I've met Wolverine, as in the mutant superhero of the X-Men. And not just once either, like five times, well actually only four, I suppose; the first time I really only saw him. I wish that I could brag about it better, but the circumstances weren't so great. I was in trouble and he helped me, saved me you could say. I guess I was a damsel in distress, almost like a fairy tale. He was definitely a hero, but.... I don't know. I think I just wish that it would've ended the way the fairy tales do too.
The first time I saw him was just a glance out the kitchen window from my late father's cabin by the creek. At first glance I didn't really recognize him. That was probably due to the fact that I was in shock. I didn't know that at the time; my only clear thought was of running away. My clothes were so shredded that they wouldn't even stay on. So I took a blanket off the back of the chair in the den. But the very first thing I grabbed was the knife I had been chopping vegetables with when the monster broke into the cabin. He'd laughed when I stabbed him with it, then pulled it out of his chest and tossed it carelessly aside. I watched, frozen, helpless as the hole I'd cut in his flesh disappeared before my very eyes. He was still laughing as he pinned me to the floor and began cutting me with his claws. I don't remember much at all after that, pain, confusion, jumbled memories I'm probably more grateful to forget.
As soon as something outside distracted the monster from me, I scrambled for the knife, my hands barely able to grasp its handle. I stood there for a moment, on wobbly legs, looking at the mess in the kitchen: everything within reach was overturned or broken, shards of shattered glass lay on everything like morning dew, and chopped vegetables and cubes of beef were scattered about the floor, soaking in a puddle that was a mixture of the beef broth I had been stewing and my own blood. The very sight of it made me sick. My father's birthday supper was ruined. That was only the beginning.
I couldn't hear what was going on outside. I stood there shivering, the knife shaking in my hands, too hurt to even cry. My mind was as empty as I felt. But when I looked up from the floor I saw the monster through the window, and he wasn't alone. My fear reached the verge of panic until I realized that the two were not friendly with one another. A man, like a werewolf, was attacking him. Whether that meant that the winner of the battle would finish me off or save me was something I couldn't decipher. But it was my chance to escape. He threw the monster into the side of the cabin so hard that I heard it crack, and watched it begin to give way. The man looked at me. I just stared at him. He shifted his eyes toward the woods and mouthed the word, "Run." That is what finally made me move. And I ran.
A person is never really sure how far they can push themselves in a situation like that until it happens. Oh, sure you can sit there and watch people do it in movies, or read about it in books, but it's not the same. You have to really FEEL it to know what I'm talking about. Your mind shuts down, well the rational part anyway. You acting purely on instinct.
Well I guess my instinct isn't very good cause I ended up kneeling next to this big old oak tree, still grasping the knife. I couldn't have been more than 500 yards from the house. Like I said, it;s a good thing I'm at the top of the food chain, well usually. I wasn't thinking anything, I just sat there, trying to hold the front of my shirt together, and hold the knife in front of me at the same time. That pretty much took all of my concentration. Don't think I even heard him walk right up in front of me.
"I'm not gonna hurt ya, but ya have to get up." He said as he approached with his arms extended toward me. "We have to move. If I found ya, he can find ya."
I was so stiff I could barely open my eyes, let alone move the rest of me. I didn't realize that I had been crouched there for almost a whole minute just staring at him in disbelief. Time just wasn't flowing for me. He picked me up. "Easy darlin', I gotcha. Just hang on. We've gotta get you somewhere else."
I let him pick me up, but I didn't let go of the knife. It was my life line. When I think back I think I still have that knife to this day. His grasp was strong but gentle as he picked me up ansd craddled me against his chest as he moved swiftly towards what must have been his car. He set me inside and buckled me in, all the while just letting me sit in my silent, unblinking, world.
We drove, I'm not sure how long, but I finally turned to him, and studied the man who had saved me. He didn't appear to be terriably tall. His hair was thick and dark, and to this day I'm not sure hoe he gets it to go into those points. His face was harsh, a grim set to his mouth as he watched the road, pretending not to notice me watching him. He was tough, hard even, but I could see the laugh lines around his eyes.
"Why did you do this?"
"Because he's a psychopathic homicidal maniac. An' I think i'm the only one with a chance of stopping him." He didn't look at me, at least not that I could see. But the hand that wasn't holding the knife clasped tighter around the shredded remains of my shirt. He steered with his knee for a moment and carefully began un buttoning his shirt. I pretended not to notice.
"Do you mean him? The monster in my father's cabin?"
He tugged the shirt, now bereft of his arms, from behind his back and handed it to me. "Sorry I don't have anything else to give you." I just looked at his out stretched hand. "Take it. It's all right. I don't need it."
I reached out with my free hand and took it, I started to put it on, but it wasn't easy when your holding on to a butcher knife for dear life.
"Damn it!" I hissed when I sliced my arm with the knife. Well if it hurt then at least my shock was wearing off.
He finally look at me as he pulled over to the side of the road and turned to look at my arm. I pulled back as he reached for me, just cause he saved me doesn't mean I'm gonna trust him.
"It's alright," he said quietly, reaching for my arm again.
"That's not what I meant." I whispered as he inspected the cut. He simply glanced at me.
I hesitated for a moment before continuing. "I meant why are you helping me?"
"Look kid, I'm not gonna let him hurt you. An' I'm not gonna hurt you myself. I'm one o' the good guys, okay. Now let me see your arm."
"Do you mind if I put the shirt on first?"
"You're gonna have to put down that knife, or you'll end up cutting yourself all over again. So just relax, a little bit, and hand me the knife." I simply wasn't ready to do that. My face seemed to say as much to him by the expression he gave me in reply. A moment of indecision, then I opened the door of his jeep and dropped down out of it running. I just wasn't ready to trust this man, he reminded me far too much of that monster, and I couldn't even allow myself yet to acknowledge what that monster had done to me. My mind wouldn't let me go back to that. And the rest of me followed suit, ready to rid myself of everything that reminded me of this day, including that man back there. Or so I thought.
The last thing I heard him say was "Damn it!" As he slammed the jeep into park. I just kept running. Until I ran into the monster. I tried to scream, but his grip on my throat wouldn't let me. It wouldn't let me breathe either. But it did let me sleep, a dark, peaceless, unmerciful, unrestful sleep tormented by nightmares of beast men and knives.
Loud, why was it so loud? I thought as I lay in peaceful darkness. I only wanted to be left alone in the silence of the darkness but how could one sleep with that damn noise!
I slowly opened my eyes to see what appeared to be a muzzle of an animal in my face. I blinked my eyes, sure that it was a dream, but then the muzzle spoke.
"Heh frail. Thought ya got away from me for a second there. Thought maybe I wasn't gonna get paid, so I took it out on yer old man."
I realized that it was the monster that attacked me. I hadn't gotten away after all. And now I was back where I started, and this - thing - had killed my father. Granted he wasn't the best of men, some might say he was an out right bastard, but he didn't deserve what this thing probably did to him. No one did.
And now he was going to do it to me. I had been good all my life, and now this monster was gonna take me out for no reason. I'm gonna have to have a long talk with my priest. Well if I was going to die I did the only thing I could. I looked him right in the eye.
It just laughed. "You got spunk frial, I've give ya that much." He ran his tongue along my cheek. "Bet yer gonna be a whole lot sweeter than that dried up old husk was."
Hell, if I was gonna die, why not go out with a bang?
"Actually, I'm kinda bitter." I thrust the knife into his stomach and turned it 60 degrees. I knew that I had held onto it for a reason.
"And that is all the payment you'll ever get out of me." Leaving the knife in his gut, I squirmed until I was free and then I bolted again.
"I wouldn't say that. You were fun, before the runt showed up." He didn't have to yell. He just bellowed and that cutting voice of his carried right to me. I shut my eyes for a moment and pushed myself harder. No! I won't think about it.
He began pulling the knife out, but before he even began to chase me, I heard him howl. Six points were tearing through the front of his shirt from behind, as if they had just burrowed through his chest.
Another voice was yelling now. "I'm not finished with you yet, bub!" (sorry, couldn't help myself)
Deeper into the woods I ran. At the time, I didn't really know what I was dealing with, and I certainly didn't realize that that was the worst place I could possibly go. But on wobbly legs I just kept going.
Behind me I heard more growling and yelling. I paused for just a moment to look back one more time. The guy who'd saved me the first time was back again, fighting with the monster. What was he really after? Well, I'd had about enough of that for one day, and I decided running wasn't going to help me much. So as long as they were both distracted....
I circled back and found the jeep, right where he'd stopped it. Keys were still in the ignition. If he really wanted to help me, he wouldn't mind me helping myself.
It didn't occur to me to feel guilty about leaving that guy there with that monster until after I got back home. But I was too scared to go back for him. And too scared to tell anyone else, because that would mean telling someone what had happened, and that would mean I would have to think about it. I would have to admit it to myself, and I wasn't ready to do that.
It wasn't too hard to hide the jeep in the parking garage below my apartment complex. I just had to keep my car parkedon the street. Nobody questioned that, but they would question it if I suddenly showed up with a new jeep.
