24 Chapter 23

"Let's begin this meeting." Scott said as he sat down on the table, surrounded by all the people who could handle the mission.

The full roster of the main X-Men, some of the younger ones like Hellion and Rockslide, Magik, Hope, Hercules and Amadeus Cho and finally the sons of Hulk.

In one small meeting room, Scott had enough power to overthrow any nation in the world with only the possible exceptions being Latveria, Wakanda and Atlantis.

"For those of you who are not entirely aware, let me tell you about Project Utopia." He said as he pushed one of the buttons on the table and holographic schematics of Utopia came to life. "It was originally called Asteroid M and used to be the headquarters of Magneto while he was still leading the Brotherhood." And then a holographic image of Magneto appeared.

It was rather ironic. Scott had spent years doing all within his power to go against Magneto and his message, yet now he was going to be using his base to put distance between the mutant-kind and the rest of the humanity in order to protect themselves.

On days like these, he wondered if his battles against the Master of Magnetism ever had any meaning; since it seemed like the mutant-kind's future was going in the way Magneto had claimed that it would anyway. Yet even so, he had to do what needed to be done.

"We are planning to have it raised back up soon, outside of the jurisdiction of any nation, and use it as a safe house for mutants and a base for the X-Men." He said with a smile before frowning. "But, as I am sure most of you here know by now, we are at the moment in a shadow war against Norman Osborn and his Avengers."

"Fake Avengers." Hercules piped up from his seat with a glare, looking rather unhappy about the fact that the new team that claimed the name of his old team was the subject. "You have to just look at their 'Hawkeye' and 'Spiderman', I would bet Aphrodite's Girdle that they can't even make a decent knock knock joke." The Lion of Olympus declared with a huff, his words somewhat bringing the mood up.

"Yes, Hercules, thank you for that important information." Scott said with a sigh before pressing on another button and making several other holograms appear, in the form of Osborn's Avengers. "What I'm trying to say is, the moment we start the project Utopia; that little shadow war of ours will not be in the shadows anymore. Osborn and his team will attack us, more than likely intending to deal with us in a more permanent way." Scott admitted.

He remembered watching Osborn's Avengers from far away. The amount of power they held was… impressive, even without thinking about their true powerhouses.

Ares, the Olympian god of war and the half brother of Hercules; a man that Scott just couldn't see himself defeating by himself. Hell, he was pretty sure that no mutant who was not Omega Level could actually defeat him, with the sole possible exception of maybe Magik. And he wasn't even the worst of them.

Sentry… he still did not know how exactly Osborn had managed to get the strongest man on the planet on his side but what he knew was that they didn't have anyone among them who could deal with him one on one. The man with the power of million exploding suns… they would likely need to send most of their forces against him in this battle.

"I actually did not want to reveal project Utopia this soon, but Osborn has already stuck against us in a manner we can not ignore when he sent Abomination at us."

"Isn't that because they are here?" Hellion asked with a scowl as he gestured at the sons of Hulk with his head. He still didn't really like them and Scott could accept that, but not when he was creating discord among the ranks. But the leader of the X-Men was interrupted before he could say anything by Logan.

"Yup, when Kala over there declared that Osborn must have had an ass inside his mouth for there was no other way for him to spout so much shit while talking." The Canadian mutant said with a laugh which was shared by almost everybody else in the room, mostly loudly by their new resident demigod. Hell, even Emma had a small smile on her face at the crude humor.

"The matter of fact is, we have a very strong enemy that will move against us if we actually go through with this plan. And the people in this room are those that I trust to have my back when they come." Scott declared and saw the small glittet of pride in everyone's eyes. "But our enemy is strong, stronger than almost anyone else in the world. So the decision to go through with the project Utopia, the decision to make our war against Osborn an official one, belongs to you." He said and then sat back down.

"So I want everyone's opinion on whether to go through with this plan or not. But know this, Osborn will not stop attacking us even if we stay here; he will just attack in a more discreet manner and gasp for the cameras if we blame the attacks on him." He declared with a glare from behind his ruby glasses. "But the decision is yours."

For a moment, there was silence. All the people in the room looking deep in thought, with the younger X-Men looking at each other in order to understand their thoughts. But the thoughts of some were easy to see.

The original members of X-Men and Hercules all had known war in their own way and were obviously ready to follow him. Same for Hope who was hardened by… by Cable's death. It was still hard to accept that his time traveling son was supposedly gone, but right now Scott did not have time to grieve.

And finally, there were the sons of Hulk. Kala looked rather calm and merely gazed back at Scott with a serene look in his eyes. His far larger brother on the other hand…

"Blah blah blah." Skaar grumbled with his arms crossed over his chest. "Let's do this thing!"

---------------

For those who like my stories, please check out my Patreon where one can become a patron and get the right to vote for which of my stories will get a guaranteed update for the next week or even vote for which one of my snippets will become proper stories and now even get to see my Patreon exclusive lewd short stories that will come out at least once a month! Not to mention every patron is a sign of support for my, in my opinion, subpar stories to get better!

patreon.com/user?u=25343580