The X-Project

Forge delivers the promised tech to the Snow Valley Center, and finally meets the infamous Essex. It's not a stretch to say these two won't get along.



"Mister Forge, do have a seat." Dr Nathaniel Essex said, rising from his chair to shake the young man's hand. The small workspace that Mark and Doug had appropriated for an electronics workshop was scattered with loose tools and parts. Essex's own files were stacked neatly, near the white board that held complex formulas in his careful script.

Forge just stared at the older man's hand, letting it hang in midair. He hefted the case he'd brought with him onto the workshop table, unfastening two valves with a hiss of air. "You're probably familiar with the design this is adapted from," he said coldly, removing the large helmet-like structure from the case. "Dr. MacTaggart had intended a similar containment unit to help save her son's life. Unfortunately, his mutation flared up earlier than expected, and the prototype was never completed. But you know all about how that works, don't you, Mister Essex?"

"Certainly. I was involved in the genetic mapping that created the suppression matrix needed to arrest the power flares and resulting physical decay." Essex withdraw his hand and sat back down, showing no visible signs of even registering Forge's actions or tone. "We never did find an adequate artificer to manufacture it. Half of the components were merely theoretical at that time."

Essex turned the helmet over in his hands, scrutinizing it carefully. He continued to talk but in an absent manner, engrossed in the object at hand. "I'm sure you are aware that much of that research went into the psionic suppression system that Charles installed at the mansion. At least some good came from it." Essex's voice suddenly sharpened. "You've brought your full initial testing, including unfiltered levels and registers, I assume?"

"The Box, right," Forge muttered. "Mostly built off of the designs of Professor Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr, the addition of the matrix technology worked well to deal with flare-ups. And yes, the initial benchmarks are on the disk there. This helmet will act as a psionic refractor and stabilizer, I originally designed it for--" he paused, realizing who he was speaking to. "Well, suffice to say it works. It'll save this mutant's life, presuming that's the intent, of course."

"It would be inaccurate to refer to Xorn as a person. The level of his power, he's more of a force than an individual. Still possessing the innate will for survival, but subsumed against a tidal wave of input. A true gestalt of consciousness." Essex set the helmet down carefully and slipped the disk into his laptop. "I trust Charles is well?" He said offhandedly, waiting for the information to load.

"A person is a person, Mister Essex, regardless of how far their mutation goes." Forge leaned against the workbench, fiddling absently with some scraps of wire. "Labeling them as a force or something 'post-human' just allows you to dehumanize them and see them as nothing more than their abilities, or their powers, or their genetics. See them as 'the Other', and it becomes nothing more than a justification of inhumanity. That's the argument that anti-mutant groups have been trying to push for years, I refuse to apply it to a mutant simply because his power level is greater than you expect."

He shook his head, turning his attention finally to the man before him. To look at him, one would think Nathan Essex was just like any other man of science, enthralled with discovery and progress. The invisible difference, of course, lay in what he considered acceptable methods to that discovery.

"I noticed you haven't published anything for a few years now," Forge remarked offhandedly, ignoring the comment about the Professor. "Most of the scientific community seems to hold a bit of a polarized opinion about that."

"I have been busy in my own research, Mister Forge. Besides, my work hardly reaches commonly accessible publications. There are perhaps a dozen people on the planet that can even comprehend the science. Do ask Moira if you're looking for access." Essex began to run down the lines of code, processing quickly the results, which not more than a few people on the planet could have made any sort of sense of.

"And as to your earlier point, I believe your instinctive reactions are compromising your ability to consider this dispassionately. Xorn receives constant input from the minds of every sentient being on this planet. His entire body is a condensed quantum singularity to power that connection. He lives as an extension of the noosphere; a higher order consciousness." Essex tapped a few keys, still watching the data as he spoke. "To us, his mind is as similar as ours is to a rodent. He exists in the crucible of eight billion points of view simultaneously. The only creature man has ever ascribed that kind of knowledge to is God."

Essex picked up the helmet again and frowned, moving back through a code group and checking the internals. "To claim he's a person ignores scientific fact and basic reason in place of a comforting sentiment. It also creates assumptions that court disaster when devising a strategy for dealing with him."

Forge reached over, closing the cover of the binder he'd brought the documentation and statistics over in. "Then if he's not a person, he's a thing. Now, I got called in here because I was told my tech is needed to save a life. That reason right there trumps any other, and if that compromises my ability to consider things dispassionately," he hissed, glaring over at Essex, "Then you can take your concept of the cold, clinical scientist and frankly, shove it. The helmet will contain him and keep him stable. If his power level is what your hypothesis claims, it won't restrict him. If your data is correct, there's not much on this planet that could."

