Issue+48+-+'Deception'


 * Issue 48 - 'Deception' **




 * Plot**

Earlier in the day before the attack on Half Moon Bay, the students and staff adjust to having their bodies back. Cameron is surprised to find himself in bed naked next to Dagan. He realizes Mac and Jubilee were using their bodies to be intimate. He slips away without waking her. Jess and Bastienne reunite, happy to be themselves again. Lucius is likewise happy to be back to normal. Billy and Ruth reconnect while Samantha spends time with her twins. Mac finds Hayley and apologizes to her for almost assaulting her. Hayley says she understands – she’s been attacked before. Mac is sad that she has such a horrible mutant ability (irresistible sexual charm). David finds Tatiana and asks her to touch Maya’s blood. He says she should have told him that she absorbs memories. He’s also tells her that she shouldn’t tell anyone what she now knows. She apologizes and seems a bit afraid of him. She touches Maya’s blood – but her ability won’t work. She can’t absorb the powers. David sends her away. He then asks Lucius about the mysterious signals being sent from the school. Lucius says he’s always scanning for them. Lucius agrees to set up a system to notify everyone next time they transmit. David then helps run Combat Club (restarted now that everyone has their bodies back). At breakfast Samantha can sense a lot of psychic tension. The body swapping has caused some broken friendships and relationships. Ginny and Gerard seem to have broken up. Classes resume.

Dane wakes up on a bus headed towards San Francisco. He checks his ticket and sees he recently came through Salt Lake City. He reaches the bus station and pays for a cab to bring him to the school. He passes the protestors and goes inside. He checks to see if his secret stashes are secure, then takes Davan from Sam, who had all three babies at lunch. While at lunch everyone’s comms go off – a signal has been sent from the lunch room. The staff searches all the students to see if they have transmitters. They don’t find any (though they discover that Dondre has pot). Dane confiscates all the cell phones to check them. David realizes the transmissions could be coming from his ankle bracelet. Dagan covers David’s class while Rafé covers Dane’s class. David asks Lucius to check out his ankle bracelet. Lucius says it’s possible that it’s transmitting the signal. Meanwhile, Dane goes through the phones and discovers a few interesting things: Pedro has Emma Frost’s personal number (though he hasn’t used it recently), Tatiana has been sending text messages to super-powered teens in New York City (in addition to the late-night phone calls), and some kids have been sexting (including his own sister!). He heads upstairs just as several students in Samantha’s mentalist collapse scream and collapse. Samantha nearly blacks out. Ruth, babysitting the twins, falls unconscious. Samantha recovers enough to have Cameron take care of her kids, then checks on the twins. Alex is screaming!

The school is under a telepathic bombardment, similar to when Maya attacked. The staff has little chance to react; Jess uses the comms to say that Half Moon Bay is overrun with zombies! David says it’s not their problem, but the rest of the eXalts want to help. Phantasma, Panzer, Bast, Blur, Glimmer, Medic, and Vortex get in the Blackbird and speed off (Jubilee can’t assist due to the bright daylight). The team reaches an area of heavy zombie attack next to a park. They destroy a few zombies and pull civilians to safety. Panzer uses his thunderclap ability to knock several zombies down. When they somehow rise back to their feet, he notices a man in a nearby building casting a spell. It soon becomes clear that there are several necromancers controlling the undead. Meanwhile, Bast is attacked by vampires that rise out of the earth. They can somehow withstand the daylight! She is badly hurt. Phantasma directs Blur and Vortex to assist. Two of the vampires (Anchorite Sect) are destroyed and the third sinks into the earth to escape. Glimmer knocks out one of the necromancers (Ancient Sect) while Panzer stuns another. The third turns into a ghost somehow and escapes.

At this time Mustang is overseeing the students back at Academy X. Everyone is brought to the cafeteria. Rafé watches the kids upstairs while the other student staff form a defensive perimeter. They’re just waiting for the sophomore class to return from a training session in the woods. Out of nowhere the school’s security system shuts down! Even the comms go dead. Vampires from three different sects (Adze, Shadow, and Siren) pour over the walls and intercept the tenth graders. The sudden appearance of Xarus surprises Mustang. Xarus says the destruction of the vampire’s blood supply will not go unpunished. He stabs Mustang, hurting him badly. Mustang manages to use his cell phone to call Phantasma. Back in Half Moon Bay, the eXalts are surprised when their comms go dead. Phantasma sees that her phone is ringing. She answers. Mustang can’t speak, but Phantasma overhears Xarus. She telepathically tells everyone that Academy X is under attack. Glimmer stays back to clean up the zombies while everyone else gets in the Blackbird.

