AS DARK AS HER EYES

It was back in 2004 when Pietro first approached me. I was working along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. A lot of people were paying top dollar for dead Al Queada and Taliban leadership. That was a damn good gig.

Pietro found me in a small U.S. Army base camp. It wasn't much: a decaying stone fort about ten centuries old that was perched on a rocky hill, a roughly cleared helicopter landing pad on the flatland below, some artfully vicious minefields, and about fifty young and tough (and handsome!) U.S. Army Rangers. Any anti-mutant prejudices the boys might have entertained weren't much of an issue. You don't worry about that sort of thing when you're in the middle of nowhere and you have to depend on each other to stay alive.

I don't have a clue what kind of paperwork Pietro had to show the Rangers to make it okay for him to walk into a Forward Operating Base in the middle of a really freaking dangerous part of the world. But he apparently had something that did the trick.

"Pietro," I said in a neutral tone. I'd done some work for his father over the years. So I'd met the son before. And so far I hadn't been terribly impressed.

I'd just got back from a mission. Fortunately for Pietro, I was in a good mood. The ear of a Taliban organizer was tucked into one of my ammo pouches. The DNA from the ear would be proof enough to the CIA that I'd made a righteous kill that was worth about $100,000. The part of the Pakistani intelligence service that wasn't working with the Taliban would pay an additional $50,000. And MI6 would kick in another $20,000 - the Brits always were cheap bastards.

Not bad for a week of field work and the price of a .308 rifle cartridge.

Pietro nodded to me. He was wearing some generic-looking, brand new, camouflage fatigues. I assume that was part of a mostly failed effort to not stand out. He had been sitting on a pile of busted masonry right next to the tiny room that I'd declared to be my private quarters, but now he was climbing to his feet.

"Hello, Dom," he said with that slightly feral smile that will always make me wary of him. Yeah, he's a spoiled rich kid with superpowers and a Daddy complex. But he's just smart enough, and just mean enough, to be really dangerous.

"What's Daddy want?" I asked brusquely.

He looked me in the eye. That's a trait Pietro's either inherited or learned from his father.

"I'm putting together a team..." he began.

I laughed and held my hand up to stop him.

"No," I said as I walked past him and flipped open the tarp that was the closest thing I had to a door. Then I stepped into my room. It wasn't much: a cot and and a wooden crate that I was using for a footlocker. A small camp-stove was sitting on a stone platform - it was a ridiculously small, light, and expensive German model. I flicked it on and filled a kettle with water from a skin that was hanging from the ceiling.

"Coffee in couple of minutes," I said. Pietro was standing in the entrance to my room, holding the tarp up. He didn't quite dare enter my room without permission. Believe it or not, that was probably more a consequence of courtesy than fear. Pietro isn't given to being scared. And sometimes he can be startlingly old-fashioned. He gets that from his father, too.

"Come on in," I added. "I promise I won't bite."

As I measured out instant coffee into two tin cups, Pietro stepped inside and found a flatish piece of broken masonry to squat on.

"Don't you want to hear the details?" he asked.

"Nope," I replied.

"We're going to fight back," he continued anyway. "We're going to make the humans understand that mutants can't be trifled with."

I sat on my bunk and started unlacing my boots. "You'll probably only make it worse," I said idly.

He smiled coldly, "In the short run, you're probably correct. But I am more worried about the long term. Someone has to have both the necessary skills and a track record of fighting back, when the day comes that the authorities finally go too far."

My boots were off and Pietro was kind enough to pretend not to notice the smell. I hadn't changed clothes for a week. Hey, that sort of thing came with the job. I pulled off my socks and tossed them into the far corner. Much to my surprise they didn't come crawling back towards me.

"Sorry, Pietro. The answer's still no," I said.

By now, the water was boiling. Getting up off my bunk - the cold stone felt good against my bare feet - I poured hot water into the two cups and handed one to Pietro. Pietro took a sip and grimaced. Frankly, I had to agree. Instant coffee is an abomination, but we were a long way from the nearest Starbucks. And once again, Pietro was too polite to say anything.

"Anything else I can do for you?" I asked.

He was looking at me thoughtfully, "If you should happen to reconsider..."

I shook my head, "Not likely."

He took my refusal in stride. After finishing up his coffee, he said goodbye and left.

