[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/7rzp20d.jpg?1[/img][/center] Rogue came to in the jet, on a bunk in the infirmary section towards the rear of the aircraft. The pad she was lying on was firm, but she didn’t have the strength or desire to get up and announce to Summers and Rogers that she was awake. Rogue wasn’t sure if it was the use of her powers at a new level, but she felt like she was hungover. At least she assumed this is what being hungover felt like. She was only fifteen, after all. Considering what her father was like, she hoped she'd never feel a hangover in her life. She was safe alone here, bundled up in a thin blanket and cuddled up against the bulkhead. Here Rogue was allowed to wallow in her own thoughts, and that’s all she wanted, as toxic as it was to her psyche. Eddie Whelan was that creature. She saw his face emerge from the fur and features of the rat that had taken him over. She saw the pain he was in, and not all of it had been inflicted by her, though she had done her fair share. He had been the nicest of the kids at the orphanage, or whatever it really was. The only one that offered a smile to her when she first got there. Not that they had been overly friendly with one another, but he at least seemed nice. And someone had turned him into a scared, confused mutant who was barely had control of his own faculties. He was nothing but a tensed muscle looking to strike when she had absorbed his power and emotions. Every time before when she had made contact with someone, she had felt the fear of what she was doing to them. But it was always background noise, almost like a faint ringing in ones ears after a concert. But this was like someone had attached two speakers at max volume to the side of her head. Rogue wasn't sure if it was because Eddie was a mutant, or if his state had amplified his emotions. Whatever the reason was, though, it had overwhelmed her. She felt the fatigue rise up again, and gave herself back to sleep, letting the rhythmic drone of the jet's engine carry her off. [hr] The Blackbird set down in the subterranean hangar below Xavier's mansion, and as late as it was, Steve needed to talk to Xavier. After what he had seen tonight, he needed someone with his resources if he was going to track down what was going on with Rogue and the other kids from the orphanage. Especially because he had a feeling that after the explosion in Mississippi he was going to have far more people looking for him than they had been previously. He had been AWOL ever since Montana, but that wasn't a threat to the people that wanted him to disappear. They probably figured Steve Rogers growing old in the mountains somewhere was the easy way out. At least there he would have been quiet and out of their hair. When he came back to the life, Natasha had warned him that it had ruffled some feathers. That was his goal, of course. But even putting away a sitting US senator didn't seem to shake the boat too much. SHIELD was content to let him take down enemies in a remote setting, but tearing down the main street of an American city with a science experiment gone wrong is a different story. On top of that, whoever had fired the rocket that blew up the orphanage made sure that it would be an even bigger story. Someone was out to make sure Steve Rogers's life was as difficult as possible. They were going to find out that might be a bad decision. He and Cyclops made their way out of the Blackbird, with Steve pausing to check on Rogue before they disembarked. She was still sleeping, or, more accurately, pretending to be asleep. It had been a hard night for the girl, and he had no desire to wake her. He'd let her have her rest and her time alone. He had a feeling it may be some of the last she would have for a while. It was an odd sensation traveling with her. Steve had been used to feeling responsible for what happened to those he was fighting with. Whether it was the Howling Commandos in the war, or his SHIELD strike team since he was unfrozen, those under his command were under his protection. Whenever he lost a soldier it cut him deep. This was different, though. Everyone in those situations had signed up for duty. They knew the risks they were taking and what their ultimate fate was likely to be. Rogue didn't ask for any of this, though. She was just a kid caught up in something even he didn't understand. He couldn't even imagine what was going through her mind. He felt the bile of anger rise in his throat. That someone would round up kids, harvest them, for an experiment. They turned one into a monster, and sent Rogue into a coma to harvest god knows what from her blood. It was disgusting. And she was now his charge. That much was obvious. Rogers made sure she was covered by her blankets before deplaning. He had no idea if he was ready for that kind of responsibility, especially if she wasn't going to follow orders. He wasn't used to insubordination, but she clearly was fluent in it. At the bottom of the ramp, Charles was trading words with Summers. When Rogers appeared at the top, the bald man nodded to his protege who made his way to the mansion