It began, as all things do, in the dark parts of the world, in a place tucked far away from the lights of the city, away from prying eyes. The shadows dipped down from a flawless night, flowing into the thin corridors between the buildings and burying the complex in deep darkness. She moved through this darkness like a cat, swift and sure in her steps, silently progressing through the abandoned alleyways.

Kneeling down at the mouth of the alley, she pressed her back against the corrugated steel wall and hugged her knees to her chest. A voice whispered in her ear, clearly enunciated and free of static. "Registering two different sets of heat signatures in the courtyard. One is moving southbound along the western wall. The other is walking a northbound pass along the opposite. Based on movement patterns, the two should intersect in the courtyard in three-point-oh seconds."

She pounced forward from the darkness, rolling out into the center of the courtyard and coming to a rest with her chest pressed against the cold ground. Her hands twisted instinctively toward her lower back, pulling her guns from the pair of padded holsters that criss-crossed just above her buttocks. Extending both arms to the side, she counted off the last beat and squeezed the dual triggers. The guards dropped silently, unaware of the intruder or the bullets that streamed toward them. Planting her feet back beneath her, she called back, "Check on the guards. How's my timetable?"

"You're still on schedule. No need to steal time just yet," the voice called back over the ear-mounted comm, and she could hear the rapid click of typing in the background. Again, she found herself astonished at the clarity of the technology, but there was little time to muse over it as her handler came back and said, "Thirty feet to the north-northeast. The big doors are a fake, but there's a single-person entrance next to the stack of crates on the right. Head for that one and wait for the guard rotation."

She fell into line without question, creeping along the outer rim of the shadows until she reached the building at the opposite side of the courtyard. She paused for a few seconds, allowing her breath to stabilize before climbing to the top of the crates and using them to springboard the overhang of rafters the stretched above the door. Wrapping her hands around the boards, she hoisted her body upward and inverted, staring down at the door below and waiting for her moment to arrive.

The door swung open slowly, the pressure arm extending to its fullest before refusing to let the door open any further. A pair of soldiers stepped through the void, rifles shouldered as they entered the courtyard. Acting on instinct once more, she pressed away from the wall, twisting through the air until she collided with the soldiers and forced them face-down into the dirt. Refusing them quarter, she snapped one neck and then the other before rolling backward and catching the door just before it snapped closed. Smiling to herself, she whispered, "I've got entry. See you boys inside."

In another location entirely, the night was not so absolute. The rich beats of festival music echoed across the night, dulled to a thin thumping by the thick plaster of the hotel walls, but lively none-the-less. The young man took little joy from the music. Instead, he felt isolated from the world outside, choked off from the streaming of life that passed beneath the window. His attentions were focused elsewhere, to a patch of land that lay far beyond the city limits, a patch of land that few could attest to knowing about.

"Switchback's inside," he said, turning away from the bevy of computer screens that lined the steeped roof. His hand went absently to his eyes, lifting his glasses from his nose and wiping the sleep from the corners. He wished he could do the same for the stress. "Not a moment too soon, if you ask me. The timetable's getting tighter, but we're still well within parameters. I think we're clear to move ahead with phase two."

His companion smiled as he relaxed in a rocking chair. The man tilted back and forth with a relaxed pace, paying little heed to the urgency of the situation. There was little room for worry in his line of work, and he wasted little time with it. Tapping his fingers along the arm of the chair, the man said, "Go ahead and send in Slowburn. Urge him to use caution in his approach. Too much is lost to a careless haste."

Circuit nodded slowly and turned back toward his computer bank. With a thought, the monitors shunted from one image to another, shifting from Switchback's positioning to that of another. Slipping back into handler mode, Circuit called forth, "Hospice Center to operative two. You have the green light to proceed, but take it slow and easy. The first operative should be underground already, and we don't need to bring the roof down upon her head."

The man in the rocking chair nodded as he felt a wave of relief sweep over Circuit, and the man could only assume that the second operative had confirmed his positioning and orders. Rocking slowly, the man tendered, "You seem troubled tonight, Circuit - a bit pensive, if you will. Is there something on your mind?"

"Just not comfortable with all this, I suppose. Of course, I'm never all that comfortable, but this time in particular, it just doesn't feel right. Call it a hunch or call it superstition, but I'm not gonna breathe easy until all of this is said and done," Circuit replied, leaning back in his own chair and switching his gaze from screen to screen with quick succession. "Don't get me wrong, I trust you implicitely, Parker. I just don't think it's kosher when we're working on a whim and trying to make something from nothing."

