Author's Note: This Deadpool story is a sequel to my Wolverine Origins fic, 'No I in Team.' I recommend you go read that first, but it's not absolutely necessary. Please note that this story is set in the film universe. So yes, this Deadpool is a mutant from birth, rather than a human mutate. In true Marvel style, let's just call it 'Earth–42 Continuity' ('42' because it hasn't already been assigned, plus… y'know… THHGTTG) but rest assured, I'm going to try to get Deadpool as close to as his comic-book incarnation as humanly possible. Which isn't all that easy, given what the producers of the Wolverine film did to him.

IMPORTANT: When you see chunks of italicised text in the main body of this chapter, which are separated from the main narrative by a non-existent break-line, they are in fact flash-backs, as I'm sure you would have figured out on your own pretty quickly. I'm just mentioning this here to avoid confusion. Also, I hate author-notes, so don't expect many more.

. . .

Lazarus

I woke from a dream, a terrible nightmare in which I was held prisoner inside my own body, silent witness to actions I could neither control nor prevent. I woke from a dream, but I paid a terrible price for waking; I forgot who I was. I could not remember that I was a man. I thought I was something… different. A machine. A monster. Something in between. In waking, I lost my humanity. I wasn't even sure I wanted to find it again.

1. From the Ashes

Night had descended upon Three Mile Island, the third period of darkness since The Incident. The third period of darkness since he had woken from a deeper blackness, one which had held him immobile against his will. For three periods of light and dark he had hidden from them, finding refuge amongst the rubble, easily evading the clean-up crews digging for survivors and salvage. But after three days and nights, he had made a mistake, and been seen by two of the men.

He stood over their still bodies, watching rivulets of red winding their way over the rock-strewn ground, diverting around obstacles too large to flow over. Their eyes were vacant and glassy, devoid of life. He waited, just in case more men were on their way, and when he was confident there would be no further intrusions, he retracted the long swords back into his body, feeling them slide up the inside of his arms, flashing coldly in the moonlight just before they disappeared.

The flash of silver light on metal… an image danced across his mind, and he closed his eyes as it played out before him.

.

He stood behind a chain-link fence, prowling cat-like back and forth, waiting for… waiting for… gunfire. Yes. Bullets were flying towards him, and in his hands he held long curved swords… items which elicited a great deal of emotion from somewhere deep inside him. He cared about those blades more than he cared about anything else in the world. He didn't feel whole unless he was holding them.

.

He opened his eyes to darkness, confused. The image, and others like it, had come randomly throughout the past three days. Sometimes they came with faces, and sometimes sounds, but mostly it was just feelings, fleeting emotions which accompanied brief splashes of colour and motion. All of the images had a sense of familiarity about them, as if he'd seen them before, in some other place, at some other time.

Taking a seat on a slab of rock, he looked again at the two bodies, and wondered why he had attacked them. His waking had been… confusing. One moment, all had been blackness and cold, and the next his eyes were open and there was light and pain. He thought he could remember his head being separated from his body, but that, too, could have been another dream. Men could not survive with their heads separated from their body; that much he knew. So… perhaps he wasn't a man. But what was he?

I am Deadpool. The thought came easily. Deadpool. Yes. That sounded… right. It was his designation. It was who he was. Looking down at his hands, he took in the sight of his skin, dusted with a coat of grey. The bandages wrapped around his lower arms were likewise dirty, but he left them in place. Deadpool. It meant… something. He was part of something. But part of what? And why couldn't he remember?

He stood up and paced, the moon and the stars sole witnesses to his silent turmoil. What were the images that came to him? Were they dreams, or memories? Whatever they were, he knew he wouldn't be able to figure it out by himself. He didn't know who he was, and he'd just killed two men. He needed help. Perhaps somebody from his past could help him—if indeed, he even had a past. Maybe… maybe… he closed his eyes, and tried to think of a name. He needed to find somebody trustworthy. Somebody who would follow his instructions and not go getting ideas. Somebody like… Bradley!