And I thought that was the last of it.

A week later, my CIA handler gave me a hot prospect. Some Taliban were planning on crossing the border into Afghanistan. The guy running this particular band was becoming a serious pain-in-the-ass. The price the CIA had on his head was a cool one million dollars. And then there were the usual lesser bounties from other interested parties.

"Why's this guy so important?" I asked.

The CIA guy shrugged. He was a quiet, middle-aged guy with a Midwestern accent who - I swear to God - said his name was Smith, "He's not just another tribal local. He's half-Pashtun and half-Saudi. It seems that daddy was an Arab Mujaheddin who was here fighting the Russians, while momma was a local girl from a very important family. So he's got lots of interesting connections in both worlds. And he's young, charismatic, and pretty big on killing the infidel. In the long run, this guy could become an important mover and shaker, so the decision's been made to end his career right now."

"Fine by me," I said distractedly as I flipped through the file Smith had given me. It had a lot of good quality pictures of the target. That's good. I hate shooting the wrong people. It's sloppy and nobody pays you for your work.

"We're planning a two-level job," Smith continued. "You'll be on the Pakistani side of the border, trying to tag this guy your way. If he manages to cross the border, the Army will handle him their way."

The "Army way" was effective, but really noisy. The CIA obviously preferred to do this a bit more quietly - probably because of the target's Saudi connections.

"I'll head out at first light," I told Smith.

The target's head exploded like a dropped watermelon. Eight hundred yards is a long shot with a medium-caliber rifle, but it's hell for the guys in the target zone to figure out where the shot came from. And that's how I prefer it.

As I snuck back under cover, shots seemed to be flying everywhere - except at me. Then I began pulling out. The Pashtun prefer to bury their dead quickly. The plan was to get the hell out of the area, then wait until the next night, sneak back in, and start looking for the grave of the man I'd killed. I didn't like to depend on CIA confirmation of my kills - every now and then they decided that there wasn't enough proof of a solid kill. And that meant I didn't get paid. No, I much preferred to hand Smith some very definite proof. Modern DNA technology is a wonderful thing. No fuss, no arguments, and a tidy sum suddenly appears in your Swiss bank account.

Everything was going just as planned. Smooth as silk, as a matter of fact. There was no reason to think things weren't under control.

I was a mile or two away from my shooting position when I ran into the slavers.

Honestly, I don't have a clue how we managed not to spot one another before we did. One second, I was scrambling down a steep drainage and onto an inter-ridge trail that was so faint that I could have sworn it was long-abandoned. And then a guard and I almost bumped into one another.

He screamed an alarm and tried to swing his AK-47 around at me. My Glock seemed to jump into my hand and I put two 10mm rounds into him - one into his chest and the other into his open mouth. The back of his head burst open and he fell dead and boneless to the ground as I scrambled for cover. Shots began whistling past me. This was beyond bad. Even if I could handle these guys, the firefight would be sure to draw the attention of the band whose leader I'd just killed.

Hiding behind a rock outcrop, I pulled a grenade out of my belt, armed it, and then let go of the handle. I had to end this and get away as quickly as possible.

Two seconds into cooking the grenade, I heard women - girls actually - screaming in terror in between raucous bursts of AK fire. That's when I realized what I'd run into. Slavery is still practiced in the Pashtun hills. And there are lots of small gangs who run slaves from Afghanistan into Pakistan.

I turned and whipped the grenade back upslope, which was a dangerous and stupid thing to do. But I couldn't use it for what I'd originally planned. There were too many innocent kids in the way. Fortunately, I'd cooked-off the grenade long enough that it exploded before it could bounce back down to me. And that's when everyone who was trying to kill me freaked out, stopped shooting, and went to ground. This part of the world has good reason to be wary of mysterious explosions. All too often, it meant you'd attracted the attention of someone with more bang-bang than you. The worse case situation was that the Americans had just noticed you. That was the equivalent of Armageddon.

There was a gap in the rocks that I was using for cover. I carefully wedged myself into it and sighted my H&K on a likely-looking spot. After a second or two, a head cautiously popped up, exposing as little of itself as possible in order to avoid being seen. And it was wearing a dirty yellow-white turban instead of a blue burqua. I had the impression that it was an older man. Given his age, he was probably the guy in charge of the party I'd just bumped into.