The other man remained calm, keeping a cool gaze focused on the technician. Folding his hands across his lap, he responded, "We do what we can, when we can. Until the network is rebuilt, we can't be everywhere at once, nor can we always work with complete information. That's why we're here - to complete the information and move on from there."

The technician shrugged, not knowing what to think of the response, but knowing that it didn't truly answer his concerns. "Well, basic topography isn't giving up much in the way of information. The compound is built on ground that is loaded with ferrous ore, so it's not on the most ideal ground for radio communications. Non-traditional communications procedures are possible, but I'm not turning up anything on the band analysis. Other than the fact that we've already encountered resistance, I would say that we're barking down a ghost town."

Parker Coleman thought about this for a minute. In the time that he'd been in charge of the Mutant Underground, he'd watched the numbers dwindle silently but surely, and there wasn't much he could do to stop it. Still, it was time to move the Underground back into the forefront of mutant politics, and he intended to make of it everything that Xavier had originally imagined the Underground capable of. "In our line of work, information is the only true commodity. Whoever has the most controls the game. If we're going to continue - in any capacity - we need to start coming out on top."

Circuit nodded without a direct response. He knew, if anything, his companion would know what was running through his mind - at least on an subconscious emotional level. Shifting back toward the view screens, the technician reached out with his mind and rotated between his active operatives, keeping a close eye on the situation and praying that nothing got out of hand.

A cool breeze thundered down the mountain, twisting through the trees and tearing the loose gravel away from the ground in a sideways funnel. Aside from the whipping of the wind and tumble of small stones, the night was silent, and he took great care to keep it that way. His mind was twenty seconds ahead of his feet, keeping an eye out for obstacles and trying to compensate for the speed differential. The scenery blurred by in his peripheral, but his eyes were focused forward, watching the road. Any twist in the landscape could upset his footing, throw off the beat of his movement, and send him into a dangerous tailspin. There was no room for mistakes, and he was determined not to make any.

After only a few seconds, the compound appeared through the dense foliage and he skidded to a halt. The blast of cold air closed in around him, filling the vacuum he had created in his steps. Kneeling down to the base of the fence, he paused to allow warmth to return to his system before engaging his comm unit and saying, "I've got visual on the compound now. No resistance in sight on the topside. Please advise."

"Operative two, word of our arrival seems to have preceded us, so it's your job to cut off the escape routes. There is a landing strip five-hundred feet west of your present location. It's a simple grass strip, masked by trees on all sides and spills out at an intersection point with a waterfall on the Amazon. All aircraft on that strip are to be disabled using minimal force against staff on the strip." Circuit's voice was distant and steady, forcing Slowburn to wonder if the technician had any sense of flexibility in his job at all. "Copy?"

Slowburn knelt forward, stretching one leg backward and setting himself for another burst of speed. The air around him cooled into that of a crisp autumn morning despite the wretched humidity of the rainforest. As the cold air raised goosebumps on his flesh, the young man burst forward, placing one foot in front of the other until he could no longer tell when one foot was moving forward and the other falling behind. His slipstream burned around edge of the compound, and he could hear the air snapping around him, but kept his speed just below the sound barrier, trying to maintain some semblance of anonymity during this infiltration operation.

The landing strip was easy enough to find. Hidden from the air, it was likely that the owners of the compound decided that no further masking was needed. Slowburn smiled to himself when he saw the grouping of planes lined up neatly, four on each side of the strip. A handful of mechanics were moving at a turtle's pace between the planes, making the final preparations for departure. A blur of color against the darkness, Slowburn moved between them, snapping his fingers next to the ears of each mechanic and playing havoc with the equilibrium of their inner ear fluids. When the last of the mechanics had dropped in an unconscious pile, Slowburn ground to a stop and smiled once more.

"Alright, so I'm removing nuts and bolts, draining fuel into the rainforest - as much a travesty as that is - and other ensuing chaos shortly. I'm complete on my part. What's next?" Slowburn said, planning his course of attack on the waiting planes.

Inside the compound awaited a labyrinth. With each step she'd taken, the static in her ear had grown steadily, and she finally resolved to stuffing the earpiece in her pocket. For the moment, she was left to a blind endeavor.

