X-Men: Red "A Simple Game of Chess"

Part 2 of 4

Originally published as The Darker Side #3 : A Simple Game of Chess and as
X-Writer's Saga 

by Chris Delaney 

Before I decided to do a second arc, I published this as an epilogue to
the X-writers Saga.  It more properly belongs here.  If you have seen it
before, please ignore.  Note, the next post will be somewhat similar to
the published X-Men #51, but will have new material.



Hello.  While the X-Writer's stuff that I was most prolific with was the
Wolverine/X-Men issues, the stuff I was the msot proud of was my Darker
Side stuff.  I had originally begun this issue as a reaction to comments
that I couldn't write an entire issue that wasn't filled with all sorts of
massive events.  So I set an entire issue around some very minor events
and focused on atmosphere.  So this is to give pople an idea of the other
side of my X_Writer's writing.  

Between this and part 10 of the story, there was another issue (Cable #27)
which has been omitted as it is the piece of work everyone agrees was
absolutley terrible.  The next positive comment on it I see, will be the
first.  All one has to know from that issue is that Cable tired to
assassinate the Shadow King (and failed).  Oh, and Genesis had put a
sleeper personality in Domino back when he had captued and was torturing
her.

The woman who Mr. Sinister and the Shadow King discuss is Rogue  and the quips about the red head suggest that not all
is as wrong with Jean as we think, in my version of the story at least.  


Prelude 

	I glanced across the table at the beautiful features of my 
opponent as she strove to counter my latest move.  I admired 
her rich black hair and the ripe body beneath the black leather.  
Hellfire women always dressed as prostitutes and Selene was no 
exception.  What was disconcerting with her was that she 
actually enjoyed it; as opposed to Emma would had used it or 
Tessa who had endured it.  

	I sipped a glass of rich red wine. It was the colour of blood I 
noticed in an amused fashion.  Selene missed few opportunities 
to make a point to me.  I watched with amusement as she took 
my pawn with her knight; it reminded me too much of that night 
at the rally.  Cable had come for me then, although what could 
have told him I was there I am still not certain.  All that saved 
me that night was his arrogance, the treachery of his mate and 
his morals.  In short, I was saved by plain old luck.  I replaced 
the glass of wine; the thought had made it go sour in my mouth.  

	I had sacrificed a pawn in a desperate game of mental 
effort.  I had been a fool earlier and I admitted it now; much as I 
enjoyed the devastation of the Savage Land it had cost me too 
much.  Made me weak and vulnerable and that was not to be 
tolerated.  When Cable had come I had barely held the illusion 
against his mighty telepathy and if his little tramp hadn't turned 
on him...  But then that wasn't entirely accidental was it?  I am 
always amazed at how stupid my contemporaries are!  Imagine 
Genesis thinking that crude mental hack job would hold; but 
now it would hold through anything.  Just the beginning of my 
vengeance on you, Nathan Summers, just the beginning.

	I stared at the board considering my next move.  Selene 
murmered and twisted opposite to me.  I laughed and she 
looked mildly offended.  Beta female to alpha male; Selene 
comes from an earlier age of this planet.  How simple the head-
blind can be.  Do they understand so little about the way the 
mind works?

	Still, Selene is not an opponent to be underestimated.  
When I returned from the Rally of the Friends of Humanity, I 
was weak and exhausted and in no shape to wage a ptiched battle.  She was 
waiting for me; a snake waiting to strike at the intruder who 
dared covet her territory.  This was no Candra to amaze the 
world with her stupidity; this was Selene who had fed on the 
souls of men before I was even conceived.  Weak as I was, 
she had nearly proved my match.  I overcome her, but at a 
tremendous cost. However in the act of victory I had gained her 
loyalty.  For as long as I remained strong that is.

	I watched as she slowly licked her lips with her tongue 
while her hand strayed across her body.  Sex was one pleasure I 
had never been much inclined towards.  My conquest of Jean 
Grey had been an act of violence and of domination.  But this 
woman - she could excite me as no other ever had.  Perhaps it 
was because we were so much alike.  

	I moved a bishop across the board and Selene's knight 
fell.  I remembered the second part of my vengeance on Cable.  
The mad dash to contact Gyrich as a respected Democratic 
Senator.  He couldn't overlook the possibility of bipartisan 
support for his projects and so he had seen me on short notice.  
So glad that Senator Henry of North Dakota was willing to 
discuss sentinels with him.  He was mine before he even knew 
it; a slave of the Shadow King.  Poor weak little human, he was 
no match for ME.  I ordered the infection of Cable with his 
soul-brothers Legacy (all three versions just to be sure) as it 
suited my sense of irony.  Then he had vanished.  But I was 
confident.  Cable had better learn to come back from the dead 
because no possibility of a cure existed given his previous 
infection.  I smiled.  

