‘It’s the parents, Emma. What could they want?’ Sean “Banshee” Cassidy asks Emma Frost a.k.a. the White Queen, his co-headmaster at the Massachusetts Academy as they stare out her office window and look at the barrage of cars that have just pulled up outside. ‘Their children, Sean. They’ve come for their children’ Emma replies as the worried parents rush up to the Academy entrance, looking very, very angry. ‘Oh good Lord, they’re going to riot!’ Emma gasps, telling Sean that the parents are afraid and angry and going to riot. ‘People will be hurt. I can feel it happening already!’ she tells him as they rush out of her office.
En route to the entrance, Sean sees Emma’s sister, Adrienne Frost, smiling at him. Sean call out to her and pointing a finger at her warns her that if she had anything to do with this, he will take her out himself. ‘I wasn’t here to stop to last time, but I won’t make the same mistake again, I promise ye!’ Sean declares. Adrienne watches as Banshee rushes to catch up with Emma, ‘Silly man. It’s already far too late’ she grins.
Furniture is knocked aside as the parents swarm the main foyer, rushing past Emma and Sean without even wanting to talk to them. Emma is knocked over, Sean helps her up as Adrienne marches down the stairs and sits down near them. ‘Delicious, isn’t it? Your precious Academy being torn apart, all these people frantic with fear for their children’s safety!’ Adrienne grins. They watch as parents begin calling out for their children: ‘My God, it’s perfect, isn’t it?’ Adrienne smiles. ‘WHAT?’ Emma shouts, pushing her sister up against a door. ‘What are you talking about? Did you start this?’ Emma asks.
Adrienne asks her sister to relax and pace herself. ‘The bombs haven’t even started going off yet!’ Adrienne exclaims. ‘The what?’ Emma gasps. ‘I’m on it, Emma!’ a harried Sean exclaims as he flies down the corridor. ‘Bombs. God help us!’ he exclaims, while Emma shoves her arm into Adrienne’s neck, ‘You are behind this, aren’t you?’ Emma asks. ‘The bullies, the explosives, these panicked parents…what did you tell them?’ Emma demands to know, before Adrienne kicks her in the face, knocking Emma back and freeing herself. ‘Why, the truth, of course’ Adrienne replies, standing over Emma.
Adrienne tells her sister that she is getting soft. ‘I was hoping for a bit of a challenge out of you, but sadly, no’ Adrienne declares, before kicking Emma hard in the stomach. Tears fall from Emma’s eyes, while Adrienne exclaims ‘You just stood by and let me waltz right in and take control. ‘It was so easy!’ Adrienne boasts. ‘Now look at you!’ she exclaims. ‘Such a good sister. You sleep. I have some children to murder’ Adrienne tells the apparently unconscious Emma, before taking off down the hall, shouting: ‘Yoo-hoo! Children! Monet! Jubilee! Funny-looking gray one! Auntie Adrienne’s calling!’. Emma slowly opens her eyes….
Elsewhere, students are being snatched by their parents and dragged from the building, while Banshee pushes past them in the other direction, searching for Generation X and the explosives, he rounds a corner and finds Everett “Synch” Thomas and Monet St. Croix, hand-in-hand. Synch asks Sean ‘What’s going on?’, to which Banshee replies ‘Adrienne, she planted explosives…’. ‘Oh my God!’ Monet gasps, before Sean reveals that he has found some of them already. Sean asks Everett to give him a hand with the explosives and tells Monet to go find the others, then move all these people away from the buildings. ‘Okay!’ Synch replies. ‘Right!’ Monet exclaims, before Sean asks her to see how Emma is doing. ‘Be careful, M…’ Everett tells her.
Nearby, a smug Adrienne is slinking through one of the hallways, ‘Come out, come out wherever you are!’ she sings, when suddenly, Emma runs up behind her, and furiously smacks her sister in the back of the head, before kicking her to the ground. ‘Not such a “good little sister” after all, huh?’ Emma asks Adrienne, who replies that Sean will never find all the explosives in time. Emma asks Adrienne why she is doing this, ‘What on Earth have I done to make you be like this?’ Emma asks her. ‘All you life, all you have ever done is take. You steal from people, you reach into their minds and just rip out whatever you want. You stole to make yourself rich and successful!’ Adrienne reminds her sister.
Frowning, Adrienne tells Emma that the sick thing is she doesn’t deserve it. ‘I should be the one on top, the one coasting through life, not you!’ she snaps, shouting ‘You have caused me enough pain over the years…it’s time for you to start hurting!’, and Adrienne lunges at Emma with her high-heeled shoes once more, until Emma grabs Adrienne’s foot before she can kick her, and tosses her sister across the hall. Monet arrives on scene, and calls out to Emma, who telepathically tells Monet not to worry about her, to go and make sure the others are okay. ‘But -’ Monet begins to telepathically protest, until Emma assures her that she can take care of her sister. ‘This is personal, go!’ she orders. A somewhat shocked Monet rushes on.
