All of these characters belong to Marvel and are borrowed without permission with no profit made.

WARNING: This story contains some adult orientated material towards the end, basically it's to do with sex, nothing is shown
too much, and shouldn't be rated above R 14, since I wrote it ;) But basically it's just naming some parts of the body, no actual
acts are described.

August 1998

Vision Comics presents:

"Wanting A Change"

Part A of Issue #16

Writer & Editor: Tom


A shadow slowly crept in to a room. It swirled in pain at the sight of light. It's body began to shrink in size and it's mouth let
out a silent scream of pain. It's black hand reached out across the enlightened area, reaching for it's mother, for darkness. It
managed to grab some shadow, and with the determination of a drowning man it began pulling itself into the darkness. In what
seemed like hours, it finally made it. Taking deep breaths it sat down on the floor and breathed deeply. Never before had it
been so closely to death, never before had it been in this world. This has turned out to be a deadly trip, and it was far from
over. But it knew it had to pass this test. If not, it wouldn't be capable of being a warrior. After regaining some strength it
looked around the room, where it was at the moment. It saw a man sitting on a chair, with a other man behind him, speaking to
him. The men in the chair got up nervously, looked in the mirror, then walked out of the room. It followed.

Senator Kelly closed the door, brushing his hair back with his hand. ^These hair stylist know nothing about making you look
good. Heh, be serious with yourself Robert, no one can make your hair look good anymore, there's hardly any left.^ He didn't
notice the shadow behind him, which seemed to move, he had more important things on his mind. He met with a security guard
at the entrance. The tall man nodded for him to follow him and he began walking up the stairs. Senator followed him up the
stairs and onto the stage. Flashes began flashing as he took his place at the stand.

With one move of his hand he silenced the crowd of reporters. When dead silence filled the room, he cleared his throat and
began speaking. "Ladies, and gentlemen, I am here, talking on the behalf of the President of Untied States of America to
officially announce Operation Zero Tolerance as closed. The operation turned out to be a failure, and unfortunately did more
harm than good. This is not to be understood wrong, the government will still be involved with mutants that work against the
law, and are dangerous to the public. But also. We, the citizens of U.S.A. the people we need to be more tolerant for these
mutants. They are human, just like us. They were born with a special gen. in their D.N.A. and it wasn't their choice. Therefore
we can't haunt them and kill them, just because they were born different. That would be faciszm, that would be like saying
every black man, every indian has to be haunted, just because their skin isn't white. We fear these mutants, because we don't
understand them. Most of us don't even know how mutants got their powers, how it is possible. We think of them as the things
with tails and green skin. How wrong are we, mutants are all around us. Their powers don't always have to be necessary
flashy. They can sometimes be able to do maths calculations in mere seconds, or have a extra toe. The person sitting next to
you on the bus, your co-worker, your friend, they could all be mutants. These people, are like us, and they live in endless fear
of being discriminated, and hated. That is wrong. They are just human as any other citizen of this country, this planet. We
haven't been noticing this lately, but we're turning into the next Nazis. All is because we fear. And we fear because we don't
understand. And that's what our job is now. It will take time to get started, but the government plans to host lectures in the
major universities around the country, about mutants, and racism. Anyone interested will be invited to come along. Such groups
as Friends of Humanity will be disbanded. The F.O.H. is a racist group, which should have not existed in the first place.
Enough people have paid the price already. The government is here to protect it's people, both humans and mutants." Senator
Kelly took a deep breath looking straight into the camera in front of him.

"But of course, just like with humans there are mutants that are not wanting to be cooperative and good citizens. We do not
need to mention any names. These people because of their power, can be a danger to the whole country, even the whole world
sometimes. I just want to ensure you, the people of USA and the outlaws, we will not tolerate any threats made to our country
and people." Senator Kelly raised his voice, slamming his hand on the stand. "We will be prepared to take you in by any means
necessary, if it's the last thing we do. No more playing games. We will be ready to take on any attack any mutant, or human
terrorist gives us. And just because the Avengers and Fantastic Four, god bless them are dead doesn't mean there are no
heroes left in this world. Thank you." With these words he walked out of the stage as the reporters began to roam, throwing
questions at him. He walked backstage, without answering one. Along the way to his dress room, he met few of his people who
congratulated him on his amazing speech. He smiled wearily and didn't say anything.