Out of guilt again I went down to the garage. I just kept telling myself that I would give him back his car. I would even take real good care of it. Start it once in a while, drive it around the block, so it didn't just set and rust. I cleaned it out from top to bottom. Washed it waxed it. I would give it back in better shape than when I had borrowed it. I wasn't a thief. As long as in my mind I intended to give it back to him, then he couldn't be dead. The monster didn't kill him and none of it was my fault. He said he wanted to help me. He did.
But I still didn't know who he was. At least not yet. I looked for registration or anything else that would tell me his name, give me an address so I could give him back his jeep, but there was nothing. It was like he didn't exist. For a long time I wondered if maybe it was all a nightmare. Maybe I'd taken up sleepwalking and cut myself in my sleep while walking in the kitchen. After the wounds had healed I doubted that they had ever been there. I wasn't sure at all what I knew. I thought that there was no evidence of any of it happening at all except for that jeep in my garage.
Unfortunately I was wrong. It was only a few weeks before I realized that something else was wrong. I saw a doctor. He never asked about the cuts that were almost completely healed. But he told me the last thing that I wanted to hear, the last thing I expected to hear. I was a virgin. I just kept telling myself that. I'd never slept with any of my boyfriends, never. But I was pregnant. I couldn't ignore my nightmares and memories anymore. That monster had...had raped me.
Ok, so a lot of people wouldn't really have agreed with my descion, but then again, not a lot of people had been attacked by a raving lunatic who had killed thier father and came after them.
It had taken me awhile to decide anything, but I came to the descion after sitting in Central Park a couple of days after I discovered the truth. A detective found me by the fountian and asked my name. He asked me if I knew where my father was. I shook my head no, thinking they wouldn't believe my story even if I told them. Guess it didn't matter though because the detective told me that they had found his body by our cabin. Well parts of it anyway, that is why it took so long to make an ID. He asked if I had any idea who could have done it. It took everything in me not to lose it and start laughing right there. Yeah look for the large feral guy or the ones with knives in his hands.
Instead I just shook my head. He gave me his card and said to call him if I remembered anything.
Well I do know something. I know that whatever that thing was, raped me, and killed my father-and I don't know why. Actually that isn't entirely true, it isn't too much of a stretch to imagine someone wanting to kill my father-what I don't know is why, and how I am connected to it.
So now I'm stuck in this situation-pregnant with a killers baby. He could have finished me off, but he didn't. Now perhaps the recent event have made me paranoid, but that makes me suspicious. There must be a reason why he left me alive, and I'm willing to bet what I'm carrying is it. Now you can call me a killer, a bitch and a whore if you like, although the term "when in glass houses" comes to mind. Anyway I went to the doctor and got the pill and took it back to my apartment.
I must have stared at it for hours, sitting on the counter next to a glass of water, but finally I took it. I wanted it over. I wanted that monster out of my life, and I wanted to erradicate everything he did to me also. I laid in my bed and I waited, I must have lain there for hours but nothing happened. I knew it could take a while, so I decided (against my better judgement I might add) to go and get some coffee. Looking back, I can see how stupid that was. I mean, who decides to abort an unwanted child and goes to get a cup of coffee because it's taking too long? I guess I wasn't thinking right, scratch that, I KNOW I wasn't thinking right.
Anyway, so in my psychological stupor I walk down the block and into the nearest Starbucks about a block away. I mean, it's only a block away, what could go wrong right?
Yeah, what could go wrong. Famous last words.
I make it into the starbucks and am waiting patiently in line. There are about 5 people ahead of me and I'm starting to wonder if this is such a good idea. I don't want to make a mess of myself in the middle of downtown New York.
So I stand there, listening to the conversations around me. The girl at the table to the left of me is complaining because her father won't buy her a new car. I feel like screaming at her to stop complaining until she had real problems, like mine. But I keep silent.
Finally it's my turn and I order a tall Mocha, pay for it and take a sip of my cafinated bliss.
I turn around and make my way to towards the door, trying to fit the lid on the top of the cup. I finally get it on, wondering if it's only my cup that the lid is to small for. I feel it's warmth fill my mouth, when I here someone behind me say , "Heh."
I turn around and unceremoniously spit my coffee all over the person. It's him, the guy in the jeep.
I look around me trying to see if I can escape, but he grabs my arm and drags me into the street. All the while I'm thinking "Hello? People, I'm being abducted here!" But of course, we're in New York, no one even blinks. Imbeciles.
In the street I try to jerk my arm away but his grip is too strong.
"Look, we need to talk."
I simply look at him amazed by his gaul. I guess the shocked stupor I have been living in for the last couple of days is wearing off, because I can feel myself starting to get angry.
"No, you look! YOU may need to talk, but I need to take my mocha and go lay down. My father is dead, and I'm willling to bet YOU had something to do with it, so bugger off and leave me alone!"
I was quite astonished at my outburst, and by the fierce scowl on his face I realized that it was probably a bad idea.
The man leaned foward, his nose almost touching mine and sniffed.
"What'd you do?" He growled.
Feeling the fingers of fear work their way into my belly, I tried to back up, but his fingers dug into my arm.
"I didn't do anything," I stammered at him. "Please, just let me go."
He started to drag me down the street, and for all his small stature he over powered me easily. As we moved quickly through the crowded street I realized that we were heading towards my apartment. This guy knew where I lived? If he knew, then chances are the other guy knew as well. I wasn't safe anywhere anymore.
"Where are you taking me?" Panic crept into my voice.
"I'm gonna see what ya tried to flamin do to yerself." He ground out. "You took something, I can smell it on ya."
He could smell it on me? What kind of nightmare had I fallen into. He walked up to the door and one of the knives came out of his hand and he sliced the lock open, dragging me in behind him. He dropped me onto the couch and went into the kitchen and started to dig through my cupboards. I heard him pass down the hallway and into the bathroom. I eyed the front door that was standing wide open. Could I make it?
I never got a chance to find out as he walked back into the living room holding a box.
"Is this what you took?"
I stared at him, frozen like a deer in the headlights, unsure of what to say. Ever since I had met him my life had been a nightmare. To my horror I felt my lower lip begin to tremble, and tears build up in my eyes.
"I just want to be left alone, by all of you." I choked out. I heard him sigh and he knelt down in front of me resting one of his large hands on my knee.
"That's not in the cards darlin' not anymore."
"I'm real sorry about what happened to you, but I had nothin' to do with it." I started crying. "Easy now. If you have to , then let it out, but there's more. Are you ready?"
I was going to nod, but the pain in my abdomen struck me first.
"Can you throw up that pill?"
"Maybe."
"Just a second." He disappeared into the kitchen. I heard him rattling around in the cabinets. When he came back he handed me a glass of oily looking liquid. "Drink as much of that as you can. It'll help you throw up."
I did. And it worked. All over my living room floor. I didn't have time to run to the bathroom.
"Now, drink this, all of it." He handed me a bottle of pepto bismol. "It'll stop the puking, and hopefully slow the effects of that pill."
My belly felt like it was trying to rupture. I gasped and sat down.
"Well, we'd better get you to a doctor. Come on." But I couldn't move. "We've been here before." He said. "Just relax. Where are the keys to my jeep?" I pointed to the counter. He grabbed them then picked me up and out the door we went.
He drove like a bat out of hell. It took me a moment to notice that we weren't going toward the hospital. I panicked and grabbed the wheel.
"What are you doin'?"
"That's what I should be asking you! This isn't the way to the hospital!" I jerked on the wheel again. His grip was too strong to budge it. My next instinct was to run again. I reached for the door. He reached out and grabbed my arm.
"No you don't. Not again." I pulled my arm against his grasp. "Look, there's a lot more to this situation than you know."
I looked at him. And then it hit me. "Is this about mutants?"
He stared right back at me. "Yes."
I pulled the door closed.
"You gonna stay put?" I nodded. He let go of my arm and resumed driving. Still like a bat out of hell.
"How do you know so much? And if we're not going to the hospital where is it that you are taking me?"
"I have a friend who's a doctor, and he doesn't have any qualms about dealing with mutants."
"But- but I'm not a mutant." I said.
"No, you're not." he said slowly. "But the father of your child is, and that means that child might be too. No tellin' what any regular doctor might try to do if he found out you were carrying a mutant child. You might not ever leave that hospital."
"Are you a mutant?" I asked.
"You like to ask questions don't ya." He paused, took a breath. "Yeah."
"What- what-" I didn't know how to ask.
"My mutation?" he said. I nodded. "I heal real fast. And my senses are sharper'n yours."
"Is that how you smelled the- what I took?"
"Yeah."
"And, the monster who- who...?"
"He's the same."
I swallowed. And the pain struck again, but not so bad this time, almost like I was recovering already. Even so I doubled over in my seat and hugged myself. I had expected very different results.
He glanced at me. "You hangin' on?"
I nodded.
"Don't pass out, ya hear? Talk to me. Ask me some more flamin' questions if ya gotta, just don't go to sleep."
"What's your name?"
"Logan. What's yours?"
I debated whether or not to give him my real name. And I decided it would be pointless to hide it from him. He already knew where I lived, who knew what else he could find out if he was of a mind to? "Irene. Where are we going?"
