Emma Frost, Headmistress of the Massachusetts Academy had only recently finished dealing with that most unappealing of American High School Traditions, the Senior Prom. On the one hand, while her Students had all finally become adults, which was gratifying, the drama inherent in such an event was far from something that Emma Relished. Indeed, this particular Prom was filled with Drama, and not the fun kind, where Emma could stir the pot and humiliate people she wasn't fond of, either. Jubilee and Chamber had just started dating when Jubilee found out that Chamber had cheated on her with Husk not three weeks into the relationship, resulting in a massive fight at the Prom that had forced Emma to intervene before things truly became unsalvagable. It hadn't helped that both were eighteen, although Jubilee was closer to nineteen thanks to spending most of a year out of school while traveling with Logan.
What that essentially meant was that hormones and tempers had been running high, helped along by spiked punch. High enough that it may have come to blows had Emma not intervened. When you had two young mutants of Jubilee and Chamber's Caliber, coming to blows involved explosions more often than not, and that was not something that Emma had been willing to countenance. In the aftermath, Husk and Chamber had left the School. Chamber had been offered a place with the X-Men and Emma had strongly insisted he take it and take Husk with him. Jubilee, well, normally Emma Found her bubbliness a bit grating, but that didn't mean that the sulking she had seen Jubilee doing was an improvement, far from it, in fact. Jubilee had become listless, locked herself in her dorm room, and refused to come out. It had been a week of this with no change in sight.
What Jubilee needed, in Emma's opinion, was a mission, and perhaps a rebound fling. Fortunately, Sean had come back from a trip to New York with just the thing that might help.
"Cerebro's picked up a new Mutant Lad out in Essex County. Might be just what Jubilee needs t'break out o' her funk." Offered Sean as he entered.
Emma looked quizzically at the Man who went by Banshee. "Strange, I didn't pick anything up about that psychically." She frowned.
"Aye, ye wouldn't've. Cerebro had t'use th' Gene Scanners t'pick him up. They're not as precise as th' psychic ones, but from what the Lads up in Westchester said, Cerebro's flagged th' new Fella as Male age eighteen t'twenty-two, with some sorta mutation that blocks psionics. Could be an Omega-Level defense, at that. Ultimately, we won't know till we can talk to th' Lad." Informed Sean.
"That's interesting. Did they say where?" Questioned Emma.
"Starkesboro for a stretch o' time, then out t'sea. Last known location was sailing due east away from th' Baker's Island Lighthouse." Informed Sean.
"East of Baker's Island is the open ocean." Pointed out Emma.
"So far as folks know, that's th' right o' it, but Scott called in a favor from Doctor Strange t'see if he could tell them anything, given how Stephen was th' fella who knows Starkesboro best. He was told that there's a number o' uncharted isles out that way that get kept off o' maps thanks t'magic. The largest is apparently an Atlantean Holy Site, the Spears o' Nodraxa, some kinda remnant of an ancient Atlantean Outpost from back before th' place sunk. There's a few ruins tumbled beneath th' waves and a couple o' rocky islets remaining above th' water. Maybe our lad's gone there?" Hedged Sean.
"Fascinating. Fortunately, we have a jet that can search a large area relatively fast. Take the Blackbird and Jubilee and see if you can't find our mystery Mutant. It will do her some good to be away from the Academy for a while." Nodded Emma.
With that, Emma went back to more important things, like reading reports from her Mole in the Hellfire Club. Sebastian had just gotten rid of the Upstarts a couple of years ago and was trying to expand once again. He'd sent that loathsome cyborg Donald Pierce to Chicago to open up a chapter in Emma's old stomping grounds, but according to the reports Donald had returned to base literally in pieces. Emma smiled as she read that. Apparently, someone had sent him and a pair of Hellfire Knights to try and recruit a new member by any means necessary, though the identity of the prospect was unknown to Emma's agent. Apparently, the prospect had taken enough offense to dismantle Donald and his two toadies. Between that news and the news Sean had brought her, Emma was in a better mood than she had been an hour ago. Things were starting to look up, after all.
If only she'd known what would happen in the next few months, Emma Frost would have eaten those words. . .
