Author: Tangles or TangleToy
Email: TangleToy@cs.com or TangleToy@hotmail.com
Disclaimer: Marvel owns the Morlocks, the tunnels, and the mutant universe in general. I own Zan, Jet, Skitter, Mandrake, and the Haven community. I'm not making any money off this story, and no harm or copyright infringement is meant. It's all fun until someone pokes and eye out.
Story Notes: This tale takes place when Storm had leadership of the Morlocks, before the Mutant Massacre. I am also using the original Morlock origins and ignoring the whole Dark Beast AOA plot. I like the original origin story better anyway.
Author Notes: A writer is nothing without her beta readers. Mine are: Lady Arkane, WinterOak, Evenstar, Manda, Carma, and Colin. Any mistakes after them belong only to me. No MSTing or Pop ups please. If you're interested in borrowing Haven, just ask so I can get first reader dibs. Ask before archiving so I can bookmark the page.
Feedback: I like hearing from my readers. Tell me what you like and what you don't. Flamers will be fed to the Fiend With No Name.
Summary: Zan begins the journey to the Morlock tunnels. True sequel to No Safe Haven.
Flotsam and Jetsam - part one
By TangleToy
"Men and women, great and small Cared for no one, not at all Sowed their will nots, reaped the same Sun, moon, stars, rain" - Anonymous
The map JuneBug had given Zan put Morlock territory one mile below the streets of New York City. That meant she would have to climb down and move through a great deal of tunnel before reaching the barest outskirts of her destination. However, there was also no guarantee that after one mile someone would be there to greet her. She just had to hope she bumped into someone, rather than be forced to search further into the tunnels.
Zan stood in the back alley of a nightclub. According to the directions scribbled on an envelope, the entrance to the first tunnel was close by the fire exit door. The club itself resided in a converted old church, and was a popular Goth hangout. With all the strange and dark costumed patrons milling about in the alley and front walk, Zan was less conspicuous in her appearance as a lost soul. Everyone around looked like they were outsiders in the human race.
Zan easily found the piece of levering pipe in its hiding place. Stuffed in a storm drain, she didn't know how she could return it to its original hiding place when she was done. But she also didn't care. Her only priority was getting into the tunnels.
'But how,' she wondered, 'to pop open the manhole cover without causing a scene?' Freezing the club goers wasn't an option. They wandered in and out of the alley, and Zan couldn't freeze them all fast enough before someone ran. Besides anyone wandering back after she was done would find human statues all around, proving a mutant had been there. Someone would get curious, and that would compromise the Morlock tunnel entrance. God forbid the FOH found it.
She could pull herself partway out of the time stream. To onlookers Zan would be invisible, when in truth she was merely appearing outside of their temporal perceptions. The trouble though with walking and moving about in stilled time was, she couldn't open anything. She could only walk through already opened paths. That meant the cover had to be opened before Zan did her trick.
Alexzandra stood there trying to puzzle out how the mutants before her managed the same feat, when the answer delivered itself in a flurry of flashing lights and sirens. The local police were raiding the club. Under aged kids, patrons on drugs or dealing, and anyone not wanting to be hassled began to pour out of the one-time church. It was pandemonium, and a perfect cover.
No one was paying attention to the sixteen year old as she pried open the manhole cover and climbed down drawing it back over with a struggle. However just to be sure she wasn't followed, Zan activated her mutant gift of time manipulation and began her decent. Everything around her looked stuck in place and unmoving, signaling her entrance into still time. It suited her fine, since she didn't really miss the scuttling sound of the rats.
Down in the 'Alley' a message was delivered. There were no phones, and mailmen were scarce, but the delivery was simple. A set of male twins, uncovered in the search by Callisto and Caliban, used their mental link as a crude phone, with the Haven community at one end and the Morlocks on the other. Besides that link there was no real communication between the two factions.
The message, sent by Emily and JuneBug, explained to those on the other end: "Put into your care one package of sixteen kittens, and a watchmaker's nightmare. Hell can have it, since Haven doesn't want it." The messages were always encoded like that, as both communities were afraid someone someday would overhear and find them.
The Morlock twin, Prometheus, turned with unseeing eyes to the others nearby, "Haven is casting out another. It's a girl. She's young too, sixteen. They used a code phrase I'm unfamiliar with, a watchmaker's nightmare."
"Damnit," someone nearby cursed. "They're sending us a friggin' time manipulator. I thought they all donned spandex and made like heroes?" There was grumbling among those in the small room.
