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would fall.
    But the air was Archangel’s element.
    Three.
    “Heads up, Hank—catch!” he shouted. Using Bobby’s own momentum, Archangel made his own body a fulcrum to swing his teammate over and down into the Beast’s waiting arms.
    Four.
    Converting the braking maneuver into a forward glide, he slid forward with a raptor’s casual grace to intercept Phoenix’s falling body less than a dozen feet above the ground, carrying her safely to earth.
    Five.
    Down and safe.
    “It’s wonderful to have wings,” Archangel said fervently. He straightened out of his landing crouch, setting Jean Grey
    lightly on her feet. She smiled at him and reached up to brush back a stray curl of blond hair from his forehead.
    “I know,” she said gently.
    “How come I end up with you and Warren gets the girl?” Iceman complained to the Beast.
    “Because, Robert m’lad, some things never change,” Henry McCoy said absently. He set Iceman down and stepped back, staring skyward with a frown and absently brushing melting frost from his coat. He looked toward Cyclops, brows raised in puzzlement.
    Scott Summers glanced at his watch. It was a quarter after three; less than five minutes had elapsed since Archangel had gone to investigate a peculiar noise.
    And then. . .
    And then what f
    Cyclops looked around, but as far as he could see and hear, the threat was over. He allowed himself to relax slightly; Bobby and the others were all right. None of his team killed —this time, the ever-present fear reminded him—no one captured, no one hurt. As fights went, that was the best the X-Men could expect these days. The only definite casualty of the engagement was one might-be innocent man, the so-called Wheel of Fortune.
    The faint wail of a siren in the distance warned that the alarms and excursions at the mansion on Greymalkin Lane hadn’t gone unremarked by the citizens of Salem Center.
    “Just another Pleasant Valley Sunday,” Archangel said derisively. “Business as usual for the X-Men, the Hard-Luck Harrys of the super hero trade.”
    Scott Summers glanced toward the edge of the trees,
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    where the only evidence that anything had happened at all was one splintered tree and a charred spot on the ground.
    No. Not the only evidence, Scott corrected himself. With a profound sense of unreality, he stared at the swimming pool, now located inexplicably at the foot of the terrace. The water was liquid—had Bobby really fallen into it, or had that been some bizarre sort of hallucination? He shook his head in bafflement.
    “Come on, team, let’s take this inside before the authorities come looking.” He turned his back on the unaccountable swimming pool and started up the steps. The others followed as he opened the French doors and went into the house.
    The welcoming quiet of the mansion’s interior told Scott that any alarms triggered by the intruder hadn’t disturbed the mansion’s other inhabitants. The flash had been visible for miles, though, which meant he’d better have some kind of an explanation ready for any of the teams that were heading home because of it.
    “What the hell was that?” Bobby Drake demanded indignantly, breaking into Scott’s thoughts. “Another nutty government agency? A crazed multinational? Girl Scouts?”
    “We’ll probably never know,” Cyclops answered. “Go and change, Bobby,” he added out of habit.
    “Not if we’re lucky,” Iceman muttered under his breath. He headed for the stairs to find his room and a change of clothes.
    The other four looked at each other.
    “It’s a strange world,” Archangel said finally. The words sounded hollow even as he spoke them.
    “Maybe,” the Beast answered, as if Warren had said more than he had, “but it’s a wonderful life.”
    STILLBORN IN THE HIST
    Dean Wesley Smith
    Illustration by Ralph Reese
    The swirling mist off the Mississippi gripped the narrow streets of the French Quarter in a deadly blanket of silence as her body was