"Westchester, New York. It's only a half an hour or so. Can you last that long?"
"I don't know. I hope so." The pain seemed to subside for a moment and I sat up straight.
"Keep talking." He said.
"How do you know the monster?"
"It's a long story."
"Give me the reader's digest version."
"We used to work together. Before we went our seperate ways."
"Which way did you go?"
He looked at me before he anwered. "To the side with the heroes. I joined the X-Men." I nodded in recognition. I'd heard of the outlaws mutants called the X-Men. "Sabretooth worked for Magneto."
"Isn't that the guy who messed up the magnetic field, and had an asteroid or something?"
"Yeah." He suppressed a growl. "Now he runs Genosha."
He got real quiet and I started to think that was a bad topic to discuss. And the pain struck again. It came and went faster this time. At the end I could swear I felt a strange sensation. Not pain, but movement. "So tell me about this baby."
Logan scowled at the question. "Not much to tell kid, I don't know much."
I couldn't help but raising an eyebrow. "Really, it seems that you know a whole lot to me. Maybe to much. You found me didn't you?"
"It's complicated."
I felt my frustration growing, "it always is." I gasped suddenly as the pain in my abdomine increased, bringing tears to my eyes.
"So tell me," I gasped at him. "You were there at the same time he was. So why was he after me?"
The man, Logan, griped the steering wheel harder.
"I told you he's a killer. That's what he does."
"But I'm not dead."
"I'm not a flamin' mind reader."
"What were you doing there? I have a hard time believing you were just passing by."
"I was following Creed."
"Why?"
"Maybe this questioning thing isn't such a good idea."
"Maybe not but I think I have a right to know."
"He's a killer."
"YOu said that already, twice."
"There was only one reason he would go anywhere, and that's to kill."
"And it is your personal duty to stop him?"
"Somethin' like that."
"Why was he after my father?"
"I don't know. How do you know he was after your father?"
"So let me get this straight," I could here my voice rising with my aggitation, reaching shrill proportions. "You were following someone who you KNEW was a killer, but SOME HOW he got away from you long enough to attack and rape me AND kill my father, and EVEN though you have been tracking him you have NO idea about WHY he chose to come after us? IS THAT RIGHT?"
"Look, kid. . ."
"Don't you look kid me! I've had nothin but trouble since you and your buddy came into my life, and given the current circumstances I don't think that your going to be leaving it anytime soon. So I don't think it would kill you to give me some answers!" I turned to glare at him.
"Or are you just the team grunt, incapable of logic and reason?" I sneered.
"That's it!" He growled. "You are gonna sit down and shut up! I have had enough of your yappin! Anything I do know is on a need to know basis. And YOU don't need to know."
I sat back in my seat, scowling. Logan leaned foward in his seatsearching for a cigar, only to be brought up by my yelp.
"Look out where the hell your going!" I pointed out the window towards the semi he had veered toward.
"Flamin hell," he muttered as he jerked the wheel to avoid a collision, for all the good it was going to do us.
When I opened my eyes, everything hurt. I was laying in a snow drift on the side of the road. The semi was on the other side of the road, laying on its side, smoke rising from the engine. The jeep had apparently flipped over multitudinous times because it was bashed into the vague shape of a ball. And Logan was nowhere to be seen.
I struggled to my feet, and yelled, "Logan?"
Then I heard a skreetch liek metal being ripped and I watched in silent horror as the monster tore his way out of the cab of the semi.
"Why won't you leave me the hell alone?" And I started trying to run.
I heard the horns and tires skreetching as he crossed the highway with no regard to traffic.
I tripped and fell flat on my face.
"Don't move." It was Logan. He was under the snow. I guess I had tripped over him.
I didn't have time to move anyway. The monster Logan had called Creed was right behind me. "You lookin' fer the runt? Well so am I. Let's see who finds him first." He began sniffing the air. "I can smell him. I know he's here. Come on out runt!" Then he turned his eyes back to me. "And I smell something else."
He inched toward me. My muscles twitched to move, but Logan had told me not to. I couldn't belive I was actually doing what I was told. Maybe I was finally starting to trust him. Maybe. I sat there, frozen as Creed crept toward where I sat leaning back on my hands. His face was inches from mine. He inhaled deeply, and his face dropped lower, smelling all of me from head to foot. Then returned to my middle. He was looking right at my belly.
He couldn't possibly know! I thought. But a voice in the back of my head reminded me that Logan had smelled me and known I had taken the pill. What if he knew? What if he knew?
He smiled just in time to catch a belly full of claws.
I sat there in mute silence. This was too much. I had never asked for much. When I was ten I wanted a puppy, at sixteen a car. Now I just wanted the crazed killers in front of me to leave me alone.
I never got the puppy or the car, so as far as I could tell the sitution at hand wasn't going to get any better.
Creed wheeled around, throwing Logan through the trees with a roar before he turned to me, picking me up by the shoulders.
His nose was touching mine as he looked into my eyes and gave what I supposed for him was a smile.
"What, do you want from me?" I whispered.
A gutteral chuckle erupted from his throat. "Just some fun." He looked over his shoulder where he had thrown Logan. The short man was charging out of the sparse snow covered trees.
"Well you had that already, so let me go."
"You," He looked back at Logan, who was drawing closer, "the runt," he turned his gaze back to me, "and now, a kid. Oh, you're definitely not goin' anywhere."
"The hell she's not!" Logan said from behind the monster.
He whirled me around so fast I wanted to hurl. "One step closer runt, and the frail gets it." He shifted his grip on me to the back of my neck like the scruff on a cat. He rested his other hand on my belly, "Kid first. Now start marching the other way."
Logan growled but didn't budge.
Creed slowly began digging his claws in. I couldn't help the scream that came out of me. "Your move runt."
I started kicking at him. Now I realize that was probably a stupid thing to do, but I guess I figured heh, may as well go down fighting. Maybe spending so much time with a 'hero' was beginning to rub off on me.
"You stupid bastard! I hope you rot in hell!"
"Irene! Shaddup!" Logan yelled, causing me to quite.
"Can I pick 'em or what runt?" Creed laughed, "Shes got more spunk than your frial, and this one is all mine!"
"Over my dead dead body Creed."
"That is the whole point runt, that is the whole point." He dug his hands in a little deeper, but this time I bit by lip so I didn't cry out.
Logan didn't need to be worrying about me while he tried to get rid of this psycho.
"You won't get to anywhere I can't find ya." Creed said as he dropped me to the ground. "Come on, runt, just like old times. You me an' a frail. I think I'll let this one live, at least long enough to reap the kid from her. Imagine that, runt, another Sabretooth runnin' around, two of me. You can't even handle this one."
While he was still mouthing off to Logan I crawled around and found a big stick. It wasn't a knife, but it was better than nothing. I swung it at the back of his neck. I heard a crack and watched as he fell to the ground. Logan proceeded to shred him to pieces. I ran to the highway and flagged down a car.
"Logan come on!" My own voice startled me. Not the sound, but the words themselves.
We jumped into the car. "Floor it." He said to the driver, a scared looking teenage boy.
"Umm, uh, I mean..." he stuttered.
"We've just been in a car accident kid, and she's pregnant, move!"
As if acknowledging his words, all three of us looked at my belly. Logan stared openly, and I gasped. I expected to see the blood from the small punctures Creed had made, but I didn't expect to see so much...of me, of the baby. I knew I couldn't be more than 4 or 5 weeks pregnant, but I suddenly looked almost 4 months along.
"We have less time than we thought." Logan said as the car jolted forward, squealing tires.
I looked at my stomach, images of Ripley and that slimy monster clawing it's way out of her chest came to mind. I must of turned a shade of green because he put a hesitant hand on my shoulder.
"You gonna be ok?"
"Oh yeah, sure, happens all the time, no problem." I whispered weakly. I saw his eyebrows draw together in concern.
"He's never gonna leave me alone is he?" I whispered as I turned toward the window.
I heard no reply, I didn't need one. I felt the world slowly melt away as the trees whizzed by as I pulled into the safe havens of my mind.
I'm really sure excactly what happened next. It was as if I was underwater, everything moved slowly and sounded distorted and far away.
I vauguely recall the kid who picked us up asking if I was alright, Logan growling, but not much else. I suppose that it doesn't really matter anyway.
Logan sat in the booth across from him, and he was worried. She hadn't moved, not even blinked for the last half hour. It was as if she had shut down completely. This was definatly not good.
Logan sighed as he pushed his plate away from him and Irene was still staring out of the window, her food untouched. He needed to get her out of here. For that he needed a car. Luckily the kid that picked them up was still here. He was gonna have to 'borrow' his car.
"You sit tight ok, kid? I'll be right back." He got up and walked out into the parking lot. He found the kids beat up old checy and pulled the door open. Kid hadn't even locked it, didn't he know that there were people around who could try to steal it? He smiled as he reached under and hotwire it, causeing it to roar to life, well sort of, it was more of a cough.
Suddenly he heard yelling coming from the diner.
"@#%$," pictures of Creed and a comotose Irene came to mind as he ran toward the front door.
