Marvel: A Tale of Shadows

They walked into the apartment rolling in the gurney with Ophelia on it. Ethan and his mother moved quickly as he led the way to the temporary surgical suite he set up. As he moved quickly they passed the living room where Laura was watching television with Felicia.

He ignored it as they quickly moved into the room. The television watching pair exchanged a look but Felicia just shook her head, "wait until they come out. He told me this might happen if they have to surgically remove something."

Laura nodded and they turned back to the television as a news broadcast featuring members of the X-Men, Captain America, and Iron Man. Apparently they had just completed a raid on a Hydra facility and recovered a number of missing people, including a large number of children that have been disappearing.

After a few minutes they were joined by Ethan's father who was moving a large number of boxes with rare metals into the room. He looked around the apartment and whistled.

"Damn, we never had a place as good as this. Hey uh… Felicia? Where should I put these? They are rare minerals and metals that we found along the way." He stated as Felicia and Laura got up and walked over.

Laura looked especially worried. On account of her mother going straight into surgery. He knew something about that, there had been a few times where he was incredibly worried about his wife and could not do anything about it. When she was giving birth to Ethan was the most terrifying experience of them all.

"We have a storage room over here that doubles as a workshop that he hides plenty of… less than legal additions and devices." Felicia explained as she walked over to a bare wall and opened up a secret hallway that led to a larger hidden room.

He whistled again, "is it wrong I am jealous of my own son. The kid really knows how to make a profit to afford all of this. Hey umm… your name is Laura right?"

Laura nodded, "yes, sir."

"Do not worry about it too much. Despite my wife's demeanor and mannerisms she actually graduated the top of her class as a doctor and even went on to continue studying all the aspects of surgery. While my son, as you might be able to tell, is an excellent planner and comes prepared for any situation. So your mother is in good hands." He explained as he moved the cart full of boxes to the middle of the room and left them.

He turned around to see Laura smiling and attempting to not cry. "Thank you Mister Hilt."

"No problem kid, now let's find something to watch while we wait. Do you have a favorite show?" He asked as Felicia closed the secret hallway and the three of them went to the couch.

"Um… no but I do have a favorite game. Are you able to play racing games?" She asked as she converted the television to the gaming system.

"Racing? I am a fantastic racer in real life. I am the go to wheel man for any vehicle, I know I can give you a fight for first place." He proudly declared as he accepted a controller and sat on the couch.

Felicia rolled her eyes as she joined them. "Be careful. Laura's a ringer, she down plays her skills by a large margin."

—------------------

Jean looked around at the numbers as they separated them into the categories in which manner they were brainwashed. But she was still stunned by one of the names she saw. Emma Frost, she knows there were indications she was at sites of Hydra attacks but there was no proof and the woman was supposed to be currently running her company.

But if she was here and according to this, was brainwashed for over a month, then who was running her company. It was a gigantic whole issue that she was thankful she did not have to manage.

But as much as they had a list of people there was a missing person, who had apparently been brainwashed far longer than any of the others. The woman's file was full of gaps about her personal information but she was the only one who had undergone three different forms of brainwashing.

Ophelia Sarkissian had started out on chemical hypnosis but she quickly gained immunity within a few days. Then she underwent Hypnosis but that only lasted nine months before it was broken, eight of those months were spent off of the active duty roster. Then she spent several years being held at this facility until they created a brain chip that worked as brainwashing.

From then on she became active duty again, but it was sporadic with points and modifications indicating she kept breaking the brainwashing. Then there was a file that indicated she helped an X-23 escape the facility and hid her in New York before she was captured again. After that was a note to consider termination, following reacquisition of an important experimental asset. There was a note attached to that one that said she would be moved to the Dionysus Program, with an attached file number.

Jean quickly looked it up as she waited for the others to finish. As soon as she opened it up and read it she was disgusted. Which clearly showed in her face from Ororo's question.

"What has made you mad enough to make that face? I can almost feel the rage from here." She started as walked over to the table where she was sitting and read what was on her laptop. "Are these the files from that facility?"

Jean nodded uncomfortably, "yes but it appears this particular program expanded beyond just this branch. There is seriously something wrong with them. I suppose it is too late to just kill them?" She responded sarcastically, glancing out the tent's opening toward the podium where Stark was giving a speech.

She felt disgust in the bottom of her stomach. She needed something to wash away this feeling of critters across her skin.

"But wow, this chick is a badass. How many times did she break out of her brainwashing?" Ororo had noticed the same thing Jean had.

"It was almost yearly but I looked up X-23 and it appears that it was under an empty file called Weapon X. Apparently all digital files were removed and the only solid files are in a remote location." Jean explained.

"So our best bet would be to find this X-23?" Ororo asked but she already knew the answer. "But I am guessing you have a better idea?"

Jean smiled and nodded, "Ophelia assisted X-23 in escaping during a transfer from a government facility located in Canada. They made the mistake of labeling the nearby town. So if we trace their steps back we should find another place."

"Okay, but we will need to split up the team. There are at least three other facilities that we now know about that both Captain America and Iron Man plan on assisting us with." Ororo explained a look of eager excitement filled her gaze.

—-------------------

"Are you going to keep watching me, Wolverine?" Doctor Faustus asked as he nervously tapped the metal bed of his jail cell.

"Yes, I may not be able to explain it. But I know you are bad news." Wolverine declared as he continued waiting for the military transport to take him from this prison to a maximum security prison.

"Ha… despite losing your memories you still know? Perhaps it is a side effect of your beast-like nature? Or maybe it is your old conditioning awakening itself?" Faustus whispered before his tapping became a rhythmic and consistent noise.

"What was that?" Wolverine began listening more closely.

Tap Tap Tap. "X-1 the sun rises." Tap Tap Tap. Wolverine began feeling woozy from the rhythmic noise. "But sunset means death."

Several minutes passed as the tapping and voices could be heard from the room. When the transport team arrived, Wolverine walked out with a headache and no clue what happened over the past hour.

—----------------------

They walked out of the room after a few hours there was still some blood on their clothes. Ethan sighed as he looked over at the couch to see Laura looking at him with hope and worry.

Ethan smiled and nodded, "your mother is just fine. She will take some time to recover but aside from that she won't even have any scarring. But she will be asleep for at least a few days."

Laura hopped over the couch, her weight causing it to creak before she ran up and hugged him. "Thank you Ethan."

Ethan's mother stepped up behind him smiling, "I will say if it wasn't for that stuff you brought in it would have been far more difficult."

"Regeneration Variable, it is a chemical myself and a chemist created on accident while we were developing another chemical. Fortunately, it can work wonders against natural infections and can heal new wounds almost instantaneously. Unfortunately the human body develops a quick resistance so it can only be used once or twice per person. It doesn't work on diseases, poisons, or anything that consistently damages the body. It also causes the user extreme pain so it is better that the user is unconscious from the chemicals used." Ethan explained as he flinched in remembering the pain of discovering that tidbit of information.

"Remarkable. Why have you not tried to sell the recipe for something like that so you could become rich. Or actually richer…" His mother remarked as for the first time she took in the penthouse they were in.

"Because, I have a vision of what I want to do in the future and it is an incomplete product." Ethan explained with a shrug. Getting a look from both his mother and father, because he was clearly straying from the family's path of business.