Okay, ow.
I must've blacked out for a second there, because the next thing I remember is opening my eyes to an indistinct blur and an unpleasant ringing in my ears. I blink, trying to clear the blur from my vision, and the world comes back into focus. Or rather, the broken form I'm lying on top of comes into focus.
To put it mildly, Magneto is a goddamn mess. His face is bloodied and bruised, his white hair standing on ends and covered with dust. The red armor on his chest is cracked, with several chips of the plating missing, revealing a black undersuit beneath. And judging by the unpleasant angles his arms are bent into, he's not going to be playing violin again anytime soon. His cape lies in tatters underneath him, purple shreds of fabric fluttering in the wind.
And yet, somehow, judging by his labored breathing, he's still alive.
I quickly roll off him, hoping to keep him that way, drawing a pained groan from his broken form, and get to my feet. I wince at the sudden throb of pain in the leg I had used to kick Magneto with, but it quickly goes away, and seems to be the worst I managed to do to myself. Magneto, obviously, isn't as lucky, considering he was at the bottom when we slammed into the ground. A spiderweb of cracks spread out across the pavement from beneath him, a small crater left from the impact of two superhuman bodies. Apparently even the Master of Magnetism has trouble dealing with being kicked at superspeed and then dropped five stories.
I stretch, feeling a satisfying pop in my back, before I brush away the stone dust from my vest. "I wouldn't try to move too much, Mags. I'm no doctor, but I'm guessing you're pretty much only holding together with luck and prayer right now, and I doubt your mutant power includes a bunch of residual organs to pick up the slack. Don't worry though, I hear they got top notch healthcare in SHIELD's Maximum Security Prison! They'll get you right as rain before your trial!"
"You... fool!" Magneto gasps out, his breath painful and short "You think those humans are your friends? They'll... throw you to the wolves... the second you are no longer a useful weapon! You've done nothing here today... nothing but hurt your own kind!"
I sigh "You know, I think the worst part of all this is that you actually believe that."
"I know it... to be so. I've... seen it happen before... and it will happen again! They will turn on you... the people you thought were your friends, your neighbors... in the blink of an eye!! And you've thrown away the best chance mutantkind has for survival!"
Well, that's the problem with Magneto in a nutshell, right there. He's not exactly wrong. There are dark days coming, and not just for mutants, and I've seen them, both in comic books, and in the past of my own world. Bolivar Trask, the Sentinels, Vietnam, the clashes over civil rights, the deaths of MLK and Malcolm X, and that's just in the next 7 years alone! God only knows what looms in the decades beyond. And while I succeeded in saving Kennedy, I don't know just how much I've changed history already, or how I'm going to prevent everything else already gathering on the horizon.
Doesn't mean I'm not going to try.
"You know, for some reason, I keep thinking that maybe, if I say just the right thing, if I give just the right speech, maybe I could make you see just how far you've fallen, "Lord" Magneto. Or do you prefer Eric Lensherr? Or even Max Eisenhardt?"
His eyes widen "...impossible!"
"No, just very improbable. And I'm not planning to tell you the hows and whys either, put that brain of yours of use to something other than psychosis, and you'll probably figure it out. See, I kept hoping that maybe I could break through to you, but I could give a hundred speeches, and it wouldn't make a dent in your delusion. I just want you to know, as you rot away in prison and wait for your judgement... your mother would have been ashamed of what you've become!"
Magneto's face draws pale, visible even from beneath the blood, and he makes a hoarse, rasping noise, like he's trying to scream, but the pain and blood loss finally becomes too much, and his head falls backwards as he lapses into unconsciousness.
I let out a breath. Honestly, that could have gone either way, it might just have driven him over the edge entirerly. Thank god it's over-
"LORD MAGNETO!!"
Oh, you've got to be kidding me.
...
The explosion from the palace had interupted their battle before it had even begun. Quicksilver ignored the shout of the Wasp woman as he sped away from her, all his thoughts turning towards Wanda as he raced towards the rising dust cloud, his mind flooding with his worst fear. His sister injured. His sister lying dead in the throne room at the hands of the X-Men or the Avengers, or caught in the crossfire between them and Lord Magneto.
Despite it all, what he found in the courtyard made him stop in his tracks, his mind blanking out in shock and horror at the sight.
The Sunshine mutant, standing over the broken form of Lord Magneto.
He stood there for a moment, unwilling to accept what he was seeing with his own two eyes. Because it wasn't possible. It COULDN'T be possible! Lord Magneto, the almighty leader of mutantkind, future ruler of the world, brought low by this... this buffoon? Lying there, defeated, his grand plan in ruins? It couldn't be true. Couldn't be ALLOWED to be true!