Back at the school, the vampires target the kids, injuring many. Xarus reads Mustang’s mind and learns Ginny is his favorite student. He stabs her with his sword, staggering her. Meanwhile, the sirens charm several students. They begin attacking each other. The eXalts burst in. Bast, Blur, and Panzer attack Xarus, but are unable to hurt him. Blur brings Ginny to safety. Vortex’s concealing cloud protects his teammates. He’s left undefended, however, and is hurt by the Adze. Phantasma saves the sophomores. Medic heals Mustang, then saves a dying student. Xarus stabs Bast, leaving her dying on the ground. Xarus then reads Mustang’s mind, trying to find who Mustang considers the most powerful eXalt; it’s Panzer. Xarus unleashes a flurry of attacks on Panzer, culminating in an attack that severs his arm! At this point, Medic realizes the vampires have been enchanted. Assuming it’s a ward that protects them from sunlight, he teams up with Amanda to nullify the spell. Mustang manages to create a burst of sunlight. The vampires turn into ash. Xarus transforms into a snow storm to flee. Before he leaves, Phantasma enters his mind and changes his memories: he now thinks Hellfire Club: Tokyo’s Crimson Branch is responsible for the destruction of the blood supply, not the eXalts! He enters the ground and escapes. The battle is over.

Mac heals the wounded. He can’t help reattach Dane’s arm, however, and the headmaster’s regeneration won’t help either! Dane puts his severed arm into frozen storage for now. Sam checks on her twins – they’re okay. She wakes Ruth. Ruth says the telepathic attack blocked her precognition. Bastienne hurries to Half Moon Bay to help Dagan, but the battle there is over, too. Cameron rounds up the kids hiding in the woods. David finds Jess in the security room – she’s not breathing! He performs CPR and saves her. One of the Shadow Sect vampires used his powers to suffocate her and left her for dead before dismantling the school’s security system. Billy goes into town and grabs an unconscious Ancient Sect vampire before S.H.I.E.L.D. takes it into custody. At the staff meeting that night, the group discusses what to do about Nicholas, the vampires, and the mysterious transmissions. There is a lot of argument over what to do with Nicholas. Lucius says he’s working on a way to help him. He leaves the meeting to continue his research (happy to avoid the arguments). David and Dane agree that Nick should be turned over to S.H.I.E.L.D. Jess says that S.H.I.E.L.D. will only use Hope on him, like they did with the Guardians. Jess and Bastienne argue that they can’t hand him over. Mac is also uncomfortable with the idea. After much heated discussion, they agree to keep him locked in the Danger Room (and sedated, if need be) until the east coast school decides if they can take him.

Next the group locks the captured vampire in Jubilee’s cell (now that she has the freedom to move about). Sam goes into his mind. She finds the trigger that would erase his memories and removes it. She then unearths a great deal of information. She learns that the Ancient Sect makes their haven in a funeral home. He doesn’t know where the other vampires’ havens are. He does know that the Moksha Sect used the ancient scrolls (formerly from the Millennium Tower) to make the vampires immune to sunlight for a time. He believes they could also use the sects to make vampires immune to all vampiric weaknesses. She is unable to learn more at that point. Later in the week, however, she learns that the Ancient Sect vampire was spying on Xarus. He learned that Xarus is possibly keeping Dracula’s head underwater near the Seikan Tunnel in Japan. Hellfire Club: Tokyo (Ebon Branch) has already acquired Dracula’s body. The group decides to trade the information to Maki Matsumodo, Ebon Shogun of Hellfire Club: Tokyo. She makes a deal with Dane: for the location of the body, she agrees to kill Xarus and stop the spread of the X-gene injections. Her condition is that Dane accompany her on the mission to find Dracula’s head in case it’s a trap. Dane agrees. He accompanies the strike team that enters the Seikan Tunnel. They find a flooded escape tunnel that contains the head. They fight off Atlantean Sect vampires and Nosferatu Sect vampires to claim the prize. Maki then reunites the head with the body and Dracula is reborn! He swears vengeance on his son Xarus and hurries away.

Back at Academy X the school’s prom goes off without any problems. Cameron is contacted by Evangeline Whedon, the school’s lawyer, with a plea bargain. He can agree to take Hope and be released on parole. He refuses. Cameron then organizes the kids to complete the school’s escape tunnel. Meanwhile, James Sangrey of the Peaceful Coexistence Party repudiates the actions of the Mutant Revolutionary Front. Xavier’s School contacts Bastienne with news: X-Corporation: New York has a program to help troubled mutants. They’ll take Nicholas – and Zach! The headmasters agree. Former Academy X student Hugo meets the mutants and brings them back east. Cameron and Mac manage to narrow down the source of the transmissions – it’s Jess! While working on the project, Mac realizes Lucius has been experimenting with vampire blood. Is he drinking it or testing it on himself? Dane returns and decrypts the signals Jess has been unwittingly sending – they’re compressed recordings of everything she’s heard. At the end of that week, Dracula appears at the gate. He asks to enter and holds up Xarus’ severed head. Once inside he tells the Academy X staff that Xarus wasn’t working alone. He was working for a man in a wheelchair named Kaga. Dracula learned Kaga’s endgame: the destruction of all mutants!

**Next:** Issue 49 - 'Devil Town' **Previous:** Issue 47 - 'Sick Things'