Wolverine's gruff words hung in the smoky air, but Ethan's eyes were fixed on the two dwindling black dots in the night sky. The soldiers were retreating, escaping. Each fleeing helicopter was a vessel carrying away precious, unearned Justice Points. He wouldn't allow it.
He scraped the bottom of his energy reserves, feeling the familiar, draining pull as he cupped his hands at his side one last time. A final, desperate spark of blue light flickered to life. "It's not that easy to run away!" he roared, thrusting his hands forward.
"Turtle Style Qigong!"
A slightly smaller, but no less potent, beam of energy lanced through the darkness, striking one of the fleeing helicopters. It blossomed into a brilliant orange fireball, a beautiful, silent flower of destruction in the distant sky. The effort left him panting, his body screaming in protest. He knew, with an instinctual certainty, that he didn't have enough ki left for another blast. The last helicopter was now a barely visible speck.
But he wasn't out of options. His eyes darted around the ruined facade of the school, landing on a massive, decorative stone pillar by the main entrance—four meters of solid granite, half a meter thick. An idea, borrowed from the memory of a long-dead assassin, sparked in his mind.
He sprinted towards it, his boots crunching on shattered glass. He didn't have a tool, so he became one. With two powerful, knife-hand strikes, he shattered the pillar's base and capital, the stone cracking with reports like thunderclaps. He wrapped his arms around the immense column, muscles bulging as he ripped it free from the wall. He balanced the pillar on his shoulder, aimed at the distant speck, and with a primal roar that echoed Goku's own, he threw it.
The massive stone column flew with the speed and trajectory of an intercontinental ballistic missile. It sailed through the air, a testament to impossible strength, and seconds later, a tiny, almost imperceptible flash of light appeared on the horizon. The last helicopter was gone.
Just like Tao Pai Pai, a fragment of Goku's memory supplied. I could have jumped on it, ridden it right out of the city back in Sokovia. But the fear of becoming a singular, obvious target for every missile in the country had kept him grounded then. Now, there were no such constraints.
"I take back what I said," Wolverine growled, his voice laced with a newfound, genuine respect. He stalked over to Ethan, the earlier dismissal completely gone from his eyes. He raised his right hand and extended the far-right adamantium claw in a gesture of salute. "You're a qualified warrior, kid. No doubt about it."
Ethan, breathing heavily, simply held out his hand to Wolverine.
"What?" Logan asked, confused.
"Cigar," Ethan said, pointing a finger at the one smoldering in Logan's mouth.
Wolverine's face soured. "No way, kid. This stuff'll stunt your growth. Ask me again in a few years."
Ethan just smirked. In a movement too fast for Logan's eyes to track, he zipped forward and back. Wolverine felt a sudden lightness in his jacket pocket. He looked down. Ethan was standing there, holding Logan's entire box of cigars and the Zippo lighter.
With a look of comical seriousness, Ethan tapped a cigar from the box, placed it between his lips, and lit it with a practiced flick of the lighter. He took a long, dramatic puff, coughing slightly, trying to look as cool as the gruff man in front of him. He wasn't actually inhaling; this was theater, a little payback for all the "little monkey" jibes.
The corner of Wolverine's eye began to twitch. "Oh, God. The Professor finds out about this, he'll kill me." He had a vivid, horrifying memory of Charles's last threat after a particularly destructive bar brawl. "The next time, Logan, I will alter your brain chemistry until you believe you are a six-year-old girl who loves braiding hair. Do not test me."
"Don't worry," Ethan said, waving the lit cigar theatrically. "If the Professor asks where I learned to smoke, I'll tell him it was 'Luo Genzhen' who taught me."
Logan's face went pale. He slapped his forehead. "Alright, you win! No more 'little monkey'! We keep this between us, got it? Secret."
Having won his victory, Ethan dropped the cigar and stamped it out. "Deal. Now, business. Logan, where did the professors actually go tonight?"
Seeing the sudden shift to seriousness, Logan's demeanor changed as well. He now spoke to Ethan not as a child, but as a fellow combatant. "Not sure of all of it. Got here this evening myself. Charles said he was visiting an old friend. He sent Jean and Ororo to Boston to check on something… something to do with that mutant attack on the President."
The pieces clicked into place in Ethan's mind with an audible, horrifying snap. Boston. The President. Professor X leaving the school. It was a pattern, a strategy.
"Logan, take me to the Professor's brainwave enhancement room. Now!"
The entrance was a mangled wreck of twisted steel. Inside, the grand chamber was a scene of violation. Wires dangled from the ceiling like dead vines, and the central platform, where the massive Cerebro helmet and its intricate machinery should have been, was empty.
"It really is him," Ethan whispered, a cold dread seeping into his bones. Colonel William Stryker. The name was a curse. He saw the whole plan laid out in his mind, a sequence from a movie that was now his terrifying reality. Stryker's mutant son, Jason, with his powers of illusion. Using him to control Nightcrawler, the teleporter, to stage the assassination attempt on the President. Using the resulting chaos to lure Professor X away from the school. And then this—the raid, the theft of Cerebro. The final step would be to capture Xavier and use Jason's illusions to force him to use the stolen machine to kill every mutant on the planet.
"The transport plane," Ethan said, his voice grim. "I saw one on the lawn when they first arrived. It's gone now. They have the machine."
"Stealin' Cerebro, kidnappin' students… what the hell's their game?" Wolverine growled, kicking a piece of debris. This kind of strategic thinking was not his forte.
As Ethan's mind raced, trying to figure out their next move, a wave of intense vertigo washed over him. A blinking icon appeared in his vision: [TEMPLATE DURATION ENDING: 10 SECONDS]. The power was about to be cut.
"Logan," he gasped, stumbling. "Get to Colossus… use the school comms… try to contact the Professor. My… my abilities are at their limit. I need… rest…"
Before he could finish, the world dissolved. The feeling was a sickening, gut-wrenching plunge from godhood back into his frail, mortal coil. His strength evaporated, his senses dimmed, and the darkness rushed up to claim him.
"Kid!" Wolverine yelled, catching Ethan as he collapsed. He checked his pulse, relieved to find him merely unconscious. As he held the boy, he watched in amazement as the spiky hair deflated, the orange gi flickered and was replaced by normal pajamas, and the red staff on his back vanished into thin air. "What a damn strange power," Logan muttered, hoisting the boy into his arms and carrying him towards the secret passage.
He awoke to the sound of soft crying and a familiar, worried voice. "Brother! Brother, wake up!"
Ethan's eyes fluttered open. Wanda and Pietro were huddled over him, their faces streaked with tears. The moment they saw his eyes open, they threw themselves on him, sobbing with relief. Born in war, they were tougher than most, but seeing their invincible new brother brought back unconscious in the arms of a scary, clawed man had shattered their composure.
"Hey, hey, I'm okay," Ethan soothed, sitting up and hugging them back. He looked around. They were in a large, luxurious bedroom in what looked like a modern villa. A safe house.
"You were out for a full hour, kid," Logan's voice rumbled from the doorway. He was leaning against the frame, a bottle of beer in his hand. "Looked like you were dead to the world."
Ethan's mind latched onto the timeframe. Only an hour? The last time, after the Kamehameha in Sokovia, the exhaustion had felt bone-deep, lasting for the better part of a day. This time, he felt… fine. A little tired, but fine.
A quiet, triumphant thought cut through his concern. It's working. The stronger my base body gets, the less the side effects. My own training is paying off. It was a small victory, but in this world, he would take every single one he could get.