Know The Why, Live Any How

Posted on Wed Jun 19th, 2024 @ 7:35pm by Shinobi Shaw & Erik Magnus Lehnsherr

2,686 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Episode 4: The Savage ConneXion
Location: Skull Mountain
Timeline: September 11th, 1990

Magneto's caregiver had to rest and sleep at some point. And so it fell to Jace to bring the Master of Magnetism his food and water this time. He was honestly looking forward to it, though. Sure, Magneto could be arrogant most of the time and an ass the rest of it. But Jace would be a fool if he didn't avail himself of this opportunity to garner some wisdom or advice from him.

He arranged the plate, canteen, and flatware on a metal tray and walked to the room where Magneto was recuperating. Jace knocked as he slowly pushed the door open. "Time to eat."

"Great..." The sarcasm was rich in Magneto's voice, but be just lacked the conviction to sell it. He pushed himself up to a reclining position, which was more effort than it should have been. "What slop is it today?"

Jace noticed how difficult it was for Magneto to sit up. That power move had taken more out him than Jace thought. "I suppose it could have been some boiled vegetable mash," said Jace. "Or whatever else they might cook in the Savage Land. But you have this place stocked like a survivalist. So it's only slightly better," he mused. He set the tray down on a table next to the bed.

"We have instant mashed potatoes, instant gravy, some canned rectangular meat, and a bowl of rehydrated mixed vegetables. I also found packets of powdered milk, cocoa beverage powder, and powdered fruit drink mix if you want to flavor the filtered water." Jace chuckled a little. "On second thought, I'm not sure it's better at all."

"Has anybody..." Magneto took a breath, "... told you that you talk too much?" He took the mashed food and ate as much as he could stomach. "This place was my original compound back when I arrived to this godforsaken place. It was never meant to be long-term. Whatever ancient civilization built this place is as far beyond us as we are the trout. My grand ambitions to plunder what they left behind... didn't end well." He spat the last bit of mash out of his mouth, unable to swallow it. "I could've done better for emergency provisions."

Jace smirked at the talking too much comment. "Plunder what they left behind?" he asked. "Well, sorry to hear it didn't end well, I guess. Maybe you could grab a few things this time around." He pulled a chair up next to the bed and sat down. It didn't matter to Jace whether Magneto wanted company or not; he was going to get it. "You're in this condition because you pulled off a power move like I've never seen before. I said it right then, but I'll say it again, well done, sir. But how? How could you crush that much armor all at once and take them all out? How did you get to be so strong?"

"Simple," Magneto said. "It is der Wille zur Macht. 'My idea is that every specific body strives to become master over all space and to extend its force, its will to power, and to thrust back all that resists its extension'."

Then, looking Jace square in the eye, the Master of Magnetism said, "That ideal was embodied most directly through the man who declared himself the inheritor of the German Empire and tried to wipe my people out. Yet I am greater than he, for my will to power is not the hubristic jingoism of a fallen empire, but the spirit of vengeance for a people who refused to die over thousands of years of persecution and slavery. I am the avatar of rebirth for a new species on this planet." The intensity of his voice led to a coughing fit that Magneto refused to yield to. He talked his way through it. "That is why I am your superior. I have cast off the shackles of slavery and become the master. You follow the way of the slave, begging for peace like a cowering dog when greatness is within your grasp if you only have the nerve to take it."

Jace silently slid the canteen of water towards Magneto for his cough. The young boy was then quiet for a couple of minutes while he thought about what Magneto had just said. He didn't have anywhere near that kind of background to motivate himself toward vengeance or the will to power. But that didn't mean he couldn't find it.

"I was an outcast in my family when my powers showed up," said Jace. "They hated me. So I ran away and left them to be their perfect little suburban family. I lived on the streets in Seattle for about five years, fighting to survive. I lost a lot of ideas and assumptions about the simplicity of right and wrong after the first time I stole some food so that I wouldn't starve. I wasn't afraid to do what was necessary to survive and help the other mutants. Then I was captured by mutants and taken to Canada," he continued. "Humans, mutants, mutants, humans...it didn't matter. Everybody was out for numero uno."