"Hope the kid had enough sense to run," he muttered, flinging to door open.
He wasn't prepaired for the sight that confronted him. Tables were over turned and people were laying on the floor, except for Irene and the waitress who stood in front of her with a knife to her throat.
Irene's eyes were wide, as she glanced wildly around her.
**************************************
Suddnely I looked up and I was all alone. Now at first I thought that was a good thing, but then I realized that I was exposed and any of them were free to get me. I couldn't let that happen not again.
I got up and charged at the next table, overturning it. I would need cover. The people there weren't with him, the one who hurt me, because they ran away. I did the same with the next tables, searching out a safe haven.
Suddenly she came at me, she wasn't as big as the monster was, but I have learned that appearances can be decieving. She wasn't very good however, becuase it didn't take me long to overpower her. NOw I just had to get out of her. Logan had abandoned me, and left me to die. Well that wasn't going to happen.
Then I heard someone walk up behind me and say "Darlin. . ."
She spun around with the knife still at the waitreses throat.
"Darlin', let her go. You don't have to put down the knife, just let her go. The car's waitin'. We gotta see a doctor about that baby remember?"
As if on cue the baby reminded me of his presence with a seriously jolting kick. I still couldn't believe he was big enough to do that already. I say he, I don't know, I'm just guessing at this point, but I never met a girl who kicks like that. Damn.
My eyes opened wide and I realized I was terrorizing some poor waitress. I let go of her and Logan grabbed my arm and dragged me into the car.
As we were pulling away from the dust clouds behind us he said, "With any luck that kid won't go anywhere and I can get this car back to him within the hour, no harm done."
I stared out the window. "Uh huh." I was thinking: whatever.
"Should I ask what was the big idea back there?"
"Uh huh."
"Well?"
"Uh huh."
"Irene."
"Uh huh."
He grabbed my elbow and shook me.
"What?"
"Don't slip out on me. We ain't got time. What was the deal with the waitress?"
"Uh, I thought you were gone, an' he was back an' I don't know, maybe I was daydreamin' or somthing."
"You finished now?"
"Day dreaming?"
"Yeah."
"I hope so." I looked down at my right hand. At least I had a knife again.
"We're here." he said. I looked up. Here was a mansion, a huge mansion.
Then a young asian girl came running up to the driver door. "Wolvster! Who's the chic?"
"Jubes, go get Hank, tell him we got a pregnant woman in trouble, hurry."
"You got it Wolvie."
"Wolvie?" I asked.
"Pet name." He grunted.
"Some pet."
We drove right around to the front door. "Can you walk?"
I nodded and then followed him through a house I couldn't begin to describe, a house that had its own medical wing.
I sat down on a bed and Logan left, but before the door closed behind him the asian girl slipped through. "Hey. Hank, that's the doctor, he asked me to have you put on a robe, like a regular hospital, ya know?" She handed it to me and continued. "I'm Jubilee. What's your name?"
"Irene." I went behind the screen to change. Before she could leave I asked her. "Is- is Logan your father?"
She laughed and then got a funny look on her face. "No, he's like my hero, my best friend. He's the coolest guy in the whole world. Why?"
"Just wondering. Is he your boyfriend then?"
"Noooo." She said it slow, almost like she was gonaa change her mind half way through the word. "Why?"
"He said you called him by a pet name. What does 'Wolvie' mean?"
She laughed. "It's like short for Wolverine."
"Oh." I came around the screen and sat down on the table.
Then the door opened just a crack. "Ready for me in there?"
"Yeah, I guess. As ready as I was for all of this to happen."
When the body that belonged to that voice came in the door I srambled backwards so fast I fell off the table. But I managed to keep a hold of my knife. "Another one! Stay away from me!" I yelled at the huge blue furred creature in the doorway.
Logan came in right behind him at the sound of my screaming. "Easy 'Rene. This is the doctor. He has no qualms about mutants cuz he is one."
"Like Hank is totally harmless." Jubilee said taking a step closer and offering a hand to help me up. "You okay?"
"Shaken, again, but fine. Ahhhh!" My tummy was cramping like I'd never felt before.
The doctor stepped up and took my wrist searching for my pulse. "So tell me what has happened."
"I'm pregnant!" I yelled.
"Yes, I can see that. Logan, perhaps you would like to fill me in on the peculiarities that surround this pregnancy."
While he was talking I was watchin my belly move. I could almost swear I--the baby--was growing bigger by the second. It sure hurt enough.
"Any ill affects from the pill you took?" he asked.
"Just some of the worst cramps I've ever had."
He raised his eyebrows slightly. "And this accelerated growth rate began just today?" I nodded. "Perhaps it is time for everyone else to leave the room."
Logan shuffled Jubilee out the door. "Don't worry, 'Rene. Hank'll take good care of ya."
"May I see the punctures Sabretooth inflicted?" showed him. "Hmm. Are you sure he scratched you?"
I nodded. "There's blood and tears in my shirt. Why? What's wrong?"
"It appears they've already healed. There's no sign of them."
Just then I swear that kid tried to kill me. He--or it--kicked me so hard the doctor could see it. And my water broke.
I felt the liquid drip down my thighs and I let out the most gut renching scream. I didn't even think it was possible for a person to make a noise like that.
"Logan!" I yelled, my eyes squeezing shut and I felt him move quickly to my side and let me squeeze his hand. I'm not sure, but I think I heard him grunt when I bore down.
"Get this thing out of me!"
"Hank!" Logan yelled as I watched the flesh of his hands change colors. "What do we do here?"
"Lay back and push."
And I did. Then the room went black. When I opened my eyes again it was quiet. I sat up and put my hand to my stomach. Just me.
"She's awake!" Jubilee yelled and bolted out the door. I could hear her footsteps echoing down the hall. It was a long hall. Long enough for me to have just enough time to split. I grabbed my knife and my clothes and I slipped out as quiet as a mouse.
I found the car that Logan "borrowed" from that kid at the diner in the driveway. I hopped in and boosted it just like Logan had done.
I didn't need any trouble, so I drove back to the diner and left the car there. I walked to the nearest bus stop. It was 2o minutes before the next bus came. I didn't even know where it was going. I didn't care. I just wanted out of here.
The bus ride gave me plenty of time to think. I never wanted that child. I never asked for that child or that monster or even Logan and his friends to come into my life. And what would I do with a mutant child anyway? He was better off with other mutants. He or she. I started to wonder what it was, but then I remembered Creed, and I didn't want to know. I just didn't want any reminders of that beast and what he did to me. I just wanted it to all go away. I wanted life to go back to the way it had been. I wanted my father back. I wanted my innocence back. I wanted my life back.
They knew I didn't want that child. They knew I had tried to get rid of it the only way I knew how. They saved it. They wanted that child. They could have it.
I took a week off of work when I got back. Told my boss I went on vacation. That way no one would bother me. I didn't want to answer any questions. I didn't want any visitors. I didn't even want any get well cards. I just wanted to be alone for a while.
So when I heard the knock on the door 2 days later I figured it was somebody selling something and I ignored it. But it didn't stop, instead it got louder, and more insistent. When I went to look out the spy hole I saw Logan. He didn't look happy. But at least he didn't have the child with him.
"Go away. I don't want to know. And I don't want a guilt trip about it."
"Irene, just let me in. Or I'll let myself in." His tone sid that he had no intentions of fooling around. And I remembered those claws. I didn't want to have to buy a new lock. So I unlocked the door and went to sit on my couch. He came in and closed the door behind him.
"I'm not here to give you a guilt trip. I came to bring you to the funeral."
I raised my teary eyes up to meet his own. "What?"
"You heard me. Your baby, your son, died yesterday."
A son. So he told me anyway. Now that I knew, I wasn't so bothered by the not wanting to know. "How?"
"When we discovered you missing, I went out after you. While I was gone Creed broke in. He took the boy. I caught him tryin' to escape with the child, and he...hurt him pretty bad. Bought himself time to escape,and paid with the boy's life. The boy didn't survive the night. I'm sorry."
I sank to my knees. I didn't really care. So why was I crying?
Logan put his arm around my shoulder. "Shh. Just let it out."
I did. All the way back to the mansion.
Hank asked me if I wanted to see him. The baby. I didn't answer so he led me to the back of the medlab. There on a bed was a small white bundle. Hank looked at me expectantly. I nodded. He picked up the bundle and opened the sheet so I could see his face. He had blond hair, like his--I could hardly think it--like his father.
Logan put a hand on my shoulder. "He had your eyes."
But he bore his father's marks as well. His neck was broken. I could tell by the way that Hank held him. And there was a deep gash that ran from his collar bone below where the sheet covered him.
"Do you want to hold him?"
I cringed and shuddered, then shook my head no. I couldn't stand it. I couldn't stand myself. I turned and ran from the room.
The next morning a handful of us walked out to a chapel behind the mansion. Logan dug the tiny grave, and he and the doctor lowered down the tiny coffin.
"Would you like to say a few words?" Hank asked.
I shook my head.
It was only Logan, Hank, Jubilee and myself. And yet I felt so alone.
