Chapter 2 

Last time on Dragon Ball X.

Satohiro was saved by two very familiar dystopian female X-Men, and Wolverine.

“...Dying race that’s just waiting for its last breath,” Wolverine snorted. To Satohiro Wolverine from this weird Dystopian future looked exactly as he expected. Gruffer more distrustful and full of cynical snark. He had bandages all over him for some reason and wore something reminiscent of an X-Men suit, leather with yellow and black markings.

“Logan! That was my dramatic moment!” Kitty Pryde was a pretty brown haired girl that wasn't too distinct. He doubted he could pick her from a crowd unless he knew her features well enough. She had a vest, similar X uniform Logan had, combat boots and other knick knacks. And a large laser sword the colour of red she somehow wielded effortlessly. She had a very passionate energy as if she hadn't really left her younger years behind her. Sato doubted she was younger than twenty at least.

“You can be dramatic when we find the cure.” He turned to Satohiro, “And this one spills where he’s been the last couple of years.”

Illyana rested her own giant blue laser blade on her shoulder the tip cutting into the roof, “Wolverine…there wasn’t any way he was going to escape the sentinel, he’s not a plant and you found us not that long ago yourself.” Illyana had long platinum blonde hair reaching her elbows her outfit some weird part medieval and part dystopian nightmare. 

He growled, and Satohiro started to see a pattern, “That’s not what I’m getting at, he’s too stupid for that-“

“I resent that,” Satohiro rejected.

“-I wanted to know if there were any other pockets of resistance," His voice soft.

Satohiro winced feeling bad he was crushing his hope, even if he had threatened to kill him two seconds ago. Wolverine closed his eyes, took a breath and walked off.

Satohiro looked to the other two, they had helpless expressions. Kitty bit her lip before she turned to fake cheer, “So! Who wants lunch?”

//

The brown-haired girl called Kitty devoured the strange slop they called food at a ravenous pace. 

Illyana, Satohiro vaguely recalled, had magic powers, teleportation and was a queen… of something. It certainly showed with her poised attitude as she used glowing constructs to cut up the slop and eat it. He looked at his own, wondering if it would ask him where the slop-thing's mother was before politely having an existential crisis about his situation. 

“So… what happened?” Satohiro asked, eyeing his food cautiously.

“What do you mean?” Kitty replied.

“Like,” he pointed to the broken house they were in, parts of it had the walls caved in and he was pretty sure the plumbing had become a rat’s amusement park, “that.”

“Oh that, a missile came through the window and vaporized the family living here,” She said cheerfully.

Satohiro stared. She kept smiling. Satohiro stared at Illyana, “She hates humans.”

Satohiro stared some more eyes slowly widening. 

Illyana raised an eyebrow, “How do you not know what happened-” her eyes narrowed, “Are you from another dimension?” 

He nodded on autopilot reeling from the previous statement. He wasn't going to be stupid and blurt out his non-mutant origins, no need to get his ass kicked out. Very put off by the accuracy of coming from another question it took him a second to respond. Ultimately wasn't surprised since she, if her backstory was right, was the same and came from another dimension

Illyana made an ‘Ah’ sound of understanding and then explained what happened. 

//

Satohiro listened attentively to their story before he summarized what he had learnt, “So about a few years ago. Because no one ever watched Hal 1000, Ultron was born right after the Sentinels were made to take out the mutants." Ultron was a genocidal AI robot that could hack anything and had near invulnerable armour. The Sentinels were killer robots exclusively for mutants which is just another way of saying there were two types of giant genocidal american robots, but only one of them was intentional and not an AI.”

"Unfortunately, the idiot senators didn't realize almost all humans had some form of mutation or will have at some point. So when Ultron and the Sentinels started making babies they were suitably shocked at the combined genocide of both mutants and humans. Then a lot of other crazy stuff happened, the Hulk decided he wanted to try out different authoritarian government styles after deciding his chaotic evil alignment."