I killed him and immediately pulled back. Three AKs opened up at the position I'd just abandoned. Flipping the selector switch on my rifle to full auto, I ran a few yards off to the side and popped back out into the place from which I'd originally gone to ground. That was risky, but I was running out of options. I spotted one of the shooters, tagged him with a snap-fired burst, and then rolled away.

The shooting stopped. I waited for a minute that seemed like an hour, trying to see if anyone was still interested in giving me trouble. When nothing happened, I began backtracking. That meant I was now heading back to the group of Taliban whose leader I'd killed. That wasn't good, but like I said before: I didn't have many options.

And then a terrified girl ran right past me. She was in black niqab instead of a burqua - which was a bit odd for this part of the world. And she was heading right toward the guys that I'd pissed off about thirty minutes earlier by killing their leader.

Without thinking, I tripped the girl. She landed with a solid thump that raised dust. Then she twisted around and tried to get back on her feet. I jumped on top of her and jammed as much of my hand as possible into her mouth.

"Be still!" I hissed at her in Pashtun. "There are men all around us who will kill us if we are not quiet!"

Her eyes went wide. And she turned to dust. And I was suddenly surrounded by a storm that was her.

It was just after nightfall. We were holed up under a rock overhang and it was getting very cold. However, I didn't dare make a fire.

Off in the distance - about five miles away, I estimated - there were a rattle of faint gunshots and then a less-faint boom. That was probably an RPG. The slavers and the Taliban seeking revenge for their dead leader had run into each other and decided to deal with their frustrations in the time-honored fashion of this part of the world. That was a lucky break for us.

"My name is Sooraya," the Afghani girl said quietly. When she... well... "reformed" is the only word that came to mind, she didn't have any of her clothes. Right now she was wrapped up in my poncho-liner.

She was a pretty young girl - probably just barely a teenager. And she was brave, as well. She certainly seemed to be adapting to a hell of a lot in a very short time.

"I am Domino," I replied in Pashtun.

"Hello," she said awkwardly.

I shifted uncomfortably, "Do you know what you did back there?"

She looked away, "I do not like to talk about that."

I nodded, "Very well. But we got away because of what you did. If not for that, we would have been caught by one or the other of those two bands of men."

That was true. The dust-storm that Sooraya had called up - hell, the the dust-storm that she became - was the key factor in our escape.

Sooraya hesitated for a long time before she said anything else, "My mother says what I can do is a gift from Allah. Others... disagree."

I gave her a long and level look, "'Others' can go screw goats."

Sooraya blinked in surprise. And then she smiled while trying to hide that she was smiling. Obviously she was a well brought-up girl.

"Why do you look the way you do?" she asked suddenly.

I made a gesture at my face that included my light blue skin and the darker blue mark that surrounded my left eye.

"You mean this?" I asked.

She nodded.

"I was born this way. And I was also born fast and strong and lucky. We are alike, Sooraya. We were born different from other people."

She thought about that for some time before saying anything else, "Why are we different? Does Allah have a plan for us? Or are we accursed?"

"I do not know," I answered slowly. It was a big question from such a little girl.

Neither one of us had anything else to say. And the night drifted on, cold and sleepless, as we listened to the far-off sounds of men fighting and dying for no good reason.

I couldn't just leave Sooraya to fend for herself. So after some careful interrogation, I got a rough idea where her home village was. Then I scavenged some clothes for her - there were quite a few people lying around who didn't need them any more - and we headed off to the northwest. They grow them tough in this part of the world, and Sooraya had no problem keeping up with me. By mid-day, we'd crossed the border.

Her village wasn't that far on the Afghani side of the border. I dug a veil out of my pack as we approached and paused to put it on. It would help a little if I had to talk to the locals. The men-folk have enough of a psychological problem dealing with a lone, gun-slinging woman. Toss in some very non-traditional (some would say "inhuman") skin color and things can get dicey. Since I wanted to avoid any situations that involved shooting or other forms of violence, a bit of discretion seemed to be reasonable.

Sooraya's home wasn't hard to find. Her family had lived just outside of the village, on a small hill overlooking some good pastureland.

Her home was a smoking ruin when we got there. An elderly couple - neighbors of Sooraya's family - were burying the bodies.

As Sooraya knelt next to her mother's body - both of them terribly silent and still - I helplessly asked the old man, "What happened?"

