Giovanna M. Bennet (burnwithlight) wrote in marvel_nextgen,
@ 2011-07-06 19:29:00

Entry tags:

giovanna bennet, rikki cargill, sengai senyaka

History Lesson
Gio called both Rikki and Sengai into the workout room. She was in her workout clothes, but had her laptop and a little projector.

"I think there's something I need to cover with both of you."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-06 10:04 pm UTC (link)
	Sengai stands patiently. He thought this was a training exercise so he had dressed as such. He nodded in understanding, making no move to rush her. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-06 10:12 pm UTC (link)
	Rikki was likewise dressed in her workout clothes. "What's up, Gio?" (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-06 10:16 pm UTC (link)

"I've been giving Sengai some history lessons since no one ever taught him properly about the mutant-human conflict. I thought another session before our workout today might be good. It's an important one." She takes a breath. "The First Stryker Crusade"

Something besides 'Magneto had to put the hurt on some sick bastards,' which she suspects is all Aunt Joanna ever told Rikki.

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-06 10:24 pm UTC (link)
	Sengai's eyes narrow. "Stryker, a name my father said only with great vehemence. Considering my father's bloodthirstiness, such contempt was astounding." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-06 10:27 pm UTC (link)
	Rikki tensed slightly at the mention of the name. "That fla--- that bastard?" she growled. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-06 10:34 pm UTC (link)

"Yeah. That bastard. Everything horrible you've heard is true. But I'm going to take it from the top."

She turns on the projector, and a photograph is put up on the wall. A playground, at night, And, hanged from the swingset, the bodies of two children. Girl and boy. Nine and ten. Clearly African-American, but only 'clearly' mutant because of the sign wrapped around them dripping the word 'Mutie'.

"This was what Magneto found on the trail of operatives of the Stryker Crusade, a movement that had the public support of thousands of Americans. Magneto had to bury the children himself, because when he found their parents, they'd been killed first."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-06 10:38 pm UTC (link)
	Sengai said nothing, though the audible sound of his knuckles cracking could be heard. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-06 10:41 pm UTC (link)
	There was the slight crack of the floor as Rikki's weight increased alongside her density. Her fists were clenched so tightly her arms were trembling. She knew this story, had heard it countless times as a child. It never failed to both raise her anger... and her hope. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-06 10:47 pm UTC (link)

Gio presses the button. William Stryker, at one of his churches, surrounded by a huge, excited crowd.

"The Rev. William Stryker, a former military colonel turned evangelist minister. Later research has discovered that he most likely murdered his wife for giving birth to a baby with obvious mutations. The baby's death was probably him, too, though the coroner's report was inconclusive."

She takes another breath. This is difficult to talk about. "The public movement was incredibly successful. Huge rallies. Constant funding for their 'churches'. No investigation into their criminal activity by authorities, superheroes, or, initially, anyone but Magneto -- and also, we hear, a few members of the 'Mutant Underground' whose fears were dismissed by other supposed 'mutant supporters' despite the great availability of evidence."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-06 10:51 pm UTC (link)
	"I've seen such fanaticism from Tamil extremists and Hindu zealots back home. People so consumed by their beliefs are people governments are reluctant to stop. Sadly such individuals tend to find a lot of support among the average citizen. Support governments don't have the spine to ignore." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-06 11:00 pm UTC (link)
	"Even by flatscan standards, that man was scum," Rikki growled. "No... he doesn't even deserve to be called a flatscan. He's worse than that even. A nonscan." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-06 11:03 pm UTC (link)

She nods to Sengai, then to Rikki. "Agreed, but let's watch the language otherwise?" Gio gives Rikki a 'please? for Andrew?' look.

"For the next phase of his plan, Stryker ordered the kidnapping of Charles Xavier and Cyclops and Storm of the X-Men. He tortured the latter two in order to help him break Xavier as part of a brainwashing process, from which he used Xavier's psionic abilities to power a weapon."

"In order to take on Stryker, Magneto met with the X-Men and convinced them to put aside all philosophical arguments in order to deal with this scum and his threat to our entire race."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-06 11:21 pm UTC (link)
	"Wait a minute, just how did Stryker capture 3 such powerful mutants? Did he have some sort of power-cancellation technology?" (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-06 11:23 pm UTC (link)
	Gio did know her weaknesses, didn't she? "Always did wonder about that myself," Rikki admitted. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-07 01:03 am UTC (link)

"No power dampeners, just some U.S. military-grade weapons. They ambushed them while they were in civilian clothing." It was pretty pathetic, but Andrew'd asked her to go easy on the X-Men, so she would.

"Stryker's psionically-powered weapon had a gradually expanding field effect. Every mutant for blocks around start to collapse in pain. Headaches and nosebleeds to begin with, but it would eventually have been fatal, even as the effect expanded to include the whole city, the country, the world. Stryker murdered one of his own assassins when her nose started bleeding, indicating a latent mutation. Not that the baby-killing bitch gets any sympathy from me."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-07 01:20 am UTC (link)
	"I see," was all Sengai said. His tone had a deadly coldness to it. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-07 01:25 am UTC (link)
	"Scumsucking son of a bitch..." Rikki growled. "That's just cold." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-07 01:32 am UTC (link)

"Yeah. I guess once you kill your wife and kid, betraying your followers is pretty easy. Anyway, Magneto and the X-men fought off Stryker's forces, freed the captives, and went up to where Stryker was leading quite a mob in order to confront him. The X-Man Shadowcat, then fourteen years old, attacked him verbally, exposing the complete intellectual and moral bankruptcy of his philosophy so clearly only the stupidest people imaginable could not see it -- which was, of course, many in the crowd. Stryker's response to was to attempt to shoot her through the heart.
..but then he was shot himself."

Gio pauses. She's pretty sure that Aunt Joanna never told Rikki this part. "...By a human."

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-07 01:41 am UTC (link)
	This wasn't particularly shocking to Sengai. Granted having a human mother he adored may have colored his opinion on the level of surprise Gio's revelation merited. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-07 08:50 pm UTC (link)
	Rikki's already dark features darkened several steps further. "What... is... this... blasphemy?!" (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

burnwithlight
2011-07-07 08:57 pm UTC (link)

Gio frowns. "It's not blasphemy when it's true, Rikki. It was a human who took him down. When the other humans started to turn on him for it --because of course they turned on him; mobs always do -- he simply said 'He was about to shoot an unarmed little girl. If that's the word of God, it's changed since I was in Sunday School,' and they backed off. Of course, that was probably more because he still had a gun than the fact that the mob was seeing sense. But yeah, a human fired the shot, depriving Stryker's movement any attempt at martyrdom or further villification of Magneto and mutantkind. Do you think I would make this up?"

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	whoholdsthewhip 2011-07-07 09:01 pm UTC (link)
	"So you're saying that in the end it was a human that ended the Stryker Crusade? I can see why my father never mentioned it. The implications are..significant." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	burnwithlight 2011-07-07 09:09 pm UTC (link)
	"A human who was willing to use force and stand his ground against the mob, yes," Gio specifies, knowing that the Xavier end of things probably don't stress the whole truth on that part, and the whole truth was what she was going for here. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	anger_issues 2011-07-07 09:10 pm UTC (link)
	"Mother... Mother always told me that Lord Magneto slew Stryker," Rikki breathed. She clenched her fist. "One moment of clarity does not prove much. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	burnwithlight 2011-07-07 09:12 pm UTC (link)
	"Aunt Joanna's many fine qualities do not include being good at history. He didn't have to. No mutant ever laid a hand on Stryker, which Andrew tells me was very politically convenient in bringing down the movement." (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)