The air around Wanda crackled with tension, the fiery glow of her magic casting eerie shadows on the shattered grounds of the mansion. Her eyes scanned the battlefield, eyeing her next target.
Iceman.
He'd been undoing all the damage that Juggernaut was doing, he needed to be distracted so her fathers plan could take place.
Though as Wanda lifted her hands, ready to attack, they started to tremble, the raw energy she wielded threatening to spiral out of control.
She took a deep breath, trying to regain control.
She heard her father, the man floating behind her take a sudden sharp breath, she furrowed her brows, scanning the battlefield for the potential cause.
Her gaze swept across the chaos, searching—
Pietro!
Not running, not fighting.
Falling.
He plummeted from the storm above, his bright silver hair whipping violently in the wind.
"PIETRO!" She screamed as her mind went blank with shock. Her magic unconsciously flickering around her fingers.
The battle seemed to freeze, the X-Men and Brotherhood looking up in unison.
Wanda's hands shot out, crimson light spiralling in a surge of instinct. Threads of magic wrapped tightly around Pietro's falling form, gently halting his fall.
The speedsters chest heaved, his heart slowly trying to settle as Wanda started gently lowering him from his spot in the air, dozens of metres still above ground.
Wanda exhaled in shaky relief—
The sky screamed.
A black blur tore through the boiling clouds above, wings tucked as he dived towards his prey, the sound barrier smashing with a sonic—
—BOOM!
The air surrounding the winged mutant pulsed and vibrated as his amber eyes locked onto Pietro's floating form.
Wanda rapidly tried to raise a shield, but it wasn't going to be enough.
She didn't have enough time!
Then, at the last possible moment before impact, Lucan twisted mid-dive. His wings flared just enough to pivot momentum, dragging his lower body forward until his boots were aimed squarely at the speedsters chest.
A predator shifting for the kill.
Wanda's magic shattered under the impact as Lucan's feet drove into Pietro's chest—
BANG!
The strike smashed Pietro into the courtyard below with a force that split the ground below like an earthquake. Dust and debris geysered into the air, the sound of the impact still echoing through Xavier's grounds.
When the dust cleared, Lucan stood in the crater he had made, his dark wings flared wide and amber eyes locked on his downed prey.
A roar of twisted metal filled the air. Every splinter of steel, every nail, every piece of rebar within a mile radius rose like a living storm, orbiting the now stone faced Magneto like a cyclone.
Wanda's rage filled scream cut through it, her hands alight with violent, writhing magic that made the air crackle and pop.
Lucan knew he just pissed off two very, very powerful people.
He needed to go.
He kicked off the ground, his wings beating with brutal force that tore him up into the sky above. The wind screamed against his face as he sharply banked left heading for the nearby forest.
A swarm of jagged metal sliced past, close enough he felt something graze his dark feathers. He folded his wings tight to his body, causing him to drop, just enough to let another sharp volley of metal narrowly miss.
He then snapped his wings wide, catching an updraft that sent him soaring into the clouds above. He looked over his shoulder, only to see he was still being followed by the now flying furious duo.
A screeching blast of magic tore towards him, Lucan tucked one wing and spiralled downwards to his right, avoiding the attack.
Magneto swept his arm, and an entire sheet of steel spun towards him like a saw blade. Lucan snapped his wings out wide, stalling in midair to let the deadly projectile pass, before diving between two rising beams of metal.
The three of them continued to climb through the now raining sky, Lucan desperately weaving in between clouds trying to break their line of vision.
A sudden fork of lightning split the clouds above, throwing the battlefield into a stark blinding white for an instant. Lucan used it, beating his wings hard and vanishing into the flash.
Wanda's next blast of magic tore through the spot he'd been in a heartbeat before, exploding harmlessly.
Lucan banked upwards, climbing further into the dark clouds, up here the rain was as thick as needles, the air sharp and the wind as powerful as a train.
But it was his, the sky was his and he couldn't be caught up here.
Magneto blindly hurled a wall of steel into the sky, but it only hit thin air, plummeting to the ground far, far below. While Lucan broke through the storm clouds into the clear air above.
Below the clouds churned and hid him completely from his pursuers.
Without a second hesitation he banked hard, vanishing into the horizon, gone before they could ever truly follow.
—-
Lucan angled down into a quiet stretch of forest, crashing through the treetops and landing hard in the undergrowth with a thud. His wings ached, his ribs ached, everything ached.
He pushed himself to his feet, dropping almost instantly into a comfortable spot in between two large tree roots.
He leaned back against the roots, rainwater dripping off of his feathers, heart still pounding with the adrenaline of it all.
That had been too close.
One wrong move and they could have had him.
Though despite that, despite the burning pain from fighting with Quicksilver, he almost wanted to do it all again.
The look on Quicksilver's face when he was caught…
Lucan laughed. His amber eyes alight with predatory delight.