proper. "You look terrible, Steven," Charles had a wry smile on his face. "Ran into one hell of a rat," he sighed sarcastically in return. "Big enough to bite your head off." "So I've been told," he turned the wheelchair to head the way Cyclops had. "The girl showed her true powers as well?" Steve nodded, "It's like she absorbed some of his power when she touched him. Not just life force, but his strength and speed as well. I've never seen anything like it." "Yes, Scott relayed me the information," Xavier pondered. "I don't think it's a mystery as to why they wanted her for experimentation now." Somehow Steve hadn't even thought of that part. He had been to wrapped up in the idea of a metakid farm for lab rats that he hadn't even considered what it would mean if someone could synthesize the ability to copy the powers of metahumans. It could change the balance of power in the world. Any dime store terrorist or tin pot dictator could create their own superpower-stealing soldiers. It could unleash some real chaos across the globe. "What about that other item we sent you?" During the fight, Steve's shield had collected some of Whelan's hairs, an invaluable clue into whatever happened to the boy in that place. Summers had put them through a simple scan in the Blackbird's infirmary and sent it back to the mansion. "Ah yes, please, follow me," he wheeled himself down a side hallway of the underground complex towards a glass door marked "Laboratory". As he approached, the doors slid open, "Hank, our guests have returned." Steve stepped into the lab, and Scout padded up to great his master. Rogers patted him tenderly on the head and took a look around the lab. It was spotless, gleaming white. So different from where he had been reborn all those years ago. Back then the Secret Scientific Reserve didn't have time to worry about proper regulatory procedure or total sterile environments. It was quick, dangerous science in a race to beat out Hydra and the Nazis. But this was like a science wonderland. Erskine probably would have been a kid in a candy store here. "Welcome, Captain Rogers!" a voice said from above him, drawing Steve's gaze up. He almost jumped back as a hulking ball of blue fur unfurled. The mutant was holding onto the ceiling with his feet, a pair of bifocals hanging on his nose, defying gravity. He gave a smile friendly enough to make the fangs he possessed seem perfectly lovely, "Doctor Hank McCoy at your service. Was just writing up my report from the tests on that hair you sent." He dropped down to the floor and shook Steve's hand, "It's a pleasure to meet you. You're a fascinating scientific story, if I do say so myself. The first artificially enhanced human. Fascinating!" Xavier sighed softly, "You'll have to excuse Hank. He has a...way about him." "Thank you, Charles," Hank didn't miss a beat. "Now, onto the samples you gathered from the specimen. That is also fascinating. Terrifying. But fascinating." The three of them gathered around McCoy's computer, which displayed a bunch of numbers and graphs that Steve couldn't even begin to understand. He remembered Stark and Erskine talking shop in the lab before his transformation back in the day. He felt very similar now. The more things changed, the more things stayed the same, he guessed. "I won't bore you with the numbers, but the boy had the metagene," McCoy started. "I'm sorry, metagene?" Steve asked, feeling slightly foolish when he did. "Every mutant has the meta, or 'X', gene," Xavier began to explain. "But not everyone with the x-gene is a mutant. For one reason or another, which we still don't fully understand, sometimes the gene activates, sometimes it does not." "Right, and according to Rogue, Whelan's did not," Hank added in. "I feel like she would have remembered sharing a building with a giant rat boy," Steve mused. "Indeed," the blue scientist nodded. "Which made me theorize that Whelan was [i]forced[/i] to mutate. So I did some digging into the data you sent, and with that I reconstructed Whelan's X-gene profile." Hank clicked a key and a picture of the boy's DNA appeared on the screen. But it was off. The normal double helix was jagged, as if someone had put it through electroshock therapy. Rogers let out a growl subconsciously, "Whoever did this is trying to create metahuman soldiers. By forcing kids to mutate. Kids whose parents these people almost certainly murdered to get to them, before rounding the kids up to pawn off to different scientists to study and torture them. It's like a sick version of what happened to me. Only I had a choice." "This is the world we live in now, Steven," Xavier nodded. "Mutant children across the world are mistreated and misused. It's why we built our safe haven here, and why I will always take in those that need help. But this...this is something I never dreamed of." "Don't worry, Charles," Rogers felt the resolute determination he had felt many times in the past rise up in him. "These people aren't going to get away with this. I'm going to see to that personally. There's just a few things I need from you." "Steven," Charles smiled. "Anything I can provide is yours."