When he entered his dress room he sighed. He sat down on his chair, looking at the mirror in front of him. He began to rub his
eyes. "I thought you'd come." he said.

A tall figure steeped out of the shadow, a smile appearing on his face. "Nice speech Senator Kelly."

"Thank you Cyclops, that's a lot coming from you."

The shadow creped into the room again. It had followed this strange man to the stage where he talked to a group of
another humans. Everything was still new to it, it didn't know the language of the humans enough. They all learned it
as they grew up, but sometimes it was more like remembering than learning. From what it knew it could understand
the basics of the conversation between these two men. As always keeping to the mother shadow it began listening
carefully, out of curiosity.

"Yes we are planning on starting a campaign around the major colleges and universities in the country. Our main aim is to
teach, to teach about mutants, help people understand, and maybe overcome the fear. And we know these things worked. Prof.
Charles Xavier, I'm sure you know of him he was a great help to bringing people and mutants closer, and he did it these ways,
by teaching. But now he seems gone, we think that he is dead, which would be possible, since we don't even know how many
Prime Sentinels are roaming out there, waiting to be awakened by one false move. We spent a lot of time and thinking on this,
there are people already training in this direction, but we hope to start something by fall."

"Senator, that's amazing, I never thought we would get as much support from you, or even the government..."

"Now listen to me, Cyclops !" Kelly looked at him sharply. "I'm doing this for the sake of the country, and it's people. And I
expect you and your X-Men to help us. This is something we have to work on together, if we really want to make a change. And
I don't want to hear about any terrorist acts, or threats against any right willed man in this country or this planet. It was hard
enough to get the president to trust you at all. You're here to fight bad mutants, do so. Be heroes for once, not outcasts. This
world needs heroes now, Cyclops, not outlaws. And if we're going to make any difference at all then we have to start working
together on this."

Cyclops took a while to answer, he had never seen Senator Kelly so devoted to a cause with such passion, unless it was
fighting mutants. Could he finally see his wrong doings ? "I understand Senator, and I agree with you, that we need to work
together. I've been wanting to do that for a long time, but most of the time the government was more interested in killing us
than helping us."

"Yes you are right about that Cyclops, but now this is going to change. Or at least I hope it will."

"Also, what you said about being ready to take on any terrorist, what is on your mind ? Surely the government doesn't have a
team of heroes of it's own, just how are you going to be able to hold off lets say Magneto ?"

"Yes you're right about that, X-Factor are believed dead." Senator Kelly stopped looking Cyclops in the eyes, trying to see a
reaction. He didn't see one.

"Yes, so I have heard." Cyclops said with no expression on his face.

"It's still in talks, and nothing is official yet, but we're planning on getting Freedom Force back together." Cyclops's face
showed surprise for a moment, but then he regained control of it. "Of course not in it's old line up, few members have passed
away, but we are hoping on getting most of them back. And I await X-Men's support on that."

"That is a very good idea senator, but you must remember that Freedom Force and X-Men have hardly been on good terms in
the past, at all in fact."

"Well Cyclops, you're going to have to make sure that they do this time, this is your big chance."

It grew uninterested of the talk of the two men quickly, as it only understood parts of it. It was still inexperienced
in such things as listening and spying. It watched as the tall man with red glasses began to move away from his
space, and towards the door, for some reason, out of curiosity maybe it began following and soon was behind the
man, keeping to the shadow.

Somewhere, sometime

The tall man known as Matuso, crossed his arms over his chest as he impatiently looked over the people standing in front of
him. He saw their faces, black, just like the rest of their body without any expressions, he couldn't even work out if they had
faces. He smiled at the thought, and began speaking.

"You know why you're here warriors of the shadow. You know who is your target. Go and make your dark master and me
proud. And remember she is not to be harmed. Now go and attack !"