He turned from looking into the distant past and faced Magneto. "I have a will to survive; to take what I can from whoever I can and live. I've learned a lot from the Professor's teaching and the training at the Institute. But after seeing your display, I know I can learn from you. No matter what path I take."

"Charles trains good soldiers," Magneto said, his voice softening at bit. Despite his enmity with Xavier, they still held respect for one another. "But mutantkind needs generals. Whatever depths you climbed from, young man, they exist only to frame and give basis to a singular oath that will drive you forward into godhood: Never Again." After sipping from the canteen, Magneto said, "Say it."

Jace stood. "Never again. Never again will they treat me like trash. Never again will they capture me for their own agendas. Never again will I be afraid of them. And I'll remove as many Wendigo brains or squeeze as many beating hearts as I need to prove it."

"Don't tell me, you fool." Magneto scoffed at the juvenile display. "Go find a mirror. It's an oath you make to yourself. Gods have none higher to swear by than themselves. Swearing to me makes me your liege. There are plenty who do and that is the most they will ever make of themselves. If you desire more, then take it. No one will hand it over to you without a fight."

Jace 'harrumphed' at Magneto's comment, but he was right. He quickly found a mirror and said the same thing to himself. Once he swore the oath to his reflection, he turned back to Magneto. "Fundamentally shift from the idea of using my abilities to survive and move towards the will to power," he said as he walked back to the chair. "Grow in strength and power and become a master."

"Bold enough words, but what are you going to do about it?" Magneto challenged. "Pal around with Xavier's Peace Corps?" His tone turned mocking. "Make friends with those who resent your existence and agree to be shackled by mediocrity in exchange for peace?"

Jace was quiet for a couple of minutes as he thought about Magneto's words. He knew his birth name and his father's name. He also knew a little about who his father was; though he realized that was probably just the tip of the iceberg. He'd already made one of those decisions in a way when he'd signed that paper authorizing Hogarth to begin reclamation.

"I'll take what I can until it's time for me to move on," he answered. "Same way I used to do things on the streets. But until then, I'll be pushing myself and abilities, willing them to be stronger. I'll push my phasing and density hardness to their extremes and see how long I can hold them. If we're the next evolution of humans, then there has to be a next evolution of us."

It was big boast for the eighteen year old. He didn't expect some grand change in the next few weeks or months. "I know it'll take lots of hard work and determination. I also know that I might not ever achieve such a lofty goal. But in five years, I'll be better off than where I am now."

Magneto started chuckling at Jace's boast. "I would call that a feeble plan but it lacks even the basic constituent parts of a plan. You're going to will yourself to be stronger? That is not how evolution works, not at any level." He raised a fist that he squeezed tight enough to turn his knuckles white. "Evolution is driven by conflict, by competing forces that vie for supremacy. Where is your conflict, young man? Training your skills?" The sidelong glance Magneto gave him was both contemptuous and skeptical. "Practicing your power? No. You have no cause to fight for, no drive to push you beyond your limits. You have only naked ambition and nothing to power it." Looking away, Magneto returned to his tray of food, adding with pristine disinterest, "As you are, you are fit only as a foot soldier in another man's war."

Jace listened and watched. He'd learned that he still had a long way to go, but he did get some advice from Magneto. He wanted to find out some more about that German phrase and the quote when they got back to the mansion. For now though, he watched the recovering old man eat his mushy food.

"We'll see," he said. "At least let me do one thing for you. How long have you been cooped up in this room and not seen the sun or the blue skies?"

"Too long." Magneto set the tray aside and cut Jace with a piercing stare. "But I cannot yet stand and I will not be carried again."

"There's no way I could carry you," he replied. "But I can phase us, decrease our density, to the point where we float. Problem is, I don't know how to propel myself. If you're feeling strong enough, you could magnetic field us to move us around. We can pass right through the wall. No standing. No carrying. Like zero gravity."

The thought intrigued Magneto enough that he held back whatever pithy insult had indubitably come to mind. "Very well," he said at length. "Let's go. Show me what you've got... Flux." It was the first time he had addressed Jace by anything resembling a name.