.

Another image flashed across his mind. A face; a man with short hair and grey eyes, an easy smile on his lips playing against the nervous tension around his eyes. Young, trusting, eager to please. Bradley would offer his help and ask for nothing in return. The perfect man to go to for something like this.

.

There was one problem; now he had to remember who, exactly, Bradley was, and where he could be found. He glanced at the corpses. Well, neither of them was Bradley. They didn't have the same face as the man in the image inside his head. No, Bradley was probably somewhere far from here.

.

"Very good. I look forward to seeing the preliminary results. But before we can even think about using him in the field, we have to find a way to control him. I doubt he'll be willing to volunteer his services, once we're through with him." The voice which he knew belonged to a man named Stryker came unbidden into his mind, and it wasn't the only one.

"Actually, I have an idea regarding that. As you know, I've been reviewing all of the Team X history files, and I'd like to make a suggestion. Actually, an improvement on one of Doctor Cornelius' ideas." This man who spoke wore a long white coat, clean and crisp. A doctor, by the name of Killbrew.

"I'm listening."

"Doctor Cornelius has suggested we implant Weapon XI with a computer processor, to control his actions. I believe the need for such cybernetics would be greatly reduced if we could somehow find a way of controlling him via genetics, specifically, a mutant power."

"Go on."

"I'm aware that one of your former team members, one Christopher Bradley, was able to manipulate electrical fields and even computers using his mutant ability." The white-coated man waited only long enough to see Stryker nod. "If we could introduce that particular ability to Weapon XI's genetic structure, we might find a way to tap into it, and control him by a similar means."

"Can that even be done?"

"I believe so. Weapon XI would still require some technological augmentation, of course, but with Bradley's ability to manipulate, we could leave most of Weapon XI's brain intact."

"Alright, you've got my interest. What do you need?" asked Stryker.

"A fresh sample of Bradley's genetic material."

"Does Bradley need to be dead or alive for that?"

"Does it matter?"

"Sure. If you need him alive, I'll send Zero. Otherwise, I'll send Victor."

Killbrew shrugged. "A sample is all I need. The state of the subject isn't important."

"Then I'll tell Creed I have a new task for him."

.

Deadpool shook his head, dispelling the aural hallucinations. No… the voices in his mind must be wrong. The things they spoke of just weren't possible… were they? He didn't know. It all sounded like lunacy. He'd heard the voices and seen the figures through a fuzzy haze, as if he'd only been half awake at the time. He'd probably heard them wrong. Probably made it all up inside his own mind. But then, whatever this 'Weapon XI' was, it was obviously important to the men in his vision. Perhaps finding Weapon XI was the key to finding the answers to who he was.

He set off walking, picking his way easily over the uneven ground. Maybe Weapon XI was buried beneath the rubble, as he had been. It hadn't been easy to dig himself out of that, especially given the fact that his head had been several feet away from his body. Or had it? Perhaps he'd simply been knocked unconscious during The Incident and imagined that his head had been separated from his body. It was the only thing which made sense. Then again, not much about this situation made any sort of sense. From looking at his surroundings, he could tell that one of the large chimney-like structures had collapsed, causing all this dusty chaos. But what on Earth could made a giant concrete chimney just collapse to the ground? And why had he woken at ground zero?

.

A face flickered to life in his mind's eye, an angry face that glared at him as if he'd personally offended it. The face of a man, attached to a body… a man who attacked him, striking out with sharp metallic cat-like claws. There was something very familiar about that face. He felt as if he ought to be able to put a name to it. A name like… Captain? Well, that was a stupid name. Sounded more like a rank. So perhaps it was a rank. Perhaps the man had a different name. But if he did, Deadpool couldn't remember it. All he could recall was that the man had attacked him, and he had fought back. He hadn't wanted to, but it's what he did. What he felt commanded to do.

.

