Chapter 1
Bruce gritted his teeth so hard he felt the blood rushing to his gums. He could so easily grip that jerk's neck, squeeze and make him beg in his mutant form.
"What's the matter Arken? I thought you liked bending over!"
He was on his hands and knees after being kicked in the stomach by a black-laced boot, belonging to one of the many classmates Bruce had to put up with. As the corridor erupted in hyena like laughter, an ivory hand shot out in front of Bruce, grabbing his shirt and lifting him to his feet. He looked at his sister as he nodded with his head to the door.
'Lets just go to math.'
'Are you kidding me?' Aurora's brows tensed as she shook her head. 'Why don't you just kick their arses? You know you –'
'What right here, in front of a crowd? Don't be an idiot.' Bruce pushed her into the class before she could argue psychically again, ignoring the jeering behind them. They took their seats in the corner of the class and bowed their head, trying to shrink into the shadows.
Bruce HATED these people; their closed minds, their constant whooping, and lets not mention the way they talked about mutants. It was probably the most talked about subject in econ/politics class. He shook his head, his soft black curls dancing along the outlines of his strong bronzed face. His eyes were a deep brown, slightly sore and squinted into a frown. Large pink lips were parted in fury.
In this town, SATAN would be more welcome than a mutant. They already spent their entire time terrorizing Bruce and his sister, if they knew they were mutants as well, they'd probably stake them or something.
He thought back to a few years ago when they had started school. The Arkens were both bright, and had been stealing books and cloths whenever they felt the need or urge to entertain themselves. It never occurred to them to find games or laptops instead; most consoles were unknown to them. They had had to teach themselves to read and write from an old cassette player and a bunch of kids books when they were at an age where they could already easily walk.
They couldn't understand a lot of the words and meanings in these books, spending many a night while squatting in an empty house outside the town reading the same line over and over again. What infuriated them most was that it was hard to read the mind of anyone in the town who even remembered or listened to anything at school. After much debating and frustration, Bruce had quietly taken them on a Monday morning to their current school, mentally altering any obstacles or questions from the minds of the head and vice principal. They were quietly handed a time table and library cards, and got on with their studies. Aurora especially felt much better, now that they didn't have to steal anymore books.
As dictated by Bruce's protective nature and Aurora's defensive one, the Arkens pretended to me twins when in actually fact Aurora was 16, Bruce 2 years older. They felt much more comfortable in one another's presence, carefully avoiding people until that day.
Aurora never uttered a word in school, unless spoken to. On their first day, when they had spoken the other kids noticed that they had the most high class British accents possible (courtesy of the British cassette tapes from the 80s). If that wasn't bad enough, the only clothes they ever wore were loose fitting, sweats and shirts. You can imagine the types of snide comments the girls made, especially to Aurora. Bruce grew red when he remembered Aurora telepathically telling him one day, that all the other girls were wearing something called a 'bra' and that she had to go that night to the store and steal one of them for some reason. He shuddered and his nose crinkled, glad his train of thought was interrupted when a teacher walked into the class.
"Kids as much as I would love to teach you, I'm afraid I have to cover Mrs Wallace's class. As mature students, I'm sure you know what to do; finish the exercise from last lesson on pg. 66, then if you finish that, make notes on chapter 3." And with that, their math teacher briskly left the classroom, shutting the door behind him.
Immediately, most of the students shot up out of their seats and left for the common room. Aurora and Bruce looked at each other, shrugged and pulled out their books to start the work, only for Aurora's to be ripped out of her slender fingers. She yelped as she got up and tripped on her loose sneakers, making a fleshy slap against the wooden floor.
A chorus of laughter followed as the same boy with the black-laced boot ran out of Aurora's away.
"Bradley give that back!"
"I don't think you want it enough, how about a cheeky look for payment?" he leered. The only people left (apart from the Arkens), were Bradley and his following of jocks (with their satanical girlfriends of course). "C'mon, Arken, show us what those clothes are hiding from the world!" he leered.
Bruce jumped up and pulled Aurora to a stop, grabbing their bags and running to the door. But Bradley was faster, slapping Aurora's arse as one of the jocks casually leaned against the door. As Aurora yelped again, another boy threw Bruce against the wall, kneeing him in the groin. Bradley wrapped his arms around Aurora's waist, pressing her against his front as he lifted her shirt.
"STOP, GET OFF ME BRADL-"
"What's wrong Arken? Am I going to be your first? Sorry bitch but I won't be gentle-" The air was knocked out of him as Aurora elbowed in the gut and ran toward Bruce but was pulled back by the collar. Bradley pinned her to the desk, this time grabbing her wrists and putting his weight against hers.
"I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU TOUCH HER ONE MORE TIME-"
"YOU'LL DO WHAT, YOU FUCKING POOFTER!"
"AHHHHHHHHHH-"
Shockingly, the scream came from both Aurora and the boy holding Bruce. Bruce's skin suddenly tightened and morphed into black armour and claws, inky black and tough. He snarled, as the plates of his skull seemed to expand as his pupils turned red and he bared his jaws, the room bathed in a red pulsing light from in between the armour.