"What should we put on his tombstone?" Logan asked quietly.
I didn't really know. Then it hit me. He should be named after the one person who cared for him most. It took me a moment, but I cleared my throat and said, "Logan, name him Logan."
The first time I saw him was just a glance out the kitchen window from my late father's cabin by the creek. At first glance I didn't really recognize him. That was probably due to the fact that I was in shock. I didn't know that at the time; my only clear thought was of running away. My clothes were so shredded that they wouldn't even stay on. So I took a blanket off the back of the chair in the den. But the very first thing I grabbed was the knife I had been chopping vegetables with when the monster broke into the cabin. He'd laughed when I stabbed him with it, then pulled it out of his chest and tossed it carelessly aside. I watched, frozen, helpless as the hole I'd cut in his flesh disappeared before my very eyes. He was still laughing as he pinned me to the floor and began cutting me with his claws. I don't remember much at all after that, pain, confusion, jumbled memories I'm probably more grateful to forget.
As soon as something outside distracted the monster from me, I scrambled for the knife, my hands barely able to grasp its handle. I stood there for a moment, on wobbly legs, looking at the mess in the kitchen: everything within reach was overturned or broken, shards of shattered glass lay on everything like morning dew, and chopped vegetables and cubes of beef were scattered about the floor, soaking in a puddle that was a mixture of the beef broth I had been stewing and my own blood. The very sight of it made me sick. My father's birthday supper was ruined. That was only the beginning.
I couldn't hear what was going on outside. I stood there shivering, the knife shaking in my hands, too hurt to even cry. My mind was as empty as I felt. But when I looked up from the floor I saw the monster through the window, and he wasn't alone. My fear reached the verge of panic until I realized that the two were not friendly with one another. A man, like a werewolf, was attacking him. Whether that meant that the winner of the battle would finish me off or save me was something I couldn't decipher. But it was my chance to escape. He threw the monster into the side of the cabin so hard that I heard it crack, and watched it begin to give way. The man looked at me. I just stared at him. He shifted his eyes toward the woods and mouthed the word, "Run." That is what finally made me move. And I ran.
A person is never really sure how far they can push themselves in a situation like that until it happens. Oh, sure you can sit there and watch people do it in movies, or read about it in books, but it's not the same. You have to really FEEL it to know what I'm talking about. Your mind shuts down, well the rational part anyway. You acting purely on instinct.
Well I guess my instinct isn't very good cause I ended up kneeling next to this big old oak tree, still grasping the knife. I couldn't have been more than 500 yards from the house. Like I said, it;s a good thing I'm at the top of the food chain, well usually. I wasn't thinking anything, I just sat there, trying to hold the front of my shirt together, and hold the knife in front of me at the same time. That pretty much took all of my concentration. Don't think I even heard him walk right up in front of me.
"I'm not gonna hurt ya, but ya have to get up." He said as he approached with his arms extended toward me. "We have to move. If I found ya, he can find ya."
I was so stiff I could barely open my eyes, let alone move the rest of me. I didn't realize that I had been crouched there for almost a whole minute just staring at him in disbelief. Time just wasn't flowing for me. He picked me up. "Easy darlin', I gotcha. Just hang on. We've gotta get you somewhere else."
I let him pick me up, but I didn't let go of the knife. It was my life line. When I think back I think I still have that knife to this day. His grasp was strong but gentle as he picked me up ansd craddled me against his chest as he moved swiftly towards what must have been his car. He set me inside and buckled me in, all the while just letting me sit in my silent, unblinking, world.
We drove, I'm not sure how long, but I finally turned to him, and studied the man who had saved me. He didn't appear to be terriably tall. His hair was thick and dark, and to this day I'm not sure hoe he gets it to go into those points. His face was harsh, a grim set to his mouth as he watched the road, pretending not to notice me watching him. He was tough, hard even, but I could see the laugh lines around his eyes.
"Why did you do this?"
"Because he's a psychopathic homicidal maniac. An' I think i'm the only one with a chance of stopping him." He didn't look at me, at least not that I could see. But the hand that wasn't holding the knife clasped tighter around the shredded remains of my shirt. He steered with his knee for a moment and carefully began un buttoning his shirt. I pretended not to notice.
"Do you mean him? The monster in my father's cabin?"
He tugged the shirt, now bereft of his arms, from behind his back and handed it to me. "Sorry I don't have anything else to give you." I just looked at his out stretched hand. "Take it. It's all right. I don't need it."
I reached out with my free hand and took it, I started to put it on, but it wasn't easy when your holding on to a butcher knife for dear life.
"Damn it!" I hissed when I sliced my arm with the knife. Well if it hurt then at least my shock was wearing off.
He finally look at me as he pulled over to the side of the road and turned to look at my arm. I pulled back as he reached for me, just cause he saved me doesn't mean I'm gonna trust him.
"It's alright," he said quietly, reaching for my arm again.
"That's not what I meant." I whispered as he inspected the cut. He simply glanced at me.
I hesitated for a moment before continuing. "I meant why are you helping me?"
"Look kid, I'm not gonna let him hurt you. An' I'm not gonna hurt you myself. I'm one o' the good guys, okay. Now let me see your arm."
"Do you mind if I put the shirt on first?"
"You're gonna have to put down that knife, or you'll end up cutting yourself all over again. So just relax, a little bit, and hand me the knife." I simply wasn't ready to do that. My face seemed to say as much to him by the expression he gave me in reply. A moment of indecision, then I opened the door of his jeep and dropped down out of it running. I just wasn't ready to trust this man, he reminded me far too much of that monster, and I couldn't even allow myself yet to acknowledge what that monster had done to me. My mind wouldn't let me go back to that. And the rest of me followed suit, ready to rid myself of everything that reminded me of this day, including that man back there. Or so I thought.
The last thing I heard him say was "Damn it!" As he slammed the jeep into park. I just kept running. Until I ran into the monster. I tried to scream, but his grip on my throat wouldn't let me. It wouldn't let me breathe either. But it did let me sleep, a dark, peaceless, unmerciful, unrestful sleep tormented by nightmares of beast men and knives.
Loud, why was it so loud? I thought as I lay in peaceful darkness. I only wanted to be left alone in the silence of the darkness but how could one sleep with that damn noise!
I slowly opened my eyes to see what appeared to be a muzzle of an animal in my face. I blinked my eyes, sure that it was a dream, but then the muzzle spoke.
"Heh frail. Thought ya got away from me for a second there. Thought maybe I wasn't gonna get paid, so I took it out on yer old man."
I realized that it was the monster that attacked me. I hadn't gotten away after all. And now I was back where I started, and this - thing - had killed my father. Granted he wasn't the best of men, some might say he was an out right bastard, but he didn't deserve what this thing probably did to him. No one did.
And now he was going to do it to me. I had been good all my life, and now this monster was gonna take me out for no reason. I'm gonna have to have a long talk with my priest. Well if I was going to die I did the only thing I could. I looked him right in the eye.
It just laughed. "You got spunk frial, I've give ya that much." He ran his tongue along my cheek. "Bet yer gonna be a whole lot sweeter than that dried up old husk was."
Hell, if I was gonna die, why not go out with a bang?
"Actually, I'm kinda bitter." I thrust the knife into his stomach and turned it 60 degrees. I knew that I had held onto it for a reason.
"And that is all the payment you'll ever get out of me." Leaving the knife in his gut, I squirmed until I was free and then I bolted again.
"I wouldn't say that. You were fun, before the runt showed up." He didn't have to yell. He just bellowed and that cutting voice of his carried right to me. I shut my eyes for a moment and pushed myself harder. No! I won't think about it.
He began pulling the knife out, but before he even began to chase me, I heard him howl. Six points were tearing through the front of his shirt from behind, as if they had just burrowed through his chest.
Another voice was yelling now. "I'm not finished with you yet, bub!" (sorry, couldn't help myself)
Deeper into the woods I ran. At the time, I didn't really know what I was dealing with, and I certainly didn't realize that that was the worst place I could possibly go. But on wobbly legs I just kept going.
Behind me I heard more growling and yelling. I paused for just a moment to look back one more time. The guy who'd saved me the first time was back again, fighting with the monster. What was he really after? Well, I'd had about enough of that for one day, and I decided running wasn't going to help me much. So as long as they were both distracted....
I circled back and found the jeep, right where he'd stopped it. Keys were still in the ignition. If he really wanted to help me, he wouldn't mind me helping myself.
It didn't occur to me to feel guilty about leaving that guy there with that monster until after I got back home. But I was too scared to go back for him. And too scared to tell anyone else, because that would mean telling someone what had happened, and that would mean I would have to think about it. I would have to admit it to myself, and I wasn't ready to do that.
It wasn't too hard to hide the jeep in the parking garage below my apartment complex. I just had to keep my car parkedon the street. Nobody questioned that, but they would question it if I suddenly showed up with a new jeep.
Out of guilt again I went down to the garage. I just kept telling myself that I would give him back his car. I would even take real good care of it. Start it once in a while, drive it around the block, so it didn't just set and rust. I cleaned it out from top to bottom. Washed it waxed it. I would give it back in better shape than when I had borrowed it. I wasn't a thief. As long as in my mind I intended to give it back to him, then he couldn't be dead. The monster didn't kill him and none of it was my fault. He said he wanted to help me. He did.