XXXX
Stephen Strange, Sorcerer Supreme, was concerned. On the one hand, a new and potent sorcerer had appeared out of nowhere and helped Tony Stark deal with foes at his new Las Vegas Casino. On the other, someone had gone to Starkesboro and mucked about with the situation there. True, it seemed like the Town had largely turned away from its Setspawn-worshipping roots, but when it came to such things, it was better to investigate personally. Last he'd heard, the town had been in a slow but steady decline since his visit, with the economy no longer propped up by Sligguth's magics. However, checking into the new mutant that the X-Men had found as a favor to Scott Summers had shown that this state of affairs had both accelerated and suddenly reversed.
It was concerning to Stephen, as while it could be said Mutant's doing, the last evidence pointed to said Mutant sailing East of Baker's Island. There were a number of mystically hidden islands in that area and not all of them were benign. It would behoove Stephen to investigate. Unfortunately, events elsewhere compelled him to focus away from Earth for the past week. When he'd returned, not only had Victor finally returned from Hell after their excursion to retrieve his mother's soul from the clutches of Mephisto, but there had been another, far darker, mystic power rising in the Balkans, one unafraid to delve into black arts such as Necromancy. One that had waged war on, and successfully defeated, a trio of local powers and established two new nations out of the defeated carcasses of said local powers.
Granted those local powers had been Serb Nationalists who had been persecuting non-Serbs within their borders, deporting Albanians, Croats, and Slovenes to holding camps where they would be processed and forced out of the country. The whole situation had a very Holocaust-esque feel to it and Stephen was glad it had stopped. However, the destruction of Evil Regimes of Men had come at the cost of establishing a bastion for Necromancy in the Balkans. The Evil of Humans could be insignificant when placed next to the Evil of Inhuman forces. There was a reason Eldritch beings like Set and Cthon encouraged the Necromantic arts amongst their followers, after all. Such things corrupt the soul. The worst that a death squad can do is kill you.
Fortunately, Victor had been quite adamant about further adventurism from this Mors Cruentia person. If you could count on Victor von Doom to do one thing it would be to utterly crush anything that could potentially take Latveria away from him. Well, that and to get into a pissing match with Reed Richards, but in this case, it had worked in their favor. Mors Cruentia hadn't made any moves in the Balkans since Victor had his little talk with the Man. That didn't mean they were out of the woods yet, mind you. Mors Cruentia didn't need to invade someone else to cause problems. Necromancy was corruptive inherently, and just its practice within the newly formed borders of the Second Principality of Zeta, as he'd chosen to name his new kingdom, would cause issues sooner or later if nothing was done.
Between keeping an eye on Zeta, watching Starkesboro, the probing of Dormamu from the Dark Dimension he'd recently dealt with, and half a hundred other fires, there wasn't a whole lot of energy he could devote to tracking down a new mutant who may or may not be an enemy or aligned with dark powers. Ultimately, he'd given Scott what information he could about various mystically cloaked islands east of Baker's Island and would have to hope that Scott, or whoever he delegated the finding and recruiting of new mutants to, would be able to handle the issue themselves. Stephen just didn't have the energy to spare to look into it. If only Anthony Druid were still alive, he might be able to pawn off the task onto him. He'd managed to get Doctor Druid to lead the Secret Defenders, after all. Unfortunately, there was no use looking into what-if scenarios.
For now, Stephen Strange returned to his Sanctum Sanctorum to rest up. Thankfully, Wong had tea waiting for him. Stephen took it with a grateful nod and sat down with a reference book on the Dark Dimension to get a bit of light reading in. Dormamu had been annoyingly able to recruit a New Age Cult Guru named Jonothan White to act as a proxy, which suggested that he was gaining strength. Dormamu hadn't been able to so blatantly influence those who weren't looking for him in years. It suggested worrying things were in store in the years ahead. Stephen had to be prepared for that eventuality.
After all, it was the duty of the Sorcerer Supreme to do so. . .