After searching the rubble for a couple of hours, he could find no sign of the mysterious 'Weapon XI', though he did manage to unearth a few bodies. They were clad in green uniforms; US army, he knew, though he didn't know how he knew. Most of the deceased had clearly been that way for several days, and the majority of them appeared to have been crushed beneath the falling chimney. None of them were familiar to Deadpool. None of them made visions happen in his mind.

So. He was on an island. He knew that much, because he'd seen the water all around it, whilst hiding from the cleanup crews. He was alive. He knew that, too, because he could feel his heart beating in his chest, could feel the blood pumping through his veins and the air being inhaled and exhaled through his nose. And he was alone. Either he had no friends or family, or they'd abandoned him to his fate. He wasn't sure which was true, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know which was true.

He sat down again, and looked up at the moon as it flooded the island with silver light. His eye caught sight of one of the other chimneys, and he felt a moment of déjà vu. He had a clear memory of being atop one of those chimneys, as incredible as that sounded. Yes, he'd been on the ground one moment, and then high up the next. He'd… teleported up there? Clearly, whoever and whatever he was, he had the ability to travel between two places instantaneously.

Focusing, he tried it now. He imagined himself reappearing beside the corpses, but nothing happened. No matter how much he concentrated, he couldn't make himself teleport. And, come to think of it, he recalled something else, too. He remembered opening his eyes when they were already open and firing some sort of laser beam from them. It sounded completely ridiculous. Perhaps that was yet another event he'd dreamed up during his period of sleeping. Just to be sure, he lifted his hands to his eyes, using his fingertips to probe around them. They felt normal… not that he had much of an idea what normal was supposed to feel like. But he certainly didn't feel as if he had laser vision. This was real life, not some cheesy sci-fi flick.

His fingers tracked down his face, running along the bridge of his nose, down to… well, what he thought should have been his mouth, but there was nothing but smooth skin. Which was strange, because he could feel his jaw working, flexing, and felt that he should be able to open the mouth that he didn't have to eat and drink and talk. But perhaps whatever a Deadpool was, it didn't have a mouth, like normal people.

.

"He was alert and cognisant for about an hour." The voice of Doctor Killbrew whispered unbidden again inside his mind.

"Did he say anything?" The second voice belonged to the other man. The one called Stryker.

"Just that he's going to kill me one day."

The other man, Stryker, snorted, sounded amused. "Think yourself lucky. Our Mr Wilson can be quite the talker, but that's easily rectified."

"You want me to sever his vocal chords?" Killbrew offered, just like that.

"No need for such intricate surgery. Just sew his mouth shut. That way he can still scream if he wants to… he just can't talk."

.

So. He'd had a mouth, once. And his name was Wilson? That sounded… familiar. But only half-finished. It was probably just part of his name. But what was the rest of it? Maybe Brian. The name Brian Wilson had a familiar ring to it… but he didn't particularly feel like a Brian. No matter, the rest of his name would come in time, or perhaps he'd find someone who could tell him who he was. Not Bradley, obviously, because whoever Bradley was, or had been, he might be dead now, which was very inconvenient and probably quite sad.

Could there be a better way to go about this? If he could piece together his own identity from things he knew about himself, perhaps he wouldn't need outside help. Maybe he could figure out who he was, and why he was here, and what he was supposed to be doing, all on his own. He stood up and began pacing again. Pacing seemed to help. It felt comforting. Now, the facts.

He was Deadpool. Part of his name was Wilson. He had blades hidden inside his arms, and though it hurt to make them come out, he seemed to heal pretty quickly. He may or may not have been headless in the recent past. At one point he'd been able to teleport, though he didn't seem capable of that now, and he may also have possessed some sort of laser-vision, at least until waking from his dream of darkness. He knew a man named Bradley, who was very possibly dead, and he'd fought a Captain atop a very high concrete chimney. His mouth had been sewn shut, allegedly to stop him from talking – maybe to stop him from objecting to something. He apparently knew two people, one called Killbrew and the other called Stryker, who had talked about a mysterious Weapon XI in his presence. Perhaps Weapon XI had something to do with the 'Team X' that the Killbrew man had mentioned. When he thought about it, faces flashed across his vision, and he recalled a voice.