Satohiro was really trying to power through the growing headache, "Separately, Stryfe and Trask two Anti-Mutant nutjobs, weren't killed so they made Black Death, Mutant Edition. But because Mutants were humans they were, much like the senators who made the sentinels, suitably shocked when humanity started to just up and die alongside the mutants.” 

He then pointed to Illyana, “You yourself had been subject to a Tolkien-esque Nightmare realm. A dimension called Limbo, where you learnt a few powers from two different users, one of nightmares, aka the darkside. The other of rainbows and sparkles aka the Lightside which is how you guessed I was from another dimension because you yourself just arrived not too long ago and helped Kitty make that Light Saber with the foot wide width. "

He then finished with a nod to Wolverine and Kitty, “Then, if things couldn't get better, the surviving X-Men lost nearly everyone in the X-Mansion because of an Ultron Sentinel attack.”

Wolverine sat back in his chair almost too relaxed as Illyana tossed him a drink from a pouch in her vest that was too small to hold a pencil much less a can. Wolverine frowned at the drink but popped it anyway with a claw guzzling it down

Wolverine then raised his can and pointed, “Don’t forget... Canada/Russia lost its polar ice caps and global warming turned most coastal cities into Venice.”

“…” Satohiro couldn't stop the migraine and put a hand to his head. 

Illyana piped in, “The stuff unrelated to us, there were some other weird events we managed to find out from other survivors-”

“-Before they kicked the bucket,” he guessed.

Kitty swatted his shoulder, “Other dimensions opened up around the same time and in the next few years started pouring in everything, causing major changes. The two of us are also from another dimension. New York became a Hellscape, and near it was the Purple City. We know even less of what happened there.” 

Satohiro sat there in silence trying to process the situation. He wasn’t sure what his objective was here. ‘Should I bother helping them? Or maybe I should run away screaming and never look back?’ It wasn’t like he could go anywhere, Naruto couldn’t travel dimensions, and he didn’t have the eye of an Uchiha. He blinked and realized he didn’t need either.

“So why hasn’t Illyana just teleported to another dimension, gotten some help, and wrecked everything back into a Utopia?”

“Because I can’t control my teleports, except to Limbo and a possible one-way trip to my dimension that I’m not sure I’d survive or end up a million years in the future.”

“Limbo-”

“Which is Nightmare Fuel the Amusement Park ride.” 

“Can’t Kitty here send Wolverine’s mind into the past and fix everyone’s mistakes?” Referring to the movie Days of Future Past.

Kitty slowly turned to Satohiro, “That...has never been a power of mine. But that would be amazing...so many problems solved...” she seemed to be gazing into the distance, which happened to be a wall with bullet holes in it.

Satohiro realized getting home or at all to somewhere safe wasn’t going to happen, “So what’s the plan here?” Trying to figure out some direction of where he was going to go. He was also trying to keep his pounding heart down, all of this was scaring him and he was a relatively chill guy someone who rolled with the punches, not meteors.

“Survive-“

“Destroy the Legacy Virus, Ultron Sentinel, and Maestro.” Kitty interrupted Wolverine. It looked like the two were having disagreements about what they should focus on.

“Kid.”

“Call me a kid one more time.”

“Kitty, the two of you will die.”

“Our friends will die! We have to try something!”

“There isn’t any way to break into any labs anymore all of them have been destroyed!”

“There’s still the Purple City!”

“That’s suicide, one wrong step and you’ll be just another face in his clone army.”

“I’ll take my chances.”

Satohiro was trying to decipher what the problem was, it seemed there was a clue to curing the virus in the Purple City but getting caught would be a serious problem, “You know...it sounds like a Shadow Clone problem," in that he could just send in an endless amount of clones without worry, "and Illyana here has teleporting abilities. I think you can see where I’m going with this.” 

They exchanged glances, “Kid-”

“Satohiro.”

“Kid. Even if we could get the clones past most of his defenses there are numerous speedsters and other heavy hitters, many of whom can fly, even if you got in how would you get the data out, barring all that. What’s in it for you? This’ll put you on everyone’s radar.” 