But I still didn't know who he was. At least not yet. I looked for registration or anything else that would tell me his name, give me an address so I could give him back his jeep, but there was nothing. It was like he didn't exist. For a long time I wondered if maybe it was all a nightmare. Maybe I'd taken up sleepwalking and cut myself in my sleep while walking in the kitchen. After the wounds had healed I doubted that they had ever been there. I wasn't sure at all what I knew. I thought that there was no evidence of any of it happening at all except for that jeep in my garage.
Unfortunately I was wrong. It was only a few weeks before I realized that something else was wrong. I saw a doctor. He never asked about the cuts that were almost completely healed. But he told me the last thing that I wanted to hear, the last thing I expected to hear. I was a virgin. I just kept telling myself that. I'd never slept with any of my boyfriends, never. But I was pregnant. I couldn't ignore my nightmares and memories anymore. That monster had...had raped me.
Ok, so a lot of people wouldn't really have agreed with my descion, but then again, not a lot of people had been attacked by a raving lunatic who had killed thier father and came after them.
It had taken me awhile to decide anything, but I came to the descion after sitting in Central Park a couple of days after I discovered the truth. A detective found me by the fountian and asked my name. He asked me if I knew where my father was. I shook my head no, thinking they wouldn't believe my story even if I told them. Guess it didn't matter though because the detective told me that they had found his body by our cabin. Well parts of it anyway, that is why it took so long to make an ID. He asked if I had any idea who could have done it. It took everything in me not to lose it and start laughing right there. Yeah look for the large feral guy or the ones with knives in his hands.
Instead I just shook my head. He gave me his card and said to call him if I remembered anything.
Well I do know something. I know that whatever that thing was, raped me, and killed my father-and I don't know why. Actually that isn't entirely true, it isn't too much of a stretch to imagine someone wanting to kill my father-what I don't know is why, and how I am connected to it.
So now I'm stuck in this situation-pregnant with a killers baby. He could have finished me off, but he didn't. Now perhaps the recent event have made me paranoid, but that makes me suspicious. There must be a reason why he left me alive, and I'm willing to bet what I'm carrying is it. Now you can call me a killer, a bitch and a whore if you like, although the term "when in glass houses" comes to mind. Anyway I went to the doctor and got the pill and took it back to my apartment.
I must have stared at it for hours, sitting on the counter next to a glass of water, but finally I took it. I wanted it over. I wanted that monster out of my life, and I wanted to erradicate everything he did to me also. I laid in my bed and I waited, I must have lain there for hours but nothing happened. I knew it could take a while, so I decided (against my better judgement I might add) to go and get some coffee. Looking back, I can see how stupid that was. I mean, who decides to abort an unwanted child and goes to get a cup of coffee because it's taking too long? I guess I wasn't thinking right, scratch that, I KNOW I wasn't thinking right.
Anyway, so in my psychological stupor I walk down the block and into the nearest Starbucks about a block away. I mean, it's only a block away, what could go wrong right?
Yeah, what could go wrong. Famous last words.
I make it into the starbucks and am waiting patiently in line. There are about 5 people ahead of me and I'm starting to wonder if this is such a good idea. I don't want to make a mess of myself in the middle of downtown New York.
So I stand there, listening to the conversations around me. The girl at the table to the left of me is complaining because her father won't buy her a new car. I feel like screaming at her to stop complaining until she had real problems, like mine. But I keep silent.
Finally it's my turn and I order a tall Mocha, pay for it and take a sip of my cafinated bliss.
I turn around and make my way to towards the door, trying to fit the lid on the top of the cup. I finally get it on, wondering if it's only my cup that the lid is to small for. I feel it's warmth fill my mouth, when I here someone behind me say , "Heh."
I turn around and unceremoniously spit my coffee all over the person. It's him, the guy in the jeep.
I look around me trying to see if I can escape, but he grabs my arm and drags me into the street. All the while I'm thinking "Hello? People, I'm being abducted here!" But of course, we're in New York, no one even blinks. Imbeciles.
In the street I try to jerk my arm away but his grip is too strong.
"Look, we need to talk."
I simply look at him amazed by his gaul. I guess the shocked stupor I have been living in for the last couple of days is wearing off, because I can feel myself starting to get angry.
"No, you look! YOU may need to talk, but I need to take my mocha and go lay down. My father is dead, and I'm willling to bet YOU had something to do with it, so bugger off and leave me alone!"
I was quite astonished at my outburst, and by the fierce scowl on his face I realized that it was probably a bad idea.
The man leaned foward, his nose almost touching mine and sniffed.
"What'd you do?" He growled.
Feeling the fingers of fear work their way into my belly, I tried to back up, but his fingers dug into my arm.
"I didn't do anything," I stammered at him. "Please, just let me go."
He started to drag me down the street, and for all his small stature he over powered me easily. As we moved quickly through the crowded street I realized that we were heading towards my apartment. This guy knew where I lived? If he knew, then chances are the other guy knew as well. I wasn't safe anywhere anymore.
"Where are you taking me?" Panic crept into my voice.
"I'm gonna see what ya tried to flamin do to yerself." He ground out. "You took something, I can smell it on ya."
He could smell it on me? What kind of nightmare had I fallen into. He walked up to the door and one of the knives came out of his hand and he sliced the lock open, dragging me in behind him. He dropped me onto the couch and went into the kitchen and started to dig through my cupboards. I heard him pass down the hallway and into the bathroom. I eyed the front door that was standing wide open. Could I make it?
I never got a chance to find out as he walked back into the living room holding a box.
"Is this what you took?"
I stared at him, frozen like a deer in the headlights, unsure of what to say. Ever since I had met him my life had been a nightmare. To my horror I felt my lower lip begin to tremble, and tears build up in my eyes.
"I just want to be left alone, by all of you." I choked out. I heard him sigh and he knelt down in front of me resting one of his large hands on my knee.
"That's not in the cards darlin' not anymore."
"I'm real sorry about what happened to you, but I had nothin' to do with it." I started crying. "Easy now. If you have to , then let it out, but there's more. Are you ready?"
I was going to nod, but the pain in my abdomen struck me first.
"Can you throw up that pill?"
"Maybe."
"Just a second." He disappeared into the kitchen. I heard him rattling around in the cabinets. When he came back he handed me a glass of oily looking liquid. "Drink as much of that as you can. It'll help you throw up."
I did. And it worked. All over my living room floor. I didn't have time to run to the bathroom.
"Now, drink this, all of it." He handed me a bottle of pepto bismol. "It'll stop the puking, and hopefully slow the effects of that pill."
My belly felt like it was trying to rupture. I gasped and sat down.
"Well, we'd better get you to a doctor. Come on." But I couldn't move. "We've been here before." He said. "Just relax. Where are the keys to my jeep?" I pointed to the counter. He grabbed them then picked me up and out the door we went.
He drove like a bat out of hell. It took me a moment to notice that we weren't going toward the hospital. I panicked and grabbed the wheel.
"What are you doin'?"
"That's what I should be asking you! This isn't the way to the hospital!" I jerked on the wheel again. His grip was too strong to budge it. My next instinct was to run again. I reached for the door. He reached out and grabbed my arm.
"No you don't. Not again." I pulled my arm against his grasp. "Look, there's a lot more to this situation than you know."
I looked at him. And then it hit me. "Is this about mutants?"
He stared right back at me. "Yes."
I pulled the door closed.
"You gonna stay put?" I nodded. He let go of my arm and resumed driving. Still like a bat out of hell.
"How do you know so much? And if we're not going to the hospital where is it that you are taking me?"
"I have a friend who's a doctor, and he doesn't have any qualms about dealing with mutants."
"But- but I'm not a mutant." I said.
"No, you're not." he said slowly. "But the father of your child is, and that means that child might be too. No tellin' what any regular doctor might try to do if he found out you were carrying a mutant child. You might not ever leave that hospital."
"Are you a mutant?" I asked.
"You like to ask questions don't ya." He paused, took a breath. "Yeah."
"What- what-" I didn't know how to ask.
"My mutation?" he said. I nodded. "I heal real fast. And my senses are sharper'n yours."
"Is that how you smelled the- what I took?"
"Yeah."
"And, the monster who- who...?"
"He's the same."
I swallowed. And the pain struck again, but not so bad this time, almost like I was recovering already. Even so I doubled over in my seat and hugged myself. I had expected very different results.
He glanced at me. "You hangin' on?"
I nodded.
"Don't pass out, ya hear? Talk to me. Ask me some more flamin' questions if ya gotta, just don't go to sleep."
"What's your name?"
"Logan. What's yours?"
I debated whether or not to give him my real name. And I decided it would be pointless to hide it from him. He already knew where I lived, who knew what else he could find out if he was of a mind to? "Irene. Where are we going?"
"Westchester, New York. It's only a half an hour or so. Can you last that long?"
"I don't know. I hope so." The pain seemed to subside for a moment and I sat up straight.
