Henry had been about to continue lounging on the sofa when Katherine Hepburn came over.
"Henry, sit up properly. Don't occupy the entire sofa by yourself all the time. At this rate, it's going to become your bed."
"Oh."
Just as Henry sat up, his phone rang.
When he answered, Cassandra's anxious voice immediately came through.
"It happened! The thing you were talking about happened! Turn on the news!"
"The thing I was talking about? The news? Which channel?"
Henry's brain hadn't quite caught up yet. He simply felt around on the table for the television remote.
"Any channel will do. They should all be reporting the same thing."
"This is big enough that it can't be another plane crashing into a building somewhere, can it?"
Since the incident in 2001, airport security throughout the United States had become stricter by more than just a little.
Anything that could potentially be used as a weapon was prohibited from being carried aboard.
Recreating the events of that day was practically impossible.
But once Henry turned on the news, he finally remembered the report he'd been waiting for.
> "This station has learned that at ten o'clock this morning, during the White House's public tour day, a mutant took advantage of the opportunity to attempt to assassinate President George W. Bush.
"United States Secret Service agents bravely engaged the attacker, successfully protecting President George W. Bush and driving off the would-be assassin.
"Based on surveillance footage from inside the White House provided by the Secret Service, experts have produced a composite sketch of the suspect. The suspect has distinctive markings on his face.
"The FBI has also issued a nationwide wanted notice. Members of the public who provide valid information leading to the suspect's capture will be eligible for a reward."
...
The news footage repeatedly showed surveillance recordings of Nightcrawler knocking down Secret Service agents in the White House corridors.
The mutant would suddenly vanish in a cloud of blue smoke, only to reappear somewhere else without warning.
Using this teleportation ability, he took down one armed Secret Service agent after another.
The footage from inside the Oval Office, however, had not been made public.
The news media had only obtained the surveillance recordings from the corridors.
Even the two girls, one older and one younger, who had been about to return to their rooms, now stood dumbfounded beside the television, staring blankly at the screen.
"Thank goodness this happened in Washington, D.C. If it had happened in New York, I think George would've been unable to come home for another two months."
Gwen Stacy spoke with lingering fear.
Skye curiously looked at the older girl, who was a head taller than her.
"With a nationwide manhunt like this, don't the police in New York have to do anything?"
"I'm not really sure. But based on what has happened in the past, they probably just notify all the police departments. They don't actively go looking for him unless they receive information that he's actually in New York.
"More importantly—"
Gwen Stacy's gaze shifted toward another person, a hint of concern in her eyes.
"—Henry, this news isn't going to affect you, is it? There's already quite a lot of debate on college campuses over whether mutants should be considered human."
College students had always been among the more radical groups in societies around the world.
These young people hadn't yet experienced the harsh lessons of society, and the fire in their hearts had yet to cool. They had only recently left high school and gotten their first taste of greater freedom.
At the same time, they were being exposed to the newest ideas and the greatest amount of information—whether good or bad, true or false.
Whatever could provoke widespread discussion among them was bound to be one of the most serious issues of the moment.
When college students had begun debating whether mutants belonged to the human race, it meant the issue was no longer something everyone tacitly avoided discussing.
Henry spoke into the phone first.
"I know. We'll talk later."
He then ended the call.
Turning to Gwen, he said,
"Don't worry. The people who are really going to have trouble are the mutants with obvious physical characteristics.
"Someone like me? As long as nobody knows, who would think I'm a mutant?
"It's not as though I go around meeting people and shooting myself in front of them just to prove how tough I am."
Looking at the freshman who, no matter how busy she was, never neglected her appearance, Henry smiled.
"Didn't you come here because you had something to ask Skye? Do you still have time to stand here discussing philosophy with me?"
By categorizing the question of whether mutants were human as a philosophical problem, Gwen Stacy understood that Henry didn't want to continue the discussion.
Philosophy didn't have definitive right answers. It was about discussing why someone held a particular view.
If they continued arguing, it would ultimately come down to who managed to out-argue whom rather than actually reaching a conclusion.
So Gwen followed Skye into her room.
Although she had already taught herself the basics of programming languages, that knowledge alone was obviously nowhere near enough to modify or adjust the biological simulation programs Professor Connors used in his research.
She needed to find a way to make up for that shortcoming.
"George Bush didn't die?"
The person speaking was the old woman, who was still watching the news.
"It's not like Kennedy, who was assassinated on live television. I thought the U.S. government would try to cover something like this up for a while."
Henry considered the situation and offered his speculation.
"That might have something to do with how quickly information spreads online nowadays.
"Something like this happened during a public tour day at the White House, which means there were at least some tourists who witnessed it firsthand.
"As long as even one of them posts about it online, there's no way to suppress the information.
"The U.S. government might as well release an official statement rather than risk the public being misled by false rumors deliberately spread online."
What Henry didn't say was that whoever was orchestrating all of this might also want to exploit the public reaction and use it to pressure the U.S. government into doing something.
If the government suppressed the news, wouldn't all that effort have been wasted?
The events of this world had once again returned to the plot Henry remembered from the movies he'd watched before transmigrating.
William Stryker had still found Nightcrawler, who had long since left the X-Men, and used his abilities to control him into attempting to assassinate the President.
The X-Men didn't have a publicly known headquarters or any official channel of contact with the outside world.
Otherwise, by now, reporters would probably have already surrounded them.
The public still knew surprisingly little about the superhero team's detailed background.
In fact, Henry hadn't originally expected to see this news on television at all.
When he, Cassandra, and the others had agreed to wait for this event, the only preparation they'd made was having C monitor the internal networks of the FBI, CIA, and other law-enforcement and intelligence agencies.
Regardless of whether the U.S. government publicly confirmed the assassination attempt, those agencies would inevitably receive intelligence or some kind of directive.
Even if the information was hidden behind layers of bureaucratic language, Henry was prepared to slowly piece together the truth.
But now?
The news had reported it directly:
A mutant had attempted to assassinate the President of the United States.
Henry didn't have to waste any effort deciphering anything anymore.
He could proceed directly to the next step.
Confirm the whereabouts of the Stryker father and son.
Then go to their door and settle the score.
What Henry hadn't anticipated was that the real U.S. government wasn't like the movie.
In the movie, there had only been one layer of conspiracy at work.
Reality was more complicated.
Some of those conspiracies had succeeded.
Others had failed.
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