“Hmm, beyond helping because you guys are in trouble? I don’t really have a way back to my world and I don’t know how I got here. If I’m going to stay for the foreseeable future, I’m not living with this Dystopia as my décor. Besides the giant robot-”

“Ultron Sentinel.”

“Megatron, probably already has me on its database. There isn’t anywhere I can run to.” Satohiro waved to the crazy lands outside. The Fallout landscape, even in the distance he could see mutated abominations roaming the land, some weird creatures here and there. 

They were his best bet. 

He let out a resigned sigh, “Alright then. But before Purple City we need to check all the other places first.”

Kitty spoke up, “If he’s joining the X-Men we’re going to need a codename for him.” Fortunately she had assumed him to be a mutant without checking.

Illyana said, “Wait I never got a codename.”

“Alright two codenames.”

"I thought her codename was Magik?" asked Satohiro. 

"That's such a dumb, on the nose-" Illyana recoiled.

Kitty interrupted her slamming her hand on the table, "it's perfect!"

Illyana started at her, "No."

Kitty ginned.

Illyana's eyes widened, “You wouldn't...” 

//

“Magik, are you ready?” 

“Yes,” A beat, “I hate you Pryde.” 

“Yeah yeah, you got your revenge already.” 

“Kitty! Stop pouting and get off the plane already.” She had sulked saying that since Satohiro was a ninja, he should’ve been named “Shadow Blade” arguing vehemently until Illyana came to his defense… sort of. 

She had named him Forest Fire, 'Which… wasn't horrible,' he thought. It had mostly to do with how his clones wore orange like his jacket and when he used the technique he multiplied like one. 'Except I can't shake the feeling the name might be revenge as well.'

Their plan was simply to check in on the X-Mansion first. 

Originally they hadn’t been able to salvage anything much too worried about the incineration lasers and sentinels that mimicked their abilities to kill them with ease. Soon enough they had managed to build a base again which they hadn’t told Sato, and pulled in survivors they didn’t have a chance to do anything until just recently. Between the fiery death beams, the apocalyptic land, basic essentials and saving people the X-Mansion fell by the wayside in their list of priorities. 

There had been fierce fighting and a number of repeat battles near the mansion. The place had been constructed to withstand extinction level events Xavier had the foresight to do so. That or he had met a mutant with the ability. Regardless, it had the strength to withstand much of the fighting and together with another mutant, who was now dead, Illyana and them created a barrier around the mansion.

Settling down, Satohiro was in awe at the magical construct X-Plane Illyana had made. It was pretty realistic even if it was "The only complex construct she could make." Much of its insides weren't there with the exception of the engine, their seats and a few other things from how Satohiro had understood it.

The liftoff has been so incredibly smooth if he hadn't been looking out the window or the translucent plane he would've never noticed. Before he knew it the plane had disappeared from view as Kitty played tour guide explaining a bunch of different things, he really was feeling bad about lying to them he wasn’t a mutant, but honestly he didn’t know how they might react or if Kitty was joking. He watched her animated expression as she pointed to the mountain range in the distance explaining what it used to be before the End. The view from the cockpit was amazing even in the blood red skies of this apocalyptic world.

The ride had been in relative safety for a while before one of the Sentinels shot a purple laser at them, it went through the plane missing Sato’s own arm by a few meters, when in the sky that was much too close for his comfort

Sato shouted, "Do a barrel roll!" Not sure where he had heard that reference from. He could see the mechanoid flying after them sending various objects towards them at supersonic speeds, if he had to guess it looked like a mix of telekinesis and magnetism was employed by the growing hoard of robots. 

"No need!" A portal in the sky opened up behind them redirecting the laser beams back towards themselves destroying a portion of the trailing sentinels. 

“I’ve got this!” Kitty shouted, “Just keep flying.” She commanded Illyana, it looked like she was in charge of the operation. Kitty muttered something and made a few hand gestures before a massive explosion rocked the skies. Sato managed to get a glimpse of the explosion starting from between the sentinels armour plating, rupturing them from the inside and  destroying the rest of the genocidal monstrosities. She groaned and Sato grabbed her before she slammed her face off the floor of the plane.