A Morlock named Skitter stepped forward. Her name above had been Leigh, but down among these people she was merely Skitter. She was petite in stature, only just over five feet tall. Her brown hair hung in straight shaggy layers to her shoulders giving her a frayed look; and her eyes were completely black, like a rodent's. She had come to the Morlock tunnels after being cast out from the Haven herself.
"I know who she is," Skitter said softly. She had encountered the coming mutant in the Haven building more than once. Emily's pup was how she was referred to. "Her name is Zan, Alexzandra Kinder. She can't effect wide spread change. She's able still the time around a person freezing them in their action, or she can pull herself out of the time stream and reappear elsewhere. I've seen her do it."
Skitter failed to supply that Zan had spent time in her home as a friend and companion to her children; or that Zan's keeper, Emily, was the one to raise the suspicion that ultimately forced Skitter's expulsion from Haven building. Some things were better left unsaid.
"Upworld scum!" a bumpy purple Morlock complained from the shadows. "Sun dweller can't make it in the world and so they send her to us? What are we, a dumping ground for their worthless cast offs?"
"Hush, hush people," Callisto commanded in her rough voice. "They did us a favor, Haven did. Think-think what a time witch can do for us. I say let the pretty doll come down. If she wants to stay, she does what we say."
Callisto swept her one-eyed gaze across those assembled, and tried to push her convictions into them through sheer will. Technically, she was no longer their leader. The Weather Witch, one of Xavier's lap dogs, was chief of the Morlocks. However Ororo wasn't among those in the tunnels right then; and it was up to Callisto to decide what was best for her people.
Mandrake, a short wrinkled man stepped forward with a sour look on his face. His gift was to absorb poisons, and the blood in his veins ran toxic to everyone but him. He had come into his powers late in life, and the senior citizen had allowed Masque to change him to look like the little root man his name derived from.
"We can't keep taking their garbage," Mandrake snapped bitterly. "Haven wanted to stay up world, so make them stay there. We have enough people here to try and feed. Winter's coming, and the ones we got need full bellies. Send this girl away. She's not one of us."
Shouts of agreement were called out, and the group threatened to step over the verge of boisterous. Staffs struck the hard ground, feet stomped, and 'hear, hears' bounced along the chamber. No one wanted to share what little he or she had with a sun dweller. If making noise on a hill in winter could chase the cold and wake the sun, then they could chase the idea of being the bottom of the barrel by sending off this Haven girl with their loud protests.
Stepping into the center of the room came a tall, broad mutant paler than milk. No one heeded his movements, because they all knew him as a gentle giant. He was the man with the mind of an innocent. "Caliban likes new friends," he mumbled like a child trying to explain the universe to an adult. "Caliban wants to meet new heaven girl."
No one paid him mind except Callisto. She patted his arm while flinching from the noise around her, and Caliban smiled warming to his subject. Louder this time, so that the others would hear him he announced, "Caliban wants to meet new heaven girl."
The Morlocks fell silent as all eyes went to the Goliath among them. Caliban had joined with Callisto to guide them to the tunnels. He had found them all like a mother cat gathering her kittens to their new den, and each owed him some gratitude for the chance at a new beginning.
"Caliban likes new friends," the gentle mutant told them in case they missed it the first time. "Caliban likes new friends, and wants to meet the heaven girl."
"Haven," Mandrake corrected stiffly. "The girl is from Haven not Heaven. Trust me there's a difference, boy. "
Caliban looked into Mandrake's face with tenderness. 'You do not understand,' he thought. 'You can't know that every mutant that comes to us, whether by choice or chance, is heeding a call from heaven. But you should. God never meant us to be so alone in this world, and that's why we've joined together. We are all heavenly indeed.'
"Caliban wants to meet heaven girl," the mutant tried to explain again.
What he was saying seemed so simple to him. He couldn't understand why these people never understood him. He turned to his friend Callisto, whom always understood, and she was glaring at the other Morlocks from under knitted brows. She knew, and she would make them let the Haven child come.
"We can't turn her away," Callisto reasoned. "We formed this underground home because the world threw us away. What right do we have to do the same to this girl now? We'd be no better than Upworld scum."