Reaching into a side pouch, she extracted a pinch of finely-ground sand and let it loose into the air. The subtle air currents of the corridor caught the granules and filtered them to the left. Knowing that an air filtration system was closely tied into her objective, she turned in the source direction of the air current and began a methodical approach. Cut off from her handler, she wasn't anxious to run into any surprise opposition.

Her mind drifted as she walked, sorting through the sordid details of the life that existed beyond the spandex and beyond the details of mutant/human politics. There was too little time to concentrate on keeping up that life. Stupid things like paying the rent on time, making sure the milk was used or disposed of before it hit expiration, or taking a mental health day for herself became huge hurdles to jump over. And somehow, she couldn't remember whether or not she'd fed the cat before catching the plane from Boston to D.C.

The sound of a gun cocking called her attention back to the task at hand, and she slid her legs back, falling to the floor face-first with her body in a decreasing incline. Twisting as she fell, she reached for her own guns and closed her eyes. A dull throb began from behind her eyes, spreading out into her mind as she mentally reached out and tugged at the temporal ley lines that laid around her. Opening her eyes once more, she watched as time marched backward around her and the world became spectres, retracing a route it had already walked. She remained in place and released her hold on the reins of time, allowing it to resume its due course once more.

This time, things were different. A sentry walked around the corner from a side cooridor, obviously working his rounds. Previously, he had caught her unaware. This time, he was captured in the sights of her pistols before he even had the chance to catch his bearings. Twin blasts of air erupted from the muzzles of her guns and seconds later sent the sentry sprawling to the floor lifelessly. Holstering her weapons once again, she made a mental note to replace the silencers when she got back to the hospice.

"Very nice, chere. But you t'ink you were a bit excessive with them boys?" A voice called from above. She rolled onto her feet and glanced toward the ceiling, finding herself face-to-face with the inverted, hanging form of a man with red eyes. As she once again reached for her weapons, the other man added, "Not everybody know they're workin' for the bad guys, non? Better to give them the benefit of a doubt."

As she brought her guns to their aiming position, the man in the trenchcoat dismounted from the ceiling and landed noiselessly on his feet. Keeping her fingers against the triggers, she replied, "I'm not here for debate, Cajun, and you're standing in my way. We can play the pleasantries game later, if you want, but for now, I have a job to do. If you don't mind."

A wry smile spread across his face, and she had expected nothing less. The Cajun was reknowned for his sense of humor in the face of adversity. Of course, that depended on whether or not he considered her adversarial. Bowing deep, Gambit shot back, "After all dis time, you still haven't forgiven me for that time in Milan, eh? C'est la vie. I won't lose sleep if you don't. But about your mission - bad news on that, chere. All dis be a dead end."

She lowered the pistols but kept her hands wrapped firmly around the grips, ready to raise them at any point. She didn't trust the Cajun, and she made no effort to hide that fact. Still, she had to admit that his statement held her curiosity. "Out with it, LeBeau. I'm not in the mood for your games, and I'm less in the mood for whatever bullshit you feel like feeding me. What exactly are you trying to tell me?"

"Dis facility is used for the shifting of material resources from one place to another. T'ink of it as a waystation in the middle of a shippin' route. But d'ere's nothing here, and you'd think they'd have some of de goods lyin' around, non? Nothin'." Gambit paused in his speech, gazing anxiously down one end of the corridor to the other. "All the equipment is still here, but there's no staff and no goods. Someone left in an awful big hurry, left their toys behind, and we just caught them on their way out the back door. So, it makes ya wonder, why are there still guards lookin' over de place, eh?"

In her years working these operations, working behind the shadows and shying away from the light, she had taught herself to always ask these questions. Now, she silently chastised herself for ignoring the obvious. This was a set-up. The guns were raised and ready in a flash, and she whirled back toward the complex entrance. Her back turned to the Cajun, she asked, "What are we looking at? Armed opposition or something worse?"

"Ain't it always something worse?"

"She's been under too long. She should have re-established radio contact long ago," Circuit said, interrupting the silence that had spread between himself and Panic. Switching the comm-link direction, he said, "Hospice to Operative Two. I need an immediate sweep of central grounds. Look for signs of intrusion by opposition forces and/or possible ambush awaiting operative one. Keep us apprised."

"She's fine. Switchback is the example of professional, and I'm sure we have nothing to worry about. Keep Slowburn on the perimeter and make sure that he doesn't engage the complex directly. I have an ill feeling regarding their escape," Parker replied from behind the technician. He rose quietly to his feet and took up vigil overlooking the monitor bank, searching for indications that there was something they'd missed. "Sweep the map for mutagenic signatures, familiar and otherwise. I want to know who's in the perimeter with her."