Sato picked her up, as Illyana glanced and noticed his concern, "She's fine, just exhausted. Place her behind the copilot seat."

"So is this… common?"

"About as much as it rains which is semi often." The plane was a semi-autonomous spell so even with her unconscious it could continue. 

When Sato asked where she learnt that, because he didn’t remember Kitty’s powers ever extending to extra-dimensional energy manipulation, “I taught her almost everything I know, which is why she’s so proficient, it helps that she showed an aptitude for it after wielding the my Soulsword. It's not really magic but Limbo being manipulated or more precisely a portion of it she phased into this reality, normally not possible but she is a Candidate for the Throne and that’s enough.” 

There were a few more close calls but Illyana herself was no slouch behind the wheel or with the weird Dimensional powers reminiscent of Dr Strange. She made it clear it wasn’t magic however, saying that was something else but not elaborating very well. 

//

After about a day’s run, Satohiro and co. arrived not too long after at what looked to be a crater. It was massive stretching more than halfway to the horizon, the diameter a few kilometers at least. There were deep gauges and pitch black ravines littered around, with much of the field's ground burnt black. The only standing structure was the X-Mansion even if its surroundings looked like the reenactment of D-day, it looked like a massive mansion turned into an apartment complex with the lower portions of the building uncovered due to the damage to the grounds. There were some green grasses that were slowly regrowing but it was a small paltry compared to the black ground and ash. 

"They were really pulling for a scorched earth scenario…" Images like this really hammered home how much his new reality didn't care for him. There were still parts of him, even if he knew logically otherwise, that believed this was all a sort of dream and felt very disconnected. ‘If the sentinel had hit me back then I really would've died…’

The land was very much undisturbed as Illyana landed the plane without so much as a whisper. Out there to greet them stood a red haired girl her hair waving wildly behind her from the wind, behind her stood two others, a werewolf with tattered clothing and the other a man. Sato picked Kitty up as she was still snoozing. 

Illyana had a look of concern as she stepped off the plane letting it vanish behind them. Satohiro almost fell to the ground not having expected that as Logan steaded him. 

The red haired girl at the front in the strange green suit with a giant yellow X crossing it spoke, "They were infected." She looked briefly in Sato's direction before turning and leading them to where the Mansion was. 

We went inside the expansive building, the place was a little museum and testament to architecture, a lot of its insides had been cleared up but a lot of it was still wrecked. It felt very devoid of life, and not at all like the home he had seen it to be in various media. 

The amateur ninja didn’t recognize who the man was but at a guess at the werewolf. He vaguely remembered Spider-Man dealt with a werewolves a few times, but there was only one for the X-Man all he remembered was they were female and Irish. She briefly sniffed and raised her hackles seemingly off put by his presence. 

Satohiro rolled for diplomacy, “Yo!” 

She bared her fangs. 

Even Wolverine started to look at him suspiciously, until Illyana interrupted the standoff, “Did you guys forget the barrier that checks for intent, he wouldn’t have been able to come through otherwise.” 

Wolverine didn’t back down, “I know, but there’s something off… I thought I had imagined it before but if the mutt can sense it then…” They stood there a while as he stared him down, Sato felt if he moved he would be cut down regardless of holding Kitty or not. He almost considered putting her down but then he snorted and walked off. The werewolf made the ‘I’m watching you’ gesture with two fingers and pointed at him to march in front of her. 

‘This is going well.’ he thought.

They walked up the marble steps and into the lobby which looked very homey and not at all extravagant like he was imagining most mansion would look. He heard a set of knocks which he memorized if needed later, then a secret section of the wall opened up and a set of stairs went downwards leading to a hallway. 

Footsteps were the only thing to be heard. Satohiro was dealing with the wonders of the werewolf’s breath near his neck rising his hairs slightly but he forced the fear down. Regardless of what the situation was they were good people, and he had nothing to hide. But if it did come down to it… his previous speed was likely to be unrivaled by anyone except Quicksilver who he hadn’t seen. 