What had happened here? How could things have gone so wrong so fast? Why hadn't the rest of the Brotherhood stopped this? Why hadn't WANDA stopped this?!
"LORD MAGNETO!!"
The other mutant looked up at the sound of his voice, and much to Pietro's anger, actually seemed more annoyed than fearful. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me!"
Pietro stomped forward, fists clenched in anger "You! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!"
Sunshine just stood there, glancing down at the prone form of Magneto, before looking back "Is that a rethorical question or something? Because..." He made a half-hearted sweeping gesture. "I feel like this whole thing is pretty self-explanatory"
"There's no way you could have defeated Lord Magneto! He's all-powerful, the greatest of all of us! You are nothing but a second-rate traitor to your own kind!"
Sunshine shrugged "Yeah, Magneto thought so too, but it didn't work out so great for him either." Sunshine tapped Magneto's side with his boot "Though I'll admit it was a group effort. Turns out even the Master Of Magnetism struggles a bit when it's four on one. And later six on one!" He paused "Oh, right. Uh, you're probably going to be mad, but there's been some recent developments with the Brotherhood's roster."
"What are-" Pietro began, until he spotted something by the palace entrance. A group of people marched out through the broken doors, Captain America in the front, who was carrying the unconscious body of Mastermind over his shoulder, followed by two of Xaviers whelps. However, Pietro barely even registered them, his focus falling on the two people in the back.
Wanda and Toad, walking with them. Unrestrained. No sign of defeat on them.
Wanda just looked at him sadly. "Pietro. It's over."
And Pietro Maximoff felt something break inside him.
.....
"TRAITORS!!!"
I sigh "Oh good, you've decided not to overreact"
Quicksilver just ignores me, staring in horror and anger at his sister and former teammate, his body vibrating with tension, making him blur on the spot "Wanda, you... how could you?! Tell me this isn't true! It can't be! Not you!"
Wanda looks away, unwilling to meet her brothers eyes "...it's true, Pietro. I'm sorry. But I couldn't do this anymore. Neither of us could." She motions towards Toad at her side, who shoots Quicksilver a defiant glare.
Unsurprisingly, Quicksilver does not take his sisters sudden independent streak well "How... why?! I would have expected this treason from that miserable waste of flesh next to you, but you?! How can you just turn your back on our cause? On Lord Magneto?"
"Because it's not OUR CAUSE, Pietro! It never was! It's always been about him!" she points at Magneto, who's still too out of it to hear her "Yes, he saved our lives, and I'm grateful, but does that mean he is to own our souls as well?! That we are to follow his madness forever? Look where his grand cause has brought us!" She gestures wildly with her arms, indicating the ruins of the palace and the empty city around us "This isn't a revolution, brother! This isn't even a war! It's just pointless destruction! This isn't our land, it was never going to be, it belongs to these people, it's THEIR home!"
"They're humans, they don't deserve it! They'll bring ruin to it, just like they've done everywhere else on the planet! Did you forget what they did to our people? To us?!"
"No, Pietro, I probably remember it more vividly than you do. But it's not these people that victimized us! And they don't deserve to suffer over what happened half a world away." She sighs, turning away "I don't know if Magneto is right about mutants being the future or not, but even if we are, we're not going to get there this way. I can't force you to change your mind, but I'm done with the Brotherhood. Please, come with me?"
Pietro's face goes slack, his expression completely blank for a moment... before twisting into pure rage. And he turns towards me, for some reason "You! You turned her against me! My own flesh and blood! You did this! You will pay, you traitor!"
"What is that, the word of the day? Also, I strongly recommend you consider your odds, because currently, the only people on your side is either in a crater on the ground, or slung over Cap's shoulder. And as versatile power as superspeed might be, you're probably overreaching a bit if you try to take us on."
"He's right, son" Cap says, stepping forward and lays down the unconscious Mastermind next to his boss before pulling his shield from his back, strapping it back over his arm "Please, just stand down. The war is over. Come peacefully, and I promise you the fair treatment you're entitled to."
"You promise?" Quicksilver spits out "Your words mean nothing to me, human. And your promises are as meaningless as your ridiculous flag suit." His gaze draws over us, lingering on Wanda, who still has trouble meeting her brothers eyes. He still looks half-tempted to go down fighting, but finally, self-preservation seems to win out. "...this isn't over. The Brotherhood will be back, better than ever. And you'll regret this day, I swear it! I will see you pay for your betrayal of mutantkind, if it's the last thing I do."
Wait, shit, he's about to-
I try to stop him before he can bolt, but a twinge of pain from my leg distracts me for just a second, which is more than enough time for Pietro Maximoff to disappear, a blur of blue and white disappearing between the buildings. I take a few half-hearted steps after him, but he's gone before I can even draw on my power.
"Well, shit..."482