The X-Mansion - Westchester, New York
Logan commandeered a vintage car and drove straight to Westchester.
The Xavier School for Gifted Teens was a shadow of its former self.
Overgrown. Abandoned. A graveyard of a brighter dream.
He didn't make it past the grand foyer before Hank McCoy attacked.
The Beast was feral, a flurry of blue fur and primal rage defending the empty halls.
Logan took the brutal hits, refusing to unsheathe his claws.
He absorbed the kinetic punishment until he finally managed to subdue the young scientist.
Then, he met the Professor.
Charles Xavier was broken, disheveled, and completely hollowed out.
He was relying on an illicit serum that traded his god-like telepathy for the physical ability to walk.
Logan didn't sugarcoat the situation. He had no time for pleasantries.
He recounted the apocalyptic nightmare awaiting them.
He spoke of the Sentinels. The mountains of mutant corpses.
The absolute brink of total extinction.
"We need your help, Charles," Logan urged, his voice heavy with the ghosts of the future.
"And we need Magneto."
To alter the catastrophic timeline, they had to stop Mystique from making her fatal mistake.
— — —
The Inner Sanctum - Skull Island
The narrative shifted.
The recorded, historical images dissolved into a crisp, real-time holographic feed.
The surveillance was transmitting directly from the watch locked onto Logan's wrist.
Ernst watched the glowing blue projection from the center of his subterranean command vault.
He observed Logan, Xavier, and Hank mobilizing their desperate plan to rescue Magneto.
Ernst already knew exactly how this timeline played out. There was no need to watch the mundane details of their recruitment drive.
"Red Queen," Ernst commanded, his voice echoing off the vibranium walls.
"Monitor Logan's every move diligently."
"Mobilize all available orbital sensor arrays. I want you to detect any micro-fluctuations in Logan's localized magnetic and temporal field."
Ernst leaned closer to the holographic display, his eyes calculating.
"He isn't just traveling through time. His consciousness is bridging entirely different dimensions. I intend to map the architecture of parallel realities."
"Understood, Dr. Ernst," the Red Queen's voice replied smoothly.
"But a query: why not extract Mr. Logan directly? Bringing him to the island would facilitate a much more controlled and rigorous study."
The AI presented a logical, glowing schematic of Logan's position.
"The tracking device on his wrist was a rudimentary prototype. It is highly prone to quantum errors. Direct apprehension is tactically superior."
Ernst dismissed the suggestion with a wave of his hand.
The AI didn't understand the delicate nuance of a temporal tether.
To study two distinct, overlapping parallel dimensions, Ernst needed to locate the exact anchor point connecting them.
Currently, that anchor was Logan's consciousness, precariously maintained by Kitty Pryde's phasing abilities in the ruined future.
The connection was incredibly weak. It would only become solid and visible when Logan's emotional and synaptic activity peaked.
That peak was coming.
When Logan encountered a young William Stryker, the sheer trauma would cause a violent temporal ripple.
That was Ernst's window. He needed Logan in the field, exposed and vulnerable.
"Just keep an eye on them," Ernst ordered, turning his back on the screen.
"This is our opportunity to let Magneto out of his cage. After a decade in a concrete box, I hope Erik has gained some wisdom and lost some of his reckless impulsivity."
"Send the encrypted directives to our assets in the field."
"Yes, Doctor," the Red Queen chimed.
— — —
Mutant Fraternity Safehouse - United Kingdom
Azazel, the Red Devil, sat on a worn Persian rug in a hidden safehouse.
He was gently playing with a blue-skinned, three-fingered toddler.
Nathan.
The boy who would one day be known as Nightcrawler.
Suddenly, a sharp, rhythmic beep emanated from Azazel's heavy wristwatch.
He froze. The signal was absolute. It was a direct summons from Skull Island.
Azazel gently set the toddler down, handing the boy a stuffed bear.
"I have to go, little one," Azazel whispered, his demonic features softening into a look of profound sorrow.
"Duty calls."
The blue child nodded silently, clutching the bear, already accustomed to his father's sudden, violent departures.
Nathan's very existence was a direct byproduct of Ernst's invisible hand weaving the timeline.
Years ago, Ernst had recognized the sheer, unquantifiable value of Mystique's adaptive DNA.
He had given Azazel a strict, unbreakable mandate: protect Raven Darkholme at all costs.
Do not let her fall into enemy hands.
Azazel had followed the order relentlessly.
During their time embedded with Magneto's Brotherhood, the Red Devil had become Mystique's shadow.
He had saved her life half a dozen times, pulling her from the brink of death.
During one catastrophic ambush, Azazel had taken a lethal barrage of shrapnel to shield her body.
Bleeding out, his organs failing, he pushed his teleportation to its absolute breaking point, tearing a hole in space to rip them both to safety.
That singular, bloody act of sacrifice had shattered Raven's emotional defenses.
It sparked a deep, undeniable affection in a woman who trusted no one.
They never married, but Raven's choice to bear his child spoke volumes about the bond forged in that crossfire.
Azazel stood up. The watch's coordinates were locked into his mind.
With a loud crack of displaced air and a burst of burning brimstone, he vanished.
Azazel materialized in a dimly lit, heavily shielded command room.
A man sat comfortably in a leather armchair, swirling a glass of expensive bourbon.
"Azazel," the man said smoothly.
"You received Ernst's message. What are your thoughts on the matter?"
The dim lighting couldn't hide the man's identity.
If Magneto had been standing there, the master of magnetism would have been paralyzed with shock.