They found themselves at the entrance to the medical wards, it was clear it used to be something else and had been converted to them. It was locked behind a passcode and a bank-like vault door. Kitty had woken up and stretched like a cat and thanked him briefly before standing on the side with the others. 

“So what did I miss?” 

“Some of ours got infected,” Logan replied. 

They quickly made their way over to the beds, where two X-Men laid unconscious. 

"They suddenly fell to the ground unconscious, we tried to lower the temperature but it was no use. The techno virus in Cable's arm is also getting worse."

We saw a giant muscular man with what looked like a parasitic prosthetic arm trying to eat its owner. Much of his lower jaw was shining with metal. There were others beside him, someone who wore an all black suit and had a giant blue glowing circle in the middle of his chest. He seemed familiar to Sato but couldn’t place him. 

“Alex and him had contracted the Mutant Virus otherwise he would’ve been able to fight it off for much longer.” Hope’s face was that of undisguised worry. Satohiro wondered if she even remembered they were there. He looked to the two faces warped in pained expressions on the beds.

Cable Summers son of Scott Summers the mutant hero of a future timeline and mentor to Hope Summers adopted into the Summer’s Family. Alex sounded like Scott’s older brother Havok aka Alex Summers, his costume certainly pointed it to be so. 

Almost exactly what he had expected to see but it was a strange feeling looking at people drawn in 2-D look real. It was the same experience he felt when he first watched the Iron Man Movie. The feeling was so pervasive that for an odd second Sato felt like he was looking at an action set piece of a movie play out in real life, he shuddered and the feeling disappeared.  

The situation was serious and they were his best chance of surviving in this world. He wondered if he had achieved his second power yet and if it could do anything to help them. 

“We don’t know how to help or to save him, but Layla has an idea-”

“Oh not just one idea, I have several.” In walked a tall blonde woman. “Hello Satohiro, it’s nice to meet you.” She smiled going to shake him with a gloved hand. “We’re going to be such good friends!” 

Satohiro had a confused expression on his face as he replied, “Sure?” 

“You’ll get it soon enough it’s because I-.”

“-Know stuff. I’m aware.” He remembered vaguely reading up on her character and her actual power wasn’t even precognition, it was something close to it he couldn’t remember what it was exactly. Whether that was true here or not remained to be seen. He was mostly surprised that they continued interacting in the future, so things must’ve gone well in one timeline/future at least. 

She smiled, “We’re going to be needing your help soon, you’ll be our heaviest hitter besides Calvin.” She then turned to the rest of the group, “Kitty’s right, we need to hit Purple City and soon.” 

Wolverine growled, “Not this again.” 

Hope stepped into the conversation, “If Layla says so then I believe her.”

The werewolf shifted back into a red headed woman, “Layla I really don’t like this kid, he smells dangerous.” 

“You’re not the only one smelling that bub.” Logan didn’t seem as concerned as the werewolf red head though. 

“Hmm, yes, but he’s on our side, I doubt he’d ever sell anyone out even on the pain of death.” Satohiro was a little shocked hearing that, on one hand he should be happy he was complimented on his tenacity but it almost sounded like he was a good pawn in their strategy sessions. 

“But of course nothing like that would happen nor would let that happen,” she said sincerity from her voice. Satohiro didn’t doubt her, but was still a little off put by her. He shrugged it off. It was likely a byproduct of seeing the future all the time that she thought of the best scenario for everyone and decided to give her the benefit of the doubt.  

“If we want anything to succeed we need him on our side.” 

Kitty spoke up having been staring silently at Cable before turning to the blonde haired Layla , “You seem oddly chipper?” 

‘Had she been depressed or something?’ he wondered.

“Yeah, I finally don’t know anything anymore! Well I still do now there are just blindspots.” She struck a pose and pointed at Satohiro, “You were wearing different colours, and Logan here was severely injured. Whatever happened had been diverted!” 