Jace was confident, if not slightly nervous. He knew what he could do but he also knew exactly who the man before him was. He stood from the chair, walked to the bed, and took Magneto by the arm. With the same ease as when he phased he and Bobby through the ground at Niagara Falls, he phased himself and Magneto. But this time, more effort was put in so that they could levitate and he could hold if longer. Jace floated several inches off the floor. "Stand up, Magneto. Right on through the bed."

A feeling of pins and needles flit through Erik's body hard enough to make him twitch. He was alarmed at first to see that he was out of phase with the rest of the world. After his legs allowed him to stand upright as if the bed wasn't even there or that he was some kind of ghost, his alarm turned to fascination. "Curious..." His strength seemed to return to him, along with some color to his cheeks. "How long can you hold this state?" The unspoken question was whether it was safe to actually leave the room.

"With two people and the couple of inches of levitation, only three minutes," said Jace. He'd phased through the ground a couple of times at Niagara with passengers. "About a minute or so longer if I didn't levitate us. Which is why we can't sightsee outside the mountain. Just outside the wall to enjoy the sun and sky for a bit and then back inside. With enough practice and determination, I can make it longer."

"I am not a blushing schoolgirl," Magneto groused as they moved through the wall, "so you need not cajole me with promises of additional minutes. The brief view will be fine." The dim twilight still looked far better than the fluorescent lighting of the bunker. Magneto took in the sight and even allowed a smirk to cross his face.

Jace chuckled at Magneto's comment. "That I can be absolutely sure of. You are the farthest thing from a schoolgirl." He took in the same sight and said, "It looks better from up here. But it would look even better on a computer monitor back home." He then turned to face Magneto. "So what kind of advanced artifacts or technology could you not get your hands on?"

"Hush." Magneto spoke in the word in a forcible whisper. He stared straight ahead at the setting sun which reflected in his gray eyes like a funeral pyre. Deep sadness welled up for a moment until he remembered that he was not alone. The steel trap of his mind closed over his face, returning the Master of Magnetism to his cold, soulless persona. "Take me back now. Before your power slips."

Jace remained silent and let Magneto have his moment in the twilight. At the command to return, Jace gave a quick nod and they floated back through the mountain wall and to the bedside.

"Now when I return us to our normal density, you're going to want to be ready to sit down on the bed," said Jace. "Your normal strength, or lack thereof, is going to return and you don't want to lose your balance."

Too tired to give a reply, Magneto positioned himself at the bedside fully ready for gravity and exhaustion to wreak their havoc on him. As Jace had warned, his phased density shifted back to standard oscillation which reinitiated full gravitational effect. He was straight back to the bed in a drop that only spanned a few inches. He let himself slowly drift backward to lay down in the position Jace had found him.

"Thank you..." Magneto said at length. "That... I confess that lifted my spirits."

It was odd seeing Magneto in such a state. Even more so to hear him say 'thank you.' The young man nodded respectfully to the Master of Magnetism and said simply, "You're welcome. Glad I could help with that."

"You will keep it to yourself." The imperative tone in Magneto's voice was unmistakable. "This never happened... though perhaps there is a place for you on Asteroid M."

"I absolutely will. Never happened at all," said Jace. "I just brought your meal and we bantered back and forth." He gave pause at the last comment, though, and became slightly somber. "There were a few times, in the very beginning, when I wished I'd chosen to go with Maestro instead of Cyclops on that day in Canada," he confessed. "I never really fit in, but I managed. Tell you what, I don't want to make a decision in this place while there is so much going on. I'd rather have some peace and quiet to consider it. If that's okay."

Jace hoped to have some good news from Hogarth when he got back. But he certainly did not want to turn down Magneto at this point. Hopefully something would work out in his favor.

"Do what you want," Magneto said, closing his eyes and allowing his head to lull to one side. "I care not."

Jace smiled. "I will," he said. He didn't quite believe that last part, though. The part about Magneto not caring. He wouldn't have offered the possibility if he didn't. Jace took the tray and any uneaten food, but left the canteen and drinks. Just in case he was thirsty when he woke up.

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