Banshee and Synch have found another one of the bombs, ‘Sean…’ Everett whispers, motioning to the time - they have nine minutes and two seconds remaining. With pliers in hand, Banshee tells Everett not to rush him and that he is nearly there, while parents and students run around in a panic behind him. Everett tells Sean that having him here with him is pointless, ‘It’s better if we split up. We can defuse twice as many bombs that way’ he points out. Banshee snips the red wire, ‘Done!’ he exclaims, before telling Everett that splitting up is out of the question. ‘But, Sean…’ Synch begins to protest. Banshee tells him that he is not sending him out there into all that mess on his own. ‘Ye wouldn’t have anyone to synch up with if ye needed to. It’s just not safe’ Sean tells him, adding that this is the end of the discussion, and telling Synch to come along, as they make their way through the crowds of students and parents.
Soon, Banshee finds Monet, who has rounded up the rest of her teammates. ‘Children!’ he calls out to them, asking if they are all right, while panicking parents and students push past the, Jubilation Lee a.k.a. Jubilee assures Sean that they are fine, before asking him where Synch is. ‘Eh?’ Sean asks, before looking around and seeing that Everett is missing. ‘Damn him! I told him to stay close!’ Sean exclaims. Monet pushes past people so that she can gain flight, and awkwardly flies above everyone in the corridor, telling Banshee that Everett is out there by himself. ‘If he doesn’t find all the explosives…’ her voice trails off as she announces she is going after him. Monet informs Sean that Emma is in the foyer with Adrienne as she leaves.
Paige “Husk” Guthrie suggests that they follow Monet, and exclaims that this whole place has gone crazy. Angelo “Skin” Espinosa asks Husk what she is talking about. ‘It’s Monet, man. Nothing’s gonna happen to her. She’ll be fine!’ he exclaims. ‘But what about Ev? He needs us!’ Jubilee exclaims. Skin reminds Jubilee that Monet is indestructible, and is the best one to protect Everett. ‘You know that…’ he tells her. Jubilee hangs her head in silence. Banshee agrees with Skin, and remarks that Monet can take care of Everett, while they need to find Emma and make sure all of the people are out of harm’s way. ‘Right! Let’s go! Stay with me now!’ he exclaims as Husk, Jubilee, Skin and Jono “Chamber” Starsmore follow him.
Elsewhere, Synch has detected another of the bombs, and enters a room, only to be confronted by the three bullies, who grab him. ‘Gotcha, you freak! You mutant freak! What are you doing to the school?’ one of them asks, angrily. A shocked Synch asks him to let him go, ‘You don’t understand!’ he tells them as he sees the bomb, with only twelve seconds remaining! ‘Monet…I need you!’ Synch calls out as he begins to synch up with her powers, tossing the bullies from him. Monet realizes they Everett is trying to synch up with her, and tells him that she is too far away for him to synch up properly, so he won’t be strong enough.
Synch replies that he is sorry, that he doesn’t know how else to stop this. ‘People will die if I don’t…’ he exclaims, looking at the bomb, which has three seconds remaining. Everett tosses the bullies from the room, and a horrified expression falls over Monet, while Synch reaches for the bomb, ‘It’s my only option!’ he exclaims as the bomb reaches zero, with a note taped to it - Love, A. Suddenly, the room explodes.
‘Oh, no…’ Emma gasps, while Jubilee screams out for Everett. Banshee and the kids run in the direction of the explosion, while Adrienne gets up off the floor, ‘Ha, I did it!’ she exclaims. ‘See that, dear sister? You can hurt, after all!’ Adrienne remarks. Emma reaches behind her back and puts her hand under her jacket. ‘You sick, cruel, twisted…right. That’s it. I’m finished with you!’ Emma announces, narrowing her eyes.
Banshee and the other kids reach the site of the explosion, where the bullies are skulking away. Monet is in the demolished room, kneeling beside Everett, she exclaims ‘Oh, God, I knew it…I knew it wouldn’t be enough…I told him! But he did it anyway, he saved those people, but then he…he just disconnected from me…’ her voice trails off. ‘Ev!’ Jubilee gasps, tears in her eyes, while Sean asks her to give Monet a moment, and various expressions of shock and horror adorn the faces of Husk, Chamber and Skin. ’Oh, God, Ev…come back…please, don’t die on me…PLEASE!’ a teary-eyed Monet, kneeling in the rubble, calls out, holding Synch’s lifeless body in her arms….
Later, ‘…and that’s why what happened will never happen again. Your identities are still secure since no one was able to prove anything’ Emma tells Monet, Jubilee, Husk, Skin and Chamber as they sit around outside the Massachusetts Academy. The kids are all solemn as Emma reveals that the files Adrienne had on them are destroyed. ‘Adrienne is…gone’ she remarks, and explains that all physical evidence has been disposed of, adding that the student’s parents remember nothing. ‘Oh, aye, ye saw to that last one personally, didn’t ye?’ Sean remarks, standing at Emma’s side.
The White Queen informs the kids that she and Sean have decided to make some changes, revealing that they don’t feel it is helping them anymore keeping them cooped up inside the Academy all the time. ‘What do you mean?’ Husk asks, to which Banshee replies that from now on, things will be very different around here. Sean declares that he cannot speak for Emma, but he personally feels that he wasn’t training them properly. ‘Sometimes I think that if I had been a wee bit more diligent…’ his voice trails off, before mentioning anything about Synch.
‘This is your Academy. This is your home. You are in a unique position to really make a difference in the world. If that’s what ye choose’ Sean tells the kids, who listen to him intently. ‘It’s your life, children, your time. So what do ye want to do with it?’….