Silence.
Then screaming and running for the door and windows, as Bruce's lower jaw extended and seemed to dislocate, an ear-shattering roar filled the school.
"OH FUCK, THEIR MUTANT FREAKS!"
"RUN!"
'GET OUT OF HERE AURORA!' Bruce bellowed in her mind as he chased after Bradley and the others. She took off out the window, rolling into the laurel bushes. 'Like hell!' Aurora threw back as she started glowing brighter and brighter until poof! All that was left was a misty violet cloud, with sparks of blue growing faint every second.
Wolverine's claws extended as he heard an echoing howl fill the air around them. The others, all clad in black suits with an 'X' on them, followed after Wolverine.
"This way!"
"Are you sure its them?"
"What do you mean am I sure? I've been tracking them for days, bub."
"Yeah yeah, ok!"
"Ahh, Notre propre limier!"
"Someone shut the Cajun up," Wolverine snarled "I'm already in a bad mood, an' I have a feeling that today ain' gonna get any easier…"
Aurora teleported in a cloudy bang, falling a few feet to the floor. She grumbled, "Wow, smooth landing much." She rolled her eyes and flinched as her skin tightened and short cream fur, like a horse, sprouted all over her body; her dark brown hair whitened and twitched in the air wildly, her eyes now an electric blue. Pulsing blue light seeped out of indentations and twisting patterns all over Aurora's body, spiralling around her lion-like tail. She stood up, a full foot taller than before.
Aurora looked up to see Bruce's tail throw Bradley back down the corridor, chasing him around a corner. Aurora chased after them, springing across the walls as her blue claws ripped apart the green metal doors of the lockers. She stumbled as her wave of hair flipped over her face, which ended up kissing the floor.
"Smooth Arken, a prime example of stealth." Aurora grumbled. She flipped her mane out of her face and scrambled up, only to be thrown to the ground by a blur of black just before the ceiling gave way. Aurora pushed Bruce off her roughly. "I know you love me, but now's not the time for a hug-" She froze.
Only a few feet away, the entire corridor had disappeared, the ground had been ripped up, and remains of the schools grey walls were scattered everywhere. But that wasn't the scary bit oh no. A towering red machine leaned towards them, extending its opening fist.
"Scanning…..Mutants located….Termination initiated." A disc in its open hand began to glow as Bruce and Aurora shouted at each other "RUUUUUUUNNN!"
They raced down the corridors, leaping off walls as they turned corner after corner. Bruce looked behind him, only to pound the floor even harder with his feet. He really wished he hadn't. The monstrous machine was still keeping up with them, its large hand ripping meters of building to oblivion at a time. Bruce guessed that the school population had already evacuated, you know, considering how deserted everything was. The mutant hunters are pretty well organised…
He pulled Aurora up the stairs, reaching the second floor just as the path in front them was absorbed in a beam of white light. "Oh shit!" They were trapped on their little elevated landing!
Aurora grabbed his claw tightly 'Hold on!'
'Don't you dare try and teleport, last time you did that while holding something you incinerated it!'
"Either be turned to dust by THAT or me!' She squeezed her and breathed in deeply, but then – BOOM!
She opened her eyes, looking around quizzically till Bruce pointed below them. Their pursuer had been taken down by a man in yellow and blue, who was ripping apart the face of the machine with long metallic claws. Around him, two others were attacking it, one throwing what looked glowing cards (?) while the other floated above the leg of the machine, bolts and panels of plating flying off it in all directions as she pointed at it.
The clawed yellow man ripped out wires from on eyes socket as a flying card flew in and exploded; but the machine was fighting back, shooting white beams of light blindly in all directions.
Bruce and Aurora, previously frozen in astonishment by this scene, freaked out as the machine shot down the supports of what was left of the second floor. They disappeared in a poof of violet smoke and blue sparks and reappeared directly below on the ground floor.
'WHY DID YOU TAKE US BELOW A CRUMBLING STAIR CASE"
"WAIT WHAT – AHHHHHHHHHHH"
Their hearts pounding, they tore away from the tumbling ceiling throwing themselves out of the way just in time. When the cloud of dust and cement cleared, Aurora opened her watering eyes to see the three pointed claws of a gloves hand. Her cerulean eyes widened and she snapped her curved canines until she saw the claws retract back into the hand, which turned over and opened to show the palm. Aurora looked up in amazement at the muscular demolisher of the machine. She paused as she saw Bruce next to her being helped up by a man with cropped hair and red eyes and a woman with fiery long hair.
"Kid, if you want to live, take my hand." Aurora looked up again at their rescuer; swallowing hard, she grabbed his hand as he heaved her off the floor and pulled her into a large black jet nearby.
Looking behind them, Bruce saw the remains of the fight; half the school had turned to dust, the sound of alarms could be heard across the property. The last he saw of Bradley was when he had ran between the legs of the machine and climbed over the school fence. He shrugged with a half smile. I never liked this place anyway.
Yey! Chapter 1 is up now, hope you like it! Please send a review so that I know how I can improve it!
NB: all the italics in speech marks between Bruce and Aurora are telepathic convos.
xo