	I glanced at the picture of Senator John Picard.  He had 
been a weak man who had been swayed into my camp by fear 
and uncertainty.  His right wing constituency was heavily 
influenced by the Friends of Humanity and he felt he had to 
appease them by making an appearance.  A weak man and one 
easily sacrificed to prevent MY death.  Stupid Cable, in his 
weakness he had killed a man who might have supported him 
eventually, a good man who was too weak to do what he 
thought was right.    

	Selene moved her king forward one space.  Hemmed in 
by her own pieces the White King is in more danger from her 
own pieces than from mine.  I laugh, our kings are in 
opposition, just like you and me Charles Xavier, you and me.  
The problem is that you never understood the rules of the game 
and that is why I must always triumph.  You can beat me a 
thousand times Xavier, but so long as darkness resides in the 
human soul I will be there.  Oh, I can be killed or banished, but 
your own weakness robs you of the decisive edge needed to 
strike for the kill.  Or the raw power. 

	I remember Phoenix and the fear as I faced her power 
unbound at last.  I had just killed Erik Lensherr and make no 
mistake he was dead.  A piece of meat with no soul inside: his 
mind banished to where the head-blind go when they die.  I had 
always thought it would be oblivion but Phoenix had reached 
across a barrier I could never conceive of breaching and brought 
Magneto back.  Then she had incinerated my body with a blast 
of telekinetic fury.  Had she used her telepathy it is not certain 
that I would be alive today.  The red haired witch; I would make 
her pay the ultimate price for her defiance.  But I was patient 
and now was not the time.  I could wait.

	I move a pawn forward.  One more move and this lowly 
pawn will be a Queen.  Selene reacts like lightening, moving a 
rook to threaten my Queen.  I laugh.  Too late little Black 
Queen.  I move my knight and it is over.  

	"Checkmate." I observe.

	"I see milord... it appears you have proven too much for 
me." she replies coyly.  I almost laugh to see her play the 
innocent.  She reaches across and touches me and it is like an 
electric spark between us.  Our lips meet and I crush her to me.  

	I am hungry and it is time to sate my hunger.


Main  

	I had almost refused the invitation to the club.  It was 
rare that I interacted with these degenerates.  Shaw had some 
spine but lacked the vision to see beyond sheets of numbers to 
the more complicated patterns around him.  He had been the 
best of the lot.  Even the doomed crusader Magneto had cared 
too much about those he would dominate to be of any real use 
in my schemes.  
 
	But this invitation had come from a Senator who had 
mysteriously survived a shooting that had felled Cable.  Sources 
inside the government painted a disturbing picture; as if he had 
been the target but had been ignored for some strange reason.  
A celebrity overnight, was it true he had arranged for Cable to 
be destroyed?  Unlikely, and yet some things could only be 
explained if he had...

	No matter.  I had destroyed a Senator who had tried to 
use a mutant power to manipulate before.  Impersonated him 
before all of the Senate and made him into the evil mutant he 
was warning others about.  And when the worm had lacked the 
spine to take his own life... well let's just say ricochet is a 
killer.  I smiled as I entered the building.  

	I wore the outward appearance of Val Cooper's ex-
husband, a tall and impeccably dressed black man.  I had worn it for many
years as her spouse.  A fine woman, it was a shame I had to leave her
behind but ambition called and she would have begun to suspect sooner or
later.  I handed my invitation to a scantily clad waitress and watched as
she grew pale.  She led me through the crowd below, degenerates playing 
at evil, to the chambers above.  I walked into a dimly lit room 
and assumed my true form.

	I saw a handsome fellow on a chair with a raven-tressed 
woman at his feet.  How medieval.  This sort of ruffian would 
be easy to manipulate... my mind raced as I thought of possible 
schemes that I could use this little toy for.  Then I recognised 
the woman... and I screamed.  I was almost fast enough to 
escape line of sight.

	He hammered through my mental defences like a hot, 
blazing knife through butter.  I sought to generated an energy 
blast to finish him off but he continued his ceaseless assault; 
depriving me of my ability to respond.  I had thought nobody 
was capable of this... but to have tamed Selene...  Only once 
before had I been this helpless, as En Sabah Nuhr had moulded 
me into the man I now was.  But that had been a birth, a 
coming of age and the acceptance of power.  This was a 
breaking; a humbling.  

	I resisted but it was futile.  If only I had brought a psi-screen with
me, but I hadn't and so was helpless before him.  I saw amusement
flicker across the face of the man.  Damn him.  Damn him to hell.  I 
fell to my knees against my will.

	"It is a sad day when you are one of the great master-
minds we have to fear Sinister.  How long ago was it that you 
couldn't even get a skin sample from Scott Summers?"  He 
laughed, mocking me.  I struggle but it is useless.  He is just too 
strong.

	"I...know...your...name..." 