XXXX
Mors Cruentia had claimed his tower. It had taken the form of an entrance to a wine cellar of a Renaissance Manor in the old city of Vastopol, the newly-minted Capital of the Second Principality of Zeta. He'd entered to find no wine cellar but an underground town populated by various townsfolk. Under-Vastopol had apparently been created by a Venetian Sorcerer on the Eve of the Ottoman Conquest of Zeta in fifteen-oh-one. The townsfolk in Under-Vastopol were descendants of the Catholic Population of the City from those days, primarily a mix of Venetians, Croats, and Slovenes, with a number of Christian Albanians scattered around. Unfortunately, their centuries of living in the magically rich environment of Under-Vastopol had mutated their bloodlines so that they could not leave to the surface for extended periods without dying.
Mors Cruentia had claimed Under-Vastopol for himself by right of conquest, along with the rest of these lands. He had been challenged by the Capitano Generale Della Città, a man named Giuseppe Pesaro who was the current Lord of Under-Vastopol. A Venetian-Descendant, Giuseppe wielded both Spell and Blade against Mors Cruentia. He was prepared for many opponents. He wasn't prepared for an opponent who was able to use Necromancy for more than just raising armies of the undead. It only took a single spell for Mors Cruentia to humble his foe. A black bolt of dark light that withered Giuseppe's body as it struck him, rendering him a skeletal husk of the man he had been. Mors Cruentia asked if there were any others who disputed his lordship. No one else spoke up.
He had spent the next few weeks pouring through Giuseppe's Pallazo for spell lore, learning much and increasing his capabilities with non-necromantic magics, occasionally emerging to deal with administrative issues in Under-Vastopol or the wider, above-ground Principality. It was in his second week of this routine that he noticed another tower being claimed far across the sea. Mors Cruentia had known that another traveler had arrived with him. A version of himself from another timeline, one who still paid attention to the petty morality of humanity, choosing to be a hero rather than making the rational choice and gathering as much power for himself as he could by whatever means possible.
It disgusted Mors Cruentia that somewhere out there was a version of himself that was so foolish as to believe that other people truly cared about him. As if the experiences they must have shared in their prior life hadn't been enough to prove that a lie. The cheating girlfriends, the friends who never wished to spend time with him unless pushed, the workaholic parents who only ever seemed to have wanted him to grow up to be a smaller version of themselves, and so on. Mors Cruentia's former life had filled with people failing to live up to the standards of decent human beings, something that his doppelganger had to also have happened to him. After all, people always failed to be decent, no matter where they were from. It was a truism that Humans only ever acted in their own interests. Why would any version of himself be so deluded into thinking otherwise would be the case here?
Even Mors Cruentia's actions of liberating ethnic Croats, Albanians, and Slovenes from Serbian oppression had been the most expedient way to create a stable power base for himself. Enlightened Self-Interest instead of anything truly altruistic, in keeping with the way that Humans always inevitably worked. After all, Mors Cruentia was no different from any other human deep down. They all wanted what was best for them first and foremost.
"I'll just have to prove to my other self the truth of the world. He would have learned eventually anyway. All I will be doing is accelerating that lesson." Mused Mors Cruentia.
Yes, that would be perfect. Of course, for the lesson to truly sink in, his other self would need to have a support network built up in the first place for Mors Cruentia to tear one away from him. Once he'd lost everything, he would see that those he'd saved or befriended would turn their backs on him, unwilling to get involved and pulled down alongside him. A support base would only last as long as you could keep hold of the reins of one, after all. Appear weak and humans will reject you every time. How his other self hadn't learned that lesson would be immaterial once Mors Cruentia taught it to him.
And when he did, his other self would thank him for it gladly. . .
XXXX
AN: So here we see a few people who would be keeping an eye out for Jan or someone like him arriving in certain places. Emma Frost has sent Banshee and Jubilee to look for this new mutant that had shown up on Cerebro's radar, Doctor Strange has heard about Jan but doesn't yet know that he and the Mutant who helped out Starkesboro are the same person yet, and Mors Cruentia is looking to fuck with Jan out of some nihilistic obsession with proving that people are assholes that will always let you down.
Any way you slice it, Jan won't be able to hole up on his island forever. Threr decently powerful people already know he's in the area.
At any rate, the next chapter we'll be back with Jan for a bit of a montage, packing six or so weeks of training into one update with an added bonus of a Spirit Quest for a totem on top.
Then Jubilee and Banshee will arrive just in time to drag him into the Operation Zero Tolerance event.
Stay tuned. . .