"Wade, you don't have to do this."

The voice came from the man with the claws; the Captain. Wade? Yes… Wade sounded right. Wade Wilson. That was his name. It was who he had been. And Deadpool… Deadpool was who he was now. Wade hadn't wanted to fight the Captain, but Deadpool had been forced to. Forced to by a cold machine voice inside his head, one which controlled his body, and the swords inside his arms.

He couldn't hear the machine voice now. It was silent. Maybe it was dead. Could machines die? He didn't know. Perhaps the Captain knew… if he was still alive. For all Deadpool knew, that particular memory could have been years old. One thing was becoming clear; he'd find no answers amongst this rubble, and in a few hours the sun would be rising, heralding a return of the clean-up crews. Eager for further information, he turned his attention to the nearby square building—a small warehouse—and set off towards it.

The door was unlocked, so he pushed it open and entered the building. There had been some sort of altercation here; there were bullets embedded in the walls, and shattered glass covered the cold hard floor. As well, his eyes picked up scorch marks, places where the warehouse had been heated intensely. He ran his fingers over the bullet holes, feeling the rough edges, wondering what had happened to make all of the people leave. Had they gone because of the chimney collapse, or had something else driven them from this place?

As he walked through the suspiciously empty warehouse, he was struck by a strong sense of familiarity. There was something about this place… he knew it well, yet he couldn't remember a thing about it. A very strange contradiction. Further investigation might yield additional results.

He continued through the building, haunted by ghosts of the past, followed by quiet voices and fleeting images of some other life. He recalled feeling angry, and afraid, and then angry about being afraid… but why? What was this place? What did it mean to him, or at least, the him he had been before now? Who were Stryker, and Killbrew, and the Captain? Why had he been left here alone, instead of evacuated with the others? What he needed was a person to interrogate, or failing that, some sort of written record of what had transpired here. He was disappointed on both fronts; no people remained, and either they'd taken their files and computers with them, or the clean-up crews had removed them after. He felt his helplessness and frustration mounting with every step he took.

As last he came to the only remaining room, and as he approached the door he expected to find it empty, like the others. When he stepped inside, however, he saw a sort of tank, reminiscent of a medieval torture chamber, and he was hit by his most powerful vision yet.

.

"The integration of Logan's DNA has worked seamlessly," said a man in a white coat; Doctor Killbrew. "Complete assimilation of the genetic sequence which will provide Weapon XI with Weapon X's increased healing factor."

"Excellent," said Stryker.

A third man, dressed in a white coat like Killbrew's, glanced over a computer monitor. "We're ready to proceed with the next stage."

"Which I will leave in your more than capable hands, Doctor Cornelius. I take it the grafting went well?"

"Yes, Colonel. We've attached the blades to the bones of Wilson's forearms using very small, lightweight brackets. We hope that once the bonding process begins, the blades, like his bones, will be coated with a layer of adamantium, making them unbreakable weapons."

"And there was no rejection?"

"None. I think that because we grafted the blades onto the bone before introducing the healing-factor DNA sequence, Weapon XI's immune system automatically assumed the blades to be part of the body."

"Excellent. Then by all means, begin immediately. And please, let's try not to have a repeat of the last adamantium bonding process, hmm? Until we can fine-tune the computer control, we'd be at Weapon XI's mercy if he managed to escape, as Logan did."

"Not to worry, Colonel," said Killbrew, "we've restrained him, and we have guards standing by with enough adamantium bullets to put him down permanently in the unlikely event that he should break free."

"Very well. Proceed as planned." Stryker's face loomed into view, looking down at him from above. "I wish I could say this wouldn't hurt, Wade, but it will be agonising for you. Once it's over, however, you will be perfect. The crowning achievement of the Weapon X program. Deadpool. Weapon XI. Hopefully the first of many. Your country appreciates your sacrifice. Goodbye, Wade."

