Seeing everyone around them standing perfectly still like wax figures, Rogue immediately asked, “Bobby, what did you do?” Everyone at the mutant school knew that Professor X was an extraordinarily powerful telepath, but very few of them had ever seen him use his powers to immobilize other people.
Since Iceman had just used his ability, Rogue instinctively assumed this was his doing.
“It wasn’t me.” Iceman looked just as confused.
It was the first time he had ever seen anything this strange.
Once all the ordinary people inside the venue were frozen in place, the previously bustling exhibition hall suddenly became silent.
Aside from the prerecorded announcements and the sound coming from the video displays, the entire venue was unnervingly quiet.
Almost eerily so.
“That’s right.
It wasn’t him.
It was me.” Just as the mutant students were curiously looking at the frozen civilians, Professor X’s voice rang out.
Professor X, who hadn’t traveled to the venue on the school bus with Roy and the others, had somehow arrived without anyone noticing.
He was now maneuvering his electric wheelchair toward Iceman and the others.
As he passed Roy, he deliberately turned his head and gave him a look, as though silently asking why Roy hadn’t stopped Pyro and Iceman earlier.
Roy understood the look perfectly well.
Naturally, however, he had no intention of revealing his real thoughts, so he deliberately put on a confused expression as though he had no idea what Professor X meant.
Seeing Roy pretend not to understand, Professor X shook his head helplessly.
“Don’t show off like that again.” Once he reached the three of them, Professor X looked sternly at Pyro.
Before Pyro could respond, one of the televisions inside the venue suddenly cut to breaking news.
“Breaking news!
Reporting live from Washington.
The Oval Office at the White House has been attacked.
Both the President and Vice President are safe.” “Sources indicate that this may have been a terrorist attack planned by one or more mutants.” The breaking-news report immediately drew everyone’s attention.
It really happened!
The moment Roy saw the report, he knew the next few days were going to be anything but peaceful.
“Professor, I think we should leave.” Cyclops said to Professor X.
“Yes.” Professor X immediately agreed.
… Two hours later.
The mutant school.
The headmaster’s office.
Besides Professor X, Cyclops, and the other teachers, Roy was also present.
He had originally assumed that he wouldn’t need to participate in this internal discussion.
But Professor X had reminded him that he was now an official member of the X-Men.
So even though Roy was still technically a student, he was expected to attend.
And that was why he was here.
“If you ask me, Magneto planned this.” Cyclops gave his opinion.
“I don’t think so.” Phoenix immediately disagreed.
Magneto was certainly an obvious suspect, but Phoenix didn’t believe he was behind this terrorist attack.
“Jean is right.” “Eric may still be capable of arranging something like this from prison, but doing so would serve no purpose.
If anything, it would interfere with his goal of advancing mutant prosperity.” Professor X explained.
“Professor, you mean his theory of mutant superiority?” Although both Phoenix and Professor X had rejected his suggestion, Cyclops didn’t take offense.
One was his girlfriend.
The other was the man who had personally taught him how to become an X-Man.
He had no problem with either of them disagreeing with him.
“Yes.
Assuming Eric still believes in that theory of his.” Professor X sighed helplessly.
“An assassination attempt on the President will cause the government to bring up the Mutant Registration Act again.” Storm quickly added.
The Mutant Registration Act.
From a certain perspective, the Liberty Island incident had happened because of that very legislation.
If the bill hadn’t existed, Magneto might never have come up with the insane plan to turn the world leaders attending the summit into mutants.
After Magneto was captured following the Liberty Island incident, the Mutant Registration Act had temporarily been shelved.
But now that the President had been attacked, the government would almost certainly reconsider implementing it.
For mutants, that was undoubtedly bad news.
“It could be even worse.” “The President could declare martial law and order every mutant detained.” Professor X said gravely.
Hearing that, Cyclops and the others finally realized that this attack might be even more troublesome than they had initially thought.
“Um… can I give my opinion?” Roy, who had remained silent until now, suddenly spoke.
“What do you want to say?” Cyclops immediately looked toward him.
“I agree with the Professor.” “But I think whoever planned the attack may not have been targeting the President at all.” “The real target might be the school.” The school?
Roy’s words immediately drew everyone’s attention.
Even Professor X looked at him with confusion.
“First, let me make this clear.
This is only a theory.
I don’t have any evidence to prove it.” Roy quickly added.
“That’s fine.
Just tell us what you’re thinking.” Professor X encouraged him.
“All right.
The main reason I’m thinking this way is because I’m looking at the situation from the planner’s perspective.” “To give a simple example, if I were the one planning an attack like this, I’d account for every possible outcome.” “For instance, what kind of security surrounds the President, and how I’d make sure the assassination succeeded even if someone intervened.” “I’m not looking down on the President’s security detail.
I just think that if someone genuinely planned this attack using mutant abilities, ordinary security wouldn’t be much of an obstacle.” “Forget anything complicated.
Everyone sitting in this room could probably do it.” “If someone was seriously planning to assassinate the President, I doubt many people would take that kind of risk without being absolutely certain they could succeed.” “So the fact that the President came through completely unharmed is suspicious.” Roy spoke at an unhurried pace.
His suspicion was certainly influenced by the fact that he was a transmigrator.
But even if he hadn’t been one, he still would have found the situation questionable.
Why did ordinary humans fear and resent mutants?
Because mutants possessed powers ordinary people had absolutely no way to resist.
Not every mutant had such overwhelming abilities.
But it only took one or two powerful mutants to make ordinary people instinctively wary of the entire group.
The White House’s security might be enough to stop conventional attacks.
But against mutants with superpowers, its defenses were full of vulnerabilities.
“You’re saying someone deliberately orchestrated this attack, but the President was never the real target?” Cyclops immediately asked.
“Yes.” “If my theory is correct, then this attack was probably just groundwork for whatever comes next.” “For example, stirring up public hatred toward mutants, or pushing the authorities to bring back the Mutant Registration Act.” “Of course, it’s also possible that the entire point of the attack was to pressure the President into issuing certain orders.” “Martial law, for example, or large-scale arrests of mutants.” Roy knew perfectly well what the true purpose behind the attack was.
But he couldn’t confidently tell Professor X and the others that the assassination attempt had been staged specifically to justify an attack on the mutant school.
He needed to guide them toward that conclusion gradually.