"Keep talking." He said.
"How do you know the monster?"
"It's a long story."
"Give me the reader's digest version."
"We used to work together. Before we went our seperate ways."
"Which way did you go?"
He looked at me before he anwered. "To the side with the heroes. I joined the X-Men." I nodded in recognition. I'd heard of the outlaws mutants called the X-Men. "Sabretooth worked for Magneto."
"Isn't that the guy who messed up the magnetic field, and had an asteroid or something?"
"Yeah." He suppressed a growl. "Now he runs Genosha."
He got real quiet and I started to think that was a bad topic to discuss. And the pain struck again. It came and went faster this time. At the end I could swear I felt a strange sensation. Not pain, but movement. "So tell me about this baby."
Logan scowled at the question. "Not much to tell kid, I don't know much."
I couldn't help but raising an eyebrow. "Really, it seems that you know a whole lot to me. Maybe to much. You found me didn't you?"
"It's complicated."
I felt my frustration growing, "it always is." I gasped suddenly as the pain in my abdomine increased, bringing tears to my eyes.
"So tell me," I gasped at him. "You were there at the same time he was. So why was he after me?"
The man, Logan, griped the steering wheel harder.
"I told you he's a killer. That's what he does."
"But I'm not dead."
"I'm not a flamin' mind reader."
"What were you doing there? I have a hard time believing you were just passing by."
"I was following Creed."
"Why?"
"Maybe this questioning thing isn't such a good idea."
"Maybe not but I think I have a right to know."
"He's a killer."
"YOu said that already, twice."
"There was only one reason he would go anywhere, and that's to kill."
"And it is your personal duty to stop him?"
"Somethin' like that."
"Why was he after my father?"
"I don't know. How do you know he was after your father?"
"So let me get this straight," I could here my voice rising with my aggitation, reaching shrill proportions. "You were following someone who you KNEW was a killer, but SOME HOW he got away from you long enough to attack and rape me AND kill my father, and EVEN though you have been tracking him you have NO idea about WHY he chose to come after us? IS THAT RIGHT?"
"Look, kid. . ."
"Don't you look kid me! I've had nothin but trouble since you and your buddy came into my life, and given the current circumstances I don't think that your going to be leaving it anytime soon. So I don't think it would kill you to give me some answers!" I turned to glare at him.
"Or are you just the team grunt, incapable of logic and reason?" I sneered.
"That's it!" He growled. "You are gonna sit down and shut up! I have had enough of your yappin! Anything I do know is on a need to know basis. And YOU don't need to know."
I sat back in my seat, scowling. Logan leaned foward in his seatsearching for a cigar, only to be brought up by my yelp.
"Look out where the hell your going!" I pointed out the window towards the semi he had veered toward.
"Flamin hell," he muttered as he jerked the wheel to avoid a collision, for all the good it was going to do us.
When I opened my eyes, everything hurt. I was laying in a snow drift on the side of the road. The semi was on the other side of the road, laying on its side, smoke rising from the engine. The jeep had apparently flipped over multitudinous times because it was bashed into the vague shape of a ball. And Logan was nowhere to be seen.
I struggled to my feet, and yelled, "Logan?"
Then I heard a skreetch liek metal being ripped and I watched in silent horror as the monster tore his way out of the cab of the semi.
"Why won't you leave me the hell alone?" And I started trying to run.
I heard the horns and tires skreetching as he crossed the highway with no regard to traffic.
I tripped and fell flat on my face.
"Don't move." It was Logan. He was under the snow. I guess I had tripped over him.
I didn't have time to move anyway. The monster Logan had called Creed was right behind me. "You lookin' fer the runt? Well so am I. Let's see who finds him first." He began sniffing the air. "I can smell him. I know he's here. Come on out runt!" Then he turned his eyes back to me. "And I smell something else."
He inched toward me. My muscles twitched to move, but Logan had told me not to. I couldn't belive I was actually doing what I was told. Maybe I was finally starting to trust him. Maybe. I sat there, frozen as Creed crept toward where I sat leaning back on my hands. His face was inches from mine. He inhaled deeply, and his face dropped lower, smelling all of me from head to foot. Then returned to my middle. He was looking right at my belly.
He couldn't possibly know! I thought. But a voice in the back of my head reminded me that Logan had smelled me and known I had taken the pill. What if he knew? What if he knew?
He smiled just in time to catch a belly full of claws.
I sat there in mute silence. This was too much. I had never asked for much. When I was ten I wanted a puppy, at sixteen a car. Now I just wanted the crazed killers in front of me to leave me alone.
I never got the puppy or the car, so as far as I could tell the sitution at hand wasn't going to get any better.
Creed wheeled around, throwing Logan through the trees with a roar before he turned to me, picking me up by the shoulders.
His nose was touching mine as he looked into my eyes and gave what I supposed for him was a smile.
"What, do you want from me?" I whispered.
A gutteral chuckle erupted from his throat. "Just some fun." He looked over his shoulder where he had thrown Logan. The short man was charging out of the sparse snow covered trees.
"Well you had that already, so let me go."
"You," He looked back at Logan, who was drawing closer, "the runt," he turned his gaze back to me, "and now, a kid. Oh, you're definitely not goin' anywhere."
"The hell she's not!" Logan said from behind the monster.
He whirled me around so fast I wanted to hurl. "One step closer runt, and the frail gets it." He shifted his grip on me to the back of my neck like the scruff on a cat. He rested his other hand on my belly, "Kid first. Now start marching the other way."
Logan growled but didn't budge.
Creed slowly began digging his claws in. I couldn't help the scream that came out of me. "Your move runt."
I started kicking at him. Now I realize that was probably a stupid thing to do, but I guess I figured heh, may as well go down fighting. Maybe spending so much time with a 'hero' was beginning to rub off on me.
"You stupid bastard! I hope you rot in hell!"
"Irene! Shaddup!" Logan yelled, causing me to quite.
"Can I pick 'em or what runt?" Creed laughed, "Shes got more spunk than your frial, and this one is all mine!"
"Over my dead dead body Creed."
"That is the whole point runt, that is the whole point." He dug his hands in a little deeper, but this time I bit by lip so I didn't cry out.
Logan didn't need to be worrying about me while he tried to get rid of this psycho.
"You won't get to anywhere I can't find ya." Creed said as he dropped me to the ground. "Come on, runt, just like old times. You me an' a frail. I think I'll let this one live, at least long enough to reap the kid from her. Imagine that, runt, another Sabretooth runnin' around, two of me. You can't even handle this one."
While he was still mouthing off to Logan I crawled around and found a big stick. It wasn't a knife, but it was better than nothing. I swung it at the back of his neck. I heard a crack and watched as he fell to the ground. Logan proceeded to shred him to pieces. I ran to the highway and flagged down a car.
"Logan come on!" My own voice startled me. Not the sound, but the words themselves.
We jumped into the car. "Floor it." He said to the driver, a scared looking teenage boy.
"Umm, uh, I mean..." he stuttered.
"We've just been in a car accident kid, and she's pregnant, move!"
As if acknowledging his words, all three of us looked at my belly. Logan stared openly, and I gasped. I expected to see the blood from the small punctures Creed had made, but I didn't expect to see so much...of me, of the baby. I knew I couldn't be more than 4 or 5 weeks pregnant, but I suddenly looked almost 4 months along.
"We have less time than we thought." Logan said as the car jolted forward, squealing tires.
I looked at my stomach, images of Ripley and that slimy monster clawing it's way out of her chest came to mind. I must of turned a shade of green because he put a hesitant hand on my shoulder.
"You gonna be ok?"
"Oh yeah, sure, happens all the time, no problem." I whispered weakly. I saw his eyebrows draw together in concern.
"He's never gonna leave me alone is he?" I whispered as I turned toward the window.
I heard no reply, I didn't need one. I felt the world slowly melt away as the trees whizzed by as I pulled into the safe havens of my mind.
I'm really sure excactly what happened next. It was as if I was underwater, everything moved slowly and sounded distorted and far away.
I vauguely recall the kid who picked us up asking if I was alright, Logan growling, but not much else. I suppose that it doesn't really matter anyway.
Logan sat in the booth across from him, and he was worried. She hadn't moved, not even blinked for the last half hour. It was as if she had shut down completely. This was definatly not good.
Logan sighed as he pushed his plate away from him and Irene was still staring out of the window, her food untouched. He needed to get her out of here. For that he needed a car. Luckily the kid that picked them up was still here. He was gonna have to 'borrow' his car.
"You sit tight ok, kid? I'll be right back." He got up and walked out into the parking lot. He found the kids beat up old checy and pulled the door open. Kid hadn't even locked it, didn't he know that there were people around who could try to steal it? He smiled as he reached under and hotwire it, causeing it to roar to life, well sort of, it was more of a cough.
Suddenly he heard yelling coming from the diner.
"@#%$," pictures of Creed and a comotose Irene came to mind as he ran toward the front door.
"Hope the kid had enough sense to run," he muttered, flinging to door open.
He wasn't prepaired for the sight that confronted him. Tables were over turned and people were laying on the floor, except for Irene and the waitress who stood in front of her with a knife to her throat.
