Reality:
Night at the Jean Grey School. Rachel Grey psychically scans for Logan after having cleared the common area. She pleads with him to come out. They can help him. They can end this peacefully. But his Berserker personality is too far gone…
The Construct:
Logan sniffs. The place smells like war. Oiled metal, cordite, fear, fascism. Nothing out of order. That’s the way it’s always smelled. This place is fake as hell, he concludes. It’s too real. Like a perfectly programmed set of sensor inputs. His brain’s calibrated to recognize it. He doesn’t like being screwed around with.
Hisako agrees. Logan promises that whatever bastard is behind this, for all she’s been put through he will not stop hurting them for a long, long time.
Reality:
The cafeteria. Chamber telepathically contacts Rachel, informing her they completed the head count and Armor is missing. Rachel asks him to check gate security. She prays Logan had nothing to do with this.
Elsewhere, Quentin Quire concentrates on the coming confrontation.
The Construct:
Boss! Logan announces, claws unsheathed.
Reality:
Quire! the Berserker snarls.
The Construct:
Nervously, Quentin turns around, pretending to be cool. Can he help them with something? he mumbles. Unsheathing his claws, Logan replies he can. How about calling off his dogs? Hisako and he spent the last couple of days avoiding getting killed by him, and frankly it’s been a tough time. Threatening Quentin with his claws, he orders him to stop it.
Logan, it’s him, Quentin whispers. Speak up! Logan commands. It’s Quentin Quire ! Why are they whispering? Hisako asks and how does he know Quentin Quire? What’s Quentin Quire? Logan asks. Hisako doesn’t know. A fuzzy name from a different life. No, yes, Quentin tries to explain. It’s a name from their real life.
Logan asks if all this isn’t real. Quentin explains. He is Logan aka Wolverine. She is Hisako Ichiki aka Armor. Two mutants who live with Quentin at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. Logan is the headmaster. Quentin admits creating this psychic construct and expanding it to include them. Their thoughts and brain processes are within Quentin’s. It’s a little complicated. He was sorta having a bad day when he did it. He apologizes.
Logan orders him to shut up. Hisako orders him to talk. There’s something he isn’t telling them. Logan threatens Quentin with the claws again. Is he some kind of hologram? What happens when he spikes him? Quentin asks him not to. He doesn’t know. Logan is of a mind to find out. Only way he can prove his story.
Swearing, Quentin claims there is another way to prove it. Isn’t he wounded? Nothing that will slow him down, Logan boasts. Quentin explains he can cure him. It’s all code, really. He concentrates and… nothing happens.
He admits that since he created the Construct it has become a little tricky to control. When Logan threatens him again Quentin concentrates and turns the building into air. They all land hard. Quentin laughs. He told them! Can he turn that into air? Logan asks. Quentin turns around to see what he means. Namely a whole army of tanks and helicopters arrayed against them. This is not his idea, Quentin pleads. He doesn’t know what this is but he can say one thing for sure. His subconscious hates his guts!
Reality:
Rachel walks through the empty school until she comes across Wolverine in the hallways. Hisako… Wasn’t him, he growls. Thank God, Rachel mutters. Quire in his room? he asks. Probably, Rachel replies. Why? But he doesn’t reply and just leaves.
Rachel tries to stop him, pleading she can help. She knows that the berserker personality stores his rage, to keep it in check. It’s not for tearing up the school and going after kids. She pleads he doesn’t want this on his conscience. He finally replies that something was taken from him. By Quire. What was taken? Rachel asks. Logan, is the reply.
Elsewhere, a complaining caretaker Toad walks the cellar to get rid of some things when he comes across the unconscious Hisako. He immediately informs Rachel, who tells him to have Karma help him. She is tied up here.
The Construct:
As the three flee from the army, Wolverine asks if he has any other powers besides the claws. Accelerated healing, Quentin informs him, then admits that he disabled that talent a bit. He hates his guts, Logan states. He knows, Quentin sighs.
They run into the street to find they are surrounded. Can he bring that building back? Logan asks. Quentin brings it down on part of the army.
Logan feels eventually the soldiers will get them. They gotta cut this off at the source. Quentin tries to think them out, to no avail. More soldiers come. Logan and Hisako try to hold them off and Logan suggests he try to work on the healing factor.
Reality:
Rachel joins Karma, Toad and the unconscious Hisako in the girl’s room. Rachel scans her, sensing psychic pain which she can barely tap. Physically, Hisako is fine and it is not really a coma. They wonder what is up. Rachel has an idea. She asks Karma to stay here and try to communicate with Hisako as well as she can. She is trying to find some answers.
The Construct:
Logan fights an endless army while Quentin tries to concentrate. Hisako asks him if, where they come from, they are friends. He doesn’t really have friends, Quentin replies. He figures he’s got Logan’s healing factor switched on. Hisako asks why this is so hard for him to control. If she’d asked him yesterday, he’d say something like it’s so well made, it just took on a life of its own. But more likely it’s because he is a mess and doesn’t have a handle on his telepathy like he thought he did.
Why do all the soldiers have her dead brother’s face? she demands. Quentin doesn’t know. The Construct draws from their memories as much as his. He doesn’t even know what her brother looks like. This is really hard— Hisako tells him to save it. She’s not gonna feel bad for him. Just take them someplace safe.
He tells her to look next to her. There is a big red button. The off button or self destruct, depending on how you want to look at it. But he doesn’t know what else to do and he doesn’t know what’s going to happen when they press this. If they pull through it okay. But he doesn’t know how else to save her and Logan. Okay, she agrees and they press the button together.