He felt himself lowered, felt his heart-rate rising as fear and anger kicked in again. This wasn't right! He didn't deserve this! He was a man! He'd served the United States; they owed him more than this! But he could not say the words out loud, because they had silenced him. Taken away his ability to say 'no'. Taken away his right to freedom of speech. They'd turned him into a slave. A tool. A thing to be toyed with for their own benefit, with no concern for the life they were destroying.

Water enveloped him, cold and biting, and for a brief moment he dared to hope that this would be a true end, that he would drown in this tank and rob them of their chance to make him their weapon. By the time he realised a mask was clamped over his face, allowing him to continue breathing through his nose, it was too late to struggle. His body was held down by shackles so tight that they afforded no movement, even with his enhanced strength. Strength that had come from another fallen soldier, who'd been nothing more than a weapon to his masters.

A noise reached his ears through the water, a mechanical whirring, and he saw things descend from above, screaming as they moved. They entered the water which began to hiss and bubble, and as the things were lowered down towards him he understood what they were; drill bits, aimed at his arms and his legs and his face. Tears of anger left the corners of his eyes, absorbed by the water. Hadn't they done enough to him already?

The drills were lowered, and he tried to struggle. He felt the hot metal pierce his flesh and his body began to thrash automatically, causing even more pain as the metal bits tore muscles which rapidly mended themselves. He knew that he was hurting himself more by thrashing, but he couldn't have stopped even if he wanted to. His body had entered an unconscious survival mode, every cell within him screaming to get away from this pain, to save himself from what was to come. He felt his bones crackling as he flailed within his restraints, felt tiny snaps of smaller bones which had been unable to take the pressure. His eyes clouded with red as his own blood began to fill the tank; it was small relief that he had no idea where the blood was coming from. Hopefully, his brain. Hopefully, this would be the end of it.

He'd thought that nothing could be more painful than having his body drilled into, but then they began pumping boiling liquid into his bones, and he found a new threshold of pain. He begged for unconsciousness, prayed for the release of death, but neither was granted to him. There was only pain, searing heat within, contrasting with burning cold without.

The drills were retracted. The heat within him began to cool, and his body ceased thrashing as severely. The pain began to subside, but the memory of it remained. Every agonising second was an eternity of torture he would never forget. A single thought sustained his life, kept his near-broken heart beating, gave him the will to keep drawing breath through that mask; he was now a weapon. He was a perfect weapon. And to thank them for everything they'd done to him, he would kill them all. Each and every man and woman who had breathed the air of this place would be dead before he allowed himself to rest.

"Bonding process complete," said Killbrew, his voice distorted by the water. "Adamantium reservoirs depleted A complete success."

"I don't believe it," said Cornelius, voice tinged with awe, and something else. "His heart didn't stop. We experienced none of the problems that we did with Weapon X. I think we may have found the perfect genetic template for cloning."

"Excellent!" Stryker sounded pleased. "And congratulations to both of you. Now… initiate the communications uplink to the cybernetic implant in Wilson's brain, and erase his memory."

.

The flashback ended, and Deadpool opened his eyes. The tank stood there, cold, empty, mocking him. He extended the blades from his arms and slashed across the tank, bringing the blades round again and again, until nothing but chunks of concrete and metal were left. Then he sank down to the ground as a darkness settled over his mind.

He could stop searching, now. He didn't need to look any further for Weapon XI. He was Weapon XI.

o - o - o - o - o

The first sliver of golden sunlight flowed across the horizon. Wade noticed it, but dismissed it from his thoughts. The first cleanup crews wouldn't be arriving for another couple of hours, if they held true to their usual schedules, and he had more important things to think about right now than a sunrise. So many thoughts were swirling through his mind that he didn't know which of them to address first.

He'd been a man, a soldier, but had been betrayed by the people he served, turned into some sort of living weapon. His sole consolation was that with the destruction that had happened here, it wasn't likely they'd attempt this again on anybody else. At least, not any time soon. He would, of course, track down anybody with knowledge of this process and kill them just to make sure… but there would be time for that later. First, he had to get fixed.