Matuso smiled as the warriors began to disappear. "They seem to listen to you really well." said a voice behind him.

"That's the beauty of them, they are devoted to their cause like no one else, you tell them to go and jump off a bridge and
they will, they're your possession."

"I hope you will be as sincere as they are, I don't want to be chasing you over the world, you have to pay for the deed I did
for you."

Matuso looked at him, his body half visible in the shadow, only the red diamond on his forehead alighting the space around
him. "You can trust me, Matuso never breaks his word."

"I really hope so Matuso, because otherwise I would have to kill you. Now remember, I'm leaving you for now, I have better
things to take care of, but I want you to know one day I'll come back to receive my payment and you better be ready.
Otherwise you'll pay with your life."

"Understood. And may I say it was nice doing business with you."

"Good bye Matuso." and then he disappeared. Matuso turned around and not for the first time this day, he smiled.

Wenchester Country

"A bit more to the left, yes that's it, hold it, hold it ! There !" With a bang the steel bars dropped on the ground.

"It's the last one." the driver said, looking out of the window and smiling.

"Thanks a lot Jack."

"Hey no worries sir, I'm just doin my job. You're a bunch of nice folks, hope this building on of new classrooms goes well, and
remember if you have any problems we're always available."

"Thanks Jack, well keep that in mind."

"See ya then." Jack waved his hand and started the engine, slowly disappearing along the road. When he passed the gate,
Jean walked out from around the corner.

"Any problems ?" Forge asked, still looking at the road where the truck disappeared.

"None at all. It was a peace of cake creating a illusion in his head so he would think that the school is actually there, and that
we want enough material to build two schools just for few new classrooms."

"If you put it that way then, I prefer not drawing attention to ourselves."

"We all have names for it Forge, but it's still the same thing. Good luck with the job, I'm going to check on Professor and
Logan."

^Someone dropped a big rock on her toe, all right." Forge thought as he scribbled down few notes about the materials on his
pad. He turned around to see various X-Men appear from the hatch, preparing for work. With a smile, he placed the pen in his
pocket and began advising them on what to do. "First of all I need you Joseph and Rogue to move all this materials to the back.
Most of them have been left there already, this is just the leftovers." Forge spoke. As Rogue and Joseph began moving the
materials Forge was joined by Beast and Cable. They laid out their plans on a table and looked at them. "We need to start by
digging the foundations, so for now I suppose all we do is start digging." said Forge pointing at drawings on the piece of
paper.

"Agreed, my fearsome friend." Beast said sipping on a cup of coffee. "The best person to do thins would be Scott, but our
fearless leader deiced to take today off and go spying on Senator Kelly."

"Not only that, I think Jean isn't doing her best either. Connection ?" said Forge raising an eyebrow.

"Almost everyone here is having problems with their lives now." Hank said. He was about to say something else, but was
interrupted by a scream. They all looked in the direction of the sound and saw Joseph lying on the ground on a patch of ice,
metal poles all around him. Iceman was standing few steps away laughing his heart out. "Eh, okay then maybe some of us are
still ourselves." Hank said smiling.

"Tell me just how are we going to get them to work together ?"

Somewhere in the mansion

"So you guys see, I think it was a mistake to come here in the first place. I don't belong in the X-Men." Sam confessed in
front of his longtime friends. They all looked at him, their faces showing obvious worry. They were all proud of Sam, that he
made it into X-Men, and now he was telling them that it might have been a mistake. "I mean I'm treated like a rookie here, like
I don't know anything, especially by Storm. I don't want to be rude or anything, but after all I do have some experience in
leadership I mean Ah lead X-Force for so long. They could at least consider listening to what Ah say."

"Sam are you sure about this ?"

"To be honest Bobby ? I don't know. It's just that, that I don't think this is the way it should be anymore. If Ah'm gonna be a
member of the X-Men then something has to change."

"But Sam, honey, do you want to be in the X-Men ?"

"I do, but.... I begin to think X-Force is my home."

"Don't worry Sam, whatever you chose to do we'll be on your side." Tabitha said hugging Sam. He smiled.

Onto Part B of Issue #16