Lifting his hand, Forge kept his gaze fixed on Essex's face, looking for any sign of reaction or emotion, and finding none. "This guy might just be a set of data points to you, fine. This might be nothing more than some... some scientific curiosity to the great Nathaniel Essex. But the only thing that's getting you my help is because I believe there's a person out there who needs it. So don't you ever think you're entitled to question my judgment, Mister Essex."

"You have a young man's judgment, Mister Forge. And a young man's assumptions. Kim Ye-Xorn does not have to be a person to have value, or to require our attention and assistance. His motives, actions and thoughts are entirely alien to us. He could easy kill a million people with the same negligence as you removing a nest of ants." Essex leaned back and steepled his fingers. "Would that make him a murderer? An evil man? To one such as Xorn, those concepts are incomprehensible. Attempting to define him as what you find value in ascribes motives to his actions which do not exist."

"You're making assumptions about his morality and motives based on... what? The fact that he thinks on a level above regular humanity?" Forge took a while to formulate his thoughts as he spoke - the concept of a being that was potentially as far beyond him intellectually as he considered himself above the mass of humanity was somewhat galling. "Either way, it's redundant. He could be a mass murderer, a sociopath, or a vegetable. None of it's relevant. I believe that regardless of his power, he's a living, sentient being and that makes him worth saving. That is all the rationalization I need here. What about you, Mister Essex?" he asked pointedly. "You don't seem like the type to accept altruism as a valid motive for action. Tell me, what do you intend to do once this Xorn is free and safe?"

"There is an essential disconnect in your considerations, young man. The only assumption that I make about his morality or motives is that they cannot be judged or measured in the same terms as I would of yours, or Charles, or any one on this planet. The essential point is correct; he is a living, sentient being. He is not a person. As mutation continues, we will see more of the same, mutants will no connection to humanity, no familiar motivations. New and wholly different life." Essex's voice would have suited a classroom or a lecture hall, not unsurprisingly, considering his background. At the school, a record of his lectures still existed, much on his scientific work, but also on his lectures of the necessary mutation of society and existence thought, to accommodate the changes that the emerging mutation population brought with them.

"As for Xorn, I don't intend to 'do' anything. What would you expect me to do?"

"I'd expect you to be a little more interested in saving his life, not just keeping him from dying," Forge replied, leaning over to glance back and forth between two sets of readouts. "I know that might not be by-the-book scientific, but it'd show at least a scrap of basic humanity and decency. And whether you admit it or not, Mister Essex, you are judging Kim Ye-Xorn. You're judging him to be worthy of action to save his life. You're making the ethical decision that this person - whether or not you recognize him as one - has the right to live. The fact that you can reconcile that with your assertion that he is something other than a person either means that you take detachment to an altogether unhealthy level, or that you're completely cracked. I'm not certain which."

Forge took a deep breath, leaning against the workbench. "But Pete Wisdom is working with you, and not dumping your body in a ditch somewhere, so that means he trusts you to do what you can to help Xorn. For the moment, that's good enough for me. So who's going to be getting close enough to Xorn to get the containment unit engaged? They're going to need to know how it operates."

"Mister Forge, we have spoken of assumptions, and now another. I am helping Xorn for a very simple reason; I was asked to. I could have grander reason, I suppose. Averting the deaths of millions of Chinese, or seeking to avoid the potential of Xorn's death eliminating every psi on the planet in a backlash, such as Charles, Dr. Grey or Miss Braddock. All very noble and higher minded choices." Essex hadn't moved from his position, watching the young man over his hands, as untouched as if he was a statue by Forge's various accusations. "But no, my assistance was requested while I am in a position to provide it. So I choose to, much as I did when Moira contacted me, or Miss Braddock."

"As for the actual containment procedure, I believe Mr Wisdom is formulating the operational end of the plan, with Miss Braddock and young Mister Haller's assistance. You will need to consult with them."

Like I believe that for a minute, Forge thought to himself before just nodding in acknowledgment. "I'll go brief Pete, then."

"Good. I will be in touch if I require any further refinement on the containment sequence. Good day, Mr Forge." Essex said, turning back to his numbers. Throughout the conversation, his tone never wavered, his composure never changed, remaining a calm pleasantness. But Forge's carefully rehearsed indignation had been simply dismissed, like a lackluster student with a shoddy hypothesis.