His main problem with that was he didn't know how much fixing he needed. He still couldn't completely remember who he'd been. He had no idea which abilities were his and which had been grafted onto him by those bastards in the military and their white-coated minions. Clearly, the blades did not belong in his arms; even if his memory hadn't told him that, he knew that it wasn't right for a man to have weapons inside his flesh. As for the rest of it… the teleporting appeared to be gone. Why, or how, wasn't important. It was something he could no longer do, therefore he could happily forget about it and move on from here.

The man, Stryker, and the other two, had talked about things. Cybernetics. Computers. Control. If he had to hazard a guess, it would be that they'd shoved some sort of computer chip inside his head, to make him more pliable. After all, computers couldn't talk back, could they? All computers did was follow their programming. They didn't have opinions, or personalities, or a soul. They were just tools… one tool, to control another. A bitter thought.

The computer in his brain wasn't working anymore, he suspected. Once, it had suppressed his thoughts, controlled his body, kept him prisoner inside his own flesh. Well, never again! From this moment on, he would never again trust technology! Perhaps he ought to destroy computers whenever he found them… though it would probably be easier to destroy the people who made and programmed said computers. End the threat by going right to the source. Yes, computer nerds would be the next to die, after the Weapon X staff.

But, again, there would be plenty of time for that later. Right now, the help he needed was more immediate. He needed to get his mouth working again, because mouths were used for eating food, and although he wasn't hungry at the moment—and hadn't been hungry since waking, which was slightly troubling—he knew that he would be hungry eventually. Also, he'd happily get rid of the blades in his arms. Perhaps he could find a surgeon to remove them. Or, failing that, a construction worker with an angle grinder and a steady hand.

He heard the sound of approaching motor boats, and stood up, looking out towards the water. So. The clean up crews were early today. Possibly they'd found their dead colleagues last night and decided to make the most of the daylight hours to search for the perfect weapon the government had unleashed on them. Which probably meant they'd come with guards. Lots and lots of guards, with guns. Maybe dogs, too. He quite liked dogs, but he didn't like guards, or guns. They were so loud, so crass… both of them.

Another scene played across his memory.

"I already amthe best marksman in the world, and I don't need my name on some trophy to prove it. I never miss what I aim for."

There was a face, to go with the words; the face of a cold-eyed, olive-skinned man who always carried at least one pistol around with him. Agent Zero. Bootlicker of the man named Stryker. A typical good soldier, always hanging around waiting for a kind word and a scrap of something to eat from his master's table. Zero was one of those who'd captured him and brought him to this place. Hopefully the man was dead, now. Deadpool had never liked him. Oh sure, he was a great guy to have around in combat, and he could shoot the wings off a fly at two hundred feet whilst it was mid-flight, or whatever. But he was so… boring. No sense of fun.

The increasing noise of the motor boats brought his attention back to the present. Yes, it was past time to be gone from here. There was nothing left for him in the ruins of this place. He needed to find somewhere new. He needed to find help. Perhaps from the Captain in his memory, perhaps from Bradley if he was still alive, or perhaps from someone else. His memories would come back, eventually. They had to. He needed to know who he was. Who he had been. Who he would become.

Taking a deep breath, he threw himself into the icy cold water, experiencing another unpleasant déjà vu of the tank, and then began to kick. He'd always loved swimming, but now it seemed particularly difficult. It wasn't as if he was wearing much in the way of clothes—he would rectify that soon enough—but he just felt… heavier.

Oh, right. Adamantium stuff on my bones, he thought, as he swam around the point of the island, out of view of the approaching boats. Probably weighing me down. Good job I have super-stamina. At least, I hope I have super-stamina. I have no idea where I am, or how far I'll have to swim to find help.

Without so much as a backwards glance at the island, he set his sights on the far bank, which looked sparsely populated, and swam towards his new life.