It was Sebastian Shaw. The Black King.
The man, Magneto, had supposedly murdered with a coin. Ernst's father.
"Eric should be rescued," Azazel replied, his spiked tail flicking nervously.
"A decade in isolation is enough to break anyone."
"But his aggression is a liability. If the time-traveler's story is true, we have to stop Raven from assassinating Trask."
Azazel stepped forward, his yellow eyes pleading.
"Let me go to her. I can talk her down."
Shaw offered a dark, knowing smile.
"I didn't expect the devil to show such bleeding-heart benevolence," Shaw chuckled, taking a slow sip of bourbon.
"But she is the mother of your son. It is an understandable human weakness."
Shaw set the glass down.
"However, you know Raven's nature better than anyone. She does not listen to reason."
"If she did, she wouldn't have left you and the boy to wage a one-woman war for mutant rights. Even if you corner her, she won't come quietly."
Azazel's crimson face tightened with deep concern.
"But..."
"Your concern is noted, but unnecessary," Shaw said smoothly, cutting him off.
"Raven is an apex survivor. She excels at adapting her abilities. She won't be caught easily."
Shaw tapped his own wrist.
"Besides, you gave her a tracker watch, didn't you? If her vitals spike, you'll feel it. You can jump to her coordinates instantly and be prepared to respond."
"What about Eric?" Azazel countered.
"If the timeline splinters and both Raven and Eric are in lethal danger simultaneously, I can't be in two places at once. I might lose them both."
Shaw paused. He considered the logistical flaw of a single operative.
"That is true," Shaw murmured.
He reached over and pressed a brass button on his heavy oak desk.
A hidden steel door slid open.
Three figures walked into the dim light.
Emma Frost, the White Queen. Janos Quested, Riptide. Angel Salvadore.
Each of them wore a watch on their left wrist, which actively shifted colors to camouflage against their skin.
All three of them had died violent deaths in the early mutant wars.
All three had been pulled from the void and resurrected in Ernst's Cradle of Rebirth on Skull Island.
Normally, they were to be memory-wiped and repurposed for island maintenance.
But Shaw had intervened. He requested their memories remain intact to rebuild his inner circle.
They had initially betrayed Shaw to follow Magneto to the beach in Cuba.
When they woke up in the resurrection tanks and saw the Black King staring down at them, they thought they were being punished in Hell.
But Shaw didn't care about their old treason.
He was a pragmatist. He needed soldiers.
Grateful for a second chance at life, the trio had surrendered their absolute loyalty to Shaw.
Shaw looked at the strike team.
"You will shadow Azazel during this operation," Shaw ordered.
"Keep your identities completely erased. If the situation goes critical, Azazel will teleport you directly into the fray."
"You answer to the Red Devil now."
Emma, Janos, and Angel nodded in unison. Death had humbled them significantly.
Azazel looked at his new squad. With his radically enhanced teleportation range, he was their undisputed alpha.
They all knew Ernst was the true puppet master, but they operated under Shaw's proxy.
Azazel had his backup. But a cold knot of dread remained in his stomach regarding Mystique.
He just had to hope Ernst's grand design wouldn't demand her life as a sacrifice.
— — —
The Pentagon - Washington, D.C.
Meanwhile, Logan's crew stuck to the original script.
They located a hyperactive, kleptomaniac teenager named Peter Maximoff.
Quicksilver.
With Peter's blinding, relativistic speed, they infiltrated the most secure subterranean prison on the planet.
They bypassed the plastic guns and the concrete walls, breaking Magneto out of his glass cage.
In the chaos of the escape, Peter and Magneto exchanged a few flippant words, entirely oblivious to the genetic bloodline connecting them.
The father and son passed like ships in the night, a missed connection in a fractured timeline.
Once above ground, the reunion between Xavier and Magneto was explosive.
Decades of ideological warfare and bitter betrayal flared up immediately.
They argued viciously, old wounds tearing open, before eventually boarding a private plane bound for Paris to intercept Mystique.
— — —
Airspace - Over the Atlantic
The cabin of the private jet was thick with suffocating tension.
Magneto sat across from Logan, his sharp eyes constantly analyzing the time traveler.
He absorbed the horrific truths of the future. He listened to the tales of the Sentinels and the systematic slaughter of their kind.
Magneto expressed righteous indignation.
He outwardly agreed with the mission parameters to stop Raven's assassination attempt.
But internally, his mind was already turning. He was plotting a far more absolute, permanent solution to the human problem.
As he observed Logan, Magneto's gaze locked onto the mutant's left wrist.
The heavy, tactical watch.
Magneto's brow furrowed.
He could feel every ounce of metal in the plane. The steel rivets, the turbine engines, the trace iron in Logan's blood.
But the watch was a complete void.
It perfectly defied his magnetic field. It was crafted from an alloy he couldn't manipulate, sense, or bend.
"That is an unusual timepiece," Magneto remarked, his voice dangerously quiet.
Logan glanced down at his wrist. He didn't know of its origins
"Can't take it off," Logan grunted, pulling at the strap.
"Clasp is locked tight."
Magneto's eyes narrowed. An anomaly was a threat. A piece of technology he couldn't control was a liability.
"I cannot control the metal," Magneto stated coldly.
"But I can cut it."
Logan hesitated.
"Do it," Logan agreed, bracing his arm on the armrest.
Magneto raised his hand.
He magnetically stripped a razor-thin shard of steel from the plane's interior paneling.
With brutal, surgical precision, he drove the floating blade down.
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