Irene's eyes were wide, as she glanced wildly around her.
**************************************
Suddnely I looked up and I was all alone. Now at first I thought that was a good thing, but then I realized that I was exposed and any of them were free to get me. I couldn't let that happen not again.
I got up and charged at the next table, overturning it. I would need cover. The people there weren't with him, the one who hurt me, because they ran away. I did the same with the next tables, searching out a safe haven.
Suddenly she came at me, she wasn't as big as the monster was, but I have learned that appearances can be decieving. She wasn't very good however, becuase it didn't take me long to overpower her. NOw I just had to get out of her. Logan had abandoned me, and left me to die. Well that wasn't going to happen.
Then I heard someone walk up behind me and say "Darlin. . ."
She spun around with the knife still at the waitreses throat.
"Darlin', let her go. You don't have to put down the knife, just let her go. The car's waitin'. We gotta see a doctor about that baby remember?"
As if on cue the baby reminded me of his presence with a seriously jolting kick. I still couldn't believe he was big enough to do that already. I say he, I don't know, I'm just guessing at this point, but I never met a girl who kicks like that. Damn.
My eyes opened wide and I realized I was terrorizing some poor waitress. I let go of her and Logan grabbed my arm and dragged me into the car.
As we were pulling away from the dust clouds behind us he said, "With any luck that kid won't go anywhere and I can get this car back to him within the hour, no harm done."
I stared out the window. "Uh huh." I was thinking: whatever.
"Should I ask what was the big idea back there?"
"Uh huh."
"Well?"
"Uh huh."
"Irene."
"Uh huh."
He grabbed my elbow and shook me.
"What?"
"Don't slip out on me. We ain't got time. What was the deal with the waitress?"
"Uh, I thought you were gone, an' he was back an' I don't know, maybe I was daydreamin' or somthing."
"You finished now?"
"Day dreaming?"
"Yeah."
"I hope so." I looked down at my right hand. At least I had a knife again.
"We're here." he said. I looked up. Here was a mansion, a huge mansion.
Then a young asian girl came running up to the driver door. "Wolvster! Who's the chic?"
"Jubes, go get Hank, tell him we got a pregnant woman in trouble, hurry."
"You got it Wolvie."
"Wolvie?" I asked.
"Pet name." He grunted.
"Some pet."
We drove right around to the front door. "Can you walk?"
I nodded and then followed him through a house I couldn't begin to describe, a house that had its own medical wing.
I sat down on a bed and Logan left, but before the door closed behind him the asian girl slipped through. "Hey. Hank, that's the doctor, he asked me to have you put on a robe, like a regular hospital, ya know?" She handed it to me and continued. "I'm Jubilee. What's your name?"
"Irene." I went behind the screen to change. Before she could leave I asked her. "Is- is Logan your father?"
She laughed and then got a funny look on her face. "No, he's like my hero, my best friend. He's the coolest guy in the whole world. Why?"
"Just wondering. Is he your boyfriend then?"
"Noooo." She said it slow, almost like she was gonaa change her mind half way through the word. "Why?"
"He said you called him by a pet name. What does 'Wolvie' mean?"
She laughed. "It's like short for Wolverine."
"Oh." I came around the screen and sat down on the table.
Then the door opened just a crack. "Ready for me in there?"
"Yeah, I guess. As ready as I was for all of this to happen."
When the body that belonged to that voice came in the door I srambled backwards so fast I fell off the table. But I managed to keep a hold of my knife. "Another one! Stay away from me!" I yelled at the huge blue furred creature in the doorway.
Logan came in right behind him at the sound of my screaming. "Easy 'Rene. This is the doctor. He has no qualms about mutants cuz he is one."
"Like Hank is totally harmless." Jubilee said taking a step closer and offering a hand to help me up. "You okay?"
"Shaken, again, but fine. Ahhhh!" My tummy was cramping like I'd never felt before.
The doctor stepped up and took my wrist searching for my pulse. "So tell me what has happened."
"I'm pregnant!" I yelled.
"Yes, I can see that. Logan, perhaps you would like to fill me in on the peculiarities that surround this pregnancy."
While he was talking I was watchin my belly move. I could almost swear I--the baby--was growing bigger by the second. It sure hurt enough.
"Any ill affects from the pill you took?" he asked.
"Just some of the worst cramps I've ever had."
He raised his eyebrows slightly. "And this accelerated growth rate began just today?" I nodded. "Perhaps it is time for everyone else to leave the room."
Logan shuffled Jubilee out the door. "Don't worry, 'Rene. Hank'll take good care of ya."
"May I see the punctures Sabretooth inflicted?" showed him. "Hmm. Are you sure he scratched you?"
I nodded. "There's blood and tears in my shirt. Why? What's wrong?"
"It appears they've already healed. There's no sign of them."
Just then I swear that kid tried to kill me. He--or it--kicked me so hard the doctor could see it. And my water broke.
I felt the liquid drip down my thighs and I let out the most gut renching scream. I didn't even think it was possible for a person to make a noise like that.
"Logan!" I yelled, my eyes squeezing shut and I felt him move quickly to my side and let me squeeze his hand. I'm not sure, but I think I heard him grunt when I bore down.
"Get this thing out of me!"
"Hank!" Logan yelled as I watched the flesh of his hands change colors. "What do we do here?"
"Lay back and push."
And I did. Then the room went black. When I opened my eyes again it was quiet. I sat up and put my hand to my stomach. Just me.
"She's awake!" Jubilee yelled and bolted out the door. I could hear her footsteps echoing down the hall. It was a long hall. Long enough for me to have just enough time to split. I grabbed my knife and my clothes and I slipped out as quiet as a mouse.
I found the car that Logan "borrowed" from that kid at the diner in the driveway. I hopped in and boosted it just like Logan had done.
I didn't need any trouble, so I drove back to the diner and left the car there. I walked to the nearest bus stop. It was 2o minutes before the next bus came. I didn't even know where it was going. I didn't care. I just wanted out of here.
The bus ride gave me plenty of time to think. I never wanted that child. I never asked for that child or that monster or even Logan and his friends to come into my life. And what would I do with a mutant child anyway? He was better off with other mutants. He or she. I started to wonder what it was, but then I remembered Creed, and I didn't want to know. I just didn't want any reminders of that beast and what he did to me. I just wanted it to all go away. I wanted life to go back to the way it had been. I wanted my father back. I wanted my innocence back. I wanted my life back.
They knew I didn't want that child. They knew I had tried to get rid of it the only way I knew how. They saved it. They wanted that child. They could have it.
I took a week off of work when I got back. Told my boss I went on vacation. That way no one would bother me. I didn't want to answer any questions. I didn't want any visitors. I didn't even want any get well cards. I just wanted to be alone for a while.
So when I heard the knock on the door 2 days later I figured it was somebody selling something and I ignored it. But it didn't stop, instead it got louder, and more insistent. When I went to look out the spy hole I saw Logan. He didn't look happy. But at least he didn't have the child with him.
"Go away. I don't want to know. And I don't want a guilt trip about it."
"Irene, just let me in. Or I'll let myself in." His tone sid that he had no intentions of fooling around. And I remembered those claws. I didn't want to have to buy a new lock. So I unlocked the door and went to sit on my couch. He came in and closed the door behind him.
"I'm not here to give you a guilt trip. I came to bring you to the funeral."
I raised my teary eyes up to meet his own. "What?"
"You heard me. Your baby, your son, died yesterday."
A son. So he told me anyway. Now that I knew, I wasn't so bothered by the not wanting to know. "How?"
"When we discovered you missing, I went out after you. While I was gone Creed broke in. He took the boy. I caught him tryin' to escape with the child, and he...hurt him pretty bad. Bought himself time to escape,and paid with the boy's life. The boy didn't survive the night. I'm sorry."
I sank to my knees. I didn't really care. So why was I crying?
Logan put his arm around my shoulder. "Shh. Just let it out."
I did. All the way back to the mansion.
Hank asked me if I wanted to see him. The baby. I didn't answer so he led me to the back of the medlab. There on a bed was a small white bundle. Hank looked at me expectantly. I nodded. He picked up the bundle and opened the sheet so I could see his face. He had blond hair, like his--I could hardly think it--like his father.
Logan put a hand on my shoulder. "He had your eyes."
But he bore his father's marks as well. His neck was broken. I could tell by the way that Hank held him. And there was a deep gash that ran from his collar bone below where the sheet covered him.
"Do you want to hold him?"
I cringed and shuddered, then shook my head no. I couldn't stand it. I couldn't stand myself. I turned and ran from the room.
The next morning a handful of us walked out to a chapel behind the mansion. Logan dug the tiny grave, and he and the doctor lowered down the tiny coffin.
"Would you like to say a few words?" Hank asked.
I shook my head.
It was only Logan, Hank, Jubilee and myself. And yet I felt so alone.
"What should we put on his tombstone?" Logan asked quietly.
I didn't really know. Then it hit me. He should be named after the one person who cared for him most. It took me a moment, but I cleared my throat and said, "Logan, name him Logan."