	"I don't doubt it.  But that is not why I summoned you 
here.  If I had wanted to look at incompetents I would have 
Candra around as a trophy.  What a waste... beautiful body, 
immortality, powerful TK and the mind of a retarded gerbil.  Ah 
well, life has it's little disappointments.  If I were you I would be 
praying that you are not one as well!"  He sipped at a glass filled 
with a deep red liquid.  "It is too bad I don't care to release you.  
You are missing a most exquisite wine."  He smiled and 
caressed Selene.  This was different than his normal pattern.  
This was something I could use...

	"I don't think so my good Essex.  So, be a good boy and 
behave yourself and you will still have a mind left when you 
leave.  Otherwise...  well, let's say I can extract anything I want.  
It is just a matter of how much pain you want to endure in the 
process."

	"What... do... you... want..." I mutter.

	"What are you planning for the X-Men?"

	"Nothing... I swear it... I mean... AAIIIIEEEEEE!"

	"Wrong answer.  Don't lie to me, Sinister, I don't like it."

	I begin to talk, the truth spilling out as I babbled to him 
of genetic potential and the need to cultivate the Summers line.  
Of plans and schemes and traitors and of a betrayal most foul.  
Then he stopped me, the bored expression leaving his face.  

	"What do you plan to do with her afterwards?"  My 
mind races.  What could he possibly want with her?

	"Her Kree physiology makes any attempt to control her 
problematic and couple that with her power..."

	"I know this.  What are you doing with her after you 
finish the analysis?"

	"Blowing her head off and dropping her body in a ditch 
somewhere was the plan." I admit.  

	"Nonsense.  What a waste.  What do you think Selene?  
Should we prevent this waste of genetic resources?  Do we have 
need of a new convert?"

	"The girl can be useful.  Her mind is weak and her 
unusual make-up will prove no barrier to your power, my love.  
I say we take her and make her ours."  She smiles and I am 
reminded of a venomous snake curled up around a branch.  I 
shudder at the comparison, a sign of how badly this mental 
assault has affected me.

	"So be it."  He pierces my shields once again and roams 
around while I am helpless.  Who could ever have dreamed a 
telepath could ever be this powerful.  I fight him but it is hope-
less...

- - - - - - - - 

	I stare at the grey buildings on the busy street and strive 
to recall why I am here.  This is most disconcerting to suddenly 
forget... no, wait I remember.  It is time to pay a visit to an old 
associate.  How silly of me I must have taken a wrong turn 
somewhere.  For a second a foreboding feeling strikes me.  As 
if I am being watched combined with the trace of a just 
forgotten notion.  It is nothing and I dismiss it.  

	I mock myself.  It is my own vanity that gets me into 
trouble. Sometimes, even after all these years or perhaps 
because of them, I forget I am only human.  I remember a weak 
man named Paris Bennet who had once trusted me and the 
price he had paid for not paying attention.  For his own vanity 
in his need for an ideological successor.  I must be careful, I am 
playing for the highest stakes possible and there are no second 
chances.   I walk down the street contemplating my plans for a 
certain X-woman.  I have delayed them too long and I have 
decided to enact them now.  Curious that I would think of this 
now given why I am here but I guess sometimes things just 
work out well.  But a little voice somewhere whispers that there 
are no coincidences.  I shiver despite the heat.  



	I thought it would never happen.  That I would never have a tool
this powerful just deliver itself into my hands. The poor Shadow King,
like most men he figured a woman's mind goes to mush when romance beckons.
Fool!  He has worn the shape of a woman and he should know better.  But no
matter.  He is mine and that is all that matters. 


Epilogue  

	I watch Essex as he fades into the distance.  This is 
where I am most comfortable, in the shadows and pulling the 
strings.  What a stroke of luck that Mr. Sinister was gullible 
enough to come here thinking he could use me.  I planted just 
enough to tease and tantalise, to reel him into me.  To where he 
couldn't resist.  Now he departs not even remembering that he 
fell at my hands.  I smile and laugh at the irony of it all; the 
schemer trapped inside another schemes.

	I hear Selene behind me and I smile again.  I never 
realised it could be like this before.  Never understood all those 
foolish cattle and their silly panderings to each other.  But this 
woman, she puts my blood on fire.  I think of her and I 
suddenly want to be with her again with all my soul.  But I put 
the feeling aside to watch the dying of the day and the coming 
of the night.  My night.

	I watch as the sky turns blood red and the light of day 
falls before the pervading shadows.  Blood red slowly fades into 
grey twilight and then pitch black emerges.  The blackness of 
my soul, of my dream unleashed on the world.  There is a world 
out there, rich in pain and anguish.  Filled with those who are 
weak and helpless and cannot defend themselves.  The cattle 
roam, not realising the wolf is already among them.  And I am 
hungry.



Chris Delaney   Department of Mathematics- Lakehead University
"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent" - I. Asimov

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