Callisto's body shook with strained tension. Her followers had never forced her to explain her decisions or actions. She blamed Xavier's people for this. She blamed the Weather Witch. They came in and changed everything, then up and left without a backward glance. No one had heard from them in months, and winter was coming for her people. The X-men were probably safe and warm inside a pretty house, living among the flatscans who made life miserable for every mutant. The Morlocks, however, were struggling everyday to just live their dream in peace in the tunnels away from normal eyes. The unfairness was enough to make Callisto want to vomit burning fire.
"The pretty doll is welcome here," she announced plainly. Then she quietly repeated, "Welcome here."
Moving through the group to the branch tunnel leading to her own private sleep space, Callisto mumbled to each face she passed, "Welcome here." It was like an absolution and benediction in one phrase, and the Morlocks felt the bond that made them a community being strengthened. Each time Callisto repeated the phrase she knitted their souls together.
Zan had been crawling through the muck for what seemed like hours. She had abandoned still time to walk in the present moment after the first couple dimly lit tunnels. The young mutant didn't want to chance missing someone from the Morlock community. Emily had said there would be a sentry before the actual living sites, and June had warned that the guard was the first line of Morlock defense.
"Expect to come into contact with someone who can kick your ass first," June had cautioned her. "Don't give 'em a reason to hand you your head, because he will. Be smart for once."
So Alexzandra was prepared for someone when she reached a turn in the tunnel and came upon a barrier gate. According to her map this marked the one-mile point. It would be the logical place to put a lookout. She approached slowly with careful steps, keeping a wary eye for any movement. She reached out a hand to the gate, leaning her weight into trying to push it open, but it wouldn't budge. It was locked.
"Damn," Zan muttered darkly. She didn't see anyone with a key. Maybe there was no sentry because they thought the locked barrier gate was enough. "Now what?"
"Now what indeed?" a mocking reply came from behind her.
Other than the voice Zan hadn't heard a sound. She spun about surprised that someone snuck up behind her. But no one was there as far as she could see. She scanned the length of tunnel leading away, and then studied the walls as she turned back to the locked gate; but she still didn't see a soul. Sucking in her breath she held it to quiet, trying to hear any sound other than the ones she made. Only her heartbeat thudded in her ears.
"Who's there?" Zan demanded. "Come out where I can see you."
A throaty chuckle floated around her, bouncing off the walls to come from everywhere. A low wooing whistle followed the eerie humor, and something struck the pits of Zan's knees causing her to fall backwards into the muck. Her head bounced off the hard floor, and stars danced in her vision. The end of a Bo staff rested at the hollow of her throat.
"You're in no position," her attacker warned, "to be ordering anyone around. Now, who are you, and why are you here? And don't make me force the answers out of you."
Zan's eyes cleared and she found herself looking up at the dark face of the Morlock perimeter guard. His skin, matte black, was darker than the deepest hole. His straight hair hung past his shoulders, and was like dark blue ink. Gazing steadily from under navy brows were light azure eyes, a surprise contrast to the darkness of his skin. Pointed elfin ears completed the odd appearance.
"Well?" he asked poking her shoulder with his staff. "Don't lay there dumb."
"I'm Alexzandra Kinder, Zan mostly," she explained slowly. She couldn't look away from his eyes. They were so strange. She guessed his age at about eighteen. "I was sent by the Haven community."
The guard didn't move his staff, keeping it hovering where it could still do damage with a quick thrust. "Prove it," he ordered.
"Prove it?" Zan asked incredulously. "How? It's not like we tattoo property of Haven on our asses. Give me a fucking break. Prove you're a Morlock."
Her attacker placed his staff over her heart and leaned heavily, grinding it into her skin and ribs; and she screamed out, "All right! I'll prove it! I'll prove it."
The staff was lifted, and she grimaced clutching her hand over the spot. "We sent a woman named Leigh last winter. She's also called Skitter. She had two kids, but one of 'em died from cold in his lungs."
Apparently the strange young man knew whom she spoke of, because he backed up and reached down to give her a hand up. "Sorry about that, but I had to be sure."
"Really?" Zan asked with some venom. "I didn't think your group got many tourists down this way."
Quirking an eyebrow, the Morlock shrugged with indifference to the harsh tone, "Well, you're wandering down here." His smile was disarming. "My name's Jet or Jetsam. C'mon and I'll take you to the main chambers."
"Aren't you afraid," Zan baited, "that someone might slip by while you're taking me in further?"
Jet gave her a sideways glance frowning, "Do you want to wander through the tunnels and hope you find the rest of us?" He waited until she shook her head no. "Then shut up, and be grateful for my help."
~Fin Part One~