The old man looked at Sooraya, "She can do things that are not right. She is a child of evil. And there are those who will not allow her kind to live."

Then he spat into the dust, "Allah will punish those who killed the innocent and left the guilty free to walk this world."

If Sooraya heard him, she didn't react. Personally, I just barely stopped myself from pulling a gun and adding to the body count. The old man got the message and hurriedly went back to digging graves.

Meanwhile, the old woman took me gently by the arm - thereby immobilizing my gun hand, by the way - and then nodded towards Sooraya and said, "I have known her since she was a baby. She is not evil."

"I know," I said helplessly.

"But she cannot stay here," the old woman continued.

The walk from Sooraya's village to the Ranger base camp took two days. Sooraya didn't say a word the entire time. And at night, she didn't cry.

"No," Smith said flatly. We were back in the base camp. Sooraya was eating dinner with the Rangers while I was busy having a yelling match with Smith.

My eyes narrowed as I examined him, "For Pete's sake, Smith! I'm not asking for much!"

He shook his head, "We can't be picking up strays, Domino! It gets in the way of our operations. This part of the world is filled with people who need a break. But we aren't in the business of giving breaks. We're in the business of breaking things. You know the score."

"Come on, Smith! Look, I can pay her way to Europe or the States - you know that's not a problem. All I need is some paperwork to make it legal. And I need someone to take care of her once she gets out of here. There are programs for Afghani orphans. Get her on the list for one of them and I'll owe you a favor!"

"No. And that's final," was Smith's only reply.

Back in Kabul, I put out a few discreet feelers. Pietro showed up a few days later.

I didn't tell Pietro that Sooraya was a mutant. Mostly because I wasn't in a big hurry to see her dragged off to Genosha. Whenever I look at Magneto, I see something that scares that hell out of me. For one thing, the way he runs Genosha like a monarch from the old days of the divine right of kings has always stuck in my craw. I wasn't sure if Sooraya would be given a chance to grow up and become her own person in Genosha - or if she would be indoctrinated into being one of Magneto's servants.

"I think something could be arranged," Pietro said cautiously. "My father has influence in some parts of the American government and the United Nations. She would be granted refugee status and placed into a program for displaced orphans."

"That's good," I said stonily as I waited for the "however".

"However," Pietro continued, "there is one question: why should I get involved?"

"Oh, for God's sake, Pietro!" I snarled. "We both know where this conversation is going. So quit fucking around and get on with it!"

Pietro stared at me. And then he sighed and shrugged his shoulders.

"I'll do what I can for your friend. And you have no obligation to me for that."

I blinked in surprise. Suddenly, nothing was making sense.

"What?" I asked in confusion.

Pietro was beginning to look slightly pissed, "I said I would try to help your friend. And you don't owe me anything at all. You don't have to join the group I'm putting together. You don't have to pay me. You don't have to sleep with me. As far as I'm concerned, you don't even owe me a favor."

Then he stormed out of my hotel room.

Sooraya was on a plane to the United States within a week.

Two months later, I caught up to Pietro in Marseilles. He has a favorite restaurant there. He was sipping over-priced wine with a beautiful blonde girl when I sat down at their table. He looked surprised to see me. She looked horrified.

"Get lost, blondie," I told the girl. Completely shocked, she looked from me to Pietro - and got no support at all from there. With a snort, she got to her feet, threw her napkin onto the table, and stomped out of the restaurant.

Pietro was drumming his fingers on the table as he looked at me.

"Hello, Dom," he said tightly. "Nice to see you, Dom. Yes, I am having a nice day, Dom. Won't you please sit down, Dom? This is my friend, Dom. Her name is Gisselle. There, that takes care of the civilized conversation part of this encounter. Now, just what the fuck do you want you arrogant bitch?"

"Thanks for helping Sooraya," I said quietly. "I appreciate that."

He glanced heavenward for a brief moment, but then he calmed down and said, "You're welcome."

I picked up Giselle's wine glass and peered into it. The wine was unusually dark. As dark as a night in the mountains of Afghanistan. As dark as the smoke from a burning hut. As dark as Sooraya's empty, staring eyes as I helped bury her parents and brothers and sisters.

"Tell me about this outfit you're putting together."

Pietro looked at me. And then he smiled.