Winter House casino had officially descended into absolute chaos.
The situation was arguably manageable when the Weapon X remnants first breached the floor, but the moment Scott Summers put an optic blast squarely into Daken's chest, the escalation curve went vertical. The concussive force of the red beam shattered the overhead chandeliers into a rain of crystal shrapnel. Daken's body smashed through three separate blackjack tables like a thrown ragdoll before finally skidding to a halt.
Aside from Daken—the relative newcomer to this particular family drama—every other hostile on the floor was a seasoned X-Men adversary. They recognized Cyclops immediately.
Arkady Rossovich looked genuinely thrilled by the development. "I get to kill more than one X-Man today!"
The massive Russian threw his arms forward. Twin coils of carbonadium whipped out from his forearms, tearing straight through the jagged hole Scott's blast had left in the office wall.
Hank McCoy casually hurled a solid oak chair to intercept the coils, shattering it into splinters and knocking the trajectory wide. He didn't miss a beat in his lecture to the two Spider-heroes.
"A word of caution," Beast said, his tone perfectly conversational despite the flying debris. "Omega Red emits highly lethal death pheromones. Even if they don't kill a superhuman organism outright, they severely degrade cellular vitality and muscular output. You'll feel profound lethargy, akin to marinating in a bathtub of cheap vodka. Furthermore, do not attempt to snap those tentacles. They are carbonadium. Nearly as indestructible as the adamantium coating Deadpool's katanas and our angry friend's claws."
Logan ripped his ruined suit collar open, popped his claws with a metallic snikt, and vaulted through the blasted wall into the fray.
Peter processed the tactical board in real-time. Weapon X operatives had come to hunt down the original Weapon X. So much for Logan's white-jacket-and-eyepatch disguise. The strike team was a greatest-hits compilation of Logan's worst enemies, completely kitted out with indestructible metal and aggressive healing factors. Wait. Sabretooth didn't usually have adamantium. And Daken wasn't even traditionally a Weapon X operative, was he? Since when did Daken have adamantium-laced claws?
Peter shook his head, clearing the continuity errors from his brain. That wasn't the point.
"So, just to clarify," Peter said, cracking his knuckles. "Every single person on that team possesses a healing factor?"
Scott, Hank, and Cindy all glanced at him. They knew exactly what the question meant. Peter's second mutation had completely wrecked his strength calibration. He was currently a walking, uncontrollable wrecking ball. But if every enemy in the room was an immortal cockroach like Logan? He didn't have to pull his punches. At all.
"Have at it, kid," Scott said, the corner of his mouth twitching upward before he stepped out onto the casino floor.
The battlefield geometry stabilized instantly. It was five against four, but the math didn't matter. None of the four Weapon X operatives cared about the X-Men or the Spiders. They all converged directly on Logan.
Deadpool reached him first. "Oh! Logan, honey, I'm home!" Wade shrieked, sprinting forward with katanas drawn.
Logan simply pivoted, dropped his shoulder, and swept his claws upward in a tight arc. Deadpool froze, watching in absolute shock as his left arm detached at the elbow, hitting the carpet with a wet thud.
Wade stared at his bleeding stump, then up at Logan. "How dare you! Do you have any idea how tenderly she kept me company last night? You son of a—"
A ruby-red optic blast caught Deadpool squarely in the chest, launching him backward over the bar.
Omega Red landed heavily in Wade's wake. The Russian's carbonadium coils whipped out, wrapping tightly around Logan's throat like a mechanized hangman's noose. Logan grunted, plunging his claws between the coils and his own skin, desperately trying to pry them apart. Sparks showered down his chest as adamantium ground against carbonadium.
"He's mine!" Daken roared. The half-Japanese mutant vaulted off an overturned slot machine and delivered a brutal flying kick straight into Omega Red's jaw. The impact broke the Russian's grip, sending him skidding backward into a shattered roulette wheel.
Logan gasped for air, coughing out a harsh, bloody laugh as Victor Creed hit the deck in front of him. "Ain't the first time, Victor."
In the end, it always came down to the two of them. Sabretooth let out a deafening roar. Logan matched it. The two apex predators collided in a blur of fur, flannel, and ripping flesh.
"Out of my way, brat!" Omega Red snarled, pulling himself out of the roulette wreckage. He flicked his wrist. A carbonadium coil punched cleanly through Daken's throat. Arkady ripped the coil free, tossing the choking, bleeding younger mutant aside like garbage. He turned back toward Logan, but a concentrated beam of concussive force slammed into his chest, flattening him against the floor.
Before Omega Red could peel himself off the carpet, Hank McCoy dropped from a surviving chandelier. Beast landed with his full, crushing weight directly on Arkady's spine, immediately unleashing a flurry of terrifyingly precise, bone-breaking strikes.
"What's the replacement cost on these chandeliers, Logan?" Scott asked calmly, maintaining a suppressive optic barrage against Daken, who was already healing and scrambling for cover.
Across the room, Sabretooth buried his thick claws deep into Logan's unprotected abdomen. Logan spit a mouthful of blood, drove his own adamantium claws straight up under Victor's ribs and into his lungs, and glanced around the ruined room.
"I don't know!" Logan rasped, ripping his claws out of Victor's chest before driving them back in. "Place was a gift! I don't look at the books!"
Scott just shook his head, making a micro-adjustment to his visor. Someone had literally handed Logan Wolverine a functioning casino. Why didn't he ever get gifts like that?
Daken suddenly broke cover. Moving with terrifying, fluid speed, he slipped beneath Scott's optic barrage, slid across the carpet, and popped up directly behind his father. Two claws extended from the back of his hand, one from his wrist. He buried all three deep into Logan's kidney.
Logan arched his back, screaming.
But the misery wasn't over. Scott widened his stance and opened his visor all the way. A massive, roaring torrent of crimson energy erupted across the floor, completely enveloping Logan, Victor, and Daken. The pure kinetic friction generated unbelievable heat. All three mutants shrieked as the blast literally sheared the flesh from their bones, exposing three metallic skeletons sparking under the pressure.
Scott closed his visor with a sharp click, surveying the smoldering pile of regenerating bones. "Sorry, buddy," he said, a faint, satisfied smirk on his face. "Knew you'd bounce back."
Near the bar, Wade Wilson was scrambling on his knees, blindly patting the carpet. "Where is it, where is it..." he muttered. His right hand finally bumped into his severed left forearm. He snatched it up, grabbed a couple of smaller, diced chunks of his own flesh from the floor, and roughly mashed the whole wet jigsaw puzzle against his bleeding stump. The flesh hissed, knitting together in seconds. Wade flexed his newly reattached fingers, the joint popping back into alignment. Good as new.
Excellent. While everyone was distracted watching Logan grow his skin back, he could sneak up and shove a katana right up Cyclops's rigidly disciplined backside.
Wade took one sneaky step forward.
A red-and-blue figure dropped from the ceiling, landing in a perfect crouch directly in his path.
"Sorry, pal," Peter said, standing up and rolling his shoulders. "Road's closed."
Wade stopped. He lowered his swords, tilted his masked head, and stared intensely at the web-slinger. Then, Deadpool asked his very first question of the evening.
"Quick question. Is the face under that mask Andrew Garfield's or Tom Holland's?"