He’s been watching and learning. However, that becomes a mite more difficult when Cessily suddenly begins to grope him down below, wrapping a part of herself around his cock and stroking it up and down in a way that has him stiffening in response.

“Cessily... what are you doing?”

“Bored~”

Man, for all his smarts, for all his increased intellect... sometimes he was still the braindead jock he’d once been, wasn’t he? It hadn’t even occurred to Thaddeus that Cessily could or would do something like this when she’d first decided to ‘embrace’ him and turn herself into an armored suit for his use. He probably should have seen this coming a mile away, but he just hadn’t.

Still keeping his voice down, he nevertheless tries to argue with Cessily.

“This really isn’t the time...”

“Meh, if we’re not going to participate in the planning, I don’t see why we shouldn’t have our own fun. Besides, you don’t know Laura and Kitty like I do. We might be here for a while...”

Just as she’s saying that however...

“Thunder?”

Blinking as he realizes that’s supposed to be HIS codename, Thaddeus is pulled from Cessily’s VERY distracting ‘embrace’ and finds all three of the other women are looking at him curiously. As though they’re waiting for him to respond.

“Sorry... I got lost in my own thoughts for a second there.”

Cessily’s airy quiet giggle resounds in his ear at that, even as the others exchange glances before ultimately shrugging. In the end, Kitty is the one who speaks.

As Harkins internally agrees with Laura’s words that it’s over and there’s no escape, he nevertheless refuses to surrender. Instead...

“Oh, you’re quite right my dear X-23... there is no escape... for YOU-urk!”

As the scientist whips around to try and slam his hand down on a particular button on his keyboard, Thaddeus reaches out... and stops him. He freezes Harkins in place with his psychic powers, effectively stopping all traffic from the man’s brain to his body. He cannot move, he cannot enact his final plan... which Thaddeus can tell was opening up the holding cell and unleashing the creature inside on them.

Before Laura can take matters into her own hands and end the problem more definitively, Thaddeus knocks Harkins unconscious, causing the scientist to slump to the floor bonelessly, hitting his head on the way down. He’s not dead, but he’ll have a nasty bump when he wakes up. IF he wakes up.

For a long moment, Laura looks down at him with anger in her eyes. At the same time, Kitty rushes over to the console that Harkins was working at, looking over whatever he was doing. Finally, the mutant woman curses under her breath.

“Shit... this is bad. This is really bad.”

“What is it, Shadowcat?”

“They... they made something. They call it Predator X. It’s specifically designed to hunt down mutants and kill them. Not just kill them... it consumes them and in doing so gains their powers. Like a biological Sentinel. It’s capable of reproducing asexually as well... we need to destroy this thing, asap.”

That did sound bad. Gwen clears her throat, before moving to Kitty’s side.

“Is there a failsafe maybe? A way of killing it in its holding cell.”

“There is, yes. But...”

Cessily speaks up, finishing Kitty’s sentence for her.

“But it’ll be total, won’t it? I’ll lose the pieces that were incorporated into it forever.”

Kitty winces and nods.

“... Yeah.”

Gwen looks between him and Kitty for a moment.

“I mean... how can we even be sure you could reincorporate those pieces back into yourself now that they’re in another living being? Is it really work the risk?”

“I don’t know.”

Cessily’s frank admission leaves them all quiet for a moment. Finally, Kitty speaks up.

“If we were going to try to get the last parts of Cessily back, I wouldn’t suggest we try to tackle this thing on our own. We’d need backup... we’d have to call in the rest of the X-Men or something.”

There’s some shuffling at that idea. Meanwhile, Thaddeus clears his throat.

“Could, uh... also call on the Avengers... or the Fantastic Four? I know a pair of gals.”

Though maybe that wasn’t such a good idea. Or maybe JUST calling She-Hulk and Invisible Woman was the better idea, since they had a soft spot for him and might be willing to keep their mouths shut.

Everyone looks at one another, nobody willing to address the elephant in the room. The easiest, simplest solution was to just use the failsafe and destroy this ‘Predator X’ right here and right now. But it would come at the cost of Cessily’s last remaining pieces. Still, she didn’t seem like she was too beat up about the possibility. Or if she was, she was hiding her own feelings on the subject carefully.

Fighting this thing by themselves though seemed like a bad idea. But then, calling in backup ALSO seemed like a bad idea. It was funny... they’d done everything right. They’d performed perfectly. So why did it feel like they were losing here? Why did it feel like they were faces with nothing but bad decisions?

-x-X-x- The Vote: [ ] Use the failsafe, destroy Predator X without risking anyone's lives - 27%[ ] Release Predator X so they can take it down as a team - 4%[ ] Call in MORE back up, call in the X-Men - 6%

[X] Call in MORE back up, call in She-Hulk and Sue Storm - 62%

-x-X-x-

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