Here's the next round!

"Hey Psycho!" a voice called. Kris turned her head to look impassively at the man yelling.

The guard threw a set of dog tags at Kris who caught them easily.

"Enjoy," he told her mockingly, stalking out of the room.

Kris looked at them blankly for a moment before turning them over. 'Lady Deathstrike' was carved onto the front plainly, along with an ID number. Kris slid one of her gloves off nervously, sure from the laugh the guard had given that she wasn't going to like what she was about to find. She touched the metal cautiously.

--

Another healer…Wolverine… No! Don't want to! Have to! Can't stop! I'm sorry poor thing, I don't have a choice! I'm sorry my love…

Brown eyes, spiked hair, looks half feral, black jump suit, gold lining, 'X' in a circle on the collar.

Ow…that hurt. Damn he's good. He always was. Still, have to stop. Have to show him that I'm not wanting to do this! Can't stop! Why can't I stop! Damn Stryker!

Would die if not for the healing factor, adamantium skeleton, three claws, knuckles not fingernails. Good fighter.

Have to stop! Have to! My kids! Got to go back to them! Kris won't manage on her own! She can't even touch objects with her bare hands!

Picked it up.

No! Don't want to die! Got to go back!

Pain…liquid metal, cooling rapidly.

NO!

--

Kris threw the dog tags away as if they burned her, breathing rapid, feeling as though she'd just had adamantium pumped into her stomach. She curled over, eyes closed, holding back the tears. She couldn't let the others see her cry.

"Krissie?" one of the others asked. Kris looked over at the younger boy.

"Yeah Sammy?" she asked him.

"When's Yuriko coming home?"

"Sammy…all of you, come here."

They others gathered around her. There were four of them including herself. Sammy, a small boy with telekinetic powers – or something very similar to them. Akira, a girl quite a few years younger than Kris, and a lot more timid with the ability to make people live their worst nightmare or fear. Cal, the older of the two boys with his ability to control water. Finally there was Kris herself with her psychometric abilities and slight telepathy – very slight, she couldn't read minds, but she could sense when people were nearby.

"Guys, it's like this. Yuriko isn't coming home."

"What?" Cal asked, his voice cracking slightly.

"She…" Kris could feel tears welling up and had to bite her lip for a moment before she could continue. "She was killed."

"Mom's dead?" Akira's voice was raspy with misuse. Yuriko was Akira's mother – the two had been close, you almost had to be in their situation.

"I'm sorry Aki. But yeah, she's dead."

Akira nodded her masked face and drifted away to sit down. Sammy followed her and the teen pulled the seven-year old into her lap, hugging him to her. Cal sat down next to Kris. He was closest to her age, but not really able to deal with the guards like she and Yuriko could.

"What we going to do without 'Riko?" he asked Kris worriedly.

"I don't know Cal," Kris leant against her adopted brother's shoulder, not crying just feeling bone weary and in surprising need of physical contact. "I really don't know. The real question I'm worried about is what can we do without her? A hell of a lot less than we could with her around."

"Cheer up Krissie, we'll figure something out. We always do."

"You know something Cal, that's what's got me worried. Whenever we have to figure something out, it always seems to go wrong…"

He pulled her closer. "This time it won't. They got our 'Riko killed. We'll make them pay." He scooped up the dog tags and ran his fingers over the metal. "These go to Aki don't they?"

"I'd say she deserves them," Kris tugged at her own tags slightly. "It was her mom after all."

Cal nodded and stood up, careful not to let Kris tumble to the floor. He crossed over to Akira, kneeling down beside her and touching her shoulder slightly. Her head turned towards him and he put the dog tags in her hand. She nodded to him.

"Thank you," she murmured, almost inaudibly.

"They're yours Aki," he told her, smiling sadly at her. "Remember that."

Kris found an echo of that sad smile on her lips. How was she going to protect these guys without Yuriko? She couldn't do it alone. Without Yuriko the others would soon have to face more of the guards than they already did. They were still just kids, they didn't need that. Unless Kris could figure out some way to pull all their attention onto her. She wasn't like Yuriko. She wasn't as brave as her, she wasn't as good a fighter, in fact, she was just a girl who happened to be a mutant to boot. Not something she was exactly happy about.

She often wondered what her parents would have said if they'd ever had a chance to find out. Akira's was one, she understood. Sammy's had been slightly freaked, but understanding in the month before Sammy had been kidnapped. Cal never talked about how his parents had reacted – although an accident had revealed it to Kris (she'd been off balance and caught his arm to support herself, accidentally touching his dog tags in the loose bracelet around his wrist) they never talked about it and she wouldn't consider it if he didn't want to. As it was, when she'd been thirteen and her mutant powers had manifested themselves, she hadn't had the guts to tell them – although she did start wearing gloves more than was needed. When she'd finally got up the guts, as she'd been heading home, the organisation that had imprisoned them had abducted her.

Kris leant back against the wall and watched as Cal did his best to comfort Sammy and Akira. They were a family of sorts. Yuriko had been 'mom' to them all, Kris had played big sis to the other three. She didn't want anything happening to them, not after she'd lost her real family and now Yuriko. She couldn't lose them too. She chewed on her lip nervously. What would she do without them? They were the only thing keeping her sane. Cal came back and sat beside her.

"How do we cope with something like this here?" he asked her, voice almost broken. "How do we keep Akira from breaking down completely?"

"Same way we always do Cal," Kris shrugged. "We look after her and make sure she knows we're here for her. And we keep the guards away from her."

"That's a given Kris."

"Then we shoulder on, and keep ourselves alive for a few more weeks."

"What if we just want to give up?" Cal whispered.

Kris didn't answer. She didn't know how to. She propped her chin on her fists and her elbows on her knees and tried to bore a hole in the opposite wall.