X-MEN
The First Class 5/10
Chapter Five: Daughters and Demons
Undisclosed Location – Magneto's Lair
Somewhere in the American Midwest
The air was still, broken only by the faint crackle of static and the low hum of fluorescent lights.
Deep underground, beneath strata of concrete and bedrock, a bunker lay hidden from the world. Spartan. Cold. Built for war, not comfort. But invisible — and that was what mattered.
Wanda Maximoff, clad in a simple red coat, leaned against the steel wall. Silent. Watchful. Her eyes fixed on her father.
Erik Lehnsherr. To the world he was Magneto. To her he was something far more complicated.
He sat on a raised platform at the chamber's center, a wall of monitors glowing before him. Each screen flickered with the same subject, replayed from a hundred different angles: the chaos at the White House. The spectacle they had orchestrated.
In his hand, two polished steel spheres orbited one another, spinning in a lazy magnetic dance. They clinked softly as they turned, their rhythm matching the cadence of the pundits' voices echoing from the screens:
"—mutants in yellow rushed into action—"
"—Magneto, the self-proclaimed leader of mutant supremacy—"
"—a new group calling themselves the X-Men—"
"—was this a terrorist attack, or a government counterforce?—"
"—the President clarifies that not all mutants are dangerous—"
Magneto had not changed since the battle. His crimson armor was still marked with faint streaks of soot. His gauntlets gleamed with threaded filaments designed to channel magnetic force. The chestplate was forged from an alloy strong enough to repel even experimental ballistics. And crowning it all — the helmet. Blood-red, ridged, unyielding.
He wore it even now, in the quiet, in the aftermath. Like a sovereign never removing his crown.
Wanda hesitated before stepping forward.
Without turning, Magneto spoke, his voice calm but cutting. "You've been watching me for ten minutes, daughter."
Her lips pressed into a thin line. "I didn't want to interrupt."
"I may not read minds like Charles…" His eyes never left the glowing monitors. "…but I see things."
She approached slowly, arms folding across her chest. The flickering light from the news feeds painted her face in restless shadows.
"You wanted something?" Magneto asked at last, his tone shifting — softer than the steel he had shown the world, quiet, almost… paternal.
"No," Wanda said carefully. "I just… I wanted to ask you something."
"About today," he said knowingly.
She nodded, her gaze drifting to the endless loop of footage. "Did we really have to do all that? Storm the White House? The guards, the cameras… The Brotherhood nearly got torn apart out there. If S.H.I.E.L.D. had shown up sooner—"
"We still would've walked out." Magneto's fingers guided the orbiting spheres into a tighter spin. His voice carried no hesitation. "Even stripped of metal to command, I am not so easily cornered."
Wanda's frown deepened. "You weren't surprised by them. Not even that new alloy they used. You expected it."
"Of course." His gaze sharpened. "S.H.I.E.L.D. has been tinkering with synthetic ceramics and polymers for years, dreaming of a world without me. But let them come. Guns or no guns, alloys or plastics—"
With a flick of his hand, the spheres shattered mid-air into a dozen needle-fine shards. They hovered in perfect alignment, a constellation of sharpened steel, poised and waiting.
"I am Magneto," he said, voice low but resonant. "And if they force my hand…"
The shards trembled, each a silent threat suspended in invisible grip.
The shards dropped, clinking against the steel floor. Magneto finally turned his full gaze on Wanda.
"This wasn't about the White House," he said, voice low but unwavering. "That was a distraction."
Wanda blinked. "Then what was it really about?"
Before he could answer, a voice cut through the dim chamber.
"Well… you've always loved theatrics."
They turned.
A tall man in a security uniform strolled from the shadows, posture too casual, grin too sly.
Then his body rippled. Skin shifted like liquid. Muscles shrank, bones realigned. In seconds, the guard melted away into a lithe, blue-skinned woman with flaming red hair and eyes like molten gold.
Mystique.
Magneto rose from his chair, all intensity. "Did you get the files?"
Her smirk was razor-thin as she held up a slim, battered binder, sealed with a biometric lock. She tossed it to him. "Straight from the Oval Office archives. Buried so deep even the President only saw a summary. But I know where to look."
He caught it, opened it. Inside: brittle pages, medical scans, black-and-white photographs. Stamped across each file: PROJECT DESIGNATION: M-X.
Wanda leaned in. Her stomach turned.
"'Mutation extraction protocols,'" Magneto read aloud, eyes narrowing. "'Subject 006 demonstrated regenerative abilities — terminated. Subject 009 exposed to neurotoxic gas to test cerebral resilience.'"
Wanda covered her mouth. "They… they tortured them." Her voice was barely a whisper. "Like animals."
Mystique's smirk faded. She didn't need to add anything — the silence was enough.
"Vivisections. Suppression collars. Deaths marked as 'failures,'" Magneto continued, his tone sharpening with every word. He snapped the binder shut, the sound echoing in the chamber.
"And all of it," he said, "long before mutants were even acknowledged to exist."
Wanda's eyes darted to his. "So while Charles was trying to build bridges—"
"They were already burning us alive in their basements." Magneto's voice was iron. "We are not citizens to them. We are specimens."
For a moment, the flickering monitors washed his helmet in light, leaving his face unreadable. But Wanda caught it — a flicker beneath the fury. Not just anger. Not just righteousness. Regret.
Magneto turned back toward the wall of monitors.
Footage rolled in crisp, endless loops. Cyclops's visor cutting the White House lawn in ribbons of light. Then Beast vaulting effortlessly over Blob's lumbering charge. The one with Angel wings soaring high above the chaos, wings catching the sun in a radiant arc against the Capitol dome. Finally the Iceman weaving frozen paths across the grass, the ground glittering in his wake.
A team of youths — mutants in yellow — already crowned heroes by the reporters' headlines. The X-Men.
And in one blurry frame, the cameras had caught him: Charles Xavier. Seated in his chair, calm and unshaken amidst the ruin. At his side, a red-haired girl. Neither named, neither explained. But present. Watching.
Wanda followed her father's gaze. "You still think about him."
"Charles?" Magneto's voice was barely more than breath. His fingers twitched as if tugged by invisible strings. "Every day."
"He's not your enemy," Wanda said softly.
Silence. The helmet stayed on. On the screens, the children in yellow were hailed as defenders of peace, while Magneto — the man who once dreamed of peace with Charles — was cast as the villain of the age.
Wanda's eyes lingered on the glow of the monitors, and the question pulled at her chest like gravity.
Maybe the world needed a villain before it could ever understand the cost of peace.
But still…
Could they change course?
Or was this path already forged — carved forever in steel?
To Be Continued...