The technician's fingers flew across the keyboard even while his mind was reeling through the electronic pathways, realigning his surveillance equipment and running all possible scans. His eyes rolled back into his head as his mind concentrated on the task at hand, and his eyelids fluttered overtop them. An accomplished technopath, he had signed on for the long haul with the Mutant Underground because he trusted Xavier and his dream and because he trusted Panic's ability to interpret that dream in relation to the world around them. Snapping back to attention, Circuit asked, "How do you think this affects the information retrieval?"

Without responding to the question, Panic said, "Patch me into the comm system." His finger moved deftly to his ear, inserting his own plugs and readying himself for Circuit's compliance with the order. "Slowburn, this is Panic. Override all previous commands and listen. I need you to strip each of the aircraft in the landing strip of their black box and bring them back to hospice right away. If nothing else, I need the data on those devices. Come back."

"Give me two minutes and I'll be on the doorstep, chief. You can count on me being there," Slowburn called back, and Panic smiled down at Circuit, nodding. The connection was cut and shifted back to the handler's station, and Panic stepped away, pacing softly along the back of the room.

Circuit was obviously unhappy and visibly distracted by the situation at hand. His fingers were moving frantically over the keys, and backspacing every so often as he made mistakes that weren't common for him. "The four quadrants were empty moments ago, but they're not empty now. I don't know where the opposition is coming from, but they're coming in fast and furious now. Switchback's on her own, I take it?"

Panic nodded in response, refusing to give voice to the fact that he wished things were different. "Switchback will take care of things on her own. Aside from that, I have contingency plans already in action."

They were on the run before she knew what was happening around her, ducking through a maze of corridors that all looked alike and not really caring where they were headed. Looking back over her shoulder, she saw the Cajun trying to keep pace with her, and she took aim over his left arm, squeezing the trigger. Gambit barely winced as the bullet whirred past his ear and tore through the chest of one of the pursuing soldiers. Coming to a dead stop, she dropped the clips to the ground and slammed home a fresh pair into the grips of her guns. Her fingers flew next to the silencers on the ends of the weapons, setting them to unravel and tumble free to the ground.

"Armor piercing rounds with a silencer? You're full of surprises tonight," Gambit said, darting past her and threading a series of playing cards between his fingers. A crimson glow erupted from the tips of the cards and singed the edges slowly. Tossing the cards with a deadly precision against the side walls, he added, "Gambit's got some surprises of his own, if ya like."

The cards exploded on contact, shredding the metal interior and spraying shrapnel in a cross pattern from one side of the corridor to the other. Smiling like a devil, he turned back toward Switchback and grabbed her by arm, yanking her in the opposite direction of the soldiers. She caught his pace and resumed running, and somewhere in between breaths, she asked, "What surprises are you talking about?"

Gambit responded by cupping his hand behind his ear. Speaking over the din of the explosions, he said, "First rule of bein' a t'ief - never go in without knowing how to get back out. Always know your exits, or set yourself up to get one."

The wall crashed inward before them, spraying dust into the chamber and adding to the chaos that streamed around them. Coughing slightly, Switchback raised her guns toward the incursion and readied her fingers at the triggers once more. As the dust settled, she learned that the Cajun had stacked the deck in their favor.

A white streak ran down the middle of the woman's hair, and her build was both lithe and demure at the same time. Thumbing toward the hole she'd emerged from, Rogue displayed a thick Southern drawl as she said, "A little bird told me y'all needed a lift home. I suggest we hit the road before the rest of this party decides to come along."

"Arriving in the nick of time? Why do I feel like I've been set up?" Switchback asked, tossing her hair back over her shoulder and starting her way up the hole. Before she was three steps up, Rogue had an arm wrapped around her waist and was urging a quicker ascent. "Hey, what's the deal here?"

"Someone wants you alive, and I don't intend to let your mozying get in the way of that," Rogue answered and lifted off the ground, flying up through the hole and out into the starry night. "Y'all almost got caught in there, and trust me when I say y'all still got miles to go before ya sleep."

NEXT ISSUE: The team is fully gathered and Panic has some explaining to do. With a leader who is holding back information and playing a chess game of his own, can the remaining members of the Underground pull everything together in time to get the current investigation closed? And what role do Gambit and Rogue play, especially when Xavier has long separated the Underground from his X-Men?