“Wait I thought you knew-” 

“Everything? No, I just know certain things, and a particular timeline, and every plan and choice we had made was going to end in…” she didn’t faltered but they understood. They would’ve failed. 

Kitty, Hope and the Werewolf chick realized this and were about to say something when Layla shot up again with a grin, “But now that’s changed!” 

Satohiro waved at the air, “Wait, that sounds like you’re ability is precognition-” 

“It’s not but it’s very similar and so much better.” 

“Super Calculations?” 

“Closer and further away more like Psychometry, combined with random 100% certain pre-cognition of certain events.” 

“Okay that’s nice and all but what about our failed futures?” Kitty asked getting the conversation back on track. 

“Kitty its best if I don’t mention them, they aren’t happening anymore.” Layla was uncharastically sober, at least more so than her first introduction. From her tone it Kitty stiffened as she had understood the exact nature of what had happened. “Now, we need to go to Purple City, but today but tomorrow. Our chance will be then!” 

Logan protested, “Hold on kid, I’m not on board with this in.” 

“The Ghost Rider finally finishes guarding New York.” 

Logan’s eyes widened, “Pe-Spider leaves?” 

Satohiro interrupted, “The Spider?” 

“The Ghost Rider ended up inhabiting Spider-Man.” 

//

With that revelation Layla hashed out the specifics of the plan before we went our separate ways. 

The werewolf Sato later learnt was named Rahne Sinclair and she was an Irish chick who hated being a mutant. She was also Catholic which was a surprise.

Illyana gave him a small tour of their recently acquired base. It was a lot of what one would expect, basic facilities and a nanotech lab here and there. That is until they walked to the Danger Room.

//

Dodging over several lasers in an acrobatic move most Olympic Gymnasts and Sato never dreamed possible he threw kunai with near calculated levels of precision into the mounted laser turrets. It was with such force even without chakra coating the metal it went right through them. The X-Men had a lot of spare weaponry from a machine Forge had made back in the day when he was alive. The two managed not to linger on it before explaining simplistically, “It’s a 3-D Printer for metallurgy.”

The moment he held a kunai it was very lightweight and sharp. He was getting familiar with it. 'Speaking of blades…'

"Stop Session." The room's functions ceased as everything slowly shut down. 

Illyana smirked, "Yeah we're awesome."

Satohiro rolled his eyes, "Yeah, yeah, wanted to ask a quick question." Her hum prompted him, "How does your magic work?"

"You want to learn it huh."

"Not dying is good."

"There's no guarantee," she took a second to think, "but a small crash course couldn't hurt."

In essence Sato discovered it wasn't exactly magic though that still existed what she was doing was utilizing extra-dimensional energies, in this case Limbo, for her uses. 

"Wait, then how is Kitty using the same thing? I thought there can only be one ruler of Limbo." Illyana Rasputin Satohiro vaguely recalled was the mutant sister of Colussus, who was X-Man. She had been kidnapped by essentially the demon king from Limbo and forced to learn magic while kept captive in Limbo for nearly or more than half her life. She eventually fought him off and became ruler herself.

"Not true there can be more than one, usually they killed each other however. At least that's what the records said, anyways we can try to help channel Limbo through you but it might end up with you dying or nothing happening. Nothing is more likely as you need at the bare minimum a conduit of sorts."

"Like what a wand?"

"No, well yes… in that its a good analogy but no not a wand. It can be whatever as long as it helps you channel the energy."

Satohiro pondered over the implications for a while and eventually decided to give it a go.

"I might be able to do it." He was banking on Naruto's ability to use Sage Mode in that he would be a good conduit himself. 

"Are you sure? I won't be responsible for whatever happens." She said coldly.

"I'm sure."

She stared hard before seeing whatever she needed, "Alright whatever, just come crying to me when you have Cuthulu for a hand." She began gathering a small glowing tendril of yellow orange pulsating between the two naturally and surged a small trickle through her finger as she touched his forehead.